Autopsy:

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Cartridges list:

• Philips Videopac #1 – Race/Spin-Out/Cryptogram.
• Philips Videopac #18 – Laser War.
• Philips Videopac #22 – Space Monster.
• Philips Videopac #38 – Munchkin.
• Philips Videopac #43 – Pickaxe Peter.

from Wikipedia:

The Magnavox Odyssey², known in Europe as the Philips Videopac G7000, in Brazil as the Philips Odyssey, in the United States as the Magnavox Odyssey² and the Philips Odyssey², and also by many other names, is a video game console released in 1978.

In the early 1970s, Magnavox was an innovator in the home video game industry. They succeeded in bringing the first home video game system to market, the Odyssey, which was quickly followed by a number of later models, each with a few technological improvements. In 1978, Magnavox, now a subsidiary of North American Philips, released the Odyssey², their new second-generation video game console.

In Europe and Brazil, the Odyssey² did very well on the market. In Europe, the console was most widely known as the Philips Videopac G7000, or just the Videopac, although branded variants were released in some areas of Europe under the names Radiola Jet 25, Schneider 7000, and Siera G7000. Philips, as Magnavox’s European parent company, used their own name rather than Magnavox’s for European marketing A rare model, the Philips Videopac G7200, was only released in Europe; it had a built-in black-and-white monitor.

Videopac game cartridges are mostly compatible with American Odyssey² units, although some games have color differences and a few are completely incompatible. A number of additional games were released in Europe that never came out in the US.

source: wikipedia videopac composite mod videopac flashcart

Autopsy:

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from Wikipedia homepage:

The ZX Spectrum +2A was produced to homogenise Amstrad’s range in 1987. Although the case reads “ZX Spectrum +2″, the +2A/B is easily distinguishable from the original +2 as the case was restored to the standard Spectrum black.

The +2A was derived from Amstrad’s +3 4.1 ROM model, using a new motherboard which vastly reduced the chip count, integrating many of them into a new ASIC. The +2A replaced the +3′s disk drive and associated hardware with a tape drive, as in the original +2. Originally, Amstrad planned to introduce an additional disk interface, but this never appeared. If an external disk drive was added, the “+2A” on the system OS menu would change to a +3.

As with the ZX Spectrum +3, some older 48K, and a few older 128K, games were incompatible with the machine. The ZX Spectrum +2B signified a manufacturing move from Hong Kong to Taiwan later in 1987.

source: wikipedia

• PIN 1 = Common (GND)
• PIN 4 = Free
• PIN 2 = 14.6v (AC)
• PIN 5 = Free
• PIN 3 = 14.6v (AC)

Click here for my Commodore Modem 8010.

Cartridges list:

• VIC-1111 – 16k Ram Expander. (Manual)
• VIC-1211A – Super Expander with 3k Ram Expansion. (Manual)
• VIC-1213 – Machine Language Monitor. (Manual)

click here for the vic-20 cartridges category.

from Wikipedia:

As for commercial software offerings, an estimated 300 titles were available on cartridge, and another 500+ titles were available on tape. By comparison, the Atari 2600—the most popular of the video game consoles at the time—had a library of about 900 titles near the end of its production life (many were variations of another title).

Most cartridge games were ready to play as soon as VIC-20 was turned on, as opposed to games on tape which required a time-consuming loading process. Titles on cartridge included Gorf, Cosmic Cruncher, Sargon II Chess, and many others.

source: wikipedia

In game screenshots:

source: papposoft web noname.c64.org

From homepage: This version fixes the compatibility bug with Snow Leopard OS.

Changelog:

• Fixed playback issues on Snow Leopard.
• Spotlight plugin is now 64-bit compatible.
• Added Remix.Kwed.Org integration (lookup remixes of a .sid tune)
• Fixed status display for tunes with more than 99 songs.
• Executable PRG files can now be dropped on SIDPLAY.

source: sidmusic.org

Cartridges list:

• VIC-1905 – Jelly Monsters.
• VIC-1907 – Jupiter Lander.
• VIC-1910 – Radar Ratrace.
• VIC-1912 – Mole Attack.
• VIC-1920 – Pinball.
• VIC-1922 – Cosmic Cruncher.

click here for the vic-20 cartridges category.

from Wikipedia:

As for commercial software offerings, an estimated 300 titles were available on cartridge, and another 500+ titles were available on tape. By comparison, the Atari 2600—the most popular of the video game consoles at the time—had a library of about 900 titles near the end of its production life (many were variations of another title).

Most cartridge games were ready to play as soon as VIC-20 was turned on, as opposed to games on tape which required a time-consuming loading process. Titles on cartridge included Gorf, Cosmic Cruncher, Sargon II Chess, and many others.

source: wikipedia

VirtualC64 emulates a Commodore 64 personal computer on your Macintosh. I wrote the software with two major goals in mind. First, I wanted to create an emulator that can be used as a demonstrator program in a first year or second year course on computer engineering.

To achieve this goal, I have integrated various debugging capabilities that let you peek inside the CPU, RAM, ROM, or one of the custom chips. Second, I tried to make the emulator as user friendly as it can get.

In short: VirtualC64 tries to combine the ongoing fascination of the ancient Commodore computers with the great user experience of today’s Macs.

Changelog:

Fixed in beta 8

• Joystick handler has been rewritten from scratch. It’s now message based and supports hot plugging.
• Fixed a race condition that could cause the emulator to crash during shutdown.
• Fixed some minor GUI issues.

source and download: dirkwhoffmann.de

from Homepage:

Aries was backordered on the required 24 and 28 pin headers needed to finish testing, and the order just came in this past week.  Thus, I finally had a chance to solder and test the units.  Testing went well, and I can program the units with my Willem programmer.

Originally designed to hold a 29EE512 64kB EEPROM, I found a good price on Atmel AT49F001 128kB 5V Flash, so I made the necessary adjustments and tested with the new memory.  Testing went well, so I am releasing the design to production.

I have noticed one issue that I need to address.  Some CBM units have an RFI shield that doubles as a heat shield.  To perform the latter function, metal “fingers are stamped out of the shield that press on the top of the ICs.  I need to ensure the metal shield/heat sink does not contact any of the pins on this unit.

source: jbrain.com

TapPlay / TAP file playback for sd2iec hardware.

Changelog:

2009-08-21 – release 0.1.0

• first usable version.

source: sd2iec.de gitweb forum thread twitter.com

After this update, the collection should contain 36,939 SID files!

Thanks to all the people who have helped to make HVSC the collection that it is today, without your help it would be a much tougher task.

This update features (all approximates):

• 953 new SIDs.
• 93 fixed/better rips.
• 6 PlaySID/Sidplay1 specific SIDs eliminated.
• 14 repeats/bad rips eliminated.
• 320 SID credit fixes.
• 159 SID model/clock infos.
• 8 tunes from /DEMOS/UNKNOWN/ identified.
• 6 tunes from /GAMES/ identified.
• 38 tunes moved out of /DEMOS/ to their composers’ directories.
• 14 tunes moved out of /GAMES/ to their composers’ directories.

source: hvsc.c64.org

ACID 64 Player Pro is the sequal of Acid 64 Player and is a cycle based Commodore 64 music player designed for playing SID tunes on sound cards/devices that have a real SID chip (6581/6582/8580) on board like the HardSID cards and HardSID 4U USB device.

ACID 64 emulates the MOS 6510 micro processor, the 6526 CIA chip and partially the 6569 VIC chip to run the code of a SID tune and it controls the SID chip on the device for playing the Commodore 64 music.

What’s new in version v3.0.2:

Fixes

• No error anymore when last directory was a root folder.
• Corrected memory bank setting for PSID tunes.
• Resizing window was corrupting active row of search grids.
• Minimal width is now set correctly.

Improvements

• Last played file is remembered now when ACID 64 is started.
• When Folders tab is clicked, the current selected file will always be visible.
• Special characters Ø and ø can now be searched by o or oe (re-indexing required)
• Pressing escape in search boxes will now select the text instead of clearing the input.
• Selecting a search filter will change the color of the filter box.
• Copy filename strips HVSCRoot automatically.
• Seeking (dragging thumb) can now be cancelled by pressing escape key or by pressing right mouse button.
• Scrolling search results will now update rows immediately without releasing the thumb.
• Clicking on a folder name in Folders tab will expand the folder.
• Changed “Browse” tab name to “Folders”

screenshot:

source: acid64.com

Sound fix diagram here. (pdf)

from Cristian Secară Homepage:

The first release (the +3) has a fatal hardware mistake: the 128K sound output is completely distorted.

• Tech explanation: the analog output of the AY-3-8912 sound chip was intended to be amplified by a one stage common-emitter transistor. In practice, they have forgot to put a resistor to the transistor’s emitter. The result: the transistor works in switch-mode – the sound is converted from analog multi-level amplitude to digitized two-level amplitude, same as the old 48K sound system.

source: secarica.ro ay8912 Demos

Autopsy:

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The original Plus2 (in the grey case) was released in 1987 to get away from the old Spectrums now that Amstrad had taken over. It was very different from previous Spectrums and had a proper typewriter keyboard, built-in casette recorder and 2 joystick ports.

For some unknown reason Amstrad later released a +2A in a black case which is actually a Plus3 with a casette recorder instead of a disk drive.

from Wikipedia:

The ZX Spectrum +2 was Amstrad’s first Spectrum, coming shortly after their purchase of the Spectrum range and “Sinclair” brand in 1986. The machine featured an all-new grey case featuring a spring-loaded keyboard, dual joystick ports, and a built-in cassette recorder dubbed the “Datacorder” (like the Amstrad CPC 464), but was in most respects identical to the ZX Spectrum 128. The main menu screen lacked the Spectrum 128′s “Tape Test” option, and the ROM was altered to account for a new 1986 Amstrad copyright message.

These changes resulted in minor incompatibility problems with software that accessed ROM routines at certain addresses. Production costs had been reduced and the retail price dropped to £139–£149.

The new keyboard did not include the BASIC keyword markings that were found on earlier Spectrums, except for the keywords LOAD, CODE and RUN which were useful for loading software. This was not a major issue however, as the +2 boasted a menu system, almost identical to the ZX Spectrum 128, where one could switch between 48k BASIC programming with the keywords, and 128k BASIC programming in which all words (keywords and otherwise) must be typed out in full (although the keywords are still stored internally as one character each).

Despite these changes, the layout remained identical to that of the 128.

source: wikipedia

Autopsy:

On the last Photo you see two Divide Interfaces. On the left, the PCB Green color, is the Original from DivIde Homepage , On the right, the PCB Red color, is a “clone” from Ebay.

Both working good, but the Divide “clone” has stopped to work after two weeks, chip ram 62256 is broken. Some components of Divide “clone” are differents from the Original Divide interface. like: some values of resistors.

Here it’s the correct picture of solder side on DivIDE 57c. (thanks to Valesoft)

from Divide homepage:

divIDE is an ATA (IDE) interface which takes your ZX Spectrum computing to a whole new level. As the time takes its toll on ageing media such as audio tapes or diskettes, many ZX Spectrum enthusiasts simply stick to emulation for better reliability and comfort.

With divIDE you can put your software collection to a hard disk, CD-ROM or even CompactFlash card and experience your favourite games, demos and utilities the way the were meant to be run – and even better. Using existing firmwares, many users find their Speccy box again a live platform – time for you to make the switch?

Features:

source: divide homepage divide forum papayalabs.co.uk