ZXF08all.PDF

Spectrum computing today

www.cwoodcock.co.uk/zxf

PRICE LIST (prices checked 20 April 2004)

New:

PC-PSU with supply for 2 Floppies and MB02

36,00 €

MB02-Printerlead

13,00 €

Proface AT Extern (Interface for connecting PC-Keyboards to Spectrum)

69,00 € KS

Proface AT Intern (internal interface)

62,00 € KS

Melodik AY-Soundbox (unboxed)

24,00 € KS

+2 Cassette recorder

36,00 €

Floppy Disc drive (1,86 with MB02, 720k with Opus, 780k with +D) Please specify

24,00 €

PSU for +2A/B and +3 or PSUl for +2 (also 48k and 128k) Please specify

29,00 €

FDD lead for 2 drives

4,00 €

Multiface 128 (works also on 48k Spectrums

26,00 €

Dust Cover 48k+/128k

8,00 €

Plus 3 Tapelead

9,90 €

Normal Tapelead

3,00 €

Spectrum +2 Lightpen

36,00 €

Spectrum +3 Lightpen

27,00 €

Phaser Gun with Software (Tape or +3)

19,00 €

SCART-Monitor cable (choose for 128k/+2 or +2A/+3)

25,00 €

VGA-BOX (connect Spectrum 128/+2 to VGA monitor)

49,00 €

VGA-BOX Multi purpose (Connect any PC monitor to Spectrum 128/+2)

79,00 €

+3 drive belt

2,00 €

Silver paper for ZX Printer

5,00 €

Keyboard membrane 48k

11,00 €

Keyboard membrane Spectrum +/128k, new quality, not aging

21,00 €

Spectrum keyword stickers

8,00 €

Used:

Sinclair ZX Spectrum 128k, complete with all cables

129,00 €

Sinclair ZX Spectrum +2, complete with all cables

79,00 €

Sinclair ZX Spectrum +2A, complete with all cables

69,00 €

Sinclair ZX Spectrum +3, built in 3'' drive, complete with all cables

99,00 €

Sinclair Spectrum 48k (Gummy), complete with all cables + Introduction Tape

64,00 €

Sinclair Spectrum 48k +, complete with all cables + Introduction Tape

64,00 €

+3 Drive (tested)

29,00 €

Interface I

69,00 €

Microdrive

25,00 €

Wafadrive

39,00 €

Opus Discovery Diskinterface with 1 x 720k Drive (new ROM)

119,00 €

Joystick interface

1-Port 3,00 €

2-Port 11,00 €

Joystick (many different)

2,50 €

Sinclair SJS-Joystick (+2/+3)

6,00 €

Consumables:

Microdrive Cartridges (ex-software)

3,50 €

Wafadrive Cartridges

16K= 7,00 €,

32K= 7,50 €

Also we have a lot of Software offers and books. Please contact us and we will send you our pricelist.

Products marked KS are sold in the name of Kompakt Servis. We organise the business.

Prices excluding postage. Delivery as long as stock lasts.

Orders to: SINTECH, Gastäckerstr. 23, 70794 Filderstadt, Germany

Tel./Fax: 0049 711 775033 email: sintech@online.de http://www.sintech-shop.de

SUMMER 2004 Issue 8

Contents

Sixteen pages of Spectrum news. p6

Your views and opinions p22

Kevin Bennett gets to grips with the Minigame contest p26

Retrospective. Matthew Harrodine examines 1985 p37

Soundtracker. Matthew Westcott explains all. p40

If you enjoy ZXF and you want it to continue then consider yourself

duty bound to let me know this (mail@cwoodcock.co.uk or by the

feedback form). All other feedback will be gratefully received too.

ZXF now has a voluntary purchase scheme. If you have

downloaded and enjoyed an issue of ZXF, and if you are able to

afford to, please consider paying £1 for your issue via the Paypal

button on at the ZXF website ('magazine' page).

If you would like to contribute to future issues of ZXF - even if it's just

to write a letter - please do ; contact me again by the email address

below.

Editor: C Woodcock (mail@cwoodcock.co.uk)

Website: www.cwoodcock.co.uk/zxf

Contributors this issue: Kevin Bennet, Matthew Harrodine,

Matthew Westcott, John King and Thomas Eberle. A big thankyou

also to all letter writers and news contributors.

All contributors retain their own copyrights.

ZXF08: 4

specifically for it - to put all of

that storage space to use within

a game. Full motion video is

Matthew WestCott's proposal for

what you could do with it. And

then there's sampled audio - think

Starglider 128 rather than

Ghostbusters .

Better still in my opinion would be

bigger games - not necessarily

larger playing areas, you

understand, but rather much

more detailed ones. The need to

rely on tiled graphics for

walkabout games would be

virtually eliminated, for example -

every screen could be as

complex as a loading screen if

you wanted it to be. Text

adventures could be supported

by detailed graphics - perhaps

even digitised photographs -

rather than the spartan vectors

we're used to.

Welcome readers old and new

to ZXF magazine. Did you know

there's now nearly a thousand of

you? Crikey.

button. Spectrum programs can

be swapped in and out of the

computer's 48K from the interface

This issue, we report on the

implementation of support for

Sami Vehmaa's ZXCF

Compact Flash

interface in two

emulators:

Fuse and

the

very

last

version

Ramsoft's

RealSpec .

It's really

good news that

this excellent

interface is

receiving emulation

support and you will

find a short tutorial on

how to set it up in

RealSpectrum on page 21.

These sorts of possibilities aren't

going to appeal to all within the

Spectrum community, of course,

and we must accept that

different people want different

things from their hobby. For many

programmers, for example, the

challenge is increasingly to see

just how much they can squeeze

out of 48K; limitless memory simply

doesn't interest. Also, the desire

to write for a machine which can

still be found in many households

around the world is likely to be

higher than the desire to write for

a system owned presently by just

a handful of people.

I received my own ZXCF

interface a few weeks back

and I must say I can't remember

ever plugging something into

the back of my Spectrum that

transformed it quite so radically.

My Plus D interface in 1990 or

thereabouts would be the

closest I ever got to this I guess,

but the Plus D is just a storage

device device (when a disk

drive is connected, of course)

and the ZXCF is so much more.

RAM using the task Manager - up

to 16 programs can be kept

running together, in fact. The

interface has its own internal

battery (good for three years

apparently, after which you'll

need a friend with soldering skills

to replace it) to power the on-

board RAM, by the way; get half-

way through a game of Scrabble,

turn off the Spectrum, come back

a week later and your game will

be there waiting for you.

For starters, before you even go

anywhere near the slot at the

back with a Compact Flash

card, the interface gives you an

enormous memory boost. A

whopping great 1MB in my

case. Just like that. The

interface's operating system,

ResiDOS (written by +3e creator

Garry Lancaster) allows you to

access this memory straight

away via its very own Task

Manager program, which itself is

called up in an instant at the

press of the interface's NMI

And when you do add in a

Compact Flash card, of course,

any of these programs can be

snapshotted to it for permanent

storage. Although actually that's

the very least that's possible. The

capacity of CF cards these days

is almost limitless; using ResiDOS

you can create as many

partitions as you want for either

files or swap data. Swap data?

Well ResiDOS has been designed

with the intention that one day

people will write programs

But the challenge is still a valid

one. just what is the Spectrum

capable of when memory is not

an issue? Perhaps it's more of an

artistic question than a technical

one where games are

concerned. Has the Spectrum

really been explored graphically

or have we just been fooled by

the endless copies of a few ideas

into thinking that all that can be

done has been done? For a long

time now I've felt there to be

plenty of artistic styles worth

ZXF08: 5

exploring on the Speccy - take

the converted piece of 'Catch

me if you can' artwork above, for

example.

It's the way we imagine Spectrum

software to be that now limits our

vison of what it could be. With

ZXCF we now have all we need

to start thinking and creating

outside of the box. And now that

it's supported in emulation there's

nothing stopping anyone from

getting to grips with this new

technology and perhaps even

starting to program with it. It's

not a replacement for the old

chalenges; it's a new challenge

altogether.

Next issue I'll be getting to grips

with the interface and ResiDOS in

more depth. Until then I strongly

encourage you to have a play in

RealSpec or Fuse and start

getting your heads around the

potential. I think it would be

great also if other emulator

authors could consider

implementing ZXCF in their

programs too. Best of all would

be an emulator that could read

from and write to CF cards

connected to a PC - now that

would really get things going!

Until December...

Colin Woodcock

mail@cwoodcock.co.uk

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