A new version of ConvImgCpc by Ludovic Deplanque is out (1st december 2020).

It's a windows xp utility to convert PC images to Amstrad CPC.

The last version of RASM is v1.3 (24th November 2020).

Rasm is now available on Github (documentation included).

This multi platform assembler (linux, windows, but not only like MorphOS on Amiga) let you program for Amstrad CPC.

Changelog is :

• extended cartridge support
• new directive LZSA1, LZSA2 for crunched code sections
• new directives INCLZSA1 and INCLZSA2 for binary import and LZSA crunching
• new directives XORMEM and SUMMEM to generate checksum of a memory area
• new directive TIMESTAMP to output date/time
• new TAPE option for SAVE directive
• new DMA import options with INCBIN directive (new checks & warnings)
• new enhanced instructions LD IX/IY,BC/DE & LD BC/DE,IX/IY
• new tag {SLOT} for extended cartridge management
• new suffix .HIGH and .LOW to split 16bits register in macro definition
• new option -msep to specify separator for labels inside modules
• new option -amper to use ampersand for hex values
• directive BRK now generates #ED,#FF opcode
• bugfix byte order for Microsoft real format
• bugfix DSK header with nightly build
• bugfix 16bits PCM wav import
• do not warn for missing file with INCLUDE in disabled condition
• do not export struct definition with symbols
• many warnings removed, cleanup, some draft for future functionalities

Targhan has released the finale version of Arkos Tracker v2.0 for linux, windows and mac.

There is also direct support of Arkos AT2 songs in basic with this tutorial !

iMPdraw Ultimate Pack Edition ! by Impact, their new graphics tools (ConvImgCpc & iMPdraw) but also iMPdos, for xMass management. This pack contains M4_Asic rom, a special rom made by Duke for Amstrad Plus ONLY !!! So if you own an Amstrad Cpc, don't install it. Latest Albireo rom is available on this Ultimate Pack Edition.

iMPdraw works on Floppy Disc A/B, Gotek A/B, M4 sd Card, Albireo Sd Card & Usb, & xMass expansion Board (iMPdos only).

Have a good fun, Bugs reports are welcome, run"install" to start.

Martine is an utility converting JPG and PNG images to Overscan screen or window for Amstrad CPC (and Plus series). The last available version is v0.26 which was released the 22th January 2020.

Impact has also released 3 demos in 2020 :

• Regulus (June 2020), a small demo (32kb) to show the possibilities of the new version of ConvImgCpc in converting ASCII ART type images and animations
• ChoDemo (August 2020), a demo
• Kraftwerk Autobahn By Martine, another showcase for the Martine utility

You are the happy owner of an Amstrad PC 1512, 1640 or a portable PPC 512/640 (or another Amstrad XT model) but are lacking a hard disk, so you are limited to slow floppy drives, either a 360 Kb 5,25 or 720 Kb 3,5 inch floppy drives. Of course for older PC it's easy to use an 100 Mb Iomega ZIP drive (parallel, SCSI or IDE) but the official driver is using an instruction only available on an Intel 80186 (seldom seen) or a Nec V20/V30 processor (stated on wikipedia). The PPC 512/640 has a V30 but the official driver uses a lot of memory and needs msdos v4.0+ instead of msdos 3.3 on the PPC or v3.2 on PC 1512 (also 1640 ?).

Well, there is another solution for using a parallel ZIP drive (not the Plus version which also features SCSI), it's using PalmZIP by Klaus PEICHL which works with msdos 2.0+, even with a 8086, uses much less memory. The only limitation is using three 32 Mb partition (C:, D: and E:) if you are using msdos 2 or 3, with msdos 4 you can use the full 100 Mb with only one partition (but disks accesses will be a little bit slower). It's a shareware, you can test it for 7 minutes for free to check that it is working for you. If it is the case you will have to pay only 8 euros. I did it two days ago, five hours later I received a zip file by email with the registered version ! Yesterday I bought a ZIP drive and I was able to test it during the night. Happily I still had some ZIP disks I was using years ago and that I kept through several house moves.

Using the driver is simple, just add in your config.sys the following line :

device=palmzip.sys /c

/c is for loading the driver only if it is connected, though the driver is only 3 Kb. They are other options so I recommend to read the included documentation (english and german). You can use the /f option to treat the zip as a fixed disk for faster operation but then the zip disk must not be removed unless using the zipman utility.

Zipman must be used if you are using msdos 2 or 3 to format three partitions of 32 Mb each (FAT12 or FAT16), or an usual 96 Mb partition if you are using msdos 4 or above. Zipcopy is another utility for copying complete partitions within a disk. The partition assigned to the destination drive will be overwritten. The last utility is lpr_test which is designed to check if your parallel port(s) supports the bidirectional data transfer mode. The PalmZIP device driver runs a similar test to determine the correct mode of operation.

You can see a youtube video by Retro Erik using the PalmZIP driver on an Amstrad PPC 512. You should check his youtube channel as he has several videos about Amstrad PC computers.

A Notepad NC200 lets you put under the disk drive one type 1 PCMCIA card which is a RAM or SRAM card with a button battery to save the ram when outside of the Notepad. The problem is that the NC200 can only hold type 1 PCMCIA cards as type 2 are thicker, too big for the slot. Also these 1 or 2 Mb RAM cards are not much better than the capacity of 1,5 or 2,5 720 Kb disks.

But David Given who is the author of CP/Mish (CP/M for Notepad NC200) has been able to use a type PCMCIA adaptator in which you put a Compact Flash card (16 Mb). CP/Mish is of course able to use such mass storage. However it needs to open the NC200 case to change the PCMCIA slot guide with a new 3D printed part !

You can see his video on Youtube in which you can see the case being opened, so why not also changing the disk drive with an USB Gotek ?

Richard Bannister was the maintainer of a MacOS port of the Arnold emulator, now maintained by Kevin Thacker. But he is also the author of the Audio Overload utility which lets you play VGM music files, including .AY and .YM Amstrad music files. This utility runs on MacOS, Windows and Linux.

The last version of RASM is v1.1 (23th June 2020).

Rasm is now available on Github (documentation included).

This multi platform assembler (linux, windows, but not only like MorphOS on Amiga) let you program for Amstrad CPC.

Targhan has released Arkos Tracker v2.0.0a9 for linux, windows and mac.

Martine is an utility converting JPG and PNG images to Overscan screen or window for Amstrad CPC (and Plus series). The last available version is v021 which was released the 22th January 2020.

Targhan has released Arkos Tracker v2.0.0a8 for linux, windows and mac.

• Play and compose your music in real-time on your CPC via any serial interface! The CPC client supports the CPC/Mini Booster, USIfAC and Albireo! And also the PlayCity! This means you can directly hear how your 3/6/9-channel music will sound on the CPC!
• A toolbox in the pattern viewer to transpose, swap, remap specific instruments.
• Instrument preview when loading them.
• A better MIDI import.
• MOD import can generate PSG instruments instead of samples. Useful for conversion to soundchip!
• New logo and splash screen.
• And many, many smaller features and bug-fixes.

You are a graphist on PC but you want that your pixel art to be on one of the following platform quoted below. Pixel Polizei will check the conformity of the color limits and save the result in the native format :

• Amstrad CPC
• ColecoVision
• Commodore 64
• Commodore Plus/4
• MSX
• Oric
• Panasonic JR-200
• Sharp MZ-700
• Sharp MZ-800
• ZX Spectrum

The draw utility by AST/Imp4act Impdraw v2 is out since the 8th November, coming also with the release of iMPdos 512 (a FAT16 ROM for your xMass, M4 or Symbiface 3, it doesnt need Amsdos so an CPC 464 can use it). Click on the source link below for download (at the end of the first message).

La précédente version (v1.2) date d'avril 2016, les améliorations sont les suivantes :

• a huge zoom zone
• using he 4096 palette of the Amstrad Plus
• fullscreen support for the 3 graphical modes of the CPC (0, 1 et 2)
• possibility of creating plugins with OrgAms or any other assembler
• adds Undo/Redo
• 100% compatible xMass with iMPdos, M4 wifi board and Symbiface 3 (thanks to @Kris for testing it)
• in case of basic return or reset, you can get back your file
• an included utility to create frames
• Load/Save .win
• Load .scr 17 kb files
• integrated help

Beware, Impdraw uses more than 128 Kb, if you use WinApe please choose 4 Mb of RAM. Also a new version will be out in a few days

The last version of CHIPNSFX tracker+player suite by CNGSoft is out since the 3rd October 2019.

There is also a new version of the Z80 assembler UZ80 (10th October 2019).