16 Colour Graphics on the PC in 1982! 

Thanks for the positive comments. I agree technology advanced too quickly to really see what was possible with the early PC.

Thanks. Glad you enjoyed it!

I have an ATI Wonder 800+ and I thought they might have Plantronics support in that too, but from memory I tried this and nothing happened. But I was aware of the Small Wonder support. After watching this video back, it occurred to me that it would have been nice to have something more like a game in Plantronics mode. I definitely have to write something, at least when life settles back down to a normal pace. It's a bit crazy at the moment.

Nice!

That was also my first PC compatible. It was the predecessor to this machine.

PC1512 640x200 16 colors - my first PC! Always wanted a V30; GEM desktop on PC1512 ran in this mode too!

Glad I could help!

I've never heard of a 10 bit monitor. What sort of connector does it have? Just a DB9 like CGA/EGA? I guess it has to be an analog signal though, rather than the TTL signal that CGA/EGA used. Sounds like a very interesting piece of hardware you have anyway. Look after that well!!

@@PCRetroTech Haha, maybe I made it sound better than it is, it's nothing special for today's standards, it's a regular modern IPS LCD with 10 bits per color, HP 27f 4k.

@@djdjukic Oh, that kind of 10 bits. Yes, I see now. Those can be run over with a steamroller without affecting their value. :-)

Sounds like they would have been fun times!

Glad you like them! I definitely like finding obscure things, that's for sure!

Apparently Eric Isaacson's A86 supports the NEC extra instructions [1]. I didn't check yet whether it uses the NEC mnemonics or some Intel format version of them. The nybble swap should be useful for CGA. As you mention there are macro packs for MASM available on Simtelnet so you can add NEC instruction support. It's a shame about the lack of compilers though. [1] www.eji.com/A86/features.htm

Nice!

Yes 89 was just the build date of my 1640 not the release date of the 1640.

That's ok, I appreciate the feedback!

Technically, I guess so. It would be pretty painful though I suspect.

@@PCRetroTech yes. Yes it was. Then again I used to play Hard Driving on it at sub 1 FPS, so... I guess as a kid it didn't seem so bad.

I have to admit I tried switch settings randomly until it worked. I read somewhere that the old Sierra games offered Plantronics support. But people often get the Amstrad PC1512 16 colour mode mixed up. That definitely was supported by some Sierra games (though it actually wasn't available by default in some of them for some strange reason). I admit I intended to test out the Sierra games and didn't get around to it for this video. Another game I'm aware of is Planet X3, though I don't have a copy to try. Other than that, I am not aware of any others that supported Plantronics.

Not as a real graphics mode. Of course composite was also a possibility in North America. But yes, I guess I should have mentioned these.

That would align with my expectation. Thanks for mentioning it.

Yeah, a few people have noted the similarity. PCPaint was 1984 as well and I don't know who copied from who.

It's been a while since composite appeared in one of my videos. It's tricky in Europe due to the composite output being NTSC and monitors here being PAL.

@@PCRetroTech Interesting. I had no idea there wasn't any PAL CGA cards made. Weird...

@@jeremiefaucher-goulet3365 There may have been, but the IBM ones were NTSC. I'm actually not sure why they didn't make a PAL version for Europe.

@@PCRetroTech Who needs colors anyway? IBM computers aren't toys, it's for serious work. 🤷

@@jeremiefaucher-goulet3365 That would certainly be my first guess. :-)