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#retrocomputing

143 posts113 participants7 posts today

I found an ancient calculator (a Commodore "Minuteman ⭐ 6" -- yes, that Commodore) that I used when I was in elementary school. It belonged to my dad. The calculator was first sold in 1974.

The power leads from the battery snapped off from the main board decades ago, but now I have a Hakko desoldering tool, so I was able to clear out the through-hole solder points and reattach the wires from the battery. It has a 7-segment red LED display and minimal operations.

And...it works! Sort of. I seem to have gotten it into a sort of self-test mode that displays a scrolling 0, until I power cycle it, then it displays EEFEEE until I hit the Clear button. And some of the segments don't illuminate. But it hasn't felt electrons surging through it since the 20th century, so I'll cut it some slack.

Welcome to the future, time traveler!

calculator-museum.nl/calculato

Continued thread
Turns out it’s core is Print Shop but patching it so that it loads from the hard disk, has some other upgrades, etc. In many ways that’s even more impressive. Also the presenter wrote his own custom presentation program that runs on Apple II so could build a self contained presentation/demo of the software. #RetroComputing #InitHello #apple2

Unsubscribed from another retro YT channel who started to use genAI images as thumbnails.

Part of the appeal of old computers is getting away from the worst aspects of current tech. Shoving AI slop images as a thumbnail on what I think will be a very good video just means I won't watch it or anything else of yours.

🌟 On the 40th anniversary of the Amiga, I made a decision.

Once my retro Mac station is fully set up — upgraded, tuned, and running just the way I want — I’ll part with the extra machines to fund a proper Amiga setup.

The Mac station is an exercise in nostalgia. The Amiga station will be one of total discovery — I never had one back in the day.

I'm late to the party, but I see Japan sold 3.5" floppy disks of MIDI music (SMF=Standard MIDI Files) from pop bands in the 90's. It also looks like they were sometimes sold in a CD jewel case but with a special insert to hold a floppy disk.

I couldn't find a 3D model for a floppy jewel case insert, so I remixed one. New model uploaded linked below.

Your band's next floppy release, maybe? 💾

printables.com/model/1365838-3