- Joined
- Jan 13, 2005
the net has failed me on this one
earlier tonite i came across a Texas Instruments Video Programming Unit 200 (VPU 200). friend of mine and i have plugged all applicable numbers on the out side of the case, all 3 of them including VPU 200.
the most we know is its mainly for automation but this it self is a self contained computer, a luggable (aka portable , lunchbox ect.) computer.
it was arround a rack full of out put carts, part number 500-5011 i think was the output carts. and we are talking easily 30 of these outputs as well as some other 500 series controllers and analog devices.
right now we are mainly focused on the VPU 200. i have not booted the thing yet, it was in an abandoned charcoal factory and i thought it might be a good idea that i clean it out before applying any power to it. but since theres a bunch of charcoal dust in it, it was pretty well preseved. i inspected alot of connections and not one was corroded so thats a plus.
i can get some pics tommorow.
i'd say its roughly 50 lbs, its set up like a breifcase, the face or front of the computer unclips at the top when layed down flat and the front folds down revealing a keyboard on the under side of the lid that folds down and a 5 inch CRT and a 5 inch floppy drive in the rest of the unit.
after taking the top of the case off i found that its an XT style motherboard except this piticular motherboard has a bulit in floppy drive controller instead of the controller being on an expansion card like....well the rest of the computer. no dates inside of the computer except for one intel chip copy righted in 1971 and referenced to be a memory controller. i think it was a 16 legged chip, was definitly ceramic.
one processor board with a thin white long ceramic chip made by Ti with a gold cap over the die and a gold stripe running half the legenth from the gold square.
at least 2 other boards, one might be math co processor, the other i dont know. possibly some sort of rom program boards. the floppy drive from the sparse info on the net suggest that they were mainly used for backing up the automation data but that could be way off.
speaking of floppys, the 5 inch drive is one i have not seen before, took me a while to figure it out:
http://oldcomputers.net/heathkit-h8.html
this is the best example of the drive it self, first picture after the banner ad about half way down theres a big of a silver box with 2 black boxes in it each with one red LED on it. the drive in this VPU 200 look like these sans red LED.
i've not seen 5 inch floppy drives like these before. mabe that could help pin down the age, does any one know when this style drive was popular?
i'm guessing its not able to read HD discs, probably single sided 384k max readable?
even though this was found at an automation box theres probally other uses for it, i just think it would be neat to get it working. its definitly an 8 bit computer and not just some sort of terminal you plug in to get to the real computer, it is the commanding computer for sure.
i dont know, lots of funkyness on this one. its cool. donw know when i am going to be able to clean it out and boot it....if it powers up.
edit:
kind of a similar set up:
http://oldcomputers.net/compaqi.html
keyboard not detachable though
earlier tonite i came across a Texas Instruments Video Programming Unit 200 (VPU 200). friend of mine and i have plugged all applicable numbers on the out side of the case, all 3 of them including VPU 200.
the most we know is its mainly for automation but this it self is a self contained computer, a luggable (aka portable , lunchbox ect.) computer.
it was arround a rack full of out put carts, part number 500-5011 i think was the output carts. and we are talking easily 30 of these outputs as well as some other 500 series controllers and analog devices.
right now we are mainly focused on the VPU 200. i have not booted the thing yet, it was in an abandoned charcoal factory and i thought it might be a good idea that i clean it out before applying any power to it. but since theres a bunch of charcoal dust in it, it was pretty well preseved. i inspected alot of connections and not one was corroded so thats a plus.
i can get some pics tommorow.
i'd say its roughly 50 lbs, its set up like a breifcase, the face or front of the computer unclips at the top when layed down flat and the front folds down revealing a keyboard on the under side of the lid that folds down and a 5 inch CRT and a 5 inch floppy drive in the rest of the unit.
after taking the top of the case off i found that its an XT style motherboard except this piticular motherboard has a bulit in floppy drive controller instead of the controller being on an expansion card like....well the rest of the computer. no dates inside of the computer except for one intel chip copy righted in 1971 and referenced to be a memory controller. i think it was a 16 legged chip, was definitly ceramic.
one processor board with a thin white long ceramic chip made by Ti with a gold cap over the die and a gold stripe running half the legenth from the gold square.
at least 2 other boards, one might be math co processor, the other i dont know. possibly some sort of rom program boards. the floppy drive from the sparse info on the net suggest that they were mainly used for backing up the automation data but that could be way off.
speaking of floppys, the 5 inch drive is one i have not seen before, took me a while to figure it out:
http://oldcomputers.net/heathkit-h8.html
this is the best example of the drive it self, first picture after the banner ad about half way down theres a big of a silver box with 2 black boxes in it each with one red LED on it. the drive in this VPU 200 look like these sans red LED.
i've not seen 5 inch floppy drives like these before. mabe that could help pin down the age, does any one know when this style drive was popular?
i'm guessing its not able to read HD discs, probably single sided 384k max readable?
even though this was found at an automation box theres probally other uses for it, i just think it would be neat to get it working. its definitly an 8 bit computer and not just some sort of terminal you plug in to get to the real computer, it is the commanding computer for sure.
i dont know, lots of funkyness on this one. its cool. donw know when i am going to be able to clean it out and boot it....if it powers up.
edit:
kind of a similar set up:
http://oldcomputers.net/compaqi.html
keyboard not detachable though
Last edited: