You won’t find links to any traditional “social media” since I don’t use any of them anymore, I much prefer classic forums over modern social media platforms. I’ve also included links to some amazing modern retro computer projects that I’ve either built myself or one that I’m following for a possible future build.
Vintage Computer Federation - Probably one of the most well-known and popular resources for retro computing, the VCF forums is a great place for information and assistance covering multiple decades of computing. You’ll find information here spanning the 1970’s right into the early 2000’s. VCF is probably one of the best sources covering the pre-x86 era of computing out there.
Vogons – A very popular forum with a great deal of resources for retro computing, with a great deal of focus on x86 based computers from the 1980’s through the early 2000’s. This is an excellent source of information with a great community of people willing to share their knowledge.
Vogons – In addition to their forums, Vogons also maintains a large database of hardware drivers for classic computers and operating systems.
TheRetro Web – One of the best resources for information, manuals, and drivers on a wide variety of classic computer hardware. Easily searchable.
DOSDays – As the name suggests, DOS Days is an excellent resource for anyone looking for hardware and software information covering the DOS era of PC’s and compatibles. Generally, from the 1980’s through the 1990’s.
DOSGame Compatibility – A fantastic chart that compares compatibility and performance of a wide range of early graphics cards in a mix of popular DOS games. An excellent resource for those looking into building a retro computer for DOS era gaming.
Vintage3D – An excellent source of information, reviews, benchmarks, and drivers for a wide variety of early video cards, Vintage 3D is a great tool for those looking at building a retro gaming PC.
VGALegacy MKIII – A comprehensive online museum of graphics cards. You won’t find any drivers here, but it’s a great tool when trying to identify vintage video cards or find benchmarks to help you with your retro builds.
Thandor – A site containing a good collection of information and benchmarks for classic video cards and processors.
OldProcessor Electrical Specifications – Looking at doing some CPU overclocking, modding, troubleshooting, or just curious? This is a comprehensive list of the electrical specifications for a wide range of vintage processors.
You can download different versions of MS-DOS for use on your retro computers.
You can also download a copy of the classic 16-bit Windows operating systems per-dating Windows 95, like the popular Windows 3.x.
Calmira – A cool re-skin of Windows 3.x that makes it look and feel a bit more like Windows 95.
NortonCommander – A popular and useful orthodox file manager for MS-DOS (and OS/2), Norton Commander saw wide-spread use between late 1980’s and early 1990’s on IBM PC’s running MS-DOS. Seeing it’s final release in 1998, Norton had realized that Windows was taking over a lion’s share of the market.
FreeDOS – The FreeDOS project is an modern open-source MS-DOS compatible operating system that can not only run on your classic hardware (386 or better), but can run your classic MS-DOS games and applications, and contains many features and QoL improvements not found in the long abandoned MS-DOS.
CP/M– The predecessor to DOS, CP/M was a disk operating system that saw wide-spread use between 1974 and the early 1980’s and across multiple different platforms and coming in both 8-bit and 16-bit versions.
CM/M Software Collections:
TheZ80-MBC2 – A Z80 based modern computer anyone can build. Running a few different operating systems, including the classic and versatile CP/M, this project is 100% open source and free. If you need assistance with the build process, you can look here, here, and here. I built my own version of this amazing little computer, if you’re interested, you can check out my 4-part build log here for a complete breakdown of my process and what the Z80-MBC2 is capable of!
Z80 RC2014 -A very cool modular Z80 based retro computer with a great deal of focus on expandability and customization.
PicoMiteVGA – A very simple low-power, and very fun, SBC built around the awesome little Raspberry Pi Pico micro controller that runs MMBASIC, a version of Microsoft BASIC, with full graphic and sound capability. Completely free and open source. This is an excellent built for beginners!
CommanderX16 – Probably one of the most well known and popular modern “retro computers”, the dream child of David Murray, better known as the8-Bit Guy. The C16 is a 6502 based computer meant to be the next logical step after the Commodore 64. While not free, the C16 is an exciting project and something that’s definitely on my wish list!
Games and Software for Windows 3.x
Games and Software for Windows 9x
Games and Software for CP/M
Geekenspiel – The best source for “Retro-themed stickers and badges for vintage and modern PCs. “
GifCities - A special project of the Internet Archive caching 20 years of searchable GeoCities animated GIF images. Excellent for retro web design, like this blog!
No comments:
Post a Comment