pouët.net

been noticing a few comments in some prods saying stuff like "waaah, the sound doesn't work in win 2k," or "It gives a runtime error 200 on my p4 1.7ghz" or whatever.

there's a simple solution to this, get hold of some old hardware (if you're clever you'll have saved some of yours) and build a computer. Install DOS or something, get the right drivers, and you'll probably want a couple of ethernet cards and a length of coax to link it to your main machine. Zip drive also works, but stuff like SR won't fit on a floppy.

anyway, I'm sure lots of people do this, but there's obviously some who don't, so obvious post to say why you should.

mine also makes a nice footrest :)

I never been able to see most of the Halcyon demos-intros because of instability... what a shame !.

A realy cool ideas was the amidemo site. Why not record a selection of oldschool and middle school PC demos on divx ?

I whould be soo hapy if someone could do that for me :o)

Today, i think that i'm one of the last scener to use a p90/dos/win98 computer. Is there any other sceners interested to make new prods in a middle school style ? (320*200*32bpp, software mode, xm track), it's realy my cup of tea :o)

I'd do it anytime :)

For the ability to watch the oldskool stuff I'm quite lucky with my pIII-450 (equipped with gus of coz) and this will not change in near future, also because I have no money for new hardware.
For me there is often more 'soul' in the old dos demos. Maybe I can do a recording of my Mekka 2002 demoshow when I find a person with the needed hardware. But in general I prefer to watch the demos 'live' instead from a tape or as divx file.

Funny, at this time I'm precisely building an "old" machine with my old pieces of hardware. The only doubt I have is about the videoboard : I must buy a new one for this computer (agp 2x, that is). Is a TNT2 able to work under DOS vesa 2 modes ?

I feel damn excited about beeing able to watch again all the DOS stuff i couldn't anymore =P

I love middle-school demos :)

william : tnt2 is not a bad choice, without univbe(which is actually not supported for tnt chipsets) it has a quite large video modes selection,
but it doesn't have a multiple color bpp modes selection, actually just 8,16 and 32,
don't expect on a tnt to watch a demo that makes use of 15bpp or 24 bpp modes ..
matrox g200 are nice too ..
some old ati cards too ..
and univbe is still an issue for many cards ..
on a pentium try to have at least a vbe2.0 video card


about the cpu .. well the best will be three computers : 486 dx2 66, pentium 133 and pentium II..

sound card .. isa is required, better have two isa slots : gus and sb ..

The video card of choice is the s3 serie.
My latest s3 card support the vesa 2.0 in hardware without unvbe, and it rocked ! (work realy at any time) a Gus card is also a must !

But even with a cool config : how to run the orange / Halcyon / coma demos that crash all the time ?
recording it is the solution !

Crest : i give you any encouragements you would need to record your demoshow :-)

Colas: By coming to Berlin and support me? Don't forget that I have not any money for travelling, hardware etc. - just my machine with TNT2 (w/o TV out) and both GUS and SB16. Actually I'm talking to Digisnap/Matrix, but don't know if he can really do such stuff. And recording Windows stuff is one (probably easier) task and can be done with modern machines, but the DOS stuff is more tricky.

Digisnap isn't able to do demo recordings and I don't know other persons here which can do this.

Crest : For dos demo, i think that recording the analog signal (output with a tv out card) will work anytime.

I think that the amidemos's videos are shooted with this technique.

why not ask to robotriot ? he have the hardware, and maye be he could help you.

i dream of a dosdemo webstite :-) whaaaa !

I think for the quality of C.A.P.-TV - Demos of a new decade you'll need a bit more. The quality of the recorded Amiga demos is often not very amazing.

i could increase the quality even more (capturing in higher resolutions), but i'm trying to keep the files below 100mb, which might be in your interest, too, crest.

robotriot: Would be probably no problem for ppl with flatrate, leased line or broadband. I'm normally not downloading any stuff that's bigger than 20 mb. And my Mekka demoshow as video in decent quality will probably fill a DVD (C.A.P.-TV contains less demos, but fills already a CDROM completly). Total running time would be 110 minutes including short infoscreens to any demo (no talking Max Headroom between the demos) ;)

Anyway, when you can do such stuff, then it's your part to do it because I have not the needed hardware.

You people surely realize that 5 years from now we'll probably be in a similar situation, with newer hardware / Windows / d3d / opengl versions not supporting old features (the way it happened with colorkeying, paletted textures, etc), and half of today's accelerated demos failing to work.

How many oldschool machines can you fit under your desk? I think recording demos (even today's demos) is the way to go. We must be careful because even digital video formats (actually, all kinds of electromagnetic media) are subject to evolution and eventual deprecation (5-inch floppies anyone?).

or maybe could we have a << source code bank >> to which people could donate their demo sourcecode for future << restoration >> against this horrible bit rot. some organisation you trust that would keep the source code unreleased but could archive them for future portings.

video is fine for yesterday's static demos, but doesn't represent well tomorrows attemps.

i wonder what demos will look like in 20 years (if there's still a demoscene). i guess nobody from 1992 could imagine how they look like today, that you don't show effect after effect anymore, and inbetween you put a starfield and a text writer. and some endless scrollers here and there. it's so different now :)

atleast on my asus whatever-tnt2 on PIII-450 there is no much screenmode problems and no need for univbe.

I think 24 / 15 bpp modes don't work, but most still used 8/32/16 anyways.

gus is very important piece to have.

and then there's lots of things that has that RT200 whatever pascal bug, so you need an packed exe unpacker and that rt200fix.exe which can be found from somewhere.

PIII-450 is usually way too fast for some demos, but disabling caches helps alot already with some prods.

ah ofcourse.. I do also have a P133 and 486/66 just to be safe.

blah for source code bank. all source code should be made free.

well, in the coming 10 years or so the computers at my home will become more and more I think :)
btw, Jare reminds me about something I already read some time ago: also cd's (burned) are not made for ever, I think already after 10 years you can get problems. so, check your demoshow-cd's regularly ;)
Jare: I even have a 5,25" drive in my latest pc, just to be prepared for anything ;)
I think the next 10-15 years will become funny: while everyone starts to own multi-processor high-end machines stuffed like hell, a small bunch of demosceners around the world is heavily trying to keep and restore old hardware, demos, software and os'es like hamsters grabbing nuts for the winter =)