[Coco] CoCo 2 16k.. Upgrade or no?

Sun Mar 18 15:00:06 EDT 2012

I was just asking to see if it might be worth more "untouched".   It had ECB

Aaron Banerjee <spam_proof at verizon.net> wrote:

>
>I honestly didn't realize that we had varying opinions.  The only  
>reason I could possibly see why you wouldn't want to upgrade a Coco  
>from 16 to 64K would be if you had one of those old "D" board Coco I's  
>that required "surgery" and you didn't want to risk ruining your  
>antique.  If I recall properly, a Coco II is really easy to upgrade  
>(replace chips, and maybe a solder point -- or was it a jumper or  
>something?  been a few years)
>
>@Chad:  Glad you got your Coco upgraded.  By the way, is your coco one  
>of those ones that does NOT have Extended Color BASIC?  If so, drop me  
>a line.
>
>As for finding something to do with the Coco, remember that you've got  
>a good relay in the cassette port.  You can measure voltages from 0 -  
>5V via the JOYSTK port(s) without any sort of fancy programming, and  
>you have a built-in D/A converter accessible out the back end of the  
>computer.  Go figure.  It's a great microcontroller..   Note that  
>doing JOYSTK conversions affects your D/A output....
>             - Aaron
>
>
>On Mar 18, 2012, at 7:02 AM, haywire666 at aol.com wrote:
>
>> I don't think you can ever go wrong maxing out any computers ram..  
>> So I didn't understand the varying opinions myself.
>>
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Chad H <chadbh74 at hotmail.com>
>> To: 'CoCoList for Color Computer Enthusiasts' <coco at maltedmedia.com>
>> Sent: Sat, Mar 17, 2012 11:04 pm
>> Subject: Re: [Coco] CoCo 2 16k.. Upgrade or no?
>>
>>
>> Ok, I got some interesting comments on this thread but never  
>> anything like a
>> opinion or recommendation equating to an answer to the question  
>> asked, so I
>> said to hell with it and upgraded the thing to 64K.  Surprisingly, I  
>> found
>> the RAM was already socketed so that saved a lot of work.
>>
>> Here's the board... http://www.mediafire.com/i/?dre4zrt4j1h9ihd
>>
>> Now....to figure out what to do with it... hmmm.
>>
>> - Chad
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: coco-bounces at maltedmedia.com [mailto:coco-bounces at maltedmedia.com 
>> ] On
>> Behalf Of Aaron Banerjee
>> Sent: Tuesday, March 13, 2012 8:21 PM
>> To: CoCoList for Color Computer Enthusiasts
>> Subject: Re: [Coco] CoCo 2 16k.. Upgrade or no?
>>
>> One of the best ways to find something is to announce publicly that  
>> you lost
>> it:
>>
>>
>> 5 FOR X=3584 TO 3609
>> 10 READ D
>> 15 POKE X,D
>> 20 NEXT X
>> 25 EXEC 3584
>> 30 DATA 26, 80
>> 35 DATA 142, 28, 0
>> 40 DATA 166, 132
>> 45 DATA 183, 255, 223
>> 50 DATA 167, 128
>> 55 DATA 183, 255, 222
>> 60 DATA 140, 255, 0
>> 65 DATA 38, 241
>> 70 DATA 183, 255, 223
>> 75 DATA 28, 175
>> 80 DATA 57
>>
>> I think the above program means:
>>
>>       ORCC   $50
>>       LDX    $8000          'START OF BASIC
>> HERE  LDA    ,X
>>       STA    $FFDF          'MAP TYPE 1 (64K)
>>       STA    ,X+            'COPY THE BYTE
>>       STA    $FFDE          'GO BACK TO MAP TYPE 0 (32K)
>>       CMPX   $FF00          'END OF BASIC AND CARTRIDGE MEMORY
>>       BNE    HERE
>>       STA    $FFDF          'NOW THAT YOU'VE GOT BASIC IN THE RAM,
>> YOU CAN SAFELY SWITCH TO ALL-RAM MODE
>>       ANDCC  $AF
>>
>> This is based on my hen-scratched notes from years ago.
>>          - Aaron
>>
>>
>> On Mar 13, 2012, at 8:47 PM, Aaron Banerjee wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> Type in PCLEAR 0 and see if the memory increases.   Remember, a 16K
>>> computer has 16K of actual RAM (locations 0 - 16383).  A lot of that
>>> is used up by BASIC (and the graphics screens).  For 64K machines,
>>> normally only 32K is available (locations 0-32767).  There is a way  
>>> to
>>> get it into 64K mode (an all-RAM machine) where you can go poke up
>>> BASIC (lots of fun).  I've actually posted the program that does
>>> that to this list, and if I can find my notebook, I'll do it again.
>>> Basically, it changes the "map type" back and forth while copying  
>>> over
>>> the contents of BASIC.  Once again, BASIC, cartridge memory, I/ O
>>> memory, etc take up space, so you'll get no where near the 65536  
>>> bytes
>>> implied by "64K."
>>>                - Aaron
>>>
>>>
>>> On Mar 13, 2012, at 8:35 PM, haywire666 at aol.com wrote:
>>>
>>>> Thats interesting I don't remember the ?mem thing...
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Can someone provide a list of the #'s and what they mean?
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> 8487 means 16k?
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> I got 24871 on the coco2 I have on at the moment, does that mean it
>>>> only has 48k?
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Steven
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>> From: Chad H <chadbh74 at hotmail.com>
>>>> To: 'CoCoList for Color Computer Enthusiasts' <coco at maltedmedia.com>
>>>> Sent: Tue, Mar 13, 2012 8:31 pm
>>>> Subject: [Coco] CoCo 2 16k.. Upgrade or no?
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Was just given a virgin CoCo2 26-3136.. It's apparently 16k, only
>>>> shows 8487 from "?MEM".  I already have a spare 64k CoCo, don't
>>>> really need this one.
>>>> I will probably put it up for sell.  Question though.would it be
>>>> better to leave it as is or perform a 64K upgrade to it?  I already
>>>> have enough spare RAM IC's and sockets and it already has ECB 1.1.
>>>>
>>>>
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>>>>
>>>>
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