Spectrum Computing

It sounds so reasonable when you put it that way! ;) I'll have a read up on how I might read a 23128. It doesn't look as though my programmer supports that directly. It's a TL866II+, btw What I was considering was flashing a new (EP)ROM making further board mods to support it. The modifications don'...

Quick update... Changed the ULA and didn't see any obvious difference. Got bold and inserted the lower RAM. On power up I'm treated to a new pattern of dancing squares. Tested continuity on the RAM sockets and found a couple of issues. Need to check out the ROM socket now. There's also the possibili...

Here's my latest haul... I was looking for another rubber keyboard Spectrum for spares and came across an auction for a 48k Spectrum with Extras. It was collection only but fortunately local. Made an opening bid and... no one else seemed to notice. All mine for £25 Here's what I collected... The Spe...

The photograph evidence shall be produced within three working days. By order! Here's the hardware... https://i.postimg.cc/1VxRW09W/spec4A.jpg Over on the AtariAge forum there's a long running 'stuff I've recently acquired' thread. Is there something similar around these parts? Now using the CRT TV...

I've changed the permissions on the YT videos... silly me :roll: I'm pretty sure my CRT can be set PAL or AUTO. Will retest with PAL. I've received the DIL sockets I was waiting for so will pop those in place for the removed chips. I can then start to play a bit more. Yesterday I also acquired a rev...

Would've edited the above post but it's not letting me Got a little more time with this. Not sure what I was seeing re the 12V. Had things set up for a while now and all voltages seem stable. On the AC measurements I see nothing on pin 1. Pin 8 = 0.045V. Pin 9 = 0.001V. The values show the upper rea...

Ok, ok... ROM out and memory removed. Things seem a little more chaotic (as predicted) Here we have the machine connected to the LCD as previous https://youtu.be/OS4Eh4dy5ac Now on a CRT monitor - excuse the flicker https://youtu.be/Icx4MKvTMDg When I first connected to the CRT it too struggled to k...

Thanks for the thoughts and advice. Very much appreciated!

Doubt I'll get a chance today but hopefully over the weekend I'll whip out the chips (lower RAM & ROM) ready for socketing. Will test more then... and with a CRT monitor.

Cheers!

The video issue goes a little like this... https://youtu.be/hMdqWx9PMS8 The video doesn't really show the screen 'noise' that pulses along with the flicker. Towards the end you'll also see the crash I describe. This output is pretty consistent on the LCDs screens I have within easy reach. I could al...

Tough one. My instant reaction is Sabrewulf. But the game that I got along with my 16k Speccy was Jet Pac. That’s a tough act to follow.

This morning I added a socket on the issue 2 and switched the CPUs between this board and one of my +2s. Both machines seem to be in pretty much the same state following the brain swap. At the moment things aren't stable enough for me to get any tests running. I've previously attempted to load diagn...

Hi all, a little brain picking if I may. Recently picked up a rubber keyboard Speccy up from eBay. Purchased in an unknown condition, apprarently it showed the Sinclair message on boot. When connected at home I found the image to be incredibly bad. Unusable so. The composite mod had already been per...

Need to test further but now have things set as above.

Initially, things seemed improved. Picture is stable but there remains an issue where after a period of time the image quality degrades quite dramatically.

Thanks for all the help so far. Will test further and report back.

Some progress... Based on measurement between the pins it seems I've got a cable designed for a +2A. I'm basing this on Pin 4 of the DIN(?) mapping to SCART 20 (VIDEO IN) Pin 1 is mapping to SCART 16 (BLANKING) Although this very nearly works with my setup it doesn't tie up with a +2 SCART doc I fou...

Thank you!

Good points, all makes a lot of sense. If I remember correctly I needed some kind of expansion to get RGB output with my rubber keyboard Speccy back in the day.

Will test more without further hardware hacking and report back soon.

Hi all, Looking for suggestions as to where I go next with some video issues I have... Connecting via RGB/SCART (not tried compostie yet) I'm seeing the screen blank briefly every couple of seconds. Otherwise the image quality is very good. Whatever is happening to cause the blank is also sending th...

Get yourself one of these: https://www.bytedelight.com/?product=divmmc-enjoy-black-edition Plugs into the back of the Speccy and allows you run games from an SD Card!!! They're ace!!!! Thanks for the link. I'll add one to my hardware wish list! For now I've found an 3.5mm jack to cassette adapters ...

Hey all! It took a while but I've reacquired a Speccy! My original introduction was with a 16k model one Christmas. Stayed a Sinclair fan for quite some time... Many, many years (and many systems) pass and I felt the urge to pick something up for the collection. I now have a working +2 (fancied a 12...