Two weeks 'till RetroChallenge!

We have 9 great entries so far and we are still hoping to hit 20 entries before the start. I know that a few of you have been talking about it... come get your entry in now!

20th Anniversary

I recently realized that not only is it the RC2014 kit computer's 10th anniversary, but according to legend, it is also the RetroChallenge's 20th anniversary! We are vintage! The RetroChallenge is retro! I am putting together a little history of the RetroChallenge that I hope to have finished by the end of the event, along with some recognition for the people who have kept this fun event running over the years.

Prizes

As much as I love our traditional mousepads, I am really excited about the custom RetroChallenge enamel pins and keychains that I just ordered:

The pins are perfect for your vintage computer festival lanyards and the keychain will keep your Macintosh Quadra 950, Centurion minicomputer, and IBM 5170 keys nicely organized. Maybe even your house and car keys too. Every entry selected by the judges will receive one of each of these beauties.

semachthemonkey is providing a "pretty special" RC2014 related prize for a winner of the RC2014 category. I can't wait to hear some more details from him.

I have some MC14500b 1-bit computer chipset kits that I put together from extras purchased for my RC2024 project.

Granz has kindly offered up some 6802 Nano computer PCBs for prize winners. We will gather up the components to make full kits out of them.

Finally, ACMS will be providing prizes to its members as one of its official activities.

But remember, the RetroChallenge is not about the winning! Anyone who completes the month will receive the judge's applause and the internet's respect, forever!

Projects

As the years have progressed the RetroChallenge projects have trended more and more technical, but I want to assure you all that you don't need to be an engineer to participate. Just use your retrocomputer for a month, whether it is for journaling, composing chiptunes, playing games, or using MacPaint to make some funny drawings. We are here for all of it!

RC2024/10 Registration is Open

We are happy to announce RetroChallenge for the month of October 2024! Brought to you once again by hosts urbancamo and ep00ch with support from semachthemonkey.

About RetroChallenge

In a nutshell, the RetroChallenge is a loosely disorganised gathering of RetroComputing enthusiasts who collectively do stuff with old computers for a month.

The point of this, if indeed there is one, is to challenge you to do something new with your retro-computer, to learn something new or just play for a month. It is sort of like a show-and-tell. Do something fun or interesting and let the world know. The event is very much open to interpretation… individuals set their own challenges, which can range from programming to multimedia work, hardware restoration to exploring legacy networking, or just plain fooling around. It really doesn’t matter what you do, just so long as you do it.

Take a look at the "rules" for the RetroChallenge for basic guidelines.

RetroChallenge 2024/10 Theme Categories

We have two theme categories for this event: RC2014 and Halloween Hacks. These categories will be judged and awarded separately from the standard entries. If your project qualifies, enter it into one of the theme categories! Otherwise, enter in the General category and just do your own retro thing. Check out last year's List of Entries for some examples.

RC2014

Spend some quality time with your RC2014 kit computer.

In collaboration with semachthemonkey, we are celebrating the 10th anniversary of the RC2014 kit computer (invented during RetroChallenge 2014) with a category just for RC2014 owners! Solder up the unassembled kit sitting on your shelf, write a fun Z80 program, or prototype some new hardware for it. If you don't have a kit yet, check out the selection on Tindie or Z80KITS and join the most active homebuilt 8-bit computer community!

Halloween Hacks

Get ready for Halloween with the help of your retro-computer!

With the RetroChallenge ending on Halloween most years, this is an obvious match. Write or port a horror-themed text adventure, modify some vintage e-waste with a halloween theme, or synchronize your haunted house animatronics with programmable logic controller from the 80's. If you don't mind your house getting egged, you could even write your own BASIC game and hand out printed copies of the type-in program to those rascally trick-or-treaters. Anything you want… with touch of the macabre.

Prizes

We will have some RC 2024/10 themed gear for the "winners" and we are working out details for some awesome RC2014 goodies too!

Hosting Options

Feel free to host your project anywhere that everyone can follow along. We are trying out a new reddit community where you can host your project updates. Blogger, your github project wiki, Hackaday.io, or the 68kMLA RetroChallenge forum (for Macs) are all great choices too. The Captain's Quarters II BBS is a perfect option for you low-bandwith luddites.

How to Enter

Fill out the Entry Form for Contestants and save the link at the end in case you want to update or change your information. Let us know in the comments if you have any issues signing up.

Sign Up Now!

RC 2023/10 Results!

The results are in and it's a tie! The three Grand Prize "winners" this year (one for each category) tied for first by popular vote! The other prize winners also received votes and were highly regarded by the judges. But as we all know, even finsihing the RetroChallenge is an impressive task (one that I have been unable to complete for years). Everyone who finished has earned the judge's respect and appreciation!

Stay tuned for details on RetroChallenge 2024/10!

Click below to see the results...

This Is the End!

Time's up, light pens down!

You did it... we are at the end of another great month of the RetroChallenge! Despite the limited number of entries, we had great participation this year, which is the way we really like it.

I will always remember this RetroChallenge as the one where I completely ignored my project and instead met up with urbancamo on his visit to Southern California. We did a version of "October Offline" as we checked out the USS Midway Museum, ate a bunch of Mexican food, and went to an (American) football game to see the Los Angeles Rams and Ice Cube. What a great time, and a great guy to co-host this event with!

As promised, if you participated in the challenge, you can vote for the winners. Take a look at the project links in the Entrants List and then cast your vote on the RC2023/10 ballot. Make sure to get your vote in on or before Tuesday, November 7 (conveniently Election Day here in the USA), and we will award prizes based on the vote and the organizer's favorites. urbancamo, ep00ch, and an ACMS board member will be spending next couple of weeks reviewing and writing up all of the projects. Stay tuned for results!

Radio Repair room on the USS Midway... at least somebody is getting their project done!

RC2023/10 Halftime Update!

We have a small group of contenders this year and it is nice to see that they are nearly all making great progress. I also really appreciate the variety of projects this year. If you are making progress and have some blog posts we missed, let us know in the comments.

Mousepad prizes have been ordered, and we can expect to have a few prizes from the Australian Computer Museum Society as well!

Here is the halftime update (after the break), or just keep an eye on the RC2023/10 Entrants List!

RC2023/10 IS ON!

RetroChallenge 2023/10 has begun!

It's the 1st of October somewhere, we have a few solid RetroChallengers, and I expect we will have many more joining us this week. It's not too late to enter! NOW, GET STARTED!

urbancamo, ep00ch and Adrian from ACMS will be working hard to keep everyone updated and get you timely halftime and final summaries and results.

Shout-out to the Australian Computer Museum Society for incorporating the RetroChallenge into their membership activities.

Announcing RetroChallenge 2023/10!

We are happy to announce RetroChallenge for the month of October 2023! Brought to you again by hosts urbancamo, ep00ch, and now members of the Australian Computer Museum Society board! Thanks to Adrian Franulovich from ACMS for offering to assist with keeping things rolling along smoothly.

About RetroChallenge

In a nutshell, the RetroChallenge is a loosely disorganised gathering of RetroComputing enthusiasts who collectively do stuff with old computers for a month.

The event is very much open to interpretation… individuals set their own challenges, which can range from programming to multimedia work, hardware restoration to exploring legacy networking, or just plain fooling around. It really doesn’t matter what you do, just so long as you do it.

Take a look at the "rules" for the RetroChallenge for basic guidelines.

RetroChallenge 2023/10 Theme Categories

We have two theme categories for this event: Endurance Challenge and October Offline. These category will be judged and awarded separately from the standard entries. If your project qualifies, enter it into one of the theme categories! Otherwise, enter in the General category and just do your own retro thing. Check out last year's List of Entries for some examples.

October Offline

Take a break from online social media!

Enhance your mental health by taking a break from online social media. Use the opportunity to check out a local makerspace, computer museum, or computer user-group meeting and share your project with real people. Maybe get your old computers fixed up and lead a scout meeting about vintage computers, or, you could base your project around some need of your local computer museum. Whatever it is, give up social media and be truly social!

Endurance Challenge

Really use your retro-computer for a month!

Getting back to the ideals of the orginal RetroChallenge, we are challenging you to use your vintage computer for a month doing normal stuff like word processing, budgeting, sending emails, surfing the web, gaming, dot matrix printing, etc. Document what you did, what works, what doesn't, and what solutions you found. We will want to see lots of update posts, but we don't expect much engineering. The Captain's Quarters II BBS has kindly provided a forum as an option for your low-bandwith progress logs. As a final nod to the original RetroChallenge, the best blogger for this category will be based on popular vote!

Prizes

ACMS will be digging up some prizes and we may have some RC 2023/10 mousepads for the "winners".

How to Enter

Fill out the Entry Form for Contestants and save the link at the end in case you want to update or change your information. Let us know in the comments if you have any issues signing up.

Sign Up Now!