HermIRES it’s a cross-platform hires bitmap (Art Studio 1 format) editor for the Commodore 64.

The format has some restrictions, here are the rules:

• The maximal resolution of the picture is 320×200
• Only 16 fix C64 colours can be used (no gradient either)
• In a 8×8 pixel-block only 2 colours can used to be displayable by C64 (this is detected in HermIRES, but .hbm files can be saved with clashes too.)
• On a real C64 the PAL will blur the screen-content a bit, should check on CRT, or at least VICE emulator’s CRT simulation.

Changelog:

Fixed:

• Pen-shapes are symmetric again. -> solution: 2.23*radius as diameter and 80 as angle-steps.
• Pen-preview is more accurate now -> solution: typing some ‘-1′ in PenPreview function.
• 0 sized filled rectangle with dither freezed the app -> solution: when start and end X or Y is equal, only drawing line…
• Taking tasbar size (30 pixel high) into the resolution-decider equation – more probable for GUI to fit into the screen comfortably.
• Windows – now the program Icon appears again in taskbar and window-title -> with the new compile.bat (not from DevCpp with Makefile.win)

Download:

• HermIRES v1.26 (Linux) (902)
• HermIRES v1.26 (Windows) (1238)

source: hermit.netne.net

Featureful native Commodore 64 music tracker with MIDI/XM converter.

SID-Wizard is an open-source project from the very 1st release, and everyone is welcome to help in further developments of my extensively commented sourcecode.

Download: SID-Wizard v1.4 (D64/PRG & Docs) (1016)

source: sourceforge.net

These are the top three winners of the “Crack Intro Music Compo 2013” for the Commodore 64. More information can be found on the site CSDB.

• 1 – Retrospectful by DRAX.
• 2 – Introduction to Crack by DRAX.
• 3 – Y-Lax-It by celticdesign.

The archive below contains all songs in SID and PRG format.

Download: Crack Intro Music Compo 2013 (1174)

A new version of the firmware for the interface 1541 Ultimate II is released. This version runs only on the 1541 Ultimate II cartridge (new fpga).

Version 2.6c includes some new features and fixes:

• NEW: Disk Copier from real drives to .D64 images.
• NEW: Command Interface.
• NEW: Ultimate-II DOS V1.0 (command target)
• NEW: Kernal replacement function.
• FIXED: TAP file recorder failed miserably on high latency write devices. Rewritten; should work better now.
• FIXED: Drive data timing has improved. Timing is now dependent on the data track itself, not on the speed setting of the VIA. This fixes some protected titles in G64 format.
• FIXED: USB stick present on boot time caused the Ultimate-II to crash when loading a file from SD at initialisation time (kernal rom / drive rom)
• FIXED: Starting a program with RUN sometimes caused the ultimate to become unresponsive when freezing afterwards.
• FIXED: Now reads USB sticks with FAT16 format, but without partition table.

Release notes:

• This version does *not* include SID, but it does include the Ultimate Audio module. Different builds may become available upon request.
• The internal copier is still in beta. It has been tested with some of my drives, but there might be drives out there that won’t work. Make sure you have an IEC link from the Ultimate to a real drive to use this function. (No need to have a link to the computer.) There is still no retry mechanism; sectors that failed to read correctly will not be re-read.
• The Kernal replacement function is critical when it comes to timing. Tested on two machines only. Might not work on C128.

Download: 1541 Ultimate II Firmware v2.6c (1230)

source: 1541ultimate.net

Commodore 64 Gold Edition on Ebay.de.

from Richard Lagendijk Homepage:

This a special edition of the Commodore C64, celebrating the 1.000.000th sale of the C64 in Germany. This is one of the most desirable Commodore items. There are about 300 golden Commodore C64 produced. The numbers from 1.000.000 until 1.000.100 were for the staff of the Commodore factory Braunschweig.

The rest was given to hard- en software companies, magazine-publishers and distributors. The C64 is a computer system with a keyboard, external power-supply and a motherboard. On the motherboard you will find a MOS 6510 processor, RAM / ROM memory, MOS 6569 VIC-II video chip, MOS 6581 SID sound chip and twice a MOS 6526 CIA. PAL version.

source: ebay.de richardlagendijk.nl

Loading game Armoured Assault and Spectron on Spectravideo SV-318.

Video:

Download:

• Spectravideo SVI 318-328 - CAS (TOSEC-v0.01) (1475)
• CAS to WAV Converter v1.0b (1330)
• Service Technical Manual SVI-3x8 (2386)
• SVI-328 Basic Reference Manual (4885)

source: spectravideo software tools

Autopsy:

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This configuration includes:

• Spectravideo SV-904 Data Cassette (Boxed)
• Spectravideo SV-602 Mini Expander (Boxed)
• Spectravideo SV-803 16k RAM Cartridge (Boxed)

from Wikipedia:

Spectravideo, or SVI, was a U.S. computer company founded in 1981 as “SpectraVision” by Harry Fox. They originally made video games for Atari 2600 and VIC-20. Some of their computers were MSX-compliant or IBM PC compatible. They ceased operations in 1988.

SpectraVision was founded in 1981 by Harry Fox and Oscar Jutzeler as a distributor of computer games, contracting external developers to write the software. Their main products were gaming cartridges for the Atari 2600 VCS, Colecovision and Commodore VIC-20. They also made the world’s first ergonomic joystick, the Quickshot. In late 1982 the company was renamed to Spectravideo due to a naming conflict with OnCommand’s Hotel TV system called SpectraVision.

In the early 1980s, the company developed 11 games for the Atari 2600, including several titles of some rarity: Chase the Chuckwagon, Mangia and Bumper Bash. A few of their titles were only available through the Columbia House music club.

The company’s first attempt at a computer was an add-on for the Atari 2600 called the Spectravideo CompuMate, with a membrane keyboard and very simple programmability.

Their first real computers were the SV-318 and SV-328, released in 1983. Both were powered by a Z80 A at 3.6 MHz, but differed in the amount of RAM (SV-318 had 32KB and SV-328 had 80KB total, of which 16KB was reserved for video) and keyboard style. The main operating system, residing in ROM, was a version of Microsoft Extended Basic, but if the computer was equipped with a floppy drive, the user had the option to boot with CP/M instead. These two computers were precedent to MSX and not fully compatible with the standard, though the changes made to their design to create MSX were minor. The system had a wide range of optional hardware, for example an adapter making it possible to run ColecoVision games on the SVI.

A later version, the Spectravideo SVI-728 was made MSX compatible. SVI-738, also MSX compatible, came with a built-in 360 KB 3.5″ floppy drive. The last computer produced by Spectravideo was the SVI-838 (also known as Spectravideo X’Press 16). It was a PC and MSX2 in the same device.

Today the Spectravideo name is used by a UK based company called SpectraVideo Plc, formerly known as Ash & Newman. That company was founded in 1977, and bought the Spectravideo brand name from Bondwell (SVI owner) in 1988. They sell their own range of Logic3 branded products, and do not have any connection to the old Spectravideo products.

source: wikipedia

Autopsy:

from Roger Spectravideo homepage:

The SV-803 16K RAM Pack allows you to easily and economically add 16K worth of “Random Access Memory” to your SV computer.  You can bank switch to a second bank of memory from BASIC.

Download: SVI 803-807 Users Manual (1203)

source: roger spectravideo homepage

Autopsy:

from Roger Spectravideo homepage:

SV-602 Single Slot Expander it houses one interface cartridge, and provides a very economical means of interfacing your SV computer with a single peripheral at a time.

source: roger spectravideo homepage

Autopsy:

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from Roger Spectravideo homepage:

SV-904 Data Cassette it connect easily to the SV-318 or SV-328, our data cassette provides an inexpensive means of running and storing a wide range of computer programs.

source: roger spectravideo homepage

A rare Commodore 65 on eBay.com.

from Wikipedia:

The Commodore 65 (also known as the C64DX, not to be confused with the Commodore SX-64 portable unit) was a prototype computer created by Fred Bowen and others at Commodore Business Machines (CBM) (part of Commodore International) in 1990–1991. The project was cancelled by CEO Irving Gould.

The C65 was an improved version of the Commodore 64, and it was meant to be backwards-compatible with the older computer, while still providing a number of advanced features close to those of the Amiga. It can be regarded as a counterpart to the Apple IIgs in providing 16-bit-equivalent technology on an 8-bit platform, though the IIgs used an 8/16 bit 65C816 processor. When Commodore International was liquidated in 1994, a number of prototypes were sold on the open market, and thus a few people actually own a Commodore 65. Estimates as to the actual number of machines found on the open market range from 50 to 2000 units.

As the C65 project was cancelled, the final 8-bit offering from CBM remained the triple-mode, 1–2 MHz, 128 kB (expandable), C64-compatible Commodore 128 of 1985.

source: ebay.com wikipedia

AspeQt is a cross-platform, free and open source Atari 8-bit serial peripheral emulator. The name is an acronym for Atari serial peripheral emulator for Qt, Qt being the cross-platform application development framework used by AspeQt.

AspeQt emulates various Atari 8-bit peripherals like disk drives and printers via an SIO-2-PC cable. If you are familiar with software like Sio2Pc, APE, Atari810, AtariSIO etc., you probably won’t have any problems getting used to AspeQt.

Even though AspeQt is not fully mature yet, it is easy to use and, despite its shortcomings, has many features that you may find useful, the highlights being:

• Up to 15 disk drive emulation.
• Up to 6x SIO speed (125,000bps)
• Support for ATR, XFD, PRO and ATX (preliminary) disk images.
• Mount folders as emulated disks.
• Disk image explorer.
• Directly boot Atari executables.
• Text only printer emulation with PC print, save, and ATASCII font support.
• Cassette image playback.
• Multilingual GUI (English, Polish, Slovak, German, Turkish and Russian)
• AspeQt client module (AspeCl) for Atari, communicates with the server and performs a variety of remote operations.

Changelog:

• Updated Turkish translations.
• Updated the AspeQt documentation.
• Added Folder Image boot support for MyDos, MyPicoDos and SpartaDos. AspeQt now offers an option to switch between those 4 different DOSes automatically. The user no longer needs to supply the required DOS files or the file containing the boot sectors ($boot.bin) as AspeQt includes them and switches from one DOS to another through the UI. The context menu (right clicking on a mounted folder image on D1:) will present a window with DOS selections. By choosing a DOS and clicking Apply on that window will switch DOSes and the next reboot of the Atari will boot selected DOS from the Folder Image. For details of the switching mechanism, the limitations of, and more, please see AspeQt documentation.
• Changed the color and boldness of the Folder Image names to visually differentiate them from other file images.

Download:

• AspeQt v0.8.7 (Windows) (1571)
• AspeQt v0.8.7 Changelog (1380)
• AspeQt v0.8.5 Manual (English/German) (1618)

source: aspeqt.sourceforge.net

Autopsy:

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from Wikipedia:

The Dragon 32 and Dragon 64 are home computers that were built in the 1980s. The Dragons are very similar to the TRS-80 Color Computer (CoCo), and were produced for the European market by Dragon Data, Ltd., in Port Talbot, Wales, and for the US market by Tano of New Orleans, Louisiana. The model numbers reflect the primary difference between the two machines, which have 32 and 64 kilobytes of RAM, respectively.

In the early 1980s, the British home computer market was booming. New machines were released almost monthly. In August 1982, Dragon Data joined the fray with the Dragon 32; the Dragon 64 followed a year later. The computers sold quite well initially and attracted the interest of several independent software developers, most notably Microdeal. A magazine, Dragon User also began publication shortly after the machine’s launch.

In the private home computer market, where games were a significant driver, the Dragon suffered due to its graphical capabilities, which were inferior to contemporary machines such as the Sinclair ZX Spectrum and BBC Micro.

The Dragon was also unable to display lower-case letters easily. Some more sophisticated applications would synthesise them using high-resolution graphics modes (in the same way that user-defined characters would be designed for purely graphical applications such as games). Simpler programs just managed without lower case. This effectively locked it out of the then-blooming educational market.

As a result of these limitations, the Dragon was not a commercial success, and Dragon Data collapsed in June 1984.

Video of Chuckie Egg game for Dragon 64:

source: wikipedia archive.worldofdragon.org

Autopsy:

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from Wikipedia:

The Sega Pico, also known as Kids Computer Pico (キッズコンピューター・ピコ Kizzu Konpyūtā Piko?), is an electronic toy by Sega. The aim of creating the Pico was to get more young children (specifically, ages 2–8) to use video game systems. The Pico was the first Sega-branded console to carry an officially licensed game from former competitor Nintendo.

The Pico was released in 1993 in Japan and 1994 in North America and Europe. In Japan, the system was a huge success and games were developed until 2005. In North America and Europe, however, the Pico was less successful and games were only developed until 1997. The Pico was also released in South Korea, and it seems to be more successful unlike the west. To celebrate its 10th anniversary in 2003 in Japan, Sega re-released some of the Pico games. As of April 2005, 3.4 million Pico consoles and 11.2 million software cartridges had been sold.

The Sega Pico’s slogan was: “The computer that thinks it’s a toy.”

The ROM cartridges were called “Storyware,” and were book shaped. Each time a player turned the page of the cartridge the screen changed to replicate the image in the book. The games were controlled by a “magic” pen and buttons. The last page of each book features a freehand drawing mode, where the player can also insert stamps of characters shown previously in the game. All software released for the Pico received a rating from either the V.R.C. or the ESRB.

source: wikipedia

Recovered a Commodore 128 in good conditions with manuals/software and a Tape Recorder.