Retro Computing

Hello!, I was wondering (sorry about this, i'm no Einstein) what can one do with a virtual machine? what I mean by that is what cool things could one do? maybe use it to play older games, perhaps even make it a storage medium?. I personally like to use applications/games on vm's (im also love customizing the whole thing, artist impulse). Do any of you have any suggestions? thank you for your input.

What piece of retro tech is your white whale? What do you aspire to own but probably won't ever have the chance to?

I grew up around and was mentored by many DEC veterans. I even work in one of their old manufacturing facilities. I'd love to own a DEC mainframe from their peak in the early 80s. Even a minicomputer is unreasonable for most of us hobbiests. One can dream though

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> a amazing game for the VIC-20. and avalable on tape ! i think its maybe one of the best game i played on the machine.

So me and my fmaily members have a bunch of old junky desktops,computers, and laptops but they refuse to get rid of any they wont even let me get rid of any of my old ones. i have pc and laptops dating from windows xp to windows 8.1 and most of them are missing minir parts that are needed like a good amount of ram, sound card, wifi, etc. is there something i cna do with old pc's escpecially ones with no sound card? i would buy upgrades buy pc parts are so pricey even old ones and i tend to collect diffrent computers fom thrift stores aswell, the pc rang from 1gb of ram-to 2gb of ram so there all slow, old and janky but just plan annoying.

any tips or suggestions would be very helpful.

Linked a source of inspiration. This is a fuzzy topic but maybe will drive "engagement" of purists 😝

The idea is to get a daily driver machine GUI to look like a retro desktop or workstation while being functional. Sure, "functional" means different things for all people, tastes differ etc. Why? To me it's more soothing and makes me want to do Serious Computing (or even work, gasp) and not get distracted. Bonus points if we can actually run some ancient software for this (old Linux desktop environments? I once kinda got Enlightenment DE to work).

My current modern setup is KDE Plasma with "Platinum retro" theme: https://store.kde.org/p/1320042 and applications style (basically buttons) set to "MS Windows 9x". You can also mess with system fonts. Kind of lazy, but does give this gray austere vibe. Maybe people have more elaborate setups, or ones easier for non-Linux folks.

I've been trying to get the Racore memory expansion working for the past few months. Seems like the DOS drivers I found on archive.org aren't compatible with this hardware version. Oh well, the Jride will give me enough memory anyway.

What do you have on your workbench?

This seems like the best resource out there: Compaq Presario CDS 520

Green Beret is a difficult game to love, because Green Beret is a difficult game to play. Honestly, it's brutal. Utterly unforgiving, unfair in places, and generally infuriating. Especially since every life lost is greeted by a shrill siren sound that will have even the most understanding spouse reaching for her earbuds (trust me).

!The arcade version of Green Beret

It's also a simple game, if a little rooted in the concerns of the 80s... move to the right, murder fools with your knife and your deep fear of communist expansion, pick up the occasional flame thrower or rocket launch to murder more efficiently... win!!!

But how did the home computer conversions handle the absurd difficulty of the coin-op? They'd have toned it down, right? Right??

!The Amstrad version of Green Beret

Amstrad: This port is the worst of the three main ones. There's just something off about it. Maybe it's the loose controls or the insane difficulty, or maybe it's the fact that your green beret looks more like Robin Hood and the communist aggressors look more like merry men. Still, everything from the arcade is represented here. Just not brilliantly. And it is so so difficult...

!The Spectrum version of Green Beret

Spectrum: Next up is the Spectrum. It's a port by the late great Jonathan "Joffa" Smith and it is a really neat conversion. The graphics are bright and crisp, it controls and moves around well, and it feels like the original arcade. But goddamn it's hard. I had to figure out how to use a Multiface, just so that I could poke in a cheat and get to my screenshot spot for this one!

!The C64 version of Green Beret

C64: The C64 port is probably the best of the bunch, but not by a long way. It looks and sounds great, definitely the closest to the arcade. It's main problem - believe it or not - is difficulty. Again, it is insanely hard. And it suffers from some unfair hit box issues - if you jump and collide with an enemy on a level above, you lose a life, which feels wrong.

!The Atari version of Green Beret

Atari: Finally, a dishonourable discharge for the Atari 8-bit version which is, frankly, a bit of a war crime.

It's beyond hard and enters an entirely different realm of frustration, with your hero wielding the smallest knife imaginable and enemies requiring the intimate closeness of a secret lover before they'll shuffle off this mortal coil

Combine this with invisible bullets (pesky Russian tech) and that awful siren that plays at the start of EVERY life and it's a recipe for an 800XL out the window.

I just got a greaseweazle to image floppies. I'm interested in archiving the software disks for Brother word processors. Before I start down that rabbit hole, does anyone know if any images are out there already?

Mine has bad floppy drives. Hopefully it'll get floppy emulator replacements soon.

Welcome to the retro computing community!