I'm a retro gaming collector and tinkerer. This channel is to showcase things I've picked up, game reviews, hardware reviews and whatever else I get up to. If you'd like to support what I do please consider buying me a coffee at Ko-Fi or get in touch (email below) if you have anything you'd like to donate to the channel for future video content!
Unfortunately, nothing happens on my VA9. Is there anything I could be doing wrong? I checked again that the tracer is well cut You made a step in the middle with the multimeter in JP1 and JP2. Was it to check some connection? Hoping for your help
I'm using the same software and a tape adapter on my Amstrad, and, in my opinion, the time it takes to load games just adds to the experience. If i wanted instant gaming I'd get an emulator.
Hang on Derek, I wondered were my CPC had gone 😂 Lovely video Dan and once again lovely to have you back sharing content. I'm sure someone already does them but if not Dan at Retrofied might make new decals for the case to freshen that up.
Some people are getting great things out of them these days with modern tools. They suffered a lot from bad Spectrum ports back in the day, nobody put in the time and money to make many great unique games for the platform back then. They were chasing the quick profit.
@@RetroRecollections Plus of course any AMSTRAD item, in any sector, was deemed (and was) penny pinching low quality rubbish. Sugar must be the only shyster that was ever knighted for selling rubbish. 😤 It’s my age!!!
I know next to nothing about Amstrad machines but I suspect it could indeed be a RAM issue. If the chips are socketed, try swapping them and check if the pattern on the screen changes at all. If so, it might be worth trying to replace them with known good ones. 🙂
Nice donation, would love a CPC to tinker with, but not sure it would get round the bend in the steps down into my basement flat, just got out sofa in but a CPC, <sucks-teeth> 😂 Tip1: Noels CPC Diag ROM Tip2: Keep the tape deck and use the Amp circuit on it to help tape input - see Noel video on it again Tip3: there is a tapduino that's been made to fit inside a tape case, pop one of them in to the broken tape deck to load, seen it on Noel (yup ol' Mr CPC again) Discord server recently, I forget the name, ask there... Good Luck!!!
There are not so many left and definitely not many left in the hands of people who are not collecting them, but willing to put them out there for sale. It's par for the course for stuff that is old and becomes a collectible overnight. Old computers and games were cheap at the time people wanted to get rid of them, even though there were few (relatively) of them - yet more than now -, and now that they're in the hands of collectors, supply dried up.
Get the gate array out, Deoxit the lot and then if that doesn't work find another gate array. (obviously also Deoxiting the other socketed chips). With that amount of rust on the inside, anything socketed could be a culprit.
Yeah I did use contact cleaner in all the socketed chips, removing each. Didn’t notice corrosion under them but yeah it is likely underneath. I’ll have to learn a bit more about these machines 😃
Nice system. I have exactly the same. My recommendation is to install a Test ROM BIOS made by Noel (from noelsretrolab on RU-vid) some years ago. You'll need to dig into his videos, but he really knows the thing about Amstrads. Very illustrative videos !!!
Sounds like you're using the composite video output. RGB output is not affected by this and gives a superior picture. Your TV would need to be compatible with both PAL 50Hz and NTSC 60Hz to give you a colour picture over composite.
@@NoobSIayer69 Yeah unfortunately you need a compatible TV or go RGB with an upscaler like an OSSC and connect via HDMI if you don't have SCART. Luckily the mod is easily reversed or you can even install a switch to change it from one to the other.
Interesting stuff! You can't beat playing Outrun in the Arcade with steering wheel and peddles. I have played both the stand-up machine and both sit in machines, and have completed atleast 3 routes, which takes some doing! ..the sense of maxing out during a video racing game has never been equaled. Maybe some day Sega will offer Outrun 3
My quest for the holy grail of coin-ops: OutRun at home began with the Speccy. Not a bad version but every level had to load from tape! At least that came with the original soundtrack on the B-side. Then I heard it was coming out on the Atari ST and £300 for one of them seemed a fsir price to acheive gaming nirvana. But no, the Amiga had more colours so after saving up another £100 I sat down to play...and was totally devastated. What a piece of crap! I often ease my conscience playing emulators and remakes with the rationale that I was ripped off so often in the 80s by unscrupulous games companies that they "owe me one". Anyway, great video. Thanks the heads up and showing plenty of gameplay - this is the way to do it! PS I recall the Speccy version of Hang On (also by Sega was fantastic). Anyone else remember the realistic bike on the arcade original you could lean into curves with?
I wrote a text adventure called Hyde and Seek for the C16 plus 4 that was never released. Having difficulty converting it to prg at the moment! ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-zFHOJ5FB9G0.html
The c16 is more than capable of out shining the c64 with the 121 color interlaced raster interupt at 320x496 pixels. memory was the c16s failure .they sold 1266000 c16s and about 827000 plus 4s 2.5million c128s.17million c64s. 2.5 million vic 20s and about 6million amigas.....they made more commodore 16 games than c128 yet they sold 2ce as many c128s grand total of 27 titles than the c16s over 500 titles with around 70 titles plus4 only
Very good points. The fact that game developers targeted the C16 mostly as opposed to the Plus/4 so that their games could work on both machines didn’t help either. If the C16 had been given the 64K and shipped at a reasonable price it could have done much better.
Nice to see an old breadbox restored....i swapped a Nintendo with Rob the robot for one of these back in the early 90s...i still dont regret it haha...The Last Ninja series was probably my most enjoyed games....and Creatures by Thalamus...and the music from that Sid chip just cannot be beaten...even today lol.....nice video pal ...subbed 😁
Thanks! Yes the C64 is one of the machines I really after as a kid - would couldn’t afford it. My mates had C64s and Spectrums and I had C16! I love it now but at the time I was a lonely boy haha
That thing is sweet man i want one so bad wonder what one of those with disks and working well the whole set up cords power every thing goes for im american guess ill have to check ebay thing is delivering something that heavy is not to cheap
Thanks. Not an extensive one this time but using a diag cart I was able to figure out several problems and find solutions. Love that we are able to use modern tools and parts to fix these old machines!
Yep - You can see the untapped potential the Plus/4 had these days with new ports and games the community are putting out. Really pushing the capabilities of the platform.
I'm just glad it went to a good home and will be used again, I felt so guilty with it just sat there unused for so long, My ACA500+ equipped Amiga is my goto. From memory, and I might be miss remembering, but pretty certain that's the 5A revision, hence the Red Power LED, (Not always a given as we all know Commodore would frequently just use what they had lying around), but I've never seen a Rev6 within anything other than Green, whereas the Red LEDs were the earlier A500s in the UK at least.
@@a500 Thanks Rich. Unfortunately I am very prone to catching bugs due to my health condition but luckily the malware was a bit milder this time around. Just went through a period of one nasty after another around the time of the first video.
sorry you've been ill. looks like you have a nice little area there with plenty of space - i assume your garage. frustrations can be had getting retro tech to work again but isn't that battle - and the victories - half of the fun?
Welcom back, man! The zooming on you camera looks like the Apple Facetime feature where it always tracks your head to keep you in frame. Could it be something like that?
Yeah it was that (I popped some text in the video when i realised). I was using it from a little more of a distance and when I was filming behind a desk and it worked quite well. I guess it got confused as I was closer to the camera 😃
I remember having a GVP 530(?) which was a SCSI HD with 68030 and FPU with 8MB(?) RAM. It may have had a 170MB HDD fitted by me and I can't remember if it had the PC emulator card fitted. I had an Apple external SCSI CD drive attached too. Amazing at the time. It was a long time ago!
Hi a very nice video. A working external hard drive is very nice donation. For me I got a ACA 500+ for mine. I got mine a long time ago. Having the ease of using diffent CF cards is nice and I can put my A1200 030 card in it as well.
ACA500+ is great -- didn't think much of it at first, but it's really an affordable game changer. It is such a well rounded product, I just leave it in my A500 all the time. Makes it really usable, especially for games that require lots of disks (e.g. Lucasfilm and Sierra adventures -- no more disk swapping!).
@@root42 I need to look into installing games on to the HDD. Apparently a lot of games support it officially and many that don't can be made to work too.
You tried Aliexpress? Too low volume could result in the data not being able to be loaded in from the audio and too high can result in the same because of distortion. It's a matter or trial and error to find the right level I guess.
when i hear the screech of the tires and the engine authentic sound it takes me back to being 17 again i loved outrun i must have bought every console back then the cassettes of the audio free on the cover of magazines and recently audio CDs i sold 2 copies of the xbox coast to coast and out run 2 sealed like a fool along with my xbox i had out run everything lol this update is sublime!!! i can play this and the PC coast to coast 2006 on my laptop so im more than happy! no more 10ps filling my pocket...
