How am I going to resurrect this long obsolete computer? - Raising the Digital Dead Ep. 2
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 11 พ.ย. 2022
- #technology #retro #computer In this episode we take a slightly closer look at the 1976 Sol Intelligent Terminal, prototype of Processor Technology's Sol-20 Terminal Computer, with an eye on replicating it. I'll discuss some additional design elements of the original machine, where it ended up, and anticipated challenges.
In the video to follow, I'll build a new cardboard model with updated information, and see how close I can get visually/dimensionally to the original.
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Part 2! Well, this was supposed to be part of Part 1, but I ran out of time trying to get it done for Halloween, and don't like letting run lengths get out of hand. This'll be followed asap by Part 3, which where I rebuild by cardboard model with newly available information and try to make it look as close to the original as possible. That process has been taking a while, but should be done this week. I hope. Cheers!
Adrian's Digital Basement on youtube does cool stuff and might know someone that can maybe make up the missing eprom rom things (the 3 chips). Also has the swpc 6800 working.
You should use that stuff they make "vote for such and such" law signs from. It's called coroplast and it's pretty cheap and about as easy to work with as cardboard, but much stronger and longer lasting. The home despot sells a 4x8' sheet for like 30 bucks. A lot of people use this for this kind of mock-up prototyping. Of course, cardboard works too, but you see what happens to in a few years of sitting.
On your dimensions, I don't think you have to consciously widen them. Just adding real wood ends will get you close to that 21 inch mark.
I'm almost certain that if you ask then the CHM will get a photo of the underside for you.
@@SellamAbraham I could try. I didn't want to push my luck, they'd already been super helpful.
I bet you can find some 1970's era furniture at thrift stores or garage sales, to get the closer grain and appearance to the original. I'm sure an end table or night stand would gladly give its life to becoming a piece of computing history.
Problem is, real wood stuff had gone out of style and faux wood grain became a thing. In the 60s and earlier, a lot of stereo equipment was made of wood with real veneer, but in the late 60s those things disappeared. Those were last real wood stuff people liked to put in their homes. By the mid 70s, most of that was gone.
@@tarstarkusz You could probably get away with going older. If the main difference is old growth vs. new, then something from the '60s or earlier ought to be a good match. And who's to say they didn't sacrifice an old bookshelf for the prototype?
@@DannyBeans If you are willing to go to the 60s, yeah, the stuff is everywhere. It really is amazing how quickly that changed.
Yeah, that's a good point. All we can really say about the wood is it was harvested before the prototype was made.
Or get a couple square feet of walnut veneer which has been selected because it's pretty. Glue that onto solid but modern walnut and it shouldn't be apparent unless you _really_ inspect the edge. The modern, less dense core will still weigh less than the old wood, and knocking on it will sound different, but once it's installed as part of a chassis, this is going to be incredibly hard to detect. As I said in another comment, this isn't a repair of a classic guitar. I don't think the original prototype gave _that_ much consideration to the wood, they just picked a slab off a shelf that looked nice.
Flights to CA aren't that pricey, and maybe the museum would allow you to see it up close, especially if you show them this video. What you're trying to do is pretty special, and something they would appreciate. Seeing it up close will likely reduce a lot of the work to recreate this, and reduce many blind alleys.
Nice to see you here Andy! Enjoyed the Capri video. cheerz Harley (NZ)
That "old growth" tree thing is totally accurate. Between harvesting for wood, and clearing for agriculture, there's very little old-growth left in North America (outside of protected lands).
Kinda sad, in addition to making it hard to replicate something that uses older wood.
@@TechTimeTraveller Perhaps you could salvage old broken furniture? I don't know how easy it is to come across in the us but it's an option.
Well, also it's cheaper and better for the environment to grow new wood. You can still get old growth from mills. Usually you get tree sellers buying individual trees from random private individuals and then they sell them to the mills. Very expensive.
Yep, wood that lived through "The little Ice Age". What's crazy is here in Wisconsin the reason we still have forests is because our ancestors replanted them after deforestation.
He could possibly find some wood from an old abandoned house or Barn??
I randomly stumbled upon the Computer History Museum less than a week ago. A very cool museum to visit! Saw the TVT and immediately thought of your video on it.
the computer history museum staff is indeed very helpful
speaking as someone who lives outside of the US
Great Video! Im 15 and trying to learn how to solder and repair computers and this has taught me a lot, along with being very entertaining! thank you so much!
Always glad to see another video man, thanks for posting!
Simply fantastic!! Looking forward towards your next video. Keep up the great work!!!
If you want to closely duplicate the vintage substrate you need a vinylester resin and heavily promote it with conap. We used to build sailboats with the stuff back in the 80s. I'll ask about the specific variety when I get a chance but I do remember it was from Derakane. I was like six, cut me some slack here :D As to the glass, any roughly 2oz glass cloth would probably suffice but I'd recommend a product known as crowsfoot if you can find it. Just laminate it up to the right thickness and clamp it between sheets of waxed acrylic sheet or carefully faired out plywood covered in waxed paper. I've no idea what the dk would be but I doubt there's anything in there that needs impedance control anyways.
I love the idea of this series. I can't wait for the next steps!
This series will be so epic. I kook forward to the next parts with great interest
Just the kind of kind of content I am looking for on a Saturday. Thank You!
Absolutely love this idea. You have a new fan. I'll be watching and waiting for more!
As always, top notch video. I'm excited to watch this journey you are partaking in. Good luck and god speed!
Another great video on this great channel, packed with information about tech older than myself. Thanks for all the effort you put into these videos so that youngsters like me get their dose of tech history!
Your content is great... interesting, enjoyable... and also has a great ASMR vibe too!
I've been toying with the idea of doing a vintage computer ASMR vid just for fun!
You might want to reach out to Adrian Black of Adrian's Digital Basement about the EPROM programmer. I believe he has an older one in his collection.
I'm slightly over 5 minutes in, and this is so delightfully crunchy in terms of details that I am gleeful. As someone trying to get into hobby electronics, having individuals glaze over the path from start to finish makes things feel unapproachable. However, seeing a segment of a journey that is just different provides perspective, making the whole field seem easier to conquer. Thanks for doing what you do!
Man I lvoe these videos like doing it for the thing of it ! Love your stuff cant wait until the next episode !
18:10 need a metal press for those nice 90 degree bends, you could simply build one using a hydraulic car jack, an appropriate edge for the metal you want to bend, and a jig to hold it all
I'm really enjoying your channel and these videos! My journey in computers started leading into the Trinity trio. I had joined a computer club in Sydney, Australia called MEGS. Microcomputer Enthusiasts Group Sydney, the first computer club in Aus. I was still at school and the strange terminals and programming switches of hardware were so weird to me but oh so interesting. I hate to think of the wonderful goodies that would have been scrapped ...Cheers
Very cool! Did you experience machines like the DREAM and DG680? Oz has so many neat locally designed machines.
Looking forward to more episodes.
ENJOYING this very much.8-)
The Computer History Museum is so great! So many amazing treasures there.
Very cool project You are taking on here, I appreciate Your interest and work in keeping the old history alive!
The dial You call out at 20:50 is a rotary BCD encoder switch, usually for setting an address, or other input.
I will be very interested to watch this project develop!
OK, looking at the layout and schematic pdf you uploaded to VCF board a while ago, although the component ID's don't quite
line up, it looks like that encoder switch selects the serial port baud rate.
I had a half guess that's what it did but thought they might have used more of a dial where you could label speeds directly. But this makes sense.. thank you!
Martin Eberhard is still available, I bought 1702 and 2708 programmer PCB kits from him. I think he can be contacted in the S100 google group. Maybe he still has the 5204 programmer kits available
Love it!
About programming vintage chips, you should check the "Retro Chip Tester Professional" (RCT). The most recent firmware versions allow to read and write EPROMS, and there's accessories that allow you to provide the chip with non-standard voltages externally.
I will check that out!
I'm very interested in seeing how this goes! 🙂
I love the SOL-20 it is one of my favorite vintage computer that I have in my collection.
Wallace Shawn (aka the Sicilian, Grand Nagus Zek) wrote in his play _The Fever_ that everything we use is "...the end of a story about all the people who made it and sold it," and prototypes like this (and the way you present them) really drive that home. *great* video, I love stuff like this so dang much!!!
I'm excited to see you add a chapter to this story!
this is one I definitely cannot wait to see done, I love this idea of resurrecting a dead device. and after reading about it in Fire in the valley seeing it IRL (via a picture that is) will be cool,, now I want to re read fire in the valley, I wonder if there is a similar book about Commodore ?
Here is how to convert original artwork to KiCAD PCBs . Import the image into Gimp or Inkscape and edit, scale etc. make sure you set the image to a true black and white image. once complete, export it as a .png file in the highest resolution possible.
Open Kicad image converter then select your .png exported image and convert it to a .mod component. this will not allow you to convert the image to a copper layer. either an overlay or user layer. export the converted file
Go to kicad component editor and import the converted file. once in there you can manually select to move silkscreen etc to a copper layer. do so for all tracks. save the part.
finally, open kicad PCBs editor and place the part. this is ONLY the copper layers and has no drill holes, vias etc. you will need to select an appropriate pad / footprint to match the original and manually place them to line up with the original footprints. place edge cuts where necessary and you are done!
produce the Gerber files an send them off to any PCB house for manufacture. no home etching or messing around. all perfectly aligned and professionally manufactured.
I'd suggest asking Curious Marc for leads regarding those HV roms, if you haven't already.
The early cassette storage systems like Processor Tech or Polymorphic Systems only had a simple "BOOT" loader in EPROM to load the RAM based full cassette system. My first serious system used the Processor tech S100 video board and a wire wrapped support board in a Z80 S100 running a custom version of the 1K 2708 EPROM Poly Monitor. It used a standard cassette recorder for it's file storage system at 600 or 1200 BPS 1200/2400Hz Byte format with file headers. The system still works but was upgraded in 1979 with 64K RAM and dual 8" floppy with a second EPROM to boot CPM from the Poly Monitor prompt.
Yes I have a Poly88 and 8813 and they do that. I also have a Microkit 8/16 that boots directly from tape. Unfortunately it appears to be a rather rare machine and nobody has come up with any tapes for it yet.
@@TechTimeTraveller The first time I got the tape running I entered the cassette tape code in hex from the keyboard using the assembler listing output. Then used this code to save it's self. I never had any tapes to start with. If you can find a printed copy of the cassette software you are set. Oh yes the Poly88 monitor entry point is F00D hex. This is a great address to remember for nearly 50 years.
You guys that make pcb transparencies need to talk to your local print shop / platemaker. See if they still have an imagesetter / can make films; send them your negative art and tell them "right reading emulsion down."
That control on the back with an edge wheel and a number looks more like a BCD or HEX encoded switch, perhaps to select an address or baud rate. This type of switch was common in the mid 70s.
Nice model. It looks the part.
Good stuff
I have a feeling... In about 30 years, a buyer on Sotheby's auction will be buying your finished replica, with Sotheby's authenticate it as the original...
Damn, can we get a time machine to see that and have a good laugh?
For repairing the damaged EPROM you would need a manual wire bonding setup or rather somone who has access to one. You can watch video by Sam Zeloof on his wedge bonder. Other possibility is a micro probing station, a microsope with tiny needle electrodes for probing ICs for prototyping and research. It still would be extremely tricky and precise work, but this could be the only way to retrieve the EPROM contents.
Neat! I'll check that out. I'm guessing CHM, by virtue of what they do, probably has people who know how to do that. Al mentioned it as a possibility in one of his posts about the machine.
I've made sharp right angles in sheet metal by clamping it in the vice and hammering it along the edge. Usually a large radius bend is made first by hand, and then it's made sharper with the hammer.
For the material for the case you should try kydex instead of acrylic it has a texture in it that would match your prototype
Also i have a functioning data io 29A rom burner. I dont know off hand but if those roms can be written to with that burner i’d be willing to give it a shot.
Awesome video, lost of cool stuff I did not know about! Also, was that an offhand confirmation of a Tech Model Train Traveller youtube channel in the works?
Haha. I would love to but I haven't been doing model trains for a while. Started getting vertigo when working on my bridges.
I think a popular pcb manufacturer does sheet metal services, too :)
Center cut walnut.
Basically the leftover of the log after they cut all the good lumber off. Cheapest stuff they could get
I've tried locating it for sale but center cut walnut doesn't seem to pop much up. I think I read somewhere it became more desirable in recent years.
You can buy a cheap metal brake from Harbor Freight. They make one that can handle 18" wide sheet metal, cost is about $45, though it's sometimes on sale with a coupon.
That number dial is a BCD or HEX 4 bit switch. Maybe for setting some option like a terminal address?
Cardboard-aided-design FTW ;)
Lol the original CAD!
I use posterboard for prototyping, it's easier to cut. The cardboard was a good (not exactly aesthetically pleasing) idea to get your ears around the general shape and layout. "It ain't pretty, but it will be one day!" There are thermoplastic sheets out there on Amazon that you can use for the cover(s), They can be bent/curved using a heat gun and a form. For example, putting the waterfall drop in the cover can be done by heating the material up until pliable, then draping over a pipe for the radius. My experience is the material is impacted by environment temp and humidity, like 3d printing, and you'll make a bunch of junk before you get the hang of it. I went through a bunch before getting pretty adept at it.
I thought about using some of the plastic stuff I have for making model railroad structures.. they have big sheets of it. Might be same as what you're suggesting. I just used cardboard because it was free and readily available. The new box model looks a bit better than the first attempt.
That dial looks like a device ID switch.
I have some black walnut wood i could send ya. Its old growth reclaimed from my farm. Its beautiful and has its own history to add to whatever is built with it. If your interested.
If the kits for the 5204 EPROM programmers aren't available, I'd try to find a manual from a programmer of the time that handled those chips. They usually show circuit diagrams, and modern substitute parts can usually be found to at least partially replicate them. Finding something that plugs into an existing computer, such as an S-100 board, could also save a bunch of time on programming if you can find the software.
When I saw the name Martin Eberhard in relation to Tesla, I was wondering if it was the same guy that made the EPROM programmer kits. Now I know.
You dyed the pcb but settled for non date matching chips, wow!
Well.. that was a different situation. The dye job I did because the only PCB material I had to work with when doing the TVT was new stuff. But then I found some NOS copper clad. For the Sol.. I will certainly try to get it in range but targeting a narroe range of dates can be tricky. With the TVT if my chips were 1975 or earlier it was consistent.
I THINK Adrian at Adrian's Digital Basement might have an old EPROM programmer that can program the EPROMS that require high voltages. If not, someone I subscribe to on TH-cam definitely does, but that doesn't help much.
It would be interesting to see if the pcb-material from Bungard is looking like the pcbs from the 70s and 80s. Bungard is a german company founded 1961 and is still around an is making pcb-material and everything around it.
If you need to get more exact with getting dimensions off the image, I’d recommend a piece of software called ImageJ. It allows you to set a known length, then measure other dimensions off your picture. It wont solve the perspective errors, but I’ve found it invaluable for reverse engineering dimensions off images.
the wood sides remind me of early 70s/80s Mixers and other Musical interfaces if you will. I used to have, if memory serves me, and old yamaha 4 track? that was almost the same size as this unit your working on . Try keeping an eye out for something like that perhaps . Just a thought mate . Cheers .
problem back the 70's i would expect either laminated stuck to chipboard or printed laminate on vinyl sheets
12:10 You can get some basic measurements from these photos is you already know for a fact what measurements the other objects in the picture are and using some parallax techniques
Probably about a 1 foot and a half long, 2-3in in front, probably flares out, with the keyboard being angled probably with some molding and tape drive, probably 5-6 inches or so towards the back, and maybe about foot wide or so
6:30 china pcbs are just sheets of fiberglass with copper film stuck on it
(03:50) I think the term you are looking for is vertical and horizontal linearity.
A bench vise and a couple of 1x6 are all you need to make a reasonable facsimile of a metal brake. Just clamp the 2x6 the same length as your metal with the metal in between the two pieces. Than you can fold the metal over and bang on it with a hammer to get a tight corner. This works pretty well if the gague is light and the pieces fairly small. Something 12-14" wide should really not be a problem, 36 would be way to big for this to work.
I tried something like that.. I don't have a bench vise (really need to invest in one). But I created an edge and used some c clamps. I think the metal was just too thick in my case. I'm not sure of the thickness of the prototype metal but it looks thinner. Maybe your idea would work!
@@TechTimeTraveller I've had success with it, but also using fairly thin metal. I've never had a reason to bend 12 gauge or something.
Also, getting corners like that is hard even with a brake. They like to round off on the bending edge and you get rounded corners. With commercial equipment, it's probably different, but using a hand brake from Harbor Freight, that's just what you get. In 99% of cases, it's well good enough.
@@TechTimeTraveller also, if you're near or in a city, a lot of libraries/public maker spaces have large tools available for small rental or membership fees. might be there's someone in your area who has a metal break and can do the bend for a small fee? this is in Canada where our library funding isn't quite so politicized thankfully and where you are too. (not trying to start a politics fight, just pointing out that public libraries have more program freedom up here)
i'm sorry i paused to write this literally the second before you mentioned you had a friend with one MY BAD
CHM should measure and send you the actual dimensions!
I love this project. It's crazy, it's foolish, it's mad, and I absolutely wish you all the luck and hope it's a wild, successful ride.
💪😁🔥🔥🔥 Well done! P.S. How much did it take to prepare this video to you? I'm curious to compare with my ones...
It's kinda hard to say because originally this was part of another video. But in general it can take 30-60 hours for a documentary style video, esp if I indulge my greenscreen habit. I'm slowed a bit because Premiere often crashes on my rig. But esp for documentaries etc.. where you're doing a ton of research.. it can be pretty involved.
@@TechTimeTraveller "Good" to hear that not only shotcut crashes and makes many problems... 🤪 I keep my fingers crossed!
With the four pins under that thumb-wheel, I'm guessing it's a binary encoder that ranges between 0 and 7.
Yes. They were certainly common in the 70s and 80s. Some are 0-7, some 0-9, and the ones I worked with were 0-9 and A-F for hexadecimal input.
Turning an Atmel based Arduino into an EPROM programmer should not be too hard. There were many homebrew programmer designs back in the day.
Can you share a video about your railroad models?
Is is worth drawing the schematics up in easyEDA/ kicad to make the project a bit easier to understand and possibly help troubleshoot some of the bodges?
It would mean if others wanted to follow the project along they could have some boards spun up.
Just a thought!
That is a thought. I lack the experience but am willing to try. We have had a number of PCB fab houses email offers of sponsorship.. ive been thinking about engaging one to help me with that, and then maybe produce a couple runs of boards of two designs: one the untouched original and the other a 'cured' version that tries to mimic the anesthetics of the original but maybe has a 3rd layer to make all the connections that weren't made. And then those could be offered to folks who want to try their own.
@@TechTimeTraveller That's an even better idea. Honestly I think as a learning tool drawing out the schematics yourself gives you a really good idea of what's going on. And hopefully will highlight what bodges were made why/ and where. I think making a modern set of boards with the same ic layout ahead of the home etched ones may save you a lot of headaches in the long run.
The main reason I ask is because I've sat there in easyEDA a few times looking at this project wondering if I should draw it up to see what it's supposed to do.
Good luck, and do reach out to the community if you get stuck! There are some fantastically clever people out there.
I'd really like to see you make this more a functional computer make the tape deck work and more RAM to be usable I think that would be really cool it would be like fulfilling the full vision besides it doesn't need to be completely historically accurate I think it would be really fun
Yes, old growth wood is exhausted.
I'm sure everybody's screaming. You have a picture of the original, it has a cassette tape in it..
You know the dimensions of a cassette tape. Very simple math here. Use whatever drawing/ cad program you have.. Coral draw etc.
do you use linux with gnome desktop? i am asking because i saw the close button of gnome for about a second with kicad
Been watching this unfold on VCFed, and if you need someone to program the 5204 Eproms I believe my Digielec programmer (From 1982) works on those I have to check the manual.
That would be amazing. I'd build one of Martin Eberhard's programmers but I don't think he's supplying the parts anymore. Feel free to msg me on the forums and then we can connect once we get to that stage. I'm guessing this is probably going to require a few burnings to get it right, if this machine works at all.
9:33 can build a arduino programmmer with an Isolated 60vpp supply or just use more common 27c uv eproms and a 12vpp programmer which are still produced, or just get a flash eeprom and just put the shit on a pcb and socket to make sure ya pinouts stay the same, 8bit parallel rom is parallel rom, the people in circa 1975 would have immediately jumped for flash eeproms if they could have gotten their hands on that true unobtainium of the time, eeproms.
24:20 put the eeprom die under a microscope and read out the data bit by bit in binary if the die still holds da bits and bytes
maybe someone like curiousmarc could assist with this
@@Clancydaenlightened Probably more something for Ken ;) The decaping reverse engineering guru
if you convert all from int to fp (16 or 8-bit), then you can do in-memory pre-calculated rom compute (lookups) in local l2-ram (cache)
any number of cores as you can operate with the memory controller, as the memory holds the core "register" (direct memory) data
super simple core architecture
assumption: super fast serial access to the rom pre-computed fp16 operations
even a hardware pre-rom multi-core java virtual machine is possible
even current (in-stock) p100 fast cache/rom chips, and some fpga to act as the memory controller (simplified cpu processor)
You could write an emulator to emulate the system and then run the BIOS ROM images and see if it actually does something and if not you could have somebody write the other 512 words of memory to make it function....
26:20 you can easily build a programmer using an arduino uno or arduino nano, you'll need an isolated 60vdc source, for the programming pulse, which can be achieved using an optoisolator and a transistor and a dc-dc boost converter (you dont need much current a few tens of milliamps), so you dont blue smoke duh Arduino wit 60v, use some shift registers for the address bus, and use an 8bit port for the data bus, if using a arduino mega 2560 you should just need the 60v isolated supply
datasheets should contain the necessary programming sequences and timings which you can use the arduino to program the chip over a uart connection
buy a table vice, you can bend metal with a little bit of sweat and ingenuity, just like the break.
4:30 or put the scans thru gimp or photoshop, split the top and bottom layers, clean up the masks and add a transparency layer to each, then send that to a pcb fab company...
get all sorts of different color solder masks, not just green or no solder mask at all
Also get all ya via hole drilled and plated too
Or just convert the logical schematic to vhdl or equivalent and run everything from a microscopic silicon pcb
I wouldn't worry too much about matching wood grain. You're not trying to repair a classic guitar here. I bet they used whatever they had laying around that looked decent. But if it really bothers you, you could use a veneer. I think if you get the stain reasonably close and the dimensions right though, you're being period accurate in the ways they would have cared about.
I wonder if the distortion in your original trace diagrams were because someone used a camera and a document holder rather than a flatbed scanner. It sounds like you encountered barrel or pincushion distortion. I was forced to archive a pile of sheet music with a camera because they were too fragile from water damage. I was literally taking a picture and then peeling the page off in flakes. I was able to get good contrast, but the pincushion distortion is brutally obvious, especially if not corrected before printing back to paper.
Can we have AI fill in the missing code?
Might be a fun experiment.
Hi; I have 6 ea. phi-decks and would like to know how to connect them to the computer, I do not have a SOL, but, I have an Altair 8800, but the interface would be the same.. Can You help, I have been to the SOL site and I didn't find anything.. THANK YOU Marty
Hi Marty! I think you provided me my digital group phideck some years ago. I'm still working on getting it going but it's been a bear. Regarding phidecks for s100 systems I've no idea. What deck have you got? There have been a few on ebay recently along with S100 phideck cards.
Regarding the "magazine page transfer method". It's crap. Always has been.
I found two methods to be reliable - use actual lithography, so print out the design on a transparent sheet with an inkjet (there are differences with inks unfortunately on how good they block light), expose photo sensitive material with UV and then etch.
Or laser print on actual transfer sheets, and then transfer the toner with a modified laminator. Temperature and speed are very important parameters.
However, the method where you iron on a design is just so prone to faults. Obviously lithography is the best for very intricate designs (requires putting the side where you printed onto directly against the PCB).
I'll have to look that up. I agree the iron on method is tricky. And it may be impossible because the board in this case I'd considerably larger than a standard 8x11 sheet. It's just the only method I learned. I actually developed a technique and managed to get all my TVT boards off with it. But it took a LOT of trial and error. I should look into the lithography angle.
@@TechTimeTraveller Now that I have watched the whole video, finally...
You're going to have to buy new PCB material anyway, as your new-old-stock isn't quite big enough, and then you can just buy substrate with photo resist being pre-applied. The method is just very consistent and repeatable, if you can get transparent prints. Pigment-based inkjets usually work the best.
The only chemicals you have to deal with are NaOH or KOH (basically drain cleaner) for developing, and sodium persulfate for etching. Stay away from ferric chloride, it's fast but usually a mess and generally much more dangerous. Well, and a bit of acetone for cleaning the developed resist afterwards.
Also, you'd benefit from having a 3D printer for prototyping purposes.
@@TechTimeTraveller Oh, and when your channel grows a bit more, you'll get requests from Chinese companies, either PCBWay, or from manufacturers of laser engravers. PCBway would surely produce excellent PCBs, while a device from the latter would be excellent for exposing photo resists.
Mahogany?
send it back too the factory ?
Just buy a new hammond console box. They still make them and can do custom jobs.
Interesting that you mention CONSOL has no facilities for *saving* to cassette, only loading... Looking at the tape deck in the prototype unit, there is no erase head for recording! It's possible they were going to make the tape deck work as part of the "computer" upgrade and toss you the PROMs with it. You're probably not far off from the machine that was meant to be.
Something like this, my idea is to try and get it in parallel processing with a few other motherboards. Like 8 x 80486's would make a decent 8-core processor with another computer utilizing all 8 of them in parallel. (Edit: I got the idea from a friend who did this with a room full of old Apple computers, easier for him because the OS was already prepared to do exactly what I'm describing, whereas MS-DOS with DesqView would be too top-heavy so the x86s would have to run UNIX.)
Didn't someone do something similar with a pile of voodoo cards? I can't remember if that was real or a joke. But this sounds really cool. I remember Desqview well.. I used it to run my multi-line Telegard BBS.
Ahhhhh… desqview and telegard…
For bending a chassis without a metal brake check out Uncle Doug's channel. th-cam.com/video/7p--jwtsT-M/w-d-xo.html
Woo.. thanks! Gonna check this out.
Great stuff! I'm 1O0% with you on using original artwork for the PCB layout. KiCAD reproductions will destroy the look and feel you are trying to recreate, which is the point of the whole project. As for the EPROMs, you will need a vintage programmer for those. Not even the expensive SuperPRO 6100N, which (falsely) claims to program everything, will do it (I know; I own one, and it doesn't). As for the power supply, it would be a pity if you used a modern switch-mode one, as they look totally different from the originals. Linear power supplies are perfectly safe (if correctly fused), just heavy and energy-inefficient. Their design is simple and universal: fuse, transformer, full bridge rectifier (they would have used four power diodes back in the day, not integrated rectifiers), bulk capacitors, coils, linear regulators. I can send you a design, but they are so simple and common you can easily use one from another (documented) computer of the time. Good luck!!
wow, wtf
The term resurrection in regard to electronics is already established. This is not a resurrection. Check out Shango066 on TH-cam.
Shango's stuff is awesome! I'm not sure on resurrection. I'm referring to reviving a dead project, which was offered but then withdrawn in favor of a produced product. I think it applies in that situation, although it's different than 'existing device resurrection'.
@TechTimeTraveller Shango has coined the term ressurection. It refers to a piece of equipment that is beyond repair by anyone's standards. Even the most savvy and enthusiastic of engineers would take one look at it and deem it garbage. As a resurrection he accepts leaky capacitors, drifted resistors, rat feces, and weak tubes, and does the troubleshooting and bare minimum required to make it function to an acceptable level, and then scrap the whole unit because it's beyond restoration.