Thank you very much for this explanatory video about WiModem !!! Greetings from Buenos Aires, Argentina..I tell you that in 1987 at the age of 18 I received a Basic Programmer ... in C64 as well as I have ventured in those times in C128 ... here in Argentina .. at least in the Private Institute where I learned Computing ... the Modem did not arrive, as well as QuantumLink ... when in 2000 I had my first PC there, I ventured into the WinVice emulators ... playing Henry's House..Ghostbuster. .West Bank and many other games as well as making my own programs ... today I already have the new versions of WinVice ... and I have it configured and connected to the Internet ... with which I can enjoy for about 5 years QuantumLink (in its People Connection module) as well as CometChat, chat and have a friendship with many users from different parts of the USA ... Florida ... Minnesota ... New York..Illinois ... California .. among many others, and I have also been "playing" with the BBS. I certainly had one of the first versions of the V-1541..today I downloaded the latest revision from 2016 .. and it works perfect ... Of course, I also have 2 Commodore 64 C with all your equipment..Thanking you again for the contribution to all of us "Commodorians" ... I leave a Big Hug.
Q-Link... and Port Commodore here in Utah (Salem), and many of those others that ran C-Net/Image BBS. OHH! I didn't know Q-Link become AOL! Wow, I wish I had known about QL back in those days! Yeah, I guess that would be bigger than the Image BBSes of the day!
When your modem has 50 times the memory of the C64, probably a CPU running at 32Mhz or higher, and the latency of the user port a thousand times higher than the internet connection itself. I think I'm gonna dig out my old BBS floppy and run it for the hell of it. he-he Too bad only one user can connect at a time... or can it do multiple connections through IP, along with BBS software mod? At 6:43 wow, now that brings back some sweet memories watching the PUNTER modem receiving data in real(slow)-time at 1,200 baud, you could actually see the binary characters on the screen.... ahh the good 'ol days. :)
Wow, this is amazing! Our first computer (under my parents' roof) was a Commodore 64 that I still have (and I think still works, but I haven't checked it for a while), and you hit the nail right on, bro! I can't wait to get my hands on one of these!
Excellent. I have yet to try out Q-Link Reloaded so it is time. It would be awesome if the Q-Link backups were found, specifically for the Software Showcase. I have several disks of Q-Link downloads from back then but it is a drop in the bucket and the entire library would be stellar. Keep up the good work, your videos are fantastic.
Here's hoping! It would be great to see it come back to life -- there's certainly enough retro enthusiasts out there to make it happen. Thanks for the positive vibes!
On a mostly-unrelated related note I've decided I'm gonna go for it, gonna get me an Amiga. It's a bit discouraging though 'cause all the machines I see for sale are PAL and I don't have a compatible display. Was hoping to just use it with my TV, honestly...
I fully support this decision ;) I'm sure there's a RetroTINK model or perhaps an OSSC will fit the bill. If you still have a 1084 or similar kicking about, PAL won't matter if you're using RGB. Some Amigas (like the 3000) can switch between NTSC and PAL at the boot menu or in software later on though I'm not sure if all models do this. Final thought: I've been messing around with a MiSTer as an Amiga 1200 stand-in and that's been fine if all you want to do is run the software.
@@retrobitstv Well it's a CRT TV so scan converters aren't gonna help me much. Got a lovely 27 inch Trinitron. Has some color purity issues I need to sort out (need to fiddle with the yoke I think) but otherwise it's pretty nice, and it's my go-to for all my old game consoles at this point. I could use a scan converter with one of my LCD monitors - might be the way I'll have to go honestly. Alas, I did not keep my 1084S. I think you once told me it was worth holding onto, but once I had my heart set on getting a PC I dumped all my Commodore stuff. Kind of a shame, kind of not. I mean I'd love to have that old 1084S now but for about 20 years I had no interest in it, so for all that time it just would have been more clutter. FPGAs and emulators are always an option but frankly, I wanna party like it's 1989. At some point around then I saw the A-500 in a shop and thought it was the best thing ever. Now I know better of course but I still want to go back and check it out, see the platform that gave rise to Battle Chess and Dune II and Lemmings and Worms and Another World - and some truly terrible ports of some NES and Genesis games - and all that other stuff. Kind of would prefer to have it be an NTSC machine as well, as much as people say Amigas are better off in PAL. I think most of the later Amigas can do the boot menu trick, and certain revisions of the 500 can be switched with a hardware mod, so at the moment I'm kind of banking on that mod (which is tricky 'cause I don't always know the rev of the machine I'm looking to buy...) I am kind of thinking about whether it might be worth going straight for a 1200 (for hard drive support, more RAM, the better chipset, greater degree of confidence I can get it into NTSC mode, etc.) but I'm a bit more interested in the 500 because nostalgia.
Ahh, CRT, gotcha. The Amiga would benefit from either an RGB display or a conventional monitor w/scan doubler. I've not used one on a TV, but that would probably be fine for games and demos and such, just not running the desktop in higher res modes. I hear ya, I appreciate real hardware, hence the channel in the first place. The FPGA has its place, and with the prices of A1200s being what they are these days, I've not been able to find a good deal on one yet.
@@retrobitstv Yeah I definitely want to explore the Amiga GUI but since I'm mostly interested in the Amiga 500 at this point (not even a Plus probably), I think the Trinitron should be pretty good for anything the system can generate. (Other than PAL mode, at least - haven't tried the set with a 50Hz input but it probably can't handle it correctly) Over YPbPr the image quality should be good enough for anything the 500 can produce, assuming I can get the set's color convergence well-calibrated. I haven't really decided if I want to get other Amiga models. 1200 would be great for a number of reasons - PCMCIA for a network adapter, IDE for mass storage, the AGA chipset plus any modern accelerator solution I care to throw at it... But to me it represents the Amiga more or less after its decline. I kind of don't want to start there.
I had a pisser of a time trying to get this thing to take text in the terminal program. Turns out you have to go into dialing parameters and turn it to 300 baud, otherwise text wont even show up on the screen for you to put the wimodem on your home network. BTW this is an actual solution in the wimodem manual. There's a lot of good stuff in there, make sure to read it.
1:00 - And that ESP8266 is probably well over a hundred times more powerful than the C64 itself. These poor microcontrollers, brain the size of a planet and they've been tasked with shuffling data around for these old 8 bit relics. You call that job satisfaction?
@@retrobitstv I did the NESRGB mod on my old NES (not sure if it's the same one I got in high school) and I threw in a 20MHz microcontroller to do the job of a toggle switch
I love your desk with 6 computers on it. Did you make it and can you make a video showcasing how they are all set up with the switches for the monitors?
The desk started life as a flat pack table from Amazon or Wayfair. I choose it because it was inexpensive and had casters. I removed the small monitor shelf and added the two larger tiers - they bolt to the metal spine of the desk using the original hardware. I'll see about demoing the setup in the next shorts video :)
@@alancook01 This is pretty similar, but not the exact same brand/model: amzn.to/3iYmHoo The two tiers on top are just heavy duty finished shelves from Lowes. For the first tier supports, I used the following hardware: amzn.to/3iVoCKt amzn.to/3zHws09 and amzn.to/3vJDazx and the first tier bolts to the desk using threaded inserts, same as the original monitor stand. Tier2 is offset to the rear and secured to Tier1 with finished wooden legs and wood screws. To finish it off, a 9-outlet power bar is bolted to the bottom: amzn.to/3gQqcup
It started life as a cheap flat-pack desk from Amazon, then I added the additional tiers to it. It's no longer for sale by Amazon, but a 3rd party vendor has it for over 2x the price :/
The WiModem benefits from a more mature firmware at this time. It's more compatible, as it works with any software requiring a userport modem (Qlink, Neo Habitat, most terminal programs) and can run up to 9600 baud using the UP9600 hack on a c64. The WiModem has a larger AT command set, and also telnet translation mode. The UII+ gives you swiftlink emulation, which offer much higher speeds (38.4k on a c64) but has no WiFi capability and requires use of the wired ethernet port.
I liked this video for the most part, but you could redo it a bit by not contradicting yourself when you said "All of the machines save the Commodore come standard with an RS-232 port...." Uh... 2 of those machines ARE Commodores! Oops.... But I do like that rolling desk of the stacked computers and 2 monitors; that's slick!
He is actually right. The RS-232 port on the C64 is actually emulated and does not follow the standards of a typical RS232 port. Many people still called it as such tho. www.c64-wiki.com/wiki/RS-232
@@PaulHockerOnEarth, I'm not saying the 64 has one. I don't even know which port on that could work like one. I'm saying that he said it like only one of these machines is a Commodore even though actually 2 of them are.
"Before the internet"? Uhh... not quite. The internet was around long before the '80s. It just wasn't public until 1989 and was named differently before.
![ฮักเทื่อสุดท้าย - บอย ศิริชัย [OFFICIAL MV]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/-1PoPoQ-B-k/mqdefault.jpg)
Thank you very much for this explanatory video about WiModem !!! Greetings from Buenos Aires, Argentina..I tell you that in 1987 at the age of 18 I received a Basic Programmer ... in C64 as well as I have ventured in those times in C128 ... here in Argentina .. at least in the Private Institute where I learned Computing ... the Modem did not arrive, as well as QuantumLink ... when in 2000 I had my first PC there, I ventured into the WinVice emulators ... playing Henry's House..Ghostbuster. .West Bank and many other games as well as making my own programs ... today I already have the new versions of WinVice ... and I have it configured and connected to the Internet ... with which I can enjoy for about 5 years QuantumLink (in its People Connection module) as well as CometChat, chat and have a friendship with many users from different parts of the USA ... Florida ... Minnesota ... New York..Illinois ... California .. among many others, and I have also been "playing" with the BBS. I certainly had one of the first versions of the V-1541..today I downloaded the latest revision from 2016 .. and it works perfect ... Of course, I also have 2 Commodore 64 C with all your equipment..Thanking you again for the contribution to all of us "Commodorians" ... I leave a Big Hug.
GREAT !
Q-Link... and Port Commodore here in Utah (Salem), and many of those others that ran C-Net/Image BBS. OHH! I didn't know Q-Link become AOL! Wow, I wish I had known about QL back in those days! Yeah, I guess that would be bigger than the Image BBSes of the day!
Great content. Thank you for posting.
When your modem has 50 times the memory of the C64, probably a CPU running at 32Mhz or higher, and the latency of the user port a thousand times higher than the internet connection itself. I think I'm gonna dig out my old BBS floppy and run it for the hell of it. he-he Too bad only one user can connect at a time... or can it do multiple connections through IP, along with BBS software mod?
At 6:43 wow, now that brings back some sweet memories watching the PUNTER modem receiving data in real(slow)-time at 1,200 baud, you could actually see the binary characters on the screen.... ahh the good 'ol days. :)
Wow, this is amazing! Our first computer (under my parents' roof) was a Commodore 64 that I still have (and I think still works, but I haven't checked it for a while), and you hit the nail right on, bro! I can't wait to get my hands on one of these!
Excellent. I have yet to try out Q-Link Reloaded so it is time. It would be awesome if the Q-Link backups were found, specifically for the Software Showcase. I have several disks of Q-Link downloads from back then but it is a drop in the bucket and the entire library would be stellar. Keep up the good work, your videos are fantastic.
Here's hoping! It would be great to see it come back to life -- there's certainly enough retro enthusiasts out there to make it happen. Thanks for the positive vibes!
On a mostly-unrelated related note I've decided I'm gonna go for it, gonna get me an Amiga. It's a bit discouraging though 'cause all the machines I see for sale are PAL and I don't have a compatible display. Was hoping to just use it with my TV, honestly...
I fully support this decision ;) I'm sure there's a RetroTINK model or perhaps an OSSC will fit the bill. If you still have a 1084 or similar kicking about, PAL won't matter if you're using RGB. Some Amigas (like the 3000) can switch between NTSC and PAL at the boot menu or in software later on though I'm not sure if all models do this. Final thought: I've been messing around with a MiSTer as an Amiga 1200 stand-in and that's been fine if all you want to do is run the software.
@@retrobitstv Well it's a CRT TV so scan converters aren't gonna help me much. Got a lovely 27 inch Trinitron. Has some color purity issues I need to sort out (need to fiddle with the yoke I think) but otherwise it's pretty nice, and it's my go-to for all my old game consoles at this point. I could use a scan converter with one of my LCD monitors - might be the way I'll have to go honestly. Alas, I did not keep my 1084S. I think you once told me it was worth holding onto, but once I had my heart set on getting a PC I dumped all my Commodore stuff. Kind of a shame, kind of not. I mean I'd love to have that old 1084S now but for about 20 years I had no interest in it, so for all that time it just would have been more clutter.
FPGAs and emulators are always an option but frankly, I wanna party like it's 1989. At some point around then I saw the A-500 in a shop and thought it was the best thing ever. Now I know better of course but I still want to go back and check it out, see the platform that gave rise to Battle Chess and Dune II and Lemmings and Worms and Another World - and some truly terrible ports of some NES and Genesis games - and all that other stuff. Kind of would prefer to have it be an NTSC machine as well, as much as people say Amigas are better off in PAL. I think most of the later Amigas can do the boot menu trick, and certain revisions of the 500 can be switched with a hardware mod, so at the moment I'm kind of banking on that mod (which is tricky 'cause I don't always know the rev of the machine I'm looking to buy...) I am kind of thinking about whether it might be worth going straight for a 1200 (for hard drive support, more RAM, the better chipset, greater degree of confidence I can get it into NTSC mode, etc.) but I'm a bit more interested in the 500 because nostalgia.
Ahh, CRT, gotcha. The Amiga would benefit from either an RGB display or a conventional monitor w/scan doubler. I've not used one on a TV, but that would probably be fine for games and demos and such, just not running the desktop in higher res modes. I hear ya, I appreciate real hardware, hence the channel in the first place. The FPGA has its place, and with the prices of A1200s being what they are these days, I've not been able to find a good deal on one yet.
@@retrobitstv Yeah I definitely want to explore the Amiga GUI but since I'm mostly interested in the Amiga 500 at this point (not even a Plus probably), I think the Trinitron should be pretty good for anything the system can generate. (Other than PAL mode, at least - haven't tried the set with a 50Hz input but it probably can't handle it correctly) Over YPbPr the image quality should be good enough for anything the 500 can produce, assuming I can get the set's color convergence well-calibrated.
I haven't really decided if I want to get other Amiga models. 1200 would be great for a number of reasons - PCMCIA for a network adapter, IDE for mass storage, the AGA chipset plus any modern accelerator solution I care to throw at it... But to me it represents the Amiga more or less after its decline. I kind of don't want to start there.
Well done Matt :) I really like your style and content.
Thanks for the encouragement!
I liked Rabbit Jacks Casino!
I hadn't heard of that until now, that's cool!
I had a pisser of a time trying to get this thing to take text in the terminal program. Turns out you have to go into dialing parameters and turn it to 300 baud, otherwise text wont even show up on the screen for you to put the wimodem on your home network. BTW this is an actual solution in the wimodem manual. There's a lot of good stuff in there, make sure to read it.
Awesome
1:00 - And that ESP8266 is probably well over a hundred times more powerful than the C64 itself. These poor microcontrollers, brain the size of a planet and they've been tasked with shuffling data around for these old 8 bit relics. You call that job satisfaction?
And here I am with this terrible pain in all the diodes down my left side... I feel the same way about using a Pi 3b+ as a 1541 drive.
@@retrobitstv I did the NESRGB mod on my old NES (not sure if it's the same one I got in high school) and I threw in a 20MHz microcontroller to do the job of a toggle switch
Its a vacation. I put a small tropical drink near the modem, and a little umbrella. The 8266 is always smiling. :)
Long live VI(M)!
Device 2 for a "disk drive"? Interesting!
AOL I have friend that actually uses it. Why don't they reopen their QL sight. Maybe they can expand their user base.
I love your desk with 6 computers on it. Did you make it and can you make a video showcasing how they are all set up with the switches for the monitors?
The desk started life as a flat pack table from Amazon or Wayfair. I choose it because it was inexpensive and had casters. I removed the small monitor shelf and added the two larger tiers - they bolt to the metal spine of the desk using the original hardware. I'll see about demoing the setup in the next shorts video :)
@@retrobitstv where did you buy the tiers? I would like to recreate the desk if possible.
@@alancook01 This is pretty similar, but not the exact same brand/model: amzn.to/3iYmHoo
The two tiers on top are just heavy duty finished shelves from Lowes. For the first tier supports, I used the following hardware: amzn.to/3iVoCKt amzn.to/3zHws09 and amzn.to/3vJDazx and the first tier bolts to the desk using threaded inserts, same as the original monitor stand.
Tier2 is offset to the rear and secured to Tier1 with finished wooden legs and wood screws. To finish it off, a 9-outlet power bar is bolted to the bottom: amzn.to/3gQqcup
@@retrobitstv thanks. what did you use to cut the pvc pipe?
@@alancook01 I started with a cutoff wheel, but that melts the plastic and makes a mess, so I switched to a regular ol' hack saw which did the job.
Love that desk, where did you get it?
It started life as a cheap flat-pack desk from Amazon, then I added the additional tiers to it. It's no longer for sale by Amazon, but a 3rd party vendor has it for over 2x the price :/
How does the WiModem compare with the modem in the 1541 Ultimate II+?
The WiModem benefits from a more mature firmware at this time. It's more compatible, as it works with any software requiring a userport modem (Qlink, Neo Habitat, most terminal programs) and can run up to 9600 baud using the UP9600 hack on a c64. The WiModem has a larger AT command set, and also telnet translation mode. The UII+ gives you swiftlink emulation, which offer much higher speeds (38.4k on a c64) but has no WiFi capability and requires use of the wired ethernet port.
Vi rulez, emacs droolz!!!
What do you use for an RS232 adapter to get the higher speeds on the C128?
I'm using a replica Turbo232 from GGLabs on my 128. A Swiftlink clone would also do the job and can be had for about $45.
They should update Tradewars 2002 to 2020...and use based on real history.....😀
Did buy or build desk?
It started life as a flat pack desk from Amazon and I added the additional two top tiers.
I liked this video for the most part, but you could redo it a bit by not contradicting yourself when you said "All of the machines save the Commodore come standard with an RS-232 port...." Uh... 2 of those machines ARE Commodores! Oops.... But I do like that rolling desk of the stacked computers and 2 monitors; that's slick!
He is actually right. The RS-232 port on the C64 is actually emulated and does not follow the standards of a typical RS232 port. Many people still called it as such tho.
www.c64-wiki.com/wiki/RS-232
@@PaulHockerOnEarth, I'm not saying the 64 has one. I don't even know which port on that could work like one. I'm saying that he said it like only one of these machines is a Commodore even though actually 2 of them are.
"Before the internet"? Uhh... not quite. The internet was around long before the '80s. It just wasn't public until 1989 and was named differently before.
Well yeah but it's like colloquial shorthand for "before the internet was popularized and readily available to the public"
@@tetsujin_144: Not really what it means. They should just say what they mean.
👍👍👍