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Never Demo a 64 Without a 1541 — Parallax Forums

Never Demo a 64 Without a 1541

PJAllenPJAllen BannedPosts: 5,065
edited 2012-08-03 09:28 in General Discussion
This guy hamstrung (sabotaged) his demo by not using the disk drive.
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-19055707

Comments

  • NurbitNurbit Posts: 53
    edited 2012-08-01 06:08
    Forget the slow datasette, his complete lack of charisma nearly put me to sleep!!
  • Ron CzapalaRon Czapala Posts: 2,418
    edited 2012-08-01 06:08
    Ah yes! The good ol' days.

    I used the cassette unit one day and bought a diskette drive the next. The cassette unit was pathetic...

    Even the disk drive was flaky. As I remember, saving a file using the same name was a problem - it was best to delete the original first.
  • ElectricAyeElectricAye Posts: 4,561
    edited 2012-08-01 06:09
    Mommy, grandpa's trying to play with his old toys again. I think it's time for his medication.
  • Ron CzapalaRon Czapala Posts: 2,418
    edited 2012-08-01 06:15
    ElectricAye wrote: »
    Mommy, grandpa's trying to play with his old toys again. I think it's time for his medication.

    Still more entertaining than walking around with an iPhone stuck in front of your face all day IMHO.:smile:
  • jazzedjazzed Posts: 11,803
    edited 2012-08-01 07:12
    Ron Czapala wrote: »
    I used the cassette unit one day and bought a diskette drive the next. The cassette unit was pathetic...

    This is why I never became a CBM fan and never use retro stuff.
  • ratronicratronic Posts: 1,451
    edited 2012-08-01 07:40
    Along time ago I used to work for R.C.A. and at one point we did warranty repair of Commodore's stuff. I remember the 1541 drives with the read/write heads out of alignment and having to tweak them back into alignment all the time.
  • Oldbitcollector (Jeff)Oldbitcollector (Jeff) Posts: 8,091
    edited 2012-08-01 08:11
    That tape drive looked like it had been through the war...

    PJ should add the words "...and a FASTLOAD cart" to the subject line of this thread. :)

    Jeff
  • ercoerco Posts: 20,261
    edited 2012-08-02 14:25
    Maybe that guy should have upgraded to this vintage cassette to 8-track adapter... http://www.ebay.com/itm/Realistic-Stereo-Cassette-Adapter-for-8-Track-Players-/120951867066?pt=Vintage_Electronics_R2&hash=item1c294b06ba

    How long have people have been waiting for THAT item to come up for sale?
  • potatoheadpotatohead Posts: 10,261
    edited 2012-08-02 19:41
    The classic car buffs are all over those things. Highly coveted. We attended a local show just recently, and I tagged along to check out the great cars. A family member is restoring a 67 Impala. (The "Supernatural" show car type)

    Many people just went stock, meaning the classic radio with two knobs and a few usually shiny buttons. (love shiny buttons, BTW) Some of the more hard core would theme their car, and those types love 8 tracks. Many will have the full set, goofy wood grain box with felt cartridge containers, the obligitory head cleaning kit, and some with those adapters and the same stuff for cassette.

    I had one in my 78 Vega GT for years, right along with an FM adapter. Both went with the car when I sold it, and even then people were starting to collect. I had installed an early model radio, with 8 track add-on, and that was part of the car value, such as it was...

    That one has a box! Totally collectable.

    Since I'm rambling, I just remember something I was going to put here. Gauges. The last couple of shows I attended featured great cars with just HORRIBLE third party gauge kits. Seems to me that's a nice niche for somebody. Make some great gauges, use a micro to sort out the signals and make adapter kits and provide some calibration capability that's dead simple. The thing is the art. Most of the "new old school" gauge kits just don't have the right looks. They would look fine in a newer car, or one that's been styled somehow, but not on a classic.
  • ercoerco Posts: 20,261
    edited 2012-08-02 19:48
    Dangit, potatohead! Now you got ME wanting it! :)
  • potatoheadpotatohead Posts: 10,261
    edited 2012-08-02 19:50
    Deffo the wrong demo. A FASTLOAD cart would have helped some, but really the fun is in the disk drive. Not surprised that the kids recognized the cassette. References are still out there and hand me down gear is still getting used by young kids.

    A 5 1/4" floppy would have blown their minds. Many of them will have not seen one at all. 90K or so / side on those things too. Crazy how far things have come. Plus, he could have included sleeve art! At that time, many of mine had stickers, doodles, instructions, etc...

    He picked a good game though!
  • potatoheadpotatohead Posts: 10,261
    edited 2012-08-02 19:57
    Re: Adapter.

    Yeah, you want it, if you've got a classic car. I do, but I don't have a classic car, and will likely just live vicariously through the one in the family who does. I get to do all the fun tweaks, tune ups and stuff, and some nice drives without owning the car. Perfect!

    Re: Disk drives.

    Yeah, I don't think those were the best mechanisms. Many peers experienced trouble with theirs, and I've had a few open to tweak. IMHO, one of the best were the Apple drives. They rarely needed alignment, just the odd speed tweak, and that was dead simple with the little rotating sticker they supplied. My own Atari disk was iffy. Required TLC. Never had a drive intended for PC go bad.

    Right now, I've got most things I care to use converted to some SD card type option. Excellent. The Apple is next on the list, and I'm just waiting for it to ship. To use it, I've maybe 20 old floppy disks. Amazingly, they are from the period, and work just fine. All I do is pull an image, use the Apple to write it, then boot. Thought there would be issues, but none have happened.

    Now, 3 1/2" disks? Hate 'em. Nothing but trouble. Nice hard cases, but man! I really just didn't have good luck at all, going through lots of drives and disks. Those things drove me to early adopt a hard disk the moment I could, and I never looked back. First one was a 10MB Hard Card type thing.
  • nightwingnightwing Posts: 56
    edited 2012-08-03 08:54
    Yep. And the 1541 was like the Apple II drives but it had a 6502 something cpu as the drive chip.

    Love that the RS Coco had a real WD controller chip and normal drive electronics/mechanical.
  • potatoheadpotatohead Posts: 10,261
    edited 2012-08-03 09:28
    Seriously. That was a nice setup. I never had one, cassette only for that computer. At least it was about as fast as the 1451, and it had file names.
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