Great question @james!

Have you considered running the BBS in emulation? Myself and many others run our Image BBS for the Commodore 64 in VICE which that gives you all the storage and connectivity you could want.  Storage on a CMD HD and the speed of SuperCPU making the VICE c64 run at 20mhz.  This is just an option to put in your hat.

As for real hardware running a BBS, if you want a 1581 that is brand new I would recommend the FX1591 from Foenix, Stefany makes these and sells them for $275, I just got mine in last week, I have yet to open it, I know why? hehe Life.  They are brand new and look cool too plus they are 100% 1581 compatible! We have a write of them on here @ https://8bitboyz.com/2023/03/15/fnx1591-3-5%e2%80%b3-720k-iec-drive/

Now continuing down the rabbit hole of running a Commodore BBS on real hardware, I would refer to @Bucko as he has done this and knows first hand what would and would not work.  He will have some good input for you!

@palkat wow, that 1591 looks perfect. Does it come with power supply and serial cable(s)? When you get yours up and configured maybe you can let me know how it works?

I've seen BBSes running on 2x1541, however, I would assume the message bases would need to be scrubbed often, well. assuming the popularity...

Ultimate II is about $200 (CAD) , that 1591 is more expensive but it's more attractive because it's a real piece of hardware... now you got me more confused on which route to take.

Any thoughts on modem integration? Null Modem or cartridge (swiftlink) type interfaces?

@james I have a 1591 it’s great! I’ve uploaded the JiffyDos ROM to it.

Two things to note it come with a serial cable but not a power supply it takes a common wall wart type. You must likely have one lying around from some other device…. If not they are cheap on Amazon.

The second is it takes DD disks just like the 1581.

@james What BBS software are you thinking of running.

I know personally before going back to Image BBS a few years ago a modern switftlink clone plugged into my c64 cartridge port with BBS server running on a pc with a serial cable to usb to connect the two worked great! It allowed my real hardware to accept telnet at up to 38.4bps.  I never went much farther as then I went with Image BBS running on VICE to save my (at that time) only c64 machine from ware and tare.

PS Image BBS supports swiftlink!

Posted by: @james

↑

Hey, looking for some guidance/advice for setting up a BBS, please.

So I have a c64 and a 1541-II , this is what I am starting with.

I need a modem/serial option now.

I have been looking at:

1) GLINKUSB-T ( https://gglabs.us/node/2018 ) 
2) GLINK-LT ( https://gglabs.us/node/2044 )
3) GLINK232-T ( https://gglabs.us/node/2057  )

- The USB option (1) I believe would be ideal since I can connect it direct to a PC and use BBS Server.

- The cartridge port would be great for the speed as well, however.. then I can't use a fast loader cartridge? Without the extra drive speed would it even make a different if I had a faster serial speed but slow drives?

 

Id like to increase the drive capacity with either.

1) 1581 (very expensive)
2) pi1541 ( https://cbm-pi1541.firebaseapp.com )
3) Ultimate II+ ( https://ultimate64.com/Main_products  //// expensive and out of stock/preorder)

- as for the 1581 I don't think I want to spend $500+ for a disk drive at this time.

- pi1541 seems like a good deal, does anyone have one and/or do you know if I can chain this as device 9 with my current 1541?

 

I'm not too interesting in playing video games with it, I have enough of those with the PC and Xbox, I'm more interesting in the BBS scene at this time, so considerations towards optimizing this experience is where I am aiming to go.

What would you consider minimal disk capacity for a BBS?

Any thoughts or suggestions would be appreciated.

Thanks!

 

 

 

 

In my opinion, you can go two different ways. Spend a ton of money getting a Hard Drive and all of the extras or you can go the cheap way. Getting a uIEC/SD and a Swiftline (Glink232-T). When I ran my Image BBS v1.2 version on real hardware, I used a uIEC/SD with the GLink 232-T, hooked up to a serial cable specially made with pin 6 removed so DCD was correct for BBS Server. The 232T was about $100 and the uIEC/SD was around $100, the reason I mention the uIEC/SD (By Jim Brain) is because you can make 12 partitions on a SD card. I used a 32gig SD card, you will NEVER fill up a 32gig SD card, I created 12 partitions of 3 gig and 2 had 1 gig. It was overkill, but it was treated as a Hard Drive, my C64 was an Ultimate 64 with JiffyDos ROM for speed. The unfortunate thing with the SD card is it is NOT JiffyDOS compatible so you are stuck with a BBS that runs at 1mhz and the HD runs like a 1541 with no speed up.. I noticed you mention using a Fast load cartridge, a lot of BBS Software will not work with Fast Load Cartridges as some like Image use the memory underneath the regular memory (Where the fast load cartridge resides) for extra memory for the BBS to run. If it was me starting up a new BBS on real hardware, I would go with the what I mentioned above (uiEC/SD, GLink232T) in addition to a serial card in my PC so I can hook up via com port for BBS Server, the USB port is ok, but you will have issues with DCD and DTR as pin 6 will not be removed. More explanation of that can be found in the BBS Server Docs.. Once set up if you set the BBS up great and it is really popular you can start to replace items a little at a time, like if you find a used CMD HD or Lt Kernal on eBay that you can get dirt cheap OR someone starts selling clones again at a reasonable price you can replace the uIEC/SD with that, then load in a JiffyDOS rom and get a JiffyDOS chip for the C64 (Socketed board) and you will gain some speed, then you can add in other things...

Now don't take this wrong, I am only bringing this portion up because it needs to be said. Before you spend a ton of money on equipment, try running a BBS in Vice with TCPSER. You can download the latest Vice, set up a Lt Kernal Hard Drive emulation. Swiftlink, TCPSER and have a full pretty quick system ready to install a BBS program on.. If you want to use Image BBS I created the BBS on a stick for just this reason. If you want to use another software, its very easy to copy the files to the emulated HD and be on your way. Now the reason I bring up emulation, it's because some people end up finding out they don't like the every day keep up of the BBS, answering feedback/email, keeping the sub boards busy by posting just about every day. Then if it is not as popular as you want it and you don't get many calls sitting there watching your hardware do nothing is very frustrating, so this is why I bring this up. If you decide you don't want to continue, what did you lose? A few hours setting things up, a few months running the board.. IF everything is popular and moves along real nice, you can then move that very same BBS over to real hardware by copying files.. It is something to think about.. 

One other suggestion, take this time while figuring out what you want to do, and layout a plan to get your BBS up and running, a good plan would be like this:

BBS Software (Which one)

Theme for the BBS

Name for the BBS

Sub-board names 

File Library Names (Start getting together some feeder programs for the libraries)

Online Games (after you decided on the BBS Software get some Doors/online games to run on it)

Trust me you've been bitten by the BBS bug, you will get one up in no time and you'll enjoy it no matter which way you go...

Have fun, and remember we are all here on this website to help..