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Vintage Computers Any vintage computer systems, calculators, video games etc., but with an emphasis on 1980s and earlier equipment. |
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1st Jun 2022, 9:58 pm | #1 |
Heptode
Join Date: Oct 2011
Location: Culcheth, Cheshire, UK.
Posts: 654
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Use and abuse of vintage peripherals
The post in the 'wanted' forum looking for paper to fit a chopper bar recorder reminded me that I used to have one.
Don't know where it came from, and don't know where it's gone to, but I do remember what I did with it. After doing all the usual plotting temperatures and light levels, I then built the World's slowest dot matrix printer, driven by Micky of course. What other unusual peripherals did you use, abuse, or non-sensibly repurpose in your vintage systems ? |
1st Jun 2022, 10:57 pm | #2 |
Dekatron
Join Date: Aug 2011
Location: Newcastle, Tyne and Wear, UK.
Posts: 11,560
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Re: Use and abuse of vintage peripherals
I don't know if you could call it a 'peripheral' exactly but I repurposed the transmitter and receiver portion of an ultrasonic remote control project (plus a valve scope which I had just acquired) as a primitive range finding 'radar.' My MK14 was pressed into service as the transmitter pulse generator. Of course you can buy the equivalent for a few quid now in tool shops.
It's not unusual to hear of people using the stepper and slide mechanism from a document scanner or large printer as a moving camera mount for use in time lapse photography, or for 'focus stacking', usually (nowadays) controlled by something like a Pi or Arduino. |
2nd Jun 2022, 9:16 am | #3 |
Nonode
Join Date: Oct 2008
Location: Warsaw, Poland and Cambridge, UK
Posts: 2,677
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Re: Use and abuse of vintage peripherals
I did try attaching an ORP12 photocell to the print head of our Canon PW-1080A dot matrix printer and then printing blank lines to use it as a scanner, but the response of the cell was too slow to make the results useful. Both printer and photocell survived to tell the tale!
Chris
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What's going on in the workshop? http://martin-jones.com/ |
2nd Jun 2022, 10:50 am | #4 |
Octode
Join Date: Mar 2011
Location: North Yorkshire, UK.
Posts: 1,115
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Re: Use and abuse of vintage peripherals
I suppose you could call it "peripheral chip abuse" - our Casu CP/M boxes had only two serial ports, one of which was taken by the console. We needed more serial outputs so I did four extra software uarts by bit-banging the SIO RTSA&B and DTRA&B pins, does that count?
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2nd Jun 2022, 10:57 am | #5 |
Dekatron
Join Date: Aug 2011
Location: Newcastle, Tyne and Wear, UK.
Posts: 11,560
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Re: Use and abuse of vintage peripherals
Not really, that's just ingenious and skilful use of existing resources. Using a serial port to generate video as Karen O did, well...
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