Notices by paulrickards (paulrickards@mastodon.social)

Things I didn't know existed: a #C64 drop in scanner for your dot matrix printer, like #ThunderScan for the ImageWriter/Mac.

https://www.64er-magazin.de/8506/superscanner.html

Anyone know how to get a Keyspan USA-28X USB to two port 8-pin serial adapter to work with a Raspberry Pi? It shows up under lsusb but says "no firmware." I'm guessing these needed to have firmware uploaded to them when they were plugged in?

I found an 11 year old Github repo that has Keyspan firmware, but maybe it needs to be compiled in a new kernal?

Anyone done this before?

Update! Simply copy the *.fw files to /lib/firmware/keyspan/

https://github.com/adafruit/rpi-firmware/tree/master/firmware/keyspan

Back from a whirlwind of a weekend. Thank you to all that stopped by my #PenPlotter exhibit table at #VCFEast this year. Was great to meet so many folks in person. And a huge thank you to all that purchased plots and floppies at consignment.

I gave away lots of postcards this year. If you got a plot or postcard, reply with a picture!

#VCFEast2025 #RetroComputing

@Infoseepage They are adjustable via replacing a resistor on the board.

One such laptop outfitted with this type of battery pack:

https://hackaday.io/project/202087/instructions

Question for EE folks:

Background: I have two of these LX-2BUPS units. They're basically a mini DC to DC UPS battery pack using 2x18650 cells. Folks have been using them to power old laptops since they can be used while also being charged.

My question: Can the output of two of these that each provide 5V @ 3A be tied together to provide longer run times?

https://www.aliexpress.com/i/3256806788068583.html

Bring back vapourwave Apple.

#RetroComputing #VintageApple

My New Year’s resolution is 640x400.

#RetroComputing #VintageApple #VintageMac

Spicy pillow extraction

Got my Mac SE/30 SCSI chain fully populated with more things! And no termination issues! 😎

Top down, beige Epson Zip 100, Iomega Jaz 1GB, Logitech ScanMan, Apple CD 300i, SyQuest 88MB. Not pictured: internal BlueSCSI v1.

#RetroComputing #VintageApple #VintageMac

You may remember that I recapped my Radius PowerView a few months ago. Recently the video started getting distorted. Turns out there’s still cap goo on the board causing issues. Gonna clean it in the ultrasonic.

#RetroComputing #VintageApple #VintageMac

Spent yesterday replacing the two 22 AWG +5V wires in the Mac SE/30 cable harness from the analog board to motherboard with 16 AWG. Voltages at floppy port went from 4.78V before to 4.98V after. Quite an improvement!

My monster SE/30 rig is getting bigger and more stable.

#RetroComputing #VintageApple #VintageMac

I opened the CD-ROM drive to discover a present: Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis for Mac. It has both 68k and PPC versions on the disc and it works on the SE/30.

#RetroComputing #RetroGaming #VintageApple #VintageMac

Retro peeps: Anyone have any tips for getting a SyQuest 88 MB drive to work? All cartridges spin up but it seems to fail the disc init check and just blinks green LED slowly (no red LED). Adrian’s Digital Basement trick of SilverLining’s “short test” didn’t work.

Apps that claim to read and seek don’t move the head. Self tests (with a jumper) do seek/move head properly.

BlueSCSI initiator doesn’t start.

Heads look clean/level/in tact. No sticky rubber bumpers.

Ideas?

#RetroComputing

Love these network topology icons in this symbols template included with MacDraw.

#RetroComputing #VintageApple #VintageMac

The civilized way to listen to the TRON soundtrack is the Sony Flamingo PS-F5. 😎 The blue vinyl is so cool looking when backlit! Soundtrack by the brilliant Wendy Carlos ❤️

#Vinyl #VinylRecords #Tron #SonyFlamingo #SonyPSF5 #NowSpinning

New blog post: iPod 3G conversion to SD card and a new battery.

I wanted to document my steps for anyone else that wanted to try this. And you don't need a disk image from the iPod as a starting point.

https://biosrhythm.com/?p=2851

#RetroComputing #VintageApple #iPod

A while back I needed to make MFM discs from image for MS-DOS (360k), Osborne 1 DD, and KayPro IV but didn’t have a PC with 5.25” floppy at the time.

What I did have was a Commodore 128 and 1571 floppy drive. So I wrote some software to write out disk images with it.

https://biosrhythm.com/?p=1680

#RetroComputing #C128 #Commodore

I’ve tried on and off for years to upgrade my iPod 3G with flash memory. I’ve tried a CF card and most recently a SD to CF adapter. Nothing seems to work. What am I missing? I’d love to get this working again.

#RetroComputing #VintageApple #VintageMac

Printing from a Newton MessagePad 2100 to an ImageWriter II via WiFi!

Normally it only supports printing to LaserWriters or certain StyleWriter printers. But it’s been chained together with CUPS and netatalk in the background to make to work. 😀

#RetroComputing #VintageApple #VintageMac #Newton

The Commodore 1520 and the other variants based on Alps plotter mechanisms were a great introduction to pen plotters and I’m still amazed to find them stuffed into the oddest of retro tech like calculators and keyboards. The gears on these suffer over time and split but I designed 3D printed replacements that have been working well for me.

#RetroComputing #PenPlotter #GenerativeArt #CreativeCoding #MastoArt #Art #ArtForSale #Artist #ArtForSaleByArtist #PenPlotterArt #PenPlot