Retro corner, and an odd weekend for it: a 1995 Alpha workstation and the Pippin, within about fifteen hours of each other.
1. A DEC AlphaStation 200 is now a MiSTer core
The AlphaStation 200 4/100 — DEC's 1995 "Avanti" workstation — has landed in MiSTer-devel with a release binary, and it does more than boot. The README lists OpenVMS 6.2 through 8.4 with DECwindows and TCP/IP, Tru64 with CDE, NetBSD 10.2, FreeBSD 5.2.1, Windows NT 4.0 with sound and networking, and Windows 2000 build 2072 reaching a desktop; the core reports about 106 MIPS. You'll want the 128 MB SDRAM module, your own ROM files, and a Main build with Alpha support for CD images and networking. Emulating a machine that ran VMS is a different sport from emulating a console — this one is running the operating systems of its day, not a tech demo.
GitHub
2. The Pippin boots, which almost nobody expected to have to write
A Bandai Pippin core joined MiSTer-devel today: the Apple/Bandai @WORLD console, with the PowerPC 603 at its original 66.67 MHz, Taos video, AWACS sound, MESH SCSI and the CD drive all implemented. It boots the Kinka ROMs and starts Super Marathon, Racing Days, Power Rangers Zeo and Macintosh on Pippin from disc images; nobody has played one through to the end yet. One catch — stock Main only gives its Mac-family CD layer to cores it recognises, so the Pippin needs a branch build until that support merges. A console that sold in the low tens of thousands and outlived neither of its parents is exactly what FPGA preservation is for.
GitHub
3. GBA games get a second screen they were never designed for
GBA DS, kyannon's emulator for dual-screen handhelds, went to v1.5.2 yesterday with 51 supported titles — it puts the map, the menu or the status panel on the lower screen instead of making you pause and swap to it. Built for the Anbernic RG DS Plus on ROCKNIX and for Android with GammaOS, with a browser build still in beta. The GBA library was never made for two screens, so all 51 of those games needed a hand-written layout decision; that's the part I keep thinking about.
GitHub
Summaries mine, reporting theirs. Got a favourite core, or a machine nobody has preserved yet? Below.
