[ Newsbits ] June 6, 2014

Friday, June 6th, 2014

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VC&G Newsbits Logo

Vintage computing and retrogaming news small enough to eat.

Despite what you may think, Newsbits is not dead. It just needs more fiber.

Recent News

  • The RetroN 5 Launching June 6th (Today!) in the US
    (Source: Destructoid)

    Hope it works as advertised.

    This thing is a beast, supporting NES, Famicom, SNES, Super Famicom, Genesis, Mega Drive, Game Boy, Game Boy Color, and GBA cartridges. All of that, with 720p output via HDMI and original controller support.

  • Wii U plugs first DS game into Virtual Console in Japan

    Once upon a time, Nintendo frowned strongly upon emulation. Now its business model depends on it. Oh, how times have changed.

    Puzzle-poser Brain Age is the first DS game to arrive on Wii U Virtual Console, and it’s out now in Japan for free until June 30.

  • Unearthed E.T. Atari games will be curated by New Mexico space museum and then sold
    (Source: Polygon)

    A unique situation where one of these games in unopened, mint condition could be worth far less than one crushed and buried in a landfill for 30 years.

    Seven hundred of the 1,300 E.T. and other Atari cartridges recovered from a New Mexico landfill will be appraised, certified and put up for sale, the Alamogordo City Commission decided this week.

  • The Verge Publishes Rarely-Seen Photos of Apple’s 1980s Prototype Case Designs
    (Source: The Verge)

    Incredible photos of early 1980s Apple products that never were

    Some of its earliest and most iconic designs, however, didn’t actually come from inside of Apple, but from outside designers at Frog. In particular, credit goes to Frog’s founder, Hartmut Esslinger, who was responsible for the ‘Snow White’ design language.

  • Watching kids trying to figure out how to use an old Apple II is totally hilarious
    (Source: Cult of Mac)

    This video of children from the ages of 6 to 13 trying to figure out how to work a vintage Apple II … shows just how inexplicable computing was to pretty much everyone before Steve Jobs released the original Mac in 1984.

  • Modder Stuffs a Raspberry Pi into a Game Boy Pocket
    (Source: Hackaday)

    This is one of the most amazing mods I’ve ever seen

    After sanding down the bosses on the inside of the case, gluing the battery door shut, and installing a bit of plastic over the cartridge slot, WarriorRocker was able to fit a Raspi inside. The buttons use the same PCB as the stock Game Boy, connected to a Teensy 2.0 board that simulates a USB keyboard.

  • Exhibiting .gifs: An Interview with curator Jason Eppink
    (Source: The Signal)

    Wonder if they know about Retro GIF of the Week

    Jason recently curated ‘The Reaction GIF: Moving Image as Gesture,’ which exhibits a set of GIFs he identified in consultation with redditors.

Cool Links

  • Where Have You Gone, Peter Norton?
    (Source: Technologizer)

    A look back at the PC utility guru’s career by Harry McCracken at the newly-reborn Technologizer

    Norton’s empire grew to include multiple software products, articles (including a long-running PC Magazine column), and books. He was everywhere that PCs were. And then, in 1990, he sold Peter Norton Computing to Symantec, which made the Norton line of software even more successful.

  • Wolfenstein game graphics, 1992 vs 2014
    (Source: Twitter)

    A million more pixels, but the jaw remains the same

  • The Most 90s Thing That Could Ever Exist
    (Source: The Atlantic)

    The zeitgeist summed perfectly in one technological artifact, which is a VHS tape promoting Windows 95, starring Jennifer Aniston and Matthew Perry.

  • Total Chaos is the Best-Looking Doom II Mod You’ve Ever Seen
    (Source: PCGamer)

    More like a “GZDoom mod,” but still very impressive.

    Total Chaos doesn’t run on the Doom 2 engine from 1993 proper, but a modified version of the original source code that brings in OpenGL, mouse looks and other features like 16x motion blur, high resolution textures, 3D models, and bloom effects.

  • The Secret History of Hypertext
    (Source: The Atlantic)

    Historians of technology often cite Bush’s essay as the conceptual forerunner of the Web. And hypertext pioneers like Douglas Engelbart, Ted Nelson, and Tim Berners-Lee have all acknowledged their debt to Bush’s vision. But for all his lasting influence, Bush was not the first person to imagine something like the Web.

  • The Woman Behind Apple’s First Icons
    (Source: Priceonomics)

    …and Windows 3.0 to XP’s Solitaire cards! (I did an interview with her about that once, gotta find it.)

    For many, Susan Kare’s icons were a first taste of human-computer interaction: they were approachable, friendly, and simple, much like the designer herself. Today, we recognize the little images — system-failure bomb, paintbrush, mini-stopwatch, dogcow — as old, pixelated friends.

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[ Retro GIF of the Week ] Digital Still Life

Friday, February 15th, 2013

Vintage Fruit and Vegetable Still Life 1988 Retro GIFClick to see other views of this image: [ Original Size ] [ 2X Zoom ] [ 4:3 Ratio ]

Have you ever seen an edible still life rendered in 16-color EGA?

It appears that this image, which shows fruits and vegetables, cheese, and a napkin or folded tablecloth, originated as either a video capture or a scan of a photograph that was then digitally cleaned up to isolate the centerpiece in absolute blackness.

[ Continue reading [ Retro GIF of the Week ] Digital Still Life » ]

[ Retro GIF of the Week ] Doom II at the Office

Wednesday, February 6th, 2013

Doom II Office Fan Art 1996 Retro GIFClick to see other views of this image: [ Original Size ] [ 2X Zoom ]

This particular image, titled “Another Day at the Office,” is one of the gems of my personal GIF collection. I believe I downloaded it from CompuServe, and I likely downloaded it on the file date, June 16, 1996.

The image itself is a computer-crafted ode to Doom II that merges a real digitized photograph with imagery ripped straight from id Software’s famous first-person shooter.

Such a passion for Doom II in the workplace isn’t foreign to me. In an office where I worked in the mid-late 1990s, certain engineers were known to play late night four-player Doom deathmatches over the company LAN.

[ Continue reading [ Retro GIF of the Week ] Doom II at the Office » ]

[ Retro GIF of the Week ] The Smithsonian’s Apple I

Friday, January 18th, 2013

Apple I Smithsonian 1992 Retro GIFClick to see other views of this image: [ Original Size ] [ 2X Zoom ]

You’re looking at a photograph of an Apple I computer that currently resides in the collection of the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, D.C. It was on display at one point, but I believe it is not being displayed at the moment (feel free to correct me on that).

I downloaded this 256-color GIF image from CompuServe back in 1994 (judging by the file date). I think it came from the Archive Photos forum, but I am not 100% sure about that. Either way, it’s a nice photo, and if you see it floating around the Internet, it’s likely because I first posted it on VC&G in 2006.

As you may know the Apple I (which was officially titled “Apple Computer 1” on the circuit board and “Apple-1” in its manual) did not ship with a case. The wooden enclosure you see here was created by early Apple employee Randy Wigginton’s father. It’s interesting how it presages the design of the Apple II enclosure to some extent.

[ Wondering what a GIF is? Read the introduction to this column. ]

Retro GIF of the Week Fact Box
Source File Name: APPLEI.GIF
Source File Date: August 20, 1994
Source File Format: GIF – 89a (non-interlaced)
Dimensions: 640 x 480 pixels
Color Depth
(bits per pixel):
8-bit (256 color)
Origin Platform: Unknown
Derived From: Scanned photograph
Creation Date: 1992
Artist: Smithsonian Institute
If you know more about the origin of this image, please leave a comment.

[ Retro GIF of the Week ] Happy New Year 1993

Monday, December 31st, 2012

Happy New Year 1993 Raytraced Retro GIFClick to see other views of this image:
[ Original Size ] [ 2X Zoom ]

In honor of the impending New Year, I bring you this ray traced image that dates back to December 1992 — 20 years ago — and celebrates New Year 1993.

As per its inscription, this image was created using StrataVision 3D and retouched with PhotoMac by its author, CT. I have not determined who CT is yet, but I will do some more poking around soon and update this entry if I find out. (If you find out first, please let me know.)

Happy New Year!

[ Wondering what a GIF is? Read the introduction to this column. ]

Retro GIF of the Week Fact Box
Source File Name: NEWYEAR.GIF
Source File Date: December 16, 1992
Source File Format: GIF – 87a (non-interlaced)
Dimensions: 640 x 480 pixels
Color Depth
(bits per pixel):
8-bit (256 color)
Origin Platform: Macintosh
Derived From: Unknown
Creation Date: Likely December 1992
Artist: CT
If you know more about the origin of this image, please leave a comment.

[ Retro GIF of the Week ] The Feminine Eye

Monday, December 10th, 2012

Eye Retro GIF - circa late 1980sClick to see other views of this image: [ Original Size ] [ 2X Zoom ] [ 3X Zoom ]

This eye is more than meets the eye. You probably can’t see it at this size, but click on the “3X Zoom” link above and you might notice a face and what might be a shoulder (or a six-fingered hand) reflected in the pupil of the eyeball. Neat detail.

Unlike many GIFs that circulated back in the day, this one is signed — twice, in fact. In the upper left, we see a small box containing stylized letters spelling “The Mage.” In the lower right, we see “A.H.”

I’ve seen other GIFs with the same resolution and color depth signed “A.H.”, so I assume that is the artist. “The Mage” might have been the name of a BBS that happened to tag the image, or perhaps is was simply an alias of A.H.

When combined with its 320 x 200 dimensions, its odd 5-bit / 32-color color depth reveals that this image was created on an Amiga. That means it is likely that it did not originate as a GIF file, and that it could be older than the 1992 file date. But until I find an older source of the image, I won’t know for sure.

Retro GIF of the Week Fact Box
Source File Name: EYE2.GIF
Source File Date: August 6, 1992
Source File Format: GIF – 87a (non-interlaced)
Dimensions: 320 x 200 pixels
Color Depth: 5-bit (32 color) (Amiga OCS)
Origin Platform: Amiga
Derived From: Unknown
Creation Date: Unknown
Artist: Avril Harrison (Updated 12/11/2012)
If you know more about the origin of this image, please leave a comment.

Animated Christmas GIFs of Yore

Tuesday, December 21st, 2010

Christmas Animated GIF

A few days ago, PCMag.com published a slideshow of vintage Christmas graphics files that I put together. Some of those images were stills from animated GIFs. Below, you’ll find the full animated GIF files featured in the article and a whole lot more. Merry Christmas!

Prepare to be besparkled.

[ Continue reading Animated Christmas GIFs of Yore » ]