TSU Meeting MONDAY — March 3, 2025

David Anderson, Jeff Burrell, Carl Miles, Ingo, Ryan Gray, Gustavo, Christian

David opened by reporting that he'd spent several days extracting programs from the BytePower cassette magazine (a TS2068/Spectrum tape magazine from the late 1980s) and posting them to the website — after Adam noticed only one issue had been archived. Listings, a spreadsheet, a word processor, and a number of small games are now available; David used a documented poke that stops the autorun and reveals the saving line.

Jeff Burrell described the combined Pico video + storage card that he and David have been working out. The plan is to merge the existing Pico-video and Pico-storage boards onto one slightly larger card built around a newer Pico 2 module that breaks out all 48 pins and carries 8 MB of flash. The new card would move from VGA to DVI (HDMI licensing avoided), keep the option of 50 Hz video, and likely add an OLED display with buttons so users can browse and swap TAP files without typing LOAD commands — useful even with software that isn't Pico-aware. Wi-Fi and a serial port are under discussion. Ricardo Calcagno is finishing the firmware on the current storage card before this becomes the next step. Target is VCF Midwest.

Carl Miles walked through several TS2068 and TS1000 hardware efforts. For the TS2068 he is building an internal board that mounts in place of the composite RCA jack and provides composite video, stereo left/right audio tapped from the AY chip (with jumpers to swap channel mapping), a jack switch that cuts power to the internal-speaker op-amp, and a small switching regulator mod (lifting the regulator into a socket) intended to reduce the hiss heard on some 2068s. He plans to capture before/after audio in Audacity to quantify the noise floor. For the TS1000 he has boards in hand for an internal 32K static-RAM expansion with HRG/WRG high-res support and an M1-NOT switch, plus a small 0.8 mm sub-board with two surface-mount switches that mounts under the motherboard screw nearest the edge connector — used to toggle M1-NOT and to disable the upper 16K when running a 1510 cartridge (still working out whether to route this via the RAM chip-select line, which would also intercept external RAM packs). Carl confirmed his TS1510 cartridge clones are built and available — including the version with the rotary switch and displays that holds 32 programs — and asked anyone interested to email him. Group also agreed to coordinate tables at VCF Midwest once registration opens.

Ingo, now relocated to Mendocino, demoed his brother's new Qidi Q+4 enclosed-filament 3D printer by showing a freshly printed KiloZ case (a full-size TS1000/ZX81 replacement enclosure built around a mechanical keyboard and the ZX-Wespi video board). The print uses an angled build orientation to produce a multi-colour 'racing stripe' effect and a textured skin instead of layer lines. The newer revision includes a D-sub cutout for VGA. Ingo plans a low-profile keycap revision, will share STL files via GitHub, and will look into space for a LiPo battery and a hinged-LCD 'laptop' variant. He and Carl agreed to compare notes on solder-free upgrade adapters. A long technical thread followed on extracting an intensity signal from the TS2068's YUV output to drive RGBI monitors: Carl noted the SCLD keeps intensity internal, the group looked at a YUV→RGB conversion schematic (CPLD-based and an op-amp-only variant) found online, and discussed referring to MSX daughter-board schematics that solve the same problem. Christian asked about TS2068 audio/music software at the end; David offered to post BytePower's AY-chip 'mini jukebox' programs to the list. Next meeting: Sunday 16 March, 2 pm Eastern.

Highlights

David archived the BytePower cassette-magazine backlog (TS2068/Spectrum, late 1980s) onto the website — listings, spreadsheet, word processor, games.
Jeff outlined a combined Pico video + storage card on a Pico 2 (48 pins, 8 MB flash, DVI, optional OLED + buttons), targeting VCF Midwest.
Carl is prototyping a TS2068 internal mod that reuses the composite-jack hole for video + stereo AY audio, kills the internal speaker, and quiets the switching-regulator hiss.
Carl's internal TS1000 32K static-RAM board (with HRG/WRG and an M1-NOT switch) is in hand; group is working out the 1510-cartridge memory-conflict switch.
TS1510 cartridge clones (including the 32-program rotary-switch version) are built and available — email Carl; VCF Midwest table coordination to start.

Projects discussed: TS-Pico · TS1510 Cartridge Interface Clone · "1068" — Enhanced TS1000 · ZX-Wespi / Wespi-Nano · Library Tape Archiving Process Topics: Hardware projects & new boards · Pico / modern interfaces (UnoDos, etc.) · Video upgrades (composite, RGB, HDMI) · TS1000 / ZX81 / TS1500 · TS1510 cartridge interface · TS2068 / TC2068

Summary generated from the meeting recording; the full transcript is kept in the group's private archive.