This is the Commodore 64 KERNAL, modified to run on the Atari 8-bit line of computers. They’re practically the same machine; why didn’t someone try this 30 years ago?
No time like the present.
This is the Commodore 64 KERNAL, modified to run on the Atari 8-bit line of computers. They’re practically the same machine; why didn’t someone try this 30 years ago?
No time like the present.
Because in 1991 Commodore still existed and would have sued?
Ha, pretty much. Also… I mean you can port the Linux kernel everywhere too, but is there any software that’ll actually run? Pretty sure the display mechanisms in both systems were quite different.
Yeah pure basic programs that don’t use any of the specialized hardware will be fine, but anything that needs to use use the specialized graphics and sound registers will fail. Still its a cool bit of work
This video does a good examination of what you can and can’t do with it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxi5_VhxkJQ
I’d love to read a report on this! This is a fantastic engineering achievement. Did you change the kernel ROM to account for the various hardware configurations and address spaces? Overall, very cool.
Regards: https://www.subscriptionflow.com/recurring-payments/
Because the “kernal” on such machin4es of the time was nothing and the atari was already a better machine than the c64? (but nowhere near the quality of z80 machines)
Jupiter ACE – hands down best …
Never had the pleasure! though I do have experience of forth from university, seemed ok!
Speccy for me. Hi-res, if not h9igh colour that did it. (and all the later things like amstrad or sam are obviously better but too late!)
I was rattling my brain the other week to remember this! That’s the one!
From someone who never had the pleasure of using an ACE, what were the the highlights of the ACE that made it a superior z80? I only touched z80s inside calculators in the late 90’s.
It had a white case instead of a black case? Reading wiki its graphic capability was better than the Spectrum with a seperate memory bank for graphics and a mixed mode so it could do graphics and text. That’s pretty funky for such a minimal machine.
I know some people rave about Forth. There’s no mention of the Jupitor Ace on the Forth wiki page which is disappointing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LISR5q1eulA
Adding colour to the Juper Ace
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGufMSlj2FI
Teardown of the Jupitor Ace
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDvEREhNtKA
Jupiter Ace vintage home computer. Rare retro collectors item.
Some of the comments are interesting. In the presentation they explain how the Jupiter Ace graphics was engineered so didn’t have the Z80 FAST/SLOW operation issues of the ZX80 and other Sinclair computers. They also pinched ideas off the New Brain which was a machine developed by Sinclair for an earlier company of his.
http://www.jupiter-ace.co.uk/ace4000.html
Jupiter Ace 4000
Here’s some other links for comparison. I’m also wondering what the Jupiter Ace is capable of if someone felt like pushing it to see how far it would go.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tAr0FtYbGCY
DOOM ZX Spectrum [Quick Play] | Nostalgia Nerd
There’ some interesting comments on the Russian spectrum clones and the beta version running on TR-DOS. They really pushed the sound chip with this.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2-voZvEtz48
The Commodore 64 has a Successor (and it’s amazing!) | Nostalgia Nerd
This is based on a prototype by Commodire which ripped of elements of the Amiga.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ekkiftETwY
Ultimate: Play the Game – the Story Before Rare (ZX Spectrum) – Kim Justice
Ultimate pushed things pretty hard with the ZX Spectrum (and BBC Micro).
Back when I was at school I dabbled with creating a 3D maze shooter game like some of the earlier examples and a car driving game a bit different to what Ultimate produced but nothing as good as any of the examples in the videos as I never got close to finishing them. I also didn’t have a clue about Z80 assembler.
This is a highly informative article.
https://www.theregister.com/2012/09/21/jupiter_cantab_jupiter_ace_is_30_years_old/?page=1
The summary is that the Jupiter ACE was a vastly superior performance Z80 based machine, providing you were willing to learn forth and forego colour graphics. There were lots of compromise decisions on specifications and hardware to make timeline and price point. Ultimately the ACE was a failure in a market dominated by BASIC and games machines. It is a little like a future that never was where serious kid programmers could have had a lot more power and eloquence at their fingertips.
At the time I was hacking away trying to get a hand-me-down 16K TRS80 to rotate 3D objects on the screen and probably would have succeeded on an ACE. I could also have learned assembly language (or machine code – we had no assembler). That all came later.
I only met an ACE once at the Bletchley Park Computer Museum. I think it was running.
That’s a good article. My post with a lot of links isn’t showing up because it is stuck in moderation but they cover some of what was said including your own comments.
The Jupiter Ace hardware didn’t suffer from the Z80 FAST/SLOW problems of the Sinclair machines as they were a bit more clever about designing the hardware as well as having seperate memory banks for graphics and main memory. The point you make about assembler is a good one. While the Jupiter Ace didn’t have a modern optimising compiler it would have been much faster than the interpreted basic which came with many machines of its era.
Looking back you can see elements of design which while crude compared to today hint of things like SGI style memory architecture and modern GPU’s and compilers and also embedded systems. The Jupiter Ace is very close to the kinds of small Forth based embedded systems used in some parts of industry at the time and it did have a usable expansion port! The expandability is what made the BBC Micro a success in academic circles much like the Raspberry PI has success with academic and embedded applications.
HollyB
I hope your comment gets through. I was not aware of the port or didn’t think off it in that context. . We used Apple IIs for industrial control in the 80s due to the abundance of expansion slots. The ACE would have been perfect with forth. Also Apples were expensive and sat there all day weighing blocks of cheese, or whatever,.
HollyB,
I think the maximum number of links you can have is 3. After that wordpress flags it for moderation. It’s one of the reasons I strip off the “http” part in some posts. IMHO long time users should be trusted enough to avoid the spam checking filters.
@Iapx432
I can still see it even if nobody else can. I’m guessing too many links. Here’s a cut and paste of the hardware specific links:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LISR5q1eulA
Adding colour to the Jupiter Ace
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGufMSlj2FI
Teardown of the Jupiter Ace
This video examines the overall construction before takign a close look at the graphics system.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDvEREhNtKA
Jupiter Ace vintage home computer. Rare retro collectors item.
Some of the comments are interesting. In the presentation they explain how the Jupiter Ace graphics was engineered so didn’t have the Z80 FAST/SLOW operation issues of the ZX80 and other Sinclair computers. They also pinched ideas off the New Brain which was a machine developed by Sinclair for an earlier company of his.
@Iapx432
Here’s the other links looking at capabilities of similar machines for comparison so people may speculate as to what the Jupiter Ace may have been capable of if given a push.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tAr0FtYbGCY
DOOM ZX Spectrum [Quick Play] | Nostalgia Nerd
There’ some interesting comments on the Russian spectrum clones and the beta version running on TR-DOS. They really pushed the sound chip with this.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2-voZvEtz48
The Commodore 64 has a Successor (and it’s amazing!) | Nostalgia Nerd
This is based on a prototype by Commodore which ripped off elements of the Amiga.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ekkiftETwY
Ultimate: Play the Game – the Story Before Rare (ZX Spectrum) – Kim Justice
Ultimate pushed things pretty hard with the ZX Spectrum (and BBC Micro).
Back when I was at school I dabbled with creating a 3D maze shooter game like some of the earlier examples and a car driving game a bit different to what Ultimate produced but nothing as good as any of the examples in the videos as I never got close to finishing them. I also didn’t have a clue about Z80 assembler.
@HollyB – This is a treasure trove. Thank you!