Entry 0731: Blog: 1

Hi

.... Photographs finished.
.... All items logged and stored.
.... Next stop image manipulation and HTML edits.
.... Get some rest... :-)

The photography wasn`t the prob this time it was the
storing the stuff afterwards. I still have to find  a home
for the IBM and I have a large box here full of stuff with
no place to go. I really am fit to bust as they say...

Anyway.. For those interested. This is what is coming up..

[ ADDED TO THE COLLECTION ]

COMPUTERS:

Acorn A3010 boxed
Acorn A3010 with modem
Acorn Pocket Book
Amstrad Alt386-SX Laptop
Amstrad NC200 Notebook
Amstrad Pen Pad PDA 600
Atari 600XL
2nd Atari 600XL
Atari 800
Atari Portfolio HPC-004
Commodore C386SX-LT Laptop
Compaq Portable III Luggable
2nd Compaq Portable III Luggable
Enterprise 64 boxed
IBM PS/1 with monitor, mouse and keyboard
IBM Luggable PS/2 P70
Matra and Hachett - Alice
Sanyo MBC550 plus hardbound binders and keyboard
Sega Mega CD II
Sega Mega Drive

AMIGA CARDS:
A2386SX Bridgeboard
OpalVision Graphics Card
Amiga 1050 Expansion for the A1000 boxed
Amiga PCMCIA Network card and kit.
PicassoIV Vers.1.2
2 x A4000 Daughterboards
Cyberstorm MKII
Phase 5 SCSI Module
Catweasel Z-11 MK 2 
Oktagon 2008
A3640 Processor Card

AMIGA:
GT-916 Genitizer
Amiga Audio Digitiser
Amiga 601 RAM Expansion Guide
Kyrandia - Fables and Friends - Westwood
Psyngnosis Games Rare Boxed -
Anarchy - Psygnosis
Atomino - Psygnosis
Armour Geddon - Psygnosis
Cruise for a Corpse - Delphine
RoboCop 3 - The Hit Squad
Super Tetris - Spectrum HoloByte
Immortal - Electronic Arts
Amiga Forever - Cloanto CD Version 5.0
A4000 keyboard
A4000 Internal Floppy Drive
2 x A4000 PSUs
Amiga Workbench 1.3 
Amiga Format Cover CDs 21,22,24
IDE Fix 1993
IDE Fix - 1993 1996 Elborate Bytes
SCSI Tools Version 2.2 - Phase 5
Village Tronic - Install PicassoIV

AMIGA MAGAZINES:
47 CU Amiga 
9 Amiga Shopper
3 Amiga Power
35 Amiga Computing
62 Amiga Format
3 Your Computer
25 Amiga Active
2 Zero
6 The One
9 Amiga World
27 AUI
2 ST Amiga
1 ST Format

ACORN:
RisC OS User Guide
RisC Application Software 1 and 2
An Introduction to the RisC OS

AMSTRAD
Amstrad Machine Language - Joe Pritchard
Amstrad CPC 6128 Manual - User Instructions
CPM Plus
Amstrad Notebook Computer NC200 Manual

ATARI:
Mega Computer Manual
Atari TrakBall
Two button mouse

COMMODORE:
C128 Controller
An Introduction to your new Pet - 2001 Series
PractiCalc64 5.25" disk plus manual
C64 Games System Software Manual
Inventory 64 5.25" disk plus manual
Anagram Software for the C64
C64 Step by Step Programming - Phil Cornes
ScreenShot Graphics Pack 
GEOS 128 v2 & BASIC 8 EPROM
GEOmakeBoot 5.25" disk plus manual - Creative Micro Designs

Commodore Games:
Rally Driver - Alternative
Turbo OutRun - Sega
Quattro Adventure - Codemasters
Arnie - Zeppelin
Yogi Bear - HiTec
River Rescu - Alternative
Super Hang On - Hit Squad
Ninja Scooter Simulator - Silverbird
SummerCamp - Kixx
Golden Egg Cup - Mastertronic
BMX 2 - Codemasters
Moontorc - Atlantis
SWAG - Micromania
Quattro Coin Ops - Codemasters
ProPowerBoat - Codemasters
Trio - Sparklers
Paperboy - Encore
StreetWarriors - Silverbird
Lotus Esprit Turbo Challenge - GBH
Commodore Action Pack 2
Sanxion - Hewson
Atlantis Gamepacks 1 and 2

SEGA:
Megadrive Games:
SONIC 2 - Sega
Rocket Knight Adventures - Konami
Claifornia Games - Sega
Sonic the Hedgehog - Sega
Road Rash - Electronic Arts
Global Gladiators - Virgin
FIFA 97 - Electronic Arts
Batman Returns - Sega
Super Hang-On - Sega
Mega CD Games: Road Avenger - Sega
Jaguar XJ220 - Core
Terminator - Virgin
Genesis Games:
QuackShot - Sega
Alien 3 - Arena International
PGA Tour Golf - Electronic Arts

SINCLAIR
Programming your ZX Spectrum - Tim Hartnell
Spectrum +3 Manual
Spectrum +2 Manual
Sinclair ZXSpectrum BASIC Programming
ZXSpectrum+ User Guide
ZX81 Learning Lab
Programming Arcade Games on the Spectrum - Adrian Jones
River Raid - Activision
Tasword Two - Tasman Software
Make a Chip - Incognito
Data Genie - ACL AudioGenic
Finance Manager - OCP
Address Manager - OCP
Griffin Software Wordspell
Spectrum Machine Code Made Easy - Paul Holmes
Advanced Spectrum Machine Language - Melbourne House
Spectrum Machine Language for the Absolute Beginner
Spectrum Graphics and Sound - Steve Money

TANDY:
GT16 - Graphics Tablet

MAGAZINES GENERAL:

Retro Gamer Load 31
Retro Gamer Load 32
Retro Gamer Load 33
Retro Gamer Load 34
Imagine FX - Dec 2006
Imagine FX - Christmas 2006
Imagine FX - Feb 2007
3D World - Feb 2007
3D World - March 2007
Games TM The Legend of Nintendo
Micromart - 9 copies

COMIX:
Witchblade 98
Elektra 18,19,20,21,24,25

WINDOWS:
Adobe Type Manager
IBM DOS 3.2 User Guide and Quick Ref Guide

MODERN STUFF:
Guildwars - Nightfall - NC Soft
World of WarCraft - Blizzard
Belkin G+ Wireless Card
TP Link Wireless Card
Disgo 2GB memory stick
BTHomeHub

[ end acquisitions ]

More on the way including a Philips CDi 450 console.

Time to get  back to the A3000UX project now.

Entry 0731: Blog: 2

Why should I think that after all these years anything would
change regarding the use, storage and archiving of files and
more specifically ' formats '

In a fit of stupidity I decided to install my PCTV card on this
crappy XP machine. I bought this card originally for the Win98
machine but decided to crack the wrapping and put it in the
XP machine. I was very careful to read what it said on the
box and there it was, printed in large letters... Suitable
for the XP Operating System... hmmmm.

Anyway I read the book about installing the card, which although
internally was easy, externally was real tricky, what with all
the wires and the like... Anyway job done.

Next up came the software... So to the book. 1st chapter on
how to install under Win98, second chapter ME and third
chapter Win2000... next chapter... er There was no further
chapter.. And no instructions for XP. Wonderful. 

I decided to proceed as if Win2000. This said just bypass all
the automated installs and run the auto-install from the CD.
This I did. I rebooted... Sadly XP didn`t think I had installed
the card so I just ignored the install new hardware prompt.
The software worked fine... Of a fashion and I was generally
happy. 

I then restarted the machine having done a few things else
and was again prompted by XP and 'Found new hardware'.. Geesh !!
Anyway I decided to play along so I installed as requested.
No surprises the new software didn`t work. I was told by Xp
that there had been a problem and I should contact the vendor.
Thank you XP... I did what anyone would do and went to get
an updated XP driver. I installed... And it still didn`t 
work. I then decided to uninstall but, you guessed it, XP
couldn`t find the uninstall exe. I deleted files all over
the place... Silly I know but what the heck, the computer
was clinging to the window ledge at this time.

I then installed the new drivers... and rebooted. The machine
lossed all the icons on my desktop... Getting better. And the
software still didn`t work. 

I decided to try and uninstall the new drivers and software, and
XP let me do this whoo hoo... Anyway I decided now to revert
back to a save point on the System Restore that I created ... 
I create these generally every other day or so. The machine
rebooted and XP said it couldn`t restore me... Sorry.
XP was really not helping much...

And so I installed the software again to the XP version which
I downloaded from the site and found that as long as I ignore
the ' Found new hardware ' prompts I can use the software and
card and all is well... 

Xp.. Brilliant or what. :-(

Next stop Codecs. OK. Rant.. I buy a piece of software, I install
a piece of legitimate hardware.. I want to use it sensibly but
I can`t. The file sizes created are massive.. Raw AVI and getting
on to 1GB for a couple of minutes. I check the help on the
dropdown and it suggests I get a compression application. Very
kindly not provided by the software... Hmmm.

I am again thrust onto the web and find loads of free downloads.
Eventually in one of the forums I find a nice free application
called.. Avidemux which I installed and works fine.. Except that
all the file formats for compressing AVI files, though successful
in the application are not read by Windows Media Player. And so
I trek back onto the web to find these Codecs. Having done so
and faced with just the DLL I find out then how to install. But
guess what XP doesn`t like these files and refuses to register
them. And so I have a legitimate piece of hardware and software
that I want to use efficiently and XP won`t let me...

In conclusion I am back to where I was with the Amiga and an 80MB
hard drive. In those days a video file would be 1mb and I could
get 80 on a hard drive. Now I have 1GB video files and will get
eighty on a 80GB hard drive. The annoying thing is, is that
VidiAmiga in providing the hardware and software fully expected
me to manipulate files and therefore provided all the tools
to do that. And didn`t need to go onto the web every second
to verify authorisation. 

This file verification process and Codec nonsense is a destructive
force that is a consequence of pirate software downloading. Trouble
is it gets in the way of legitimate users and makes life a
mysery. I know there are work arounds, and I know that I could
probably find the way.. But honestly, why is it so difficult.

And finally... Having gone through the pain, the machine now 
has this boot up error problem, I have files that are not of
a usable size and to top it all something in that flurry 
installed spyware on my machine. So why bother.

Back to the Amiga Room me thinks....