My collection of "Yesteryear" computers

[Ian Rogers]

Yep!! I am one of those weirdo's that collect old 80's style computers... I have Amiga's, Atari ST's, BBC's, Archimedes and of course my favorite specy collection...

I had recently decided to put my prize into an aluminium box "Sort of Laptop" so I can get it out and mess with it.... I have already done similar with my old 16k, but my Toastrack 128k has been neglected..... I rigged up the monitor in the lid and made a power supply to drive the monitor, specy and all its peripherals..... Double checking all wiring I gave it a test run... "Snif Snif. ear wot's that smell" I said..... My prize...... I had completely forgotten that the power supply on those old specy's were reversed... the + is on the outer shell as opposed to the center pin... AAAARRRGGGHHH!!

I quickly disassembled the computer... On first inspection there was very little damage... the obvious sign was the smoothing coil on the incoming power rails... I reversed the power and plugged it back in..... I ran fine but alas no TV output... I connected up the scope and found the ULA and CPU were running fine.... The video encoder however wasn't outputting an AV signal.... After a quick check I found the invertor circuit wasn't generating +12v... Worse still the -5v had dropped to -6.25v.... Once I fixed the problem (TR4) and replaced the main 5v reg ( 7805) everything is back to normal...

These things are fetching over £150 nowadays....

So I had a near scare moment...... Anyone else have any stories to tell.... Anyone else with a collection of similar nature??

 

[JimB]

I still have my Beeb "B" and all the bits from the 1980s, I have not had power on it at least since the turn of the millenium.

A PDP11 would look "cool" sitting in the corner, but all of my corners are full up with other junk.

As regards the faux pas with the power, I am sure that I have done similar things in the past, but time has dulled the pain and I have forgotten the incident.

JimB

 

[Ian Rogers]

I'm waiting for a decent ZX81..... It has to be in good working order, although I will do minor electronic repairs..

I don't think I want a PDP11 or any of the business computers of that era... Its the personal computers I keep... Although I have an XT and an AT.... Then everything since....

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

I've still got my original computer - a 6502 based Tangerine MicroTan 65

I've also got a couple of Amiga's (an original A500 - pre-UK keyboard) and an A600 someone was binning.

I've also got a Commodore +4, complete with disc drive.

 

[tvtech]

I had a Sinclair Spectrum 16K many years ago. With all my moving around I probably tossed it. Gave me lots of fun though with games it could run..nice Basic ones.

Now the ZX81...I wanted to buy the kit version and assemble it myself as a Teen...had to come from England though and was way too expensive by the time it would arrive here in South Africa. I remember drooling over Practical Electronics and other ads from England.

I think I have the Mags still where Sir Clive said it could run a Power Station or something similar. On 1k of RAM.

Think about it though what Apollo 11 accomplished with so little computing power to put a man on the Moon.....

Quote: "The so-called Apollo Guidance Computer (AGC) used a real time operating system, which enabled astronauts to enter simple commands by typing in pairs of nouns and verbs, to control the spacecraft. It was more basic than the electronics in modern toasters that have computer controlled stop/start/defrost buttons. It had approximately 64Kbyte of memory and operated at 0.043MHz." Unquote.

Link here: https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Apollo-11-The-computers-that-put-man-on-the-moon

Regards,
tv

 

[tvtech]

Bump. I edited my post above.

 

[cowboybob]

OTAT (Off Topic A Tad), but...

The comments of the site tv listed are vastly amusing.

And relatively recent. And vehement.

The "it (the Apolla 11 Mission) was PhotoShopped" comment was telling.

 

[tvtech]

OTAT (Off Topic A Tad), but...

The comments of the site tv listed are vastly amusing.

And relatively recent. And vehement.

The "it (the Apolla 11 Mission) was PhotoShopped" comment was telling.

Hi Bob

There is a video there in the Comments section that I actually watched. It's an eye opener and it's long....say 45 Minutes or so.. Same Video just on YouTube:

Regards,
tv

 

[tvtech]

Sorry Ian for taking your thread a little OT.

Instead of starting yet another new thread I thought I should just carry on here

Regards,
tv

 

[Ian Rogers]

No problem!! I've done with my rant.... I wanted to see how many here tried a spectrum... It seems like it was the only personal computer aimed at getting people into programming...

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

No problem!! I've done with my rant.... I wanted to see how many here tried a spectrum... It seems like it was the only personal computer aimed at getting people into programming...

I would have thought the Spectrum was pretty well down the list on that score? - there were many computers before the Spectrum better for learning programming on.

 

[Ian Rogers]

Yes! I know.. But it was the first aimed at children.... If you sat a child in front of an old IBM or commodore pet, they wouldn't have shown an interest..... I bought my first spectrum when I was about 20.... I had a commodore 16 ( 1k of ram ) before that... The specy was definitely use more than the commodore for programming...

 

[tvtech]

No problem!! I've done with my rant.... I wanted to see how many here tried a spectrum... It seems like it was the only personal computer aimed at getting people into programming...

Thanks Ian. I was such a dumb ass back then. All I wanted to do was use the Spectrum for games.
I did not know better

Never been a Digital guy. If only someone then had shown me the road that lies ahead..I would have payed attention.

Regards,
tv

 

[tunedwolf]

A mate of mine still has a Pet tucked under his bench and I gave him a box of chips for it about 15 years ago. I also had a 48K spectrum and a few games for it, but its main use was for programming eproms. I also had a Dragon32 and an ST1024 for gaming. Loved Volfied, Pushover and Moonshine Racers

I must have replaced literally hundreds of RAM chips and a stack of power supplies in the Spectrums when I had the shop

 

[Brian Griffin]

You guys are lucky enough to have all these classic 8-bits computing systems.

Here in my place, we can't afford these things in the 80s (they might not even exist there - never recalled a Commodore64 in here) and the best one was the one with the 486DX computer during the early 90s.

The only 8-bit system I had was the "Micro Genius" video game system. But that was already disposed. Had good times with those cartridge games, gave us loads of entertainment back then.

 

[killivolt]

Thanks Ian. I was such a dumb ass back then. All I wanted to do was use the Spectrum for games.
I did not know better

Never been a Digital guy. If only someone then had shown me the road that lies ahead..I would have payed attention.

Regards,
tv

I with you buddy; I'm an analog guy in a digital world at work these days. It's like the crossroads; the bus has left the building and stopped already.

That was 10 years ago.


kv

 

[tunedwolf]

You guys are lucky enough to have all these classic 8-bits computing systems.

Here in my place, we can't afford these things in the 80s (they might not even exist there - never recalled a Commodore64 in here) and the best one was the one with the 486DX computer during the early 90s.

The only 8-bit system I had was the "Micro Genius" video game system. But that was already disposed. Had good times with those cartridge games, gave us loads of entertainment back then.

The Commodore 64, great machine, terrible power supplies though, the 5V rail failed on them regularly.

I had an Atari 2600 games console as well on which I played Tank Commander, or something like that and Asteroids?
I also used a really expensive Compaq XT, then later a Sanyo 16Mhz AT at work back then. The regulator board in the Compaq was full size and would happily heat the room and the Sanyo only liked it's own formatted disks and had other little peculiar issues only the Sanyo had, but otherwise a very useful machine in its day. I seem to remember buying Windows 3.11 for that one. Eventually though, I bought my own 486DX, 25Mhz AMD processor, with upgraded 2MB of RAM, upgraded 40MB hard drive and a 3 1/2" floppy drive. It came originally with 1MB RAM, a 20MB hard drive and a 5 1/4" floppy drive. Bought it from CIC computers for the princley sum of £1800 inc a 14" VGA monitor, Genius KB and Mouse and delivery. I loved it to death, my wife loved Prince of Persia so I had to start making my own supper

 

[ronsimpson]

Had one of these. Many of the boards were hand wire wrapped by me.
I added two 8" floppy drives and later a 5meg hard drive. That set me back a months wages for the HD.

Also one of these.

 

[Ian Rogers]

Loved Volfied, Pushover and Moonshine Racers

Still play pushover... My 500 is still sat on a desk at work.... I also play it on the amiga emulator (WinUAE)

 

[tunedwolf]

Still play pushover... My 500 is still sat on a desk at work.... I also play it on the amiga emulator (WinUAE)

"I'll get them!"

I loved those old games, somehow they felt like games, not at all like the stuff being produced nowadays. While it's all super duper technical with graphic detail that now rivals the space shuttle simulator, modern games just feel like a whole lot less "fun" to me

ronsimpson
I was lucky enough to have been spared that, however, I did notice that you can buy a true replica as a kit from here: http://www.altairkit.com/
It looks like he is also making a serial expansion board for it