Date   : Tue, 06 Jul 1993 08:35:34 +1200
From   : David Andrew Sainty <David.Sainty@...>
Subject: Beeb graphics

I was thinking, what Tequilacomm really misses, or where it misses out MOST
over other machines, is lack of colour. And of course this spills over to
applications like GIF displaying etc.

So I would quite like to have a look at improving the situation.

Fundamentally, I want a simple character by character foreground/background
colour setting, with intensity (bold on/off) and probably flashing
too (with comms in mind). I'm looking at a very inexpensive system,
sitting between the RGB output and monitor (i.e. no composite or TV
support).

This system MAY be extendable to full pixel by pixel colour setting, or even
half pixel by half pixel, to double horizontal resolution (this all sort of
depends on how easy a task it is to lock onto the RGB data stream from
the beeb, which is what I'm going to look at first).

Other options are there.... A complete external video system, which would
obviously be more expensive, and not quite the "simple upgrade for a colour
terminal" job, this would really need using (gif viewers and stuff).
And then there is always the option of simply taking a standard IBM video
card and interfacing that to the beeb.

Anybody else interested in looking at this, or interested in the results
of what I try? And how would you want to use the system? (is just comms
type colour ok?)

Probably most important, how much is it worth? (i.e. do you like the idea
quite a lot, but only $20 lot?)

I think a character based colour system may be feasable for around $20 parts
(Not including connectors! :-). My design will probably be most influenced
by what I am able to recycle out of old circuits I've picked up, so I
may never find out a firm price (I always hope that it will cost me
nothing! :-)

Dave.