Tatung Einstien..

Talk about non-Acorn classic computers/hardware/software here (including retro consoles)
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jonb
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Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by jonb » Mon May 01, 2017 7:57 pm

£189, last one failed to sell not long ago.

Contact seller via eBay.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/usr/adamski10_0?_ ... 7675.l2559

Really needs the monitor, but the seller will advise.

YuT666

Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by YuT666 » Sat May 06, 2017 8:04 am

I'm still searching for a possibility to fit a 3.5" drive in the second bay ... heared about it, but i can't find some further infos.

RobC
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Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by RobC » Sat May 06, 2017 1:40 pm

Mine's packed away or I'd take some pictures but you just have to mount the 3.5" drive somehow. I made a bracket out of aluminium and then used a dremel to "modify" the front panel.

YuT666

Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by YuT666 » Sat May 06, 2017 2:09 pm

Thanks. Does a simple common 3.5" drive work without technical modifications?

And i could mill a bracket at my work, 'cause i'm a cnc-engineer.

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Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by RobC » Sat May 06, 2017 4:19 pm

YuT666 wrote:Does a simple common 3.5" drive work without technical modifications?
Thinking about it (it was a good few years ago) I think I followed these instructions - my 3.5" drive is drive 1 so pretty straightforward:
http://www.einstein.talktalk.net/idc.html
YuT666 wrote:And i could mill a bracket at my work, 'cause i'm a cnc-engineer.
You'll certainly do a better job than my hack!

YuT666

Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by YuT666 » Sat May 06, 2017 4:26 pm

Thanks again ...
RobC wrote:You'll certainly do a better job than my hack!
I don't think so ... but maybe it's easier :wink:

YuT666

Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by YuT666 » Sun May 21, 2017 2:19 pm

Ok, this will be my next project ... fitting a 3.5" floppy or a hxc into the second bay. Stay tuned ... :wink:

Zarchos
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Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by Zarchos » Sun May 21, 2017 3:57 pm

YuT666 wrote:Ok, this will be my next project ... fitting a 3.5" floppy or a hxc into the second bay. Stay tuned ... :wink:
I'll be very interested to read your progress.
Thanks in advance,
Z.

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1024MAK
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Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by 1024MAK » Mon May 29, 2017 7:33 am

I have moved the "Tatung Einstein TC-01 with TM-01 colour monitor fault" into a new thread.

Mark

YuT666

Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by YuT666 » Sat Jul 08, 2017 5:44 pm

Modified the second bay for a 3.5" drive.

Well, i'm not pleased with the result of the internal look, but it works. The front looks ok. I'll show the finished mod soon.
TatungDrive1.jpg
TatungDrive2.jpg
TatungDrive3.jpg
TatungDrive4.jpg
TatungDrive5.jpg

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jonb
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Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by jonb » Sun Jul 09, 2017 8:03 am

That looks pretty OK to me - there aren't enough Einstein users to get upset about the "unoriginality" of it..

YuT666

Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by YuT666 » Sun Jul 09, 2017 8:22 pm

I tried to use the 3.5 as the boot drive ... transfered some Tatung games with CPCDiskXP to disk and they work (Alice, River Bandits & Chuckie Egg).

I think i would use the original 3" drive as the second drive (with the different jumper configuration). Will show the result in the next days (i hope), 'cause i'll have to make a cable for both drives.
Last edited by YuT666 on Sun Jul 09, 2017 9:01 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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sirmorris
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Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by sirmorris » Sun Jul 09, 2017 9:00 pm

This is good stuff - any technical information would be appreciated!

YuT666

Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by YuT666 » Sat Jul 15, 2017 10:18 am

Well, after a hard week i had time to finish the Einstein disk drive project. My english skills aren't that good, so i've to apologise for that.

First i made a floppy cable, which i could use for both drives (3" and 3,5"). The original one had only one connector for the 3". I found an old cable and had to put another 3" connector to the cable, 'cause the gap between both drives and the connectors didn't fit.

Image

I want to use the 3.5" as the main drive (boot drive 0), so i joined the lines 10 and 12 of the floppy cable like here:

http://www.einstein.talktalk.net/pdf/idc.pdf

Image

After that i opened the original 3" drive to change the jumper settings.

Originally (so the 3" drive is 0):

Image

Changed it to drive 1:

Image

Now i'm quite happy with the results. I could easily swap the positions of the drives (the right one to the left and vice versa), so the main drive will be at the first position.

Image

Image

Image

Image

Image

RobC
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Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by RobC » Sat Jul 15, 2017 11:10 am

Excellent job - looks really good =D>

YuT666

Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by YuT666 » Sat Jul 15, 2017 11:26 am

Thanks ... :wink:

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1024MAK
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Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by 1024MAK » Sat Jul 15, 2017 1:33 pm

@YuT666 - your English is fine :D

And some good work on the Einstien =D>

Mark

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Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by jgharston » Sat Jul 15, 2017 4:43 pm

You can now start using a proper programming language. :)

Code: Select all

$ bbcbasic
PDP11 BBC BASIC IV Version 0.25
(C) Copyright J.G.Harston 1989,2005-2015
>_

YuT666

Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by YuT666 » Sat Jul 15, 2017 5:53 pm

@1024MAK & jgharston:

Thanks ...

Thought about the following stuff.

An ABBA switch is a great thing ...

http://www.einstein.talktalk.net/abba.html

... but i'm 99% certain, that i'll use the 3.5" drive as the boot drive. So the ABBA would only be a funny gimick.

YuT666

Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by YuT666 » Fri Aug 11, 2017 11:31 am

A little addendum. De-yellowed the keys, so the whole things looks far better.

Before:
Einstein-700x525.jpg
After:
TatungKeys.jpg

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Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by Commie_User » Fri Aug 11, 2017 12:22 pm

Fantastic. Just imagine the kids' faces when this maintained machine is 50 years old.

Now the big question - Is the BBC better than the Einstein for games?

YuT666

Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by YuT666 » Fri Aug 11, 2017 12:57 pm

I think, that there are much more regular games available for the Beeps.

But i like the Infocom versions for the Tatung and mostly the isometric Batman and Attack of the Killer Tomatoes. I like the Starquake version.

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jonb
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Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by jonb » Fri Aug 11, 2017 2:28 pm

You can get Elite for the Tattie but it is just a port of Speccy Elite (no bad thing) without sound (shame!).

There's a funny thing, though. The Elite disk was copy protected and can only be bought (working) from that Tattie specialist. B & H Computers I think they are called. Seems odd given that the game is freely distributable on other platforms.

Keys look good, by the way. One day I will do mine... one day...

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jonb
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Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by jonb » Fri Aug 11, 2017 2:31 pm

jgharston wrote:You can now start using a proper programming language. :)
Doesn't it already have BBC Basic, JG? I mean, it's one of the original disks supplied with the machine I thought.

YuT666

Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by YuT666 » Fri Aug 11, 2017 2:34 pm

jonb wrote:You can get Elite for the Tattie but it is just a port of Speccy Elite (no bad thing) without sound (shame!).

There's a funny thing, though. The Elite disk was copy protected and can only be bought (working) from that Tattie specialist. B & H Computers I think they are called. Seems odd given that the game is freely distributable on other platforms.

Keys look good, by the way. One day I will do mine... one day...
Yes, StarshipUK wrote a time ago:
Protected games only work when transferred back to original 3" Einstein disks. They do not load in MESS, using floppy drive emulators (like HxC) on the Einstein or SD Card devices on the Einstein.
These are the protected games:

http://www.tatungeinstein.co.uk/front/progress.htm

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jgharston
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Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by jgharston » Fri Aug 11, 2017 8:31 pm

jonb wrote:
jgharston wrote:You can now start using a proper programming language. :)
Doesn't it already have BBC Basic, JG? I mean, it's one of the original disks supplied with the machine I thought.
Some were supplied with BBC BASIC on disk, but I don't think it was originally a default option. I think it did become a default option later on in its lifetime. My Einstein did come with BBC BASIC, but it was a machine a tenant had left behind in my Grandma's flat, so I had no way of knowing if it came with the machine or not.

Code: Select all

$ bbcbasic
PDP11 BBC BASIC IV Version 0.25
(C) Copyright J.G.Harston 1989,2005-2015
>_

Commie_User
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Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by Commie_User » Sat Aug 12, 2017 12:41 am

I'd be amazed if BBC BASIC on the Tatung was as good as it is on the real thing.

Having BBC BASIC on the obscure machines was an inspired idea, not least because you can still use them if you had a grounding on the Beeb at school. And in the 80s, if you could push your rival machine as like the BBC, maybe that's how a few boxes even got to leave the warehouse.

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Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by Richard Russell » Wed Aug 16, 2017 10:23 pm

Commie_User wrote:I'd be amazed if BBC BASIC on the Tatung was as good as it is on the real thing.
It was my BBC BASIC (Z80), so effectively identical to what was in Acorn's Z80 Second Processor.

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Re: Tatung Einstien..

Post by Commie_User » Thu Aug 17, 2017 7:36 pm

Ah, sorry. Perhaps I should have clarified that for us:
I'd be amazed if BBC BASIC on the Tatung was executed as well as it was on the real thing.

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