37 replies to this topic

[Ze_ro]

Happy_Dude said:

Raijin Z said:

1541 drives can't read PC disks.

Actually one of my C=64 lots had a stack of blank disks so they're not 1.2Mb's

The problem is that C64 disks use a format called GCR, and the floppy drive controllers (not the drive mechanism itself, but the chips on your motherboard that access them) on PC's are incapable of reading or writing disks in this format. So, regardless of whether you have 360k disks or not, you still won't be able to write C64 disks with a PC 5 1/4" drive.

In order to write a C64 disk with a PC, you either need to buy a more versatile floppy drive controller card such as the catweasel (kind of expensive, but you'll also be able to read/write just about any type of disk for just about any type of computer (Mac, Amiga, Atari, etc) using your existing PC drives), or make/buy yourself an X1541 cable and use it to connect a 1541 drive to your PC, and use a program like Star Commander to access it.

I made myself an X1541 cable a long time ago, and it has served me well, both for making C64 disks, and dumping what games I have.

--Zero

[JB]

Ze_ro said:

JB said:

And didn't the TRS80 and C64 come with BASIC as an operating system, through some drunken miscarriage of sanity?

Back then, having BASIC was better than an operating system really... Most of the people who used C64's did at least some of their own programming (Back then, the only people who used computers were people who actually knew what they were doing), so including BASIC became pretty important. BASIC worked for normal OS tasks as well, like reading directories... although stuff like deleting/copying files was a pain. Of course, you could always get GEOS.

I always felt BASIC should be a sub-element of the OS, as it was on MS-DOS machines(and debatably the 99/4a, as BASIC wasn't capable of doing most OS tasks).
It was never designed for general use purposes, and shouldn't be made to do so.

[Jasoco]

I don't miss DOS. I am perfectly happy with OS X and its Unix underpants.

I DO hoever, miss QuickBasic. When we were out of a Windows 95 capable computer for 5 months YEARS back, it was QBasic that taught me the joys of programming. If I had to go back to that, I would. If I HAD to that is.

As for pack-ins and games. Fuck yes I miss them.

I mean having to pay $24-$30 for a second controller, $20-$25 for a mmory card, $50 for a game to play. WHAT ARE THEY THINKING? Money, money, money. THAT'S what they're thinking. Great... now I'm gonna have Abba in my head all day.

[Bryan]

Raijin Z said:

I can't miss DOS. I'm never without it. I have no fewer than four PCs with 3.0 or higher installed. Well, I'm not quite sure about one of them. I found it on the curb last night... It's slow enough to have DOS on it, but I'm haven't tried booting it yet.

There's a guy in my neighborhood who must be in the recycling business, because every other week or so, there's a bunch of old computers out at the curb (usually 486/Pentium class). I used to bring stuff home and mess with it, but I ran out of space for all the junk. I kept a bunch of case and power supply fans though, 'cuz it seems they're always going bad.

-Bry

[Ze_ro]

JB said:

I always felt BASIC should be a sub-element of the OS. It was never designed for general use purposes, and shouldn't be made to do so.

I guess they figured since everything important could be done through BASIC, then it wasn't worth the bother and price increase to code an OS and include it in the ROMs... memory was quite pricey back then. There are plenty of simple shell programs available for the C64 though. In fact, I have a disk drive called an Indus GT that actually has an OS (amung other things) built into it's ROMs that you can load into memory with a simple LOAD command. Very nice disk drive, with a lot of great options.

Jasoco said:

I DO hoever, miss QuickBasic. When we were out of a Windows 95 capable computer for 5 months YEARS back, it was QBasic that taught me the joys of programming.

Well, these days there are some excellent free C/C++ compilers available (Such as GCC and DJGPP). C is harder to learn than BASIC of course, but once you learn the basics (no pun intended), the language is so much more versatile and powerful.

Of course, Windows users can always resort to Visual Basic... but real programmers will make fun of them

--Zero

[liquid_sky]

you could learn python too.. its not TOO hard.. not too useful either though.

[Ze_ro]

While we're at it, why not learn INTERCAL (the only language with a "COME FROM" command)?

And of course, here's a Hello World program written in Unlambda:

```s``sii`ki

 ``s``s`ks

     ``s``s`ks``s`k`s`kr

               ``s`k`si``s`k`s`k

                               `d````````````.H.e.l.l.o.,. .w.o.r.l.d.!

                        k

      k

  `k``s``s`ksk`k.*

See? C is actually pretty simple.

--Zero

[Albert]

Scooterb23 said:

Just one random point...last week I got hold of a computer with DOS on it...I was having such a great time trying to remember all my command prompt commands...but I got to play a rousing game of Commander Keen...so it was all good

It is nice to keep an old computer around to play older games. There are some games (such as Ultima VII) that use proprietary memory managers (and will not run in Windows at all) or are not speed limited, and are a bitch to get running in an impure DOS environment on fast machines.

..Al

[JB]

Ze_ro said:

JB said:

I always felt BASIC should be a sub-element of the OS. It was never designed for general use purposes, and shouldn't be made to do so.

I guess they figured since everything important could be done through BASIC, then it wasn't worth the bother and price increase to code an OS and include it in the ROMs... memory was quite pricey back then.

*shrugs*
It just always annoyed me. BASIC was pretty evidently never intended as an OS.
...
But then, I was raised on the 9/4a, where BASIC was just a programming language anyways.
Well, you could load disk and tape applications from it, but any sort of file management was the responsibility of an outside program(hooray for Disk Manager).

Quote

There are plenty of simple shell programs available for the C64 though. In fact, I have a disk drive called an Indus GT that actually has an OS (amung other things) built into it's ROMs that you can load into memory with a simple LOAD command. Very nice disk drive, with a lot of great options.

Nice.

A feature I would greatly appreciate on my TI disk controller and Atari floppy drive.
Hell, I'd appreciate it on my IBM-clones. 'S nice to not have to find an boot disk when the installed OS gets fucked.

...

Actually my 99/4a used to have a RAM-disk in it. But not just ANY RAM-disk, no. This was a BATTERY-BACKED RAM disk.
Hard drives? Who needs them?
...
Well, maybe if you need more than 64kbytes of disk space, or whatever size it was... But it had space enough for Disk Manager and TI Writer both, so I was happy.

Too bad the thing failed on me a while back.

Quote

Of course, Windows users can always resort to Visual Basic... but real programmers will make fun of them

And rightfully so. Visual Basic is just an overglorified paint program

[Jasoco]

Sorry, guys, but anything past BASIC, simple JavaScript and low end PHP, I can't learn. It does not stick. I've spent $200 on C++ starter kits and Game Programming tools only to find out, I can't program worth shit.

I'll stick to HTML, PHP and the occasional TNT Basic program.

[Raijin Z]

bryede said:

Raijin Z said:

I can't miss DOS. I'm never without it. I have no fewer than four PCs with 3.0 or higher installed. Well, I'm not quite sure about one of them. I found it on the curb last night... It's slow enough to have DOS on it, but I'm haven't tried booting it yet.

There's a guy in my neighborhood who must be in the recycling business, because every other week or so, there's a bunch of old computers out at the curb (usually 486/Pentium class). I used to bring stuff home and mess with it, but I ran out of space for all the junk. I kept a bunch of case and power supply fans though, 'cuz it seems they're always going bad.

-Bry

Le sigh... I'd love to have access to all that. Still, I haven't gotten around to purchasing NICs for all of my obselete beauties.

[KaineMaxwell]

I don't miss DOS much, but I do miss when buying a system having a decent pack-in game or two along with 2 controllers. it really made the system worth having that way- a pack-in game or two to showcase the new system and see if you enjoyed it, and 2 controllers so you and a friend can evulate if you wanted to keep playing, or buy other games for it.

[vespertillio]

Ahhh the memories of DOS gaming
Editing the Autoexec.bat and Config.sys(before edit that is EDLIN )
Trying to squeeze as much conventional memory out as possible
Remember some of those Origin games? 631k needed (are you nuts)
Loadhi, devicehi, himem.sys QEMM (when it worked)

Good times. Good times.