A good capacitor tester can be very expensive. The Chinese Fnirsi company sells a rather affordable LCR meter that can test capacitors, inductors and resistors, measuring multiple parameters, which you can compare to published datasheets. But is it any good? I bought mine quite some time ago, so it’s time to show it off!
The C64 goes Internet!
Using a very cheap ESP8266 controller and a simple PCB, we can lift the C64 into the modern era of having internet access. We evaluate two different WiFi modem firmware solutions, and I will show you how to connect to a BBS with gateways to modern websites. You can now read the news, look up things on Wikipedia, and most importantly: download software for your C64!
Let’s Code MS DOS 0x39: Samples on the PC Speaker
The PC speaker is known for loud, harsh beeping noises. However with a little bit of trickery we can coerce it into producing almost arbitrary sounds. By manipulating it with the built in time chip, we can simulate a pulse width modulation, that allows us to play pulse code modulated digitized sounds, such as voice recordings.
Let’s Talk 0x01: LLMs and AI
I have to chime in when it comes to the topic that just doesn’t want to die: LLMs and AI. What do I see as the issues with LLMs? Are they ok for use in retro computing projects? Are LLMs the work of the devil? Of course, there will be lots of opinions from myself in this video, but I try to be as objective as I can.
Let’s Code MS DOS 0x38: Huge Pointers in Turbo C
In MS DOS you can only access up to one Megabyte of memory easily, on an original PC or XT. This memory in turn is segmented, so accessing more than 64K at a time becomes a bit more tricky. This is why languages like Turbo C and Pascal introduced near and far pointers to the programmer. However there are also huge pointers, which we will investigate in this episode.
FPGATED for C16 and Plus/4
The Commodore 264 line of computers included the C116, C16 and Plus/4. They were build around the TED video and I/O chip. Also known as the MOS 7360 and MOS 8360, the early revisions of the chip were plagued with production issues. Many of the early R1 chips are broken by now. Replacements are hard to come by and often expensive. Now there is a modern replacement: The FPGATED by Istvan Hegedus promises high compatibility, together with additional features. HDMI output for modern screens, as well as ROM replacements and SID emulation in future firmware updates. Let’s test it and see how compatible it is!
Commodore 4040 Disk Drive Refurb
Another Commodore 4040 dual floppy disk drive ended up in my hands, but only temporarily for repairs and refurbishing. This drive didn’t boot up in the beginning and had other small issues. I will show in great detail how to take these things apart and how to clean them and get them up to speed again.
New Commodore Branded C64 Power Supply
The old C64 doorstop power supplies and their successors are a bit of a liability if you continue to use them nowadays. The internal voltage regulators like to die, and in the process they can destroy the C64 or worse. There are modern power supplies to replace them, but Individual Computers are now coming out with the “Commodore C64 Smart Supply”, including official Commodore branding! And the sales pitch is that this is the best PSU you can get for your vintage C64. Let’s take it for a test drive!
Let’s Code MS DOS: 0x37 Rainbow Surf Analysis
This year’s Revision demoparty had a surprising winner in the 256 byte compo. It was Rainbow Surf by Plex/BionFX and it is only 16 bytes long. That is short, very short. In fact, here is the code: c4 04 48 ab 26 03 45 ae 26 03 05 c1 e8 02 eb f2. Let’s dissect it!
Commodore 1541 Disk Drive Differences
The 1541 was the ubiquitous floppy disk drive for the C64. The different drive revisions look very similar, but on the inside there are some significant differences. Not only did they use two different manufacturers for the mechanisms. But the mainboards also had multiple revisions, and one particularly snarky little difference in the 1541C, which was only used on some of the drives that could make swapping parts between old drives very difficult.