[ql-users] For sale at Eindhoven show, 24 march 2007
I need room... The following packages might be available, if you manifest yourself here or by email, at the coming soon Eindhoven QL show of 24.03.2007: - package A: QL(JS)+SuperHermes+SGC+Miracle 40MB harddisk+modem+twin ED drives+mouse+many hundreds of floppies, including some ED floppy (most are SD, ql format... you sort them!). - package B: Q40 in black box (32MB memory)+HD floppy+2 hard disk+sound system+keyboard(french)+mouse, fitted rom 3.12 SMSQ/E, original SMSQ/E and QDOS classic - package C: Collection of QLWorld (nearly complete, some duplicate, missing some QLissue), and QLToday(the six or seven first years) (as well as the stopped american QL fanzine, and probably some - package D: Canon BJC600 printer (parallel port, colour ink jet, works with esc/p code, Quill compatible), with programmer's book (all the codes). Head might need an alcohol cleanup - package E: Epson LX-800 printer (parralel port, dot-matrix printer, same esc/p, BW), with a set of still sealed rubans, and all paper feeder options (continous roll, cut-sheet stocker (A4) as well as basic hand feed if you do not want). Expected Price (in euros, and cash only, no card, no check): A: 120 € A+B: 150 € C (only if A or A+B): 50€ D: 20 € E: 30 € A+B+C+D+E: 200€ I won't travel for only C/D/E, and B is available only if A is sold too! Optional extras (only if package sold): for package A, you might also have a philips monitor, add 20€. for package B, a set of 8 empty eproms for Q40 (would fit 4 Q40), with an eprom programmers (on parallel port, need MS windows) and eprom eraser, for 100€ (that's not even the tenth of what it cost me, but if package B is sold, I won't need it anymore). If you save me the travel by collecting at Paris early, you can save some money too. ___ QL-Users Mailing List http://www.q-v-d.demon.co.uk/smsqe.htm
Re: [ql-users] Spare GC or SGC?
Seeing all this discussion about possible new hardware etc. and the risks etc. is why I've come to the conclusion that there's never going to be any new hardware. It's just not economically viable: (a) The cost in time and money to design and build would be high. (b) The size of the market is too small so the price would be prohibitively high. It would be really nice if magically a new, hyper-fast, QL compatible replacement motherboard for the QL which fitted into the case would appear, but it's not going to. Those who want to continue to play can't find the old upgrade cards anymore (though I have seen on eBay UK at the moment someone selling two QLs with one Gold Card) so there's a problem. Porting something like SMS/Q or whatever to a new platform is still expensive in time but no-where near as much as new hardware, so surely, the best way forward would be to find some easily obtainable alternative hardware which can be easily adapted to our cause. (Sorry, for me emulation doesn't cut it, it's too clunky. I want to be able to plug a machine in, switch on and hit F2.) This is why I suggested 2nd hand Amiga 1200s (I know that one of our french friends said that french keyboard layout Amigas are hard to come by) as by default they're faster than the QL with useful on-board hardware and can be easily upgraded using reasonably available 3rd party 68030/040/060 and memory upgrade boards which can often be found on eBay. The only other possible alternatives would be Ataris, which aren't expanable and you pay through the nose for a Falcon040 (if you can find one), or old Apples, which don't have a great deal of hardware documentation. The alternative to replacing the Amiga Kickstart ROM in the machine would be to have the OS on disk as software and get Kickstart to load that instead. Probably easier than burning ROMs I would imagine. At least the Amiga platform is well documented and close enough to the QL to make it feasible. (You could probably even write a Copper list to make the Amiga video hardware read the QL screen format directly.) There are very few options available. All of them would require a huge amount of work. Steve -- --- Nostalgia isn't as good as it used to be. ___ QL-Users Mailing List http://www.q-v-d.demon.co.uk/smsqe.htm
Re: [ql-users] ZM/hT full manual ( was: The power of the Internet.)
Hello Jan, Thanks for your comments, I can understand your point of view and maybe you're right, The QL was doomed from the beginning as it was too expensive for the 'kids' and in my opinion should of been designed as a high end games machine/ business machine instead of just the latter. I really think if the QL came out with 64 colour capability and maybe dedicated graphics hardware then the QL scene now would be truly alive and well, just like the Speccy scene. The fact that My QL can emulate a Spectrum without breaking into a sweat ( admittedly with a SGC ) can only get my imagination working overtime. I cannot see why it cannot emulate a Sega Megadrive for example, And what about other Open Source code that lives in the wild. Am i the only one who gets excited at the possibilty? Yes, the QL could become a reasonable platform for hobbyists and whilst it would never cross swords with the Spectrum and the homebrew machine of choice, the Sony PSP, it could carve it's own niche. Re cost, Yes, I'm with you there, cost is prohibitive but sadly, thats the rut the QL scene appears to be in but there is plenty of free software out there and plenty of excellent software too which I'm discovering. Also, my experience is that the QL'ers out there are a great bunch and have a wealth of knowledge. Perhaps all this talk of new SDGC hardware should cease and a true QL project should be thought up, there is enough expertise out there. Sadly, my C / 68000 Assembler is weak but I'm willing to learn. reaches for Programming the M68000.. 2nd ed by Tim King Brian Knight' I could go on but I suspect Im waffling already. neil [EMAIL PROTECTED] 14 February 2007 21:11 From: Neil Riley A comment Davide made to me has suddenly hit home. Basically he was pleased that someone was still having fun with his product after some 10 years or more but wait a minute, the spectrum scene is still strong so why on earth isn't ZM/ht etc still commercially available and being advertised on Auction sites like Ebay. With full respect to Davide - he did truly good job with his emulator, I do love it - I wouldn't probably buy it today. This time has gone. I like his approach to provide it for free, which promotes himself better than low selling product. I am from spectrum scene and I cannot believe what some people are writing here. Have you ever think why on earth is the spectrum still so strong? There are knowledged people willing to share for NO PROFIT. This makes the spectrum scene stable, strong and up to date with HW and SW. IDE HDD interface called divIDE (similar to Qubide) is great example of such activity : http://baze.au.com/divide/ Anyone can build it from schematics, buy a DIY kit for 20EURO(!) or buy a complete interface for 30EURO. For 30 EUROs (+/- price of the components) your ZX Spectrum has much higher value and more features. Reward for these authors is only success and feedback from users. Similar trends to have open projects can be seen in Atari scene, Commodore (look at Commodore One), MSX, CPC (look at try out SymbOS) etc. In contrary what I see here on QL scene is still push to commerciality. This doesn't attract newcomers, because unexpanded QL which you buy on ebay with four Psion microdrives is nothing more than poor computer with cool design and potential. Expanding QL is hard and expensive or not possible due to lack of expension cards. At the top of it there are no open source projects to change this status. Software on QL is special category... So, where is the QL heading? I don't want to be missinterpretted - it is nothing against you Neil, but certainly I see here big difference in ZX Scene and QL Scene. btw, as a side question. I have plenty of _Z80 images that ZM/hT expects but i have even more .SNA's. Is anyone aware of a .SNA to _Z80 convertors. Just for fun i renamed .sna to Z80_rom and whilst ZM/ht saw the Z80 and even showed initial splash screens, it crashes. Z80 is compressed, SNA is not. Decompressing not compressed data must certainly crash. Jan ___ QL-Users Mailing List http://www.q-v-d.demon.co.uk/smsqe.htm *** The contents of this email are confidential to the intended recipient. It may not be disclosed to or used by anyone other than the addressee, nor may it be copied in any way. If received in error, please contact the company on 01793-715380, then delete it from your system. Please note neither the company nor the sender accepts any responsibility for viruses and it is your responsibility to scan attachments (if any) for viruses. No contract may be concluded on behalf of the company by means of email communications. BC Services (UK) Limited (trading as Boxclever), Technology House, Ampthill Road, Bedford, MK42 9QQ. Registered No. 5290544 England www.boxclever.co.uk
Re: [ql-users] ZM/hT full manual ( was: The power of the Internet.)
omega wrote: Have you ever think why on earth is the spectrum still so strong? Is it? I have actually no idea. There are knowledged people willing to share for NO PROFIT. Oh well, then we only have to find some of those and we're all good. That should be easy ;-) This makes the spectrum scene stable, strong and up to date with HW and SW. Up to date? With all due respect, but regarding your example, the QL has had hard drive support for at least 15 years. I'm also sure it's possible to get the schematics and layout of the QuibIDE board for free if anybody wants to build one for themselves and the firmware is free anyway. So hardware of that complexity is a pretty old hat. Building hardware that actually advances the QL on the other hand is probably a dozen times more difficult. IIRC even the old SGC card is some very complex 4 layer board that you can't just cook up in your kitchen. And regarding the software side, how big is the spectrum firmware? 8kb of assembler code? Current SMSQ/E releases are 312kb of pure assembler code. That's well over 200,000 lines of code. So excuse me if I think that the two systems cannot be compared in any way. Development for the QL is, in my eyes, much more complex and in a completely different league. Don't get me wrong, I see your point to a certain degree. The hurdles for newcomers are much too high and expensive. You are completely right in that respect. But on one hand the QL scene was always driven and held together by the various commercial traders. On the other hand now is a time that not many new products happen, but that is in part because developing something truly new for the QL can be prohibitly expensive, in both time any money. Marcel ___ QL-Users Mailing List http://www.q-v-d.demon.co.uk/smsqe.htm
[ql-users] Hardware and software - new horizons
Hi, To stimulate the debate further. I still believe that new hardware stimulates new software, which all goes together to create activity and interest. The QL with the original QDOS and the newer SMSQ/E has an OS that is still interesting and capable of development. The form factor of the original QL black box has the dimensions of a modern keyboard, a convenient size; and many users and those with a retro interest coming to the QL for the first time regard the industrial design as cool in appearance. There have been many developments to the original specification of 128K RAM and 2 microdrives. Disk drive interfaces with extra RAM, Hard drive interfaces, etc. The Gold Card and Super Gold Card set the eventual standard of an expanded upgrade - yet they are now in short supply. The Emulators have taken the OS on to different platforms of hardware, like the PC. Acceptance has to be given to users who have many different needs and current set ups. With many users having several set ups in use. Both old and new users are stimulated by something new. Repeating a list that I gave earlier - probably 3 item ranges will be suited : 1 - £50 to £100 a card of some type, probably modular too, that most people would have an interest in to add to their existing system 2 - £100 to £200+ a card of some type, probably again modular too, that would significantly change the system - discarding the existing GC's and SGC's 3 - £300 to £400 an entirely, or almost entirely, new system of a small size, or even portable, using standard available parts as far as possible Rich Mellor recently gave me this link to an interesting hardware development for the BBC model B computer, that had 32K RAM. The GoMMC which allows the BBC to use a multi-media card (MMC) - see http://web.inter.nl.net/users/J.Kortink/home/hardware/gommc/what.htm Cost is around 74 euros plus postage and the MMC. -- Malcolm Cadman ___ QL-Users Mailing List http://www.q-v-d.demon.co.uk/smsqe.htm
Re: [ql-users] Hardware and software - new horizons
Malcolm Cadman wrote: SNIP Both old and new users are stimulated by something new. Repeating a list that I gave earlier - probably 3 item ranges will be suited : 1 - £50 to £100 a card of some type, probably modular too, that most people would have an interest in to add to their existing system 2 - £100 to £200+ a card of some type, probably again modular too, that would significantly change the system - discarding the existing GC's and SGC's 3 - £300 to £400 an entirely, or almost entirely, new system of a small size, or even portable, using standard available parts as far as possible I think if any or all of these projects could get off the ground then the availability would itself generate further interest. Or maybe I am living in QL dreamland again . . . who knows Rich Mellor recently gave me this link to an interesting hardware development for the BBC model B computer, that had 32K RAM. The GoMMC which allows the BBC to use a multi-media card (MMC) - see http://web.inter.nl.net/users/J.Kortink/home/hardware/gommc/what.htm Cost is around 74 euros plus postage and the MMC. I have two of these on my BBC B and my BBC Master and can't rate them highly enough. They have really given my Beebs are new lease of life, not to mention stimulated interest from the younger generation - my nephews - who would never have sat by waiting for programs to load from tape! ___ QL-Users Mailing List http://www.q-v-d.demon.co.uk/smsqe.htm
Re: [ql-users] Hardware and software - new horizons
- Original Message - From: David McCann [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, February 15, 2007 4:53 PM Subject: [ql-users] Hardware and software - new horizons To keep an old computer going you need a reasonable user-base and a perceived function. The Spectrum gets continued support because it had masses of users to start with and it's easy and fun to write games for it. Indeed. The Spectrum was a success right from the start, but the QL was seen by the experts as a failed computer practically from day one. It was the peripherals industry that turned it into a practical computer. In other words the QL has only survived for 23 years because people developed new hardware at an early stage in its life. Those of us who went to the Sinclair show in Norwich a couple of years ago had a very strong impression that the Spectrum has not moved on to the same extent as the QL. We saw stall after stall selling Spectrum hardware and software that we remembered using in our Spectrum days. The only QL stall selling similar vintage QL software was Simon Goodwins. The QL no longer has enough users to make commercial products viable, Just as Quanta has to change if it wants to survive, so too have the traders. Then there's the lack of USB and printer support. But just a provocative thought. Have you ever tried to connect a USB only laptop to a parallel printer? PC World don't know the answer to that one, but I do mainly because of my QL experience of looking for solutions to problems, Best Wishes, Geoff ___ QL-Users Mailing List http://www.q-v-d.demon.co.uk/smsqe.htm
Re: [ql-users] Spare GC or SGC?
- Original Message - From: Malcolm Cadman To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, February 15, 2007 12:02 PM Subject: Re: [ql-users] Spare GC or SGC? Well ... 2 years is a long time in computing ... :-) ... so may be some optimism that new ideas can take seed. And in those 2 years 86 members (28% of the membership) have said goodbye to Quanta. I would love to know who they were and why they did. What have the officers done to find out? Best wishes, Geoff ___ QL-Users Mailing List http://www.q-v-d.demon.co.uk/smsqe.htm
Re: [ql-users] Spare GC or SGC?
In a message dated 15/02/2007 09:40:16 GMT Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Seeing all this discussion about possible new hardware etc. and the risks etc. is why I've come to the conclusion that there's never going to be any new hardware. It's just not economically viable: (a) The cost in time and money to design and build would be high. (b) The size of the market is too small so the price would be prohibitively high. It would be really nice if magically a new, hyper-fast, QL compatible replacement motherboard for the QL which fitted into the case would appear, but it's not going to. Those who want to continue to play can't find the old upgrade cards anymore (though I have seen on eBay UK at the moment someone selling two QLs with one Gold Card) so there's a problem. Porting something like SMS/Q or whatever to a new platform is still expensive in time but no-where near as much as new hardware, so surely, the best way forward would be to find some easily obtainable alternative hardware which can be easily adapted to our cause. (Sorry, for me emulation doesn't cut it, it's too clunky. I want to be able to plug a machine in, switch on and hit F2.) This is why I suggested 2nd hand Amiga 1200s (I know that one of our french friends said that french keyboard layout Amigas are hard to come by) as by default they're faster than the QL with useful on-board hardware and can be easily upgraded using reasonably available 3rd party 68030/040/060 and memory upgrade boards which can often be found on eBay. The only other possible alternatives would be Ataris, which aren't expanable and you pay through the nose for a Falcon040 (if you can find one), or old Apples, which don't have a great deal of hardware documentation. The alternative to replacing the Amiga Kickstart ROM in the machine would be to have the OS on disk as software and get Kickstart to load that instead. Probably easier than burning ROMs I would imagine. At least the Amiga platform is well documented and close enough to the QL to make it feasible. (You could probably even write a Copper list to make the Amiga video hardware read the QL screen format directly.) There are very few options available. All of them would require a huge amount of work. Steve What about a hardware connector that allows an existing amiga accellerator board to connect to a QL empansion slot or a backplane, would that not be simpler and give the advantages with less effort? Duncan ___ QL-Users Mailing List http://www.q-v-d.demon.co.uk/smsqe.htm
Re: [ql-users] Hardware and software - new horizons
-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE- Hash: SHA1 gwicks wrote: Then there's the lack of USB and printer support. But just a provocative thought. Have you ever tried to connect a USB only laptop to a parallel printer? PC World don't know the answer to that one, but I do mainly because of my QL experience of looking for solutions to problems, USB to serial interface and one of the QL serial to parallel converters - - with a QL to 9D converter. ... but there are commercial 9D serial to parallel converters as well. Tony - -- QBBS (QL fido BBS 2:252/67) +44(0)1442-828255 [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://firshman.co.uk Voice: +44(0)1442-828254 Fax: +44(0)1442-828255 Skype: tonyfirshman TF Services, 29 Longfield Road, TRING, Herts, HP23 4DG -BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE- Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (MingW32) Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org iD8DBQFF1O6TM3RzOs8+btoRAonUAJ9ki+94GxhAxuw5jj/soNaw4vCdiwCff8CD vHv33hkBqWETTog+hxbjxUc= =BwHN -END PGP SIGNATURE- ___ QL-Users Mailing List http://www.q-v-d.demon.co.uk/smsqe.htm
Re: [ql-users] Hardware and software - new horizons
In message [EMAIL PROTECTED], gwicks [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes Those of us who went to the Sinclair show in Norwich a couple of years ago had a very strong impression that the Spectrum has not moved on to the same extent as the QL. We saw stall after stall selling Spectrum hardware and software that we remembered using in our Spectrum days. The only QL stall selling similar vintage QL software was Simon Goodwins. I was about to write the same thing. The Spectrum has not 'moved on' or got 'up to date'. The scene is only stronger than the QL because people like playing the retro games (maybe because, given the age of the users, the modern ones are too hard for them to take in). It was obvious at that show that the QL was light years ahead of the Spectrum and equally obvious that we had no software to offer. There is not one piece of software for the QL that would tempt someone to get into the QL scene. The QL no longer has enough users to make commercial products viable, Just as Quanta has to change if it wants to survive, so too have the traders. There is little a trader can do these days. Since I do not write software myself, and I am offered little new software, I am stuck. Take away the cash flow and I will have to fold at some point. I keep going because I still enjoy it and I want to support the people who have been my customers for 10 years or so. Then there's the lack of USB and printer support. But just a provocative thought. Have you ever tried to connect a USB only laptop to a parallel printer? PC World don't know the answer to that one, but I do mainly because of my QL experience of looking for solutions to problems, That is easy - there is a specific bale to do it or a USB port replicator. I have both even though my laptop has a parallel port. -- Roy Wood Q Branch. 20 Locks Hill, Portslade, Sussex.BN41 2LB Tel: +44 (0) 1273 386030fax: +44 (0) 1273 430501 skype : royqbranch web : www.qbranch.demon.co.uk ___ QL-Users Mailing List http://www.q-v-d.demon.co.uk/smsqe.htm
