Alpex Project RAVEN - The Fairchild Channel-F | Computer History
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 6 ก.พ. 2019
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The Fairchild Channel F games console arrived in 1976. The first in a new wave of second generation games machines and the culmination of works by Alpex Computer Systems outlined in the "555" Patent. A blueprint for consoles for generations to come.
Today we remember the system and take a tour.
● Music
All music is used under license
Beau - Martin Gauffin
Body Resonance - Ave Air
Descend Into Self - Ave Air
Digitalized Waves Of Unspoken Distances - Ave Air
Emoticon 17 - Niclas Gustavsson
Reach For The Stars - Anders Bothén
Rushing 70s Mustache 1 - Per-Anders Nilsson
Tenacious Dreams 3 - Magnus Ringblom
Thri - Twelwe
When I Feel You - Daniel Gunnarsson
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Thank you for watching! 1976 was an exciting year for gaming and the work of Alpex set the tone for generations to come. Was it a patent based on insight and genius or an opportunistic grab at what everyone was working towards anyway? Either way it has been a pleasure exploring this system. Neil - RMC -
Episode links:
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Love your videos mate, keep it coming !
Considering Alpex had a working prototype, I'd say it was more than an opportunistic grab. I wouldn't say it was a particularly large intellectual jump, however. IMO the market would have been led to this eventual conclusion as the technology to support it developed.
@@KonjonoAwesomeI think that's a fair assessment
@SebiTimeWaster Thank you I've fixed that now.
Interesting system from the historical point of view. But nothing to really play today, i guess. The controllers are awesome! Would love to try these out.
Btw.: In the overview at 19:16 you included the SABA Videoplay 2 two times, 1978 and 1979. And the last company is named Nordmende, there's a D missing.
Keep up your work! Great videos!
I very much enjoyed this trip down memory lane viewing this excellent history of the Channel F System I & II. I (Nick Talesfore) was the industrial designer for both systems, the hand controllers and the Video Carts. I also art directed all the graphics for the Video Cartridge labels with Tom Kamifugi, the artist who created the vibrant colored images depicting the games appearing on each label and carton. I would like to give credit to Ron Smith who was the ME who designed the inner workings of the 8 degrees of freedom hand controller as well as the zero-force cartridge connector system. Ron and I worked together with Jerry Lawson to create everything visually and mechanically associated with these 2 systems. It is very gratifying to see this first micro-processor based video game remembered and memorialized.
Thank you for those little tidbits of industrial design history! I never owned one of these, but I remember absolutely loving the hand controllers. I thought they were brilliant in their usability.
Very nice to see your comments Nick, you know that we are still making new software for it?
I love to read about the history of video games and the Channel F is definitely at the core of it all. A few years ago I found a very interesting article by Benj Edwards over at Fastcompany.com going into detail about the system www.fastcompany.com/3040889/the-untold-story-of-the-invention-of-the-game-cartridge
Loved my Channel F! Spitfire, Drag Racer, and Bowling were probably my favorites but I also enjoyed many others including Desert Fox, Baseball, Blackjack, and the Space Invaders clone. Thank you for being part of the team who gave my friends and me so many hours of fun!
very cool , the overall design and artwork got me to order my first fairchild system in 2021 (born in 88)
electrical engineering graduate & i enjoy opening these systems up and seeing how they worked
cheers 🥂
I'm glad that others like yourself are helping to keep this console's legacy alive! The wonderful 70s' aesthetic of this console is just great and it's an important part of video game history that has been lost to time. I admit that I could not get a hang of "Drag Race," but you make me want to give it another try. Thanks so much for asking me to be a part of this. Fantastic video!
This is fascinating piece of history. Woodgrain, scifi aesthetic, giant 8-track looking cartridges, what's not to love.
Have you ever heard of the magnavox odyssey
@@trevorbunyak2821 I certainly have. Also the Odyssey 2 as well. But this thing is way more interesting than the first Odyssey.
I was 16 when this console came out. I remember seeing it being demoed by a live preson in a department store. She was showing it playing the card game Blackjack with human player against the computer. I thought that was amazing. Then I looked at the price and knew I could never get the parents to spend $170 on it, and it would be out of reach for me to get it with lawn-mowing money ($3 per yard!). $170 then would be $760 in 2019 money. I'm sure that was reasonable, considering the state of technology, but maybe that was the problem.
My father used to bring this home from his work place at weekends and I was the lucky guy who got to play it. Started my life long love for games I guess. There used to be a great breakout game on there which amazed an eight year olds mind. Remember the controllers being very responsive and well made.
Ah my girlfriend has one of those controllers in her drawer.. though I've never seen the console strangely enough 🤔
The rumble feature is the big seller.
Yeah... I think generation 3 where cordless, had rumble function and was available in different colors. :-D :-D
i think that's another type of "joy stick"
This says more about you.
i dont think thats whats in your girlfreinds drawer. they didnt have feedback back then
2:20 ....... Clint's ears pick up, *LGR* hears the words _Wood & grain_ & then logs on to eBay !
ikr The angles just make it all the more groovy. I want it just because of the shape.
I love the subtle War Games reference :D
2:11 It even came with two electric shavers instead of controllers, a radical move that was never emulated by other consoles.
Very nice video, the Alpex background is probably not very well known.
Your Grandstand derives the clock from the 8.8... something MHz (double color burst for PAL) crystal in your machine. CPU is clocked at 1/5 of that which is about 1.77 MHz, a little less than the NTSC.
The first generation PAL had a separate 2.00MHz crystal, so the fastest "Channel F" is the PAL v1 and the slowest is your machine, a gen. 2 PAL unit.
All the logic chips you saw on the Sean Riddle motherboard image... compressed into a single ceramic 40 pin chip visible as a socketed chip at 12:42 is a bit more than cosmetic changes. I guess to the end user there's only cosmetic changes unless counting being able to adjust the volume.
It's a "hand controller" according to the manual - and more like a stick than any other joystick. ;-)
Slot Machine!? How is that fun?
My best Drag Race time: 7:6 - that's fun!
Michael Glass has only the initial K, the T is left there from the original text (the word WANT).
This machine is a real novitily item. What a sleek futuristic yet 70s design lol just a treat as a trophy item!
The retro gaming community continues to surprise me. I never expected to see Erin here! Anyway, great video as always. The Channel F certainly earned an interesting place in history.
Glad the games came in use. Great vid so much detail Neil.
My family grew up with the original version of this system, with the first 7 carts, (as well as the 4 switch Atari.) I actually held onto our original 'F' system for quite a long time, up till the 90s. Sadly, during one of my moves, a controller had got broken and I ended up throwing it out. Space was at a premium at the time, otherwise I would have kept it. There has been times, now, I wish I hadn't tossed it, given how people are now looking back at those older systems again. During those the later years of having the 'F', I think I played the Video Blackjack quite a bit.
18:38, The patent states Alpex Computer as being in Danbury, CT --- wow, I grew up there and didn't even know it was part of video game history. Small world. I also found out that the next town over was where Objective-C began.
Talk about a blast from the past! I remember seeing these all over the place when shopping as a kid, I wanted one so bad! I'm gonna have to sit down and try to model this console one of these days. Thanks for covering it, it brought back some wonderful memories.
I'm only watching the intro and I know this will be amazing! RMC you make my day with every video!
Yay, I`m your 350th patreon :) nice little milestone, thanks for all your great content.
oh wow thank you so much for your support!
Great, as usual. Always a pleasure to watch your videos.
Fascinating history, and a system that looks even more '70s than the 2600!
I'm sure that the folk that got the Fairchild Channel -F were completely satisfied with the machine. Sitting around in the lounge on Christmas afternoon with everyone having a shot. Thanks for the memories. I did have a Binatone game console [no game cartridge just it had switches] shared with my sister. The bat and ball style simplicity was a load of fun with all the family around.
Great video RMC, and great job with your appearance Erin! I knew some details about the Fairchild Channel F before, but after watching this video as well as Erin's video on it, I can say that it was definitely more ambitious and innovative than the later Atari 2600.
Great video with a lot of interesting info. I stepped into gaming with the Atari 2600 and never even heard of the Fairchild until recent years. After a quick search i see there's still quite a fanbase and even a homebrew scene. New carts with homebrew games are even still sold today!
I loved this video, I was telling my 5 year old boy about the games I played at his age, we were lucky enough to have one of these and almost no-one ever knew what I was talking about. It's amazing to know now that me and my sister were playing the first generation of consoles before they became mainstream.... Doodle, breakout and space war, kept us quite for hours
Nicely made video and an interesting bit of history.
Lots of people didn’t think much of the Steves back then. They were “The Crazy Ones, the Square Pegs...”, etc.
Videobrian. I had one as a kid. Just wish I could find an emulator even though it is one of the most obscure systems of the era
Brian? Welease Bwian!
John Bloodworth you can use mess or mame i think retroarch does it to
I love your videos, dude- thank you again.
Thanks so much
Greetings Professor Falken.
This is where my Gaming life started. Great old system, and made me the gamer I am today.
Wait, what? They were awarded the patent for ROM cartridges and raster graphics? Soooo, did Alpex claim royalties from later systems that used those concepts?
This is a door I chose not to open in this video but may make a video on soon. Other companies would have paid license fees, just as for example Microsoft pay Sony and no doubt Sony pay Microsoft for various patents for consoles, controllers and software patents. Nintendo however did not with the NES which led to a huge court case. Alpex were looking at a big payout but Nintendo proved they used a different (and quicker) method of getting the pixels on the screen and avoided the fine. There are a lot of cases around the patent.
@@RMCRetro Interesting, thanks.
A few days ago i decided to promote myself from a "Official Cave Dweller" to a "Credit Roll Cave Dweller". It's videos like these that do more than justify decision like that. Excellent, excellent work again. You spoil us all with your minty and slick videos.
Upon starting this video i immediately thought of Erin's video from a while back so it was a nice and welcome surprise to see Erin featured in this. Been a sub to her channel for quite some time now as well, really recommend it. A bright and cheerful young lady with some very interesting coverage of oddball stuff and niche computer history.
Thank you for the kind words and your patronage Morph. I found Erin while researching, I'm surprised TH-cam hadn't put her in my recommendations, hopefully some Cave Dwellers will give her a sub!
I never heard of this console till your video. I grew up with the Atari 2600, and always thought that was the first ROM based console. Thank you for doing things like this.
love your channel! very interesting history of that system. What caught my eye was the INPUT MAGAZINE collection in the background! I have the complete set too! I got it from my friend way back in the 80's. I learned a great deal about programming my commodore 64 and my tandy computer from them! Keep up the good work!
I bought that set on ebay about 15 years ago and had them in storage. Was a nice surprise to find them again. Thanks for the kind words!
The biggest problem the Channel F had was it's bizarre video RAM access method that slowed the graphics down.
Morris Marina? Nah, I got my license in 77 and I can assure you that an Elvis fan would have a red Ford Capri MK 2!
More likely they would have been driving around in a Morris Minor, dreaming of having 'the car you always promised yourself"
I love that cart slot just plain cool
This was my first games console, before I really got into gaming. But, it paved the way for my next console, The Mattel Intellivision. The Fairchild Channel F was a pretty cool system, and I wish I could find one in working order with games and controllers. I've been with computers for a long time, starting with the Tandy CoCo Model 1, Atari 800XL, Atari 520ST, then my fist "PC", a 286/12 based system that I built myself. During this time I never got another console, then in the late 90's, I got a Nintendo 64. That was my last console, and I still really would have liked to have kept this one. But the PC has dominated the most and to this day is my go-to system.
I had one of those, but not as a Fairchild, but as a LUXOR TV-DATORSPEL (TV-COMPUTERGAME) Entertainment system. I still miss it, is was lost years ago.
So... get another one. The one with a lid or the one with detachable controllers?
The "controller straight out of the mind of H.R. Geiger" bit had me spit out my drink. Amazing! that was a good one
Very thorough and super enjoyable review, up to the sky-high standards of this channel. Great work bud
The Giger reference really cracked me up.
It's interesting that the console was debuted in Chicago at CES. Two local TV shows, Ray Rayner and Bozo's Circus, actually had a contest where kids would play what looks like "Shooting Gallery" over the phone. It was called "TV Pow" on the show, because players would say "pow" over the phone to take shots.
Well one has to day that the Fairchild apparently had what's now called a "Framebuffer" which the Atari 2600 didn't. The hardware of the Atari 2600 still was locked in the ball-and-bat mindset, though controlled by a microprocessor. The Fairchild seemed more like a computer aimed at graphics but severely limited in terms of RAM.
We had the Grandstand version of this when I was a kid. Had completely forgotten about it, until this video. :-)
great video. I really enjoy.
A fascinating and well produced video. I wonder how much money they made from that patent? The patent money Magnavox got fro their video games patent exceeded that from consoles. Interesting that the 2600 doesn't use a frame buffer instead "chasing the beam". I wonder if that was to avoid paying patent fees.
That font is straight out of moonbase alpha.
Ok, so have done the Adventure easter egg many times as a kid and not long ago, So I had
to try it with my original Fairchild VES.... Sure enough, the easter egg you mentioned is truly there!
Very cool to find this out!
That was a great episode, you did the old Channel F proud!
Thanks Thomas
@@RMCRetro you remember us chatting about the atari 400? i think i might have found you a good one! i'll be in touch soon.
@@Dr.Dawson Sounds exciting! Thanks Thomas
Ah, Wozniak.
It's weird when you examine your own family tree and realise who you may be related to.
In my case, it would seem there is evidence to suggest I'm (distantly) related both to Steve Wozniak, and the Scottish Royals. XD
Though, that's hard to truly substantiate without a LOT more research, since a few random family names don't strictly prove any such thing directly...
They merely hint at it.
11:52 Good WarGames reference.
That's a good one as well.
I had the UK Grandstand version - think it came from a department store called Owen Owen in Uxbridge - don't remember seeing it for sale anywhere else in my area. Unfortunately it disappeared at some point in the past, probably thrown out or given away. Had a number of the game cartridges and remember the odd controllers it had.
Amazing breakdown
Thanks. Great vid.
Love this console! did a podast and video series on the games, plus interviewed Nick Talesfore who worked with Jerry larson on this console. I had the first release (the one in the vid is the 2nd release), I picked up the Multicart for mine that also includes some neat homebrew games for the Channel F :)
Channel F Files is a great podcast for the games of this system, well worth a listen.
Very enjoyable! :)
What a nice looking system great video.
I had one of these as a kid. Later on after it died I converted the controller for my TI-99/4a. The Fairchild was a great unit, but all the arcade game ports went to the Atari.
This video alone deserves a subscription
I used to have one of these, mint condition with a full set of carts. Got took down the dump in the mid-late 90's, wish I'd known its potential value then
That happens a lot.
Usually you only realise what you've done several decades later. XD
These days I do my best to hold onto things...
But there's a fine line between keeping things for historical reasons and just becoming a hoarder.
In some ways, nearly everything is valuable if you keep it long enough.
In fact, sometimes the more it seems like trash at the time, the more valuable it is in the long run precisely BECAUSE nobody keeps it...
We actually had one of these. My father was and "early adopter" of new technologies. It was cool in theory, but many times the product wouldn't last the test of time. Betamax, Sony Minidisc, ON/SelecTV, and Mattel Intellivision were all in our house at one time or another.
I really miss our old Intellivision. We had more than one of those.
The Betamax tapes were playing perfectly well into the '90s.
Damn, I had one of those controllers/joysticks for my Amiga back in the day. Damn thing was unbreakable. So cool to see it's heritage from so long ago.
I owned one of these! I thought the retro world was denying its existence.
The Fairchild Channel F (Grandstand in the UK) appeared in the British Game Show 3-2-1 made by Yorkshire Television. The Breakout game (Cartridge 17) was used as an eliminator for the 2nd round. Look up any 321 episode from 1981 and you will see this game being played.
It also appeared on a US show called TV pow, using the shooting game, well until they worked a deal with Mattel who made a special intellivision game for them which eventually got a retail release.
I wonder if Bally took cues from that to make their Astrocade console around the same time.
Hey it's Erin!! Yay!
Yay! Erin rocks
It was called The Luxor Video Game Consoll in Sweden.
1:52 and 1:59 I had that Crazy Kong LCD handheld!
Seeing this, makes me wonder if the Bally Astrocade which came out a year or two after, wasn't a nearly direct clone, even down to the joysticks and included games like Quattro.
Great episode again when you try and tell folks that there was consoles before te Atari some dont know. Heres the proof, and yes us early gamers would expect other console to have a built in game, unfortunately that trend did not stick around.
Great channel.
Thank you David for watching and taking the time to comment
Oh man, that "quadra-doodle" thing. I remember Deluxe Paint had a feature like that. It was called something like "kaleidoscope" in the manual. And more recently, it's made its way into Krita.
R.I.P. Jerry Lawson's Thanks for you dedication ❤❤
The ROMs in those cartridges look pretty weird. I'd be interested to see a closer look at them. Perhaps someone knows more about their packaging and construction?
Fairchild used Apollo missions know-how on these gaming console. Real lunar lander and it’s computer was the ancestor of the cpu’s, gaming consoles and pc’s.
I didn't live the 70's lifestyle Neil. But the games were fun for sure I got a sizable collection of units from that era.
Anthony..
Interesting. I had just watched an old video on the Bally Astrocade, and what shows up after than another short-lived retro console from the second generation, and from one of my favorite mild-mannered UK 'tubers who records a retro game/computer show in a self-described man-cave.
I really meant to stop the last part of that last sentence after favorite, just adding "youtubers" to complete the sentence. Yes, one of my favorite youtubers- period. :)
Thank you for the kind words, it's always a pleasure to see you comment
@@RMCRetro Thanks for the video and the reply. To add to the above, my family had an Atari VCS (and later Colecovision) when I was growing up, but I've never had a chance to try either the Astrocade or the Channel F- and both with weird controllers too.
I did have friends with Intellivision and Odyssey^2 also.
As with all of these history deep dives, i just lost track of time and enjoyed myself immensely :)
Thanks Kai. A question for you Sir, I was tempted to go deeper into the history of the "555" patent and the court cases surrounding it from Atari, Nintendo et al but that would have made for a 30+ minute episode. What's your ideal episode length for a video of this style?
@@RMCRetro I could have watched maybe another 5-10 minutes, but anything longer tends to feel too long. Still, there's a lot of content you can squeeze into 5 minutes!
11.54 was that a quote from WOPR in Wargames?
Hehe it was indeed
Can you do a follow up with home brew and programming information? I like how it has a frame buffer. The 2600 didn’t. This makes it easier to program “modern” games.
There is a site called veswiki that has a lot of excellent information for folks interested in making homebrew.
Press F to pay respects.
I think the guy who wrote that patent abstract must have had a new thesaurus for Christmas.
this console is just beautiful :)
Woah! Astro wars and, most of all, Munchman!! I spent ages "reverse engineering" Munchman's cheap VFD whilst playing it to (quite literally for the machine) death.
That Machine looks Great...
Biggest change from 1976 to the Channel F II (from a user perspective) is the sound on RF instead from a built-in speaker. There's a 1976-looking version with this construction as well on a large motherboard - just as the PAL SABA Videoplay 2.
From a technical standpoint all the standard TTL logic chips have been replaced by custom IC:s - which makes it impressively small compared to the original.
Homebrew games that's available on the Multi-Cart should be mentioned as well I think. Tetris, Pac-Man, Lights Out ... latest additions are the small games "Kevin vs Tomatoes" (released on it's own cart as well) and upcoming "Killer Heads of Lettuce", both by Chris Read.
BTW
There's an easter egg in #26 as well (Brad Reid wrote that as well so... not that surprising).
My mom had one as a kid, and I had hers as a kid. First video game system I had.
I actually own a Channel F; those controllers are hands down the best ones I've used from any console of its era. Ergonomically it wasn't beat until the first proper gamepads, and even that is debatable imo.
Interesting Historical Adventure!
Thanks for the video, it's one console I don't own.... I have been "collecting game systems" for many years... Atari did so well with the 2600 was due to marketing... something this system didn't do too well in the US....
I love that aesthetic. That thing looks like it future. (from the future we wanted, not the one we got)
Thanks so much - I had one of those but couldn't remember what it was called. I'd have been given it by my parents because it would have been much cheaper than the Atari in 1981, I imagine. I became so good at duck shoot, I could win without looking at the screen.
Someone recently released a homebrewed version of Centipede on the Channel F and I must say it's pretty good given the limitations of the system, and the fact that the system predates the original arcade
The mention of the Channel F, to me, hinted at Gerald "Jerry" Lawson, and thus drew my attention
Jerry's role in the console's creation was minor. Nobody mentions the people who created the console's prototype, controller or the removable cartridges. People just see Mr Lawson as the team leader and attribute their works to him.
I had a coleco Telstar ranger it came with light rifle!
Elvis 8-track into a T-Bird??? As an American (north american in the somewhat united states), i find that comment, well ..um, a little....HILARIOUS! :):)
I tried my best to sound cool 😂
It kind of reminds you of the people who turned down 'The Beatles' or 'Star Wars'. 'I knew Seventeenths Jobs & Steve Wozniak, but I wasn't impressed with either of them, I once interviewed Steve Wozniak but didn't hire him'. Bet he could kick himself all the way to the bank ;-)
I'm changing my name to Schlumberger.
Schlumberger, dead ahead 🛳
technicly video games are once again being distributed on roms within a cartdridge. the switch uses a flash based ROM. (really just a flash card with perminatnt write protect) but it qualifies as "read only memory"