CGTERM by Per Olofsson is an excellent Commodore Graphic terminal emulator which runs in Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux. You can download it at http://www.paradroid.net/cgterm/ ... Unfortunately, it's a Telnet-only program, so it can't be used for dial-up connections.

However, Greg Pfountz, the author of the software that I'm running on my dial-up board, also wrote a terminal program for MS-DOS in 1991 called the C64 Color Terminal Emulator. Unfortunately, not all modems are supported with this program. External modems work best; most "WinModems" will not work. You can download this program at http://cottonwood.servebbs.com/C64TRM5B.EXE ... Some have had success running this from a DOS window from within Windows. The best thing is to just try it out and see if you can get it to work. Be sure you know what COM port your modem is running on, and set the config for the terminal to use the same port.

I thought this information might be useful to people wanting to call Borderline BBS who don't have Commodore hardware to call with. It's also possible to call using the Commodore terminal program of your choice from within VICE. Of course, if all else fails, just call using any ASCII-capable terminal program.

-Andrew
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He still accepting registrations?
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So... DOSBox to the rescue?

I remember using this term in the early 90's when BBS'ing was still popular. All the BBSes in my area were ANSI but there was one that was run on a C128. I can't remember the name but it wasn't local to me and since I didn't have my 128 anymore I called very infrequently using a DOS com prog (Telemate) in ASCII mode. I had a 486 PC running DOS at the time.

I stumbled upon C64TRM5B and decided to call and see how it looked. The results were very disappointing. What this program basically does is translate (poorly) PETSCII > ANSI. It duplicates most colors and attributes (blinking, reverse) but you will not see any PETSCII graphics - only a very, very rough approximation of their ANSI equivalents. Most of what I saw for commodore graphics came up as gibberish rendering some of the messages in the bases unreadable.

The only way I knew how badly this displayed commodore graphics was by visiting a buddy of mine who still had his 64C. He called with MultiTerm and when I saw what the graphics were supposed to look like I dumped C64TERM and reverted to calling that BBS in ASCII mode. The BBS eventually went offline so the need for C64TERM died with it.

I just tried running C64TERM in XP after reading this thread. I have a Pentium 4 with XP PRO Service Pack 2 and two modems:

1) Supra V.34 external connected to COM1 via RS232 serial cable

2) Internal V.92 win modem which has created it's own virtual com port (COM3).

C64TERM will not communicate with either one when I launch it from a DOS window. The CPU usage rockets when I attempt to send any AT commands to either modem and the send/receive lights on the external modem show no activity. Yes, I tried the /noems, /nomouse, /nofifo, and /bios options. No dice.

I tested two other DOS comm programs - Procomm Plus 2 for DOS and Telemate 4.12, two very popular comm programs released about the same time as C64TERM. Both work flawlessly with either modem in a DOS window. No special settings or tweaks required.

Ariqu wrote:

So... DOSBox to the rescue?

Not this time. I tried DOSBox 7.2, same results.

gklinger wrote:

He still accepting registrations?

I hope not. Even though it's only $20 it's not worth it.

For the ultimate commodore dialup BBS experience the obvious choice is to connect with a real C64.

For those of you who would rather emulate (like me) Vice will work very nicely with your favorite C64 term prog and a modem using an ip>serial redirector such as NetSerial. (I have tested this setup and it works - the downside - NetSerial's price: USD $90)

Eltima makes a similar product but it too is more expensive than buying a used C64 setup (USD $99.95)

One of my pet projects is to get Vice, TCPSER and a modem working together for a free solution to dialing out to C64 BBSes but it is very, very low priority since the number of dialup BBSes can be counted on one hand.

I wouldn't waste my time with C64Term however.
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BTW, in this thread on the PETSCII forums, Jeff Ledger describes the settings that he used to successfully connect to my BBS using a terminal program in WinVICE with a real modem. Obviously, calling with a real Commodore computer is the best option. I'd say that Jeff's method is the second best, and using C64term from an MS-DOS machine is third best.

-Andrew
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Bringing up this old post because I am having trouble with Syncterm. How do you set it to recognize C64 Ansi / Petscii graphics within the terminal session? I tryed setting my current screen mode to C64 and that didnt work.
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Never mind.. gave up and switched back to CGTerm.
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