Home
JAQForum Ver 20.06
Log In or Join  
Active Topics
Local Time 23:52 27 Apr 2024 Privacy Policy
Jump to

Notice. New forum software under development. It's going to miss a few functions and look a bit ugly for a while, but I'm working on it full time now as the old forum was too unstable. Couple days, all good. If you notice any issues, please contact me.

Forum Index : Microcontroller and PC projects : CMM2 G2 sales....

     Page 1 of 2    
Author Message
Grogster

Admin Group

Joined: 31/12/2012
Location: New Zealand
Posts: 9063
Posted: 01:28am 04 Nov 2023
Copy link to clipboard 
Print this post

I sold three units to members here(two have been sent, last one will go out on Monday), so I put up the remaining two on my website last night - they have both sold by today.....

I will have to order more units then!!!  

I did not get more then five for a start, as a few years have passed since the G2 release, and cos of COVID, I was not sure if the demand was still there - technology moves on so fast, a couple of years might as well be a couple of decades as far as technology goes.    

But I am delighted to see that demand is still there, and I hope that also makes Geoff and Peter smile too for all the work they have both put into what the CMM2 G2 is.
Smoke makes things work. When the smoke gets out, it stops!
 
William Leue
Guru

Joined: 03/07/2020
Location: United States
Posts: 382
Posted: 01:29pm 04 Nov 2023
Copy link to clipboard 
Print this post

Great news! It would be good if we could generate some publicity so that more people know that the freeze is thawing.

-Bill
 
PeteCotton

Guru

Joined: 13/08/2020
Location: Canada
Posts: 316
Posted: 11:20pm 06 Nov 2023
Copy link to clipboard 
Print this post

Yes - I see projects like the Commander X16, Spectrum Next and Agon Light, all of which are excellent projects and deserving of success - but I can't help but feel that the CMM2 blows them out of the water in most areas. I know CMM2 doesn't have low level programmability like those other projects, but I would argue that most nostalgia nerds don't want to learn machine code. CMM2's BASIC is an exceptional implementation and with the speed and graphics - it really is the dream home computer for many people.

We almost need someone to drive a marketing campaign.....
 
William Leue
Guru

Joined: 03/07/2020
Location: United States
Posts: 382
Posted: 02:20pm 11 Nov 2023
Copy link to clipboard 
Print this post

MMBASIC on the CMM2 runs considerably faster than programs written in assembly language  on any of the new retro-8-bit machines. And being able to create fast full-screen bit-mapped graphics on the CMM2 is a whole lot easier to program than being forced to use tiles on these other machines.

While I miss being able to use an object-oriented language for large programs, and while sometimes it would be great to have a few other runtime libraries to handle things like complex numbers and other math-y stuff, it's hard to beat MMBASIC for pure fun!

-Bill
 
William Leue
Guru

Joined: 03/07/2020
Location: United States
Posts: 382
Posted: 08:01pm 19 Nov 2023
Copy link to clipboard 
Print this post

Grogster, my new MM2 Gen2 arrived today, and it works fine. Thanks much!

-Bill
 
Grogster

Admin Group

Joined: 31/12/2012
Location: New Zealand
Posts: 9063
Posted: 11:35pm 19 Nov 2023
Copy link to clipboard 
Print this post


Smoke makes things work. When the smoke gets out, it stops!
 
EDNEDN
Regular Member

Joined: 18/02/2023
Location: United States
Posts: 63
Posted: 12:07am 20 Nov 2023
Copy link to clipboard 
Print this post

  William Leue said  it would be great to have a few other runtime libraries to handle things like complex numbers and other math-y stuff


It would not be hard to add a native Complex variable type.   The big problem would be a lot of the If statement comparisons get kind of ambiguous.   Does > refer to the Magnitude of the complex number?   Or does it restrict itself to just the Real part of the complex number?   Things like that would not be totally obvious to people.
 
William Leue
Guru

Joined: 03/07/2020
Location: United States
Posts: 382
Posted: 09:05pm 20 Nov 2023
Copy link to clipboard 
Print this post

EDNEDN said:

  Quote  t would not be hard to add a native Complex variable type.   The big problem would be a lot of the If statement comparisons get kind of ambiguous.   Does > refer to the Magnitude of the complex number?   Or does it restrict itself to just the Real part of the complex number?   Things like that would not be totally obvious to people.


True. In any object-oriented language, this problem does not occur, since operations like > can be overloaded so that they get automatically directed to the correct methods that match the data types.

In MMBasic or other non-oo languages, you'd have to resort to library functions like CAdd, CSubtract, CCompare, and so on, and throw an error if an inappropriate operation is attempted.

-Bill
 
Mixtel90

Guru

Joined: 05/10/2019
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 5727
Posted: 09:33pm 20 Nov 2023
Copy link to clipboard 
Print this post

Woah! MMBasic isn't designed to be an OO language. You can *use* it as something like that, but it's not OO. You can't make it into one either - it's BASIC.

You could probably write a true OO language, but that's starting again. Messing about with changing MMBasic on the CMM2 would break compatibility with all the other platforms. It is what it is, take it or leave it.

.
Edited 2023-11-21 07:34 by Mixtel90
Mick

Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini
Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs
 
toml_12953
Guru

Joined: 13/02/2015
Location: United States
Posts: 326
Posted: 02:40am 21 Nov 2023
Copy link to clipboard 
Print this post

  EDNEDN said  
  William Leue said  it would be great to have a few other runtime libraries to handle things like complex numbers and other math-y stuff


It would not be hard to add a native Complex variable type.   The big problem would be a lot of the If statement comparisons get kind of ambiguous.   Does > refer to the Magnitude of the complex number?   Or does it restrict itself to just the Real part of the complex number?   Things like that would not be totally obvious to people.


Maybe not obvious but the implementation would be described in the manual so everyone would know exactly what to expect. Naturally, when you choose one method out of two, there are people who want the other choice.
 
EDNEDN
Regular Member

Joined: 18/02/2023
Location: United States
Posts: 63
Posted: 04:09am 21 Nov 2023
Copy link to clipboard 
Print this post

Mostly I mentioned that "It would not be that hard to add a native Complex variable type." to MMBasic because the one thing Fortran has over BASIC is complex numbers.

Pretty much MMBasic has F77 (or F95) beat on every other metric.   It was purely a point of reflection.  Complex numbers allow Fortran to easily do things like Laplace transforms where shifting the problem to the Complex Plane helps realize the solution.

It is an interesting topic to think about.  But I fully acknowledge if you really need Complex numbers to solve your problem, BASIC isn't the right language for you.   Still????   It might be something fun to play with for a few days.   :)

I'm now curious how F77 handles the comparison of Complex numbers...   I have some reading ahead of me.
Edited 2023-11-21 14:41 by EDNEDN
 
zeitfest
Guru

Joined: 31/07/2019
Location: Australia
Posts: 381
Posted: 11:47am 21 Nov 2023
Copy link to clipboard 
Print this post

  Quote  It would not be hard to add a native Complex variable type.


The last I heard was the MMBasic architecture was restricted to three native datatypes,  integers and floats (both nominally 64 bit) and strings.

If anything, I'd suggest first adding some of the ordinary datatypes like byte, (char),  int (16 bit), long int (32 bit),  unsigned versions, single precision float (32 bit), .....
 
Mixtel90

Guru

Joined: 05/10/2019
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 5727
Posted: 12:07pm 21 Nov 2023
Copy link to clipboard 
Print this post

I suspect it would be extremely difficult to add a Complex variable type at this stage. You almost certainly couldn't keep compatibility between the different platforms.

Strangely enough using other data types will almost certainly sacrifice speed doing the conversions. These are not computers, they are microcontrollers - albeit a very fast one in the CMM2. They work using a single full data width fetch on the internal bus and you get whatever that is. :)
Mick

Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini
Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs
 
Volhout
Guru

Joined: 05/03/2018
Location: Netherlands
Posts: 3528
Posted: 12:11pm 21 Nov 2023
Copy link to clipboard 
Print this post

Complex numbers:

You can see complex numbers as 2 dimensional arrays.
Then it is easy to implement all the math. Either in individual statements, or in array math.

@Grogster

Are you out of G2's ? Can I place an order for 1 ?

Volhout
Edited 2023-11-21 22:31 by Volhout
PicomiteVGA PETSCII ROBOTS
 
Grogster

Admin Group

Joined: 31/12/2012
Location: New Zealand
Posts: 9063
Posted: 12:42am 22 Nov 2023
Copy link to clipboard 
Print this post

Currently out of stock, but more have been built at the factory, and they will be sending them to me any day now(production is 95% complete), so yes - if you check my website in a few days, I will have updated the stock number, and re-enabled purchasing of them.

I'm thinking about allowing back-orders.
What do the members think?

I generally don't like selling stuff I don't actually have yet, if you see where I am coming from.....
Smoke makes things work. When the smoke gets out, it stops!
 
Mixtel90

Guru

Joined: 05/10/2019
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 5727
Posted: 02:47pm 22 Nov 2023
Copy link to clipboard 
Print this post

For those in the UK: At the moment Rapid Electronics are selling some grey enclosures that are compatible with the CMM2 via ebay. The price is very good. Front & rear panels are beige ABS plastic.
ebay link
Mick

Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini
Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs
 
matherp
Guru

Joined: 11/12/2012
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 8582
Posted: 03:20pm 22 Nov 2023
Copy link to clipboard 
Print this post

That is incredible value. Postage on more than one is free.
Edited 2023-11-23 01:26 by matherp
 
Mixtel90

Guru

Joined: 05/10/2019
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 5727
Posted: 03:56pm 22 Nov 2023
Copy link to clipboard 
Print this post

I bought two. There don't seem to be any disadvantages to them. :) Front and rear panels will accept PCB as usual. How long this offer will last I've no idea,
Mick

Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini
Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs
 
William Leue
Guru

Joined: 03/07/2020
Location: United States
Posts: 382
Posted: 05:52pm 22 Nov 2023
Copy link to clipboard 
Print this post

Grogster, I notice that on my CMM2 Gen2 that you built, the SD card also appears to be situated a little too far away from the board edge, so that it pretty much disappears into the panel when fully inserted, instead of leaving a bit sticking out so that you can push it in to eject it.

-Bill
 
phil99

Guru

Joined: 11/02/2018
Location: Australia
Posts: 1783
Posted: 08:45pm 22 Nov 2023
Copy link to clipboard 
Print this post

  Quote   it pretty much disappears into the panel when fully inserted

Had the same issue on a mini PC. The solution was to bevel the edges of the slot with a craft knife. Before doing that I was using a plastic LCD stylus to push the end of the card.
 
     Page 1 of 2    
Print this page
© JAQ Software 2024