[HN Gopher] MEGA65 - highly advanced C64 and C65 compatible 8-bi...
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MEGA65 - highly advanced C64 and C65 compatible 8-bit computer
Author : rbanffy
Score : 78 points
Date : 2021-09-30 16:06 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (shop.trenz-electronic.de)
(TXT) w3m dump (shop.trenz-electronic.de)
| buescher wrote:
| The retrocomputing sweet spot for me would be reproduction
| keyboards with nice mechanical switches and DB9 joystick ports.
| For both the Atari 800 (4-joystick) and the Commodore 64/VIC-20,
| please. Something I could use with an emulator or eventually
| something like the MiSTer.
| billyjobob wrote:
| My issue with this is the price. Not because it's not worth it,
| but because it means no one outside of hardcore enthusiasts will
| buy one, that means very little software will ever be developed
| for it.
|
| Also I find the presence of the floppy drive in 2021 ridiculous.
| Yes the C65 had one - but that was a prototype machine from 1990
| that was never produced. There's no c65 software available on
| floppy disk, so no reason this couldn't have used sdcards
| instead.
| buescher wrote:
| Is the floppy drive fast? That would be cool.
| anonymousiam wrote:
| Agree. The price is about double what it should be, and right
| now it's vaporware.
| pgeorgi wrote:
| It seems that there's an SD slot at the front, right below the
| floppy drive.
| davewongillies wrote:
| There's actually two, from the specs sheet:
|
| * dual SDHC(tm) card slots
| rbanffy wrote:
| > because it means no one outside of hardcore enthusiasts will
| buy one
|
| I can imagine a version based on an emulation using a small ARM
| with the same physical keyboard and box, minus (or maybe not)
| floppy. The board is costly, and they expect to sell a finite
| number of units, so they need to recover the cost of the
| plastic injection tooling within that batch.
|
| Having future versions based on emulated hardware would open up
| a market and drive down unit costs to more THEC64 Maxi levels,
| which would be extremely beneficial.
|
| I'm looking forward to more retro machines, even if based on
| emulators, but with accurate physical reproductions of vintage
| hardware.
|
| For lots of platforms, the physical object is not that
| important - We have 102/104-key with layouts that replicate
| most post PC-AT Unix workstations - it's the same layout we
| use, that the Archimedes and its descendants used, that most
| SGI's, most HP's and most other post-AT computers used. For
| those, the most important physical aspects are easy to
| replicate. If you really want, even a Trinitron tube can be
| replicated with a flexible OLED display and some bent plastic.
|
| For computers like the C-64, 128, 65, Amigas, 8-bit Ataris,
| ST's, Apple II's, ///s, and earlier Macs, Sun workstations,
| Lisp machines, Alto's, Lilith's, DECs and others, the illusion
| will break if you use a PC keyboard and mouse. It'll feel
| strange.
| gardners wrote:
| A small ARM cannot emulate the MEGA65's 40MHz CPU or 81MHz
| pixel-clock VIC-IV video controller, unfortunately.
| snvzz wrote:
| >price
|
| I'd consider buying one at 300EUR. I'm not even contemplating
| it at the current price.
|
| >floppy ridiculous.
|
| I disagree. Floppies are very adequate to this sort of
| hardware, and an important component of the classic feel.
|
| I just wish the drive faced the right side (like a keyboard
| Amiga) instead. It's not like they have any ports in there.
|
| Inserting floppies from the front seems extremely uncomfortable
| to even think about.
| romwell wrote:
| Tape drive would have been more appropriate, and more fun
| though :)
| [deleted]
| snvzz wrote:
| I suffered enough of that back in my C64 days.
|
| Anybody who could afford it did get a floppy drive. I got
| an Amiga 500 at some point, instead.
|
| I still have the hardware and the tapes, so I intend to get
| everything operational again at some point. It's just in
| the back of the queue, as I am busy dealing with a lot of
| "retro" platforms already.
| ipaddr wrote:
| At the end of the c64 era I had hd. Ran a large bbs. In
| the beginning of the c64 era a 1541 was more than enough.
|
| Using a hard drive for a c64 isn't uncommon.
| kwanbix wrote:
| Yeah, 800 euros for something that for me would be to remember
| my C128 days is too high.
|
| I can get a RPi4 for much less and install an emulator.
|
| I understand that this is (should?) be better, but still, 800
| euros!
| russdill wrote:
| People want hands on physical hardware. If you just wanted
| 2021, you could run everything in an emulator. Having a floppy
| drive is cool and nostalgic.
| gardners wrote:
| The MEGA65 has dual SD card slots as well as the floppy drive.
| jug wrote:
| I'd consider it at EUR400 (i.e. above a full MiSTer setup
| price) if it was a well crafted case like this but an Amiga
| 1200 equivalent with a C64 mode and SD card slot as "floppy".
| Something more pragmatic.
|
| This one instead reminds me of those Vampire FPGA's with SAGA
| graphics mode running on a so called Motorola 68080, that is so
| niche on a niche system that nothing is developed for it other
| than tech demos and software compatibility suffers to boot.
|
| Then again, I don't like to complain about these passionate
| projects! They're clearly 80's "dream machines" of sorts. I
| just think that from a financial/success perspective this may
| not be where most profit is at.
| radicalbyte wrote:
| The MiSTER has filled this gap for me - even if I do need to find
| a nice keyboard to use with it.
| wiz21c wrote:
| For those who don't know the project :
|
| https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/Main_MiSTer/wiki
| codezero wrote:
| I pined over a lot of retro hardware over the past year, there
| are a lot of competing modern C64 and Amiga hardware, at the core
| of most of them are FPGAs, so if you want to save money and have
| a large set of options, get yourself a DE-10 Nano / Mister setup.
| It's kind of the kitchen sink of retro computing at this point
| and runs < $200. You can emulate everything from an Apple II,
| C64, ZX-Spectrum, most consoles through the 90s, Amigas, even a
| 486 (though it's shaky).
|
| What you won't get is an already set-up system, a nice case, or
| simple to attach peripherals, but I haven't had too much trouble
| with it, except trying to get a formatted hard disk for an Amiga
| into an SD card with files on it, but I figured it out :)
| snvzz wrote:
| I absolutely agree about MiSTer.
|
| If you're into this, that's the hardware to get. A massive
| ecosystem of cores with good software to choose, configure and
| keep them all up to date.
|
| I just wish the target devboard was among those supported by
| the open synth/place/route stack. Maybe in the future, somebody
| will make an OSHW custom board for the purpose, using a well-
| supported FPGA that could also hopefully be fatter than the one
| the DE-10 Nano has.
|
| But, right now, MiSTer is the way to go.
| christkv wrote:
| These guys just announced a version of the mister hardware
| trying to make it more accessible to use for end users
| https://rmcretro.store/mister-multisystem/
| jug wrote:
| This looks interesting! I've long wished for a more mature
| MiSTer system that feels like a complete retro
| console/system/computer. There ARE already many options there
| but involves 3D printed parts, soldering, or more. If I could
| just throw an added EUR50-100 on the problem I'd gladly
| consider it, and this looks promising. I don't really fancy
| the official rectangular case. It looks more like a hacker
| platform. Which, I guess, it is... But...
| codezero wrote:
| Wow this looks great. Now I almost regret having the janky
| DE-10 Nano and SDRAM hanging off a power cable next to my TV.
|
| I love the form factor and the cases! Thanks for sharing
| this.
| TeaDude wrote:
| I'm buying one because I have problems but I sincerely think
| there should be a cut down version. Especially one without a
| floppy drive (What if you don't actually have any old floppies
| and just want a cool embedded games platform?)
|
| I mean, I'm not seriously expecting this to be the next big
| computing platform but I do think that a lower barrier to entry
| would help adoption.
| 300bps wrote:
| Can check these out as an alternative:
|
| https://ultimate64.com/
|
| The Ultimate 64 is the computer and the Ultimate II+ acts as a
| memory card reader for a Commodore 64 so you can mount
| different .d64 images to it.
| pvg wrote:
| Recently:
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27231293
| blue1 wrote:
| Yikes! I've been waiting for this, but 793EUR!
|
| I understand the reasons. Quality parts, small run, etc. But then
| I wonder: suppose I am so crazy to buy one. Extremely cool,
| certainly.
|
| But then?
|
| I stopped writing C64 software 27 years ago. Fondly remembering
| POKE 53280 is one thing, but doing that again...?
| bastardoperator wrote:
| Love the idea but the cost is just too prohibitive.
| omarhaneef wrote:
| I can see which generation of people has hit their peak earnings
| by tracking which decade's nostalgia hits the market.
|
| Not that I am complaining: this scratches my itch. I just wish it
| were _even_ easier to obtain software.
|
| I think the reason the pi and this are accepted over an emulator
| is because I don't want to run strange software on my main
| machine(s).
| PaulHoule wrote:
| It would be tempting at a lower price but I'm inclined to save my
| money for a machine that runs Win 11 and can take a current
| generation GFX card.
| jagger27 wrote:
| The keyboard assembly is really cool and I personally appreciate
| the effort, but I bet all that custom plastic really adds onto
| the price. Custom double shot keycaps are not cheap. I wonder if
| there could be a much cheaper option with a simpler case and a
| PS/2 keyboard adapter instead. Perhaps even USB could work, but
| that feels wrong for this project.
| whartung wrote:
| But it's part and parcel to the experience, right? It's a
| tactile thing.
|
| It's a stand alone, one piece computer, like the old days.
|
| I mean, you don't restore a Chevy Bel-Air and put bucket seats
| in the front, right?
|
| Even down to the floppy. You get to thumb through the floppy
| case to find a copy of "Burgertime", shove it in the slot, plug
| in your joystick, hear the "whirr tick tick tick" of the
| floppy, and then MUSIC! CRESCENDO! ATTRACT MODE! AWAY WE GO! In
| all it's one channel, 8 bit splendor.
|
| Pretty sure the market isn't folks looking for a bare board
| with cables strewn about. There is a lot of effort out there,
| and many folks, trying to replicate this "retro" experience.
| And others willing to support it.
|
| Otherwise, yea, run a simulator on...well, anything. "Whee".
|
| It's not my cup of tea, mind, but I'm not the one buying it
| either.
| jabl wrote:
| Well, where do you draw the line? Eventually you arrive at just
| running an emulator without bothering with hardware at all.
| loudmax wrote:
| I would draw the line at EUR200. A lot of people can justify
| EUR200 for nostalgia. If you can run the old software and the
| hardware has the right look and feel, people won't mind the
| details too much. Far fewer people can justify nearly EUR800.
| HelloNurse wrote:
| > Awesome chiptune potential: 4 SIDs, OPL2(tm) (wip), 4-channel
| 16-bit DMA-based Audio in FPGA
|
| FOUR SID devices? A new lot of actual 6581 or 8580 chips (which
| would justify the price, BTW), FPGA approximations (likely), or
| emulated in software?
| Narishma wrote:
| It says FPGA in your quote.
| gardners wrote:
| The first 400 sold out within 8 or 10 hours. Less than 900 in the
| second larger batch remain available at last check.
| joeberon wrote:
| As someone who is often interested in buying music hardware, it
| is hilarious seeing people freaking out about the price of this
| EamonnMR wrote:
| You could slap a midi interface snd and knobs onto a few SID
| chips and sell it for way more than this.
| sumthinprofound wrote:
| for 800 it would have to include a spiral bound user manual.
| zokier wrote:
| Like this one? https://shop.trenz-
| electronic.de/media/image/98/f1/dd/MEGA65...
| sumthinprofound wrote:
| perfect. I was looking at the pdf version on the actual
| mega65 site but did not see this. ty.
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