Retroblox

[Flojomojo]

I'm new here but pretty sure I can speak for everyone when I say please take irrelevant worthless printer posts to a different thread.

 

@kismet

 

You have to be kidding me with that overwrought explanation of why you personally are poor and why you personally don't want one (neither do I btw). 200-300$ is not a lot of money, college or otherwise. FPGA's do not exist for anything past 8-bit atm, and for the forseeable future, so your second point is mute. Everyone in 2017 is "the pirate", so that point is stupid also. "The Pirate" SCAAAARRRSGAAARRRDDD!!! would love to have a nice retron-style system with an SD slot. Maybe .1% of users actually care about streaming to youtube so another pointless point. And if you're arguing electricity cost is a factor for using FPGA, you really need to get a job and probably shouldn't be involved in retro gaming anyway.

 

Wow, what charm school did you go to?

 

We don't generally talk to each other like that around here. Since you're "new here," maybe you'd like to please explain how this adds anything to the conversation.

 

"irrelevant"

"overwrought"

"point is mute" <sic>

"stupid point"

"pointless point"

"you really need to get a job and probably shouldn't be involved in retro gaming anyway"

 

Or, piss off, what do I care. As another clever person said in a thread like this, "your non sequitur is dismissed."

[Keatah]

I'm new here but pretty sure I can speak for everyone when I say please take irrelevant worthless printer posts to a different thread.

 

If you understand anything about how threads work you'll also know they occasionally have a side-comment about something totally unrelated.

 

It is also not up to you to determine what is or isn't a worthless point. $200 is a lot to some people. Others wipe their ass with it. So frakking what.

 

Kismet's comment on energy-savings of FPGA vs power-hungy cpu for emulation is very valid. No need to give the 'lectric company an extra $8 per month if you don't have to. Give it to me instead! I'm a poorboy so I can certainly use it.

 

I also have no intention taking my side-comment about printers to another thread unless directed to do by a moderator. It is a small diversion point as is within bounds and rules. If you want to play moderator, open your own forum.

[Keatah]

@flojomojo: Have it be known I totally dislike modern printers. They're so cheaply built it's.. it's.. I don't know WHAT IT IS!

 

Back in the day, I was enamored in that I could print out my BBS program and take it with me to school to edit it and make changes to it. Then come home and type it in.

 

And then there was the Microbuffer (we affectionately called it a micro-boofer), it was totally magical that I could LIST a Basic program of 1000 lines instantly, restart the computer, and play a game (Bandits from Sirius Software for example). While playing the game the buffer would feed the printer.

 

I remember I made up some bullshit story to my parents about how this buffer box would increase my programming efficiency and cut down on noise! Whatever I said worked! In retrospect I think they were curious about it too and that was half the battle.

 

So you see, printers were an ok thing. They're not so bad..

Edited February 24, 2017 by Keatah

[Flojomojo]

I think everyone on this thread would enjoy this funny video. Except for that grumpy dude, who shouldn't look.

 

[Keatah]

That's better than any retroblox promo! I know I'm gonna spend all night contemplating "what does it mean?"

[Kismet]

If this is a serious question, it doesn't need emulators.

 

There are upper scale FPGA recreations of some computers that have a full suite of original ports. Like the Suska for the ST: http://experiment-s.de/en/

 

The MiST can't connect to printers but can do Ethernet on the Atari and Amiga cores:

 

It can also be setup to use serial NULL-modem communication (by disconnecting the MIDI extension). Somebody hooked it up a Raspberry Pi:

http://www.minimig.net/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=655

 

These are just some examples, but basically FPGA can be wired to old and new peripherals if they provide the connections on the PCB.

 

 

I think we're not far off from being able to do this. Like emulating proprietary printer interfaces may simply need emulating more of the "south bridge" type of chips to use a PC analogy. The problem is more likely that there is little demand to do this since the old printers (especially dot matrix printers) and their paper hasn't been around for 20 years unless you've been working in a government office that still uses them However there is the occasional demand to connect to old industrial hardware like CNC machines, broadcast hardware like genlock/video toaster, just to do "retro" types of things.

 

It still amazes me that "Halt and Catch Fire" was able to find so much working 80's kit to film that series. The probably had to get some people actually familiar with the hardware to produce vintage looking screens and not just secretly connect the monitors to non-vintage hardware.

 

 

I'm new here but pretty sure I can speak for everyone when I say please take irrelevant worthless printer posts to a different thread.

 

@kismet

 

You have to be kidding me with that overwrought explanation of why you personally are poor and why you personally don't want one (neither do I btw). 200-300$ is not a lot of money, college or otherwise. FPGA's do not exist for anything past 8-bit atm, and for the forseeable future, so your second point is mute. Everyone in 2017 is "the pirate", so that point is stupid also. "The Pirate" SCAAAARRRSGAAARRRDDD!!! would love to have a nice retron-style system with an SD slot. Maybe .1% of users actually care about streaming to youtube so another pointless point. And if you're arguing electricity cost is a factor for using FPGA, you really need to get a job and probably shouldn't be involved in retro gaming anyway.

 

Did I strike a nerve? Are you a dirty pirate?

 

The point is that emulation goes beyond piracy, but piracy is part of collecting and preservation. You don't seriously think the MAME developers have hundreds of arcade cabinets stored in a warehouse somewhere just collecting dust do you? CRT monitors don't last more than 30 years before they hit their brightness halflife. Waiting too long, like "Marble Man" is likely to result in the game never entering the public domain, and any working hardware long since becoming unusable by 2087.

 

Software absolutely has to be preserved because copyright-law doesn't take into account things like format shifting, or hardware operational life.

 

Everyone who is just downloading whatever they want and showing off that they didn't pay for it, are disqualifying themselves from work in Law Enforcement. As someone once said on a police forum "If your ambitions are to work in law enforcement, stop breaking the law now, because we don't hire people who can't show restraint."

 

Which goes back to the topic of what is the point of many of these libretro devices. They are piracy devices, the amount of people who legitimately have the software is not going to be very high, and the amount of people who actually can dump their own software even fewer. I wish a few more companies would follow SEGA's lead and just build their own emulator-packaged software, leaving the ROM unprotected so if you really don't like their emulator you can use your preferred one. Many DOS games in fact are distributed this way now on gog.com and steam. It's not a huge leap to do the same with any other vintage software. The only companies I see never coming on board are Nintendo.

Edited February 24, 2017 by Kismet

[Keatah]

Eh, Nintendo are nothing more than a fart inna bottle.

[Keatah]

I'm new here but pretty sure I can speak for everyone when I say please take irrelevant worthless printer posts to a different thread.

 

@kismet

 

You have to be kidding me with that overwrought explanation of why you personally are poor and why you personally don't want one (neither do I btw). 200-300$ is not a lot of money, college or otherwise. FPGA's do not exist for anything past 8-bit atm, and for the forseeable future, so your second point is mute. Everyone in 2017 is "the pirate", so that point is stupid also. "The Pirate" SCAAAARRRSGAAARRRDDD!!! would love to have a nice retron-style system with an SD slot. Maybe .1% of users actually care about streaming to youtube so another pointless point. And if you're arguing electricity cost is a factor for using FPGA, you really need to get a job and probably shouldn't be involved in retro gaming anyway.

 

Nonsense. MiST (and other projects) seem to handle 16-bit just fine. Till you read up on what's out there you probably shouldn't be involved in FPGA discussions.

[S1500]

Kinda sad the latest "computer show" episode was just a paid ad by HP. Mind you, they only did 2 episodes back in '15.

[Keatah]

Gotta admit it was funny. The type of technology portrayed is long overdue for the home-office. I don't know or think if it will sway people to begin liking inkjet tech again or not. All I can tell you is modern HP printers are built like shit and have a service life that's even shittier. All the while breaking your bank.

 

Printers raced to bottom faster than PC's I think.

Edited February 24, 2017 by Keatah

[Flojomojo]

Kinda sad the latest "computer show" episode was just a paid ad by HP. Mind you, they only did 2 episodes back in '15.

 

I guess so. Does it make you feel better if you consider the prior episodes are just paid ads for Sandwich Video? Because they are. A whole lot of things on YouTube are there for commercial purposes.

[Flojomojo]

Printers raced to bottom faster than PC's I think.

Without a doubt. Give me a cheap PC any day. Keep the cheap printer (and expensive, proprietary, clog-prone ink cartridges).

[Keatah]

Do you think we should stop this discussion of "print" ?

[Tusecsy]

 

Nonsense. MiST (and other projects) seem to handle 16-bit just fine. Till you read up on what's out there you probably shouldn't be involved in FPGA discussions.

Really? I didn't know there was a SNES FPGA with HDMI 720p/1080p...I'll have to look into it..../sarcasm

Edited February 24, 2017 by Tusecsy

[Flojomojo]

Do you think we should stop this discussion of "print" ?

 

 

[Keatah]

Really? I didn't know there was a SNES FPGA with HDMI 720p/1080p...I'll have to look into it..../sarcasm

 

Not ALL 16-bit. Some 16-bit, like Amiga and Atari ST.

Edited February 24, 2017 by Keatah

[Keatah]

 

 

 

 

 

I touched on buffers, old-school dot-matrix jobbers, modern-day inkjets, crap hp quality. Not sure where to go from here. I could regurgitate some stories about how I did printing jobs for the other kids in school back in the day.

 

A vintage printers thread sounds like it would be cool though, because I fear that any more discussion of print is gonna get us thrown outta here or something. A couple 2-3-4 diversion posts is ok. But I KNOW I could carry it on to many many pages. Then I'd have to print them out for when the mods delete them. Posterity and preservation, you know.

Edited February 24, 2017 by Keatah

[Flojomojo]

video of you imitating tractor-feed impact printer or GTFO

[Keatah]

I'm outta here man! That's too much!

 

<blows out of the room amid a flurry of fanfold paper flying in a vortex wake>

Edited February 24, 2017 by Keatah

[Newsdee]

Really? I didn't know there was a SNES FPGA with HDMI 720p/1080p...I'll have to look into it..../sarcasm

There is a SNES FPGA but for now the author isn't sharing it (either commercially or open source):

https://youtu.be/h7TWjnaF_U4

 

Genesis is being developed for the MiST now, there is a working beta available with sound. PC Engine works (arguably not fully a 16 bit console though).

 

On the computer side you have the Atari ST, Amiga with AGA chipset, Acorn Archimedes, Mac Plus with 4MB RAM expansion, and the russian 16bit computer BK0011M.

 

Now these are all open source projects, meaning they can survive if the author stops working in it (in fact many were ports of older projects). But it also means it's being done by volunteers so progress depends only on motivation. It will keep progressing though and code sharing for big parts (e.g. accurate implementations of the Z80 or 68K chips) is already happenning.

[Newsdee]

 

I think we're not far off from being able to do this. Like emulating proprietary printer interfaces may simply need emulating more of the "south bridge" type of chips to use a PC analogy. The problem is more likely that there is little demand to do this since the old printers (especially dot matrix printers) and their paper hasn't been around for 20 years unless you've been working in a government office that still uses them However there is the occasional demand to connect to old industrial hardware like CNC machines, broadcast hardware like genlock/video toaster, just to do "retro" types of things.

 

Yes, it's probably more practical to get FPGAs to translate printer commands into a BMP file written to the SD card (same as some emulators do).

 

Beyond that, in theory assuming you have enough pins you could make an FPGA that plugs to serial cards and other legacy hardware extensions.

It's unlikely free / OSS approaches will care much about that, but having today cheap FPGAs around with free development tools will allow people to tinker more.

 

(hw geek note: it's not necessarily a matter of pins, it's possible to multiplex a signal and do that "south bridge" approach to plug into real connectors; but again system specific so lots of work for small payoff)

Edited February 25, 2017 by Newsdee

[Andromeda Stardust]

Eh, Atari are nothing more than a fart inna bottle.

Fixed that for you. Nintendo was an emprie last i checked!

 

They releasing a new console next week? When the last time Atari did something? Hint: AtGames don't count!

[Keatah]

Alright.

 

Atari is a squeaker.

Nintendo is a shaker.

Both are methane in a closed container.

[Tusecsy]

Alright.

 

Atari is a squeaker.

Nintendo is a shaker.

Both are methane in a closed container.

Nintendo about to change the game forever. Sleep at your own peril.

[keepdreamin]

There is a SNES FPGA but for now the author isn't sharing it (either commercially or open source):

 

Then as far as I'm concerned, that's all Coleco Chameleon until further notice.