As some of you may remember, I’ve had a nearly pristine VideoBrain with a single controller, box, a few cartridges and other materials since 2007. As you may also remember from the above blog post, it didn’t work.
Back in May of this year, I bid on and won a badly beaten VideoBrain with the super rare Expander 1, the latter of which was by itself, but in superficially good condition. The VideoBrain itself came with a joystick with a missing outer stick shaft (it just has the metal joystick rod), and a keyboard with the SHIFT key ripped off (and no parts remaining, just the bare keyboard contacts exposed where the key, spring and other plastic bits should be). Also, there was no power supply, which you’ll know is particularly critical with the VideoBrain because of the unique locking connector.
Anyway, I was able to try the second VideoBrain last night with the power supply from my original broken system, and lo and behold it worked right away, though a bit sporadically (I would get junk character screens more often than not). Not being technical by any stretch of the imagination, I decided to open up both units and do essentially a motherboard swap, and cross my fingers. What’s interesting is that these are two VideoBrains from two different production runs. They clearly tried a few different methods of motherboard and processor shielding/heat sinking, and had a few other variations between runs. Given the relatively limited number of units produced and the relatively short time the company was operational (maybe a year at best, based on previous reports), I’m surprised there were this many differences.
Long story short, after hours of hand wringing and admonishing myself for what I got myself into, I finally got the correct orientation and placement of plugs (I’ve since marked them with black marker so it can be redone in the future if need be) and have one seemingly perfectly working system with a full working keyboard (even the sporadic functionality in the first test is now gone). I’ll be sure to take plenty of photos of at least the one unassembled unit, though I’m not sure it will be realistic for me to do it to the working one (it’s almost fully back together at this point).
This being my first live exposure to a working VideoBrain, I must say a few things struck me about it. First, the RF output seems to be pretty crystal clear, which fans of the APF IM, Timex Sinclair 2068, and many other systems know is a major accomplishment. Second, I’m very impressed by the graphics and sound, keeping in mind the late 1977 release of this system—the only other comparable system with color graphics and sound was the Apple II, and the VideoBrain definitely has the Apple II beat in core sound capabilities. Added to the fact that this is the first ever cartridge-based computer AND it has four joystick ports, it was an amazingly forward looking design (of course the keyboard layout is garbage, but it does have full stroke keys). As is typical for VIDEOGAME consoles of the time, it also seems that the games (I only briefly tried its top game – Gladiator) come with many variations on the one cartridge. There’s even music on the title screen (at least on Gladiator). Again, impressive stuff. Even the four built-in programs (again, comparable to say, the first programmable videogame console, the Fairchild Video Entertainment System, with which it shares some features) are interesting, consisting of text entry, clock, alarm and color bars.
I’ll try to post those photos soon, and hopefully can do a video look soon as well. I’m trying to acquire one cartridge that works with the Expander 1 to make sure that works, and then I’ll see about getting it into the hands of someone who can do a tear down and replicate it. After my testing with the VideoBrain is done, I’m moving on to my APF IM stuff, which is also long overdue…
*************************** Bill Loguidice, Managing Director
Armchair Arcade, Inc.
As some of you may remember, I’ve had a nearly pristine VideoBrain with a single controller, box, a few cartridges and other materials since 2007. As you may also remember from the above blog post, it didn’t work.
Back in May of this year, I bid on and won a badly beaten VideoBrain with the super rare Expander 1, the latter of which was by itself, but in superficially good condition. The VideoBrain itself came with a joystick with a missing outer stick shaft (it just has the metal joystick rod), and a keyboard with the SHIFT key ripped off (and no parts remaining, just the bare keyboard contacts exposed where the key, spring and other plastic bits should be). Also, there was no power supply, which you’ll know is particularly critical with the VideoBrain because of the unique locking connector.
Anyway, I was able to try the second VideoBrain last night with the power supply from my original broken system, and lo and behold it worked right away, though a bit sporadically (I would get junk character screens more often than not). Not being technical by any stretch of the imagination, I decided to open up both units and do essentially a motherboard swap, and cross my fingers. What’s interesting is that these are two VideoBrains from two different production runs. They clearly tried a few different methods of motherboard and processor shielding/heat sinking, and had a few other variations between runs. Given the relatively limited number of units produced and the relatively short time the company was operational (maybe a year at best, based on previous reports), I’m surprised there were this many differences.
Long story short, after hours of hand wringing and admonishing myself for what I got myself into, I finally got the correct orientation and placement of plugs (I’ve since marked them with black marker so it can be redone in the future if need be) and have one seemingly perfectly working system with a full working keyboard (even the sporadic functionality in the first test is now gone). I’ll be sure to take plenty of photos of at least the one unassembled unit, though I’m not sure it will be realistic for me to do it to the working one (it’s almost fully back together at this point).
This being my first live exposure to a working VideoBrain, I must say a few things struck me about it. First, the RF output seems to be pretty crystal clear, which fans of the APF IM, Timex Sinclair 2068, and many other systems know is a major accomplishment. Second, I’m very impressed by the graphics and sound, keeping in mind the late 1977 release of this system—the only other comparable system with color graphics and sound was the Apple II, and the VideoBrain definitely has the Apple II beat in core sound capabilities. Added to the fact that this is the first ever cartridge-based computer AND it has four joystick ports, it was an amazingly forward looking design (of course the keyboard layout is garbage, but it does have full stroke keys). As is typical for VIDEOGAME consoles of the time, it also seems that the games (I only briefly tried its top game – Gladiator) come with many variations on the one cartridge. There’s even music on the title screen (at least on Gladiator). Again, impressive stuff. Even the four built-in programs (again, comparable to say, the first programmable videogame console, the Fairchild Video Entertainment System, with which it shares some features) are interesting, consisting of text entry, clock, alarm and color bars.
I’ll try to post those photos soon, and hopefully can do a video look soon as well. I’m trying to acquire one cartridge that works with the Expander 1 to make sure that works, and then I’ll see about getting it into the hands of someone who can do a tear down and replicate it. After my testing with the VideoBrain is done, I’m moving on to my APF IM stuff, which is also long overdue…
***************************
Bill Loguidice, Managing Director
Armchair Arcade, Inc.