I am pleased to announce that booking is now open for the next in person ABUG South.
Venue
The event will take place from Friday 6th to Sunday 8th January 2023 at The Ely, London Road, Blackwater, CAMBERLEY, Hampshire, GU17 9LJ.
If you visit the venue's website(s) you may find information suggesting that they have closed down. Fear not, they are currently undergoing refurbishment (which is why the event that was scheduled for this month was cancelled) and are rebranding as a 'Chef & Brewer'. Chef & Brewer is part of the same parent company (Greene King). So it really is just a marketing thing.
The venue is a combined hotel and pub/restaurant. We have been there a number of times now and the feedback for this venue has been very positive. The meeting room is just off the bar. We have always been impressed with the food. As a Chef & Brewer it has a new menu. But this still looks like the same kind of hearty pub food we have been used to. They are still doing a Sunday roast too with apparently similar opportunities to over-indulge.
The meeting room is much bigger than anywhere else we have been in recent years. The official capacity is 110 (although I think that is perhaps a bit sporting). At the previous ABUG South events, we have been comfortably able to accommodate 35 attendees with a full table each and plenty of room to pass between tables. This is, however, somewhat contingent on people being kind enough to bring a few extra tables, as the hotel has a limited number of rectangular tables and round tables do not work very well for our setup.
The room also contains a large projector screen. So, if anyone has a Beeb compatible projector and cable they can bring along, I am sure there will be much fun to have with that.
Travel
The venue is a short distance from J4a of the M3 and pretty close to the M4 too. There is a reasonable amount of parking on site. There are nearby stations at Blackwater and Fleet which are less than 10 minutes by car (and, as usual, I am sure that there will be volunteers to do pick-ups). They are just branch line stations but are easily accessible from Reading, London Paddington and London Waterloo. It is about a half hour drive from Heathrow Airport.
How to book a place
Places will be subject to a charge of £15 per head (although I am not planning on taking any money until much closer to the time). The £15 charge covers the cost of the meeting room together with as much tea, coffee, fizzy pop and unhealthy snacks as you can consume.
If you wish to reserve a place, please post in the thread below or send me a PM, either through the forum or via Facebook. (I can be found in the Acorn Computer and BBC Micro Enthusiasts section as 'Justin Nathan')
If you do not take one of the above steps, you will not have a place. In particular, it is not sufficient to click 'going' in the Facebook event page.
Booking a hotel room
In previous years there have been discount codes available which resulted in some very attractive offers. I cannot find any offers available for January. There are offers for November and December, but these are nowhere near as generous as in previous years. Attempts to negotiate special rates have been met with stoney silence from the venue. I think they feel (with some justification) that they are already giving us a good deal on the function room.
As at 5 January 2023, there is now only 1 room available at the venue. Room booking is available here. In the current economic climate, it may be difficult to justify the prices that they are presently asking (£166.50 £180.00 £193.50 £207.88 for the two nights). There are, however, a number of other hotels nearby, including a Travelodge which is 2.4 miles away and charges £83.98 £76.98 £68.98 £67.98 £65.98 for the two nights. This Travelodge is even better value (£64.98 £66.98 £63.98 £68.98 £67.98 for the two nights) and is 3.2 miles from the venue. I will keep an eye on room availability and pricing and post updates on this thread.
What happens at ABUG
Acorn & BBC Micro User Group (ABUG) events are open to enthusiasts of the BBC Micro, Acorn Electron, Atom and Archimedes/RISC OS machines. Attendees will typically stay for two if not all three days. The events are always very informal and can involve:
- members bringing their own hardware to set up and show off*
- time spent working on hardware and programming/games projects
- exchange of ideas/knowledge
- upgrade and repair of poorly Acorn machines
- collaborative work on community projects, such as software preservation, preparation/planning for displays at other events etc.
- sale of items by members (not guaranteed, but there are often opportunities to buy bits)
- general socialising, food/drink and the odd hi-score competition!
- Important! Ensure that any hardware you bring that features the RIFA/paper-type capacitors with a tendency to go POP (e.g. Beebs) have had the caps changed! We can't risk setting any smoke alarms off as that may incur charges!
Enthusiasts of other platforms are also welcome. In the past we have seen people bringing along vintage systems from:
- Apple
- Commodore
- Sinclair
- Dragon
- Vectrex
Rules
There are very few rules:
- no hot food is to be consumed at the venue other than that which is purchased from the bar/restaurant
- no alcoholic drinks are to be consumed at the venue other than that which is purchased from the bar/restaurant
- see below regarding children
- the hotel is a snake-free venue; please do not bring any snakes to the event
ABUG meetings are not child friendly events because of the following:
- there is not often a lot to engage the interest of very young children
- people working with hot soldering stations
- people working with potentially toxic substances (lead, IPA)
- people working with exposed mains voltages
- large amounts of electrical cabling representing potential trip hazards
- lots of fragile, expensive and sometimes rare equipment
If, however, children become a risk to themselves or others, they will have to leave.
New members
We are particularly keen for new members of the forum to attend these events. You do not need to be working on developing a Cray 1 second processor for the Beeb or porting Crysis to the Acorn Atom. You just need to be interested in vintage technology.
We are a friendly bunch and we will make sure you feel welcome. If you have any questions or uncertainty about the event, please feel free to PM me (either on this forum or using Facebook Messenger - I can be found in the Acorn Computer and BBC Micro Enthusiasts section as 'Justin Nathan').
Partners
Many people bring their partners to these events. They are all very welcome. Those of you who are lucky enough to have a partner who is genuinely involved in the retro-computing scene, will have to secure and pay for a separate place for your partner. But those partners who just attend to socialise are welcome free of charging and without needing to take-up one of the places.
Confirmed
One day only
- JudgeBeeb (Robert) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- cmorley (Chris) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- sbadger (Stewart) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- tom_seddon (Tom) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- inky (Mark) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- Dave Footitt (Dave) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- markdryan (Mark) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- mattyj (Matt) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - bringing one table - paid
- 1024MAK (Mark) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- tricky (Richard) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- gavinlew (Gavin) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon- paid
- flibble (Peter) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- MattH (Matt) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- daveejhitchins (Dave) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - bringing one table - paid
- baz4096 (Chris) - arriving Friday evening, leaving Sunday afternoon - bringing one table - paid
- IanS (Ian) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- kieranhj (Kieran) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- Prime (Phill) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- Revaldinho (Rich) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- BigEd (Ed) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - bringing two wobbly tables - paid
- jubber (Robin) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- 0xC0DE (Kelvin) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- steve3000 (Steve) - arriving Saturday morning, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- dominicbeesley (Dominic) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - bringing at least one table - paid
- VectorEyes (Adrian) - arriving Saturday late morning/early afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- Joka80 (Costa) - arriving Saturday midday, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- Arcadian (Dave) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - bringing two tables - paid
- BeebMaster (Ian) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- helpful (Bryan) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- soruk (Michael) - attending Saturday & Sunday, not staying overnight - paid
- jbnbeeb (Jason) - arriving Friday evening, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- z0m8ied0g (Stephen) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - bringing two, possibly three, tables - paid
- Paul (Paul) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - bringing one table, will look for more - paid
- chrisn (Chris) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
- dp11 (Dominic) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday afternoon - paid
Unconfirmed
- MarkMoxon (Mark) - may visit some time on Saturday
- sixxdog_uk (Alex) - Saturday only
- scropp (Stephen) - just Saturday - paid
- picosonic (Jasper) - visiting on Sunday - paid
Reserve list
Thank you for organising. I'd love to come to this ABUG, something great to look forward to, for the full weekend please.
