Leaded Solder

New blog post! It's part five of my quest to make my very own #ColecoVision. This time, I let other people build one too, and make sure I actually included all the parts! There's still some bugs to work out, but I do still love my first clone system.
#retrogaming #kicad #coleco
https://www.leadedsolder.com/2026/03/24/colecovision-diy-part-5.html

2026-03-09 18:27:26 UTC

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why can't you do program bank switching, is it a limitation of the C runtime?

2025-11-25 01:08:44 UTC

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maybe I'll make a card! I was going to make a character generator card but this seems faster for now

2025-11-25 01:05:48 UTC

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is that VGA?? I gotta have this

2025-11-23 19:49:49 UTC

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nice! My own backplane is designed to fit in an IKEA bathroom organizer. I still have to figure out why RomWBW won't boot.

2025-11-23 19:47:54 UTC

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oh right, I forgot that was the goal for this board. Explains the power connector! Please continue, we can save this for the rack mount hypercube rc2014

2025-11-23 19:45:13 UTC

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put an edge connector on the end so you can stack another one for more slots. You gotta get a minimum of five boards, remember

2025-10-26 00:57:20 UTC

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value village tablecloths, rotate them out

2025-10-12 17:15:32 UTC

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it's hand applied and I suspect I do not yet have the rhythm down. It's also a brand new kind of paste to me that doesn't flow like the others did... plan is to braid this and then hold down the chips with tweezers and individually hot air. Hand-soldered would have been much faster by now...

2025-10-12 16:52:01 UTC

Working hard to make all the solder paste mistakes imaginable! I'll figure out a workflow for this if it kills me. #retrocomputing #apple3 #apple2
https://cdn.masto.host/retrochatonline/media_attachments/files/115/362/226/785/714/021/original/5ddfa6384038acba.jpeg

2025-10-11 20:09:37 UTC

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it was a joke: surgeons must have started with similar hobbies that got out of hand and now they're fixing people

2025-10-11 19:51:47 UTC

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it makes you really suspicious of how surgeons got into it

2025-08-26 18:13:39 UTC

@npub1kn4…sw72 @npub1tuj…qajr a friend of mine puts clear 3M film on the back of her laptop when she gets it, and then affixes stickers to that film. When it's time to retire the laptop she pulls off the film and keeps it.

2025-08-24 22:27:59 UTC

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Great idea, I look forward to reading it. I remember Common Ground used to be popular for "app books" on Mac. Hope I remembered that name properly.

2025-08-13 17:39:24 UTC

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the alt+number pad stuff from dos has never made sense to me. This and to a lesser extent the Apple option+letter method makes more sense.

2025-07-25 15:23:47 UTC

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that's gotta really speed things up!

2025-07-25 15:20:36 UTC

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I've forgotten - are you getting the fab to do some of the assembly?

2025-07-17 00:17:15 UTC

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yeah, that sounds like a ton of stuff! I would love to get there but I have to figure out character graphics first. :) I started doing a Galaxian clone board but got stuck in the weeds.

2025-07-17 00:09:59 UTC

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do you want a character generator or bitmaps? Scrolling?

2025-07-14 14:03:18 UTC

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probably pay for itself just in reducing house heat alone.

2025-06-03 02:01:17 UTC

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how tight is your supply chain of parts? What's the hardest bit to get for your BOM?

2025-06-03 01:59:54 UTC

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it would be a very fun project to do.

2025-06-03 01:58:45 UTC

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having a p-system interpreter only makes marginal sense on a Z80 or 6502 (Apple tried very hard, though,) but a 65816 would rip and tear on it for sure

2025-06-03 01:57:30 UTC

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Pascal often has the benefit of compiling to p-code so it's possible we could ship a runtime for Sent and just have some libs to link to on a PC

2025-05-31 15:41:07 UTC

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if I had a nickel for every time I've put a connector on backward... can you fit an SD card extension cable?

2025-05-16 15:10:18 UTC

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all my screwups are guaranteed authentic

2025-03-27 19:35:18 UTC

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one day this aesthetic will be hip. But I hope I never see it

2025-03-08 17:40:07 UTC

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we use skip the depot and they pick it up along with our bottles. Not sure if they're available in your region but if they are, I can give you a promo code that gets my local animal shelter $15 on your first pickup

2025-02-19 15:58:27 UTC

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I'm into retro computers too
https://cdn.masto.host/retrochatonline/media_attachments/files/114/031/374/040/963/704/original/ff7dc2a586ea2dfb.jpeg

2025-02-15 17:50:12 UTC

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MagSafe, my ass

2025-02-13 03:03:12 UTC

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I am also curious about this. If you decide to write this book, please hit me up to help.

2025-01-23 03:01:46 UTC

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I was super grumpy buying an Apple TV to use to test TVs only to have the Netflix app send me an email after saying "sorry this is gonna stop working soon." Plex seems like a great use for it... thanks for the idea.

2025-01-21 15:58:44 UTC

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Unicode invisible spaces and non-breaking spaces turn out to be a valuable ally for humanity

2024-12-26 19:33:23 UTC

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have they ever made a comment about it? I miss those suckers

2024-12-26 18:02:11 UTC

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it's like a metroidvania soap opera

2024-12-26 17:46:01 UTC

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I was just playing this game. It's unusual!

2024-12-24 23:19:41 UTC

One of these days I'll get either better or more expensive taste in videogames. #retrogaming
https://cdn.masto.host/retrochatonline/media_attachments/files/113/710/356/778/396/355/original/ebab437e6bbcab6c.jpeg

2024-12-17 17:13:45 UTC

New blog post! FujiNet is available on more platforms than ever before. I built the in-development CoCo1 version and tried out some of its cool new features! I'm lying, I mostly just played internet-multiplayer Yahtzee. #retrocomputing #tandy #esp32 #fujinet
https://www.leadedsolder.com/2024/12/17/coco-fujinet.html

2024-12-10 06:12:59 UTC

Finally got the scavenged 32X hooked up. I can't believe I didn't buy one of these when they were being dumped, or when they were cheap (but uncommon) at thrift stores. Ah well. Virtua Fighter is surprisingly close to the Saturn version! #retrogaming #sega
https://cdn.masto.host/retrochatonline/media_attachments/files/113/627/045/603/337/354/original/9980e4cc9eddb906.jpeg

2024-11-22 20:16:16 UTC

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text is an endless rabbit hole, but it's a fun one

2024-11-22 16:26:51 UTC

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yeah I think it is a good application. I was thinking like "lisp machine" or some other oddball OS-upward gigaproject

2024-11-22 16:22:06 UTC

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yeah it's a fun machine I have no good use for! Also like all my computers are keyboard computers so I'd have to build an additional shelf for it

2024-11-22 16:19:30 UTC

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I can't look at this right now but I'm really interested in the bare metal stuff. Don't have a project in mind but there's a lot of horsepower on even a cheap Pi...

2024-08-26 17:37:52 UTC

Never seen these tiny Mega Drive shock boxes before. Must have been a Sunsoft thing. #retrogaming #sega #megadrive #segagenesis
https://cdn.masto.host/retrochatonline/media_attachments/files/113/029/533/870/494/802/original/436c8e64111a522b.jpeg
https://cdn.masto.host/retrochatonline/media_attachments/files/113/029/534/040/160/126/original/95ad74fdde3c931c.jpeg

2024-08-25 21:44:38 UTC

Finally getting around to formalizing my #ColecoVision joystick PCB, which was formerly just a protoboard and a bunch of bodge wire. How badly have I screwed this one up? We'll see soon! #retrogaming #kicad
https://cdn.masto.host/retrochatonline/media_attachments/files/113/024/841/787/975/137/original/92fcd7fefa0bfdbd.jpeg