Re: Which old programming languages do you still use/play with today->

Posted on 2023-09-22, 09:00

by

by pan069

in Milliways

in Milliways

Re. the original question of this thread; I only use C and Assembler (the Watcom variants) for anything DOS and early Windows programming related. Sometimes I dig into QuickBasic (4.5) out of reasons of nostalgia.

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Re: What retro activity did you get up to today?

Posted on 2023-09-21, 21:38

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by pan069

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Unfortunately I could not find manual for IO card. It might be actually thud since even floppy drive did not work. I had a quick scan through here but couldn't find it, I might not have looked close enough so it might be worth having another scan. https://www.arvutimuuseum.ee/th99/c/c16ide_i.htm

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Re: What retro activity did you get up to today?

Posted on 2023-09-20, 10:08

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by pan069

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

DerBaum wrote on 2023-09-20, 01:16: ... For the soundcard i will either use a AdLib clone, a Mediavision Thunderboard or a Aztech Sound Galaxy BX II ... The Adlib clone would probably be the best fit... ... 😀 Cool system. I would definitely go with the Aztech Sound Galaxy BX II, seems like the best …

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Re: What retro activity did you get up to today?

Posted on 2023-09-19, 23:09

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by pan069

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I was on holiday in Japan last week, Osaka, and I walked into one of those electronics stores and I noticed that they were selling a lot of optical media, not just DVD and BlueRay but a lot of CDs as well. So I google up a picture of a floppy disk and showed to one of the guys running the store, he …

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Re: How big is the custom video mode gap before VESA VBE 1.0?

Posted on 2023-08-31, 21:04

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by pan069

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

Did any games actually exist before december 1990 that used these custom svga modes (greater than VGA 640x480x16) but not vbe 1.0. Or even were any games ever released that used VBE 1.0 , (released in 1989) up to december 1990. These modes weren't really designed with games in mind. They were …

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Re: 3 (+3 more) retro battle stations

Posted on 2023-08-30, 06:48

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by pan069

in Marvin \ System Specs

in Marvin \ System Specs

According to this legitimately looking document, the VM386SX+ is its own design that is 10-40 % faster than baseline Intel 386SX. Suddenly the 386SX field is more interesting. The same document contains very interesting information about Cyrix and Texas Instruments. There is a diagram showing how …

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Re: What retro activity did you get up to today?

Posted on 2023-08-28, 09:33

by

by pan069

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Spent yesterday re-educating myself on the topic of 1999-2003 AGP video cards and the difference between x2,x4,x8 slots and their voltages. Honestly its a not stop rock and roll life style I lead LOL Very recognisable lifestyle. I found myself reading through this the other week on a Friday evening …

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Re: 80286 BIOS image collection

Posted on 2023-08-26, 21:44

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by pan069

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

#: 92 Manufacturer/Identifier: NO NAME Chipset: HEADLAND HT12/A BIOS/Version: AMI BIOS ID : 20-0000-DG1112-00101111-031591-HT12-8 Look very similar to (if not the same) as https://www.vogons.org/viewtopic.php?p=1188735#p1188735 The BIOS on this board is more modern though. SAB80286-16-N.jpg ROM.zip

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Re: Retro Rig Photo Thread

Posted on 2023-08-17, 14:53

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by pan069

in Marvin \ System Specs

in Marvin \ System Specs

This is my newly finished 286 build. More of my computer builds are available on my website . Am286-16 01.jpg Am286-16 02.jpg Am286-16 03.jpg Nice. I have an affection for 286s. Count me in as well. That case looks brand spanking new inside. Is that a NOS PSU? So shiny... Never understood people …

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Re: VGA games with only 16 colors

Posted on 2023-08-06, 10:23

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by pan069

in DOS

in DOS

Maybe not the best image, but quite some time ago I was trying to take screen grabs of the Bitmap Brothers game Gods. In the below image you see the 320x200 frame buffer dump (garbled) but when you resize that to 352x181 you get the correct alignment (they resize the framebuffer for smooth panning). …

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Re: What retro activity did you get up to today?

Posted on 2023-08-05, 21:15

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by pan069

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

appiah4 wrote on 2023-08-05, 13:12: Today is a good day to sunbright my 286.. Nice box. Never understood people who'd place the optical drive in the lower drive bay. 😀 You just let it sit out there? Maybe post results?

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Re: Bought these (retro) hardware today

Posted on 2023-07-28, 04:45

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by pan069

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Yeah, its a 3d printed thing. Is yours not? I wasn't aware it came with a metal bracket option, would definitely have gone for that. I ordered from Tindie. The order receipt doesn't specify details around the order. Yes, I got the metal bracket. I bought mine via Ebay. They had separate listings …

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Re: Bought these (retro) hardware today

Posted on 2023-07-27, 23:03

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by pan069

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I got one as well the other week. On my one the bracket seems to be all wonky, looks like some of the components are weirdly offsetted. I haven't tried it yet. PXL_20230702_035452027.jpg Is yours the plastic bracket? Yeah, its a 3d printed thing. Is yours not? I wasn't aware it came with a metal …

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Re: Bought these (retro) hardware today

Posted on 2023-07-27, 19:56

by

by pan069

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Received this Sound Blaster clone this week. Curious to try this out and see how it compares to an original Sound Blaster. I'm hoping it's less noisy that the real deal. I got one as well the other week. On my one the bracket seems to be all wonky, looks like some of the components are weirdly …

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Re: Bought these (retro) hardware today

Posted on 2023-07-17, 20:47

by

by pan069

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

I am so jealous of some of those sound cards, great haul man! Thanks ! For my use, I think the highlight is the Pro Audio Spectrum 16. Will probably replace my SB16 with this one. May I ask why? Don't get me wrong, the PAS16 is a cool card, I have a few myself, and unless you're going the Windows …

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Re: Quick Basic 4.5 - Using int 21h, 4bh to launch external programs

Posted on 2023-07-16, 20:41

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by pan069

in Milliways

in Milliways

@doshea Good write up and good tips! I'll do some more testing and digging around when I get the opportunity. Re. SETMEM. The simple test I did was to execute MEM.EXE, from both the IDE and from compiled EXE. When executed in the IDE, I have to release memory otherwise it returns a 0x08 Out Of …

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Re: Quick Basic 4.5 - Using int 21h, 4bh to launch external programs

Posted on 2023-07-13, 10:09

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by pan069

in Milliways

in Milliways

@Peter Swinkels. Okay, I did a more more tinkering and this is what I found... But before I go into the details, first I want to give a big shout out to both @Jo22 and especially @doshea for providing some really good links and reading material. Thanks guys! So, right off the bat... Executing …

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Re: DOS programming tools

Posted on 2023-07-10, 20:25

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by pan069

in Marvin \ Software

in Marvin \ Software

You can probably find some interesting old school books here: https://www.pcjs.org/documents/books/programming/

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Re: Quick Basic 4.5 - Using int 21h, 4bh to launch external programs

Posted on 2023-07-10, 00:54

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by pan069

in Milliways

in Milliways

why are you using the INTERRUPT to launch an external program instead of use using the SHELL statement? I think that another benefit is that the SHELL statement throws away the return status/exit code/ERRORLEVEL/whatever you want to call it, and that information can be useful. [/quote] Fair enough. …

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Re: Quick Basic 4.5 - Using int 21h, 4bh to launch external programs

Posted on 2023-07-09, 22:02

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by pan069

in Milliways

in Milliways

I am trying to use int 21h, 4bh to launch programs from a Quick Basic program. It only works from inside a compiled program for me. When executed from the run-time environment the function always claims there isn't enough memory (ax = 8h). I know for a fact that in most cases this can't be true, …

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