[Coco] Color computer these days...

[Michael Robinson]

I checked out Ebay for the heck of it to see if I could find a 
Coco 3 for sale.  Well, I found a coco3 with multi pak 
interface WAY over priced.  Worse, I searched for 360k disk drives 
and couldn't find any.  I have two 360k disk drives that are shot.  
I can't get Gauntlet II to work over drivewire where I could
theoretically pick up some disks and write the images to them
if I had working disk drives.  Can I cheat somehow and get away 
with using a modern 1.44 meg floppy drive as a substitute?  What 
if I can find a 720k disk drive, will that work?  My disk 
controller says hard drive specialists on it, but it doesn't 
control a hard drive.

Anyways, what ever became of the MM/1 and the Tomcat?  I couldn't
find any on Ebay.  

My nephew has a coco 2 and wants a coco 3 because he is aware 
of the differences in capability.  I have a 512k coco 3 thanks 
to cloud 9, but no 512k software for it.  At $50 for a coco 3
from cloud 9 it may be worth it to order one through them.

There is talk of coconet and projects that favor the rare 
coco 1,2, and 3, what about dreams of a coco 4?  Could a 
coco 4 be done?  What would it look like?  Would it have a 
modern AT keyboard, a gig of ram, the original instruction 
set of the coco3, plus say 100 or more new clock speeds?  
How could a 64 bit coco compatible computer be designed?  
These days there are pic micro controllers that could 
probably emulate the 6809BE no problem.  I think the biggest
compatability hurdle would be the Microware/Microsoft rom
code.

Color computers seem to be getting rare, especially Coco 
3's.  The Tomcat and the MM/1 seem to be gone.  I guess 
the 68000 took over, but even that is gone now.

The following is the only coco 3 for sale at a reasonable price 
that I have been able to find on E-Bay.  I'm tempted to bid on
it, but how do I know that it works?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&item=260328354693