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ArsTechnica has a fun project--hacking a TRS-80 to get online:
The true test of a man's patience is crimping pins onto the end of a cable that leads to building a custom serial cable—especially if it's the first time you've even handled a serial cable in a decade. So as I searched under my desk, using my phone for a flashlight, I wondered whether I had finally found the IT project that would send me over the edge. On a recent day, I set out to turn my recently acquired vintage Radio Shack TRS-80 Model 100 computer into a working Internet terminal. And at this moment, I crawled on the floor looking for a DB-25 connector's little gold pin that I had dropped for the sixth—or maybe sixteenth—time.
Thankfully, I underestimated my patience/techno-masochism/insanity. Only a week later, I successfully logged in to Ars' editorial IRC channel from the Model 100. And seeing as this machine first saw the market in 1983, it took a substantial amount of help: a Raspberry Pi, a little bit of BASIC code, and a hidden file from the website of a certain Eric S. Raymond.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Hyperturtle on Thursday August 06 2015, @12:47AM
I still have my c64 ready to connect to the internet. I used an rs2-323 adapter to a db 25 pin connector, a null modem adapter, a 25 to 9 pin adapter, a serial cable, and then the db 9 on the other side connected to the PC that provided the gateway. Typing in ATDT and the IP address got me where I wanted to go. I had to also use a hayes serial emulation driver on the windows machine hosting the connection. pretty much the same thing that guy was doing, but raspberry pis didnt exist when I connected it to the internet, so I had to use windows 2000 instead.
Anyway not a lot of telnet BBSes that show CG graphics anymore. Amiga boards, yes.. but genuine c64 ones? I've been thinking of setting one up, actually, but I figure I'd get a crush of connections for a little while and then no one would "call" it... after their curiosity was satisfied.
It's sad that facebook is very much the center of many folks social experiences online (and the occasional forum, such as this).
I can confirm xmodem over 9600 bps nowadays is just as slow. 9600bps was the fastest the c64 was willing to go, but my favored terminal emulator only was reliable to 1200bps anyway. I have one that let me see ANSI and 80 columns; it looked crummy on the composite monitor I have, but it is OK on the VGA one I've rigged up via a signal converter. 80 columns on a c64 can only go so far with emulated ansi color.
I was going to even eliminate that serial cable and just use bluetooth and have a wireless c64, but I don't think too many people would get excited about that. It'd work just as well, though! The blue tooth adapter has to be configured on something other than the c64, but once that's hard coded, it acts as a serial and such slow speeds shouldn't be an issue.
Anyway, If anyone knows of one or more c64 online BBSes, please post them and I'll be sure to check them out on it. The windows 2000 box is gone, but I have the driver and a 32 bit version of windows installed on another box I can use to bridge that gap.
(Score: 2) by dltaylor on Thursday August 06 2015, @01:22AM
Any Linux or *BSD box with either a native or USBserial converter can support a serial terminal, and will be happy to connect to your home network, and, thence, to the internet. No need for a Windows box (I do miss Windows 2000, though; the best of the bunch so far).
(Score: 1) by Illop on Thursday August 06 2015, @04:25PM
I will leave this here for you. http://commodorebbs.com/ [commodorebbs.com]
Grab cgterm and get boarding. http://paradroid.automac.se/cgterm/ [automac.se]
(Score: 1) by Hyperturtle on Thursday August 06 2015, @04:58PM
Awesome, I will have to check some of them out!
I see some of them appear to be using a similar serial gateway method that I'd mentioned. It almost makes me want to pick up one of those CF card or SD card readers and mount a hard disk on my c64 and start a download with punter. It'd still take a while at 9600 baud... but when relieving memories like this, it is better they remain authentic!
(Score: 1) by Illop on Thursday August 06 2015, @05:42PM
You should! Check out Jim Brains' store http://store.go4retro.com/ [go4retro.com] , specifically the UIEC/SD, Easyflash 3, and the 64nic+. I am a total door game addict and mostly play Empire 2 and Nukem on madworld.bounceme.net:6400. There are still a lot of people BBSing even these days.