Stuff from Retro-Donald

Just a quick heads-up, I recently ordered some stuff from Retro-Donald’s Sinchai-Shop. Finally the goods arrived, and above you can see the loot I got.

Top: Micromys V3. Below, from left to right: EasyFlash 3, MMC2IEC + programmed AVR, Nano SwinSID, Super PLA.

Sinchai.de is an online shop that is specializing in Commodore 8 bit accessories and DIY kits. Unfortunately the site is in German only, as is all communication and support. Additionally the information and instructions for the products may be very slight, and most of the product support seems to be at the German C64 forum Forum-64. The shop supports the community there and vice versa it appears.

At least the product assortment is very interesting, and they ship worldwide. And Google Translate is your friend if you are like me and don’t speak nor read German.

Apart from the language barrier and almost three weeks’ delivery time I’m very pleased with the experience. Might be that Donald is busy putting the now-released EasyFlash 3 boards together! The pieces I finally got are of good quality, and the packaging was well done. Postage rates were reasonable, and generally, so are the prices at the shop. My recommendations.

Quick run-down of the stuff I ordered

While I’m unboxing my own stuff…

It feels like it’s been ages since my last post. One reason for this feeling is probably the fact that I have moved during this break. Being more specific, I have moved in with my special lady. Who does her best to understand my interest to old computers and other weird stuff including my peculiar electro-analogish taste of music. Wish me luck ;)

Not starting a relationship blog here and still sticking to old computers and weird stuff; Some interesting SID related updates have emerged in the meantime for both SwinSID and 1541 Ultimate projects.

Micro SwinSID has got two firmware updates since my review. The updates have improved the ADSR envelope and filter emulation closer to real SID chip. The latest firmware also introduces 6581 filter emulation that can be selected by e.g. a switch by grounding one of the AVR pins. Unfortunately I haven’t had the change to get first hand impressions of the improvements as I’m lacking the means to program the microcontroller.

Micro SwinSID – an AVR based SID replacement

SIDs are sought after sound chips. Being semi-analog they are difficult to emulate. They also break easily from e.g. static discharges. If one is to build a SID synth or you need to replace broken SID chip you may have trouble finding the chips.

SwinSID is a project that I have been keeping an eye on for many years now. Swinkels, the man behind the project, has been prototyping and developing a SID compatible custom sound card for C64 or other SID-utilizing devices such as MIDIbox SID.

Originally the SwinSID was not aiming to emulate a real SID chip but rather to be a pin-compatible SID-like sound device with some enhancements. The hardware is based on one or two (stereo) Atmel AVR microcontollers and some additional circuitry including a DAC.

But now Swinkels and Crisp have developed a new model of a different goal. It is called SwinSID88, or Micro SwinSID, and it’s a direct replacement for the SID chip. It is mono only and it aims to emulate the sound of 8580 SID chip as good as possible.