10 Print "Kiwi_Steve" 20 goto 10

Introduce yourself. Tell people why you are interested in vintage computers and what (if anything) you've got.

10 Print "Kiwi_Steve" 20 goto 10

Postby kiwi_steve on Mon Jan 31, 2011 9:53 pm

That was me, age approx. 11... on a ZX81 (or maybe a ZX80? I can't recall now), at an informal 'computer club' at Tahuna Normal Intermediate in Dunedin... and from then on I was hooked.

I had to use other peoples computers for a while to get my fix, as I was unable to convince my parents to get me a micro - but I eventually got a Spectravideo SV328 MkII (from a little shop called Computer Call at the 'terminus' at the top of Silverton St) for Christmas one year when I was about 13 or 14, and spent a lot of time on it over the next couple of years. (I also ended up working in that shop after school for the person that bought it off the original owner - and the original owner I believe was the guy that produced the Kiwi-MSX magazines - of which I had the full set - all gone now. I also think the original owners brother may have lived in Cromwell and had an appliance / computer store there? faded memories that someone may be able to fill in).

Around that time I also managed to score myself a TRS-80 and an EACA Colour Genie (which I would very much love to get my hands on again) which I played with quite a bit over the next couple of years.

And does anyone remember Eclipse Radio and Computers just down Stuart St from the Octagon? I spent a lot of time messing about on the computers there... fond memories of totally ignoring the "oh no, its that kid again" looks from the staff - my all-time favourite shop in Dunedin. Ever. Period.

As to what happened to all my old computer equipment... well, I'm ashamed to admit that I pulled the TRS-80 apart for 'experiments', and the other two computers eventually went to the tip after my parents got sick of them lying about for years after I had left home. Gone were countless hours of programs on countless numbers of cassettes, countless magazines, and all the hardware. And just recently I've started to wish I had it all back... but oh well...

I would also like to take time out of this into to make a rather belated heartfelt thanks to a guy in Dunedin who's name I can no longer remember (but I think, from memory, he lived on Forbury Rd) who helped me a lot with the Colour Genie, including a bit of machine code, help in building and coding a light pen and a printer interface. I wish I could thank him for the help he gave me then, and the hours he spent teaching me. I still remember with awe the speed difference in moving a pixel around the screen between BASIC and machine code.

On finishing the 7th form at OBHS I went into the Air Force and dropped computing completely due to the sheer effort involved in the training and all the moving about I was doing... but picked it up again some years later (in the 386 days) and got right back into it in a big way... Since then I've run my own IT contracting business, taught computer techs at Polytech, developed websites in HTML and CMS-based sites in Drupal, and have now come full circle and I'm back at school (Canterbury Uni) doing a degree in Computer Science which I will follow up with a post-grad secondary teaching diploma so I can teach computer science at a high-school level.

Most recently (about 2 or 3 hours ago) I purchased a non-operational Spectravideo SV328 from TradeMe - which is what led me here tonight : ) I'm looking forward to getting it home, getting it going and doing something with it (although I really don't know what, just yet). It has no data cassette with it, so I'll need to come up with some way of getting programs in and out - I might just rig something up to save them as MP3's on my laptop or Android phone... who knows... So many projects, so little time :)

So thats me in a nutshell, thanks for having me here.

Steve
Old stuff I own: Casio PB-100, Spectravideo SV-328, AY-3-8500 IC (Just waiting till I have time to build a Pong game with my daughter)
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Re: 10 Print "Kiwi_Steve" 20 goto 10

Postby lizardb0y on Mon Jan 31, 2011 10:03 pm

Hi Steve, and welcome!

I'm a Dunedin lad myself, and remember Eclipse very well indeed. I particularly remember seeing th SV318 and Osborne One in there.

If you don't want the C64 box that came with the 328, I'll be happy to take it off your hands ;)
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Re: 10 Print "Kiwi_Steve" 20 goto 10

Postby tezza on Mon Jan 31, 2011 10:09 pm

Hi Steve, and welcome to the Forums. It's great to hear people's stories and connect up with other enthusiasts.

I managed to get my hands on a Colour Genie a couple of years ago. Having a System 80, I really wanted one when they came out. It took 28 years or so but I finally scored a 32k unit. Did yours have the original ROMs or updated ones?

Re: the Spectravideo 328. I'm not sure if it has the same cassette interface as my SV318 but this is how I built a software library for mine. The article might help.

I like the Spectravideos.

Cheers

Terry
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Re: 10 Print "Kiwi_Steve" 20 goto 10

Postby kiwi_steve on Tue Feb 01, 2011 9:58 am

lizardb0y wrote:Hi Steve, and welcome!

I'm a Dunedin lad myself, and remember Eclipse very well indeed. I particularly remember seeing th SV318 and Osborne One in there.

If you don't want the C64 box that came with the 328, I'll be happy to take it off your hands ;)


I actually don't really remember what computers I played with there, but I remember being there a lot :P

As for the SV318, my best mate got one about the same time I got the 328. We could do exactly the same stuff, but mine was a heck of a lot easier to program on because of the real keys. They might look way cool in a retro kind of way, but at the time they were awful (IMHO) :wink:

And I'll gladly give you the C64 box... I never really liked them, and had many a heated discussion about the relative merits of Z80 based systems over those nasty old 6502's, things like how the Spectravideo tape deck was damn near faster than the C64 disk drive, and how I could just type CLS, where C64 owners had to hack machine code to achieve the same thing... ah, the arguments I had... lol :) (I suspected back then that C64 owners were much akin to American car owners with their "I'd rather push my American car home than drive foreign rubbish" attitudes).

And now, having put myself offside with half the board, I'll go back to work, lol :)
Old stuff I own: Casio PB-100, Spectravideo SV-328, AY-3-8500 IC (Just waiting till I have time to build a Pong game with my daughter)
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Re: 10 Print "Kiwi_Steve" 20 goto 10

Postby kiwi_steve on Tue Feb 01, 2011 10:09 am

tezza wrote:Hi Steve, and welcome to the Forums. It's great to hear people's stories and connect up with other enthusiasts.

I managed to get my hands on a Colour Genie a couple of years ago. Having a System 80, I really wanted one when they came out. It took 28 years or so but I finally scored a 32k unit. Did yours have the original ROMs or updated ones?


I'm not sure what ROMs it had, but if you ever stumble across another one for sale, please let me know :)

tezza wrote:Re: the Spectravideo 328. I'm not sure if it has the same cassette interface as my SV318 but this is how I built a software library for mine. The article might help.


Thanks, I've had a quick read and I may just adapt something similar but skip the tapedeck step altogether... I'll just have to wait and see once I get the unit home and start playing with it.

tezza wrote:I like the Spectravideos.


Ditto :)

FYI: The South Island quiz game was written by the owner of Computer Call, the shop that my original 328 came from. He wrote a North Island one as well. I also believe he produced the KiwiMSX magazines, and had some nice graphics pads drawn up - one was 256x192 light blue grid for designing screen 1 graphics on and the other was a series of 8x8 grids for designing sprites on. I'll keep searching my memory, but I can't get the name "Peter" out of my head - and his brother? in Cromwell - Gary?... last name hasn't come back yet... it will come to me in time :)

There was also a young guy in Oamaru who wrote some very impressive games for the SV's - I really can't remember his name but I'm pretty sure he featured in at least one article in Bits and Bytes so if anyone has old copies of those then the info will be there...

Steve
Old stuff I own: Casio PB-100, Spectravideo SV-328, AY-3-8500 IC (Just waiting till I have time to build a Pong game with my daughter)
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Re: 10 Print "Kiwi_Steve" 20 goto 10

Postby kiwi_steve on Tue Feb 01, 2011 10:11 am

My brain is doing overtime... Peter George? I think that was his name... and Gary George from Cromwell... I think... They might be good sources of memorabilia if they are still around.

[edit] - googled a bit, came up with Gary Anderson in Cromwell... appliance store - this is ringing bells now... So maybe he wasn't a brother... or maybe a brother in-law? I'll have to keep thinking :) [/edit]

Anyone remember the names?

Steve
Last edited by kiwi_steve on Tue Feb 01, 2011 10:14 am, edited 1 time in total.
Old stuff I own: Casio PB-100, Spectravideo SV-328, AY-3-8500 IC (Just waiting till I have time to build a Pong game with my daughter)
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Re: 10 Print "Kiwi_Steve" 20 goto 10

Postby tezza on Tue Feb 01, 2011 10:14 am

kiwi_steve wrote:As for the SV318, my best mate got one about the same time I got the 328. We could do exactly the same stuff, but mine was a heck of a lot easier to program on because of the real keys. They might look way cool in a retro kind of way, but at the time they were awful (IMHO) :wink:
.

You are quite right! Luckily I acquired a SV728 when getting a haircut so now I can enjoy MSX as it should be (-:

Having cut my teeth on a Z80 machine, I used to have the same arguments with those insufferable 6502 Apple and Commodore users :D .
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Re: 10 Print "Kiwi_Steve" 20 goto 10

Postby lizardb0y on Tue Feb 01, 2011 10:20 am

kiwi_steve wrote:
lizardb0y wrote:I'm a Dunedin lad myself, and remember Eclipse very well indeed. I particularly remember seeing th SV318 and Osborne One in there.


I actually don't really remember what computers I played with there, but I remember being there a lot :P

I was definitely in there quite a lot as well. It's entirely possible we crossed paths at some stage :)

kiwi_steve wrote:As for the SV318, my best mate got one about the same time I got the 328. We could do exactly the same stuff, but mine was a heck of a lot easier to program on because of the real keys. They might look way cool in a retro kind of way, but at the time they were awful (IMHO) :wink:


I loved the little red joystick on the 318, which is why I remember it. The Osbourne was so different, and industrial, compared to everything else that it just stood out. I can even remember where they had these in the store!

kiwi_steve wrote:And I'll gladly give you the C64 box...


Thanks :) I'll PM you with details.

kiwi_steve wrote:I never really liked them, and had many a heated discussion about the relative merits of Z80 based systems over those nasty old 6502's,


Now, let's not go down that path eh ;) (Actually, I was a Z80 fanboy back then and regularly scoffed at their pedestrian 0.9Mhz and tiny instruction set, carefully avoiding the fact that the reduced instruction set executed in fewer cycles per instruction, compensating in a large part for the slower clock.)

kiwi_steve wrote:things like how the Spectravideo tape deck was damn near faster than the C64 disk drive,


I had a ZX81 that actually did load the same amount of data faster off tape than the 1541 could load from disk, by using a bandpass filter to clean the tape signal and a modified loading routine with faster timings.

I love the small of flamewar in the morning! Someone recently tried to start one up, cross-posting a hamfisted attack on Spectrum and Atari to comp.sys.sinclair, comp.sys.atari and comp.sys.cbm. It fizzled out as the troll was clearly an amateur.
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Re: 10 Print "Kiwi_Steve" 20 goto 10

Postby tezza on Tue Feb 01, 2011 10:28 am

lizardb0y wrote:I love the small of flamewar in the morning! Someone recently tried to start one up, cross-posting a hamfisted attack on Spectrum and Atari to comp.sys.sinclair, comp.sys.atari and comp.sys.cbm. It fizzled out as the troll was clearly an amateur.


Lol. Yea, fanboys *sigh*. Of course you still see it today with OS X vrs Windows vrs Linux, IPhone vrs Android etc. Tribalism seems to be hardwired. :) However, with age comes wisdom and an appreciation of how silly it all is.
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Re: 10 Print "Kiwi_Steve" 20 goto 10

Postby lizardb0y on Tue Feb 01, 2011 10:36 am

tezza wrote:
lizardb0y wrote:I love the small of flamewar in the morning! Someone recently tried to start one up, cross-posting a hamfisted attack on Spectrum and Atari to comp.sys.sinclair, comp.sys.atari and comp.sys.cbm. It fizzled out as the troll was clearly an amateur.


Lol. Yea, fanboys *sigh*. Of course you still see it today with OS X vrs Windows vrs Linux, IPhone vrs Android etc. Tribalism seems to be hardwired. :) However, with age comes wisdom and an appreciation of how silly it all is.


Not to mention the fact that I can't possibly attack any platform now, as I probably own one of them anyway :) [EDIT: the old platforms that is, not the new ones. I don't approve of any of the new ones.]

Except a Lisa. Still looking for one of them :-P
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Re: 10 Print "Kiwi_Steve" 20 goto 10

Postby YetiSeti on Mon Feb 21, 2011 10:44 pm

Hi Steve,

Computer Call - now there's a name from the past. I didn't think anyone remembered that shop. That is where our new Spectravideo 318 came from. The manual is all I have that remains of it and I've been in the market for one for a while now. I have only seen two or three come up for auction in about five years. I bought a SV-318 MK II, but a grey joystick just isn't the same as a red one.

I received a Spectravideo 328 and Spectravideo Super Expander SV-605 (pic on http://www.samdal.com/svperipherals.htm ) from Paul Crabbe if that's a name from your past? He is now a Holistic Healer, Poet and Photographer, but in those days was very much into the Spectravideo scene and programming and was involved with or ran the Spectravideo Users Group I think.

I do have a four or five Kiwi-MSX magazines I got a few years back. I intend to scan them in one day unless someone has already. We had quite a few of the magazines in the 80s but they're long gone now too. I remember the owner was running a competition or had a sign up offering money for game ideas (i.e. didn't have to program them, you just had to provide the ideas) which had my brother and myself busy occupied drawing pictures on pads and trying to come up with game ideas. Of course, these game designs would never quite make it to the shop.

Our Amstrad CPC464 and Amiga 500 came from Eclipse Radio and Computers, along with probably 50+ Amstrad games and 50+ Amiga games purchased new from there as well. They had an awesome game selection and display of computers. I think they really did well out of our family (or dad's pockets).

Later on the rather pricey 386SX-25 (which then got upgraded to a DX-33 a bit later on because the SX was pretty slow) came from Shands. However our memory of their reputation is a tarnished one from when we took the newish computer back with something wrong and they insisted it was something we did. A few people we knew had a bad experience there along the customer service lines.

All other computers (and there were quite a few indeed) we had were from garage sales and the computer ads section in the newspaper. It was a great read on a Saturday and required many phone calls and trips for viewing computers and items for sale.

For Dunedinites you might just recall another computer shop that was hidden away in an arcade in the first block of George St. I don't remember any other details of the original shop. It was just inside that place to the left of where Champions of the World is now:
http://maps.google.co.nz/maps?q=7+george+street,+dunedin&layer=c&sll=-45.873414,170.504006&cbp=13,62.41,,0,-14.87&cbll=-45.873545,170.503958&hl=en&sspn=0.006295,0.006295&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=7+George+St,+Dunedin+Central+9016,+Otago&ll=-45.873396,170.504044&spn=0.000898,0.001725&z=19&lci=com.panoramio.all&panoid=y9mQZC8u91bzzUpsAVhpzw

I'd love to see some photos of the old computer expos when they were a copy fest and had lots of individuals showing off their computer set ups. This was before they were tidied up and got boring and driven more by business interests.
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