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| The first port of call for everything ever produced for the Acorn Electron |
| 5TH MAY 2008 |
Another whole year in the making, it's EUG #68 rolls off the presses. And without doubt, it is the most gorgeously presented one yet, featuring:
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| 18TH APRIL 2008 |
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Two rather quirky additions to the Haven disc library today - Bit Twiddlers' adapted versions of CHUCKIE EGG ("CHUKEE") and KILLER GORILLA ("KILLA")... Originally available on tape only via mail order (and with an extra title as yet unavailable, "MONSTAS") described as "a sure fire way to extend the longevity of the games in question"... |
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| 17TH APRIL 2008 |
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Added six more discs to the Micro User catalogue in PD World. We are anxious to complete this archive, but despite a few requests on the forum over at Stairway To Hell, so far no-one has stepped forward with any contributions. This magazine was very popular in its day - bizarrely, much more popular than any of the obscure archives that have survived! Any help gratefully appreciated! |
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| 16TH APRIL 2008 |
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Added the previously unavailable MR. MEN MAGIC STORYMAKER from Mirrorsoft and COMPOSER from Micromart, both of which have been spruced up with our nice loading screens. |  |
| 2ND FEBRUARY 2008 |
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Hmmmm... There's been a distinct lack of activity at Acorn Electron World for a good few months now. However, today we finally completed the Alligata catalogue with our own discified version of BUMPER BUNDLE. Explanation why Dave E has been too busy to update the site recently on the right in a Mode 1 screen rendered with IMAGE2BBC: |
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| 8TH DECEMBER 2007 |
| Added the full user guide, and instructions, for GAMEMAKER 2 from the little-known professional company Holly Computers. (A disc image is not available yet, but hopefully will be in time for Christmas, then you can all write your own Mode 2 machine code games without difficulty!) |
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| 2ND DECEMBER 2007 |
| Hey, it's the find of the year - the complete HeadFirst PD catalogue, kindly donated to this site by its former founder, Gareth Boden! |  |
| 1ST DECEMBER 2007 |
| Quite a surprising omission finally remedied in time for Christmas, as we upload CASCADE 50 GAMES for the Electron to Acorn Electron World. The last two games were not included on our original tape (We checked a spare version we had and they were not on that either!) - so only 48 of the games are available. Hold your applause please - for the new menu system!!! |
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| 11TH NOVEMBER 2007 |
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Two major acquisitions today for Acorn Electron World... Firstly, all the programs from Vince Apps' book 40 EDUCATIONAL PROGRAMS FOR THE ELECTRON finally make it to our website as an EUG Special disc...! (Look out for a review of this disc, and several other new releases, in the upcoming issue of EUG #68.) Secondly, the 'quite-rare-because-it-wasn't-particularly-good' Collins STARTER PACK - INTERMEDIATE disc and user guide are available for the first time! |
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| 10TH OCTOBER 2007 |
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| 27TH SEPTEMBER 2007 |
| Another Acorn Electron companion disc completed and uploaded for posterity. This one is the result of typing in over 250 pages of code and contains all of the programs from the Pan book SIXTY PROGRAMS FOR THE ELECTRON. Little-known fact: There are only 56 programs in this book. If only we'd known in 1984, we could've all sued 'em! |
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| 12TH AUGUST 2007 |
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| A Microsoft Word version of the full 246 pages of the ACORN ELECTRON USER GUIDE is finally available! So too is the shorter 3 page ACP/PRES USER PORT USER GUIDE. We remain hard at work on the other outstanding manuals and user guides... |
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| 5TH AUGUST 2007 |
| Got a BBC Micro? Tired of playing the same downloaded BBC games from Stairway to Hell? Trying to think of what else to put on your GOMMC cartridge? Some wonderful things are happening over in the BBC PD archives... |
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| 9TH JULY 2007 |
| Wow, quite a break there (almost a month) whilst we worked on our latest whole new project, a companion disc of all the programs included on HET BBC COMPUTER-SPELEN BOEK. Incidentally, we designed the loading screen (in Mode 2!) for this one very simply - by using a combination of MICROSOFT PAINT and IMAGE2BBC! (The programs are all in Dutch by the way. ;-D) |
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| 12TH JUNE 2007 |
 Due to the laborious efforts of Mr. Spock, Romik's ATOM SMASHER added to the archive! |
| 3RD JUNE 2007 |
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We do like those discified compilation discs... ;-) |  |
| 30TH MAY 2007 |
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Today we finally discified the programs contained in ACORN PROGRAMS #6 from scans of the official paper-based magazine back in 1984. We believe that this now completes the whole of the Acorn Programs library! |
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| We have added a new archive to the Public Domain section - that of Bazzasoft PD, who produced a range of Public Domain software for the BBC/Electron, scattered across the different libraries that existed! It's like collecting Panini stickers, don't you think? :-) |  |
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| 6TH MAY 2007 |
| We are slowly progressing through our pile of Micro User discs. However, we do not have any discs from volume 4 and only one from volume 5. Please contact us if you can help us complete the archive! |  |
| 1ST MAY 2007 |
It's that time of year again, and EUG #67 is upon us, featuring, amongst other things:
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| 29TH APRIL 2007 |
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We've completely upgraded the Electron User section with an EUG-browsing-style interface. Also, if you have any question regarding the Acorn Electron that you need the answer to quickly, then you might find our full spreadsheet useful! |
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| 25TH APRIL 2007 |
 Oooooooooooh, it's a brand new archive! (The disc images aren't available just yet, but watch this space!) |
| 22ND APRIL 2007 |
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Finally today we completed the massive task of cataloguing every last article, review, game, utility and feature ever published by Electron User. |
| 11TH APRIL 2007 |
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Today, the Organ Grinder's Monkey released a fabulous new disc: DANIEL PUGH'S BBC MUSIC DEMO WORLD #1. And, co-incidentally, a number of older discs from Digital Solutions PD also re-surfaced, featuring a whole host of BBC demos and utlities! |
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| 31ST MARCH 2007 |
| The archive entry for BBCSoft's A VOUS LA FRANCE has been updated with full documentation and user manual in Microsoft Word format. Our Ed is trying to learn French at the moment, and will undoubtedly review the package in the very near future! |  |
| 17TH MARCH 2007 |
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Revamped the EUG review of PD classic SUNDAY with illustrative screenshots galore! (Something I've been meaning to do for some time. :-D) |
| 11TH MARCH 2007 |
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Those long lost music demos just keep flooding in!! We have started work on BBC MUSIC DISC #7 but, in the event there's a long wait before we discover any further demos to add to it, we have put up a fully working 'demo' version of it now. If you have any music demos on old discs, that are not listed on these pages, please do not hesitate to submit them to us! A big thank you to Dave M (of Stairway To Hell fame) for finding all of these new ones! |
| 25TH FEBRUARY 2007 |
| During our recent voyage of discovery through the archives of BBC PD, we discovered that, on quite a few of the discs in the library, there were extra programs not listed in the descriptions on the old www.8bs.com web site. Particularly interestingly, we discovered a whole single-sided disc image full of POLISH MUSIC DEMOS. They all work on the BBC only (or an Electron with a PROJECT EXPANSIONS SOUND CARTRIDGE EXPANSION and we have just uploaded them to their rightful place in PD World. As you might expect, we have also reviewed one of them. |  |
| 19TH FEBRUARY 2007 |
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Have you been following the release of IMAGE2BBC on the Stairway To Hell forums? Today we got to grips with it, and wrote a full review of how it can generate amazing screens for the BBC/Electron. So if you'd like to see conversions of RICK DANGEROUS, TARGET RENEGADE and GHOSTBUSTERS II, and some, ahem, 'glamour' photos of celebs like Rebecca Emaloglou [Who? - Ed] then click here! |
| 11TH FEBRUARY 2007 |
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| Generally, when it comes to the Books Archive, we only add Cover Art. However, because Dave E is learning French at the moment, he has quickly typed up the GUIDE DE L' UTILSATEUR, which is the French version of the original USER GUIDE! |
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| 14TH JANUARY 2007 |
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In preparation for the upcoming issue of EUG #67 (Yes, that time is almost upon us again!), we've been examining THE DANOSOFT COLLECTION, released late last year and featuring fourteen new programs. Can't wait for EUG #67 to read the review? Then click here now. |
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| 13TH JANUARY 2007 |
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We've got 'new' releases arriving by the bucketload at the moment, and today we have archived the companion disc to COMPUTER GAMER #3 which contains Esmirasoft's last ever full game SNAKE MAZE and the previously forgotten MINER. |  |
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| 12TH JANUARY 2007 |
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Roll up, roll up, roll up! We have compiled our sixth full disc of music demos for the BBC B, B+ and Master 128 (Not, alas, compatible with the Electron!) from the music scattered throughout the BBC PD archives. Whilst doing so, we've also uploaded the whole of the BBC PD collection as, since 8BS closed down, it has not been available anywhere else. |
| 4TH JANUARY 2007 |
| Mr. Carlos Rondao, who wrote GALEX-VADERS, unearthed in Computer Gamer magazine about one year ago, also scanned in his own personal copy of another magazine: Games Computing, which contains another 'Esmirasoft' game: STAR PANIK. If you thought all type-in games were slow plodding BASIC affairs, then think again! We also scanned in the last of our Home Computing Weekly magazines today - hoorah! |
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| 2ND JANUARY 2007 |
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Digging through a pile of discarded Beeb PD discs today, we uncovered this hitherto unseen ACORN USER GALLERY disc, also known as ACORN USER PORTFOLIO. Needless to say, this has quickly been added to the archive for everyone to enjoy! |  |
| 1ST JANUARY 2007 |
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In our never-ending quest to find 'new things' to bring you on your Electron, we have today converted one of the BBC MUSIC DEMOS to work on an ACORN ELECTRON fitted with a PROJECT EXPANSIONS SOUND CARTRIDGE. The conversion proved a tortious process and, seeing as this interface seems to have had a production run of only a few hundred units, there's little use in spending a lot of time converting the other 200 or so demos if no-one can enjoy them anyway. However, we've realised, with much perseverance, the conversion can be done! ;-) |
| 31ST DECEMBER 2006 |
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Gave the Hardware Lane catalogues a much-needed update adding, amongst various things we've picked up, some information on ELECTRON GOMMC, a brand new hardware expansion by John Kortink bringing Gigabytes of storage to the humble unexpanded Elk. |
| 29TH DECEMBER 2006 |
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That's another little archive sorted out then... ;-) |
| 28TH DECEMBER 2006 |
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We're buzzing away behind the scenes as per usual this Christmas time and today we present, for the first time, the whopping BBCSoft suite A VOUS LA FRANCE! on no less than three double-sided DFS discs. We'll have the instructions for you as soon as possible too! |
| 2ND DECEMBER 2006 |
| The Acorn Programs companion discs received a boost today with the release of all the programs from its second issue. We are working on releasing EUG #67 for March 2007 but, in case you can't wait that long to read our review of this, and several other new products, click here. |
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| 18TH NOVEMBER 2006 |
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We're not sure how many of you who visit this site also visited the late, great 8 Bit Software - but those of you who did, will know that 8BS went down almost a year ago. It shows no signs of re-appearing at any point in the near future, so we have started to put up some of its archives here - many of these games will work on the Electron, although they are mainly intended for the BBC. Please visit our PD World section, and check out our new archives of Acorn Computing, The Micro User and The Yorkshire Boys. |
| 12TH NOVEMBER 2006 |
| We're hard at work creating a DVD of all the Home Computing Weekly magazines and programs for the BBC/Electron that appeared within its pages. We really cannot bear to keep all this hard work for buyers of the DVD only so it will all be made available on this web site for free. However, we are also creating a DVD for those people who would like to have the complete collection, without the tedium of having to download every issue! Of all the programs we've archived so far, the SPACE SHUTTLE DEMO is our personal favourite. |
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| 7TH NOVEMBER 2006 |
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Whilst browing through the library today, I noticed that the links to IDENTIKIT and TIME by Stell Software had not been updated, even though Mr. Spock made fully-working disc versions of both of them a good few months ago. These have now been updated for everyone to enjoy! You will see that we also got hold of the fantastically rare title RAILROADER this month too - hopefully the protection on this title can also be beaten and the game uploaded... |
| 6TH NOVEMBER 2006 |
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Ooooh, a lovely new find in the BBC PD section of the archive today - JUKEBOX, a disc featuring sixteen four-channel music demos for the BBC or, presumably, an Acorn Electron fitted with either the COMPLEX SOUND SYSTEMS SOUND CARTRIDGE or the PROJECT EXPANSIONS SOUND CARTRIDGE!
There's actually meant to be eighteen tracks in total on this disc but two of them are missing. Has anyone got the complete version hiding in their disc collection? |
| 5TH NOVEMBER 2006 |
| Further to yesterday's news of the completed (Well, almost!) Home Computing Weekly magazine scan archive, we have begun work on a companion disc archive showcasing all of these forgotten type-ins. Please click here to see the progress we've made so far. |  |
| 4TH NOVEMBER 2006 |
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 Today we have a major new addition to the site - an almost complete archive of Argus Press's Home Computing Weekly magazine, which is bound to be of interest not only to BBC/Electron fans, but also legions of other 8 bit users. A bit 'sexier' than any of its contemporaries, we have combed its pages for gorgeous girls cuddling Beebs or Electrons, although sadly without success. Dave E is phoning around model agencies as we speak to remedy this appalling situation! |
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| 21ST OCTOBER 2006 |
| Added a review of THE SAS SQUAD GAMES, which were recently re-discovered by Stephen Scott and released into Acorn Electron PD World. Featuring ANDROIDZ and HEADCASE HOTEL, this disc is now available to download over in the PD World archives. Also, some huge updates to areas of the sites today, as a load of missing software poured in over this weekend! We have also uploaded another batch of companion Acorn User Electron discs in the 'PD World' section. |
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| 10TH SEPTEMBER 2006 |
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Text adventuring is not dead! J. J. Guest has released TO HELL IN A HAMPER, a brilliant, brand new text adventure for the BBC/Electron (and we love it!) - and Heyley's long lost DREAM TIME has been recovered! These discoveries have given us a whole new thirst for adventures and we noticed that A&B's ADVENTURESCAPE package currently doesn't have instructions available anywhere on the web - so we've remedied this! |
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| 6TH AUGUST 2006 |
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All the Electron User articles on text adventuring have been converted to web pages - and the Adventure Help Index from EUG #58 updated so that you can find help on all the adventures it covered! Incidentally, EU compiled lists of what it called Electron text adventures - some of which we here have never heard of! Does anyone know how reliable the following lists are? Database Of Electron Text Adventures (Electron User 5.02) Guide To Electron Text Adventures Part 1 (Electron User 7.03) Guide To Electron Text Adventures Part 2 (Electron User 7.04) Guide To Electron Text Adventures Part 3, (Electron User 7.05) |
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| 22ND JULY 2006 |
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Added 'Making Of...' Articles for ELITE, EXILE, TETRIS and THE WAY OF THE EXPLODING FIST. | |
| 21ST JULY 2006 |
 Today, we completed the Mr. Men suite! |
 And Mr. Spock 'disced' ELECTRONIC COLOURING BOOK! |
| 19TH JULY 2006 |
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You'll remember that we reported we'd picked up the Acorn User companion cassettes a few months ago. We've now transferred these to discs and issues #30 to #47 are now available right here in the 'PD World' section. The rest of them are coming soon... |
| 17TH JUNE 2006 |
| According to an e-mail we've received, it would be nice if all Electron User issues were also available as html files (as well as scans). We can't quite manage that overnight - but here's a start with Barry Woods' collection of 'Time Warp' articles. These originally appeared in the later issues of the magazine, and reviewed the developments of the Acorn Electron, back in the days when it was surrounded by activity:
Time Warp 1984 (EU 1.05) Time Warp 1984 (EU 1.07) Time Warp 1984 (EU 1.07) Time Warp 1985 (EU 2.04) Time Warp 1985 (EU 2.06) Time Warp 1985 (EU 2.09) |
| 14TH JUNE 2006 |
| We are currently adding some of the adventure and arcade game related articles that appeared in Electron User in html format. Click here to read how Tony Oakden wrote QUEST and here to read how Neil Davidson wrote RICOCHET. We've also published Merlin's first article about adventuring and his second and his third and his fourth, and his fifth, and his sixth, and his seventh, and his eighth, and his ninth, and his tenth, and his eleventh (and SPHINX, and his twelfth, and his thirteenth, and his fourteenth, and his fifteenth, and his sixteenth, and his 17th, and his 18th, and his 19th, and his 20th, and his 21st. Pendragon: his 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th, 11th, 12th, adventure database, 13th, 14th, 15th, 16th, 17th, 18th, 19th, 20th, 21th, 22nd, 23rd, 24th, 25th, 26th, 27th, 28th, 29th, 30th, 31st, 32nd, 33rd, 34th, 35th, 36th, 37th, 38th, 39th, 40th, 41st, 42nd. Adventure #1, Adventure #2, Adventure #3. 41st, 42ndSolution |  |
| 8TH JUNE 2006 |
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| John McHugh's EXILE solution, originally published in EUG #16 in October 1994, has been overhauled with images and screenshots illustrating how to complete this amazing game! |
| 21ST MAY 2006 |
| As of today, the differing graphic sizes in the presentations of the EUG articles on this site are history. We hope this makes the EUG sections of the site a bit more pleasing on the eye. |  |
| 20TH MAY 2006 |
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We should be indebted to Mr. Quazar, who has provided the E2P-6502 USER GUIDE. For those of the 'hardware-uninitiated' persuasion, the E2P is the Second Processor cartridge which allows the Electron to run up to three times as fast. This is the Jafa Systems version of the user guide; we understand there is an earlier PMS version, published around 1984. Anyone got a copy of that to complete the archive? |
| 14TH MAY 2006 |
| Some new additions to the site today, with the top level pages of the web site given an overhaul with postcard-style 'famous quotes' illustrations. We've also updated the FAQs, what's in the pipeline and what's for sale. You'll also see we have gotten hold of a few new Acorn User magazines (although there's very little in them for the Electron unfortunately. Boo.) |
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| 2ND MAY 2006 |
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After putting off this job for several years, Dave E has finally spruced up HeadFirst PD's solution to Superior/Acornsoft's IMOGEN, making it devilishly easy for you to now walk through the puzzle! |
| 1ST MAY 2006 |
| Today is a good day for Electron User fans - finally the archive of scans of the magazine is complete. Just a few odd issues that turned out to be missing a page or two! Sure we'll pick them up in no time though. | |
| 15TH MARCH 2006 |
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As promised, we proudly present EUG #66 - a brand new on line EUG magazine, featuring, amongst other things:
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| 11TH MARCH 2006 |
| We've updated the For Sale area of the site with the duplicate copies of Acorn User companion cassettes - these are something of a rarity for anyone who's looking for an investment opportunity. ;-) |  |
| 9TH MARCH 2006 |
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Something of a boost for the Acorn User companion cassettes archive today as we've managed to pick up official tapes for every issue from January 1985 (AU #30) to August 1987 (AU #61). We hope to make these available on both BBC and Electron format within the next few weeks... |
| 8TH MARCH 2006 |
| Time to blow our own trumpet a little: We are proud to announce today that, within three months of opening up the Electron User magazine scans section, we have reached the halfway mark; 41 of the 82 issues of the magazine have now been scanned in and uploaded. |  |
| 3RD MARCH 2006 |
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| Sort of like the Channel Tunnel, we're starting from both ends of the Electron User magazine pile, so you'll find we've now added the very last batch of ten magazines to the magazine scans section. Happy reading! | ||||||||||
| 27TH FEBRUARY 2006 |
| Just to renew our appeal for any Headfirst PD discs that we do not have in our library. We don't believe they sold a lot of discs - but if you were a member of the Electron User Group or subscribed to the BBC PD magazine run by Chris Richardson, there's every chance you did buy a few of them. And we'd be very happy to add them to our archive! | |
| 26TH FEBRUARY 2006 |
 Anyone feel like a bit of Shakespeare? |
| 26TH FEBRUARY 2006 |
| A new EUG magazine is in the final stages and will shortly appear. Co-incidentally however, we received a request for information that is featured in one of the very articles of this new issue - so we've put the link up to it a bit early. The article in question gives the connections that allow you to build a lead from your BBC/Electron to a scart socket. |
| 26TH FEBRUARY 2006 |
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Thanks to the endeavours of Mr. Quazar, we can announce several Acorn Electron programs previously thought "not able to be transferred to disc"  are now available: TEMPEST and ZANY KONG JUNIOR in the Superior Software archive, PEG LEG in the IJK Software archive and TOMCAT in the Players archive. |
| 25TH FEBRUARY 2006 |
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| We had a request from Andrew Oldham for more of the early issues of Electron User - which was handy, because we've just scanned all of them in for you! | |||||||||||
| 15TH FEBRUARY 2006 |
| We've managed to pick up a few more Acorn User magazines recently. Please contact us is you can help us complete the remaining issues! | |
| 31ST DECEMBER 2005 |
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Oh, go on then - before we sign off for a month (or three!), here's a full scan of ELECTRON USER 7.02 featuring, amongst other things, the Superior Software retrospective. |
| 30TH DECEMBER 2005 |
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| Brilliant news: Mr. Spock has successfully made both ADFS 1D00 and DFS disc images of ROBOTRON 2084 and THE BIG K.O., meaning that the archive entry for this title is now 100% complete. Not so brilliant news: These regular updates are destined to stop as of today as the Christmas holiday has drawn to a close and our dreaded working lives beckon again. |
| 29TH DECEMBER 2005 |
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Two new uploads to the site today - disc versions of a) Chalksoft's PUNCMAN 1 & 2, which were actually supplied together in the same package; and b) Letts' CHEMISTRY FOR O LEVEL GCE, CSE AND GCSE, a suite of ten revision programs featuring an intriguing sliding block puzzle featuring scientific apparatus. |
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| 28TH DECEMBER 2005 |
| Another disc full of programs added to the archive, this time from issue 3 of ACORN PROGRAMS. To be honest, this is quite a mediocre compilation and not all the games work on the Acorn Electron - some need either a BBC or an Electron with a JAFA MODE 7 DISPLAY UNIT. However, with over 25 home-grown programs to choose from, you're certainly spoiled for choice quantitatively! We also added a full scan of ELECTRON USER 7.07 to the magazine scans, which features an Arcade Corner devoted to CODENAME: DROID and RAVENSKULL. |
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| 26TH DECEMBER 2005 |
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A day late but Merry Christmas! Please check out EGGS and OPERATION KRISTOS, the latest type-in games to be archived here at Acorn Electron World. Originally from the pages of Computer & Video Games' BOOK OF GAMES, EGGS is a rough and ready platform gamer high on frustration levels whilst KRISTOS is a nice little text adventure. |
| 25TH DECEMBER 2005 |
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| Hands up any of you who've ever heard of COMPUTER GAMER? We thought so. Well, one issue down, a whole history of this magazine left to uncover then. In the meantime, do have a play on GALEX-VADERS though, a 100% machine code space invaders blast-'em'up recovered from its pages! |
| 24TH DECEMBER 2005 |
| Happy to see acornmags has got just put up full PDF versions of the first five Acorn Programs magazines, which contain a large variety of type-ins, articles and utilities from the era of the Beeb and Elk. Don't even think about typing any of 'em in yet (unless you're a masochist!) before you've checked out our Acorn Programs archive. |  |
| 23RD DECEMBER 2005 |
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Thanks to master hacker Mr. Quazar, we can finally add a working copy THUNDERSTRUCK to both the ADFS 1D00 and the DFS disc archives. This also completes ELECTRON POWER PACK 2, which will also be made available to download very shortly. Oh, btw, this is the new style 'What's New' page. Any comments are welcome via the feedback link. |