Sunday Things - miscellaneous edition
posted in Links by Cargo Cult on Sunday March 5 2017
Greetings, readers across the world! I had a quick peer at my web-stats whatsits, to see followers from as far afield as Austria, Latvia, Peru and New Zealand. Hello, whoever you are.
This week is mainly retro space-related, with some bonus 1970s horror.



Bonus Terran Trade Authority corner:
- Spacecraft: 2000 to 2100 AD - I remember finding a copy of one of these compilations in the appropriate-looking Heanor Public Library some time in the late '80s. Best thing ever.
For more information please reread.
Sunday Things - eccentric edition
posted in Links by Cargo Cult on Sunday February 26 2017
Thematic!

Bonus Additional Eccentricity corner:
- The Telegraph Pole Appreciation Society - in their words, "glorious everyday mundanitude of these simple silent sentinels the world over". May include electricity pylons.
- John Finnemore's Souvenir Programme - You Are Not A Geek - many here will understand the sentiment behind this sketch, from the remarkable John Finnemore (and Radio 4).
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Sunday Things - obsolete video edition
posted in Links by Cargo Cult on Sunday February 19 2017
Are you following Techmoan? You probably ought to be - a northern gadget nut who's been acquiring, repairing and documenting all sorts of weird and wonderful old bits of home entertainment systems. Most of which I've never heard of before...
Bonus Quantel Corner:
- Quantel DVM8001 Mirage - Demonstration Video - showing off some fancy new 'computer graphics' and digital video processing. Might catch on one day. The British Quantel will definitely lead the way!
- A Quantel Paintbox For Christmas! - The Complete Story - the tale of a glorious nutter who acquires an old Quantel system and hacks it back into working order again. Wonderfully bizarre machines, and definitely not intended for the consumer market.
- Quantel V-Series Paintbox Tour - imagine being able to draw and paint on a computer. Like a super-early, hardware-assisted Adobe Photoshop, this particular machine is a descendant of something even older.
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Sunday Things - warbird edition
posted in Links by Cargo Cult on Sunday February 12 2017
A hangar, neglected and abandoned since soon after the war became irrelevant. Sunlight streams through grimy windows on to faded plastic and tarpaulin sheeting covering unidentifiable mechanical shapes, spattered in the dust and detritus of decades.
He walks over to one of the lumpen masses, its covering still faded but clear of dust. Pulling aside the sheeting, he pauses briefly to admire the war machine beneath.
Built in the closing stages of the war, not long before both sides' struggle became pointless in the face of a third, ascendant superpower - its shape clearly echoing the lines of earlier machines but with a last-ditch internal hardware layout inside. This particular specimen is clearly not abandoned, at least not now - cleaned up access ports and new umbilical cabling show the man's work over the years. But beyond this functional rehabilitation, unmodified - true to the day it first left its long-forgotten factory.
He pulls out a device from his backpack, tiny and implausibly powerful in comparison with the old war machine before him, but still a direct descendant of that new enemy's clunky past. Loaded with newly engineered firmware, designed to circumvent this relic's system limitations - he plugs it into a cable harness, preparing for upload to the old bird. Firmware to make the machine's main engine and awkward yet hugely capable auxiliary power unit beat as one, in perfect synchronicity - firmware designed with the knowledge and experience of decades of work, to carry the weapon originally wielded by that new enemy but in a manner long thought impossible.
Transfer complete, he begins the boot process. The Atari Falcon030 shall fly again - and a friendly flight over old Amiga territory seems strangely appropriate, just for old time's sake...
Bonus Soviet NASA corner:
- NASA Armstrong Fact Sheet: Tu-144LL Supersonic Flying Laboratory - NASA-operated Soviet-era supersonic airliner, the Tupolev Tu-144 being the Buran to the Space Shuttle Concorde.
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Sunday Things - dredged from the bookmarks edition
posted in Links by Cargo Cult on Sunday February 5 2017
Quick selection this week - opening up 'Other Bookmarks', waiting for it to slowly (so slowly!) scroll near the end, then randomly clicking on a few things.


Bonus Crap Hardware corner:
- CGA in 1024 Colors - a New Mode: the Illustrated Guide - or, how to make PC graphics not look like shite. Do I need to apply these tricks to my modern gaming PC?
- Meanwhile, on the Atari ST - upgraded version of the same PhotoChrome I trolled the acolytes with data from some years ago.
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