Meeting in Cologne

Meeting in Cologne

It happened on May 10th, 1996: I bravely decided to attend the Spectrum meeting that was to take place one day later, to show that a Viennese can also take part even if the distance is considerable. I know Wolfgang quite well by now and have often contributed my articles to the SPC until SCENE was founded; nothing seemed more fitting than paying him a little visit on this special day.

It was not lost time, and I met many familiar and less familiar faces and names there (people too, of course!) and got five new readers for SCENE. The meeting took place on May 11th; the meeting point was an abandoned pub near WoMo's apartment, a rather nice area, but as a foreign visitor I got royally screwed over, because not a single payphone in the area accepted coins, and all I wanted was to reassure my parents that I was still alive. Modernisation, gentlemen of Telekom, certainly has its downsides!

Everything started before eleven o'clock when Wolfgang opened up the venue. Just like in Filderstadt, I was the first one to be let in; everyone else arrived shortly afterwards.

I immediately noticed that the SAM, quite unlike at the meeting in Filderstadt (a special supplement of the first SCENE paper zine reported on it!), was quite strongly represented. Wolfgang from WoMo Team proudly presented the SAM IDE Interface with new software by Ian that makes handling easier, Slawomir G., who brought along a lot of news for the SAM, including the latest MOD player and some really great mods. I copied the module "Das Boot" by U96 from him—really powerful sound, though on my setup it sounds a bit worse than at the meeting, as I don't own an EDDAC and play all mods through the Blue Alpha Soundsampler; at least that proved its purchase wasn't a waste of money after all. While I can also play the mods on the Amiga, I just prefer the SAM.

Stefan Haller was naturally there as well; he became known for his experiments with SAM graphics and, as far as I know, is working on a new SAM game again. His Coloris was already a smash hit, let's see if he can pull off something even better. Maybe I will even write the story for his game.

There was also someone present who was burning some Speccy CD-ROMs with a MAC he brought along—a good idea, though very few Speccies have a CD-ROM drive.

From Holland, J.W.Koning, the head of SGG, visited us, and with him came the designer of the Spectrum IDE Harddiskinterface, who is currently working on running PC keyboards on the Speccy. We talked shop a bit and discussed various possibilities (4 MB on the Speccy, Harddisk+DMA, etc.). Unfortunately, Roelof revealed that his eyesight is getting worse and worse, and he intends to replace hardware tinkering with another hobby.

Peter Rennefeld brought the new coloured keyboard overlay stickers for Spectrum +2/+3 users and for all those who rewire keyboards specifically for the Spectrum. A sticker sheet costs DM 9,-. Peter's address is:

Peter C. Rennefeld
Genhodder 19
D-41179 Mönchengladbach
Deutschland - Tel. 02161/571141

So if anyone is interested, they can write to Peter; this sticker sheet is definitely a really good idea.

Some people from SUC were also there, and so I was able to take a first look at the MB02. The interface that I brought back from Czechia a week later does work, but stubbornly refuses to boot—if only I had listened to Jaxon right away and bought a new drive with it! I was asked if I couldn't translate the manual; hmm, we'll see.

The interior of the MB02 (there is no exterior, as it is delivered without a casing) was an explanation to me as to why Jaxon Hollis explained in an interview that it would make the Spectrum faster. Well! One of the many chips is a Z80 DMA; this cheap 10 DM part can copy a whopping 35 KB of memory and perform similar operations per frame = 1/50th of a second, which is also the reason why the MB02 can transfer 50 KB/second. But I'll dedicate myself to that another time. Jaxon had different numbers at hand, because according to him, it can only transfer approx. 20 KB per frame.

There was something to admire at my table as well, and not just SCENE+ 4, my latest demo, or the "Legacy" storyteller and "Legacy" multiple-choice dialog system that I provisionally just named "TALK", but also, as someone aptly noted: the only proper use for a Commodore SX64: as a mini colour monitor for the Speccy.

I have already promised the guts of the SX64 to someone; inside the casing will soon go a Spectrum with +D or Disciple—the decision isn't easy. For "Legacy", Kunta Kinte will probably also be available, namely as a villain! Quite a few people wondered how I am programming the game without MC knowledge! It's not easy, fortunately I am able to write a few very short MC routines. Otherwise, there was once again lots of fun, the latest info, and much more.

Hopefully I'll see you all in Filderstadt, because it really is a very long way to Cologne.

So, that was the report from Sinclair Treff Köln '96; I am still in negotiations to organise a Speccy meeting, but partly very high sums are being demanded—hopefully I'll find something at an acceptable price.