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Fred's Coco Page                   
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What is a Coco???

For all of you friends and family out there who have always suspected that I am a nerd, well, here's the proof. I have a Tandy Color Computer 3, a 21-year old 8-bit computer that I still tinker around with as a hobby. Don't get me wrong, I also have a PC and use it extensively, but I also love my Coco because it has more personality, and because it can still do some amazing things. In my opinion it was the most powerful 8-bit computer ever built. It runs an operating system called OS-9 that is based on Unix, and which is capable of true multitasking. Through the use of some advanced hardware scrolling techniques and self-modifying code, two guys wrote a DOOM-style game for this machine a wile back called GATE CRASHER that features very smooth, fast 3-D animation. Very impressive for a 2-mhz, 8-bit machine.

   
TOP: My Coco3 system circa early 2002
LEFT: Webcam pic of my system taken 1/18/2003. Coco running Mandel09, a program I wrote.
RIGHT: My Coco3 system pic taken 1/14/2003. Notice Atomic Fireball taped over monitor power button to hold it in place.

MY CURRENT SYSTEM INCLUDES:
512k Tandy Color Computer 3 with a Hitachi 6309 microprocessor running at 1.78 mhz
SVGA Monitor connected using a RGB-VGA adaptor
Multi-Pak Interface, model 26-3024 upgraded with new PAL chip for Coco3 compatibility
FD-502 5 1/4" Floppy Drive and controller
3 1/2" Floppy Drive installed in second bay of FD-502 case
Cloud-9 TC3 SCSI Hard Drive Controller
Seagate 180mb Hard Drive partitioned between OS-9 and RS-DOS
NitrOS9 3.2 Operating System (an upgraded version of OS-9),
    --- a real-time multitasking operating system based on Unix.
Multi-Vue, a GUI that runs under OS-9. Running upgraded Gshell 1.26. Looks great!
RGB-DOS, a patched version of RS-DOS on an EPROM in the disk drive controller that
    allows use of a hard drive and autoboot of OS-9
2 standard black Radio Shack joysticks
1 Deluxe Joystick
2 Pistol Grip Joysticks
2-button mouse
Hi-res Joystick Adapter
RS-232 Interface
RS Speech/Sound Cartridge

SOME OF THE SOFTWARE I OWN:
Icon Basic09 by HAWKSoft
Ved OS9 Word Processor
Dynacalc OS9 Spreadsheet Program
Supercomm Terminal Program
Disk EDTASM+
OS-9 Pascal
Data Windows OS9 Database Program
Gate Crasher
Rogue
Tazman
Rescue on Fractalus
King's Quest III
Koronis Rift
Flight Simulator 2
Gantelet
Gantelet II
The Seventh Link
RoboCop
Predator
Sinistaar
Crystal City

 Shamus
Arkanoid
Super Pitfall
Tetris
Rampage
Malcolm Mortar
Mind Roll
Demolition Derby
Galactic Attack
Space Assault
Dungeons of Daggorath
Castle of Tharrogad
Kyum-Gai: OS9 Version
Warrior King
Zenix
Paladin's Legacy
War Monger
Smash
The Contras
Zork I
Sub Battle Simulator

I also own a ton of other cartridges and miscellaneous stuff which is still sitting in my parents' attic in New York. Someday I'll get the rest of it.

HISTORY OF MY INVOLVEMENT WITH THE COCO:

My dad has worked with mainframe computers as part of his profession since the early '70's. When I was little he would occasionally take me into work and I was totally fascinated and totally fell in love with computers. When home computers came out in the early '80's, I desperately wanted one and begged my parents to buy me a Timex Sinclair 1000 or a TI 99/4a. I started saving up money to buy one myself when my parents pre-empted me by buying me a TRS-80 Color Computer 2 for Christmas in 1983. It had 16k with Extended Color Basic. I used a tape recorder to load and save programs. I learned to program in BASIC and started writing my own programs. All through school I had very little money, so upgrading my system with more hardware and software took years. After a year or so I upgraded to 64k memory. In 1985 I wrote an adventure game called 'AANDARK' and entered it in the Third Rainbow Adventure Contest. I was a finalist, and my program was published in the Third Rainbow Book of Adventures. Soon after I finally got a disk drive and a multi-pak interface, and I wrote a sequal to AANDARK called 'AANDARK II'. I entered that game in the Fourth Rainbow Adventure Contest in 1987 and again I was a finalist so that program appeared in the Fourth Rainbow Book of Adventures. That fall I finally earned enough money to buy a Coco 3 and a Magnavox 8CM515 monitor. I definitely wanted the Magnavox, as it was (and is) in my opinion superior to the CM-8 that Radio Shack sold. With a simple press of a button I can switch between RGB and Color Composite modes, eliminating any worries about whether a program uses artifact colors or not. Anyway, I started working on 'Aandark III' which was a Coco3-only program, but I never finished it. Rainbow didn't do any more Adventure contests, and besides, I soon got OS-9 and that consumed most of my Coco computing time. I learned Basic09 and started writing programs in that language, though I produced mostly 'practical' applications programs. In 1991 I finally got Multi-Vue and learned to program in that environment. I wrote a Mandelbrot picture-generating program that ran under Multi-Vue called Mandel09, and it was pretty good if I may say so myself.

In February of 1992 I left for a 2-year stint in France & Switzerland doing volunteer work for my church. I was unable to bring my computer with me, and in 1994 when I came back I powered up my Coco for the first time in two years only to find out that it no longer worked. I was crushed. I have never been very good at all at fixing computer hardware, so I had no idea how to go about repairing my Coco. By that time Rainbow was gone, the Coco market had apparently collapsed, and so I had no idea whether there was anyone out there who would be able to fix it for me. As far as I knew, there was hardly anyone left using the computer anyway. So I really had no alternative but to pack up my system and store it in my parents' attic. The system had so much sentimental value that I couldn't bring myself to throw it out or sell it. So there it sat in the attic for years gathering dust.

In 1996 I moved to Utah and in 1998 I got a job working for a brokerage firm that actually gave every employee Internet access on their desk. One day just for kicks I typed in 'TRS-80 Color Computer' into a search engine and a whole slew of websites came up! A whole new Coco community had formed using the Internet to hold it together! I was amazed. People were still making stuff and selling stuff for my favorite little 8-bitter. I couldn't believe it. But it wasn't until the summer of 2000 that I decided to try to set up my old system again. It was then that I found an advertisement by Ken Baker selling mint never-been used Coco3's for $50. I also found Cloud-9's website advertising new fast hard drive systems. One thing I always dreamed of having back in the 80's was a hard drive system, but they were always too expensive. Now, at age 29, I was in a position where I could afford it. So I splurged and got the new Coco and the Hard drive system. But all my other stuff - the MPI, my monitor, my disk drive, all my software, was still back in NY. It was several months before I was finally able to travel back to NY to get it all. Finally, in Feb. 2001, I had my system all set up again. After 9 long years, I'm finally back!

CURRENT PROJECTS: MANDEL09
(Last Updated 4/1/07)

Mandel09 is a program I originally wrote back in '91-'92. It is a fully-featured, fast fractal generator written in Basic09 which makes full use of the Multi-Vue environment. It is a very nice-looking, impressive program. It really shows what is possible under Multi-Vue. After getting back into the Color Computer back in 2000, I discovered that my original disks containing Mandel09 had been damaged by bit rot. I started work on restoring Mandel09 to functionality. Despite running into some obstacles that slowed me down (incl. a hard drive crash, and no access to the Internet for a while preventing me from downloading 'vefio', a utility necessary for running Mandel09), the restoration process proceeded slowly but surely. It is now pretty-much done, and I now feel it is ready to be released it to the public. I have uploaded the files to the Yahoo! Coco Club files archive. Click here to go to the Yahoo! Coco Club. You must join the club to have access to the file archive. Once you are a member, the link to the files archive should be on the left side of the page. Click on it, and look for 'Mandel09' and download it. Alternatively, you can email me and I will email you a copy.

OTHER PROJECTS:

Recently I wrote a utility that converts icons designed for stock Multi-Vue into icons that work better with gshell 1.26. I call it Iconvert, and it changes the palette registers of each of the colors in a Multi-Vue icon to colors that look better under gshell 1.26. I have also uploaded that utility to the Yahoo! Coco Group, or you can get it from me directly by emailing me. Also, since I got my system set up and running I have been slowly acquiring additional hardware and software for my Coco. I'm particularly interested in OS9 software. I'm always on the lookout for people on the Web who are selling Coco hardware & software. Also, recently I added a 3 1/2" floppy drive to my Coco, and I've started learning Assembly Language and Pascal on the Coco.

THE FUTURE:

Now that I've released Mandel09 1.1, I have started work on Mandel09 2.0. There's a few features I want to add to the program. I also will continue to study Assembly Language and Pascal and I want to start writing programs in those languages. I also want to get a fast modem and a good terminal program so I can surf the Net with my Coco. I'd also like to someday finish 'Aandark III'. Any new programs I eventually produce I of course will make available to the rest of the Coco community.



HERE'S HOW YOU CAN GET IN TOUCH WITH ME:

Click Here to Email me!
Snail Mail: 329 E. 4140 S. #191
Salt Lake City, UT 84107
Phone: (801) 266-1811


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MY FAVORITE COCO LINKS:

The Tandy Color Computer SuperSite

TRS-80 Tandy Color Computer Webring

Cloud-9 Hardware for the Color Computer

Yahoo! Coco Club

More Favorite Coco Links!

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