 Hello everyone and welcome to the homelab show episode 71. I have a special guest in the studio with me today. Hi, Veronica Hello, how's everybody doing? I'm sure everybody's going to be doing great when they see how awesome this episode is going to be because I was really looking forward to this one I've never since we started talking about it. So Tom is on vacation today. So He's not But we are going to talk about Retro homelab gear or retro homelabs. I didn't know what to call it But it's just retro stuff and I figured, you know with Over 70 episodes in I think it's time to have a little bit of fun I also learned that retro homelabs is a real thing. There's a reddit for it actually so All right So just want to take a moment to mention the sponsor Linode who was gracious enough to sponsor This podcast were basically the majority of the life of this podcast if there might have been one or two episodes I don't know how many but Linode is has been all for this podcast ever since we announced you were going to be doing it and This podcast is hosted on Linode as is my entire, you know The web-facing portion of my channel learn Linux TV is also on Linode They're a sponsor because we actually use them. They have a great dashboard Easy to use billing so it's not like other cloud providers out there where it's like learning Dungeons and Dragons is easier than understanding Just their billing component Linode is totally not like that. It's easy to use it's straightforward and Some people might be wondering why are you talking about? Linode a cloud provider on a podcast that's mostly for self-hosted. Well Linode is basically the ultimate DMZ you could basically anything your that's web-facing can be placed there or Whatever other reason you could think of your own VPN server, for example, you could play around with wire guard Set up a next cloud server. There's definitely a lot of carryover and it's been a great relationship So thank you to Linode for sponsoring yet another episode. We really appreciate it so it's time to talk about retro homelab, but I'm just going to live vicariously through this moment because I don't have my gaming channel yet I don't know when or when I'll set that up But I just want to take a moment to just put my Atari jaguar in this spotlight here for the people that are watching this And my virtual boy also because I don't really get a chance to show off my retro gear I'm not going to really spend any time talking about those since they're gaming consoles Not that there's anything wrong with that, but we're going to be talking about Retro computers so Veronica you did a really awesome video But they really awesome commercial in it by the way that you did yourself It's all about the Commodore 64 and that video did very well. I enjoyed it as did many others So you figured we'd have you on so for people that don't know about your channel and your video Why don't you go ahead and just tell them about it? Okay, well, it's it's fantastic to be here. This is very exciting. I don't think I've done a podcast before So this is the first one. It's it's kind of fun. Um, we'll we'll figure out how it works. Um, my name's Veronica I do Veronica explains and uh, I did a video a little bit ago where I explained a little bit about uh, how networking worked in that uh, the eight bit era the classic period of time when machines like the Commodore 64 reigned supreme and We what we did in the video was we actually got a Commodore 64 online onto the modern internet using a couple of different mechanisms One which closely replicates the experience that we had Back in the day getting onto bbs's so terminals and that sort of thing which was exciting But then the other way was with a special cartridge called the 64 nick plus uh that actually Incorporates the tcpip stack and allows you to actually surf the web On your Commodore 64 so not parsing it off to like a raspberry pi or something like that But like actually having the the 64 run it it was slow It's it's not a lot you can do there's not a lot you can do with it. Um But it's an exciting cartridge for some of the other things you can do with it like Backing up discs over the network and and all that which we did not cover in the video because it's 22 minutes long And I didn't I didn't want to make it too long, but in a future video. I might do some more like internal networking with your Commodore 64 just to just have fun with that It was so awesome. I mean, I love old computers, but what's really I don't want to say sad because it's it's fine. Um, even though it sounds bad I didn't even have my first computer until I was 19. So I missed out on all of that So I didn't have a Commodore 64 I mean how many other tech youtubers out there have you heard that's like Yeah, I started on the Commodore 64 or You know TRS 80 or any of these others and you know, that's really cool But you know by the time I started, you know, that that stuff has already come and gone So I really enjoy the retro technology especially now because it's a way for me to go back and Kind of see how things were The retro gaming collection I have also kind of helps with that too because we deal with some of the same issues like Trying to figure out how to display the computer on a high definition TV Right aren't always the funnest thing, but then in your video It's like you made the Commodore 64 go online, which um I think is brilliant and it's a lot of fun because it's you know, not something that you immediately think about Right. Well, thank you. I I'm I'm glad you liked it It it seems like the comments are pretty positive with it Like people seem to think this kind of idea is cool So I'm probably going to do a few more in the future with some of the other systems I got a Vic 20 sitting right there, but then I've also got my Amiga 500 right here and That's I I can imagine getting both online in the relatively near future as a follow-up would be kind of a fun video for me personally my First Like my first forays into computers weren't actually the Commodore family at all. Mine was The 286 that was my first computer The Commodore 64 was already pretty old hat by the time I really started getting into it But my family has some history with the Commodore 64 including one of my grandparents was actually a circuit board designer and so I was working on Stuff for the Commodore environment and I ended up finding a bunch of her old books at one point And it was like I I got I got to get into this and it just the bug kind of hit me A few years ago and it's like I just I have to have more My mom actually learned basic on a Vic 20 and That was that was right before I was born and she then As I was growing up with like the 286 and then eventually the 386 and the 486 and higher stuff She was always teaching me basic so that was actually my first language and It just kind of grew from there and I ended up making a career out of it So like so many of us do I think I think it it's something to be said about a passion project turning into a full-time job And by the way, I just want to throw this out there for anyone who hasn't seen this particular video yet Even though it's not a linux video. I have this domain have a url shortener. So This is really easy. So even those of you that are listening You don't have to pull over if you're driving and jot this down because it's pretty easy to remember If you go to linux dot video slash c64 hyphen online Again, that's linux dot video slash c64 hyphen online It goes right to your video. So that way they don't have to remember that long url or wait until the You know, it's in the show notes or whatever because with tom on vacation. I'm not really sure like When those would be posted it'll probably still be posted around the same time for those of you not listening live um, but that video was a lot of fun and I also look forward to more Of the same as I'm sure many of your fans do and if anyone hasn't checked out your channel Veronica explains they should absolutely do that because I'm calling it now. It's going to be huge It's going to be ginormous. So Well, I thank you and thank you for making the short url. That was that was super helpful um, it's it's it's given me ideas for how I can do short urls in the future I will have to talk after about that because that that's going to be a ton of fun. I I recently bought a new domain Thinking ahead for short url. So it's a short domain. So we'll see if it works So one one topic that I feel like, you know, because I'm just getting started when it comes to Retro computers. I have a I do have a couple of stories that are related. I can share But I haven't really had a chance to get into it yet But there's some overlap between, you know, the fact that I collect retro gaming gear and you know with older computers They're they're both computers. I mean, I don't I don't mean to say one is and one isn't it's just that one is a Purpose for gaming But shelf life is a big problem and I don't think there's a really easy answer because I know in your video I I'm pretty sure there was a floppy disk emulator or something that had the images on there because yes I wanted to get to find the wizardry disks the wizardry series is something I don't think a lot of people know about it said old PC game series before we had elder scrolls or any of those other things and and I think it might have Might predate might and magic possibly around the same time as ultima started just to give anyone who knows what I'm talking about a time frame And that that game was really or the series of games was released on floppy disks And I could find it on eb right now. I don't know if it'll work if I plug it in or insert the disk but There's something to be said about having the physical media But then in your video, I think you had like a it was a floppy disk emulator That's right I use the pi 1541 I actually have it in a bin over here And uh, I I have bins there's when when you collect retro computers you have bins There's lots of stuff in bins but um, the uh, the pi 1541 is my personal favorite Floppy disk emulator project on the Commodore 64 The benefit to it is that it is a cycle exact emulation of the original 1541 floppy disk Which if you don't know a lot of games and other, uh, utilities Used the 1541 floppy's flaws used its problems to Actually implement things like copy protection or some other features Took advantage of it for loaders or you know that sort of thing and so if you're using some other Replacement that's not cycle exact. You can actually run into issues and the 1541 on the Commodore 64 Is I mean that I'll go into it some other time But it is a fascinating thing because it's like its own computer Inside the disk drive, you know, we think we tend to think of a disk drive as being like a peripheral Where the your computer the main computer does all the work Or at least the processing work, but on the 1541 it actually has its own processor and computer and operating system inside it and emulating that in a Precise way can be a bit of a challenge and that's the raspberry pi is a perfect fit for it without ruining You know a whole lot of these floppy disks So That's that's an excellent option if you can do it and if you have a raspberry pi you can actually build one yourself 1541 or you can buy them from a number of locations. They're pretty sweet That's a really great idea and The more I dive into this the the more I realize especially when you read about the history How much the timing matters and it's more than you think It's like think about how much you think it might matter and times that by 10 And that's probably half as important as timing actually is Because if you think about um, let's just say emulation You might think well, we have solid state on everything nowadays. We have micro sd cards that that um Can hold I don't know 100,000 a million floppy disks or something like that on one little tiny chip That's you know smaller than your thumbnail and You know one school of thought is that okay. It's going to load like super quick. No You you can but the computer and the operating system took that timing into effect and that's even Relevant now when you have newer game systems that are backwards compatible with older game disks Where you might think well, this new game system has a really Amazing processor and it's just going to load this game a lot faster sometimes but but if it loads it fast then It's not ready and it just literally has to be completely recoded in order for that to function, which is really Strange when you think about it But then with the more you read about it like if you read about mist have you ever read about the development behind the original mist? You know, I I played a bit of mist. Um, it wasn't It wasn't exactly my cup of tea when it came out, but I've been meaning to revisit it I have played it. I will say that my adhd prevents me from playing it for too long But um, when I read about it or actually I watched a video. They were talking about the development of it Um, technically mist was impossible When it came out you it could not be done. There was no way to make mist because each of the Areas the which are mostly static images, but for the time higher resolution If you're moving through areas it has to load a new image But that takes a very long time on a single speed cd rom drive that cannot load the images fast enough for the player to not Just get tired of it and walk away So they had to do some trickery to preload and do this do that to make it Seem like it was loading everything spontaneously quick nowadays. Obviously, it's easy But um that entire game was built on the timing of the media on which it was released So that's a huge thing for sure The timing is is a huge thing and one I remember it was a 3d pong game for dos I don't even remember the name of it. Somebody probably remembers but I had this 3d pong game that I loved on my 386 And then at some point I upgraded to like a pennium 3 And I managed to get into the shell and I started to load it And it didn't work at all the the the time it was so fast that it was unplayable and I I Had such a hard time wrapping my head around it as you know, like a kid the kid I was And I ended up looking it up or asking Somebody who knew and they were explained. Oh, it's because the developer of this game must have used the cpu clock as the Timing mechanism for the game and so your cpu is 300 times faster So it's gonna play 300 times faster and you gotta get them to recode the game if you want to keep playing it and Not only did that give me an appreciation for how far we've come but it also gave me an appreciation for open source Because in that moment it was like well Gee if I had the source code I might be able to reprogram Yep, which was a lesson I learned later on and or a lesson I took with me later on in life, which was exciting Yeah, some of the source code that I've seen for like nes games I mean, you know, some of this older stuff was written on assembler and it's just not something that I can do but I'm speaking of pennium 3. I had a fun experiment because my first computer was a pennium 3 that I that I owned and Um, I was curious what came before so I came into possession of windows 3.1 floppy And also da 6.11. I think it was and I came into possession of this So I had a spare 500 gig hard drive or something at the time Not 500. No, I think it was 500 megabytes actually at the time not gigabyte I would have been that would have been if it was 500 gigabytes at the time that would have been more expensive But it was I think it was 500 megabytes I also had like a one and a half gigabyte drive and I decided to install dos As a dual boot on this pennium 3 so Windows 3.1, I don't remember how many floppies it had So what I did was I I it had a floppy drive So I just created a folder And I one by one I just grabbed the contents of the floppy disks and I just dumped them all into the same folder Then I burned it onto a cd that I went into dos And I decided to install windows 3.1 So when I did I have never seen a windows install go so fast in my entire life It was literally probably 10 seconds and that progress part is like zip and it was done And then because I mean who'd have thought you know windows 3.1 running on a pennium 3 I mean, it's a horrible thing to run on a pennium 3 There's not really a whole lot you could do with it But I just wanted to see if you could do it and it was just hilarious to see the Progress bar just jump straight to the end and Then of course I had to load sim city because why wouldn't you load sim city? Oh, yeah, no, of course That's a class I love sim city um Jesus I could play some sit I At some point I like I don't know if slow tv is a thing with certain games Like I don't do much for retro gaming on youtube But like I would love to do a long play of sim city one day Just kind of go through Because it's one of my favorites now you you mentioned Assemblers and people were coding in assembly back that I have This is like the canonical book on machine language for the Commodore 64 and You know the pet and some of these other things it's by jim butterfield And it's called machine language for the Commodore 64 and other computers and I I'm going through this right now This book actually belonged to my grandmother Way back when so it's it's been handed down through the generations But I'm I'm actually teaching myself machine language right now um because I I do think the appreciation and the understanding of how some of these machines worked In the olden times and how these processors worked can really help us understand The design choices that we currently live with and the stuff we do In present-day development whether you're developing on you know windows or mac or linux or Whether you're developing games or that sort of thing. I think understanding Where we come from it's like reading a history book and That's really important. You know, if you're a decision maker, you should know the history. Well, if you're a developer You should know the history. That's a useful thing and One of the nice things about a lot of this is that it is readily available on either internet archive You can go to archive.org and find entire Sets of these books downloaded as a PDF and the way you go. I don't think that's illegal because some of these are long since out of print But you can also like pick it up on ebay if you want the paper copy there's all kinds of ways you can get some of these classic instructional books And frankly, we should always be writing instructions this way because When people weren't used to computers you had to really explain things step by step and actually detail how it works Now so much instructions assumes knowledge and it's so nice to and refreshing to see something that assumed you were coming from a zero and Builds you up and I love that and it's it's just so much fun and it's so good as a developer to do I just typed in his name while you were talking because every now and then when I do a podcast There's always something your phone work, right? I want to check this out later because it's absolutely And I put it in google and I don't know how the algorithm will be for other people, but for me it shows Obviously his wikipedia page for jim butterfield, but then underneath that a Commodore 64 training tape full link an hour and 56 minutes I want I want to watch that so bad I I have I have dreams of doing a cover of that video on my channel Where I basically just do everything jim butterfield does like I want that setup I want that studio. It's it's so It's so cheesy and fun. Um Did you subconsciously mention that because you want people to hold you to it, which is going to like make you actually do Come back if I haven't done it in a year. Let me know because yeah, I I definitely want to do a Veronica explains 70s 80s style video I think that's gonna be like a filter over the the camera or the in post or something and make lots of star wipes and The whole my gosh, that would be so great. Um, it's gonna be fun So one of the things I think might be, you know, bringing it back to home lab I think there's several things here that that are important. So Um, I'll just give you an example. So for me, I have a backup Share on my truenas for you know backups, obviously It's not that the only place my backups go but this isn't your normal backups directory This isn't for like all my business stuff or any of that It's just one off things and I I did a video a while back about playing older computer games And when I did that video, I bought older computer games from ebay And the first thing I would do any time one of those games came in is I would create an ISO image of the cd-rom or a disc image if it's a disc Because being a retro game collector, I know about disc, right? I know about these things. They're a really big problem So now on truenas, you know with with check sums and all of that I have backups So I bought both doom games and all the wizardry games Um, because I'm just crazy about that series check out that series by sir tech if anyone is interested They're just so great. Don't don't look. I mean, you're not going to get good graphics And we're talking early 80s here, but um, they were way ahead of their time anyway Um Archiving everything is kind of what I I knew I had to do as soon as I started ordering these games for the video I I wanted to make sure that I retain them because I don't know if the floppy discs are going to work tomorrow or cd-roms We thought they were eternal. They're really not there's a shelf life issue here so One of the things that could be important for home labbers if you get into retro Computing then you might you need a place to to make sure you keep these images and the operating systems because that stuff is really hard to find Absolutely That's I do the same thing with I any time I I acquire a retro game um Whether it you know pretty much in any sort of capacity I I I do make an iso or a rom copy or you know like these sorts of things I I try to save that stuff because You know, you never know what you're gonna find and you never know what you're gonna lose and And it's it's always tragic when like You see your floppy of you know something you worked on 20 years ago and it's like oh I'm glad I found this now make a copy of it now Do copy that floppy because do do do that because You're gonna lose it And It's so it it is it's it's an eternal challenge in retro But it is also a good practice for regular life too where You know, it's the same you know test your backups, you know check up make sure they're working It's extremely important and you know with retro gaming. Luckily when you test your backup, it's playing video games, which is fun And you know, I'll give you a an actual example of this that that happened to me Because I do the same thing. First of all, I have I was trying to look up my collection and see oh, I have it here So I have over 1100 physical games in my collection right now Which I'm actually looking at my my account on Christ charting.com, which is where I keep track of this Probably over 11 to 50 So I always download a you know a rom copy as well because It's easier to play you don't have to worry about the save battery dying or anything like that And you can make sure that it works but I before I did that I I kind of had like a An issue that came up where I had I was a fan of Well, I'm still a fan of mario obviously who isn't so I was playing super mario all stars and then You know, I was playing it on a really powerful computer being emulated and the game ran terribly like it was just sluggish it's like The whole System is having a hard time playing this game And I know that some of these games are hard to play because you know, they had something going on Maybe the emulation isn't perfect But then later on a couple years later because I just assumed you couldn't play super mario all stars You couldn't emulate it which didn't sound right, but I couldn't get it to work But then one day I'm like, I'll just re-download it. Why why not right and it works fine Then I realized I had maybe some bits flipped in the rom or maybe some bit rot happened I didn't have checksums or truenas back then So that's really important when you have when you're archiving that you have something that can actually scrub the data because Unless you're trying to play through each of your games Like constantly by the time you get through your whole collection It's time to retire from work because you know, how many decades have passed at that point You can't play your old games and the same with software too. I mean you go to load it Is it going to work? I don't know. It may not so it's really important to Keep track of that and make sure that things work and they're tested But you can't test everything yourself if you have data that needs to be consumed like media That's a lot harder I I do love truenas for this. They do a fantastic job um using uh, I I do I have zfs setup for my retro collection and I I do check it frequently, but then I I do physical tests to play through the games Because if I didn't I think I would go insane from too much work And so I I I justify it with myself of oh, I'm I'm testing the backup That's Sometimes that's the only way I'm going to get time away to just play a game is if I justify this I'm just testing the backup I'm just testing the backup Yeah, that that's the same same here totally. Um, so yeah, even though this isn't the retro gaming episode I I come from that angle because I have more experience with it But but it comes to getting started with these do you have any tips because I'm just kind of curious Being so late getting into this. I mean, I did have The Pentium 3 that I mentioned I at one point had a DOS computer I wish I still had it But I was playing around with but I kind of missed all of this so for someone like me Do you have any tips for getting started? Well, with retro computing in general You know unlike retro gaming where I think with retro gaming, you know, the It's a popular enough hobby to where It's been written about like how to acquire games and all that but or how to acquire systems and referrals and these sorts of things retro computing is a little different because A lot of the things I've picked up over the years I actually got from businesses And that's a different kind of take so like with retro computing as you know, like let's take Apple as an example. This is a Reasonably common thing. I see a company clears out an old IT closet And they find an apple too Or an old man like a mac 128 or 512, you know something that was somebody's machine for A number of years had on their desk They used it and then they upgraded at some point to like 486 or You know when windows 95 came out that was one of the big ones at that point a lot of these older machines Got thrown in a closet and a lot of businesses still have them. So, you know, I always tell people If you know anybody who works at like a building that went through Any sort of like has been the same business since 1980 Ask them to look in the closet Because you might have gems there um But then beyond that what I recommend a lot of is emulation emulation emulation emulation to learn What you like and what you don't Because there's so much out there that looks cool when you see it on youtube It looks cool when you're having When you see the games and stuff But like if you're trying to get into the computer side of it the the day-to-day tasks or the The home lab the networking devices together, you know, some of the The retro the the day-to-day retro experience It's a good thing to try it before you buy it because you know like a commodore 64 that's been recapped and is ready to go I mean, it's going to set you back at least 400 american um And then you have to buy a disk drive which is going to set if it's in good shape It might set you back 50 to 100 dollars um And it this stuff piles up really quick and then I always hate to hear that like I bought a commodore 64 and the disk drive And a modem and all these things and I couldn't do anything with it because I wasn't into it It's a tragedy. We don't know that that is sad for sure And so it's like emulated quite a bit before you get started. That's what I did with the amiga Um, I only just got my first amiga in the last Six months and so because I always wanted one growing up Because I I liked track or music. I like the games for them, but my parents wouldn't buy one for me I finally got one but only after emulating it long enough to know I wanted to commit to the investment because it is an investment. You know, there's there's money spent here Um, and luckily a lot of these emulators are open source. They're free. You can on linux. You can they're just a Uh in the repo and ready to go some of them are even on flat pack. Um So there's there's a lot of options there for emulation Um commodore is especially easy to emulate. I haven't tried the Atari computer systems I know I saw some people in the chat use Atari. Um So if you've got any ideas for emulators, you know, let me know because I might want to try them at some point um DOS is reasonably easy to emulate and That one's an easier one to kind of get started with Is that the free DOS also? Yes, there's also free DOS, which you can actually install on bare metal and it isn't terrible. Um No, there's a lot of really good options for Dipping your toe in the water and it's the same kind of advice I give to people who are getting started with linux for the first time is like Expect hiccups. This is new to you you know, like And you know jumpers to get the sound to work for this game But I want to play this other game. I have to change the jumpers again. Why? You may need to solder I mean That was that was everyday life It really was and and I you know, I feel like I have a lot of catching up to do because What what my goal is and I'll I'm going to create a video An updated video of my studio later The only reason why I'm not doing it now is because I I'm going to re redoing it. I have lumber I'm going to be like really redecorating this But part of the room that nobody sees is my retro gaming wall Which is just nothing but old classic game systems And my goal is to have A tandy a comodore 64 and at least one more computer setup on that wall for retro gaming computer games But to your point though Some of you listening may not know this I'm sure you most of you have heard of retro pies for emulating your retro console games But it also supports DOS games as well. So you can literally get that working I do have a video On my channel where I I did do that. So if you look through you should be able to find it I don't remember when it was It was a while back and I don't I didn't create a short url for like I did your video But it was a long time ago. Um, and and what I did in that video is I got a pi 400 which for me Was a a great way to kind of get the comodore 64 experience because at the moment I couldn't find a comodore 64 and I still haven't because I feel like the pi 400 is the modern day Equivalent of that idea where the keyboard and the computer are built in together and you can hook it up to a tv Although this one has HDMI and then I I loaded a bunch of DOS games on it It's a fun project to get started. Then if you want to you know, use the real hardware Retro pi isn't really going to give you any experience that you can translate directly to the hardware It just makes your games work But but at that point you have the images for the games and then if you want to try An emulator that is comodore 64 or whatever your platform is Specific, then that's probably when I'm going to assume you'll start to learn the platform better It that that absolutely makes sense and there's a ton of great stuff you can do on the raspberry pi with with retro, um, not only just gaming, but also networking and and all of that To take it the next step without necessarily doing an investment in not only the monetary investment with retro computers, but also the practical and space investment with retro computer. Oh, yeah um This stuff takes up a lot of room That's a thing. Um One thing one project that I I haven't died dove dived dove into myself yet But I'm I'm hoping to at some point is the mister Which I if you're unfamiliar, it's an fpga Ecosystem where people have essentially You know you buy an fpga board and then there's various hats and accessories that people add on to it similar to a Raspberry pi in their ecosystem But with fpga you have a little bit more flexibility in emulating And it's debatable whether it's even emulation at that point precise Exact timings and and functionality that was present on the original systems If you're familiar with the analog Company they're they're you know super end here their analog pocket or if that's a similar that's that's the fpga It's the same kind of thing. Um most of their products anyway and The mister project includes At least very well working if not perfect um Emulation of a lot of retro computers classic retro computers Um, I mean and it's going back further than you know, we are right now like I think I saw one for a pdp 11 Um, which you know now at this point we're talking like my my great grandpa worked at Univac We're talking that era like the big giant main framey kind of stuff is starting to get Emulateable and that's uh Now we're talking not only would that be helping you, you know recreate Some you know connect with some old peripherals, but there I start to see Some real benefits in your career if you're a developer Um Working with legacy systems, you know like one of the great areas of need for more developers You know everybody focuses on web development or game development. Mm-hmm, but I I'm a cobalt dev and I got to tell you I'm never hurting for business You know, I don't think you ever will be hurting for business. I mean, I think that's pretty much said Like it's it's one of the and there's always a need for if not actively maintaining these systems Understanding how they work well enough to help somebody migrate away from these systems And that's where I see a lot of benefit from a career standpoint Which ultimately I think one of the reasons a lot of people home lab Is to further, you know an ambition in it and at least that's that's how I got started with it And so if you're if that's your goal and you you know, you want that area of kind of untapped potential future career legacy systems management and updates are is a huge area and You know, that's where some of these projects like the mister really start to look exciting because If you can learn like if you learn how token ring worked, man You can probably do anything in a modern network The only token ring I You know follow is you know the one ring from token with all the oh, okay. Sorry bad joke Lord of the rings. Okay. I had to insert that in there. Um Yeah, I mean that those are some really good tips and You know, some people might think like well, why is it so hard because you said emulated? Well, why is it so hard to emulate? You know something way back then when our computers now are hundreds of times faster However, many hundreds of times faster But then you always have to understand too that you're emulating every single cpu cycle Which is going to add an immense amount of overhead, which is why still to this day Nintendo 64 is hard to emulate it people do it so before anyone writes in I'll have you know I have n64 emulation running perfectly. I get it. I know I know you do But many people don't and it's not easy but then it becomes easy and then these Technologies become within reach when they weren't before and then to your point about Legacy systems I feel like and correct me if I'm wrong But I have a feeling you'll probably agree with this that when you were working on legacy when it wasn't as legacy That was harder Then nowadays we have all of these technologies And I mean I was just talking about st cards that you know have terabytes of space And it's not even as big as your fingernail And you have all these different things that you can use raspberry pi emulation That gives you a cutting edge on legacy that People when they were working with that technology when it was new would feel like you are a god If the if you came back then you know 20 30 40 years ago with the technology we have now and you're like Yeah, I'll just copy that to an sd card or what and how'd that happen? Uh, that's so amazing to me that you could take the technology we have now and use it to support technologies of yesteryear In ways that people back then couldn't even do it Absolutely. No, I'm I'm I'm with you It's it's really impressive and and one of the things that I I love about it is It very much reminds me of the the linux community In how the linux community like there there's so many differing opinions on it, but like everybody's Still kind of working toward the same goal Right and so much in the modern retro computing scene Just reminds me of that where like so much of its open source It always was you know like you know back in back in the conradore 64 days the uh most things like the software A lot of software was public domain and then you get into Amiga and a lot of software was public domain and if it wasn't public domain somebody Put it out there To where it became Right really available and the the culture in that time was I I think more accepting of of that openness and that collaborative spirit And I really do naturally Yes, I do. I I I agree. I think that back then You know computing as the concept was much harder to do and so the people who did it Felt accomplished and wanted to share it and wanted to share their their works and things like that and Now with you know smartphones being everywhere and you know the barrier to entry being virtually non-existent It's I think we've lost a little bit of that in kind of like public understanding of computing, you know, I I'm reminded of Something I think it was I think my grandpa told me this You know, he said we we all had to learn how to use a terminal because it was what was there It was what we had And so like literally anybody who whose job required a computer, which was a fair amount of non-technical people Learned a command line, you know That was like and they did okay and and I think that That's one of the things that I appreciate so much about retro computing is that it does Give you a sense that these things were learnable by Just about anybody, you know Yeah, absolutely if you have the drive and the determination you could get it done And that really does give me hope for what we do in the future with technology because we can make really cool things That everybody can use even if It requires a little bit of work on the front end to you know get it to a point where everybody can use it I I just it's so inspiring to me and I just love it Yeah, I love it too. I feel like it's If you look into evolution and biology It's like we are a tribal species and we've evolved faster than any other species has but we're still a tribal species That's why if I see a movie and I think it's awesome Hey Veronica, you got to check this movie out. It's so cool because I want to share what I enjoy with someone else and everybody Unless you're a complete introvert I don't think anybody is truly a hundred percent introverted maybe close But they want to share what resonates with them with other people and naturally when the computing age comes We want to do the same thing We want to share that game that we find so much enjoyment with we want to Share this program that has really helped us out And you know, there's a lot of stigma around emulation and sharing and things like that and the companies don't want you to do that Obviously, and I'm not advocating for you know screwing over companies, but let's be honest This stuff isn't sold anymore. Um, and they made their money. They went bankrupt and all these things But um, but again, I'm not saying that everybody should just preload because that's not what I'm saying at all I feel like emulation keeps history alive and one of my things is I want to see stigma completely go away About this because it's not about getting everything for free if you look at all the other companies I feel like if a company is still in business today and they had legacy software I feel like they They really owe it to the community to just put it out there for people to download Because they've already moved on to other things and how else are you going to enjoy these things? So it's and it's almost like either the companies will do the right thing and make their legacy software available Or we'll do it for them. Um, one of us is going to do it It's like which one do you prefer it's going to happen whether you like it or not so either jump on board and and let's make computing accessible to everyone or Well, I mean, it's going to happen. There's nothing we could do about it But when it comes to emulation I just feel like these companies don't really do a good job I mean we had nintendo With the we shut down their download service for downloaded games so all those games you bought you can't download So you better have backups But if they have the keys to the castle on their end that references your serial numbers being able to Play a game because it's mapped to that and then their service goes under then your ability to enjoy the software Also goes under when your machine dies. I don't think that's okay I think with emulation we can keep these things alive And then we could show future generations what it was like and what came before Um, otherwise everything fades into obscurity and I don't think that's okay No, I'm I'm I'm totally with you the uh There there's really something to be said too about the like preserving history and And understanding like there's there's Probably a whole series of videos I could do on why on windows The main computer drive is called c That's probably like five videos And it's funny because a lot of people don't know why that is it's like why didn't they go back to a after the the a and b drive went away It's like it's still c to this day. I know there's more to it, but yeah Yeah, no, there's there's a ton to it and and like again, it's we could I could probably do five hours on the subject but um it's it's just understanding that Is something, you know in 20 years the people involved with that Won't be here anymore in all likelihood and so and and This is the case with just about every paradigm we think of, you know, like the x86 processor and understanding what went into machine language on on on these processors like We need to understand this really deeply now because In 20 years, we might not be able to ask and That's that's why in my mind these company like, you know large companies that are That have a history going back 30 years 40 years In some cases much longer um they I would love to see more source made available More comments made available um because the comments The you know the details the the the thoughts that went into it the notes about When a certain operating system was being constructed Those are historical documents that are extremely important to us understanding How we got here What we're gonna do next Exactly. I I was um, and I still you know because I research video game history so much. I um I'm going to be setting up a retro gaming channel eventually I'm not going to even throw a date anymore because every time I do I I miss it but To your point though on that I I've been researching the nintendo playstation and Some people might think what's a big deal? Well, we'll understand we didn't have youtube back then all we had was newspaper articles some magazine articles And there was a lot of what I found is that there's a lot of assumptions made um, for example, they they say that the nintendo playstation is going to be a cd rom add-on It was never going to be that but every single Source says that because what else are they going going to assume? It was going to be it was an all-in-one unit But those that news and the interviews and even footage where they where these devices are revealed to the public at trade shows Is gone too. So We don't we didn't have like all this information We had the internet back then sure but we didn't have as much information And nowadays you could say like a sentence You know out loud on the news and it's on twitter 10 seconds later and everyone has a clip of it We didn't have that we don't have the historical documents to go back to and some of that stuff is Just down to he said she said and the thing is I'm also a fan of music So I I just finished watching the janet jackson documentary because i'm really into music history also And I was thinking while I was watching it how cool would it be if there was a documentary like that That was done by a computer programmer that had built something or created something that revolutionized things and Just go through his or her life and just say hey, how'd you develop this? What did it look like show their workstation show all these different things and then walk through The development of these older computers and the older software. I feel like would be Something that would really take off in media. I mean in netflix You know just cut me a check for that idea because I I said this out loud So you need to give me royalties Obviously, but how cool would it be to get these people to to make documentaries so that people In the future could say hey, who is that individual? And let me learn about that person and then see what they did and see their creation come to life I think that would be awesome. Absolutely. It would be that and you know, there's there's a few I don't have as much time to Watch tv Now that I'm making content um Yep, people people don't know this but it's like for every For every minute you see on a video. It's like an hour of work Mine aren't getting to be for somewhere between four and ten hours of video at this point. Yeah It's it's it's a lot of work. Um, which it does it takes away from your time for things like, um sleeping and watching television and so, um I it's rare when I actually get to like sit down and actually watch something but Um, there's one I forget what service it's on but it's called the commodore story and I've been meaning to check it out um, but one that I mean it's not specifically related to uh, home lab but one of the Very interesting youtube video, which is freely available is um I think it's called trackers the sound of 16 bit And I it's it is very well worth it if you're interested in some of the history of especially amiga and where Amiga happened and who was using it and all that but It's also for me as a musician. It's just Absolutely thrilling because like truly tracker music Is the like because if you don't know tracker music if you played retro games in the, you know late 80s to the 90s The music you were listening to there's a good chance it was tracker music so, you know classic game music tracker music and That's some of the reason I became a musician was because I love video game music and that is just something that always stuck with me and That that documentary was just so well done. I'd love to see more stuff like that Especially from creators like I know To name check another one Macintosh librarian did an excellent video on The history of mech mecc, which you might know from the oregon trail games and so it's it's very it was Her video was very well done. It's cute. It was funny. Um, she has a little Macintosh sidekick that's that interjects and it's very fun Um, so very well worth checking out too if you're into retro stuff. She's she's got a great channel So I'm gonna just throw out a challenge to the audience Try to safely obviously, but but try to incorporate Retro tech into your home lab in some clever way Um, you know, I don't I don't care if you're using a Commodore 64 as your ssh You know machine to get onto your servers and you know, maybe they'll watch your video and get it online So they can maybe get an ssh session or something to other systems I don't know how cool would that be right, but I'll leave it up to the audience even if you build a new computer into an older case or Have a console tv as your monitor to your um, you know true nas server. I'm just making up stuff here But I think it'd be a lot of fun To just see what the community comes up with and tag us the home lab show And just show us basically what you've come up with and if you already have something absolutely show us that and Yeah, so where would you like people to go? Where would you like to point people to on your end? On my end Well, I the I'm hoping my next video It's not quite ready yet, but I'm I'm I just recently acquired a Model M keyboard Which was in various states of ickiness So I'm cleaning it up and I'm going to do a video Hopefully next week about getting it working on a modern computer And you know remapping keys and you know, just just kind of having some fun So that's going to be that's going to be awesome. I'd say my the only thing I'm promoting right now is the channel so Veronica explains and The url I do have a short url for this. It's please subscribe dot be so it spells out please subscribe But it's please subscribe We're doing some masterclass domain stuff here with my Linux dot video and Linux learn Linux dot link and then yours and yeah, this is fun It is a lot of fun um And one thing I would say is, you know, just about that that challenge about the home lab is so many of these computers Are capable of serial connections to more modern equipment And there's a lot of fun that can be had with that, you know, it's it's Whether it's the user port or you know, which you can do with some funky adapters and some fun stuff But then um on some other computers you have rs 232 connections There there's a lot there that can be explored and still used and I mean I still in my basement for my My primary storage server. I still have a terminal plugged into it I just power on the terminal and start typing. Um It's it's dark down there. So the terminal is actually quite convenient. Um, so it's these things They they still have some some life left in them In a lot of cases. So I think it's always fun to check out It absolutely is. Yeah, your channel is awesome. I'm a fan of it. So definitely subscribe. I have actual thank you well And the only other thing I'll plug because I think everyone knows where I am on this podcast by now I mean learn Linux TV if you are just watching they're listening to this podcast for the very first time with this episode But then also, um, my book mastering Ubuntu server fourth edition is complete I don't know exactly when they're going to pull the trigger. I have a lot of people asking me I really don't know. Um, it literally could be any minute any day any hour Um, I'll just I'll end up getting an email usually digital comes out first and then the print copies have to circulate a bit But as far as I'm concerned, I'm done. I've archived the files. It's off my hard drive It's in their hands. So Ubuntu server book com if anyone wants to pre-order that book It's going to be out like it's imminent like anytime now It's going to be available. I had a lot of fun writing it. So definitely check it out And one of the things I did in that book this time was I um any any videos that I already have on the channel I also created some new ones I I literally put URLs to the videos if they're relevant about the chapter in the at the end of the chapter With a linux dot video slash and then whatever it is links. So it's really easy So I feel like one of the cool things about this book that you guys will find out is that it really does Kind of it's a one-to-one relationship with the channel. It doesn't require the youtube channel It's a book But if you are the type of person that likes learning in two different ways like something to read and something to watch It gives you both. So, um, definitely check that out. Uh, again ubuntu server book com So thank you so much for being on this is a really fun episode Oh, this is a ton of fun. This this was fantastic and thank you for having me. I I so appreciate it Yeah, and come back sometime. Oh, I will Awesome. All right. Well, thanks for listening everyone. We really appreciate it and we'll see you again