RARE VIC-20 Cartridge - have you ever seen this?

History and Preservation Issues

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sydbolton
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RARE VIC-20 Cartridge - have you ever seen this?

Post by sydbolton »

Hey folks....we received an amazing donation of things recently at the Personal Computer Museum. A lot of it was Atari stuff, but there was a bunch of uncommon VIC-20 things (like an almost complete collection of the Thorn-EMI titles all boxed and complete...like Amok, Super Amok, etc.)

Anyways, one of the titles that slipped in here is called "Prowriter". I haven't tried it out yet, but I assume it's a word processor. It's a bit confusing because there was the C. ITOH printer called the "Prowriter" as well.

I am wondering if any of you have seen this. It's from Tymac, and I know their stuff is usually rare.

http://pcmuseum.ca/details.asp?id=39095&type=Software

I am wondering if this thing has been archived yet? If not, we should make a dump of it for everyone to share.
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Mayhem
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Post by Mayhem »

Most Tymac stuff is very hard to find, as you say. Not seen this, so dumping it would be good, even if for posterity.
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dragos
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Post by dragos »

So its for sale?
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orion70
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Post by orion70 »

:shock: Is it possible that no VIC software list / doc ever mentions it? Was it sold in bundle with the printer maybe?
sydbolton
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Post by sydbolton »

So its for sale?
Uh, no? We're a computer museum - we archive things like this and maintain a massive collection for people to enjoy for generations to come. We *do* sell duplicates from time to time, but I am reaching out to the VIC community because nobody here knows anything about this item and I just wondered if anyone else had seen this.
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Mike
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Post by Mike »

dragos wrote:So its for sale?
sydbolton wrote:Uh, no? We're a computer museum - we archive things like this and maintain a massive collection for people to enjoy for generations to come. [...]
You do know though, that there is the section 'Collecting and History' here in Denial, which deals explicitly with that kind of stuff?

@mods: please move.
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sydbolton
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Post by sydbolton »

You do know though, that there is the section 'Collecting and History' here in Denial, which deals explicitly with that kind of stuff?
I put it in the General Section because the description of "Collecting and History" says "History and Preservation Issues" -- I really wasn't having an issue, just wondering if anyone else had even heard of had seen the cartridge. If it was for sale, of course, I would have put it in the Buy, Sell, Trade section.

Anyways, I'm going to plug this thing in today or tomorrow to find out what comes up and I'll report back.
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Mike
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Post by Mike »

You *had* put it into the 'Buy, Sell, and Trade' section. That's why dragos asked ...
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orion70
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Post by orion70 »

sydbolton wrote:Anyways, I'm going to plug this thing in today or tomorrow to find out what comes up and I'll report back.
I'm curious about that. IMO, it's unlikely that it was a software bonus with printers: too expensive (maybe a tape or disk could have been more probable bonuses), and the logo on the label is different from the printer's:

Image
Image
(no leaf/tree in the 'O')

Anyway, it would be great if someone could check the original PW printers documentation (manuals, brochures, ads...).
sydbolton
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Post by sydbolton »

You *had* put it into the 'Buy, Sell, and Trade' section. That's why dragos asked ...
Well then that was a big oops! I meant to put it in general. MY BAD - sorry guys!

Yeah I don't think it has anything to do with the Prowriter printer - it just came up doing searches (because the Prowriter could be interfaced to the Commodore).....so we will see!

I still find it fascinating that we are discovering things, 30 years later, for these systems. Just a couple of weeks ago we discovered the only (known) Atari 2600 game that was developed in Canada (http://www.pcmuseum.ca/extraterrestrials.asp).

That is one of the best things about this hobby - there is still a chance of discovery even after all these years!
Visit the Personal Computer Museum online (http://www.pcmuseum.ca) or in PERSON for all your vintage computing needs.
sydbolton
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Post by sydbolton »

OK so I plugged it in ... and .... NOTHING - just your 3583 bytes free!

So .... either it's damaged or it's going to require a SYS to get it running.

I do have a HES multi cart unit, any suggestions on how to dump the memory?
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Post by Mayhem »

Mike wrote a program a while ago to dump all blocks of memory if you don't know where it resides...
10 POKE55,0:POKE56,30:CLR
11 PRINT"{CLR}VIC-20 CARTRIDGE RUN"
12 INPUT"NAME";N$:N$=LEFT$(N$,12)
13 S$="2000":GOSUB16:S$="4000":GOSUB16
14 S$="6000":GOSUB16:S$="A000":GOSUB16
15 SYS64802
16 SYS57809(N$+S$),8,1:POKE780,0:SYS65493
17 RETURN
18 :
19 REM ** EASYRUN
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Mike
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Post by Mike »

Mayhem wrote:Mike wrote a program a while ago to dump all blocks of memory if you don't know where it resides...
That's the program to *run* a cartridge dump ... :?

EASYDUMP is the first one in this post to dump the cartridge.
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orion70
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Post by orion70 »

HERE's a disk containing the two programs :wink: .
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Mayhem
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Post by Mayhem »

Ooops, I have no idea why I copy/pasted the wrong program there :?
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