Emulation nostalgia

I remember back in the late 90s (around 97 I think) I still had my Genesis and games around, until a friend told me about Genecyst. I got me a four button PC gamepad and sold my Genesis and games and saved for a PSX. I had the PSX for a few months and sold it to save for a Dreamcast. Since then I kept all my consoles. 

I'd say the golden age of emulation was the late 90's early 00's. You may think I'm crazy but lately I've been feeling nostalgic about those times, when I'd find a translated game or would discover a gem and fire up KGen or ZSnes and enjoyed it on my Celeron PC.

With the modded Xbox I never thought I'd go back to the original hardware, until the nostalgia bug bit me sometime in 08 and got me a Genesis. I have the carts I like and can afford, for everything else I use flash carts. 

For systems like the Saturn, the emulation never got to the level of PS1 so real hardware is the way to go. For systems like the PCE while they're emulated pretty well, I had some curiosity as to how things worked there.

It all boils down to your preferences and budget. Personally, nothing beats the real console hooked up via composite to a CRT, just like back in the day. While RGB may look nice on a PVM, I just don't see me going that route, I mean it's not what I had 20+ years ago.

Hobbies

Ok, so here are some of my hobbies:

1. Hiking / Hiking mountainous terrain
2. Sky diving (it's been some time but I'm always ready for some action)
3. Cooking
4. Photography. I may not have an expensive Nikon/Canon camera but that doesn't stop me form taking the most unusual pictures.
5. Play softball. Yeah I know no more baseball, the team atmosphere is what I like the most.
6. Writing. You know like this blog.
7. Reading. Last year I read 4 books. The most recent "Ensayo sobre la ceguera" (Blindness) from José Saramago.
8. Community service. It's so great being able to "give something back" to the community.

You filthy console

A few days ago I saw a listing for a broken XEGS console. I was interested in just the shell (I had a spare working motherboard laying around). I thought this would make for a quick restoration project so for the rough equivalent of $14 USD I got this:

It was filthy with capital F. I set the mobo apart and washed everything with a brush and laundry detergent, dried it with a towel then let it sit in the sun for a few mins.

I still wasn't too happy with it, it was a bright sunny day so I just decided to spray paint it. My options were Red, white, orange or gold. Here's the result:

As per the supposedly broken motherboard, I cleaned it up with compressed air then tested it. It worked fine with the internal Missile Command and a Pole Position cart so I decided to go with it.

Here's the end result:

(at least using composite connections) Everything works like a dream. This will be my go to console for cartridge based gaming. 

For any Atari 8 bit owner I strongly recommend getting the Atarimax cartridge, that thing kicks butt even if you use it only for gaming. Every game on .xex format is available at Atarionline.pl

Can you live 100% on emulation?

Short answer yes. I've done it before. Sometimes I even feel nostalgic about emulation. Around Aug 97 is when I first tried emulation with Nesticle and Genecyst. At the time I didn't have internet at home, part of the fun was to rent a PC after class, bring a box full of floppies, download and copy emus and roms, get home, unload everything, fiddle with the emus configurations and explore all these systems I didn't have "back in the day" or relive past glories. Thanks to emulation I got to relive the glories in the arcades from the comfort of my house and without spending tokens. I got to enjoy the best the Atari 2600 and SNES libraries had to offer (two consoles I didn't have). I discovered some of what the mythical Sega Saturn had to offer, etc. In 98 I sold my Genesis and games, in 99 I sold my PS1 (kept my NES in storage). From 99 to 08 it was 100% emulation for my pre 6th gen gaming.

Fast forward to 2008, I got nostalgic and bought me a Genesis and good amount of games. Later on I found myself getting more games for my NES and later on I was exploring other systems and definitely got back to getting and using real hardware.

Today, emulation still has its place, the Wii is a great emulation box pretty much for everything pre 5th gen. I got a pad converter and use it specially when I want to record some footage.

Using the real hardware helped me to better understand what was it like "back in the day" using these consoles and computers. Consoles like the Saturn and the PC Engine were great to own if you had access to japanese releases. A device like the XEGS was a good value if you needed a PC that got the work done and let you chill out at the same time. 

As per PC goes, packages like Virtualbox, VMWare and Dosbox are neat but don't quite replicate the experience. One of my recent projects has been assembling a PC like the one I had back in 2000. I didn't realize I forgot so many things about getting Win98 to play along with productivity software and games. And I'm gonna leave it there for now.

The Atari XEGS

It was the year 1986. The Nintendo Entertainment System proved there was money to be made in the videogame industry and companies like Sega and Atari wanted a piece of the pie. Sega released its Master System and Atari would re-release the 7800 and the 2600 with plans to repackage their 65XE computer into a sort of hybrid entry computer / advanced game system. 

In 1987 Atari Corporation released the Atari XEGS. It came in two retail configurations: 

Basic set: Game console with Missile Command built in and a matching gray CX-40 joystick.

Deluxe Set: Basic set plus keyboard (with Atari Basic built in), Flight Simulator II cartridge, XG-1 light gun and Bug Hunt cartridge.

As stated before, it was a repackaged 65XE computer which in turn was a redesigned 600XL which in turn was an update of the Atari 400/800 line. The 8-bit line began in 1979, so it was pretty dated technology for the time.

There were some advantages though, for the somewhat low price of $199 USD you had an entry level computer which could play games. It was fully compatible with the existing Atari 8 bit software and peripherals. 

So you could expand it with tape and disk drives, attach a printer and get some work done while being able to chill out and play some good games from the early 80s. 

Software was made during the XEGS era which in turn would work with other 8 bit computers granted they met ram requirements.

In terms of gaming it was what the 5200 should have been but nothing impressive compared to competing systems like the NES and the Master System.

Atari XEGS specs:

CPU: MOS Technology 6502B @ 1.78 Mhz

RAM: 64kb

Colors: 16 On screen out of a 256 palette

Video output: Composite and RF

Audio output: Mono RCA and RF

On future articles I'll cover some its games and accesories, until then.

The X68000

We know or may have heard about the Atari ST and the Commodore Amiga, those computers which brought the 16 bits home (or someone else's ;-D). But you probably haven't heard about the X68000, a japanese computer fromt he same generation as the ST and the Amiga, of which about 120,000 units were only sold in Japan, because Sharp only sold it there.

Let's get to know the "machine". It was a computer created and sold by the japanese company Sharp y it was released to the market aroung 1985 (quite a while indeed). For its time it was quite an impressive machine with an even more impressive software catalog.

It had its own OS (operating system), developed by Hudson Soft (a great software company during the 80s and 90s) in four flavors: HumanOS (similar to MSDOS), another one similar to Atari TOS (Human68k, other version was similar to the Unix X-Window (KO-Windows) y the fourth one was like the Amiga Workbench. Everything off course in perfect japanese... ;-D

Regarding software, well, the catalog was quite extensive with hundreds of games and applications. The games where not quite unknown. Games and Arcades like Ghouls and Ghosts, Final Fight, Bubble Bobble, Bomberman, Cotton, Street Fighter II, Salamander, Twinbee, etc were masterly taken to this computer.

These are the overall basic specs for the X68000. During the years Sharp did some revisions like replacing the SASI controller for a SCSI controller or moving form 5.25" to 3.5" floppies.

some of the X68000 Tech Specs:

CPU: MC68000 at 10 Mhz produced by Hitachi with license from Motorola

RAM: 1-2 Megabytes

Graphic modes: 768x512, 512x512, 256x256 all with 65.535 colors

VRAM: 512 Kb

Sprites ram: 32 Kb (16x16 pixels)

Tranparencies

Sound: Yamaha with FM (synthesis)

For storage, (initially) there were two 5.25" 1.2MB floppy drives. The file system was compatible with MS-DOS. It cam with option of connecting an internal SASI or (later) SCSI hard disk. A unit with an SCSI is more desirable since SASI sisn't gain traction on the market.

An unknown computer, with impressive specs and great arcade conversions. It is never too late to get to know it, thanks to the magic of emulation.

You know what's BS? Motherboard gouging

Yes, exactly that, motherboard gouging. 

During the past few decades, a lot of PCs ended in landfills, so I can understand complete working branded 286/386/486 PCs are now commanding high prices. Maybe even not so old PCs are now commanding high prices. Still, we are talking about complete or somewhat complete PCs.

But crappy old motherboards? you know, the cheap ones (Biostar, PC Chips, ECS, Soyo, etc) made in the millions, that allowed you to assemble inexpensive desktop PCs about a decade ago.

Take a look at this one for example:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/ISA-Slot-Motherboard-1-3ghz-CPU-1gb-RAM-M7VKQ-Socket-A-Works-perfectly-/291344647299?pt=Motherboards&hash=item43d57e8483

Sometime in 2003 I bought one of these to make a cheap computer, so I know it. This was not state of the art or anything memorable back then, however someone thinks it is some kind of museum highly collectible piece. Go figure.

These things should be free or nominal cost so they don't end up on a landfill. 

CPUs like Socket 370s PIII and Celerons, PC66/100/133 ram chips are also beginning to command high prices. It is just getting ridiculous. 

2014 anniversaries

2014 was filled with memorable anniversaries. On the top of my head:



Ride the Lightning (1984)
Powerslave (1984)
Sonic 3 (1994)
Sonic & Knuckles (1994)
Megadeth's Youthanasia (1994)
Korn's first album Korn (1994)
The Sega Saturn was released in Japan (1994)
The Sony Playstation was released in Japan (1994)