Foenix FNX1591 Disk Drive and F256K Software

[@johnsobota6234]

I bought an F256K and the drive. Loving it so far. Haven’t loaded Jiffy DOS on drive yet since I don’t have a windows machine. Will have to borrow one, i guess.

[@mistwolf]

If this is Jan Beta, I can't wait to see Jan Release!

[@kloakovalimonada]

Jesus those are some pretty machines

[@garthhowe297]

Enjoyed the video. Would love to see more Foenix content.

[@sternwartevach]

oh i so love listening to you while i am installing workbench 3.2 on my amiga 500 🥰

[@3vi1J]

Other than the Brown-Green-Brass(?) function keys, I think this is one of the coolest looking machines around (I think those keys would be better orange or black). I really like the drive design too. Someone certainly spent some time making the system look good.

[@1BitFeverDreams]

I recently acquired my first bench power supply and I can confirm my F256K runs with 9V and takes about 240 mA. It also ran fine with an old dinky 12V 750mA power supply adapter i had laying around.

[@JanBeta]

Good to know! I can confirm the current draw for 12V. I think the recommended 2A power supply is just to have some headroom and possibly a cleaner supply (because not driven to its limits).

[@HuntersMoon78]

$545 for the foenix F256K.....damn that thing is expensive!

[@PJBonoVox]

$275 for the drive as well 😮

[@JanBeta]

These are low volume, largely hand-assembled systems. Resin printed cases, custom PCB, FPGAs, custom keyboard etc. I don’t think there’s a lot of margin on these actually. You can’t really compare the pricing with something mass produced. It’s pretty much a hobbyist project made by enthusiasts for enthusiasts.

[@Darkstar2342]

23:58 you can load SEQ files by simply adding ",S" to the load command, so something like LOAD "JAN,S",8 should load it just fine. That was a cute little trick back then to "protect" your games from other people, because they couldn't figure out how to load SEQ files 😀

[@JanBeta]

Nice! Didn’t know that little trick. BASIC V2 is full of surprises still! Thanks for pointing that out. :)

[@Breakfast_of_Champions]

Well done with JiffyDOS Jan😀You can even find improvement patches for both ROMs that fix some things in the 1989 release version.

[@more.power.]

Thank you Jan I always enjoy and learn from your channel. Cheers

[@twocvbloke]

Pretty neat that the drive is easily backwards compatible with the 64, only drawback is the price (being the poverty-stricken brit that I am!), would love to have a 3.5" drive with my 64c... :)

[@naderhumood]

Always thumbs up....great internation.... thanks Jan Bita.

[@1BitFeverDreams]

That's unfortunate about the sound. Definitely revisit the last game on the next video and check out the 10 awesome sid music. The title screen iirc instructs you to switch them around using the numeral 1 to 0 keys.

[@kaitlyn__L]

That's a pretty good arrangement of Spooky Scary Skeletons, but I must admit I was hoping for an original composition 😅

[@EngineeringVignettes]

Finding that ROM on the _net_ must have been _fun_ :) Cheers,

[@desertfish74]

"Before I even try this I want to open it up and take a look inside" Spoken like a true enthusiast 👍

[@RDJ134]

Thumbs up in advance and hitting play to watch now!! :)

[@espressomatic]

These new systems are inventive and pretty great overall. Their downfall however is their price. Just way too expensive. It pretty much ends there. At these price points there are better solutions available, two of which are simply a Mister setup or Ultimate64 Elite.

[@aqualung2000]

Hey Jan, long-time fan. Foenix offers a 6809 CPU option instead of a 6502. I would _love_ to see you cover that; if you're an old programmer like me (who was programming even back when these chips were new) you'll know that the 6809 kicks the pants off the 6502 and is much more fun to program for since it gives you so many more options. But the kit is expensive and it's not clear how much software work has been done or how well it's supported. I'd really love to see that covered. Thanks for all the videos!

[@sprybug]

Nice! I'm currently working on a modernization of the Tandy Color Computer which uses the 6809. The system will use the 6309 alternate that's 100% compatible, but can run faster and has a few new additional features. I plan on having it run at a top speed of 3.58 mhz (twice the speed of the CoCo 3), with SDCard interface, OPL support, PS/2 keyboard, Wii nunchuck controller support, expansion card slots, etc. I just received my first test PCBs to test the expansion designs on. I eventually would like to expand the video to VGA with more video modes than the CoCo 3 had.

[@Breakfast_of_Champions]

The 6809 is the full package with the features to build a real system, while the 6502 was designed as a minimal subset of the 6809 more likely to work as a microcontroller. The 6809 already has a multitasking, multiuser and realtime OS with OS-9, it is definitely the most interesting of all 8-bit CPUs for assembly and higher level coding.

[@aqualung2000]

@@sprybug That sounds very interesting! I'm glad you aren't running it _too_ fast, that spoils the fun. I think around 2MHz is the sweet spot and you're near that. The rest sounds awesome, but if it were me I'd make sure to have a minimum of 2 RS-232 ports as well! Hope the project goes well!

[@aqualung2000]

@@Breakfast_of_Champions To be precise, the 6502 has a subset of the _6800_ features, which was the predecessor to the 6809. So the 6502 is a cut-down version of the older, less advanced chip. That's not to say it didn't have a place (it obviously did!!), and Chuck Peddle was a genius for realizing the world needed super cheap CPUs. But take price away and the 6502 is really kind of a pile of crap compared to either the 6800 or 6809.

[@danielmantione]

@@aqualung2000 I don't agree: The 6502 is indeed more simplistic than the 6800 (the 6800 has two accumulators), but it is more powerful. The reason is Chuck Peddle's innovation: Zero page addressing. The zero page addressing helps a lot in the low amount of registers that the 6502 has and is very useful for 16-bit pointers. Thanks to this, the 6502 can compute more per clock cycle than an 6800. It was cheaper *and* better.

[@michaelb4439]

23:55 In addition to Darkstars2342's excellent answer, the jiffyDOS command @T:filename could probably list the F256K SEQ file to screen on the C64, although the file is probably tokenized and would look like gibberish using this command.

[@JanBeta]

Ah, neat! I’m going to give that a try! :)

[@OscarSommerbo]

It is just silly how copyright is used to just hurt enthusiasts. It isn't like the roms are selling, the copyright is only hurting the retrocomputer community.

[@JanBeta]

The Commodore copyrights are a very special case. There’s been so much fighting over them that nobody really knows who owns what at this point I guess. The ROMs are most definitely still copyrighted though (although they are readily available from several places on the web).

[@danielmantione]

@@JanBeta Yes, the copyright is valid, but it is very unlikely someone is able to present a chain of credible documents that a court can validate the transfer of rights from the original authors to the party who wants to claim copyright. Preparing such proof would be very expensive already. If you would hire a lawyer to start an enforcement case, he will more likely try to convince there is no change of winning such a case (and make his money on the legal advice), instead of being eager to start such a case.

[@rosariodagosto6484]

Good for backup for commodore computers

[@RainerK.]

Jan, old house. Long time no see!

[@JanBeta]

Sorry for the delay. Real life got in the way big time recently. :/

[@RainerK.]

@@JanBeta Ooops, hope it was nothing serious! Glad to have you back!

[@horusfalcon]

Egad! I thought I was already subbed here, and looked just now and saw I was not! Very sorry, as I follow what you do with interest. The Foenix system looks like a fine example of "faux-retro" hardware. These systems can be a lot of fun.

[@JanBeta]

Thanks! Yes, the Foenix is one of the most sophisticated new retro systems so far (at least of the ones I've experienced). :)

[@tetsujin_144]

It's cool that somebody cloned the 1581 but I have to wonder if it was really worth it. That is to say, it's useful to have an 800K floppy disk on an 8-bit machine. But is it really useful to have one that's a near-exact clone of the 1581, to the point of needing to use the original ROMs and so on?

[@JanBeta]

There may be dedicated ROMs for it in the future. Stephany hinted at the possibility of using HD disks, too. So maybe it’s going to become slightly more advanced than the original 1581 soon.

[@danielmantione]

The usefullness is compatibility with custom loaders. The drive should now be perfectly compatible with a load of modern loader systems such as Nosdos, Fload, Krill's Loader, Covert Bitops Fastloader and so on. And will also perfectly run GEOS. You cannot achieve that with a proprietary solution. However, as everything is on an FPGA, the hardware should be very flexible, and changing to custom non-1581 hardware should be a matter of a firmware upgrade.

[@zap2002]

Trying to decide between this and the Mega 65

[@CamperMarko]

You could just order both, if Mega 65 delivery times don't change, you'll probably have the F256K a year earlier.

[@jasongins]

Do you know if it will format a high density disk to 720k and have the disk be reliable?

[@dougjohnson4266]

JiffyDOS is the only way to go. I think the drive is cool, but finding good media will it be difficult?

[@tetsujin_144]

It's not too bad in my experience. Plenty of old-stock double density media on ebay, I've developed a good-sized collection of 3.5 and 5.25 media in the last few years.

[@JanBeta]

The drive should also work fine with HD disks (formatted as DD). There’s plenty of those around still at least. NOS double density is getting slightly more difficult to find but not impossible (yet).

[@stryxwoman]

have you got a c64 reloaded 2

[@flekkzo]

As much as I would want a 1581, I’d really love an FPGA 15x1 drive with an SD card. Like a Pi1541 but with the Pi and as exact as possible. Because yes, I want four:) And yes, I have real drives, but they are failing:(

[@JanBeta]

You might want to have a look at the 1541 Ultimate II+. Emulates several drives cycle exact using an FPGA (recently added 1581 emulation, too). It uses USB sticks for storage and is aimed at the C64 though.

[@andrewgillham1907]

I believe you can run the 1541 Ultimate II+ standalone by powering via the micro USB. Then you need ethernet so you can telnet in and mount floppy disk images. I need to test that feature myself.

[@JanBeta]

Oh, I didn’t know that! I’m going to have to give that a try, too. Thanks for pointing it out!

[@andrewgillham1907]

@@JanBeta I tested a U2+ (3.10j) standalone with a C64 last night. Worked great. My laptop was in the other room so I used telnet from my phone which was a little clunky. Anyway it works. I don’t remember seeing any videos demonstrating it so it would be neat if you made one.

[@danielmantione]

@@JanBeta My approach when using the 1541U2 with non-C64 8-bit computers is simply to place a C64 next to them. I stick the 1541U2 inside the C64 and connect the serial cable to whatever computer. Would work with F256 fine. You can indeed use ethernet as well, but my non-plus 1541U2 doesn't have ethernet yet.

[@rosariodagosto6484]

Jan is a CD romantic coming out ?

[@JanBeta]

I don’t think there’s any plans for that. Would be fun though. :)

[@awilliams1701]

I see one area where the Commander x16 is better. It has commodore compatibile basic programs where as this doesn't. Is that a big deal? probably not. lol

[@activelow9297]

I think the A2560K is more exciting than this... any plans to get one?

[@JanBeta]

Maybe I’ll get a review unit sometime. Would be great to take a look at the 2560 but I can’t afford to buy one myself currently.

[@mortarmopp3919]

Maybe you should've checked your sound setup /before/ making the video. Just a thought.

[@derek8564]

Whats with the "LIPS" on the monitor?

[@huubpeters7972]

Phil just had to go.

[@user-yr1uq1qe6y]

In older videos he had a Phillips brand monitor with black tape covering the “Phil”. It was at the bottom and much smaller. Maybe a joke with the new monitor was to put label with “LIPS” in honor of the old one 😂

[@derek8564]

@@user-yr1uq1qe6y ahh :)

[@JanBeta]

Exactly this. I had several people complaining about the missing "LIPS" when I switched the monitor to the bigger one I now use (which is actually an LG brand TV I fixed some time ago). Couldn’t resist overdoing it. ;)

[@SuperMoleRetro]

So this is a retro style computer that will not run existing retro software? It will only run software designed for it? I kind of get the disk drive, you can use it as a retro drive on the C64, but the computer I don't get the appeal of wanting one. I can't see a huge backlog of software being developed for this. Why have this when you can get a C64, Atari, Apple, or any other vintage computer with a huge catalog of existing software? Or any of the new reproduction FPGA versions of them?

[@jimmiles33]

Ultimate 64 is what you’re looking for. This is for people who want to develop or play on a retro style machine with BASIC or ASM.

[@CamperMarko]

It's a retro style computer to write your own software, just like the C64 used to be when it first came out. Some people enjoy creating software more than using it. A modern machine like this makes this way more enjoyable than the vintage hardware. For example you don't need an old flickering CRT monitor (or a converter). Also it is even easier to get started developing for this machine, the SuperBasic on this machine is far ahead of the C64's Basic 2.0. More colors, more sprites, etc. Still it is simple enough that one person alone can understand everything that is going on in the machine, just as it used to be in the 80s.

[@stefanyallaire]

You see the glass half empty instead of seeing the glass half full. You could say that if the collective that developed software for the C64 right now, would do it for the F256K instead, you could have a renaissance of what retro computer was back in the day. New games, new hacks, etc... It is about discovering a new platform, not pimpin an old one and play the same old things. You can always go back to the C64. But the Foenix Line of computers, the X16 and the Mega65 (to a certain degree) are all about getting back to the beginning where you are facing a new machine and to learn it and to exploit it. What's the point of reimplemting the same old hack that most demo creators have used for ages when you have the possibility of finding new ones in a new machine... You see what I mean? It is about how you look at it!

[@dh2032]

the bit I dont get with retro new systems, back all home computer where of this type of design, there was an eco system game, game pad, even game on disk and cassettes, and you did suffer if the was not moch of a eco system for your machine, and most where sold ing 1+ millions plus, now we get to new retro machines like one in this video, there only going to be sold 1,000+ if that, so the probley a lot let then the least successful model being back then?

[@JanBeta]

I think the appeal is to make your own stuff for the new systems. In the old days, when a new computer was released, there usually wasn’t a lot of software at first and people had to figure things out on their own. The new retro style systems give you a similar experience. Wrapping your head around a new system is fun for quite a few people (including myself).

[@dennisp.2147]

I'd feel better about the price, if it wasn't using that cheap flimsy laptop floppy mechanism

[@JanBeta]

My guess is that the slim ones are the only 3 1/2 inch disk drives still in production these days. I’ve not seen any new desktop disk drives in ages, the USB style slim drives are still readily available though.

[@dennisp.2147]

@@JanBeta I'm sure that's the case. That being said, there are almost certainly NOS full sized floppies from Dell and HP business class machines in the late aught's to early teens that still came with full size floppies. I suspect that the number of these 1591 drives being manufactured isn't so high that they can't find a reliable source of NOS or even low-hour floppies pulled from the surplus business class machines.

[@tarstarkusz]

When are these people going to get it through their heads that it's not 1982 anymore and that their "dream system" from 1982 is not a dream system today. What it is, is an obsolete computer which cost 10 times what it should and has no software.