Over on Archive.org you can find lots of old magazines, such as Amiga Format Magazine which was a British Amiga magazine that ran between 1989 and 2000. It's a good time killer if you really have nothing better to do than read 15-26 year old articles and advertisements. ;)
Thursday, October 1, 2015
Character joysticks from 1992
I ran across this in the Amiga Format Magazine special issue 2 from 1992 and I thought they were pretty cool.
How to make the Amiga Quicknet 2000 card work with 10Base2 BNC networking
So! I bought a QuickNet 2000 card on ebay and I was having serious problems getting it working at several levels. After much muss, fuss and extra expense, it's now working like a charm!
I decided I'd do this write up on how I finally got it working and connected to the internet through a modern home network via 10BaseT (RJ45). I started to make this post about only configuring MiamiDX but then I decided I'd give a guide on how I got mine working at the hardware level too just in case there are others out there who need help with setting up this card and don't know where to start or what to buy. It's a little long winded but worth the read if you're lost about how to get your Quicknet 2000 a card (and maybe others) online.
This left 10Base2 (BNC) as my option for getting the card connected. I went to a large, local area used computer equipment store bought myself a CentreCOM MR820TR network hub for $10. Being a hub and not a router, it doesn't issue IP addresses. It merely shoves the traffic it sees to anything hooked up to it. This is actually a good thing for this particular setup, since the goal is to bridge 10Base2 BNC to 10BaseT RJ45.
The items you will need for this are as follows:
1) A network hub (not a router or switch!) with BNC and RJ45 ports. It may refer to the BNC/AUI ports as "backbone", but that's ok so long as it's a hub. You may also substitute BNC on the hub for AUI if you use an AUI-to-BNC transceiver, but that just complicates matters unless that's your only option.
The MR820TR is a very good choice as it's a solid piece of equipment and can be purchased for a relatively low price, even online. (As low as $20-25 on ebay with shipping) It has a steel case and uses a standard PC power supply type power cable.
Another nice feature, if you are only hooking it up to your Amiga or other vintage equipment via BNC, is it's built-in terminator switch. Normally BNC has to be put on a tee with a terminator at the end of a chain. However, you can bypass needing a tee and terminator at the hub by putting the "terminator" switch into the "on" position. This will save you a few bucks in extra parts you don't need for a very basic setup.
2) An RG-58 BNC cable, 50 ohm. (not 75 ohm!) You can find the cables on Amazon, ebay and even in-store at some places, such as Fry's Electronics (if they aren't out of stock anyway). Here is an example of a good quality, 6' cable sold by Fry's and other retailers, part # M50-006M:
3) BNC tees 50 ohm (not 75 ohm!) (1 or 2 depending on your hub). If your choice of hub does not have a built-in terminator switch such as the MR820TR, then you will need two; one for the Amiga (or other machine) side and one for the hub side. I picked these up used for a buck each and they just happened to be 50 ohm, but if you want/need a specific part #, the one on the left shown below (of very high quality) is a Pomona 3285
4) BNC terminators. 50ohm (not 75ohm!) (1 or 2, depending on your hub). Just like the BNC tees, you will need one or two depending on your hub. If your hub lacks a built-in termination option, you will need one at the Amiga side and hub side. Even if you only buy one, be sure to get one with a chain just in case you need to ground your terminator to your Amiga as this may be required. In the case of my MR820TR, the internal termination may be grounded already since it works fine without the Amiga side being grounded. It has to do with removing static/noise/interference from the network line. Here are two good quality examples of terminators sold by Fry's and other retailers, part #s BNC-3061P (no chain) & BNC-3061-2P (with chain):
It's all easy to assemble, but here are some examples of how it should look.
If your hub DOES NOT have a built-in terminator option (or you choose to disable it), it should look like this:
If your hub DOES HAVE have a built-in terminator option, it should look like this:
Now just plug in your hub to your router (but NOT in it's "uplink" port, pick #1 to be safe) and you're done.
Oh.. wait. there is one more thing regarding the hardware I need to mention before we move on to the software side of things. You have probably noticed the small, unmarked 3-way switch on the QN2000 card. In regards to my v1.1 card, it needs to be in the position shown in the photos. If you have a desktop case, it will be the right position, if you are facing the back of the machine, as illustrated in the last 2 pictures (although, that's a tower case). If you have a tower like I do it will be the "down" position. It may or may not worth for you in the other two positions, but that's the way I have it working for me so I thought it was worth noting.
Okay, one more thing and then we'll go to software. I promise! This is more hardware than software, though it can cause software-side problems if it's not known to the user. As far as I know from what I've read, as I haven't tested it to see, the QN2000 does not support DHCP so you will need to set everything static: IP address, netmask, gateway and DNS servers within your choice of TCP/IP stack's ettings. It's probably a good idea anyway since you are bridging your connection through a hub. I felt I needed to point that out here since it's a hardware feature that won't work if attempted at the software level.
If everything was done right. you should be set up at the hardware level now.
The QuickNet 2000 card has a ROM with build-in drivers for it's own proprietary networking ("Quicknet.device)", as well as a SANA-II driver ("QuicknetS2.device"). Completely disregard the "Quicknet.device" driver since there is a 99% chance you don't want the special Quicknet setup. Intead, you want to run TCP/IP.
However, they may or may not worth for you depending on your card and the TCP/IP stack you choose, the Sana-II driver may or may not work! Why? I don't know exactly. Also, you can download the drivers online in case you have problems with the ROM or somehow prefer to call on the driver from your hard disk.
I found that under MiamiDX 3.2b2, it would not work with the Sana-II device driver (Quicknets2.device) for anything in the world. It works fine under AmiTCP 3.0b2 however, if you prefer that stack. Your results may vary, but that is the experience I had. Since most people probably would prefer to run MiamiDX, I am going to tell you the "secret" to making this hard work under MiamiDX that noobs such as myself would probably never figure out in a hundred years... don't use Sana-II! Use MNI! I don't know anything about it and I'm not going to pretend do. In fact, this is what another Amiga user who is apparently vastly experienced in Amiga, told me and I quote:
when selecting MNI device, Miami comes with those by default, just point it to the MiamiDX/MNI/z2-mb86950.mni file
Low and behold, it worked like a charm for me!
I won't do an in-depth tutorial about configuring MiamiDX (at least right now) but I will at least tell you where to select this.
Under the "Hardware" section when you go to add (or edit, if you have already added it with the SANA-II driver), select it and click the "Edit" button. You will want to select "MNI driver" in place of "SANA-II driver", then browse your hard disk for the the z2-mb86950.mni file. Look in the "MNI" drawer where ever you installed MiamiDX.
This is how your config should look, although you probably named your device something different:
Assuming you haven't forgotten or messed up something in your MiamiDX (or other TCP stack) setting, you should be online!
I decided I'd do this write up on how I finally got it working and connected to the internet through a modern home network via 10BaseT (RJ45). I started to make this post about only configuring MiamiDX but then I decided I'd give a guide on how I got mine working at the hardware level too just in case there are others out there who need help with setting up this card and don't know where to start or what to buy. It's a little long winded but worth the read if you're lost about how to get your Quicknet 2000 a card (and maybe others) online.
Hardware side
The first problem I ran into was that the QuickNet 2000 (v1.1, at least) won't work with AUI transceivers, due to a problem in the grounding that I found mentioned on the web. Transceivers will not power up when plugged into the card and therefore, they won't work! Besides that, the port has very little space around it so you physically can't make transceivers fit unless you remove the outer casing. As if that wasn't enough, the AUI port on the card is not equipped with the standard slide-lock mechanism found on AUI cables, transceivers and network cards for other computer platforms. Here are two different transceiver makes and models with the QuickNet 2000 v1.1: This left 10Base2 (BNC) as my option for getting the card connected. I went to a large, local area used computer equipment store bought myself a CentreCOM MR820TR network hub for $10. Being a hub and not a router, it doesn't issue IP addresses. It merely shoves the traffic it sees to anything hooked up to it. This is actually a good thing for this particular setup, since the goal is to bridge 10Base2 BNC to 10BaseT RJ45.
The items you will need for this are as follows:
1) A network hub (not a router or switch!) with BNC and RJ45 ports. It may refer to the BNC/AUI ports as "backbone", but that's ok so long as it's a hub. You may also substitute BNC on the hub for AUI if you use an AUI-to-BNC transceiver, but that just complicates matters unless that's your only option.
The MR820TR is a very good choice as it's a solid piece of equipment and can be purchased for a relatively low price, even online. (As low as $20-25 on ebay with shipping) It has a steel case and uses a standard PC power supply type power cable.
Another nice feature, if you are only hooking it up to your Amiga or other vintage equipment via BNC, is it's built-in terminator switch. Normally BNC has to be put on a tee with a terminator at the end of a chain. However, you can bypass needing a tee and terminator at the hub by putting the "terminator" switch into the "on" position. This will save you a few bucks in extra parts you don't need for a very basic setup.
2) An RG-58 BNC cable, 50 ohm. (not 75 ohm!) You can find the cables on Amazon, ebay and even in-store at some places, such as Fry's Electronics (if they aren't out of stock anyway). Here is an example of a good quality, 6' cable sold by Fry's and other retailers, part # M50-006M:
3) BNC tees 50 ohm (not 75 ohm!) (1 or 2 depending on your hub). If your choice of hub does not have a built-in terminator switch such as the MR820TR, then you will need two; one for the Amiga (or other machine) side and one for the hub side. I picked these up used for a buck each and they just happened to be 50 ohm, but if you want/need a specific part #, the one on the left shown below (of very high quality) is a Pomona 3285
4) BNC terminators. 50ohm (not 75ohm!) (1 or 2, depending on your hub). Just like the BNC tees, you will need one or two depending on your hub. If your hub lacks a built-in termination option, you will need one at the Amiga side and hub side. Even if you only buy one, be sure to get one with a chain just in case you need to ground your terminator to your Amiga as this may be required. In the case of my MR820TR, the internal termination may be grounded already since it works fine without the Amiga side being grounded. It has to do with removing static/noise/interference from the network line. Here are two good quality examples of terminators sold by Fry's and other retailers, part #s BNC-3061P (no chain) & BNC-3061-2P (with chain):
It's all easy to assemble, but here are some examples of how it should look.
If your hub DOES NOT have a built-in terminator option (or you choose to disable it), it should look like this:
If your hub DOES HAVE have a built-in terminator option, it should look like this:
Now just plug in your hub to your router (but NOT in it's "uplink" port, pick #1 to be safe) and you're done.
Oh.. wait. there is one more thing regarding the hardware I need to mention before we move on to the software side of things. You have probably noticed the small, unmarked 3-way switch on the QN2000 card. In regards to my v1.1 card, it needs to be in the position shown in the photos. If you have a desktop case, it will be the right position, if you are facing the back of the machine, as illustrated in the last 2 pictures (although, that's a tower case). If you have a tower like I do it will be the "down" position. It may or may not worth for you in the other two positions, but that's the way I have it working for me so I thought it was worth noting.
Okay, one more thing and then we'll go to software. I promise! This is more hardware than software, though it can cause software-side problems if it's not known to the user. As far as I know from what I've read, as I haven't tested it to see, the QN2000 does not support DHCP so you will need to set everything static: IP address, netmask, gateway and DNS servers within your choice of TCP/IP stack's ettings. It's probably a good idea anyway since you are bridging your connection through a hub. I felt I needed to point that out here since it's a hardware feature that won't work if attempted at the software level.
If everything was done right. you should be set up at the hardware level now.
Software side
The next hurdle to jump over was trying to make the card work at the software level! I'll try to keep this as brief as possible since I'm sure you are sick of reading this tutorial by now.The QuickNet 2000 card has a ROM with build-in drivers for it's own proprietary networking ("Quicknet.device)", as well as a SANA-II driver ("QuicknetS2.device"). Completely disregard the "Quicknet.device" driver since there is a 99% chance you don't want the special Quicknet setup. Intead, you want to run TCP/IP.
However, they may or may not worth for you depending on your card and the TCP/IP stack you choose, the Sana-II driver may or may not work! Why? I don't know exactly. Also, you can download the drivers online in case you have problems with the ROM or somehow prefer to call on the driver from your hard disk.
I found that under MiamiDX 3.2b2, it would not work with the Sana-II device driver (Quicknets2.device) for anything in the world. It works fine under AmiTCP 3.0b2 however, if you prefer that stack. Your results may vary, but that is the experience I had. Since most people probably would prefer to run MiamiDX, I am going to tell you the "secret" to making this hard work under MiamiDX that noobs such as myself would probably never figure out in a hundred years... don't use Sana-II! Use MNI! I don't know anything about it and I'm not going to pretend do. In fact, this is what another Amiga user who is apparently vastly experienced in Amiga, told me and I quote:
when selecting MNI device, Miami comes with those by default, just point it to the MiamiDX/MNI/z2-mb86950.mni file
Low and behold, it worked like a charm for me!
I won't do an in-depth tutorial about configuring MiamiDX (at least right now) but I will at least tell you where to select this.
Under the "Hardware" section when you go to add (or edit, if you have already added it with the SANA-II driver), select it and click the "Edit" button. You will want to select "MNI driver" in place of "SANA-II driver", then browse your hard disk for the the z2-mb86950.mni file. Look in the "MNI" drawer where ever you installed MiamiDX.
This is how your config should look, although you probably named your device something different:
Assuming you haven't forgotten or messed up something in your MiamiDX (or other TCP stack) setting, you should be online!
Please leave a comment if you found this information useful!
Tuesday, September 15, 2015
Helpful Amiga Customization Screenshots
Aminet is pretty much THE repository site for all things Amiga, but it totally lacks screenshots, despite there being a placeholder for one on each page. Generally, you have no idea what you are getting until you get it and install it, which annoys me to no end.
I came across an archive of three screenshots someone uploaded (aeswb.lha) back in 1996 that shows their highly customized Workbench screen, as well as a listing of their installed mods! How useful!!
Below are the three extracted GIF files from the above linked archive found on Aminet.
I came across an archive of three screenshots someone uploaded (aeswb.lha) back in 1996 that shows their highly customized Workbench screen, as well as a listing of their installed mods! How useful!!
Below are the three extracted GIF files from the above linked archive found on Aminet.
Sunday, September 6, 2015
Xerox/Microsoft Hybrid Mouse
This is an odd mouse I came across at a Goodwill store with a steel ball and branded Xerox. It's perhaps a Xerox / Microsoft mouse hybrid. I really don't know much about this mouse.
The website OldMouse.com used to have a page talking about it, but for some strange reason, they have removed it! Only a few days ago, Google still had cache of the page but they have since also removed it.
Thankfully, Archive.org still has it, at least as of the time of this post.
This is what the page said:
Xerox-Microsoft Hybrid Mouse
This mouse inspires speculation about the feedback Xerox gave Microsoft for the mouse it commissioned.
This Xerox mouse for sale on eBay by user vintagecomputermuseum appears at first glance as Microsoft's so-called grey eyed mouse simply rebranded for Xerox in custom coffee colors. The Microsoft grey-eyed mouse was released in 1985. Apparently Xerox commissioned this custom mouse after abandoning its own Xerox 8010 (so-called Star) optical mouse of 1981 origin. The custom connector plug that looks like an RJ45 would not work on a regular PC.
But flip the Xerox mouse over and its ball and housing retain the style of Microsoft's earlier so-called green eyed mouse (developed in 1982 and introduced in 1983). This Xerox mouse wears the 1985 Microsoft mouse's shell on the 1983 Microsoft mouse's mechanism.
The grey-eyed Microsoft Mouse 5.0 of 1985 release has a rubber coated steel ball held in place by a round plastic retainer ring that latches into a round track. The older mouse has a bare steel ball held in place by a screw tab on its retainer ring, just like the ball housing on this Xerox branded mouse.
The website OldMouse.com used to have a page talking about it, but for some strange reason, they have removed it! Only a few days ago, Google still had cache of the page but they have since also removed it.
Thankfully, Archive.org still has it, at least as of the time of this post.
This is what the page said:
Xerox-Microsoft Hybrid Mouse
This mouse inspires speculation about the feedback Xerox gave Microsoft for the mouse it commissioned.
This Xerox mouse for sale on eBay by user vintagecomputermuseum appears at first glance as Microsoft's so-called grey eyed mouse simply rebranded for Xerox in custom coffee colors. The Microsoft grey-eyed mouse was released in 1985. Apparently Xerox commissioned this custom mouse after abandoning its own Xerox 8010 (so-called Star) optical mouse of 1981 origin. The custom connector plug that looks like an RJ45 would not work on a regular PC.
But flip the Xerox mouse over and its ball and housing retain the style of Microsoft's earlier so-called green eyed mouse (developed in 1982 and introduced in 1983). This Xerox mouse wears the 1985 Microsoft mouse's shell on the 1983 Microsoft mouse's mechanism.
The grey-eyed Microsoft Mouse 5.0 of 1985 release has a rubber coated steel ball held in place by a round plastic retainer ring that latches into a round track. The older mouse has a bare steel ball held in place by a screw tab on its retainer ring, just like the ball housing on this Xerox branded mouse.
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