Posted by RobOHara ( @Commodork) on November 27th, 2023 in Computers/Tech/Games, Main 
I have a hard time parting with old laptops, especially when there’s nothing wrong with them other than the fact that Microsoft Windows has expanded past their capabilities. The typical response you’ll get from nerds like me when this happens is “install Linux on it,” which is not a one-size-fits-all solution and, at a minimum, requires familiarizing oneself with a completely new and often confusing operating system. Recently I found another solution: Installing ChromeOS Flex. ChromeOS is an operating system developed by Google that runs on Chromebooks. It is a very lightweight operating system that relies heavily on having access… (read more)
Posted by RobOHara ( @Commodork) on July 20th, 2023 in Hacking / Security, Main 
Earlier this week I was informed that Kevin Mitnick, the “world’s most infamous hacker,” had passed away. I was asked to sit on the news until the family had time to release a statement, but word travels fast and this morning it appeared on the front page of the New York Post. For those who haven’t heard or read the story, back in the mid-2000s my wife, who was in charge of putting together a training class at work, hired Kevin Mitnick to travel to Oklahoma and teach a course on social engineering. Susan knew how into computers and security… (read more)
Last weekend I attended the second annual Boatfest gathering, which again took place in Hurricane, West Virginia. Despite its name, the event has nothing to do with boats — it’s a gathering of retrocomputing and retrogaming enthusiasts named after the organizer, John “Boat of Car” Shawler. Boatfest is difficult to summarize because it’s different things to different people. Some people go to Boatfest to show off their vintage computers and gaming systems, while others go just to see them. It’s an event where old friends reconnect, and new friendships are made. There are tournaments, there are presentations, there are people… (read more)
Last weekend my buddy Jeff and I visited Oklahoma City’s Up-Down Arcade. Up-Down is a barcade (21 to enter) with a full bar, a kitchen that sells pizza by the slice, and sixty(ish) arcade games. Jeff and I were hanging out in arcades together years before either of us were old enough to drive, and nearly 40 years later we’re still doing the same thing. There are seven Up-Down Arcade locations; the other six are in Des Moines, Kansas City, Milwaukee, Minneapolis, St. Louis, and Nashville. This was my second time to visit our local Up-Down, and Jeff’s first. Up-Down… (read more)
Posted by RobOHara ( @Commodork) on July 14th, 2022 in Computers/Tech/Games, Main 
Recently while digging through a pile of old electronics in my workshop I stumbled across this, my old Sony DVD/CD burner. I began purchasing audio CDs in the early 90s, and bought completely into the format in 1993 when my car was broken into and all of my favorite cassettes were stolen. I never thought people would be able to burn CDs on their home computers; if such devices were ever produced, I reasoned, they would be much to expensive for the average person to afford. We got our first CD-ROM burner at work in 1995, a clunky external device… (read more)
I met John “Boatofcar” Shawler online twenty years ago on the Digital Press forums. Although “Boat” is nearly a decade younger than I am, the two of us share a a common love of old computers, games, and arcade machines. Boat has been a fan and supporter of my podcasts from the very beginning, and several years ago he, along with his pal Amigo Aaron, started their own show about Amiga computers, titled “Amigos”. Boat has expanded their show to a small network which includes, among other shows, a couple of my podcasts including Sprite Castle and Like a DOS.… (read more)
Posted by RobOHara ( @Commodork) on January 18th, 2022 in Computers/Tech/Games, Main, Reviews 
I’m a fan of old school digital artwork. For the past five years I’ve enjoyed viewing ANSI artwork (created in the 1990s for BBSes) in my office on a dedicated Raspberry Pi running PyAns. Another style of vintage art I really enjoy is pixel artwork. Pixel graphics are images drawn on a grid, one pixel at a time. These pictures can be very small, like characters from an old video game, or very large. The sprites that make up characters in most Commodore 64 games are only 24×21 pixels in size. Other pictures, like the backgrounds from those games or… (read more)
It’s a little difficult to explain how I ended up with more than 200 Nintendo cartridges — a system I never cared that much for in the first place. For those who know me, it may be even more difficult to believe that I’ve decided to part with them. The Nintendo Entertainment System, or NES, was released in North America the fall of 1985 just in time for Christmas. Several of my friends ended up owning a Nintendo, and while I enjoyed playing their games when I visited, I never wanted a Nintendo of my own. By the time the… (read more)
Today I am repairing a Commodore 64 keyboard. Not just any keyboard, but the one I grew up using back in the 1980s. The original Commodore 64 came with brown keys. For a brief period of time, Commodore made a similar computer, the Commodore 16, which came in a black case with grey keys. A few years after the C16 was discontinued, Commodore’s stock of replacement keyboards flooded Radio Shack. Although the two keyboards were not electronically compatible, the keys themselves were. I bought one of those keyboards back in the late 1980s, plucked the gray keys off of it,… (read more)
Earlier this week my buddy Robb and his wife Mel flew in from Colorado to celebrate his birthday. The two flew into Arkansas, drove over to Oklahoma to visit me, and eventually returned to Arkansas to visit the Arkadia Retrocade in Fayetteville before returning home. While they were here we ate onion burgers, had Mexican food at Ted’s, and had breakfast at Hatch. We also did some shopping, sight-seeing, and even stopped by Bob Funk’s stable to check out the Clydesdales. I had a great time visiting with Robb and his wife, and I hope they had a good time… (read more)
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