“The Catholic Church is an institution I am bound to hold divine – but for unbelievers a proof of its divinity might be found in the fact that no merely human institution conducted with such knavish imbecility would have lasted a fortnight” – Hilaire Belloc
My first video card was the original 8-bit Sound Blaster card. Besides upgrading to VGA graphics, nothing changed my gaming experience back in the day more than this one upgrade.
Enter the Snark Barker. It’s an open source project that gives you a complete bill of materials, circuit diagram, board fab files, and tons of other information you need to make your own. Yes, MAKE your own Soundblaster clone. It looks like a very doable project for those a little handy with a soldering iron.
Links:
David Larsson makes a bunch of clone ISA audio boards such as the Gravis Ultrasound, 8-bit ISA Soundblaster, MCA Sound Blaster, Disney Sound Source. He sells them on Tindie for pretty reasonable prices considering the ebay prices for the original boards.
Here’s a good review of his 8-bit Soundblaster card:
These aren’t the only sound card clones. Turns out there are lots of others too:
Links:
Texelec makes some amazing retro PC equipment. They make clone Adlib and soundblaster cards, EMS ram boards for 8 bit computers,
One of the things they make is an 8-bit ISA floppy controller board that control up to 4 floppy drives.
PixelJam has done a fantastic job re-inventing the old vector graphics game style in a new and creative way with their upcoming Utopia Must Fall (Steam). Add to that some stellar soundtrack, fun gameplay, and deep progression path; and it’s kind of what retro arcade reboots should be.
Even better, you can play it online for free.
Funny little bit from the DYI crowd.
Here’s a collection of all the tools you’ll need to set up an old MFM style hard drive in a XT/286/386/486 computer.
Anime has grown in popularity. Just like the US that has many animation houses (ex: Disney, Hanna Barbera, Cartoon Network, Warner Bros, etc), there are many Japanese studios and many are known for their particular styles and genres.
Arikendo’s video is informative because it gives you a great overview of all the major studios. There is information about the founder, leaders, styles they are known for, business models, and other tidbits such as working conditions at these studios. I found some studios and series I wouldn’t have even known about.
Some tidbits: the story of a WIT worker that claimed working 391 hours in one month (over 13 hour days, 7 days a week for a whole month). KyoAni that treats it’s employees really well and has high profits from selectively producing titles from their annual Kyoani awards. Or the sad story of a worker at A-1 Pictures that died after working around 600 hours a month (20 hours a day, 7 days a week).
Wow – that’s disturbing. AI has a way to go yet
Kane Pixels has created some of the best found footage versions of the backrooms lore. Give his channel a look.