@jimblimey.com Yeah good call I reckon!
@jimblimey.com They’re also good for messing about with RS232, but you need at least two of them to play with Sinclair Networking. If you do get one I’d highly recommend Tom Dalby’s ZXPicoMD instead of a real Microdrive.
@jimblimey.com Yeah, for me it was Microdrives; so futuristic! Now having tried the +3, as well as Beta Disk (TR-DOS), I reckon the best Speccy disk system is PlusD (by MGT, later Datel). I get the need to “scratch the itch” of using the +3 though! (The 3" disks are expensive, slow, small, single sided; annoying!)
@mattround.com We were lured-in early-on with their nice API but I’m glad we decided to roll-our-own. Always felt like it would be ceding too much control over our links but the convenience was strongly appealing.
@squidgybuffalo.bsky.social Yeah, fast and fluid FPS metroidvania kinda thing. Mad weapons and ridiculous power-ups. The remaster takes the good bits from the Saturn and PSX versions, (but at a nice modern frame rate!)
@fuzzweed.co.uk Hahah. It’s the journey not the destination.
@fuzzweed.co.uk Yeah that rings with what I’ve heard anecdotally. You can tape over the hole, but it’s maybe not reliable. I pretty much just use HD drives and DD disks.
The DD drives I do have are not keen on disks that have been thru an HD drive but in my case I think that’s more to do with head alignment etc.
@fuzzweed.co.uk @robsmithdev.bsky.social has some very illuminating videos about ST/Amiga multiformat disks (that’s a special case but explains how each are supposed to work)
youtu.be/HhTfBSIANfI?...
@fuzzweed.co.uk Is that because Atari uses FAT12 and 9 sectors per track?
I need Greaseweazle for PlusD and SAM disks because they’re 10-sectored, TR-DOS uses 16 sectors. Apparently USB FDD tend to be fixed to 9. I think Amiga disks also use 10 sectors?
@zxvintage.bsky.social I did not take the time to map it though, and consequently never got very far! I did play it again and again though.
(It’s also the only tape I remember having that I don’t have now, it must have gone missing along with my Spectrum +2A. Perhaps they’re still out there, somewhere!)
@zxvintage.bsky.social I didn’t have access to a lot of games when I got my Speccy (no intraplayground-backup-network at my school, alas) so I was stuck with Horace etc for a long time. Eventually a friend of my dad’s introduced me to Firelord and it blew me away. Dynamic (sort of) loader, loading screen, graphics, wow.
@squidgybuffalo.bsky.social I’m up to the final bit of Dragon Age Veilguard, just finishing a few side quests before the PONR. I saw you’d posted a review earlier but I’ll save that until I’ve finished it for myself!
@squidgybuffalo.bsky.social Ah okay, thanks. Yeah I just wasn’t really getting into it! I also finally got around to playing the Exhumed remaster and that was great. (I really enjoyed the Saturn one back in the day). So that my only completed game in 2025 so far!
@squidgybuffalo.bsky.social I was wondering your thoughts on this one! Never played the series before, fired it up on Game Pass; it made a really bad first impression. Too hard, fiddly, old skool camera and impossible-to-follow action. Is it all about blocking and waiting to strike? I couldn't tell what it wanted me to do.
@wretchedmorgan.bsky.social Oh crikey, well done!
@quentinpsausages.bsky.social Congratulations! Is it out on Bitmapsoft soon?
@robertprice.bsky.social Ah, I see! Could you keep the earths linked but each board has its own +5V?
@robertprice.bsky.social I never thought of doing Slot 1 at a right angle before, that's cool. Do you use that for something specific?
@zxvintage.bsky.social Laughing at the thought of using Xbox Series X or PS5 as a CD player for a Spectrum, but even the models that do still have optical drives don’t actually play CDs.
@fuzzweed.co.uk D’0H!
@zxvintage.bsky.social And Amstrad reverted it back to out-only for the cost-reduced “+2B” revision!
@balford.bsky.social’s article notes that the cable was wired for two joystick pins but only uses #6 (SJS up; Atari fire)
I wonder why they didn’t take advantage of stereo, load two bits …halving the loading time?!
@breakintoprogram.co.uk If you swing by on the 15th you could catch the GOTY show!
planetasinclair.blogspot.com/2025/01/elem...
@breakintoprogram.co.uk Heh, you were 🤏 this close to inventing Uber. #sidehustle
@breakintoprogram.co.uk I can hear interference from the stepper motor via the telly speaker when SAM accesses a disk (and a bit of visual noise too) but I can't say I've noticed the same phenomenon with a Gotek! I love those weird instances where your brain's anticipation/pattern matching fills in the blanks though.