[Coco] Coco Digest, Vol 104, Issue 33

[Aaron Wolfe]

On Tue, Nov 29, 2011 at 7:29 AM, Timothy Keith
<timothy.g.keith at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Welcome "back" Tim! I'm no longer using a CoCo, but still have a couple and keep up with the list. You might want to start by dwonloading "Tandy's little Wonder" from the site archives (ftp://maltedmedia.com/coco/MAGAZINES/Tandy's Little Wonder/Cocobook-TLW2.pdf).
>>
>> A couple years before I stopped using the CoCo I compiled a book of all the history, repair info, and most common mods I could find. Some of the schematics didn't > duplicate well, but there's a lot of info all in one location. Worth printing out! I sold a few, then revised the book in 2006 and made it available as a PDF for free >download. There is a copy of the original version at ftp://maltedmedia.com/coco/MAGAZINES/FARNA/Tandy's Little Wonder/LittleWonder.pdf
>
> I have read that were were between 20 and 30 million Commodore 64s
> manufactured.   How many Cocos were made ?  I also read that the
> original Coco was very
> similar to the 6809 reference implementation board that Motorola
> created for evaluation by OEMs.  Tandy did not get as creative with
> the Coco as they could have, which I think means that the Coco doesn't
> have as many custom ASICs as the C64. The Coco is a pretty clean
> design.  That there are millions more C-64s built than Cocos, is
> probably why there seems to be more cool Commodore projects.  The
> stock C-64 had better sound and graphics than the original Coco, but I
> think the Coco hardware hackers could probably go a little further
> than the C-64. Back in the day, the 1541 disk drive was not very good,
> the Coco had a more standard drive, but none of that matters much now.
>  If you haven't done so, Google Commodore 64 hardware projects.
> They're still pretty actively updating their simple 6502 box.  I think
> most of what has been done for the C-64 could be done for the Coco.
> In one Commodore blog it is claimed that USB support was added in a
> couple weeks.  I have no idea how these mods are done, or what value
> these mods really add to the C-64, but its fun to read of the ongoing
> enthusiasm for the classic 8-bit home system.  It helps that there are
> a gazillion C64s out there.  I'm not a hardware person, but I'd like
> to learn a little more.  I think that in a few years thousands of
> iPhones will be resting in the back of desk drawers, maybe they'll
> still be cool, but likely not used. Its got to be easier to mod the
> Coco than the new stuff.  One web site claims to be powered by a
> Commodore 64.  No doubt that HTTP is simple, especially when the
> content is static. There is a decade old Ethernet cartridge project
> for the C-64 that supports connecting to the Internet. Does similar
> hardware and TCP/IP stack exist for the Coco?   Its fun hobby stuff,
> some of the C64 projects are described as if it is rather simple.
>

The CoCo does have a web server of sorts, and in some ways its more
"native" than the C64 and Apple 2 web servers that exist, although in
other ways much less.

More native because its written in Basic09 and runs under OS9, an
operating system and language that shipped on the original CoCos
(afaik the other 8 bitters are using ports of contiki or custom,
dedicated software).  This means you can continue to use your coco as
a regular coco while it runs the web server as a normal OS9 process
and development of other networking programs can be done in the same
languages anything else written for our CoCo is written in.

Less native because we don't have a native tcpip stack at all, instead
the CoCo implements the application layer (processes HTTP, and can
provide dynamic content fwiw) but does not implement IP or native
networking hardware.  Instead, it uses a hybrid solution that provides
IP services over the bitbanger serial port and a host PC to do the IP
side of things.  The project did win the "Retro Computing Challenge"
last year (or maybe it was the year before.. time flies), and the
httpd server is designed to work with a native networking solution,
should the hardware ever be created... but still it isn't currently
completely satisfying.

Project page is here:  https://sites.google.com/site/drivewire4/

-Aaron