Zenith XT Clone Running the Area5150 Demo
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Published 2022-11-10
Credit to the CRTC+Hornet and their amazing team of talented developers who squeezed every last ounce of power out of the IBM 5150 for this graphics demo. Also, I suppose credit to 1980s Zenith for making such an accurate clone of the IBM 5150 with their own unique take on the platform.
Live audience demo reveal: • Area 5150 Audience Reaction
Thanks for @PCRetroTech for the encouragement and their contributions to the demo!: • We WON a Democompetition! Area 5150 @...
Credits for the Area5150 Team:
Jim Leonard - youtube.com/c/JimLeonard
PCRetroTech - youtube.com/c/PCRetroTech
andrewmjenner - youtube.com/user/andrewmjenner
x86VileR - youtube.com/user/x86VileR
shiru8bit - youtube.com/c/shiru8bit
debuglive - youtube.com/user/debuglive
All Comments (3)
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A lot of the glitching you are seeing in the graphics is due to the Zenith using a different font than IBM I would say. However that's not the only issue. The Glenz effect at 7:00 shouldn't look like that. It's very timing sensitive so perhaps that's the issue there. What surprises me though is that the end credits work so well. That is an exceptionally timing sensitive effect. So perhaps the CGA implementation in this machine doesn't like the mixed mode that Glenz uses.
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Thanks for testing this on your Zenith! Could you elaborate on what CGA hardware it's using - is it on-board (as with some other XT clones), or an ISA card? If so, is it a Zenith CGA which came with the machine, or some third-party board? In addition to PCRetroTech's comments, I also see that the screen isn't being blanked properly at some points (e.g. the "blinds" effect just after the intro), so the Mode Select register behavior may not be 100% implemented. But yeah, the font definitely looks odd. Let me know if you'd be willing to dump the contents of the font ROM, if you have the equipment to do so... I'd definitely be interested in having a look at it.
