by Jack Kincaid / jkinca1@cugkc.cjb.net
And again Lenard Roach came through with a demo on operating the C64 on a battery. The Commodore just might become a portable yet! Now if we can find a monitor that is LCD and compatible with the C64 and a way to change the disk drive to a ram drive. Old things are new again!
Ken Clayton gave us a quick demo of a program called Tracer. This program can trace the execution of a basic program as it is running to show you where you are in the program. Ken will bring some documentation to the next meeting.
The Lacys went to the new Plaza library to check it out. His comment was that it was rather sparse so far. They do have a small meeting room. At the next meeting we can discuss if we want to go back to the Plaza.
All right then - next meeting will be on June 9 at 5120 Cedar the Roeland Park library at 6:30PM. Go to our website at http://cugkc.cjb.net and leave messages at the Forum!
I still have 64s and 128s with 1541 and 1571 drives. I also have monitors and printers just sitting in my basement doing nothing. For a small price they can be in your home doing something! Call or see me at the next meeting. My phone number is 816-761-4777, and I am home most days after 4:00 pm.
Financial Report
Balance Apr. 2005 ................... $293.44
Income: May 2005
Membership renewal ................
$ 10.00
Sale of printer ...................
$ 20.00
Total Income: May 2005 ..............
$ 30.00
Expenses:
May 2005 ..................-$ 0.00
Closing Balance May 2005 ............ $323.44
by Leslie Lacy / llacy1@cugkc.cjb.net
Helen & I visited the new library on 47th & Main. Guess what? They remembered our group! Yes, there are 2 rooms: 1 large and 1 small. Remembering that we had good meetings there in the past, do we want to try there again?
One drawback is that we can only meet there on Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday. This is a Missouri library and all close at 6:00 pm on Thursday and Friday.
Please let one of us know your thoughts or come to our meeting on June 9th at the Roeland Park Library!
by Lenard Roach / lroach1@cugkc.cjb.net
Thanks again to everyone for allowing Gabe and I to demonstrate the GABE.U.PAK.64 V2 battery pack for the C64. It was nice of the pack to die about 1/2 hour into the demo, but this is my fault. A rechargable battery needs to be charged completely and discharged completely at least three times before it reaches its full capacity. The GABE.U.PAK.64 V2 was only charged once before I brought it to the Club to demo. However, in that 1/2 hour we got to show you that this larger model of the GABE.U.PAK.64 V1 can handle the pull from a standard Commodore 64 desktop setup. If someone knows where we can get an inexpensive LCD style flat panel monitor that has RCA style plug ins for inputs, then we should be set. We were also thinking of making the power inverter handle more capacity than the 175 watt unit we now use. This way we could add a printer to the mix and the Commodore 64 can truly be a stand alone unit.
Well, after much procrastination, here are the photos of the GABE.U.PAK.64 V1 and V2 battery packs. Please note that I stink as a photographer, so some of the photos are a little fuzzy. Hopefully, though, you'll get the idea of what we've been working on all this time.
Now about cost: To buy the GABE.U.PAK.64 V1 and all the attachments, including the charger, will cost $159.99. The GABE.U.PAK.64 V1 alone is $89.99, which is cheaper than most laptop batteries.
The GABE.U.PAK.64 V2 however is $219.99 for the PAK alone. Add an extra $70.00 for the other attachments. If you can find any of these components cheaper in your area, then by all means get them there. The PAK, however, is professionally welded and sealed. Gabe and I designed it, but we had JLH3 Electronics do the actual building of the PAK.
These PAKs are versatile; therefore you can use them for more than just the Commodore units. As long as you have a power cord, then this PAK should work for you; just remember that the more power you use, the quicker the PAK will discharge, and you cannot use more watts than what the inverter can pull constantly. If you want more watts than what is offered by the inverter we offer in our package, then we can get you one for a slightly higher cost.
If you have any questions, comments, or observations about the units, then please leave us email at lroach1@cugkc.cjb.net.
The Commodore Users Group of Kansas City is a not-for-profit educational support group for persons using Commodore computers.
Membership benefits include a monthly newsletter as well as access to CUGKC's library of over 1000 public domain and shareware disks.
Dues are $15 the first year, $10 annually thereafter. Disks of the month and library disks cost $3 each for members.
Meetings are held on the second Thursday of every month at the Cedar Roe branch of the Johnson County Library, located at 5120 Cedar Street in Roeland Park, Kansas. Visitors are welcome to attend any meeting. For more information, contact any officer:
Email us at cugkc@cugkc.cjb.net
or visit our web site at http://cugkc.cjb.net.
Our snail-mail address is:
CUGKC
6025 Corona Avenue
Kansas City, Kansas 66102