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• Post #4352906

  RE: https://techhub.social/@jimluther/117027732176761789 Long ago this is what “beta” meant in our industry. No known bugs, but we don’t trust it yet. People now ship things that are falling apart and (if we’re lucky) that call it a beta. Nope. Things with known bugs are alpha versions. But just like in politics, the Overton window of software quality has shifted a lot and, also like in politics, in the wrong direction.

• Post #4333650

  🤭

• Post #4333649

  Huuumm better not, just in case it breaks something. 😅 But super impressive the check still works! I regret having disabled the OS version reporting dialog thinking it would fail, I guess that would be fun for stats. @bbedit @siegel

• Post #4333648

  Removed the shield from the last 475 and washed the case. It’s very clear which monitor spent years on top of this thing. 😅 But I’m not doing retrobright again until I find a method that works and I am convinced I’m not ruining the plastic. De-rust will happen tomorrow. This was the Mac in worst shape, both lower and upper shields are quite rusty. #retroApple

• Post #4333647

  I bought a RPi 5/8GB February 2025 for 73€+tax. Same Pi today costs 173€+tax. Price more than doubled. Pis are used by kids to learn computing and programming and for some it’s the only computer they can (could?) afford. But please explain me how having the opinion the current wave of AI products does more harm than good is “gatekeeping”. I would rather kids have the tools to learn stuff than lazy ass engineers live the illusion they don’t need to know said stuff anymore.

• Post #4204651

  Bummer, looks like the Apple TV free months that could be redeemed just by visiting AirCanada site are gone. They offer 2 free months of Fitness+, though, although that’s not my thing.

• Post #4204650

  Rusty EMF shield separated from the LC III top case. Based on how hard it was to pull it out I don’t think it will be a problem to keep them together without the plastic thingies that were holding it. #retroApple

• Post #4204649

  RE: https://tech.lgbt/@LilahTovMoon/116988260137336768 It tracks, though. History already showed us who are the kind of people who destroy books keeping a copy for themselves only.

• Post #4204648

  Finally had time to reassemble the second mouse. Here are them side by side. Different colours and both stained… can’t really recommend the wrapping in plastic film method. They are better than they were. Much better. But other methods have better results. I’m putting retrobright on larger things like the LC cases on hold until I figure out another method. Sucks that I don’t have a backyard where I can leave things under the sun all day. #retroApple

• Post #4204647

  Most After Dark screensavers are meh, but Starry Night will always be my all time favourite. Sorry, flying toasters.

• Post #4204646

  I bought memories! In this economy! Two 32MB SIMMs, one for each LC 475. The LC III will be bumped to 8MB from the base 4MB with one of the leftovers. Also if you’re curious how fast is eBay international shipping… it’s not. This took a whole month to come from California to Lisbon. And that shipping not exactly cheap either.

• Post #3960401

  First experience with #retrobright! Will it work? Who knows. The weather is still partially cloudy so sunlight occasionally goes away, and my apartment has limited exposure (around lunch time no direct light hits the balconies as the sun is aligned with the side of the building, and I have to move it from north to south balcony). Additionally it all goes away just past 5PM as it gets shaded by a taller building. And I may not have used enough of the magic peroxide cream.

• Post #3696126

  I don’t miss Objective-C at all. But it’s kinda cool to clone a project from GitHub where the most recent change was 12 years ago, the oldest 22 years ago, opening it in Xcode 26, clicking the Run button, and it just builds and runs.

• Post #3692743

  Americans saying “I didn’t vote for him, why are you screaming at me” piss me off. Look at Europe, and France. People bring the country to a halt if they increase retirement age for a few months. Look at Iran. People risk (and often lose) their lives protesting. You barely protest. You don’t strike. You don’t refuse their orders. You don’t become violent. People in countries your government is threatening don’t give a damn who you voted for. And they don’t see you doing jack shit about it.

• Post #3485284

  RE: https://indieweb.social/@alineblankertz/116822789781344785 This is why any tech product that has as its top selling point being European loses me instantly. Thinking Europeans will magically be morally superior to Americans is just ludicrous. Just look at examples listed by Aline and politics moving towards the end of privacy and introduction of backdoors. If Europe does not want to keep marching to total irrelevancy, it needs to make better products, technically and ethically. Not promote...

• Post #3436029

  The G5s are on that valley of not being antique enough nor modern enough to be valuable. They’re practically being given away.

• Post #2049282

  Who says it’s hard to buy hardware these days? Here’s my new memory! 4 whole Megabytes of it!

• Post #1925621

  Introducing MacDVI, finally! 😁 Here's the ready-to-use binary, source code and a LOT of documentation on how to use a Pico 2 to convert your compact Mac TTL video signal to DVI! Bring new life to an old Mac with a dead CRT, or just enjoy it on a modern monitor! There's extensive documentation on how the Mac generates the video signal and how MacDVI samples it. Hope it's good learning material for people interested in #retroApple #retroComputing! 👉 https://codeberg.org/a...

• Post #1830787

  RE: https://mas.to/@mcpinson/116489976446311305 I had to check if this is real. It is. Wow. https://maps.app.goo.gl/cgzaKbbu9hGw4zeu7

• Post #1762163

  The 52MB disk apparently has decided 2026 is just too much. And the Mac does not have enough memory (yet) to boot from 7.1 that’s installed on the other SCSI disk. So we have to use the floppy. But… Here’s a real Mac Plus booting of a floppy disk, with a video converter made out of a single Raspberry Pico! 😁 Still have to improve a few bits (the Mac sends random noise that messes the auto-adjust for optimal sampling) but look at it going! #RetroApple

• Post #1762162

  After testing my TTL to HDMI converter on the Mac Plus logic board yesterday and seeing it working flawlessly 😁 I'm looking into the next phase of the project, and need help from #retroApple #retrocomputing folks. If you have any of: -Mac 128/512/Plus analog board user-visible components (power switch, socket, battery holder and brightness knob, speaker) OR analog board (good or damaged, 120 or International); -Mac Plus case/frame; that you do not want, please ping me. https://mastodon...

• Post #1762161

  RE: https://mastodon.social/@dtgeek/116478277793589725 One of the things that really blows my mind is the amount of people who think natural language is good enough to express deterministic behaviour. They even call “specs” to something that is nothing more than a list of wishes and dreams. Buddy, the CPU won’t stop to ask directions. It has to do SOMETHING. And either you tell it what to do, or a random number generator biased by a bunch of heuristics will. Your choice. (And yes, the cloud p...

• Post #1762160

  RE: https://wetdry.world/@michi/116476750150590603 I want this to be real!

• Post #1762158

  If you live in an apartment, be respectful to your neighbours and stick felt pads under all furniture that is commonly dragged around the floor. Don’t be like my neighbours.

• Post #1697208

  Finally!! Perfect sampling! Still a bit of expected garbage on the vertical back and front porches but the sampling works, totally stable and pixel sharp! And even better, 100% PIO and DMA based! The only thing the CPU core is doing is pre-calculating a table with the sampling timing (based on Bresenham sampling) and adjusting the DMA addresses on interruptions. #RetroApple

• Post #1309841

  Part one of my crazy project finally done! Pico 2 generating a video signal mimicking a Mac Plus, good enough to fool the RGBtoHDMI. Now I can start working on the second Pico that will sample this signal and spit it out through the HDMI port without risking damaging the Mac logic board due to some accident. I learned a lot about programming the Pico (including PIO and controlling the system clock) and how exactly the Mac generates the video signal. #RetroApple

• Post #1289980

  If software developers could agree on using either shift-return or option-return for new lines in normally one line fields, but whatever the one they pick, make it standard and use it anywhere, that would be great.

• Post #945458

  RE: https://mastodon.social/@jamesthomson/116347643258004274 Optical fibre but without the fibre. Really cool!

• Post #945456

  Oh no, I think the LCD screens for the Mac Plus that were being sold on ETSY are sold out. :( Does anyone have the link for it? I can't find it anymore. #retroApple

• Post #945455

  Someone didn't want screws on the HD SC20? 😬 This is going to be a pain. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qof-Wjj_rWI #retroApple