Fred 36
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Submitted by Dan Dooré on Monday, May 21, 2018 - 18:20.
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Release Year
1993
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Copyrights Granted
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Description
Issue 36
Item | Author | Description |
---|---|---|
Menu | Andy Monk | |
Magazine | Lemmings On The Coupe!! | |
Letters | Campion - The Spreadsheet, E-tracker, Boing! Reviewed | |
Starbug | Nathan Dolan | Games Master Game |
Paradox | Andy Monk | Selection Of Andy Monk Tunes |
Notepad | Calvin Allett | Superb Word Processor |
Celebrate | Stefan Drissen Andy Monk Brian McConnell | Colourful Mc Birthday Demo |
Mc Pt 25 | Steve Taylor | Info For DRiVER WIMP system. |
Wombles | Howard Price | Mc Demo By, Yes, The Wombles! |
Wizard Demo | Steve Taylor | Birthday Demo By Steve Taylor |
KE_Disc | Geoff Winkless | PC-Format Disc Reader!! |
Mosaic | Darren Clarke | Challenging Puzzler |
Fredex | Brian McConnell | List Of Back Issues' Contents |
Magazine
BM Editorial Hurrah! We've made it! FRED magazine, for the SAM Coupe, is now officially 3 years old! Oh, isn't it exciting! Just think; a mere three years ago FRED magazine was a tiny young babe with a handful of readers. Now though, it's a veritable veteran (try saying THAT after a few jars) with, erm, a handful of readers! As has been promised, we really do have some treats for you, in the form of new of the Big Licence Deal (which many of you apparently guessed with ease) and in terms of software. I'd like to take this little bit of space here to thank everybody for their contributions to this issue. For the first time in God knows how long we've actually got too much to include! All that means is that issue 37 will be excellent as well as this one. Some of the programs we've been sent for this and next issue though - they are SUPERB! And I don't use that word lightly. Okay, maybe I do sometimes, but not this time; this time the stuff IS superb. Very superb indeed, even. BM Editorial Aah, I can relax now. Those ol' Higher results dropped through the door just yesterday, and I'm pleased to say that your beloved FRED editor now has seven Highers (and two CSYS's). Not bad at all, considering the fact that Colin took the whip to me every time he caught me trying to sneak in a bit of studying between disc-compiling sessions... Colin's decided to actually write for the magazine this month. Ever the cynic, I believe he only did it so that he could announce the Big Licence instead of me, which is not fair at all seeing as I did loads of negotiating, and put in large amounts of time and effort. Well. Maybe that's a slight lie. Perhaps I did have nothing to do with it whatsoever. Alright then Colin, have your little moment of glory... (Before I go though, I'll just say that FRED is in no way responsible for throat injuries caused by excessive shouting and cheering at the following pages...) CM The BIG news! Here it is. At long last. Two years in development. Programmed by the author of the last big SAM licence. L EEEE MM MM MM MM I NN N GGGGG SSSSS !! L E M M M M M M I N N N G S !! L EEE M M M M I N N N G GG SSSSS !! L E M M M M I N NN G G S LLLLL EEEE M M M M I N N GGGGG SSSSS !! Yes - it's on target at long last!!! In January of this year, Noesis Software handed over the SAM "Lemmings" to FRED Publishing. After 6 months of negotiations, phone calls and meetings in London, we have worked out terms to get the SAM Lemmings released! CM SAMmings Currently the SAM coding is pretty much complete. The only thing still to go in is the various graphics and map data. DMA Design and Psygnosis are working together in order to get the data to us in a suitable form and once we receive this it will only be a matter of weeks before completion. The deal FRED has with Psygnosis means that we can buy the boxes to another version of Lemmings and simply put SAM stickers over any mentions of the A***A etc. As I've said, we don't know the exact release date - well, this IS Chris White! No, apologies to Mr White; the problem lies with converting the other data. We are hoping for early October in order to bring in the Christmas sales because as you may guess, Psygnosis would only agree to a deal which nets them an "acceptable sum". In this case we're talking 5 figures.... It is vitally important that the SAM Lemmings sells in quantity so I'm afraid you'll have to put up with a lot of publicity! CM SAMmings The price, again, is not really what we were aiming for. And I hope I don't make too many of you take a double check when I say the RRP will be £19.99. However, while you're still here, there will be either two or three pounds off that to FRED or FORMAT subscribers. I can promise you that this is the lowest figure we could release Lemmings for. Psygnosis are used to selling thousands of times more copies at £25, so it was hardly a simple task getting them to agree to a SAM Lemmings at all. Perhaps that's why neither SAMCo or Noesis succeeded in getting anywhere... Unless SAM Lemmings sells over 1,000 copies FRED Publishing will be losing money: between Psygnosis and the programmer, there's barely enough left to pay for music, graphics, disc duplication, and postage and packing. We are making a huge sacrifice in the hope that it pays off - I would expect anyone who would like to see more SAM licences to buy a copy. Thank you. CM SAMmings As I mentioned, a release of early October is planned (SMALL NOTE: the start of October will mark exactly two years since FRED first published it's first title - Impatience!!). However, I am NOT accepting advanced orders at the moment. There should be some screens from the SAM Lemmings in the screens section this month and with any luck, we'll have some sort of demo for FRED37. Naturally, such a big game is bound to have lots of bugs. So to prevent a repeat performance of Prince Of Persia I would like to appeal for playtesters. There isn't any money available for the task but the selected few get to play the game before anyone else, and naturally get a copy of the finished version. If you're interested, write to FRED with a few details and if your name is picked out of the hat we'll be in touch! SAM Lemmings is 512K only but works with or without a mouse. CM Surprise, surprise! I reckon anything I say after that bit of news will come as a bit of an anti-climax, but at least it's more good news! FRED have just launched another game! This one has been kept secret all through development in order to avoid the dreaded "So it's not actually OUT yet then?" syndrome. The game is called "The Witching Hour". It was sent in by contributor John Vincent as an entry into the FRED game competition. Since the deadline has been extended (to September 11th - hurry!) we don't know if this is the outright winner, but the game was so good we just had to publish it anyway!! Created on GamesMaster, it is a Dizzy/Boing style game. An arcade adventure involving puzzle solving was how they were once described, I believe! Before I tell you the plot, I suggest you turn the page.... CM The Witching Hour The Story so far... Hallow'een has arrived and the evil Demon Master has captured most of the villagers from the little town near the sea. In an attempt to rescue their friends, the few remaining villagers come to you, Gretta the good witch, the only one with enough magical power to save them. You must destroy the demon master during the witching hour or all will be lost. At the start of your quest you may choose between Gretta the witch or Beardy the wizard (no sexism here, matey!). During the game you can pick up, examine, use and read objects as well as interacting with several other characters in order to complete your quest. CM The Witching Hour And what price for this marvel of madness? Not content with this being the first commercial GamesMaster game and one of the first SAM games that hasn't had people waiting for it's release, we've decided to create another first: SAM's first commercial Budget Game! Priced at only £4.99, this gets you the works, not just a disc with a photocopied label. We're talking printed color inlay, box, instructions and colour printed disc label. Wooaahh! Oh! I'm sorry. I said the game costs £4.99, but that's before I mentioned that if you're a FRED or INDUG member, you of course get the obligatory 10% off. Bringing it down to an extremely wallet-friendly £4.50 If we can spare the disc space this month there'll be a playable demo of "The Witching Hour" which although is blindingly easy to complete, gives you the idea of the game. [Nope, there wasn't room. Next month, okay? - BRIAN] CM Water way to go....? Groan! Sorry. WaterWorks - released at the end of last year, it proved to be the most popular FRED game and is STILL selling in decent numbers!! It's also the game we've had the most letters and phone calls about from people saying how good it is and are there plans for "extra levels" (when they're not crying and/or begging for solutions that is). Unfortunately, unlike with Impatience, we didn't have the foresight to realise how popular it would be. So to satisfy FRED customers we've decided to do a sequel!! With no name at present, "WaterWorks 2" is in the same style as it's predecessor, but with extras such as spikes, barrels, lifts and a jeep! Not only will it feature completely new levels, but we're also re-doing all the graphics and music! Essentially it's a new game: it will not require the original to load or play, but the levels will be harder so it's recommended that you've played the original a bit to get used to Martin Bell's (the programmer) way of thinking...! CM WaterWorks 2 As yet, we don't have any definite release date but based upon current progress I'd say this would be another late Autumn release. Naturally we'll keep you posted as to how it's coming along and no doubt we'll be able to sort out a demo nearer the time of release. In the meantime, if you don't already have WaterWorks it might be a good idea to buy it to get yourself used to the general idea of the game. The game still retails for £9.99, but as usual, FRED or INDUG members can purchase it for the discounted price of just £9. Just to fill up the remainder of this page I'd like to remind everyone that we're always looking out for ideas for new games. Whether you fancy your hand at designing, coding or doing the graphics or music for a game, send something into FRED and we'll get back to you. CM Outlets Unfortunately, the merger of Outlet into FRED has not gone as planned. Everything was great for a few months and then suddenly we didn't have anything to make up the Outlet side of things! No technical queries to answer, utilities to use or anything! There wasn't a lot we could do about it. Naturally, we'll still stick useful utilities or FRED and answer technical enquiries but we can't create these sorts of things out of thin air. And to be honest, people seem to prefer FRED the way it was. As a result, the "incorporating Outlet" will not be appearing on the disc anymore. Incidentally, we can now bring down the price of Outlet back issues from £3.50 to £2. Yes, you can purchase any issue of SAM Outlet (32 - 65) for £2 each or £20 for any twelve. Sorry it's taken so long to bring the price down - but it was part of the contract. We may try to get hold of one of the last OUTDEXes (list of contents of old issues) for FRED. Any comments on this? CM Revelation's Driver in Pole Position (Ha Ha) The WIMP style environment that Steve Taylor has been developing for the last 18 months is at last just about to be released. Being a fairly regular user of the PC's Windows and the Amiga's Workbench, I've seen my fair share of WIMP systems and Steve's "Driver" is up there with the best. "Driver" will be published by Revelation Software in September with the expected price tag of £29.95 (£24.95 to FRED / INDUG people). The software itself is complete, the manual is currently being written and will then have to be typeset and printed. The demo* on this issue will basically tell you all you need to know about it. Before you buy, remember you must have MasterDOS but you do not need a mouse. However, Revelation will be producing a special mouse bundle. More details on that as well as the review in FRED37. *[Sorry! No room this issue! Wait another month - BRIAN] BM Hurrah! Yes. Hurrah! - that's how I'd describe the events which formed the past few pages. Hurrah! again, just for sake of being annoying. Lemmings eh? That'll shut a few SAM-haters up, I expect. Mind you, so would games like Waterworks and Wop Gamma if people in general (ie not just wise SAM owners) bothered to play them. Well, at least now some of you will now why questions regarding this little game were "cunningly edited" in the Letters section! The very fact that we did censor them actually gave it away to some people (Stand up Douglas Murdoch!). As I'm getting rather desperate for something to say in order to fill up the rest of this page, I'll just make the following cliched and ancient and not in the least bit funny remark: "News items are like buses. You wait months and nothing happens, then loads come along at once." Hmm. Maybe I ought to have ignored that idea... BM Hello To All The New People! (Both of 'em) The newsletter sent out by West Coast which contained the FRED leaflet you probably read was not sent only to FRED readers (why send a mailshot to a mere four people?). Since we hyped FRED a lot, and not too unjustifiably, in the FRED leaflet (well, what do you expect?! A list of FRED's failings? What'd we fill the other 57 lines with?), there's a distinct possibility that you were one of the people who got this issue as a one off thing (because you were bored or curious or masochistic or something), in in which case I'd like to say thanks for taking the trouble. FRED has changed a lot since the early days. Well. A little, at any rate. Colin's not the editor any more, for a start. I am. And who am I? Why, only the greatest human being EVER (apart from Toby Mangel, whose name inspired a joke regarding the name of a man who caught a bodily part in some farm machinery)! Brian McConnell is my name, and I like it, so there. If you look in the top-left corner of the magazine you'll see the initials of the author, in this case BM. BM What It's All About I suppose FRED really has two aims: to keep people aware of what's happening, and to keep people entertained (causing havoc with my social life is merely a secondary objective). Each month we have this section you are presently reading, plus a letters and reviews section, an adverts section, and the rest of the magazine is filled with whatever demos, games, utilities, tunes and articles we can get our messy paws on. FRED costs £2 per issue, or £20 for a year's subscription (12 issues). It went up from £1.50 in order to pay people for their contributions, to cover the duplication costs, and to enable Colin to give me money for to pay for the odd pint every six months or so (and with my wages, they're VERY odd pints, consisting largely of water). Subscribers not only get twelve issues of FRED, however. They get a monthly newsletter containg news too new to have been printed in the magazine, and also substantial software discounts on titles across the board - not just FRED titles. BM The Meaning of FRED We did merge with Outlet a few months back, but it seems that their stock of contributors is a little "shy" about contributing to FRED. There's no reason to be, but they are. At any rate, we've received very little in the way of Outlet-type contributions, and so cannot support the Outlet side of the magazine, as Colin pointed out earlier. We do consider ANY type of software for the magazine though; we're not only out for games and demos (although we do welcome these, as do the majority of our readers). FRED is now the "main" SAM magazine, and along with FORMAT which covers in more detail the serious side of computing, is the best way to hear about what's happening in the SAM world. So. Now you know what FRED's all about, have an article by FRED regular Stefan Drissen on something far, far beyond my meagre understanding of machine code... SD What do you mean, NO LIMIT? =========================== As you most certainly WON'T have concluded from the title, this is an article on some research into the real speed of the Z80 instructions. As you may recall, in my article on sprites "Cokes, Fantas and 7-Ups" (FRED 29) I mentioned that you could calculate how fast a routine theoretically would be by adding up the amount of t-states used. There was however a snag with the length of a t-state due to, quote, memory contention and other nasty things. But, I said, you could use the t-state values to compare two routines to see which one would be relatively faster. This was all very nice until I accidentally discovered that 7 = 8. Is this the equation that flushes all mathematics down the toilet? No, it simply means that an instruction which according to Z80 documentation should take 7 t-states really takes 8 t-states. This left me with a problem. What is the point of using t-state values to compare routines if the theoretical values do not hold up in the practical world? I decided to test each instruction to see how long it takes to run, but how do you go round testing the length of an instruction? To do this I simply filled a block of memory (32K) with this instruction and then worked out how many instructions are executed within one frame (1/50 second). It works like this: I wait for an interrupt and then start executing the instructions. 1/50 second later an interrupt occurs, and this then POPs what is on the stack pointer giving the amount of bytes run through. This must then be divided by the amount of bytes one instruction is. To have something to relate to I set the time it takes for a NOP at 1 and then the rest of the instructions are based on this. For example an opcode with speed 2 takes twice as long as a NOP. Testing led to a few interesting discoveries about the speed of the SAM. When the screen is enabled it runs at approx 4.75 MHz compared to approx 5.98 MHz when the screen is disabled (OUT 254,128). When in MODE 1 the Z80 is slowed down to approx 3.87 MHz and it doesn't matter whether the screen is enabled or not. Another interesting fact (which Edwin Blink had already pointed out to me) is that INs and OUTs to ASIC ports (250-255) are slower than INs and OUTs to non-ASIC ports (for example floppy disc controller). Now here comes an amazingly boring long table, unless you are interested that is. In the first column is the name of the instruction, in the second is the relative speed as found in the test. The third column is the relative speed converted to t-states (multiply rel. speed by four) and in the last column is what the speed is theoretically (according to Programming the Z80 by Zaks). So now print it out and optimize routines to your heart's content... (Table over the page) relative Mnemonic speed t-states theoretical ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ADC A,(HL) 2 8 7 ADC A,(IX+d) 4.7 18.8 19 ADC A,r 1 4 4 ADC A,n 2 8 7 ADC HL,rr 3.7 14.8 15 ADD A,(HL) 2 8 7 ADD A,(IX+d) 4.7 18.8 19 ADD A,r 1 4 4 ADD A,n 2 8 7 ADD HL,rr 2.6 10.4 11 ADD IX,rr 3.7 14.8 15 AND (HL) 2 8 7 AND (IX+d) 4.7 18.8 19 AND r 1 4 4 BIT b,(HL) 3 12 12 BIT b,(IX+d) 5.7 22.8 20 BIT b,r 2 8 8 CALL c,nn 5/3 20/12 17/10 CALL nn 5 20 17 CCF 1 4 4 CP (HL) 2 8 7 CP (IX+d) 4.7 18.8 19 CP r 1 4 4 CP n 2 8 7 CPD 3.7 14.8 16 CPDR 5.7/3.7 22.8/14.8 21/16 CPI 3.7 14.8 16 CPIR 5.7/3.7 22.8/14.8 21/16 CPL 1 4 4 DAA 1 4 4 DEC (HL) 3 12 11 DEC (IX+d) 5.7 22.8 23 DEC r 1 4 4 DEC rr 1.6 6.4 6 DEC IX 2.7 10.8 10 DI 1* 4* 4 DJNZ d ? ? 13/8 EI 1* 4* 4 EX AF,AF' 1 4 4 EX DE,HL 1 4 4 EXX 1 4 4 HALT 1* 4* 4 IM x 2 8 8 IN r,(C) 2.7 10.8 12 asic 3.7 14.8 IN A,(n) 2.7 10.8 11 asic 3.7 14.8 INC (HL) 3 12 11 INC (IX+d) 5.7 22.8 23 INC r 1 4 4 INC rr 1.6 6.4 6 INC IX 2.7 10.8 10 IND 4.7 18.8 16 asic 5.3 21.2 INDR ? ? 21/16 INI 4.7 18.8 16 asic 5.3 21.2 INIR ? ? 21/16 JP (HL) 1* 4* 4 JP (IX) 2* 8* 8 JP c,nn 3 12 10 JP nn 3 12 10 JR c,d 2.7/2 10.8/8 12/7 JR d 2.7 10.8 12 LD (rr),A 2 8 7 LD (HL),r 2 8 7 LD (HL),n 3 12 10 LD (IX+d),r 4.7 18.8 19 LD (IX+d),n 5.7 22.8 19 LD (nn),A 4 16 13 LD (nn),rr 6 24 20 LD (nn),HL 5 20 16 LD (nn),IX 6 24 20 LD A,(rr) 2 8 7 LD A,(IX+d) 4.7 18.8 19 LD A,(nn) 4 16 13 LD A,I 2.7 10.8 9 LD A,R 2.7 10.8 9 LD r,r 1 4 4 LD r,n 2 8 7 LD r,(HL) 2 8 7 LD r,(IX) 4.7 18.8 19 LD rr,(nn) 6 24 20 LD rr,nn 3 12 10 LD HL,(nn) 5 20 16 LD IX,(nn) 6 24 20 LD IX,nn 4 16 14 LD I,A 2.7 10.8 9 LD R,A 2.7 10.8 9 LDD 4.7 18.8 16 LDDR 5.7/4.7 22.8/18.8 21/16 LDI 4.7 18.8 16 LDIR 5.7/4.7 22.8/18.8 21/16 NEG 2 8 8 NOP 1 4 4 OR (HL) 2 8 7 OR (IX+d) 4.7 18.8 19 OR r 1 4 4 OR n 2 8 7 OTDR ? ? 21/16 OTIR ? ? 21/16 OUT (C),r 2.7 10.8 12 asic 3.7 14.8 OUT (n),A 2.7 10.8 11 asic 3.7 14.8 OUTD 4.7 18.8 16 asic 5.3 21.2 OUTI 4.7 18.8 16 asic 5.3 21.2 POP rr 3 12 10 POP IX 4 16 14 PUSH rr 3.7 14.8 11 PUSH IX 4.7 18.8 15 RES b,(HL) 4 16 15 RES b,(IX+d) 6.7 26.8 23 RES b,r 2 8 8 RET 3 12 10 RET c 3/1.6 12/6.4 11/5 RETI 4 16 14 RETN 4 16 14 RL (HL) 4 16 15 RL (IX+d) 6.7 26.8 23 RL r 2 8 8 RLA 1 4 4 RLC (HL) 4 16 15 RLC (IX+d) 6.7 26.8 23 RLC r 2 8 8 RLCA 1 4 4 RLD 4.7 18.8 18 RR (HL) 4 16 15 RR (IX+d) 6.7 26.8 23 RR r 2 8 8 RRA 1 4 4 RRC (HL) 4 16 15 RRC (IX+d) 6.7 26.8 23 RRC r 2 8 8 RRCA 1 4 4 RRD 4.7 18.8 18 RST x 3.7 14.8 11 SBC A,(HL) 2 8 7 SBC A,(IX+d) 4.7 18.8 19 SBC A,r 1 4 4 SBC A,n 2 8 7 SBC HL,rr 3.7 14.8 15 SCF 1 4 4 SET b,(HL) 4 16 15 SET b,(IX+d) 6.7 26.8 23 SET b,r 2 8 8 SLA (HL) 4 16 15 SLA (IX+d) 6.7 26.8 23 SLA r 2 8 8 SRA (HL) 4 16 15 SRA (IX+d) 6.7 26.8 23 SRA r 2 8 8 SRL (HL) 4 16 15 SRL (IX+d) 6.7 26.8 23 SRL r 2 8 8 SUB (HL) 2 8 7 SUB (IX+d) 4.7 18.8 19 SUB r 1 4 4 SUB n 2 8 7 XOR (HL) 2 8 7 XOR (IX+d) 4.7 18.8 19 XOR r 1 4 4 XOR n 2 8 7 n = byte (0 to 255) nn = word (0 to 65535) d = displacement (-128 to 127) r = register (A,B,C,D,E,H,L) rr = register pair (BC,DE,HL,SP) b = bit (0 to 7) IX = IX or IY c = condition * = very probable value (not tested) ? = not tested, compare with other instructions NB: for unofficial Z80 instructions which use the high of low half of IX or IY you must add 4 t-states to the tested value for the HL equivalent. For example LD IXh,0 is based on LD H,0; this instruction takes 8 t-states so LD IXh,0 takes 8+4 = 12 t-states. Well that wraps up this table, if you are into the optimizing business do use this table and not the official t-state values because you could be wasting a lot of time, yours and the processor's. Any comments and or remarks on this article would be most welcome, send them either to Fred or to me. Stefan Drissen 2 May 1993 Zevende Herven 6 5232 JZ 's-Hertogenbosch The Netherlands BM Brian Returns How Stefan ever found time to compile that large, and to be honest rather frightening table I'll never know, but he did manage, and I think it deserves a round of applause: (clap here) Right. There have been numerous pleas for passwords and tips for the games available for the SAM, as well as numerous letters containing such tips and passwords. Over the next couple of pages, therefore, you can find some of them. Colin compiled these pages. Which makes a change from sitting around playing Triltex, doesn't it Colin! No, I won't hear a word against our Col. He may like watching Australian TV programs, but hey, nobody's perfect. CM Cheats A lot of you have been requesting cheats for some of the latest games, so here's a few pointers. Parallax : Hold down as many keys as possible on the menu screen Dyzonium : Type in DIGITAL DREAMING. WaterWorks : The passwords are :- 2 KANGAR 9 REDWIN 16 FORFOR 3 CLIMBA 10 PENCIL 17 SEVNTE 4 OPENTH 11 HELLAN 18 TONINE 5 STAYAL 12 DIVEAN 19 TENNIN 6 STEALS 13 SHIRTC 20 TWOTEN 7 HEAVEN 14 SEVXTO 21 PONTOO 8 GARDEN 15 TENNFI 22 DUBTWO Bulgulators passwords :- FOX, LIE, ALE, RAT, TNT, KEY, WEB, GIN, OFF CM Cheats Boing : to activate invincibility against the nasties :- Get the torch (hidden behind tree trunk). Jump up 8 times in the middle of the bridge between the fish. After falling down, drop the torch. Use one of the teleporters. Wop Gamma : the passwords are :- 5 SANITY 55 DURESS { NB : If HAUNCH doesn't work on your 10 ZAPHOD 60 CARROT } version, send the disc back to 15 BOING! 65 TEABAG { Revelation with an SSAE. 20 SPLAT! 70 WAFFLE } 25 MELLOW 75 LANDER { We were going to publish the cheat 30 DOMAIN 80 HAUNCH } mode but decided not to at the last 35 SENTRY 85 TARDIS { minute. We might publish it later in 40 MOUSSE 90 JARRE! } the year. 45 OUTCRY 95 FROG!! { 50 HIMMEL } CM Price List details By now, everyone that has bought anything from FRED will have at least one (or possibly dozens!) of copies of the FRED order form. However, the form at present doesn't tell you anything about the software. So, I'll just do a brief rundown of what each item is : Impatience : Set of two puzzle games Triltex - TLL : Extra levels for Impatience Parallax : Shoot-em-up SpellMaster : Spell checker with 80,000 words incorporating word processor and anagram & crossword solver. Dyzonium : Cross between a shoot-em-up and collect-em-up Bulgulators : Pacman in the 90's with 100 colourful levels, locked doors, one way walls and lots more Boing! : Colourful and professional Dizzy style game - originally to be published by Noesis Software WaterWorks : Arcade/Puzzle game which proved to be a bit of an unexpected success. CM Price List details ETracker : Music creation package. This is the standard package used to create all SAM music today. See samples in ETunes sections. MasterDOS : Best-selling extension to DOS. Allows date stamping, ramdiscs, sub-directories and more. MasterBASIC : Extension to SAM Basic. Essential for avid BASIC programmers. FileManager : Creative and flexible database program. GamesMaster : Menu driven games creation system. Creates stand-alone m/c games. SC_Assembler : Standard assember/dissassembler. SC_Filer : Database creation program. SC_Monitor : Monitor your machine code. Lets you see exactly what's happening in m/c programs. SC_DTP : Desk Top Publishing program. CM Price List details GM_Base : Simple database program. GM_Calc : Simple spreadsheet program. SAMDisk 2 : Disc doctor utility. SAMTape 4M : Last version of excellant Spectrum emulator. Banking System : PBS - self explanitory!! Outwrite V2 : Popular word processor. Incorporates simple spell checker. Style Writer : Mini colour DTP program. Wop Gamma : Excellent Boulder Dash clone. 100 levels, almost 20 tunes and 5 graphic banks. Manic Miner : Souped up graphics and sonics, and three times the number of levels from the original! Batz 'n' Balls : Arkanoid mouse compatible game. 160 levels. The Secretary : Best-selling word processor of 1992!!! CM Price List details Days Of Sorcery : Colourful adventure game. Sheriff Gunn : Adventure game set in a Western town MIDI Sequencer : Lets you program your MIDI keyboard. SCADs : SAM Coupe Arcade Development System. Adds dozens of new commands to BASIC to allow simple creation of arcade games. Anti-Glare scrn : Anti-Glare 14" monitor screen. SAMPrint : Poster/ Card/ Headed paper designer. FRED Publishing can also supply a wide range of printers, computers and consoles. The latter two can be purchased at discounted prices between now and Christmas. Phone for quotes. Brands available : Citizen, Commodore, Sega, Atari, Amstrad... Remember folks, orders need not be placed on order forms - a letter will suffice. Or subscribers can simply order by phone and have goods despatched same day! BM Disc Contents For those of you who are to observation what the Tories are to promise-keeping, that was a brief rundown of the FRED price list so that you all know exactly what to spend your money on this autumn. And now, FRED Publishing proudly presents - the contents if Issue 36! Woooo! Yeah! Woooo again! SCREENS contains some ported Amiga screens by AXE, some screens from Lemmings, AND some from The Witching Hour. They should keep you going until we get some demos sorted out. STARBUG is a very nice GAMESMASTER game by Nathan Dolan. It's a shoot-'em-up of sorts, and you have to collect the grey and blue rectangles (or is it the grey and RED ones? I can never remember...). The keys are 67890, or you can use a joystick (provided you've GOT one, naturally). BM Disc Contents PARADOX is a music demo by Andy Monk which could, as Andy himself points out, be renamed Best of Andy Monk's music. It contains some new tunes, some older, remixed tunes and some which he put on to fill up space (maybe). NOTEPAD. Ah, now HERE's a treat for you all. This is a full word processor, and is really quite incredible. Calvin Allett wrote it, and it's just indescribable! There are SO MANY FEATURES! A full and comprehensive instruction file is included, and although the package is a doddle to use, you will almost certainly miss out on the finer details unless you read this. In order to load the instrution file, you load up Notepad, press EDIT to enter Command Mode, the L to load something. Elect to load a file, enter the filename as NOTIN and then the instructions'll load in. Sorry. I just need to go and lie down. This word processor is so good I'm getting all dizzy. Before I forget, you'll need to load the CONFIG file, just as a text file, to set it up as you want it to be. BM Disc Contents CELEBRATE is a superb (that word again!) machine code demo written by Stefan Drissen featuring 4 layers of parallax scrolling, a specially written Andy Monk soundtrack and a nice spectrum analyser effect. And the fact that all the graphics were done by Aesthetix (me) has nothing to do with my pointing out that this is an excellent demo. STEVE TAYLOR not only managed to write another article on machine code, but he sorted out the iffy numbering as well - issues 34 and 35 both had part 23 on them, but now we're at number 25 and all is right with the world again. THE WOMBLES caused quite a stir with their last demo, and now they're back with another one! This one features the usual scrolly and music (and we wouldn't have it any other way), BUT! It also gives you the once in a lifetime chance to watch - wait for it, wait for it - a womble raving!!! BM Disc Contents Steve Taylor notches up his second main menu appearance this month with his very own machine code birthday demo. Awww, innit sweet.... (The demo. Not Steve. Godlike, omniscient, perhaps, but not sweet). Oh! What have we here? Could this be another undeniably brilliant utility we've got for you? Why, I do believe it could be. And wait a mo - isn't this a very fine indeed PC disc reader? Well well well. Geoff Winkless wrote this, and it's truly awesome. I don't know. You people are spoiled aren't you? £2 this issue cost you. £2. Two measly quid!! And you not only get a word processor that makes Outwrite! look like a cabbage but you get a program that does vurtually everything that PC Suite (£30) does. No. It's too much. I can't take it any more. All this classy software starting to get to me. There'll be a complete machine code game next. Guess what? BM Disc Contents Yup - a complete machine code game! (Oh surprise surprise...) Darren "Spellmaster" Clarke of, erm, Spellmaster fame wrote this extremely difficult board-game type thing, and I really am starting to wonder how we do it. How on Earth are we able to bring you such good stuff? Anybody even THINKS about saying this issue is a waste of money is going to get very nasty letters for months, possibly YEARS to come (and you think I'm kidding?!). Anybody who manages to beat the computer at this game on the most difficult level will first of all be congratulated, and then taken outside for a good kicking for being too clever for their own good. ADVERTS is its usual dependable, reliable, self; not too exciting, but security is the keyword here. Lastly, we've temporarily binned Bits 'n' Bobs. In its place is a small database which just happens to contain details of everything that's ever appeared on FRED. That's all. BM Disc Contents Nothing special, just a small program so you can look at it once, shrug a little shrug, and leave it alone. Yeah, RIGHT! I know for a fact that most of you have been crying out for this program - FREDEX!! Hurrah! Short for FRED(ind)EX took literally days (woah!) to write and compile, and I should know, because I wrote it (Tcha. Has to get his bit of credit in somewhere, doesn't he - EVERY FRED READER. PROBABLY). No more digging through old issues of FRED looking for things - at last there's a catalogue to sort through. If you like this program, don't clap - just throw money (you know it makes sens). Right that's it. That's yer lot. E-Tunes we've missed out because Andy Monk's Paradox demo more than covers the music side of things. Chris White's Invaders column will return next issue, and we'll hopefully get some nice product demonstrations sorted out as well. BM Last Page Look, I'm sorry, but it's 23:30, I am very tired (having worked in Wm Low from 7:30am until 8:00 pm!!!!!) and I am going to watch the rest of Naked City. It is actually quite funny; I've just seen the thing about L7 which was nowhere near as phoney and well, poor, as something like The Word would have made it. So - enjoy the issue, send us lots of money, and have a generally happy life. Thankyou and good night. (Don't forget to read the music bit and the wrestling bit though!) Finally, I'd like to give a wee mention to an AMIGA PD library, simply because it's great, it's cheap, and it's fast. This is now the official "FRED Editor's Fave Amiga PD Library", and don't you forget it! Discs are just 80p each (incredible by Amiga PD standards)! For more details write to: Alpha PD, 3 Whickham Street, Easington, {} And say you've got a Peterlee, Co. Durham, SR8 3DJ }{ SAM and FRED sent ya! BM Credits Editor: Brian McConnell Contributors (who are all brill): Stefan Drissen Calvin Allett AXE Steve Taylor Andy Monk The Wombles Stefan Drissen Darren Clarke Darren Hubbard Nathan Dolan Geoff Winkless Doug Murdoch (great tape!) Dr Alex Paterson (great music) ooOOoo Cheques payable to: Phone [redacted] FRED Publishing at [redacted] Music + wrestling >>>----->> BM Music Section As I said about 2 pages ago, I am knackered, and despite the fact that I've been buying numerous CDs recetly, including those by Rage Against The Machine, Amorphous Androgenous, Positiva Ambient Collection, Smashing Pumpkins, and The Jesus And Mary Chain, I am not going to be reviewing anything. Howard Price of The Wombles, however, will be reviewing things. Phew. Just about an empty Music Section! Jings! (ahem). Concert news: I had been promised a review of House of Pain/ Cypress Hill/Funkdoobiest at Glasow, but my reviewer has turned out to be a mite unreliable. He's not a SAM owner though, so feel free to direct feelings of discontent at him. I am hoping to go an see the Smashing Pumpkins and Teenage Fanclub in Glasgow in September, but no guarantees. Anybody interested in maybe meeting along there, get in touch. Right. Have a bit o' Howard... HP Reviews - Charlatans First up, Charlatans:Between 10th and 11th. A great one this. Forget the loud angry people like Alice in Chains, this nice quiet album is absolutely yer epitome of background soothing moosic. Ermm, this isn't coming out right, but then, it's so old you'll all have got it by now anyway, if you know your marbles. Exhibit A - I don't want to See the Sights. That's a good one for a start, it's got a sort of warbling bass wot's the same all the way through, some nice interesting and rather cracking guitar. Then it changes JUST when it's beginning to get predictable, and sounds really.. ace. Try on Exhibit B, C and D for size - Tremolo song, The End of Everything, Weirdo. Could be classed as boring, but the nostalgia of 1990 and the birth of our Sam is really nice. You'll not notice the duds, and get engrossed in some intricate graphic work before realising you've sung along to the whole album on it's first listen. This is a well cool record, to use a now out-dated phrase! Several million out of ten. HP Reviews - Blur Aha! Blur, the ridiculous puppet band from the pre-grungewear days (I love grungewear, but I hate the expensive kind!! Those designer bleeders made grunge a laughing stock!!). They've gone English, and we mean nice, '90s London Underground English. Face it, everyone loves London, even the pollution. Like this record - you'll be forgiven if you've unwittingly ripped the piss out of it with your mates - it's a cliche in its own lifetime. Unfortunately, it's really good! Oh, there're a couple of REALLY crap songs, like Resigned (Yawn), and the lyrics (or "words" to normal people) are strange to say the least. But you've got several berilliant songs. Like For Tomorrow, like Chemical World, like Sunday Sunday, like Blue Jeans. Almost unrecognisable progress has been made since Leisure (debut album, with about 4 good songs on it (Kitty! Give me my copy back NOW!)), though you can still hear it in Turn it up, and perhaps Villa Rosie. And then there's the Intermission and Commercial Break, frantic brilliance. It's all there, another great album (but then, I only buy albums I know I'll like! Next on the line is Jamiroquoi and Suede) 10/10. HP Reviews - Radiohead Pablo Hunny? Could you take out the trash? Okay, just as soon as you tell me why Radiohead's satisfactory debut is called Pablo Honey. Right. Things start off okay, with You, and Creep is a bast for the heart strings, but the next two are crap! So, it's quite lucky that the rest of the album is a fine example of commercially viable rock including Anyone Can Play Guitar, and Blow out, the latter of the two DOES blow out! I can almost see their three guitarists going mental at the end to get the screaming song. Thom's quite good aswell, though I don't really see what the commotion about his star-quality is about... Not a lot can be said about the album really, except for the two songs in the begnnning half (ie first side), which let it down, cos their too similar. Ripcord and Vegetable, however, make a good pair to tunes, ven though they sound quite samey. One last thing - this needs listening to, you're not going to get a rush of Play Me Again when you listen to it, but the songs are really good when you've listened to them so much you can recite the words without the songs playing... Only 7/10!!! HP Rage Against The Machine Pretty cr*p. But good cr*p. It'll sell. But don't listen to the album all at once. Funny really! Now I'm certain to get my head kicked in by some guy arguing that politics is best served up like this - ie shouted to some power chords. But don't think I don't like it just because it's simple - I wouldn't have bought the thing if I didn't go mad when I saw that Late Show, with Bullet in the Head (and Smashing Pumpkins' Rhinoceros - but later, later). Okay, so it loses something in the studio mix, but so does Catherine Wheel (another great album!!), so ou can't really complain. It starts very well - Bombstrack, with some nice funky rhythm to the rap, and okay "tune". Then follows the now classic Killing in the Name, but by then I advise a bit of a lie down or something, or the effect wears off. 10 tracks, all of which are pretty good examples of their loud funk/metal moosic, tend to get very repetitive, so the excellant Freedom and clever Township Rebellion are wasted, unless you deliberately start listening with these tracks. HP Rage Against The Machine Still, you couldn't want more, with the burning monk on the case, a name like Rage Against the Machine and titles such as Fistful of steel and Take the Power Back. No score accurately descibes this.... Quicksand Quicksand are loud. Of course, it's never obvious from this album - Slip - but what is apparent is that they value lots of songs, even if they are short on ideas. So you've got some really good tracks here (like Lie and Wait, and Baphomet). But you've also got to put up with the bands biggest drawback - the singer hasn't got much of a recognisable tune! However, if you play this loud, it's somehow fitting that he's just battling it out with the guitars, and you get interesting results, just not totally successful. A bit iffy, but then, if they were brilliant, you'd have heard of them! (or something like that!) Another 7/10.... HP Smashing Punkins - Siamese dream Only kidding, it's not out yet. But if it's as good as the CD-Single Cherub Rock, you're in for a great album. I'm getting it, so wait for the review in a couple of months time.... Tobermory puts away his big jangly headphones and goes to bed... See ya! BM Brief Comment Charlatans - crap Radiohead - dunno Blur - saw 'em live last year! Not bad Rage Against The Machine - Crap? CRAP?! How dare you!!!!!!! Quicksand - who?? Smashing Pumpkins - I DO have it. The album IS excellent, and Cherub Rock is a classic song. Wrestling time, grapple fans.... (aarrgghh! I SAID it!) DH Daz Hubbard's WWF Update After a severely stressful two months revising for and doing exams, I'm back with more WWF news, as, on re-reading the video reviews, it seemed like just a long listing of wrestling manuevers, didn't it? (Still more "entertaining" than a Jackie Collins novel). This months shamelessly outrageous plug. 6 (6!) Speccy games for a fiver. Yep, a barguin if I ever saw one, simply write to me for a list, to buy them individually, or enclose just £5 + 50p postage to get five of my choice (they'll be good ones, mind). This months listings of wrestlers are... ---------------------------------------------------------------- HULK HOGAN 295lbs Managed by Jimmy Hart Fan Favourite Old bloke with yellow trunks, and automatic top contender for any title he chooses. Seems more interested on how his latest film is doing than keeping a title. Recently caused a stir on saying that the WWF belt is just a "toy" (see later on). Finishing move - (the very useless) Legdrop ---------------------------------------------------------------- THE UNDERTAKER 328lbs Managed by Paul Bearer Fan Fabourite Person dressed in all black, has an irritating manager, and says "Rest in peace" all the time. Having problems with Mr. Hughes (next month), who recently stole his sacred urn. Finishing moves - Tombstone Piledriver ---------------------------------------------------------------- "The King" JERRY LAWLER 235lbs Rulebreaker Hardly ever wrestles, as he is commentating all the time. Hates Bret Hart. Also wrestles with the USWA, another federation. Also hates the chant "Burger King". Finishing move - Piledriver ---------------------------------------------------------------- LEX LUGER 270lbs Fan Favourite Once arrogant bloke, now the prime WWF marketing tool. Wants a shot at the WWF Champion Yokozuna, and will probably get it. Has a perfect body through years of bodybuilding. Also famous for his forarm, which has a six-inch steel plate embedded in it, to knock people out with. Finishing move - Running Forearm ---------------------------------------------------------------- GIANT GONZALEZ 460lbs Managed by Harvey Wippleman Rulebreaker A giant of a man - 7'7 inches! Wears a stupid caveman outfit. Can't find any opponents because everyone is scared of him! Finishing move - Choke Slam ---------------------------------------------------------------- TAG TEAMS ---------------------------------------------------------------- RICK AND SCOTT STEINER Combined Weight - 505lbs Fan Favoutites Current WWF tag champs. Both have amateur backgrounds and scientific skills. Currently switching titles often with Money Inc. - They beat Money Inc, two days later, Money Inc won the belts back and three days on, the Steiner got them back again. Finishing moves - Frankensteiner, Flying Bulldog, Top Rope DDT ---------------------------------------------------------------- MONEY INC Combined Weight - 508 lbs Rulebreakers The team of Ted Dibiase and Irwin R Schyster use huge wads of dosh to get everything. Three-time WWF tag-champs. Finishing moves - Million-Dollar-Dream sleeper hold (Dibiase) Write-Off Flying Clothesline (Schyster) ---------------------------------------------------------------- NEWS - Yokozuna, after winning the WWF title from Hulk Hogan, recently challenged any U.S. professional athlete to body-slam his 568 frame, on the deck of the U.S.S. Intrepid, a famous U.S. landmark, on July 4th. Many accepted his challenge, wrestlers, NFL stars, basketball players, even a 100 pound jockey, because they didn't want America to be shown up by the Japenese. They all tried, and failed. But, one more challenge was coming, from none-other than former-rulebreaker Lex Luger, who went to the ring, called Yokozuna a "Blood-sucking, sushi-chomping champion", hit him with his forearm and prompting slamming the fat bloke. Lex Luger, in the days that followed, demanded a title shot, which has been denied by Mr Fuji, Yokozuna's manager. Expect the match to happen at Summerslam 93, in Detroit, Michigan. HULK HOGAN QUITS! Hogan handed in his notice on 1st July. But why? Well, it seems that it is a combination of bad-mouthing the WWF while wrestling in Japan in May ("I'm a five-time WWF Champ. To me, this belt is a toy, like a Christmas tree ornament. The WWF belt is like a Honda, the IWGP [Japanese federation] belt is like a Rolls-Royce. It's the real championship belt."), and the massive court case the WWF boss, Vince McMahon, has over Steroid abuse, his relationship with other wrestlers, illigal payments, possesion of illigal substances i.e. cocaine, heroin, marajuana, and sexual misconduct. Never mind, he couldn't wrestle for toffee anyway. Ted Dibiase is reputed to leave the WWF after 5-6 years in it. It is understood he will leave after Summerslam 93, and Irwin R. Schyster will become a singles wrestler. RUMOUR MILL: Sensation Sherri (manager of wrestlers like Randy Savage, Ted Dibiase and Shawn Michaels) has left the WWF. She will open up a beauty parlour (!?!) instead. The results for the KING OF THE RING supercard are as follows... PAPA SHANGO pinned OWEN HART with a shoulder-breaker in a match not seen on TV...BRET HART pinned RAZOR RAMON in 10.28 (match time) after Ramon duffed up a back suplex...MR PERFECT defeated MR HUGHES by DQ in 6.02...BAM BAM BIGELOW beat HACKSAW JIM DUGGAN in 5.01 with a Flying Headbutt in a truly dire match... TATANKA and LEX LUGER wrestled to a 15 minute time limit draw. As a result, Bigelow had a bye into the finals...Bret Hart beat Mr Perfect by reversing a Small Package in 18.57 in a contender for Match Of The Year...YOKOZUNA defeated HULK HOGAN in 13.11 for the WWF title when an actor, sorry, I mean a photographer's camera blew up in Hogan's face...the STEINERS and the SMOKING GUNNS defeated MONEY INC & the HEADSHRINKERS in 6.48 when Billy Gunn pinned Ted Dibiase with a Small Package...Shawn Michaels retained his Intercontinental Title by defeating Crush with a Superkick in 11.11...Bret Hart downed Bam Bam Bigelow in 18.45 with a Victory Roll to win the tournement and have the title "King Of The Ring". After the last match-up, Jerry "The King" Lawler, attacked Hart, for "being a pretender to his throne". This leads to the next item: SUMMERSLAM 93 match-ups The next WWF supercard will be on Sept 1st on Sky Sports, and only two matches have been set so far... BRET HART vs JERRY LAWLER: Resulting from the previous item. Although both are scientific competitors, don't expect this one to be that, this is going to be a brawl... and the UNDERTAKER vs GIANT GONZALEZ in a R.I.P. match. Haven't a clue what this one's about, although it's likely to be a Loser Leaves WWF match (explain's itself that one...) Thats it for this month. Stay tuned next month for more absolutly-not-fixed-at-all-even-though-when-the-camera-exploded- in-Hogans-face-it-didn't-even-touch-a-foot-away-from-him-action. Remember the 6 (6!) games for a fiver! The address to write to is Darren Hubbard, [redacted]. Barguins-a-plenty and stuff. Next month sees more listings of Mr Perfect, Doink, Adam Bomb, Mr Hughes, Bam Bam Bigelow, Jim Duggan, the Smoking Gunns and M.O.M. (not Holmes and Leonardi! (Then again, with them going to work on 16-bitters, it would be...interesting to see them match up with these guys!!!) (Only kidding!) See you in 30. DH "U.S.A." by WWF SUPERSTARS/HACKSAW JIM DUGGAN Review by DARREN HUBBARD Don't buy it. It's crap.
Letters & Reviews
BM Letters/Reviews Before I begin, I'd like to say that I've had a couple of letters asking if we can get rid of that nasty ol' white text on black. Well, the good news is you CAN change the colours of the text and the background, and this has been possible for well over a year now! Had you read the first page you would have noticed that pressing brings up the Colour Menu from which you can choose any colours you like. I myself quite like a medium shade of blue, or a pleasant yellow, but please don't let this influence your choice one little bit - remember, I am colourblind! But enough droning on. Let's have some letters! Letter from Pauli Lindgren In the FRED #26, Daniel Cannon wrote about the new features he would like to be added to SAM. He suggested that a DMA should be added to boost the graphics and sound features. I don't think that would be much use. DMA would improve the speed of scrolling, but not as much as you may think. The processor is NOT free to do other things while DMA is working, since DMA takes over the system bus. What we really need is hardware scrolling logic. That is, a 15-bit register that contains the starting address of the display within the display page. Scrolling (vertical, horizontal or diagonal) would be performed simply by writing new value to this register. Scrolling would be instant, not a bit of screen data would need to be moved. That is how scrolling works on most other computers. Letter from Pauli Lindgren The graphics features of SAM could also be improved. First thing that you notice when you look at SAM screen is that only small part of TV screen is used. SAM uses only 192 lines, but there is room for at least 256 lines in non-interlaced mode. A very simple way to enhance the resolution would be just to use more lines on screen. Of course, there could also be more pixels per line. Both of the above enhancements are very simple and require very little hardware, but they can only be done inside the ASIC. I would also like to see more colours and additional modes with higher resolution, but these would be more complex things to do. Since the ASIC chip is in socket, it can be easily replaced (no soldering iron needed, Calvin Allett!). This is a much neater way to update SAM than those white boxes sticking out the back of the machine. Letter from Pauli Lindgren I don't believe developing a slightly modified version of the ASIC is that expensive. It is not the same thing as creating a whole new ASIC. Unfortunately, after Samco collapsed, there is no-one to do such development. Blitter chip and sound hardware, on the other hand, could be done as external add-ons. I don't see much use for a Blitter chip. Sound card would be nice, but I am afraid it would be expensive. Simple DMA would not do the trick. You can't get good sound quality with just 4 bits and no output filtering. And if DMA used SAM's internal memory and sound chip, it would take over the system bus and thus block the processor from doing anything while the sound is output. Amiga-style sound device should include external RAM, D/A convertters, filters and complex control logic. I'd estimate such a device would cost something between £100 and £150. Would there be demand for it at that price? Letter from Pauli Lindgren Anyway, perhaps some day I will build something like that for myself. It would perhaps help if I had the Hardware Development Kit. I ordered couple of kits from Samco already in February 1992 but never received them. Does anybody actually have the kit or the Kaleidoscope? Do such things even exist? I wonder why West Coast Computers or anybody else do not sell them. Now onto another subject: Spell Master. I am using it just now, and it is quite a nice little word processor. The spelling check works fine, it is fast and handy. However, there are some things I find irritating. This damn thing does not even know the word YOU! Now, about the missing plurals. Adding the plurals to the dictionary would NOT double the dictionary size. You would only need one bit for each word to indicate, if the plural form is allowed. Or you could reserve a whole byte for each word, to allow flags for other endings, such as -ing or -ed. Letter from Pauli Lindgren Another defect is the keyboard scanning. I don't understand why it is so difficult to make it work correctly. When I write a word starting with a capital letter, Spell Master almost every time writes two characters, a capital and a lower case letter. It may be my typing style, but in any case, there is no such problem with the Basic editor, nor with any word processor on other computers. On most SAM games and other programs (including Flash and the Fred text reader menu), the key scanning works unreliably. When you press a key e.g. to move the cursor, the cursor may not move at all, or it may move 2 or 3 positions. And then the key starts repeating without any repeat delay! There is a working key scanning routine in the ROM. Why don't the programmers use it? One more thing. Would you please give the address of Your Sinclair (or is there other Spectrum/SAM magazines still available?) None of Sinclair magazines have been for sale here in Finland for many years. BM Reply to Pauli Lindgren I may as well take this opportunity to say that I firmly believe that trying to upgrade the SAM is not going to do any good. If people are really concerned about music they'll buy Amigas or, although this is perhaps less likely these days, an ST. The SAM has no chance at all of ever being better than the Amiga, but some people seem to believe that would be no problem at all. If it was so easy to build a cheap machine that could make the present Amigas look like cheap toys, I'm sure Commodore would have realised buy now and built it themselves. The Amiga is now £200 for a bottom-end model. The SAM is never going to succeed in terms of the commercial world in which companies such as Commodore and Sega can be found. The people who buy SAMs are going to do so because of its user-friendliness, the fact that you can write your own programs with ease. The graphics and sound capabilities of the SAM really aren't that important to such people; they're good to have, certainly, but not the be-all-and-end-all. BM Reply to Pauli Lindgren Yes, I now know that adding plurals to Spellmaster would not necessarily double the size of the dictionary, but it would add a good couple of thousand bytes. It's too late to change it now, anyway. As for words which Spellmaster doesn't recognize - you are allowed to add these words to the dictionaries, you know. It's usually just a case of finding a word which should be included (but isn't) and then adding it to the dictionary. Simple. I've no idea about your key-scanning problems, but I do know that from now on there are no widely-available Spectrum/SAM magazines. YS closed down just last month, as you'll know if you got FRED 35. The Kaleidoscope. The hardware development kit. Do they exist? Well, there'll be a couple going around, but I'd say your chances of getting hold of one are a little worse than terrible. - BRIAN Letter from Marc Rickard Dear Colin, Just a short note about the SCPDSA. I've just received FRED32 and read your news piece about the mentioned association, and I'd like to say that having paid out something like £4 (I can't remember the exact price - it's ages since I've heard anything at all) I received one rubbish Karate Kid disc, and that's it. I'd like to thank you for pursuing this matter - people should not be allowed to get out away with this out-and-out theft. Many thanks, Yours sincerely, Marc Rickard CM Reply to Marc Rickard Thanks for the vote of confidence Marc. Unfortunately, there's nothing more I can do. I've contacted Brent Stevens himself numerous times with nothing resolved. One reader took the matter up with the Trading Standards Office, and managed to get a refund. I contacted the TSO of behalf of everyone that Brent conned, but they were only interested in hearing from the people that Brent directly owes money to. So, if the SCPDSA still owes you outstanding issues, write to : Mrs Coventry c/o Trading Standards Office, [redacted], Tel : [redacted] Letter from Calvin Allett 25th July 1993. Dear Colin/Brian, I'm just writing to let you know that if you want anyone to write reviews of games then I wouldn't mind reviewing some. The only reason I haven't been buying the games you've been releasing is because I'm saving up for an Amiga 1200 + hard disc and so I need all my money (that's why I wanted to know if you had any plans to enter the Amiga market!). I can review any games but I don't like adventure games (by that I mean I don't like the type where you have to type in east, north etc, I like the Monkey Island type of adventure games though), also it's pointless me trying to review an assembler or moniter because I don't program in machine code but anything else's OK if you haven't found enough people yet. Letter from Calvin Allett If you want anymore articles written then let me know, also I'm busy writing a program to go with The NotePad that allows you to insert graphics within a document, you can also draw lines for underlining or borders if you like and you can draw circles, by using the graphics feature you can add big titles etc as graphics, it won't be a DTP program or anything like that but it would make a good FRED freebie. Would you be interested in using this on FRED ? BM Reply to Calvin Allett Thanks for offering to review stuff for us. I'm sure Colin'll get in touch with those who've volunteered to help. You can read a couple of reviews by one quick-off-the-mark young chap later in this section. As for that graphics thingy - yes please!! - BRIAN Letter from Graeme Tattersall Dear FRED, Congratulations on a great disk magazine, happy 3rd birthday. Does anyone know what West Coast are planning to do with all the Speccys that they will get from this 50 Part exchange thing against a SAM (you never know, they might get a lot). What happened to 'KALEIDOSCOPE' - you know, that thing that was supposed to expand the SAM's colour range. I heard that it adds two new modes (a 512 colour version of MODE 3, and a 1024 colour version of MODE 4 with a much higher resoloution) to the sam as well as expanding the colours. Is this true or has some fool been telling me fibs? I have a Canon BJ10-ex printer (page 13, Editorial Fred 31). I would agree with Brian in saying that it is an excellent printer, both for text and graphics, although you can't use the half decent graphics mode from the SAM. The text from the Sam is superb though. Letter from Graeme Tattersall Brian said that the font download facilities wouldn't work from the SAM. On my printer, they worked with a program called 'FONTWIST.4' from the Addenders section of Outlet (some issue after no.56). Some questions and other points now : 1. What happened to kaleidiscope, the interface that gave the SAM quite a few thousands of colours. Was it any good? Can it still be bought? 2. Why doesn't someone design a hard drive for the SAM (say, about 20 or 40 Megabyte in size), or can the SAM not handle that kind of disc-based storage. 3. How about including the aforementioned 'FONTWIST.4' in FRED? It makes font-downloading a hell of a lot easier. Letter from Graeme Tattersall 4. Would it be possible for someone to design an emulator for the sam so that the sam could emulate, say a Commy 64 or even a BBC micro. This could shift the SAM's reputation from being a 'souped up Spectrum' as a terribly misinformed person once said to that of an extermely powerful all-rounder. Also, making the SAM compatible with the computer that the majority of schools still use (The BBC) could provide a gateway to success for the good old sam. 5. Is the SAM MOUSE (the one released by SAMCO) a genuine Atari ST Mouse. My mouse died - the plastic bits inside it snapped when I accidentally dropped it. If I was to buy an ST mouse, would it work with the SAM MOUSE interface box like the other one did. Nothing more for me to say now, except to repeat the first paragraph for emphasis - Happy birthday to FRED, and, to Colin, Brian, and anyone else involved with the production of this mag: keep up the good work. I wish fred every success in the future. BM Reply to Graeme Tattersall Taking your points one at a time (always a good method, I find), I'd imagine that any Speccies received will be cannibalised for parts or something. Maybe the people at West Coast can turn them into intelligent remote-controlled cars or something. Assuming that the Kaleidoscope wasn't an April Fool type thing, I think it's safe to say it WON'T be revolutionising the SAM world. I should have explained a little clearer what I meant when I said the font download wouldn't work with the SAM. It will work from any computer, I just wasn't aware that there was software available to do so on the SAM. I'll have to have a rummage around in Colin's collection of Outlets for that little proggy. I don't see that particular program being used on FRED, but you can obtain back issues of OUTLET from FRED if you want, for the price of a single issue of FRED - £2. Yup. BJ10-ex printers are GREAT!! BM Reply to Graeme Tattersall A hard drive of some sort would be amazing for the SAM!! I'm kind of saving up for one for my Amiga ("kind of" in the sense that I can never seem to get more than about £50 together at the one time), and a SAM one would make my life so much easier you wouldn't believe it. There're no plans to release one unfortunately, although it's not something which should be ruled out altogether. Seeing as the SAM cannot even successfully emulate the very similar Spectrum 128, I think it's safe to say a C64/BBC emulator is as likely as John Major winning the 1500 metres at the next Monifieth High School sports day (or the next election for that matter, ho ho). You should be okay with a normal ST mouse. If not just return it to the shop you bought it from and explain the situation. Provided you have the receipt I'm pretty sure they have to give you a refund or replacement as the goods are unfit for the purpose for which you bought them (or something). - BRIAN MS Review by Mike Sutherland Program : Campion - The Spreadsheet Publisher : Revelation Software Price : £29.95 (INDUG/FRED members £24.95) Thirty quid for a spreadsheet! For that sort of money I would expect this to be nothing short of the bee's knees'. For my money I got a 92 page A4 manual, a disk and two stickers for any working copies I may care to make. First impressions? Well, it's nice to see such care being taken with the manual - it seems to be laser printed and printed, VERY impressive! And then a look at the disc : no DOS, no Auto* file (so it's not a load-up straight away job) and the actual code for the database is only 22K long..!?! Either the programmers are extremely competent or I've just wasted £30! The manual was designed to be of use to both newcomers and old-hands at spreadsheets. This it does quite nicely except for the section where it tells you to perform various functions MS Campion without explaining what you are doing and why....weird! Anyway, that aside, the first 50 pages of the manual are taken up explaining how spreadsheets work, what makes this one tick and how to travel around the whole thing. The last 40 pages provide an alphabetical list to all the functions available to the user. These range from the "to-be-expected" ones like INT, TAN, IF and PI to the "looks-very-impressive-but-why-on-earth- would-anyone-use-that" like VLOOKUP, SYD, NPER and DDB. To explain the last one, DDB, here's the manual's definition : "DDB calculates the depreciation allowance by using the double- declining method, where the depreciation is high in the early years of the asset's life and gets lower as the asset reaches the end of it's useful life." If that didn't confuse you, there're dozens more just as complex which perform seemingly wonderfully useful functions - provided MS Campion you actually have a use for them. In short; every function under the sun is in Campion, as is every one under the moon, stars and any other orbiting objects you care to name. Campion has 128 x 1000 cells which should prove more than adequate for anyone. The clever bit (well - I thought it was clever) is that the length of the file you save out depends on how much you've typed into it ie if you just load up Campion and save out a blank spreadsheet it only takes up 163 bytes, but you can fill it right up to 64K (although it would take 6 months worth of typing!). Inside the actual spreadsheet you move the bar around using the cursor keys. You can start typing on the edit line at any time when you wish to enter something into a cell. The Edit key brings up the main menu at the top left of the screen. From this you can change almost everything. Like all good spreadsheets you can change the entire format of MS Campion each individual cell : it's alignment, width, format of how numbers are stored etc etc. If you enter a number above 1000, Campion automatically puts a comma after every three digits!! If you've used a spreadsheet before you will know that you can need to input a row/column of figures in a specific direction. What Campion does is it remembers the last direction the cursor bar moves in, and pressing Return will move the bar in the same direction again! For example : pressing cursor left, entering 1 , 2 , 3 will produce : 3 2 1 Clever eh? Two other unique features of Campion that immediately spring to mind are the "almost equal" and comments. The "almost equal" is a function which tests if two numbers are MS Campion "almost equal" ie 1/3 and 0.3333 are "almost equal" Obviously, anything greater than a minute decimal difference will result in the "almost equal" failing as well. Campion also allows you to enter comments as part of the formulae so that when you look at it again you have a note of what it did! This is achieved by putting a semi-colon after the formula followed by your comments. Very similar to a REM statement - and just as useful. I've been shown how to use three of the best PC spreadsheets in my time and provided I forget things like graphs, integration and mouse control, I can honestly say that Campion beats them hands down. It has clearly been designed and programmed by people that have spotted the downfalls of other spreadsheets and MS Campion have been able to come up with an ingenious program - especially in just 22K !!! I can honestly recommend that Revelation and the programmers get together and start on the PC market - they'd clean up. Other than minor niggles like the lack of hot keys and a few more personal choice touches, the only snag with Campion is it's hefty price tag. If you have any use for a spreadsheet whatsoever, you'll find it worth every penny - but perhaps Revelation should have gotten a demo version out on the market to let people see what they're getting, I mean £30 s a fair few bob to be splashing out on something you aint seen. But take it from me (if this gets printed), you won't be wasting your cash. Revelation Software, PO Box 114 Exeter Devon EX4 1YY . Reviews by Peter Vinnicombe Hi FRED, After reading your plea for a software reviewer in issue 35 of your mag, I thought you could consider me for doin the job! I'm interested in all sorts of software from utilities to games, and would jump at the chance to review them for you. Below are some samples of my reveiws... REVIEW: E-TRACKER PRICE: 30.00 ( 27.00 FOR FRED SUBBERS!) TYPE: MUSICAL UTILITY DISKS: 2, 1-MAIN DISK CONTAINING E-TRACKER+COMPILER 2-PROGRAMME DISK TO PUT YOUR OWN CREATIONS ON!!! PV Etracker Review E-tracker comes in a nicely painted glossy box containig disks with a professional 21 page manual. The manual is written in easy to understand English which takes you through step-by-step instructions. The main disk contains E-tracker itself and a rather useful compiler. The programme lets you use the full capabilities of the PHILIPS chip: 2048 Tones, 96 possible notes, 8 octaves, 6 channels. You can easily edit each seperate channel using different instruments and ornaments. You can also do various tricks at the touch of a few buttons ie copying large chunkss of music around and changing the speed etc. The compiler is very easy to use reducing the files from 125k to apprx. 4k-7k. E-tracker lets you perform any musical miracle and as it states in the manual " THE ONLY LIMITATION IS YOUR MUSICAL ABILITY". Quite honestly, I'm very crap at producing a musical piece myself but can achieve quite good results using this package. PV Etracker Review The only 2 disapointing things I came accross was that there wasn't any option letting you sample pieces of a CD or tape, And that there isn't the option to DE-COMPRESS the files; if you could then you will be able to browse through other people's work and learn more about the package by exploring their musical pieces!! LASTABILITY:9/10 USEFULNESS:8/10 PRESENTATION:7/10 MAIN FUNCTIONS:8/10 OVERALL: 8/10 - AN EXCELLENT BUY !!!! PV Boing Review REVIEW: BOING PRICE: 10.00 ( 9.00 SUBBERS) TYPE :ADVENTURE/PUZZLE GAME DISKS :1 Boing is a type of DIZZY clone where you have to search the land for items which will go on to solve various puzzles. The graphics are very good with very colourful and cute sprites. The object of the game is to find 20 potions, the crystal, the battery, and the lever, which will all help to get your time machine working again. The annoying thing is you can only carry 3 items at a time and you only get one life, which is all that is really needed as the game is far too easy. The game is quite big with 57 screens to visit and like all these games all that is needed is logical thinking! PV Boing Review The option to get rid of the sound (not music but sound) is quite useful as every time you jump, the music seems to get disturbed. GRAPHICS: 9/10 SOUND/MUSIC: 8/10 LASTABILITY: 6/10 - TOO EASY! OVERALL: 7/10