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From: RobertB (all posts)
Date: 2000-04-15
Subject: Re: Questions

Dear Csaba,

On Sat, 15 Apr 2000, Plus4 wrote:

> I guess I should quickly introduce myself for those who don't know me (most
> of you :-) My name is Csaba Pankaczy or Csabo of LOD, I've been a Plus4
> fanatic for a long time. I live in Canada, on a recent visit my parents from
> Hungary have just brought me my old Plus4, the disk drive and my tons of
> disks. I haven't been able to hook it up yet, because

I'm a closet Plus/4 user here in California. Though my main machines are C128D's, I'd like to get more use out of my NTSC Plus 4. I too brought back a Plus 4 from Europe, a PAL machine. Here in the states there's a lack of programs for the NTSC Plus 4, but in Europe there are plenty for the PAL Plus 4. My friend, Peter Hanson, the Plus 4 King of England has more than 10,000 PAL programs.

> 1) We have 110V here and my Plussy's power supply is for 220V.

You can find a North American Plus 4 power supply or hardware hack North American C64/128 power supply to make it work with the Plus 4. The Euro PAL Plus 4 will be able to handle the power supply.
However, you'll run into the problem of the crystal timing of the Euro PAL Plus 4 will be thrown off by the American p.s.. The crystal expects 50 HZ. but will be receiving 60 HZ.. The video chip also expects a 50 HZ. frequency but will receive 60 HZ.. This means that the video you will see will lose its color information (i.e., you'll get a black-and-white picture), and the screen will flicker terribly. PAL programs used on such a Euro PAL/American p.s. machine will not act correctly to keypresses or other input. (I received several PAL programs from Peter Hanson, such as Flight Simulator 2 for the Plus 4. However,
they don't work correctly with my Euro PAL/American p.s machine. They do work correctly with a PAL Plus 4, Euro p.s., and PAL monitor -- which Peter has.)

> 2) The "TV cable" does not connect to the TV's here...

You must be talking about a "SCART" t.v. cable. I use a C64/128
video cable to connect directly to a monitor, and thus I bypass the PAL t.v. modulator inside a PAL Plus 4.

> Are the any Plus4ers here in Canada or in the States? If yes, then I guess
> they could help me with these things. I'm pretty sure there is an adapter
> for both 1) and 2). Any help or comments would be appreciated. If I manage
> to get my Plus4 going and my disks are still ok, there is a chance I will
> finish our first mega demo (several years in the making... :-)

I'm here, though I could be more active. Good luck on your mega demo. My need is to find a good source of NTSC Plus 4 programs. I had a source in Los Angeles, though I don't know if he's still in business. Does anybody know of a website or other source of NTSC Plus 4
programs?

Truly,
Robert Bernardo
Fresno Commodore User Group