I get home from work today......

[CraigsBar]

...... And look what the postman has delivered [emoji2]

Sent from my ONEPLUS 3t using Tapatalk

[00WReX]

Ahh, yes. That feeling when the postman delivers your Retro goodies. 

I had these three beauties arrive only days apart...

[attachimg=1]

[attachimg=2]

[attachimg=3]

Cheers,
Shane

[Duke]

Ahh, yes. That feeling when the postman delivers your Retro goodies. 

That GX 4000 colour looks great, wonder if the CPC464/6128 plus were originally in same colour

[Bryce]

I get parcels like that several times a week. The only difference is that they are always broken and get returned as soon as they work again.

Bryce.

[00WReX]

That GX 4000 colour looks great, wonder if the CPC464/6128 plus were originally in same colour

Yes, the colour difference is amazing. I knew the Plus was yellowed, but it's only when you see them side by side you realise how much.
The GX4000 was NOS (New Old Stock) so had not see the light of day since being tucked in it's box in 1990.
I was almost scared to power it on for the 1st time, I flicked the switch and stepped back just incase it went up in a puff of smoke 
Power hitting those almost 30 year old components must have been a shock  ....but I fired straight into action, no problem and with a nice crisp display.

Here is the 1st power up test...

[attachimg=1]

Cheers,
Shane

[arnoldemu]

...... And look what the postman has delivered

Should we expect a game from you sometime?

[tjohnson]

Nice one did you get them off the ebay in the UK?  There have been a few 464 plus going through the last few weeks.  Seeing the GX4000 makes me cringe, I had a perfectly good working one with 3 extra game, unfortunately I left it in the loft at my parents years ago only later to find out my mum gave it away, I wasn't impressed as she didn't ask.  Hey ho.

Ahh, yes. That feeling when the postman delivers your Retro goodies. 

I had these three beauties arrive only days apart...

[attachimg=1]

[attachimg=2]

[attachimg=3]

Cheers,
Shane

[CraigsBar]

Should we expect a game from you sometime?

Not too sure about that. I think it is time I learned assembler lol.

Sent from my ONEPLUS 3t using Tapatalk

[AxelStone]

Boxed GX4000 in mind condition, you are going to really enjoy that C4CPC 

[00WReX]

Boxed GX4000 in mind condition, you are going to really enjoy that C4CPC 

Dare I say it....but I think the GX4000 would not really be worthwhile without the C4CPC.
With the library of games (.cpr) that have been converted and are still being converted, makes it an awesome little games machine.

Only just tested it with the C4CPC on the weekend...very cool. 

[attachimg=1]

Cheers,
Shane

[AxelStone]

I agree, thanks to C4CPC the GX4000 is a cool machine. Without it, there is too short games catalogue to enjoy.

[Duke]

I got another GX4000 + joypad today.
All works fine, except the joypad fire 2 button looked a bit weird! - just had to share the images

[attach=2]
Hmm strange what happened to it? - So had to open it of course..
[attach=3]
Ouch, wtf.
[attach=4]
That is well done

[Bryce]

Someone connected it to a computer that outputs 5V on the second firebutton pin, so as soon as the button was pushed, the max current passed across that button and caused that mess.

Bryce.

[Duke]

Someone connected it to a computer that outputs 5V on the second firebutton pin, so as soon as the button was pushed, the max current passed across that button and caused that mess.

Yeah figured it was something like that, although the person must have been quite insisting keeping it pressed for a long duration I would think. Oh well 1 fire button is good too 

[beb]

A real "AutoFire" !:)

[Shaun M. Neary]

You like your GX4000 paddle extra crispy? It's been arranged! 

[tjohnson]

Dare I say it....but I think the GX4000 would not really be worthwhile without the C4CPC.
With the library of games (.cpr) that have been converted and are still being converted, makes it an awesome little games machine.

Only just tested it with the C4CPC on the weekend...very cool. 

[attachimg=1]

Cheers,
Shane

Spare a thought for the people who bought it back in 1990, I did, was just 14 at the time, spent all my money on it, £99 and purchased from Dixons in Staines (now Staines-upon-Thames lol) and thought it was great when released, but months of hoping more games would come out ended in dissappointment when it became clear it had died a death.  I bought 3 extra games, robocopy 2, was very hard and didn't get far through it, switchblade which I thought really great and pro tennis tour which I enjoyed but only really bought as that was one of the few games I could find.

I got another GX4000 + joypad today.
All works fine, except the joypad fire 2 button looked a bit weird! - just had to share the images

[attach=2]
Hmm strange what happened to it? - So had to open it of course..
[attach=3]
Ouch, wtf.
[attach=4]
That is well done

That has taken a beating, must have been a furious session to generate so much friction heat.

[Shaun M. Neary]

Spare a thought for the people who bought it back in 1990, I did, was just 14 at the time, spent all my money on it, £99 and purchased from Dixons in Staines (now Staines-upon-Thames lol) and thought it was great when released, but months of hoping more games would come out ended in dissappointment when it became clear it had died a death.  I bought 3 extra games, robocopy 2, was very hard and didn't get far through it, switchblade which I thought really great and pro tennis tour which I enjoyed but only really bought as that was one of the few games I could find.

I remember seeing one in a local newsagent for about £30(IR) in 1992 and being very tempted to get it. I kinda dropped out of the Amstrad scene in 91 and 92 though because the lack of newer games coming out for it, and most of what were were awful tape multiload crap which was really becoming a chore to deal with as a 464 owner.

Oddly enough, I picked one up without a power supply, controller or cartridge on ebay yesterday for about the same price. I've a spare controller and a Pang cart floating around, and I'd need a new PSU for it to handle the C4CPC, so i'll hook it up to my Plus monitor when it arrives in the meantime and test it. 

[tjohnson]

I remember seeing one in a local newsagent for about £30(IR) in 1992 and being very tempted to get it. I kinda dropped out of the Amstrad scene in 91 and 92 though because the lack of newer games coming out for it, and most of what were were awful tape multiload crap which was really becoming a chore to deal with as a 464 owner.

Oddly enough, I picked one up without a power supply, controller or cartridge on ebay yesterday for about the same price. I've a spare controller and a Pang cart floating around, and I'd need a new PSU for it to handle the C4CPC, so i'll hook it up to my Plus monitor when it arrives in the meantime and test it. 

Yeah I moved one from Amstrad to PC must have been about the same time after the Plus/GX4000 failure.  I got a job in Woolworths managed to save up near £1400 and bought a Dan Technologies 386DX40 PC, 4Mb RAM, 130Mb HD, 1Mb Trident graphics card, 14" SVGA monitor, some sort of hard disk hardware cache, MS-DOS 5 and MS Windows 3.1.  Seemed like light years ahead of the Amstrad with games like Wing Commander, Money Island 2, Command and Conquer coming out.  We sold both CPC 464 and 6128, tonnes of games which I think we mostly cassette based, multiface 2, external FDD-1, dot matric printer, had loads of Amstrad stuff back then.  In hindight I think the plus range came too late, it had the looks but everyone was moving to 16bit for home computering with the Amiga and Megadrive/SNES or PCs.  While the plus was good it was still 8bit, I thought burning rubber was a great demonstrator which looked 16 bit to me but I guess not enough people were sold on the idea.

[Shaun M. Neary]

Yeah I moved one from Amstrad to PC must have been about the same time after the Plus/GX4000 failure.  I got a job in Woolworths managed to save up near £1400 and bought a Dan Technologies 386DX40 PC, 4Mb RAM, 130Mb HD, 1Mb Trident graphics card, 14" SVGA monitor, some sort of hard disk hardware cache, MS-DOS 5 and MS Windows 3.1.  Seemed like light years ahead of the Amstrad with games like Wing Commander, Money Island 2, Command and Conquer coming out.  We sold both CPC 464 and 6128, tonnes of games which I think we mostly cassette based, multiface 2, external FDD-1, dot matric printer, had loads of Amstrad stuff back then.  In hindight I think the plus range came too late, it had the looks but everyone was moving to 16bit for home computering with the Amiga and Megadrive/SNES or PCs.  While the plus was good it was still 8bit, I thought burning rubber was a great demonstrator which looked 16 bit to me but I guess not enough people were sold on the idea.

So much this, really. Amstrad really invested in a sinking ship in terms of the Spectrum +3 the year prior, especially with it's TV advertising while the CPC was left out in the cold. Unlike the 6128, which had a vast array of disk based games, the Spectrum had a lesser selection on disk (although tapes still sold quite well for it), but even adding the lightgun as part of the deal wasn't going to save it. Of course, they ended up forsaking the machine a few months later to make way for the Plus series, but I agree 100%. Had they focused on revamping the CPC a year earlier, the GX would have had more time to get support from developers and more houses would have probably catered to the newer hardware.

[tjohnson]

So much this, really. Amstrad really invested in a sinking ship in terms of the Spectrum +3 the year prior, especially with it's TV advertising while the CPC was left out in the cold. Unlike the 6128, which had a vast array of disk based games, the Spectrum had a lesser selection on disk (although tapes still sold quite well for it), but even adding the lightgun as part of the deal wasn't going to save it. Of course, they ended up forsaking the machine a few months later to make way for the Plus series, but I agree 100%. Had they focused on revamping the CPC a year earlier, the GX would have had more time to get support from developers and more houses would have probably catered to the newer hardware.

I guess the Spectrum was a bigger market back then even though the machine was vastly inferior in my opinion so with the Amstrad approach of pile it high sell it cheap that might have been the reason for the focus on the Spectrum.   I guess even if the Plus had come out early it may have only had a 3 to 4 year lifespan, so maybe revamped range could have survived until 1993/94 maybe with earlier momentum.

When did the Amiga die off?  My brother had one, a 500, and it was clearly much more capable than the original CPC but I don't recall it having a hughly long life.

[Shaun M. Neary]

I guess the Spectrum was a bigger market back then even though the machine was vastly inferior in my opinion so with the Amstrad approach of pile it high sell it cheap that might have been the reason for the focus on the Spectrum.   I guess even if the Plus had come out early it may have only had a 3 to 4 year lifespan, so maybe revamped range could have survived until 1993/94 maybe with earlier momentum.

Oh I'm not denying it's popularity or it's market. Just saying that the disk range of software for the +3 wasn't great compared to what one could get for the Amstrad, it was almost like beating a dead horse, especially as the +2 was still selling well anyway.

When did the Amiga die off?  My brother had one, a 500, and it was clearly much more capable than the original CPC but I don't recall it having a hughly long life.

According to wikipedia, Commodore filed for bankruptcy in 1994, and the Amiga ceased production in 1996.