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A podcast about home computers of the late 70's through the 80's. NEW SPONSORSHIPS! 8-Bit Classics is a great place to get video cables, power supplies and more for a wide variety of vintage computer platforms. Arcade Shopper has a wide variety of hard-to-find items for a large number of platforms.

Nov 16, 2015

The TI-99/4A - History, Interview with Jim Fetzner and Mark Wills

In the home computer timeline, I’m currently covering computers released in the era from 1979 to 1980.  Next up is the TI-99/4A.  When I went to research the TI-99 I found an incredible amount of information about the machine and an involved, vibrant community surrounding it.  As a result, I pulled in as many experts as I could find to be involved in providing information about this very interesting machine.  I got so much involvement, and found so much information, that I will be covering the TI-99 for the next several shows.  That will include the typical topics, such as history, tech specs, modern upgrades, emulation, Web sites and much more, as well as interviews with some TI luminaries.  As I typically like to cover the history of the machine first, that will be the topic of the first couple of shows.  For the history segment, I was lucky enough to find a couple of people who have an incredible history with the TI-99, Jim Fetzner and Mark Wills.  Jim has an extensive, multilingual library of all things TI and possesses some very interesting hardware items related to the TI-99, as you will hear.  Mark is the author of TurboForth for the TI-99/4A and has been involved in the TI-99/4A scene pretty much since 1983.  He’s also English, living in the UK, so he has a rather British take on the home computer wars.  Since the interview piece I typically do with the co-hosts before covering the main topic took so long and turned out to be so interesting in it’s own right, I decided to break out the interview into its own show and the next show will then cover just the TI-99 history with the help of these two gentlemen.

 

Links Mentioned in the Show:

Mark’s Forth for the TI-99/4A - http://turboforth.net

Tursi’s (Mike Brent) Website - http://harmlesslion.com

Classic99 TI-99 Emulator - http://www.harmlesslion.com/cgi-bin/showprog.cgi?search=classic99

F18A video upgrade - http://codehackcreate.com

SID Master 99 Card - Marc Hull - http://www.dsapsc.com/what-is-sid.html

ForTI - Forth-driven sound card - http://www.unige.ch/medecine/nouspikel/ti99/forti.htm

ninerpedia - http://ninerpedia.org/index.php/Main_Page

FTP Site at whtech.com - ftp://whtech.com/

Chicago TI International World Faire - http://www.chicagotiug.com/tiki-index.php?page=Faire


Joël Calippe
over eight years ago

This is probably one of the best episode of Floppy Days. I have enjoyed it immensely. The two guests (Jim and Mark) were amazingly knowledgeable of the machine and its siblings like the 99-2, the 99-8, and the Genève. In this episode, I have learned a lot about a machine that I still like after all these years. I have two 99/4A machines at home (a yellowing beige and one black/silver) with a collection of game. I do love turning them on to play a game of MunchMan or Parsec. You know what ? I'm going to listen to the episode again, it was so enjoyable.

Jeff Molson
over eight years ago

loved my TI-99 - recall selling it in a garage sale and I have regretted it every day since - loved the 99er magazine and the programs in the back of the mag.

Klaus
eight and a half years ago

that was a very nice show about my favourite computer! i am looking forward to the next one.

Joel Gerdeen
eight and a half years ago

I really enjoyed the Floppy Days TI99 podcast. I have used the TI99 since 1980 and have a collection of the most common stuff. Used to lead the MSP99 Minneapolis-St. Paul Minnesota user group back in 1983. Looking forward to the next podcast.
Joel