Hello Everyone,
Just wanted to say hi, as a new user.
Well, maybe not that new, I remember logging in there a few years ago, but I couldn't remember my former account name. Maybe it got deleted.
Anyway, I've recently restarted playing with an old 486 laptop. Since I am a bit masochist, I installed Windows NT 3.51 on it, and after messing with IRQ conflicts and things like that, managed to get the
PCMCIA modem to work alongside the 10 mbit/s Ethernet card. But modem is more fun, and I've found an old Qmodem setup which had this BBS's phone number in its dialer. I was glad to see it work again! And
also very surprised to be able to do 57600 bauds over the VoIP codecs of my landline provider (which gets encapsulated over IP, I guess).
I like playing with old retro computer stuff, I am also the owner of an Apple //e, which I could try to connect to here since it has a Super Serial card. I would need to find a modem for it though. I also
have a Macintosh SE that was bought by my father in the late 80s, which I mostly use to play Shufflepuck with my son!
And when I'm not messing around with weird computers, it's often because I'm under the hood of some of my old cars from the 80s. I guess I was born in the wrong decade!
I'm glad to see places like this are still around. I'll make sure to connect on a regular basis so I can contribute. I've managed to make SemPoint work with QWK packets, even though the call is toll-free
for me, despite calling from overseas, I find it quite comfortable to do it this way.
Hi Thlc, I don't delete accounts unless they've been used for malicious purposes, so you old account is probably still here. There's an option from the main menu to show the user list - you might find your old account in there perhaps?
NT 3,51 I remember installing that for the first time and being impressed with the stability of it.
Where did you get Qmodem from btw? Interesting that Magnum BBS appears in the phone directory :)
Do you own any other retro computers?
Are you originally from the UK?
Hello Everyone,Hello THomas, enjoyed reading your message. Dialup is the best. I agree.
Just wanted to say hi, as a new user.
Well, maybe not that new, I remember logging in there a few years ago, but I > couldn't remember my former account name. Maybe it got deleted.
Anyway, I've recently restarted playing with an old 486 laptop. Since I am a > bit masochist, I installed Windows NT 3.51 on it, and after messing with IRQ > conflicts and things like that, managed to get the PCMCIA modem to work
alongside the 10 mbit/s Ethernet card. But modem is more fun, and I've found > old Qmodem setup which had this BBS's phone number in its dialer. I was glad > see it work again! And also very surprised to be able to do 57600 bauds over > the VoIP codecs of my landline provider (which gets encapsulated over IP, I
guess).
I like playing with old retro computer stuff, I am also the owner of an Appl > //e, which I could try to connect to here since it has a Super Serial card. > would need to find a modem for it though. I also have a Macintosh SE that wa > bought by my father in the late 80s, which I mostly use to play Shufflepuck
with my son!
And when I'm not messing around with weird computers, it's often because I'm > under the hood of some of my old cars from the 80s. I guess I was born in th > wrong decade!
I'm glad to see places like this are still around. I'll make sure to connect > a regular basis so I can contribute. I've managed to make SemPoint work with > QWK packets, even though the call is toll-free for me, despite calling from
overseas, I find it quite comfortable to do it this way.
BTW, I am calling from the south of France, near Marseille.
Thanks for reading me, and see you soon!
Cheers,
--Thomas
* SeM. 2.26 * if (Original_Ver==OK) Don't_Upgrade();
Hello THomas, enjoyed reading your message. Dialup is the best. I agree. This BBS is a wonder in its connectivity. Amazed the number was in the dialler.Keyop, your work is highly prevalent in this niche world of retro.
all the best
Brian
Hello THomas, enjoyed reading your message. Dialup is the best. I agree. This BBS is a wonder in its connectivity. Amazed the number was in the dialler.Keyop, your work is highly prevalent in this niche world of retro.
Re: Hello from south of FranHello Thomas, what other retro computers do you have that you call BBS systems with? I'd be interested to know. I have a client program that emulates a MiniTel terminal. I have used it to try those hobbyist systems in France that try and preserve the TeleTel system. My BBC micro does it quite well albeit
By: Brianm to Thlc on Mon Oct 06 2025 20:36:33
Hello THomas, enjoyed reading your message. Dialup is the best. I agree. > > This BBS is a wonder in its connectivity. Amazed the number was in theHello Brian,
dialler.Keyop, your work is highly prevalent in this niche world of retro >
Well, the number was in the dialer because I got an old config that I had al >
Thomas L.
Rognac, France
Re: Hello from south of FranNow that would be an excellent idea. Direct dialup Prestel would be a
By: Brianm to Thlc on Mon Oct 06 2025 20:36:33
Hello THomas, enjoyed reading your message. Dialup is the best. I agree. > > This BBS is a wonder in its connectivity. Amazed the number was in the di > > all the best
Brian
I'm toying with the idea of creating a 1200/75 7E1 dial in line for prestel >
I need nelgin to finish and publish his mode 7 work for Synchronet though to >
K
Hello Thomas, what other retro computers do you have that you call BBS systems with? I'd be interested to
know.
I have a client program that emulates a MiniTel terminal. I have used it to try those hobbyist
systems in France that try and preserve the TeleTel system. My BBC micro does it quite well albeit
the rendering is only in three colours as the display is quite a high resolution. Are those systems
popular in France at all ?
Now that would be an excellent idea. Direct dialup Prestel would be a
major attraction for me. using Synchronet would me it highly connectable to all the other boards so it wouldn't get lonely. I take it I could gateway into it from the Magnum dialup numbers?
Minitel was very popular in the late 90s/early 2000s, but Internet replaced it quite fast. Nowadays, everything Minitel-related is only a geek niche. I remember dialling to 3614 HACKER
[http://www.3614hacker.fr/] a few years ago, it was fun.
I'm guessing Minitel closed down, like our Prestel service did?
Indeed, the Minitel network was shut down in June 2012. It was probably completely useless at this point anyway.
Thats quite late. Prestel was closed in 1994 according to wikipedia, although I'm sure it ran for a bit longer.
Yeah. But successful things last long! Like, I've recently discovered that AOL was shutting down its dial-up service. Or did I discover that AOL was *still* running its dial-up service?! haha!
I wonder if there are still any other dial-up ISPs still running ... ?
I had to go and look it up. Seemingly there is at least one dial-up ISP still running. Could be a bit of a hotbed of dodginess, though :)
The one I found is somewhat ironically called "nippy internet" and requires no sign-up, you just dial their 0844 "local rate" number and log in as "nippy", password "internet". So you could be anyone. I
guess
they track the calling party number but we all know that can be messed with.
Amusingly it has instructions for how to set up your dialer on Windows 95, 98, NT, ME, 2000, XP and Vista but nothing newer than that :)
BobW
0844 so thats 7p per min..... Wonder if I could make any money out of that idea? :)
The one I found is somewhat ironically called "nippy internet" and requires no sign-up, you just dial their 0844 "local rate" number and log in as "nippy", password "internet". So you could be anyone. I guess they track the calling party number but we all know that can be messed with.
Well, someone evidently thinks so. I guess there's not that many lines on it and telephony is cheap.
I think 08 numbers are super variable by carrier. Their site says 6.5p/min peak or 1p/min evenings and weekends - I feel like it would cost me more than that on my mobile or that pointless POTS port Vodafone
light up for me on my router, want it or not.
It actually came in vaguely handy the other day, I stuck my oscilloscope on it to see what the signal was doing on idle and when you call its number. Fixed a problem my colleague was having, though I think
we
could have guessed to try flipping the polarity without the supporting evidence :)
I think I might have tried this. Would have made a useful way to connect this doddery Acorn up for some POP3 email. But when I tried, none of the numbers actually answered.
I think I might have tried this. Would have made a useful way to connect this doddery Acorn up for some POP3 email. But when I tried, none of the numbers actually answered.
I was looking at the ofcom website which said up to 7p, so I guess thats the maximum charge?
Wish I had ordered a POTS line before they stopped selling them a few years ago... We still havent switched to fibre only on our exchange.
I'm typing this on an A3020 with its top off (fnar fnar) whic is my BBSing device of choice.
Yeah... despite making my living off selling PON equipment the wind down of analogue phone lines makes me really uncomfortable, mostly from a survivable comms perspective. The "incident" in the week really
brought that back to mind. I think I'm gonna buy some meshtastic stuff and see what's about. I can't wait to see Vodafone's RFO on that one, I think the withdrew a huge portion of their routes for a couple
of
hours, that's not your everyday oopsie. My first hop in the Vodafone network was sending destination unreachables back (occasionally) indicating it lost its default route / full routing table as well. Pretty
b0rked :)
I need to get an archimedes ...
I lost my main broadband about 3pm. My gateway then switched to Vodafone cellular, which also failed, so it switched to Three cellular... stayed there for about 5 mins, then switched over to O2 cellular where it stayed until just after 5pm when everything was restored.
It's certainly a different experience, I'd recommend it but everyone's tastes vary :) I never had an Acorn back in the day so my love for it is clearly not nostalgia.
If for nothing else, the choices made around the GUI are very different. I joined a RiscOS programmers 'fireside gathering' once and one of the guys on there was vary proud that RiscOS has a window
decoration
button to send the window to the back, and 'who else has that?' - there are other quirky things like if you grab a window handle and expand it to the edge of the screen and keep it there then your window
will
expand from the opposite side until it reaches the other edge of the screen. And you can drag windows around with or without bringing them to the foreground depending on which mouse button you use.
And the panpipe "hoob" on boot. Man, the first time this thing made the "hoob" noise I was so excited.
My personal mobile piggybacks off Three and my work one off EE, so I was fine.
Ive run out of space - again ... although thats not stopped me buying more retro stuff recently.
I used to carry multiple phones around with me so that I had a connection on each network. Now that phones can support more than one eSIM I only need to carry two now :)
I suppose you could get "some" of the experience by running RiscOS on a Pi. It doesn't quite hit the same, though.
One of my mates was saying he has a work eSIM on his personal mobile. Aside from the absolute disgust I felt at the idea of not being able to just
throw the work mobile in a drawer at the weekends he mentioned that the work SIM was doing "WiFi Calling" over his personal data. That just seems
like
a "dick move" from the provider to me!
Acorn brothers in the house!
What Acorn are you rocking there?
I'm typing this on an A3020 with its top off (fnar fnar) whic is my BBSing device of choice.
Typing this on an A7000+. I used to have a beautiful, exceedingly usable StrongARM 233 RPC. Sold it, sadly.
I used to have access to an A3020 in the early 90s. That was my first experience of Archimedes machines. Would love to play with RISC OS 3.1 again. I remember it having a great keyboard.
Re: Hello from south of Fran
By: Brianm to Thlc on Sun Oct 12 2025 00:29:32
Brian,
Hello Thomas, what other retro computers do you have that you call BBS sy > > know.
I dial from:
- My i486 Toshiba laptop, running either Win 3.11, NT 3.51, or NetBSD
- My Apple //e 128k, using an US Robotics modem with a SuperSerial card
- maybe soon, my Macintosh SE, but I'm missing some cables (mini-DIN8)
I have a client program that emulates a MiniTel terminal. I have used it > > systems in France that try and preserve the TeleTel system. My BBC micro > > the rendering is only in three colours as the display is quite a high res > > popular in France at all ?
Minitel was very popular in the late 90s/early 2000s, but Internet replaced >
Thomas L.
Rognac, France
Re: Hello from south of Fran
By: Thlc to Brianm on Sun Oct 12 2025 08:12:47
Minitel was very popular in the late 90s/early 2000s, but Internet replac > > [http://www.3614hacker.fr/] a few years ago, it was fun.
I'm guessing Minitel closed down, like our Prestel service did?
On <Mon, 12 Oct 25>, you wrote me:
I'm guessing Minitel closed down, like our Prestel service did?
Indeed, the Minitel network was shut down in June 2012. It was probably completely useless at this point anyway.I am glad Thomas confirmed 2012 was correct :-)
--Thomas
Rognac, France
* SeM. 2.26 * A fool and his guilt are soon parted.
Re: Hello from south of Fran
By: Keyop to Thlc on Thu Oct 16 2025 22:47:08
Hi, Keyop.
I wonder if there are still any other dial-up ISPs still running ... ?
I had to go and look it up. Seemingly there is at least one dial-up ISP stil >
The one I found is somewhat ironically called "nippy internet" and requires > know that can be messed with.
Amusingly it has instructions for how to set up your dialer on Windows 95, 9 >
BobW
I think it wound up around 2012 , which was ironically the sames time as Teletext on TV finished here.
Re: Hello from south of Franget their systems populated with some stuff. Not much there on either as yet. Would be great to have a few more beyond, Telstar,NXTEL,CCL4 and TeeFax. RetroCampus is a really good system , but there's nothing going on messaging wise, even though it does have a a simple messaging system. There's just no public messaging. Beebs is a good system and is primarily aimed at Viewdata people but it does do all the other ANSI/ASCII stuff too. Beebs is the only other one that offers public messaging like Night Owl. That's the prob with most of the Viewdata boards, there's very little interaction.
By: Brianm to Keyop on Wed Oct 29 2025 20:53:33
I think it wound up around 2012 , which was ironically the sames time as >Its a shame, but there are plenty of mode 7 services out there now to dial iYeah agree, there's certainly a good number. Hoping that Deon G and Nelgin can
get their systems populated with some stuff. Not much there on either as yet. Would be great to have a few more beyond, Telstar,NXTEL,CCL4 and TeeFax. RetroCampus is a really good system , but there's
nothing going on messaging wise, even though it does have a a simple messaging system. There's just no public messaging. Beebs is a good system and is primarily aimed at Viewdata people but it does do all
the other ANSI/ASCII stuff too. Beebs is the only other one that offers public messaging like Night Owl. That's the prob with most of the Viewdata boards, there's very little interaction.
What do you think?
Indeed, the Minitel network was shut down in June 2012. It was probably completely useless at this point anyway.
Re: Hello from south of FranYes you should give beebs a try ..I don't get on as much as I used to but he isnow running a custom Host he built himself. He has done a quite amazing job to
By: Brianm to Keyop on Wed Nov 05 2025 20:48:46
get their systems populated with some stuff. Not much there on either as > > nothing going on messaging wise, even though it does have a a simple mess > > the other ANSI/ASCII stuff too. Beebs is the only other one that offers p > > What do you think?
I do need to get around to setting up an account on beebs and trying Vela's > ]
Yes you should give beebs a try ..I don't get on as much as I used to but he isnow running a custom Host he built himself. He has done a quite amazing job to
manage it. Very simple function but nice is simple.
| Sysop: | Keyop |
|---|---|
| Location: | Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, UK |
| Users: | 715 |
| Nodes: | 16 (0 / 16) |
| Uptime: | 164:28:51 |
| Calls: | 12,095 |
| Calls today: | 3 |
| Files: | 15,001 |
| Messages: | 6,517,798 |