globeron Posted June 3, 2023 Share Posted June 3, 2023 17 hours ago, Tornadoboy said: The 99/8 seems to come up a lot, has any thought of trying to repro the motherboard? Or are there too many custom parts? With MAME (and optional qmc2 front end) you can emulate the /8 1 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5264184 Share on other sites More sharing options...
digdugnate Posted June 3, 2023 Share Posted June 3, 2023 My personal TI-99/4a grail is more of a whine from me than anything and not *particularly* rare, but for me it'd be a working MBX with headset and joystick in relatively good shape. First it was 'I had the money but not the space', but now that I have the space it's no money, lol. Ah... what can you do. 1 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5264200 Share on other sites More sharing options...
+arcadeshopper Posted June 3, 2023 Share Posted June 3, 2023 4 hours ago, digdugnate said: My personal TI-99/4a grail is more of a whine from me than anything and not *particularly* rare, but for me it'd be a working MBX with headset and joystick in relatively good shape. First it was 'I had the money but not the space', but now that I have the space it's no money, lol. Ah... what can you do. I may have an extra lemme look 1 1 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5264269 Share on other sites More sharing options...
digdugnate Posted June 3, 2023 Share Posted June 3, 2023 36 minutes ago, arcadeshopper said: I may have an extra lemme look awesome, thank you! 1 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5264282 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tempest Posted June 3, 2023 Share Posted June 3, 2023 5 hours ago, digdugnate said: My personal TI-99/4a grail is more of a whine from me than anything and not *particularly* rare, but for me it'd be a working MBX with headset and joystick in relatively good shape. It's funny, but I wanted an MBX for a long time and had a few opportunities to get one at a decent price but after actually getting to play around with one I decided that I didn't like the speech from it as much as I did from the TI Speech Adapter. To me it just doesn't sound as good for some reason. So other than to play Baseball or the kids games, I don't see a reason to have one now. 1 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5264289 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tornadoboy Posted June 3, 2023 Share Posted June 3, 2023 (edited) 7 hours ago, globeron said: With MAME (and optional qmc2 front end) you can emulate the /8 Yeah but emulation just doesn't feel the same , real hardware just seems more authentic. Maybe someone can cook up an FPGA for it someday? I really don't have a dog in that fight though as I'm holding out for something like a Geneve 2020, but I just like seeing rare stuff get repro'd, especially canceled prototypes that deserved to make it to market. Edited June 3, 2023 by Tornadoboy 2 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5264312 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Casey Posted June 3, 2023 Share Posted June 3, 2023 2 hours ago, Tornadoboy said: Yeah but emulation just doesn't feel the same , real hardware just seems more authentic. Maybe someone can cook up an FPGA for it someday? I really don't have a dog in that fight though as I'm holding out for something like a Geneve 2020, but I just like seeing rare stuff get repro'd, especially canceled prototypes that deserved to make it to market. One wonders how hard it would be to cook up a "the 99/8", perhaps with 99/4A mode also, though I suspect the demand for such a project would be less than "The C64". I'd still like one though 5 1 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5264369 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andrewmacattack Posted June 3, 2023 Share Posted June 3, 2023 I'm looking for the French logo cartridge,this is one of those rare items I've been searching for many years to add to my collection. Anyone have one I would pay dollar for it . 2 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5264387 Share on other sites More sharing options...
fabrice montupet Posted June 3, 2023 Share Posted June 3, 2023 2 hours ago, Andrewmacattack said: I'm looking for the French logo cartridge,this is one of those rare items I've been searching for many years to add to my collection. Anyone have one I would pay dollar for it . I think that I still have one that I can trade, I'm not interested by money. Do you have some rare TI99 stuff that you can trade too? 5 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5264431 Share on other sites More sharing options...
RXB Posted June 3, 2023 Share Posted June 3, 2023 I think the Holy Grail is a rewrite of XB and XB ROMs a project I am currently on. Or the ROM zero of TI99/4A Operating System adding in a paged system at ROM 0 Like say first 4K is fixed always the same but the upper 4K is paged with 256 pages of 4K so many options can be added. 6 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5264436 Share on other sites More sharing options...
8_is_enuff Posted June 5, 2023 Share Posted June 5, 2023 My personal Holy Grail is a complete set of the original Infocom titles for the good 'ol TI-99/4A. I only came to this realization recently. There's something so cool about the text experience, and the Infocom guys really knew how to augment it with 'feelies'. Plus, the TI got to hang with the big boys (Apple II, C64, Atari 8 bit, MS-DOS, etc.) on those early titles--too cool. I'd also like to pick up a copy of Dragon's Lair. It's such a technical achievement. Unfortunately I had way too many bills at the time it came out. Ah well, now I get to hunt for one. 3 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5264936 Share on other sites More sharing options...
InfernalKeith Posted June 5, 2023 Share Posted June 5, 2023 32 minutes ago, 8_is_enuff said: My personal Holy Grail is a complete set of the original Infocom titles for the good 'ol TI-99/4A. I only came to this realization recently. There's something so cool about the text experience, and the Infocom guys really knew how to augment it with 'feelies'. Plus, the TI got to hang with the big boys (Apple II, C64, Atari 8 bit, MS-DOS, etc.) on those early titles--too cool. I'd also like to pick up a copy of Dragon's Lair. It's such a technical achievement. Unfortunately I had way too many bills at the time it came out. Ah well, now I get to hunt for one. I had most of the Infocoms and sold them off years ago during a rough patch. I've re-bought a few and I'm hoping to find the rest here and there. Seeing that 40-column screen pop up makes me happy. (I tried playing Moonmist on a C64 a while back and the disk access was slower than ours by a good bit.) 3 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5264950 Share on other sites More sharing options...
XLERB Posted June 5, 2023 Share Posted June 5, 2023 11 hours ago, 8_is_enuff said: My personal Holy Grail is a complete set of the original Infocom titles for the good 'ol TI-99/4A. I only came to this realization recently. There's something so cool about the text experience, and the Infocom guys really knew how to augment it with 'feelies'. Plus, the TI got to hang with the big boys (Apple II, C64, Atari 8 bit, MS-DOS, etc.) on those early titles--too cool. I'd also like to pick up a copy of Dragon's Lair. It's such a technical achievement. Unfortunately I had way too many bills at the time it came out. Ah well, now I get to hunt for one. I have ”Sorcerer” in the original box. 2 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5265110 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tempest Posted June 5, 2023 Share Posted June 5, 2023 Did they make all the original games that ran on the v3 engine for the TI or just the most popular games? It seems that v3 was the end of the line for most systems other than the C64/Apple II/PC/Amiga/ST/Mac. Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5265138 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Geoff Oltmans Posted June 6, 2023 Share Posted June 6, 2023 On 5/30/2023 at 5:15 PM, arcadeshopper said: Pcode PEB cards aren't rare, working ones are I have 10 broke ones here.. I'd like to have a p-code card in any condition. Preferably working of course. Keeping my eyes open for that. I was thinking a clone of that would be nice. 1 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5265655 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Geoff Oltmans Posted June 6, 2023 Share Posted June 6, 2023 On 6/3/2023 at 12:21 PM, Tornadoboy said: Yeah but emulation just doesn't feel the same , real hardware just seems more authentic. Maybe someone can cook up an FPGA for it someday? I really don't have a dog in that fight though as I'm holding out for something like a Geneve 2020, but I just like seeing rare stuff get repro'd, especially canceled prototypes that deserved to make it to market. Emulation is good (and I am clearly vested in that with ADAMEm) but I agree that I prefer the visceral experience to the more ethereal one that emulation typically provides. But of course at some point some obsolete part will become unobtanium and then you have no choice but emulation or substitution. I am genuinely impressed with those that have substituted new designs for unobtanium. In many ways prototyping new hobby hardware has become easier than ever before in the past. Nostalgia is a harsh mistress. haha 5 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5265660 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tornadoboy Posted June 6, 2023 Share Posted June 6, 2023 (edited) 41 minutes ago, Geoff Oltmans said: Nostalgia is a harsh mistress. haha Ain't that the truth! 😀 Emulation is certainly better that nothing and has its place but I'm a big fan of FPGA technology and love the MISTer project, thus far I think it's as close to truly preserving vintage hardware as has been possible so far. I think eventually the day will come where you can get pretty much any chip reproduced easily as long as it's function is well documented, which is why it's critical as much information about them as possible be documented now. Between that, 3D printing technology and such it should be possible to reproduce things like the 99/8 near perfectly from scratch, as well as consoles, whole arcade games, etc. Edited June 6, 2023 by Tornadoboy 2 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5265675 Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Ksarul Posted June 6, 2023 Share Posted June 6, 2023 On 6/3/2023 at 4:29 PM, Andrewmacattack said: I'm looking for the French logo cartridge,this is one of those rare items I've been searching for many years to add to my collection. Anyone have one I would pay dollar for it . There are also Spanish, Dutch, Italian, and German Logo cartridges--Dutch and Italian are Logo II, whereas all of the others exist as both Logo and Logo II. I've got most in my set--but I have never seen a physical copy of the German Logo II (just the GRAM files for it). 2 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5265759 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Geoff Oltmans Posted June 6, 2023 Share Posted June 6, 2023 4 hours ago, Tornadoboy said: Ain't that the truth! 😀 Emulation is certainly better that nothing and has its place but I'm a big fan of FPGA technology and love the MISTer project, thus far I think it's as close to truly preserving vintage hardware as has been possible so far. I think eventually the day will come where you can get pretty much any chip reproduced easily as long as it's function is well documented, which is why it's critical as much information about them as possible be documented now. Between that, 3D printing technology and such it should be possible to reproduce things like the 99/8 near perfectly from scratch, as well as consoles, whole arcade games, etc. I know they are popular, but I'm less enthusiastic about FPGA implementations. They are pretty pricey and they are still an approximation/behavioral model compared with the actual hardware. Any implementation software vs FPGA should be possible with a reasonable level of accuracy with either approach of these old machines with modern general purpose computers. I prefer the cheap option. 3 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5265810 Share on other sites More sharing options...
jrhodes Posted June 6, 2023 Share Posted June 6, 2023 11 minutes ago, Geoff Oltmans said: I know they are popular, but I'm less enthusiastic about FPGA implementations. They are pretty pricey and they are still an approximation/behavioral model compared with the actual hardware. Any implementation software vs FPGA should be possible with a reasonable level of accuracy with either approach of these old machines with modern general purpose computers. I prefer the cheap option. I'll just say that if Retro Games LTD or some such other company made "THE99 mini" (reference to the THEC64 by Retro Games LTD) that included all first party TI titles and the ability to add new software via USB, i'd jump on it. 5 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5265813 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Geoff Oltmans Posted June 6, 2023 Share Posted June 6, 2023 42 minutes ago, jrhodes said: I'll just say that if Retro Games LTD or some such other company made "THE99 mini" (reference to the THEC64 by Retro Games LTD) that included all first party TI titles and the ability to add new software via USB, i'd jump on it. plug and play is nice... 1 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5265832 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mtlatc Posted June 9, 2023 Author Share Posted June 9, 2023 Just wanted to take a second and thank everyone who responded to this question. At the present time I have two silver and black systems and about 10 carts. I've also got an Atari joystick that I've constructed the adapter for. I'm a long way from having the stuff you guys either have or want, but it was fun to read. Thanks again. 7 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5266988 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Atari_Bill Posted June 27, 2023 Share Posted June 27, 2023 On 6/3/2023 at 1:26 AM, pixelpedant said: Here is a better view of the Milton Bradley Expander (MBX proto) demoed at CES, as it appeared in Electronic Fun (April 1983): Is the software for the MBX especially hard to find? I’ve had a nice boxed MBX for some time now that I was lucky enough to acquire, but still haven’t found any software. Granted I haven’t completely focused on it, it it seems hard to come by. Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5275911 Share on other sites More sharing options...
pixelpedant Posted June 27, 2023 Share Posted June 27, 2023 23 minutes ago, Atari_Bill said: Is the software for the MBX especially hard to find? Not really, for the most part, so far. There have usually been copies of various carts kicking around on Ebay. Partly, I would say, just because some carts can *only* be played with an MBX, so their market is inherently vanishingly small, even if their number is also pretty small. They're all relatively uncommon in TI cart terms, but none of the released titles (for which stock was in most cases dumped to employees and a couple vendors very hastily, after the product's cancellation) are all that hard to get. I have assembled a repository of MBX information in this thread here, should you need more: 3 1 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5275932 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nightengale Posted June 27, 2023 Share Posted June 27, 2023 In many ways all of my own TI-99 dreams and beyond are available. I can't think of any grails worth more than the awesome things we have access to 5 Quote Link to comment https://forums.atariage.com/topic/351761-what-is-the-holy-grail-of-the-ti99-4a-world/page/4/#findComment-5276059 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Like us on Facebook
Follow us on Twitter
AtariAge on Instagram
Watch us on YouTube
Chat on Discord
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.