Commodore Free 5/Commodore_Free_Issue_05_2007_Commodore_Computer_Club.d64/t.iv winters

Text File | 2007-01-01 | 12.3 KB | 399 lines

uInterview with Piccadore 64
creator Jason Winters

In a reverse of efforts Jason caught
up with Commodore Free magazine,
firstly to Commend my efforts, and
also to tell me about his project. I
then persuaded Jason to a small
interview for the readers. Here is the
interview.

CF please tell the readers what is a
Picodore 64

JW The Picodore 64 is a custom built
C64 laptop based on the main circuit
board from a DTV Hummer Off-Road
Racing game (many thanks to Jeri
Ellsworth). The Hummer game was one of
those joystick games that you connect
directly to a TV. The game wasn't very
good but it didn't take long for the
DTV hackers to discover its secrets.
As far as laptops go the Picodore is a
tiny one. It's a little smaller than
those portable DVD players. It
includes connections for a disk drive,
external keyboard, audio/video output,
headphones, joystick/userport,
external power adapter and SD card.
Buttons below the LCD screen allow for
brightness and volume adjustment.
There is even a speaker tucked into
the enclosure.

CF how did you come up with such a
great name for the machine?

JW I wanted the name to emphasize the
smallness of it and the prefix "pico"
means one-trillionth. Since I already
own the domain "picobay.com", it
seemed like an easy decision.
"Picobay" doesn't mean anything in
particular. I registered it way back
in 1996. With the success of Ebay, I
thought the "Vbay" suffix was really
going to catch on. Nanotech was just
starting to get its roots and I
figured picotech wasn't far behind. I
was wrong on both counts.

CF Tell the reads a little about
yourself

JW My father was in the mining
business and a jack of all trades. I
learned a lot from watching him patch
together broken machinery with
whatever was on hand. I, on the other
hand, was always tearing things apart
when I was a kid to see how they
worked (actually I still do). I loved
anything related to computers,
electronics and Lego blocks. I wanted
a career in robotics and I eventually
went to school for mechanical
engineering. My last year in college,
I placed in a national robotic design
competition and I landed a cool job
designing gizmos for the U.S. military
and space program. Over the course of
five years, I moved up in the ranks
and, unfortunately, became less and
less involved in the technical side of
things.

Consequently, interfacing with the
human mind and body was another area
of interest for me. So much to the
bewilderment of my parents (and
jealousy of my friends), I decided to
quit my job and return to school
again. I'm happy to say that I just
received my master's degree in
biomedical engineering last month and
now I'm working on my PhD. My area of
research involves implanting
electrodes into the brain for both
data acquisition and stimulation. It's
a dream job for a hacker since so much
is still unknown about the central
nervous system and how the various
areas communicate with each other.

Cf Please tell us about Commodore and
yourself, what machines do you own,
your first machine, do you still use
Commodore Machines?

JW I'm 29 years old, so I grew up
during the middle to end of the
Commodore's golden era. I received a
C64, which was my first computer, when
I was about 12. I loved programming
and the Commodore was great for that.
I was also fascinated with controlling
things with a computer. I felt like I
discovered cold fusion the first time
I hooked up an LED to the userport and
made it blink. Needless to say, it
wasn't long before I fried the CIA
chips in that first machine. A few
years later I got a C128 but I used it
in 64 mode 99% of the time anyway. I
lost touch with the Commodore scene
during college since everything seemed
to be PC based in the world of
engineering. To tell the truth, I
really didn't get back into Commodores
until a few months ago when I was
designing a
custom video card that relied on
control via RS-232 input and output
composite video. My initial attempt
with a microcontroller yielded poor
results. Then I thought about my old
Commodore and wondered if I could use
the VIC-II chip and RF modulator. I
bought a C64 on Ebay with the
intension of gutting it for the
components that I needed but once I
got it in the mail and booted it up to
that familiar blue on light blue
screen, I didn't have the heart to
destroy it. During the next week I
ordered a disk drive and the parts to
make a XM1541 cable. I learned about
the DTV while researching the VIC-II.
It was by accident that I saw a
DTV-Hummer game at a local Radio
Shack. I didn't know what I was going
to do with it, but I knew they were
getting scarce so I bought it on a
whim.

Cf Tell us a little more about the
project, also how many other people
would you estimate enjoy DTV and
Hummer hacking?

JW I can't stress enough how this
project is a combination of a lot of
effort by the entire DTV hacking
community. I was just the first person
to put it all in a nice little
laptopish package. I, too, would like
to know how many DTV hackers are out
there. There are about ten very active
members who are blazing the trial for
the rest of us. I really didn't join
the forum discussions until I was
almost done with my project and I
would think there are many others
reading those message boards and
working on their own projects.

CS I see the machine is battery
powered, are these recyclable and is
the machine able to run from mains
power ?

JW The LCD screen is very power hungry
because of the type of backlight it
uses. That component basically sets
the power requirements for the entire
unit. I knew I wanted to use
rechargeable batteries and thankfully
the discharge curve of NiMH AA's fit
within the voltage requirements of the
LCD. The Picodore 64 can also run from
an AC wall adapter. When the external
power plug is inserted, the batteries
are removed from the circuit via a
mechanical contact switch in the
receptacle. I wanted to make it as
useful as possible, but I stopped
short of actually charging the
batteries while they are in the unit.

CS I have included the specifications
of the machine at the end of this
question and answer session but,
please can you give us (in as much
detail as possible) how you came to
design the machine and the thought
process, and problems you had along
the way.

JW My initial tinkering with the
Hummer involved hooking up a PS/2
keyboard, disk drive and fixing some
problems with the video and audio
circuits. It wasn't until I connected
the video output to a little LCD
screen that I decided a tiny laptop
was in order. I read through the
entire PETSCII forum (THE resource for
DTV hacking information) to make sure
that this would be the first of its
kind. I then started looking for a
small keyboard with the LCD as a guide
for the approximate dimensions I
needed. I took a chance and ordered a
few different types. It turned out
that a portable folding keyboard meant
for a Jornada PDA was the perfect size
and had all the necessary keys.

The only problem was that it couldn't
be directly connected to the DTV board
because it didn't use the required
PS/2 protocol. I borrowed an
oscilloscope from my lab at school and
used it to decode the signals. Knowing
very little about how keyboards work,
it took me a few days to get a
microcontroller to decode the Jornada
keyboard signals and re-encode them to
PS/2. Figuring out the power circuit
turned out to be easy since the
various components used standard
voltages. The SD card slot interface
was adapted from a design by Jan
Derogee and Pyrofer.

I started looking for a case to modify
as soon as I got the keyboard working.
I found a bunch of little enclosures
that were almost the right size but it
would have been a lot of work to make
it look right. I ended up just making
the entire case out of wood and
superglue. It turned out to be a great
decision. The materials were cheap and
readily available. I was able to build
the entire thing with a minimal set of
tools. All I really needed was a saw,
drill, sandpaper, dremel tool,
micrometer and razor-knife. Covering
it with faux stainless steel contact
paper worked out great and really gave
the project a professional look. I
don't think it would have received the
same amount of attention if I left it
looking like wood.

The joystick was one of the last
things I did for this project.
Realistically I knew the Picodore 64
was going to be primarily a machine
for playing classic games and a full
sized joystick wasn't going to look
right. I found a miniature Atari
keychain joystick that I managed to
convert into a device that was
compatible with the Commodore joystick
port.

CS Would you consider selling the
machine if someone was interested?

JW I've been debating this, but yeah,
I probably will eventually. I've got
a few other projects that I'd like to
pursue and as a poor college student
my funds are limited.

CS do you think the machine is a
commercially viable product for the
Commodore community, if it could be
mass produced?

JW This particular design wouldn't be
great for mass production since it
seemed to take forever to get the case
done. But if you're asking me if a C64
laptop would sell? I would say
"Absolutely!" Granted, a C64 laptop
doesn't have the market potential of a
Sony Playstation III, but it
definitely fills a niche.

Not only would this be a great
creative outlet for all those young
programmers out there, but the
enormous library of existing software
is a resource just waiting to be
tapped into. I think this would be a
no-brainer for some company out there.
Though, I do have a laundry list of
things I'd like to see on a mass
produced unit. Some sort of memory
card slot would be a must to get
software on and off of it. A million
new C64 laptop owners scouring Ebay
for 1541 drives and 5.25" floppies
isn't very realistic. Also, I'd like
to see an enhanced version of BASIC
and a JiffyDOS-like utility included.
This might be upsetting to the
Commodore purists out there but my own
C64 become a lot more entertaining
once I plugged in a Super Expander 64
cartridge. I think better access to
music and graphics from within BASIC
could be added without sacrificing
compatibly. And let's face it, if
you're that nuts about the C64, you're
probably coding in assembly language
anyway.

CS what problems would mass production
cause

JW The obvious problem involves all
the old software that was written off
as unprofitable and abandoned by
software companies years ago. As
certain titles become popular again,
software companies may attempt to
enforce old copyrights and cause
trouble for sharing sites. Hopefully,
these companies would choose to
develop new software instead. The
thought of EA Games writing new
software for a C64 may sound far
fetched, but mobile phone gaming has
demonstrated that there is still money
to be made from relatively low tech 2D
games. Another problem that is
happening right now is the legal
entanglement of the several parties
involved in making the current batch
of DTV gaming devices. Each party owns
a piece of the technology puzzle and
I'm not sure they are all on the same
page these days.

CS do you have any other projects in
the pipe line?

JW Haha, I'm assuming you only want to
know about the Commodore related
projects. I have another, larger, C64
laptop in the works with a 3.5" floppy
drive in it. Although the Picodore 64
wins the prize for being little, it's
really too small for coding without an
external keyboard attached. The
Commodore 64 has been around so long
that it's difficult to come up with an
original hack for it. Though I do
think my future projects will focus on
demonstrating that there is still a
place for this classic machine in
today's world of ultra-fast and
ultra-complex computer systems.

CS I am sure all readers, would like
one of these, have you had many
comments?

JW I thought I might get some
feedback, but I really didn't
anticipate the overwhelming amount of
positive comments left on various
message boards. And yes, many of them
do express the desire to own one. I
would build more of these but DTV
Hummer parts are getting hard to find.
Besides, my apartment is tiny and I
need my kitchen table for other things
sometimes. Finally, I would like to
thank all those who have contributed
to the DTV hacking effort on the
PETSCII forum. I also need to thank my
girlfriend for not complaining during
the week that I converted our kitchen
into a workshop. She was more than
tolerant of the layer of sawdust that
was deposited on everything in our
apartment and the frequent trips to
the hardware store.

CS thanks for your time and efforts

...end...