Wishing you a joyous holiday season and a happy new year.

Sorry, this entry is only available in Italian.

The HxC Floppy Drive Emulator is a software and hardware system created by jfdn aka Jeff.

The aim of this project is to replace the floppy disk drive by an electronic device emulating the floppy disk drive (list of supported Computer/Hardware).

There are two differents emulators:

• A USB version which allows to connect the floppy disk drive interface of the computer to a PC via a USB cable.
• A SDCARD version which allows to emulate floppy disks which images are stored in a SDCARD.

Release notes for the HxCFloppyEmulator software v1.5.1.0:

• New files Support : Jeff Vavasour Color Computer Disk Image format (*.JVC) added.
• Floppy disk dump tool/ HFE conversion : Bitrate value are now corrected.
• Floppy disk dump tool : a small GUI change.
• D88 file format support improved.
• HDM file support : gap len increased to 116.
• FAT12 Floppy Generator enhanced : More FAT12 floppy format available, FAT geometry adjusted/corrected.
• FAT12 Floppy Generator : Sources files on the PC side are now correctly closed in case of fail.
• E-Mu SP1200 support : E-Mu SP1200 RAW file image support added (*.sp1200fd)
• ISO/IBM track generator : Skew/interleave generator bug corrected.

source: hxc2001.free.fr

Autopsy:

Many thanks to Nilo for the Apple IIc Mouse.

Apple Inc. is responsible for the mouse interface standard used by today’s computers.

Apple did not invent the mouse, but just like Apple’s popularization of the graphical operating system, the company made the mouse a fundamental part of the personal computer. The Apple mouse has been evolving since the early days of Lisa and Apple II.

Onslaught / Wrath Designs / Vandalism, bring you the 54th issue of the Vandalism News.

source: noname.c64.org

This program for M$ Windows converts the EasyFlash files in .crt format (and others as well) to two binary files that can be used by eprom programmer.

source: noname.c64.org

Finally i had time to finish the enhancements of my Commodore 64, below a brief description of what you see in the photos.

Enhancements description:

• 1541-III bulk version.
• Reset Switch.
• Multi Kernel with Atmel flash rom.
• Multi Kernel Switch.
• Eprom homebrew PLA.
• Cartridge ON/OFF Switch.
• DualSID with separate output (6581 / 8580)
• 2 x Fan Cooling.
• Fan Cooling Switch.
• Bright Blu Power LED.
• 1541 Ultimate REV1 with v2.0 Firmware.

ZoomFloppy is an USB device for connecting Commodore disk drives to your PC.

The ZoomFloppy is an improvement based on XU1541 from Till Harbaum. Nate Lawson and Jim Brain teamed up to produce a professional product.

This controller will support IEC drives, IEEE-488 drives and a user-port connection for parallel speeder drives.

source: jbrain.com commodore-gg.hobby.nl

KryoFlux is a USB-based floppy controller designed specifically for reliability, precision, and getting low-level reads suitable for software preservation.

Technical Specs:

• Compatible with USB 2.0 (high-speed).
• Powered by USB interface (approx. 500mA). Drive requires it’s own power.
• Shugart (with extensions) drive interface. 34-pin dual-row header connector.
• Developed with 3.5″ Samsung SFD-321 and 5.25″ Newtronics D509 drives and compatibles. Other types of drives and media (such as 3″) currently under investigation.
• Connection of two drives supported using a dual floppy cable, one can be accessed at a time.

source: kryoflux.com

Attitude is a disk magazine for the Commodore 64 computer. This edition is written in collaboration with the joint forces of TRIAD and Oxyron.

We hope you enjoy this issue as much as you did the previous ones!

source: attitude.c64.org

Dtv2ser is a small hardware device that bridges TLR’s dtvtrans protocol used to communicate with a DTV via a RS232 interface to your Mac or PC.

By using a serial-to-USB adapter the dtv2ser provides dtvtrans access for all modern PCs where the original dtvtrans parallel cable cannot be used.

The new firmware integrate the support for Arduino 2009 board.

Changelog version v0.5 – 11.12.2010:

dtv2sertrans:

• Fixed double open problem in pySerial on Windows.
• Added missing ‘g’ command available in TLR’s dtvtrans for usage compatibility.

dtv2ser firmware:

• Added support for Arduino 2009 board (ATmega168, 16 MHz, 250kB/s transfer)

source: lallafa.de

The team from dienstagstreff.de has demonstrated a Commodore C64 on the “Hobby und Elektronik 2010” in Stuttgart.

Demonstrating a C64 is not so special but this time the C64 was under water! They submersed a C64 circuit-board in water, connected it to a power supply and a monitor and the C64 work without problems for 1 hour.

source: youtube.com commodore-gg.hobby.nl

Autopsy:

Today i picked up two Commodore 64, both are in poor condition and Broken.

The first one with the chip SID 6581 can play a garbled sound and the closing hooks broken, the other one with the chip PLA 906114, 7406, CIA 6526 dead. I made some cleaning and repaired the problems.

Autopsy:

12►

MSX was the name of a standardized home computer architecture in the 1980s conceived by Kazuhiko Nishi, then Vice-president at Microsoft Japan and Director at ASCII Corporation. It is said that Microsoft led the project as an attempt to create unified standards among hardware makers.

from Wikipedia:

On 27 June 1983, the date considered the birthday of the MSX standard, the MSX was formally announced during a press-conference, and a slew of big Japanese firms declared their plans to introduce machines. The Japanese companies avoided the intensely competitive US home computer market, which was in the throes of a Commodore-led price war.

Only Spectravideo and Yamaha briefly marketed MSX machines in the US. Spectravideo’s MSX enjoyed very little success, and Yamaha’s CX5M model, built to interface with various types of MIDI equipment, was billed more as a digital music tool than a standard personal computer.

source: wikipedia

A new version of the firmware for the interface 1541 Ultimate I / II is released.

This version also runs on the Ultimate-I! (Of course, only the features that MK1-hardware supports will show.. no RTC, no USB, no C2N (tape), etc…)

This is a MAJOR update from RCA! Please note that former versions had issues with writing back data to .D64 images.

Your copies that you made with former 2.0RCx versions might be corrupt!!

Major improvement in latest release:

• Added: Small step made to supporting block sizes other than 512 bytes (for CDROM, which I want to support soon!)
• Added: Update changed to flash all roms too…
• Added: Boot FPGA definitions added for booting with Winbond Flash.
• Added: USB hub support (high speed devices only!)
• Added: C64 reset included in 1541 reset (optional)
• Added: Option to save current disk as D64 or G64.
• Added: Option to create formatted G64.
• Added: Progress bars in user interface.
• Added: Stop option added to tape playback.
• Added: Initial attempt to implement creating of G64 files.

Read more…