[HN Gopher] The IBM 5153's True CGA Palette and Color Output (2022)
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       The IBM 5153's True CGA Palette and Color Output (2022)
        
       Author : susam
       Score  : 50 points
       Date   : 2023-10-26 19:33 UTC (3 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (int10h.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (int10h.org)
        
       | accrual wrote:
       | I find this work fascinating. I wonder if it'd be possible to
       | create a test suite for the IBM PC to cycle through various
       | colors and patterns, then distribute it to known IBM 5153
       | (monitor) owners and have them capture the output in best
       | possible conditions and upload the results.
       | 
       | The results could include the video file and camera used. Then,
       | iterate over the results programmatically and try to determine an
       | average from them. Then the author's work could be normalized
       | across many different revisions of the CRT from different
       | conditions, instead of working from a single sample monitor. Then
       | compare this with the canonical and revised colors.
       | 
       | I'm sure the differences would be barely noticeable, but just
       | kind of wacky retro experiment I'd love to participate in.
        
         | qingcharles wrote:
         | You'd have to use a photographic color calibration swatch in
         | each photo to make sure you had a reference, though.
        
       | doubloon wrote:
       | nice link
       | 
       | this is as close as possible to i will ever get to understanding
       | how the older generation feels about cars from the 1950s.
       | 
       | it's not even so much about the tech it's about the memories i
       | have from being young, and the process of discovering that some
       | of the mysteries of the man made world do actually have answers.
        
         | Lerc wrote:
         | I always liked looking at this old tech with a what-might-have-
         | been viewpoint using the technical constraints of the time
         | combined with the knowledge and hindsight available today.
         | Without a time machine it's essentially a pointless endeavour,
         | but nevertheless rather fascinating.
         | 
         | The Gigatron https://gigatron.io/ is a really good example of
         | people making something pretty amazing using late '70s to early
         | '80s tech.
         | 
         | I spent quite some time trying to figure out what palette I
         | could make using just 4 digital lines, resisters, and diodes.
         | This is what I ended up with,
         | https://fingswotidun.com/images/4bitPal_arduino.jpg Maybe I'll
         | make my own 16 colour computer one day with it.
        
       | SoftTalker wrote:
       | I would guess that the original PC color palette was selected to
       | match or at least be similar to the colors on the 3270-style
       | mainframe terminals.
        
       | treve wrote:
       | Very excited to learn that 'brown' was special-cased. Back in my
       | high-school Turbo Pascal days I always thought it felt a bit like
       | the odd-one out
        
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       (page generated 2023-10-29 23:00 UTC)