[Coco] [Color Computer] Questions, Questions, Questions...

[Brian Blake]

On 12/31/2012 6:36 PM, Aaron Wolfe wrote:
> On Mon, Dec 31, 2012 at 4:14 PM, john.bielak <j.bielak at comcast.net> wrote:
>> Hi!
>>
>>
>> Any suggestions about using A CoCo with a modern Monitor/TV?  I've got a Composite to VGA converter that works moderately well (though not spectacularly) with some other retro equipment... and one brilliant little mod board that makes a TS-1000 look amazing on LCD/Plasma display. I'm going to drop in the Composite mod for the CoCo2, and there's I have an RGB to VGA converter I want to try with the CoCo 3 once I wire together cables... but does anyone have any suggestions based on their experiences?
>>
> Roy Justus makes an excellent coco3 rgb -> vga converter.  He recently
> started offering them for sale again.

You can see a review of Roy's VGA adapter here: 
http://tandycoco.com/blog/roy-justice-vga-adapter


>
>> I recently picked up a Coco3.com Drive Pak and Wireless RS-232 Pak in a bundled eBay auction and was wondering:
>>
>> How does the Drive Pak compared to the SuperIDE interface?  I not really interested in which is faster, but rather they're overall usability.
>>
> There is a comparison of features at:
>
> http://www.frontiernet.net/~mmarlette/Cloud-9/Hardware/SuperIDE.html
>
>> With the Drive Pak, and the CoConet 1.27 firmware, on a CoCo 2/3 I've found it easy to use and like the way mounting drives and partitions are handled.  I'm not happy about the lack of SDHC support, and I'm definitely not fond of the proprietary format used on the SD card.  The three other Retro SD drive replacements I have at the moment (Commodore, Timex-Sinclair ZX81, Atari) use one of the DOS/Windows FAT or NTFS file systems which makes loading and transferring things a breeze.  The CoCoPak utility make life WAY easier but I'm not seeing it as an ideal solution in the future (See: Windows 8 and beyond)
>>

The CoCoPak utility was not written by the author of CoCoNet. I'd 
imagine his incentive to continue it's lifespan would be directly 
related to the plans and efforts of the new owner of the 
DrivePak/CoCoNet...
>> Cloud 9's SuperIDE looks very interesting, but the documentation I could find the site doesn't talk much, if at all really, about the actual usage on a CoCo under normal Disk Basic/RSDOS. Nothing about how, or if you can at all, mount disk images or move through sub directories... or if primary meant for higher end OS's like OS9.
> The SuperIDE provides 256 disk images in DECB by default, but you can
> use less space than that, and there are community hacks available to
> support many more.  They are all "mounted", you just type DRIVE XXX
> like you would on a normal DECB system and use the standard DECB
> commands like normal.  No support for subdirectories or anything like
> that, its just a blob off disk images on the CF/SD/HDD.

I'll add to what Aaron said with this: the SuperIDE is the fastest 
storage device for the CoCo, at least in this discussion - and it is 
currently very well supported by the community as well as the developers.

>> Does anyone had any experience with the Wireless RS-232 Pak?  It's without a ROM which from what I gather, on what's left of CoCo3.com's forums, is not necessarily a bad thing as the original RS-232 where fairly unless and a number of apps and OS's just access the hardware directly.  Question is, rubbish or not, can anyone point me in the direction of the 115k bps RS-232 ROM?  I gather that you can burn a EPROM with CoConet and use it as a Wireless DrivePak?  Has anyone used on in conjunction with a DrivePak?

You don't have to have a ROM in the wireless pak - according to what 
Roger once told me - since CoCoNet includes a modified ROM code from the 
RS-232 pak (all of his pak devices use a 6551 ACIA to talk to whatever 
storage media is being used. If you have the DrivePak in a slot, and the 
Wireless Pak in another, the DrivePak's ROM should detect it. I've used 
the Wireless pak with a completely different bluetooth module from what 
Roger sold with it, as well as an XBee wireless radio, in conjunction 
with the DrivePak. Honestly, though, I never tried to remove the ROM 
from the Wireless Pak. If it works as told to me, just select the slot 
on the MPI to the DrivePak slot. Start CoCoNet Server on the PC with the 
correct settings and it should detect not only the DrivePak but also the 
Wireless Pak as well.


>>
>> >From a bit of Googling,I know "what happened to CoCo3.com?" has been asked and somewhat answered, but... and forgive me if this those "community sensitive spots" (See: Maurice Randall + Commodore)... but for a while it looked like someone else was picking it up.  Did that fizzle out or is just one of those slow, back burner, things?
>>
>> Thanks!

It does tend to be a sensitive area. However, CoCo3.com was purchased by 
one person. The CoCoNet/Pak business was purchased by a completely 
different person. That's all I'll say for now....


Brian