Delta
Softhouse (in background) with rabbit (in foreground - no mistake) 1995

   My name is Peter Turányi and I was born in 1972. Then came beautiful childhood time but there was not any reference on Spectrum. I saw the computer on excursion when I was in last school form for the first time. It was the "famous" computer PMD-85 (made in Czechoslovakia). I played Penetrator, Frogs, Bombarder and I was lost. I joined a computer club and spent amazing time with friends in a leisure time center.
   After my basic school in 1987 I started grammar school in Považská Bystrica. By chance my classmate Robert Šustek had a Sinclair ZX Spectrum - Delta. Thank to him I could familiarize with it and played Ikari warriors, Commando and other games. From this moment I wanted Spectrum! I asked my father to get it - and best 128. Unfortunately he brought me the Commodore 64. After I had unpacked it I plugged it and tried to communicate with it. But when I got something like "Error 04" after I had typed and run primitive three line long program, I packed it and said father "Thanks no more". So I spent my free time in computer club, formed in building of "National front" (political organization). There were not only PMD computers but also three Atari 800XE. So by programming on PMD we had good craze with River raid and Karateka.
   Situation changed in second form when Robert decided to sell his Delta. I did not hesitate any more. I "smashed my pig" (saving box) and asked father for help again. So Delta was moved to me. I started learning secrets of Sinclair basic and looking at machine code. I had not any problems with programming at school so the lessons bored me. My teacher of informatics was very angry with it and finally she asked me what I would have liked to do. "Machine code" was the answer without hesitating. She gave me few hours after lessons and lent me a book about machine code of 8080 processor. Thanks to it I came to instruction set of Z80 processor. First time I did not understand anything. I began investigate programms of other programmers and did experiments. Step by step I got it. So in 1991 I can write my first demo Music supercode 1. Before that I had already made some programs in basic.
   The computer club moved and under its wings rose Sinclair-club and I was established as a boss. Since that time the dust has been falling on Atari in corner.
   That year I started studying at Slovak technical university, faculty of electrotechnics. But not informatics. I had to be satisfied with the material engineering. In spite of it I met many new people and Perfekt company which was later renamed to Perpetum. Thanks to some colleague I got cheap D40 (diskdrive made in Slovakia) at the end of second term. I remember my endeavor to buy some diskettes before I started returning home for holidays to try it. I spent holidays saving my software collection at diskettes. After that I could save anything on diskettes and I made money by converting multilevel games. I spent this money to buy another floppy drive D80. My hardware park was extended with music interface Melodik with AY-chip (made in Slovakia) and I run demos again and again with great amazement. I also longed to do it myself. First I trained myself with AY-driver and after I had known enough to manage Sound tracker I created my first AY demo. My programmer's capability rose with the help of a book "Assembler & ZX Spectrum" that extended my knowledge I had gained by self-study.
   D40/80 opened the door to world of other computer world data and university opened the door to the world of internet. I started visiting IRC channel #Z80 and downloaded various data from internet which I transferred them to my Spectrum. There were mainly texts so I created convertor from T602 (PC czechoslovak text editor) to Desktop (Spectrum text editor). After my friend Rado Benda (Atari 1040 ST user) had showed me quantum of graphics I started downloading pictures too. I was especially interested in animations on ST. I used some of them in my next demos. With a little of the graphics I improved game by T.S.S. - "Mind crosswar". But first of all I had to create new program I named it ST-linker to be able to work out these images. Later I improved this program to such an extension that it became fully new programm I named it Di-vision. Well when the Sample tracker came I needed some samples and because there were many samples for PC I made Sample convertor.
   I'm not gambler. I can say I am even fastidious. All the time I have been having Spectrum I have never had more than 20 cassettes which I converted to almost 40 diskettes. But after some time I lost view and I needed to make some list. I felt so ingenious that I wrote Neolite. After my gold mine ftp://nvg.unit.no finding I had no more problems of getting programms again. But many programms were "dirty" snaps and I had not PC. So I made snap launcher for D80 and I originally named it ZX emulator. With a respect to real emulators I first used Luntner's Z80 but today I use only RealSpectrum.
   My Spectrum career ended with conversion of games Minesweeper and Solitaire. I finished them before I went to my military service. I started writing National flags in assembler code but its realisation was "broken" because I got married. When I moved off from my parents I simultaneously lost TV set needed as a screen for my Spectrum so almost all my activities on Spectrum stopped. In 2002 I bought PC which I still have and at least I could return to Spectrum by help of emulator. I have great planes. Besides finishing National flags I have some ideas for original games inspirated by PC games (Alley cat), TV contests (Wheel of fortune - but I probably missed the train, I think) or board games (Turf and stake). I am short of time and the rest of it I spend for converting books on ZX into electronic format. We will see what will come true.
   I have also other hobbies. I like reading books (mostly SCIFI) and magazines, Jung psychology and tourism.
   Now you can contact me at conference, or e-mail address softhousesk(a)gmail(o)com.


- SOFTHOUSE -
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Delta Stránka v slovenčine