Precisely the kind of niche video topic I've grown to love your channel for. This was awesome.

@retrovhsmanvaultfromthe70s97

7 жыл бұрын

Lazy Game Reviews I saw some of thoes on EBAY

@FinalBaton

7 жыл бұрын

+Lazy Game Reviews ikr

@retrovhsmanvaultfromthe70s97

7 жыл бұрын

FinalBaton there is only few in stock on eBay

@NeedlesKaneTM

7 жыл бұрын

For some reason seeing two of my favourite youtubers interact gives me a feeling almost as warm and fuzzy as LGR's voice.

@codykamminga9667

7 жыл бұрын

Lazy Game Reviews hi clint

One of the best quotes to date: "The composite signal is actually surprisingly sharp and clear, as long as it's monochrome. Once you shoehorn the color signal into that, it greatly degrades the signal." - The 8-Bit Guy

@fribigy47

2 жыл бұрын

I saw this exactly as it came on

@joaovitormatos8147

Жыл бұрын

Whenever I watch shows from the 60s, it always strikes me how sharp the black and white ones are compared to the color ones

8-bit guy: Does a review video. Reviews four things at once. Finds obscure thing. Writes own software. Infinitely increases the software library for object. Good guy youtuber. Some people 'review stuff' by taking it out of the box.

@tomwilson2112

6 жыл бұрын

This. Just... unspeakably awesome.

@BillAnt

5 жыл бұрын

At 12:58 "Or does it?" Hi, Michael from Vsauce here.... lol

@souptenderpanini3106

5 жыл бұрын

Joshua Mcateer alright, but joeys world tour comes second place!

@Keelyn1984

4 жыл бұрын

One big difference is that 8-bit guy does this out of his own passion. It's unlikey he won't get paid to review such old stuff. But a random reviewer likely gets paid by a company to 'review stuff' by taking it out of the box.

@Minecraft101ToonLink

4 жыл бұрын

Reviewer: Hello everyone! Let’s unbox this thing! **Gets thing out of the box** Reviewer: Well, I hope you enjoyed this video! Bye!

I started my MBA program writing my papers on the C64 rather than using a typewriter like most of the students were doing. The professors were impressed with the dot matrix printouts. By the end of the program I updated to a C128 to write my thesis for the ease of 80 column screens. This was far ahead of the rest of the class using typewriters. By the time I started teaching at the University I had upgraded to a PC 286x model. I have purchased a new computer every three years since then, but still love my Commodore.

@375-Productions

7 ай бұрын

Hello random stranger on the Internet! Just out of curiosity, are you still upgrading every three years, even today? Computers nowadays are so overpowered for general home/business/office use, unless you're a proper gamer, or serious proffesional using 3D software or music creation etc., the power of an ultramodern PC is rarely needed!

great video! 80 columns was something i was truly envious of when i owned a C64 back in the day

@Bruh-rj5vw

3 жыл бұрын

No replies? Time we change that.

@harleylane0583

3 жыл бұрын

Egg90

@NuisanceMan

2 жыл бұрын

@@Bruh-rj5vw Yeah, but your reply isn't really a reply.

@QuarioQuario54321

5 ай бұрын

And then GUIs came and now all computers needed graphics and text columns basically disappeared.

The degradation of display quality with the VideoPak reminds me of what happened with the Currah Microspeech on the ZX Spectrum - this was also an external cartridge that had a loop through for the standard video output - it added an audio signal to the video (rather than using the Spectrum's weedy inbuilt speaker) - the result was speech synthesis that came out of the TV speaker, but the screen had crosshatching interference on it. The Microspeech had a trimmer capacitor that could be adjusted to supposedly compensate for this, but it was a case of approaching least-worst, rather than best fidelity.

@Sh-hg8kf

3 жыл бұрын

Computer noob here. What's crosshatching interference?

@caiogamer2723

2 жыл бұрын

atomic shrimp knows about old computers :O

@mjdxp5688

2 жыл бұрын

Didn't expect to see you here!

Missed an opportunity there to make an 80 column outro :) Great video as always!

I had a C128D but I had no RGB monitor, only a TV. But, I found that I could get a monochrome 80 column display out of the RGB connector and get 80 columns pretty clear on my TV but obviously only in 128 mode. But it was great for connecting my C128 to the dialup pools of my university so I could get on the internet. Yes, I brought my C128D to college in 1993!

@ScrapKing73

11 ай бұрын

I used my C64 for everything, including productivity (thank you GEOS!) and dial-up connectivity, until I finally got an Amiga in 1992. So I’m not far behind you!

@ScrapKing73

11 ай бұрын

I really wanted a 128 for many years, but I could never afford one. As it was, I bought my Commodore 64 second-hand for $200 in 1986 or so.

The 128 in 80 column mode was Gods-gift to the user when using terminal programs to connect to PC hosted BBS'. You could utilize the full display of how the BBS was meant to be, plus enjoyed the wonderful ANSI graphics. Quite memorable experience that I still remember. Made you realize how silly and amateurish 40 column mode was. Unfortunately, few software took advantage of 128's native mode so many users hopped over to Amigas or PCs once they realized how much more they could achieve with a computer.

@joyange1

5 жыл бұрын

You might not realize it. But 40 columns was not chosen because it was cheaper to implement. It was chosen because of the bandwidth limitations of the NTSC/PAL video standard. Most people back then just used their TV as a cheap alternative to buying a real monitor.

@dbranconnier1977

5 жыл бұрын

Commodore did it right with the 128. The 64 should have included an option for 80 columns text built-in, when paired with a proper monitor. It would have made it a lot more competitive with the Apple IIc.

@MattMcIrvin

4 жыл бұрын

@@joyange1 Yeah... the real divide between business machines and home machines in the early 1980s was that the home machines were, in most cases, designed to connect to a color TV as a monitor. But analog color NTSC just couldn't handle 80-column text adequately. The computers aimed at business were designed to work primarily with a dedicated monitor, which was often monochrome, because good interactive text display was the paramount consideration.

@solarbirdyz

2 жыл бұрын

I wrote one of those apparently 12 (lol) packages that supported C128 80 column mode - though I'm confident the number was higher if you included Geos128, which ran well in 640x200 mode on that chipset, even with the base 16K of 80 column video RAM. It was indeed basically this - though in the case of mine, it also supported Atari ASCII, raw Petscii (for the BBSes that did that), and you could also implement arbitrary keyboard layouts. It got published via Uptime! which was a floppy-disk monthly for the C64 and C128.

There was a C64 wordprocessor released towards the end of the machine's life called Interword which either did 40 columns using the standard text mode, or had a software created 80 column mode. Wasn't amazing but it was just about readable (I think it used bright white characters to make the characters stand out) even on a TV. I was impressed by it back in the day anyway!

@jsrodman

3 ай бұрын

Paperclip had a sort of proof mode with 80 column display in software. It worked well enough fit my simple essay writing needs.

Thanks for the walk down memory lane. I used to be a librarian for the Toronto PET Users Group (TPUG) and later worked for Batteries Included. It has been over 30 years since I worked on the BI-80 and programs like PaperClip. Just before Batteries Included was purchased by Electronic Arts, we removed the need for the dongle. We had a lot of people complaining because the dongles would get damaged and there was no way to make a back up. Plus EA didn't have the facilities to make dongles. So in 1986 there was a version of PaperClip which didn't need the dongle. That version supported the BI-80. EA would have owned the rights to PaperClip (I believe) and Oracle (database software) but even when they quit selling/support C64 software, EA never released the software to the public. :( Probably 20 years ago I pulled out boxes and boxes of floppy disks (5.25 and 3.5) with the source code for all this stuff but sadly the disks had degraded and weren't readable. I wonder if Steve Douglas ever kept his copy of the source code. There wasn't source control systems like we had today. When I moved to California, to work for EA, I lost touch with everyone at Batteries Included. :( Also, Batteries Included created the BI-MonoChrome Adapter. It was a cable which allowed you to connect your C128 to the Commodore 1701 or 1702 monitor. It was really the same cable you describe in this video. We made it for people who just wanted to buy one pre-made rather than make one themselves.

My first ever computer was a c64 but my parents got a monochrome green monitor for it. Boy was I disappointed. Mainly because I got run over by the motorcycle in last ninja 2 all the time since I could not tell the color of the traffic lights

@someguy2135

5 жыл бұрын

Too bad you didn't have a spare color television to use. These days you could get all the free CRT televisions you wanted for free from Craig's List.

@justanotheryoutubechannel

5 жыл бұрын

Some Guy Are you sure? I’m yet to find a single CRT on Craigslist. Whenever I search, I just find these huge industrial generator looking machines up in London.

@vhfgamer

4 жыл бұрын

@@justanotheryoutubechannel They are so common and so undesired that thrift stores won't take them anymore. Craigslist in my area usually has at least 5 free CRT tv's at any one time.

@eusebiusthunked5259

4 жыл бұрын

You know, there's a special pair of sunglasses ... Oh wait, you're not colorblind like the 8-Bit Guy, just your monitor.

@niko5008

Жыл бұрын

@@eusebiusthunked5259 lmao? You seemed personally affected by it

I'm not really sure if someone commented this, or even me when I first saw the video, but every TV has a "colour" setting. Most of times, if you get it all way down to 0, you get a really sharp monochrome signal. I tested it with a NES, and works flawlessly. Surely enough, your TV will have that same configuration, and the same "trick"

The pass-through aspect reminded me of the SEGA 32x.

It just hit me that the music that starts at 2:54 is ABSOLUTELY the stuff you would hear in a corporate video (a "how to use your newly bought item" kind of thing, or maybe a training vid from a chain of stores, or just an '80s or early '90s ad on TV). Brilliant choice!

Nice work! I recently discovered your channel and you never cease to amaze me how much effort you must put into creating these videos and deciphering the technology. I'm sure much of this work is done on trial and error basis. I too grew up in the 80' and 90's playing with this stuff and I love seeing a more detailed explanation of a lot of stuff I used back then. Keep posting videos!

5:05 GENERAL KENOBI!

Wow... that Commodore 1084 monitor is damn versatile : RGBs 15kHz, RGBi (TTL), S-video, composite video. And since it's a pretty sharp monitor, monochrome via composite video is very sharp as a result. The monochrome on it looks great, although not as great as those green phosphore dedicated monochrome screens, but still damn sharp! Also if you had one then you could take advantage of the Commodore 128's 80 columns mode in colour through RGBi, without needing a dedicated RGBi monitor in your setup. Pretty cool :)

@mikebell2112

7 жыл бұрын

Commodore color monitors always had great sound quality, such as the basic 1701. Then there was the 1084S, stereo speakers!

@KC9UDX

7 жыл бұрын

FinalBaton Keep in mind that there were many variations on the 1084 and 1084S. If you buy one, inspect it carefully.

@AiMR

7 жыл бұрын

NES System looked awesome on it!

@jeder6915

6 жыл бұрын

I have also seen scart shaped peg, so another rgb plug, although for europeans only, i guess

80 Columns? You showed my age! I know exactly what this video was about! Thanks for the memories!

Great video. Amazing how something can go from being a real challenge in one generation to something nobody thinks about or would imagine could be a problem in the next generation.

very easy way to understand the way the video connectors work. Great video

3:30 I see an HM6116 on the right hand side there. Those were the memory chips they used in the NES. 16KB SRAM. They're actually real easy to use. Ben Eater used them in his breadboard computer. I remember making a breadboard based RAM module based off of his design. They were probably used in everything in the 80's through to early 90's and probably beyond.

Another terrific video. As a proud owner of 2 VICs and 3 semi-functional C64s, I just want to say THANK YOU for bringing back a lot of great memories (ha!) on top of great technical explanations.

Informative as always. Nice little ASCII art program you wrote, too. Thanks for the valuable and educational content!

if 80 column mode was a necessity, there's good odds you'd just rule out the C64 from the get-go

@MattMcIrvin

4 жыл бұрын

In the world before the IBM PC, things might have been different. But the IBM-compatibles were already taking over the business market at this point.

@odysseyguyperson

Жыл бұрын

@@MattMcIrvin Before the IBM PC, There was no C64! (It released in 1982, 1 year *after* the IBM PC in 1981.)

@emretamer_gyiad

Жыл бұрын

@@MattMcIrvin 80 column was a necessity for typewriter compatibility. :))

Why don't you have your own show on Discovery Channel yet ?you run one of the most amazing and informative retro shows on youtube

I really like your videos. You are so calm and clear to explain stuff which makes them very enjoyable. Keep up the good work!!

So I stumbled on to this video mostly because of the title. I loved my C64 in the early 80s. As the video played I'm thinking to myself, "I wonder if he'll mention the word processor and adaptor I used in college?" So I'm trying to remember its name... holy smokes, Paperclip! That's the one! I bought the adapter and a monochrome amber monitor to go with it! Served me well through many papers, with my Okidata 82a printer. We've come a long way. Thanks for this post. This was fun! :)

Awesome! Thanks for another Commodore video. In 1988 I bought a used C-128 and 1571. I liked the 128's 80 column mode for calling BBS's and word processing but I was disappointed that there were few if any games that took advantage of of the 128's hardware.

Some of my earliest days on the internet were with an 80-column C64 terminal program called VIPterm.

@thegoodrevbadandyarr4272

Жыл бұрын

Im not sure if that was the specific one, but I definitely had an 80 col terminal program, too. I spend a good amount of time making my own custom font for it as well, not being satisfied with how cool/legible the other options were to me (mine was one of these kinda fat futuristic type fonts). Took some fiddling, but I finally got it to where I was pretty happy with it.

I'm subbed to over 100 you tubers, many with millions of subscribers. Still this channel is by far my favorite. I grew up with all this stuff, I love the nostalgia it brings back. Keep up the amazing vids!

Your videos are so fascinating. Thank you for pulling stuff apart and collecting all this gear.

@0deer0se

5 жыл бұрын

I want to find a PET for you!! lol

Compute Magazine published Speed Script, a fairly decent word processor, machine language program around 1982. This was the beginning of the "business application wars". To this point most of the 8 bit machines were used by hobbyist and gamers but most of the manufactures knew the real potential for computers was in business application. The problem with Speed Script was in it's display of 40 characters. The typical typed or printed page was 80 characters (plus or minus a few). While Speed Script put line breaks and line feeds at the end of 80 characters it could not display what the printed page would actually look like Several months after publishing Speed Script, Compute Mag published Screen-80 which is similar to the first software driven 80 character display shown in the video and it had the same display results and drawbacks. The next problem was that the Commodore printer couldn't print using it's standard font set in 80 character so the text had to be sent to the printer as a bit map in order to replicate what was on the screen. Needless to say you could take a 10 minute coffee break while you waited for a single page document to print out. Aside from that, in order to try to speed up the print, Speed Script would blank the screen. Once you started printing you could do nothing else until it finished. I was able to overcome this a bit by vectoring out of the print routine to my own "plug in" that outputted on the user parallel interface to a 24 pin HP printer (I was a field tech for United Press Int at the time) that could be switched from 40 to 80 character mode using it's own font sets. This reduced the print time immensely since I was sending character codes in 8 bit parallel rather than single graphic pixels. Except for using Speed Script, I really found little use for 80 column display. It could be used to code some interesting character graphic screens and games but they also suffered from the slow nature and limited color of the display software. All in all I wouldn't say this caused the death of the Commodore 64. When IBM came out with 256 color pallet based EGA display and Amiga with it's 8 layered pallet graphics, even with all the graphics tricks the poor C64 simply could not compete with what gamers wanted and began to find their final resting place on the closet top shelf. Speed Script published in Computes Second Book of Commodore 64 Screen-80 published in Computes Third Book of Commodore 64 free download in PDF and text format: archive.org/details/commodore_c64_books

@RandyWaage

5 жыл бұрын

I LOVED Speedscript! It was a great word processor and well worth the price of an issue of COMPUTE! magazine. I used it exclusively to write all of my college papers. I'm pretty sure I typed in Screen 80 from COMPUTE! too and was lucky enough to buy an Amber monitor from a thrift store to use it with. As pointed out in the video that type of program slowed down the output quite a bit. The 80 column display was elusive on the C64, but I always thought it was cool. Seemed like a semi big deal when they had 80 column on the C128. :)

@bwc1976

2 жыл бұрын

Oh man, I remember seeing SpeedScript in the magazine! I wonder how many people actually bothered to type it in, and how many decided to just order it on disk instead. Dang I miss Compute! and other magazines like that. It was very educational seeing how the BASIC source code from different computers compared to each other, and I was especially impressed with how the Amiga version didn't use line numbers and was more like what became QBASIC on the PC.

@3DPDK

2 жыл бұрын

@@bwc1976 The machine language code was not difficult to type in if you used the code entry program provided by Compute. I added my own code to it to make a number pad out of the keyboard and with a minimum of practice learned to use it by feel. I never took my eye off the page of code and used my finger to keep track of where I was. I made the error checksum sound a buzz and erase the eight numbers in the line just entered. You simply re-entered the line without skipping a beat. I don't recall ever running one of these typed in programs that crashed because of a bad entry on my part.

Nice visual effects. It seems your editing has improved.

One thing worth noting on the Apple II is that the 80 column standard - at least as far as software was concerned - on that platform actually /wasn't/ an Apple standard. Instead, it was the Videx Videoterm that set the standard, which emulated a Datamedia 1520 terminal (I think). And, it worked in a similar way to the first C64 cartridge that you showed - the Apple II sent commands and characters to the card, which maintained its own screen buffer. I believe initially, it didn't automatically switch modes, though, you had to flip a physical switch. But, later, activating the card firmware activated the card's video output as well. In any case, everyone just cloned /that/ card, rather than doing their own thing, which is what made everything go a lot more smoothly. And, Videx themselves released a 132 column card. This basically meant that you couldn't get away with twiddling the hardware directly, because different cards did slightly different things, and you had to rely on the firmware, as far as I can tell (even though Videx documented how to twiddle the hardware directly). When the Apple //e was being designed, 80 column functionality was added to the motherboard chipset (the 80 column cards for the //e are merely RAM cards, adding the RAM necessary for 80 column mode in a bankswitched area on top of existing video memory, and the video hardware alternates which bank it pulls from for each byte). This means that in the //e, 80 column is now memory-mapped, where it wasn't on the Videx card. However, for compatibility, Apple implemented Videx-compatible firmware for 80 column mode, so software written for Videx would still work. Essentially, Apple subsumed a third-party standard into their own platform.

Don’t forget that the 128’s VDC was in fact accessible in the machine’s C64 mode. It’s still mapped into memory.

@waynemorellini2110

3 ай бұрын

Interesting to know.

Why 80 columns? Because in 1928 the Tabulating Machine Company designed a punch card with 80 columns.

@GaryCameron780

4 жыл бұрын

80 columns is the width of a standard piece of paper in a typewriter or dot matrix printer. If you're using the computer for word processing you want 80 columns. I have an apple //e and Appleworks which uses 80 columns. Much nicer and easier to work with than say Magic Window which uses 40 columns.

@EebstertheGreat

4 жыл бұрын

@@GaryCameron780 In the U.S., TTY was limited to 72 columns, and typewriters varied a lot. Most weren't monospaced anyway. Ultimately, it was the influence of the IBM punched cards that led to IBM PCs using 80 columns, and that ultimately (briefly) became the standard.

@GaryCameron780

4 жыл бұрын

@@EebstertheGreat Interesting regarding TTY though typewriters are mono-spaced. At least all the ones I've ever used are. Back in the day I remember two basic type faces: Pica and elite. the differences were 10 characters per inch and 12 characters per inch. 80 columns at 10 cpi is 8 inches with 1/4 inch in each side for a margin.

@AiOinc1

4 жыл бұрын

@@GaryCameron780 A rather large amount of typewriters are variable width. Only the absolute most basic ones were constant width. I've seen portable typewriters from the 50s with variable width fonts.

@mahna_mahna

4 жыл бұрын

This conversation got me interested and I poked around google. Some cool old marketing copy can be found for proportional spaced typewriters if you do an image search for *proportional spacing typewriter*

The Commodore 128's separate video ports for 80 column and 40 column were awesome, not a design flaw at all. It was my first dual screen software development experience, since you could run both at once. Developing game code on the 80 column screen while viewing the codes results on the 40 column.

@The8BitGuy

7 жыл бұрын

Might have been good for niche uses.. but it would have seen more use had it been integrated into one video chip.

@RandyDandy7467

6 жыл бұрын

The 128 did have some good software support for the 80-column mode. In college, about 28 years ago, I was using my C128 with two displays; an amber monochrome I used for the 80-column mode, and a regular 13" TV for the 40-column 128 or C64 mode. That way, I could have my 80 columns for serious work, and 40 columns in color for my games. I did have GEOS 128 and a Star NX-1000C printer, but there were so many issues with the printer jamming and leaving off pixels at the end of lines on printouts, that I eventually had to give it up and go with Fleet System II, which fully supported the 128 mode and 80 columns, and worked beautifully with same printer. Also, let's not forget the reason that Commodore did the separate ports was for full C64 compatibility. However, ironically that same 100% C64 compatibility might have been what caused the C128 to die early; because few were using the C-128 mode; most were using the C-64 mode and playing games.

@keiyakins

5 жыл бұрын

It's such a useful trick that IBM did it too: you could run with both an MDA and CGA card

I really think, commodore didn't push development regarding 80 columns on the c64 because it would have interfered with the pet line sales. Think about how many small company's bought a pc mostly because of word processing and spread sheets. Great video, just awesome as usual.

I did not expect the 4th option :P Very interesting topic and great video as always, keep the good work!!!

Lol....the quest for perfection on obsolete hardware! I love it!

@KC9UDX

7 жыл бұрын

MadMalcolm D Commodore 64s never go obsolete.

@SpearM3064

7 жыл бұрын

No, 1983 was when it was introduced. 1993 is when they stopped producing it (mostly because the company went out of business.)

@ConstantinosE

7 жыл бұрын

MadMalcolm D Is your hardware between your legs also obsolete?

@EgoShredder

7 жыл бұрын

I guess it is if the feminazis have their sperm banks! :-D

@KWatson1984

7 жыл бұрын

If human cloning becomes a reality, don't be surprised if they advocate for male feticide for the "safety of all women."

Excellent video! It seems that where C64 stays behind, Amstrad CPC excels.

I had a C128 as a teen. Had the monitor as well. I did use both the monitor and a TV to program games. Programmed so the tv would show gaming graphics and the monitor would show stats like lives left or ammunition. Had fun with it. Programming helped me when I joined the Navy as a Aviation Electronics Technician.

The ONE use I can think of that I would have LOVED that for was back in my BBS days. I used to use a C64 terminal program (I forget the name now) that used that software, 80 column font. I even edited my own version of it back then to improve the look. I had a TV, and had to strain to see what some of the letters were, but you got used to it and it helped a lot with logging on to and viewing IBM BBSes and such. We had a ton of BBSes back in the day where I lived so it was nice to be able to do that. I kind of wish I had a C128 back then, it would have been perfect for browsing BBSes on. One thing I do recall about the C64 is that you could copy it's character set to RAM which was hidden under the RAM which the character set used. It was interesting to program, you read from the character ROM and then poked the same value to the same memory location, only it would be written to the RAM under it. You then disabled the character ROM and it would use the characters you copied under it which you could then redefine to look how you wished. So, for BASIC programs, you didn't really waste any memory for the 80 column font as you used hidden RAM under the character ROM, not normally available for use anyhow. I remember programs that would use that hidden RAM for RAMDISKS for the C64.

@The8BitGuy

7 жыл бұрын

I actually had a small section in this video about that very topic, using 80-columns to call IBM BBSs... But I cut it out because the video was getting too long and those scenes were going to be tough to film.

The real best selling and self-booting computer of all time, the Atari 8-bit family, was 40 column as well. 80 column text could be done in Graphics 8 via software, but there were 3 hardware add ons that provided 80 columns. Of those, the Atari XEP80 was compatible with all Atari 8-bits since it connected via a joystick port as well as providing an industry standard printer port.

@The8BitGuy

7 жыл бұрын

I've been looking for one of those XEP80s...

@KuraIthys

7 жыл бұрын

A Floyd the monitor in this video reminds me of the monitor I had with my 800XL's when I still had those in the early 90's. Kinda miss that green on black display. We had a 286 at the same time that had an actual monochrome display. (eg. White phosphor, not green or amber). I liked messing around with the 800XL... I had two of them and about 400 games, but never got most of them to work. I was actually surprised 800XL's usually had floppy drives, because both of mine had tape drives. And I hever really had the patience for dealing with tape drives. I had about a dozen cartridges too though I think... I had two due simply to it being a cheap way to get tons of software second-hand. The plotter was amusing too. In hindsight I wish I kept those things. But chances are I would have lost them anyway. That's what happened to the snes I had at the same time after all. The 800's I sold. Ironically perhaps to the same person that technically stole my snes afterwards. Never leave stuff with people unless you really trust them. You may never get it back. XD

You are one of the best KZreadrs out there! Your tech videos are always brilliant and you upload regularly! Keep up the good work. 😀

Great channel! I've started repairing old computers thanks to you explaining it so well! Keep up the great work!

Thank you 8 bit guy for the subtitles and understand the video well :) deaf guy with CI here. Love your content of old computers and software. Keep up the awesome work!

"Batteries included" is an awesome company name! 😂

@KenKeenan1973

5 жыл бұрын

They made a great paint program for the Atari ST called DEGAS

I really like your videos, a hug from Brazil!

@derekwildstar1572

7 жыл бұрын

Hahaha que maneiro achar outro brasileiro que assiste o 8-Bit Guy. =)

@CosmicEffect

7 жыл бұрын

Somos muitos por aqui :)

@julius4543

7 жыл бұрын

Somos 3 que assistimos ele! hehehe

@derekwildstar1572

7 жыл бұрын

Cosmic Effect NOSSA, até você por aqui Eric huahuahuahuah

@CosmicEffect

7 жыл бұрын

DerekWildstar >até você por aqui Haha, acho que é ao contrário: como eu *não* estaria por aqui assistindo (atenção, lista é longa e só tem os excelentes pra cima!) 8-Bit Guy, LGR, My Life In Gaming, AHOY, Classic Gaming Quarterly, Lord Karnage, Game Sack, Matt Chat, Retro Core, HappyConsoleGamer... :D É só dar uma espiada na aba "Sobre" do CFX, rs... Abs!

I like how you don't beg/harrass/plead youtubers to like and subscribe, love the channel David keep up the great work!

I never knew that composite could output such a sharp picture until I saw that green screen monitor

3:36 mysterious beep

Ah, four shades of green... #Memories...

I literally know nothing (except what I've learned here) about retro computing or computers in general and this is still one of my favorite shows, keep up the good work can't wait for the next episode!!

YES ANOTHER VIDEO! I am honestly always in wait of more content, love your stuff.

Ah, television. You know, when you talk about text you run into the implied resolution. 40 columns of text with 8 pixel characters is of course 320 pixels. 80 columns of the same character set would be 640 pixels. Fine if you're using a monitor... But A tv? Tv signals for that era are of course analogue. When you look at the standards you notice they mention 'lines' of resolution, but not the number of pixels in a line. ...Because a line is a continuous analogue signal, and thus has no explicitly defined resolution. However, TV's do. And I actually counted the pixels on my last two CRT tv's... Both were late 90's Panasonic models, and one was PAL, the other multiregion (so basically supports everything), though the PAL model supported PAL 60 too, which technically means NTSC... NTSC is defined as having 525 lines, and PAL as 625 (OK, yes, technically these names refer to the colour encoding standards, but this is confusing enough already). however, not all of this is visible. it includes v-blank and overscan and the like. DVD's defined the resolutions as 720x480 and 720x576 respectively, but what about the actual TV's? Well, it turns out both these Panasonic TV's had a resolution of 480x480 pixels for the visible part of the screen. My super famicom outputs 224 lines and of these 222 were visible onscreen (though keep in mind the 240p hack means one of the fields and thus half the lines are blank). but I do believe the screen is 480 lines and not 444, because it is ultimately a PAL tv first, and NTSC second, and 480 lines would distort the expected aspect ratio of an ntsc signal. But anyway, these are late 90's TV's, so you could expect older ones to be worse. (I also had an early 90's lcd tv that had I believe a resolution of 160x120 or so) The problem here should be somewhat obvious though. If you have just 480 actual pixels in a line... You could never show 640 pixels and get a clear picture. It'll end up blurred. And 40 column text with 8 pixel wide characters would fit, but 80 column text would exceed the resolution of the display by quite a margin (160 pixels short) unless you used narrower characters. (but then you have less definition to the characters themselves). And then there are a bunch of other issues like those caused by composite video signals... Yeah. High resolution ANYTHING using a TV rather than a monitor is quite a challenge.

aaaaaa you upload so frequently I love it

I just love your videos! One of my favorite channels! Keep up the great work and greetings from Germany :)

I remember being amazed at how cheap a color monitor was for the C64. Combined with a garage-sale VCR I had myself both a crisp computer monitor and a nice color television using the VCR's built-in tuner. This was fine for 80col text. I only needed 80-col for word processing and if I recall correctly, PaperClip handled that in software.

Great video! FWIW, I did extensive word processing on my C-64. it wasn't WYSIWYG, but it was just fine. I wouldn't want to work that way today, but it's a stretch to say it was unusable for non gaming. GEOS a few years later did some awesome things.

@CmdrKroz

7 жыл бұрын

Agreed. What killed the C-64 as a business machine was the IBM brand entering the personal computer market. The glacial speeds of the Commodore 1541 disk drives certainly didn't help. :)

@oldtwinsna8347

6 жыл бұрын

The 64 never had any hope of being a business machine without the 80 columns. It's not like 80 columns was unheard of during that time. It was common and expected feature for anyone doing word processing, which was the huge attraction of computing at the time. Businesses didn't mind paying extra money for computers back then that worked better.

Although being released in 1984, the Amstrad CPC had built-in 80 columns screen mode.

@diogenesesenna9323

2 жыл бұрын

I still miss my CPC 6128.

@alonecoder600

2 жыл бұрын

Timex Sinclair 2068 released in 1983 also had kinda "80 column" gfx mode (monochrome 512x192). Many other ZX Spectrum clones (SAM Coupe, Byte, Profi, ATM-Turbo, GMX, Pentagon with add-ons) also had similar modes.

+The 8-Bit Guy When I was a kid I owned a commodore 64 and I began to write a 80 columns program in assembly code, using bitmap display. I never finished it because at the same time the Atari ST and the Amiga were released. In Europe we are lucky when it comes to plug old computers in TV sets, because we have the great / infamous /clumsy / unreliable /featurefull (strike the wrong words) scart connector, with RGB, composite, svideo and stereo sound on the same connector. Pluging a C128 is really easy with one wire, and only a switch to switch TV between composite 40 columns colors and RGB 80 columns.

@mipmipmipmipmip

7 жыл бұрын

CaptainDangeax With 80 column editing I wonder if there was a Fortran compiler for C64.

@KC9UDX

7 жыл бұрын

mipmipmipmipmip Even in 40 columns there was.

Great music in this episode! That commodore Blue sure brings back some memories!

4:58 General Kenobi

My dad tells me about how amazing his Commodore 64 was when he got one when he was in college.

@FalcoTheImpaler

7 жыл бұрын

Same can be said for the Nokia 3310, but I played Snake until the buttons fell off my first cellphone.

@GeoNeilUK

7 жыл бұрын

Its floppy disk drive had more processing power than the computer itself and the cassette routines were buggy to the point that *every* games publisher wrote their own routines to stop their games taking an hour to load. Once he games had loaded however, the C64 was a great machine.

@SpearM3064

7 жыл бұрын

Actually, no it didn't. It had the *same* processing power (a 6502 CPU running at 1 MHz) as the computer itself. The disk drives that came with the PET were faster because they had dual 6502's, one of which did all the GCR encoding/decoding and the other did everything else, but on the 1541 they decided to use just one 6502 to save on cost. The cassette routines were not buggy... they were the most reliable in the industry. The problem is that the *hardware* (the 6522 I/O chips in the VIC-20) were buggy, forcing the computer to use "bit banging" (software) to time the tape reads and writes. As you say, game publishers wrote their own routines that sacrificed reliability for speed (such as writing only one copy of the program instead of two, etc) to speed things up. The Commodore 64 had 6526 I/O chips which did not have the bug that the 6522 did... but you were still stuck with the slow, software-driven load routines because some idiot put a screw hole where one of the traces would have gone, so the C64 still had to use bit banging. It wasn't until the Commodore 128 and the 1571 disk drive that the computer and the drive had fully-functional hardware I/O. There were some aftermarket products that required modifications to the C64 and 1541 (such as JiffyDOS) which included new BIOS ROMs and working I/O that gave the 1541 the speed it should have had, and game publishers developed their own formats that worked both as copy protection and a super-speed loader, such as the Epyx Vorpal system. Vorpal was about 23 times faster than the standard Commodore format, could store about 20% more data per track, and except for track 18 (where the directory was, and where the Vorpal routines were hidden), could not be read by a copier expecting the standard CBM format.

@RussellTeapot

7 жыл бұрын

I know about "head banging", but not about "bit banging"

@SpearM3064

7 жыл бұрын

Bit banging just means that *software* directly sets and samples the state of pins on the microcontroller, and is responsible for all parameters of the signal: timing, levels, synchronization, etc. Originally, this was supposed to be done by *hardware* (the 6522 I/O chip), but as I mentioned, the 6522 had a bug. As a result, the CPU has to do all the extra work that the 6522 was supposed to do. And this is the reason why the tape and the disk drive were so slow.

That purplish Blue Screen, in the intro. Reminds me so much of the opening parts of GTA Vice City when you start the game up, but being it was meant to be like 80s retro, it makes so much sense. lol

Great video on pure tech history, and astonishing modern works on it!

"the final cartridge 3" has a bult-in word processor that runs in 80 columns.

TASWORD (writeprocesor) use 80 columns in MSX too .. I remember this tecnic in this vídeo I was have an MSX bug I LOVE all sistems of 8 bit! (Now Im back to program in c.m. with commodore and I like!!)

@amcadam26

7 жыл бұрын

ricardo gil lozano I used tasword on the amstrad CPC. that had 80 column mode in two colours.

@dipi71

7 жыл бұрын

Just when I wanted to write a comment about not mentioning the Amstrad CPC464 (or, as it was distributed by Schneider in Germany, the Schneider CPC464) -- yeah, even on a color monitor like my still sharp and working CTM 640, the 80-column graphics mode (640×200 pixels) was just part of the workflow; either by using the »mode« command -- part of Locomotive Basic -- or by using programs like several games, switching mode during H-sync interrupt. And who can remember the copy cursor, copying text from its location to the primary cursor location by pressing the _COPY_ key? Adorable!

I've been watching since the beginning and your fascinating content always impresses me Keep it up! :D

Your channel is awesome thanks from the U.K. for your hard work. Loving it!

My Atari 130xe was 40 column stock, but the original owner had put an 80 column expansion card in. I never actually got the card to work.

@bluejaygamesyt6438

7 жыл бұрын

hi

@jan_harald

7 жыл бұрын

Kazriko Redclaw so? it probably used another initializing address or something + maybe something was needed but got removed by the owner for one reason or another... some solutions are so hacky they only work for one person and not another, especially old hardware hacks...

@kazriko

7 жыл бұрын

It didn't come with any documentation. Only a toggle switch on the side that says 80 col. The switch did nothing though. When I took it apart I did see a small board hacked into the system board then wired to the switch.

@vwestlife

7 жыл бұрын

Atari had their own 80-column add-on for the 8-bit 400/800/XL/XE computer series, the XEP-80. It connected to the joystick port, supported graphics as well as text, and included a parallel printer port. But there wasn't much software support for it either, aside from Atari's own AtariWriter 80 word processor.

@melodywhispersong9541

6 жыл бұрын

Kazriko Redclaw I swear you profile picture is a miqo'te

4:18 "No significant advantage" - Well, that mode has no borders, what I find, is a noticable advantage. :)

@warp9988

3 жыл бұрын

poke 53280,0:poke 53281,0

Good work as always David, very informative and well explained.

This stuff is enthralling to me for some reason I cannot completely grasp. Thank you so much for making these!!

Обожаю ваш ретро канал! Большое спасибо!!!=)

Nice video. As always

love your channel man and learning about old gadgets and computers!

I love this channel. I get to enjoy the trials and tribulations of a realm of computing I was never a part of.

I fond this video very interesting!

Hi! what about connect a monitor with s-video input to C64/128? can it improve 80-cols display?

@simonrichard9873

7 жыл бұрын

The c64 can't produce 80 columns text out of the box.

@tjja7321

6 жыл бұрын

Iván Escobar no cuz it’s the same tv. Also did it even have svideo?

@johnklumpp7901

6 жыл бұрын

In essence, it did but Commodore named it "Chroma - Luma". Quite early on I had a 1701 monitor and the signal connected to four pins. The Chroma - Luma (SVideo in a later era) display was very sharp compared to RF or Composite. One could even use half the pins on the Commodore Chroma - Luma lead to display the 80 Column mode, in monochrome, from a C128.

@someguy2135

5 жыл бұрын

@@simonrichard9873 I assume he meant using 80 column software.

@oldtwinsna8347

5 жыл бұрын

native resolution is too poor on c64.

nothing but the best from you keep up the great work!

so great to see you putting out videos this quickly!

Funny, being from that time, like you, I’m partial to the Apples, Commodores and the Atari 8-bit machines, but wonder why you fail to mention, review, or do projects with the Atari computers? I’d love to see some Atari 8-bit content on your channel! :)

@warp9988

3 жыл бұрын

Surely there are other channels that have more atari content? Atari 8 bit owners and Commodore 8 bit owners were fairly discordial to each other back in the day. Apple owners tended to be richer as their machines cost the most. Atari and Commodore owners had similar budgets, but once you picked an ecosystem, most people stayed on it. At least that's how it was in my town. You picked your tribe and you stuck in it. Funny tho.

@user-tb5ns7hc5i

3 жыл бұрын

Warp I agree it is strange. The Atari’s were significantly more costly than the Commodores though falling price wise in between the Apples at the top and the Commodores at the Bottom. For quality of materials and construction though many of the Ataris were actually as well built with similar higher quality parts as the Apples, that is, until Atari was sold to the Tramiels and the rest was history. Ataris bad rap where they went wrong was sticking with their game marketing, which caused their demise due to lack of focus on cheap home computing which is why Commodore won that battle. It’s a shame though, as the Ataris were easily arguably superior hardware... they just never were positioned, priced, nor marketed properly in the marketplace. Interesting and not well known fact, Atari had the rights to produce the Amiga instead of what became their ST line before Commodore did, which all changed when Tramiels bought Atari. Atari without a doubt would have become Apple if all of their engineers and artists had not departed to Apple before their sale. Apple’s early Corp culture and DNA is in fact mostly imported from Atari. Most people do not realize just how important Atari was to the core creation and development of Silicon Valley... Likely just as critical as Xerox, IBM and HP, especially for what became Apple. Jobs and Woz saw what worked (quality, art) and what didn’t (games, drug culture) at Atari and corrected it. Brilliant move.

This is probably a stupid question with too much of today's thinking... but would it have been possible for them to add RAM to the cartridges like they do with video cards today to mitigate RAM usage from the computer itself? Or do these cartridges have nothing in common with video cards?

@The8BitGuy

7 жыл бұрын

Well, in this case, adding RAM actually slows the performance down. But that's because this card isn't doing any onboard rendering of graphics. In those days, it was faster if the video chip could access the computer's main memory when it comes to displaying text and graphics.

@vaderexmachina

7 жыл бұрын

The 8-Bit Guy still no luck with the SID2SID?

@HappySlappyFace

7 жыл бұрын

The 8-Bit Guy miracle cartridge?

@TheTurnipKing

7 жыл бұрын

in theory, yes. In practice, however you're hitting the 64k barrier that was the effective RAM limit on most common 8-bit processors as a result of their 16bit wide address bus. To support more you require extra logic for address decoding, which will cause a speed hit.

@hans-joachimbierwirth4727

7 жыл бұрын

Additional address decoding does not cause a speed hit. I did this using a second CIA to address 64+512+512 KB on my C64. I even enjoyed higher memory speed using DMA instead of the annoying slow 6510 to move around my bits.

A great video again. Thank you for all the effort you put into it!

Hey man! I don't know what it is, but recently your vids have become so much better since the past 3 or 4 episodes. Keep it up man

First external gpu???.

@MAX-uh6kh

4 жыл бұрын

youre right but shut up

@CharlesHepburn2

4 жыл бұрын

More like a TPU.... text processing unit.

You somewhat forgot GEOS

@MichaelGisiger

7 жыл бұрын

javier gonzalez Yup, GEOS 128 runs on 80 columns, and ist was/is great!

@eusebiusthunked5259

4 жыл бұрын

@@MichaelGisiger but not GEOS on C64 I imagine?

@MichaelGisiger

4 жыл бұрын

@@eusebiusthunked5259 No, but GEOS128 for the C128 ran in 80 columns mode

@eusebiusthunked5259

4 жыл бұрын

@@MichaelGisiger sure, but the quest for 80 columns on the C128 was not so treacherous, simply use the hardware intended to provide the feature. GEOS 64 in 80 column more would have been even more impressive... They could have eaten Macintosh immediately.

I found this video completely fascinating. Thank you much! Thumbs up!

*No way!* I had the data pak video 80 in my collection for years! I had no idea what the heck it did. I've since only been able to find three web pages (not sites, pages) about the darn thing on the entire English speaking internet, even then only mentioning that it... increases the text columns to 80. There was almost NO information available about the Video pak 80. Good job shedding light on the most enigmatic and haunting peripheral I've ever owned. Thanks 8-bit guy. P.S. I sold it, along with a bunch of other C64 items to the Seattle computer museum lol

80 columns on the PAL machines using the software mode turned out to be a little more legible due to the higher resolution of the PAL TV standard regardless of the C64 resolution being 320x200 or 160x200 in high res or multicolour modes on both NTSC and PAL machines.

@ramdrivesys1869

7 жыл бұрын

The resolution was not very different. It is the higher CHROMA (color) resolution that made it more legible. NTSC color resolution is like 40x40, completely terrible.

Did you draw that dinosaur picture?

@The8BitGuy

7 жыл бұрын

No.. Somebody else did.

@JesperGravgaard

7 жыл бұрын

See csdb.dk/release/?id=121498 for the original picture

@robintst

7 жыл бұрын

It was impressive, nonetheless. :)

I had one of these. Thanks for making this one. I'm Canadian and the batteries included device I think was made in Richmond Hill (a city within the greater Toronto area).

So I just finished modding my BI-80 adapter tonight. Since the adapter was just using luma and I do not have a dedicated monitor like what is in the video, I ended up modding in some S-Video ports to replace the RCA jacks. I soldered in the luma lines and luma ground in the board and did some pass-through lines for everything else. The result is a really nice S-Video setup for my Commodore 64. The image looks really good on my CRT tv and video capture devices. Also for using PaperClip with 80 columns (for those who care), you have to modify the load command given (assuming your disk drive is device id 8: load" paperclip64?-80",8 Or for Spellpack versions: load" pclip 64?-80-s?",8 Great content even years later

COME BACK AWESOME AIRGUNS MAN!!!!

I didn't like this one. There was no vinegar at all.

@ongong9772

7 жыл бұрын

King Parodije This isnt a repair vid

I had a VIC20, a C64, then later a C128. I was able to get 80col monochrome on a 1702 monitor. I used an RGB connector, an RCA connector, and some left over RG58 coax from a ham radio antenna I built. I soldered one end of the center connector to the pin on a RGB connector and the other to the RCA and plugged it into the front and it worked. The resolution wasn't great, but it did work and I was able to do word processing using Paperclip on it. Definitely not plug and play. Fun days.

thanks nice retro-ing. Also, as an old-skool geek, I commend your technical accuracy in all these vids.