Proton BASIC Community

Just for the challenge and nostalgia of it I purchased one of these.



My thought is to 3D print a nice translucent front case for it and then work out how it may be driven.

It is a CCIR System device. I should be able to drive it with something I have lying about, maybe a dsPIC, ESP32 of heaven forbid a pie.

If any forum members have any good ideas I'm all ears.
BTW I will be interstate for a while looking after my 99 year old Dad.

https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/357092999823?_skw=12V+4.2+watt+micro+4%22+crt+monitor&itmmeta=01K1G68A3AG4V1DNMSDS1P24AK&hash=item532466c28f:g:h0IAAOSwbi5oSqf3&itmprp=enc%3AAQAKAAABAFkggFvd1GGDu0w3yXCmi1eW38uMrPd%2FK54PfFisxeoPGTVSiyL7KRksL3TJd7cfh7kP7s8MLdt%2B9gYbJDXZR%2BGg%2Fn7ViVfser%2Bwkd%2BqLHkW3w9ugFLhaUdCbAGNYqm5iDhHQw%2B%2FrchFKtlcLhsocN6fp7hgHeMEZ4u4oPSZMe%2BpE0dPhKLEIUtO5HsicQI8I3vKcd4S3EY19Ik2gugYQwmRicL97ItdyJwqZXT83fUNlZbtPEzCV%2FUOsj3K6kU02y7akB0kLGiaI0Oc9KEmeIzFGnU29EM3xqhdS7M1szfJBNh1ccPODgMfwwACQh39vRXY6wcxbTCpAmJsic4sAkw%3D%7Ctkp%3ABFBM5KGhhoxm

Looks a bit like the one Clive Sinclair used in his miniature TV - that was a side scan job too.
https://hackaday.com/2021/10/11/sinclair-pocket-tv-teardown/
99 years old?   You might be lucky enough to have the genes to live that long too so you can finish this project.

Cheers,
David

Oh memories.

From a link in the article: http://polymathperspective.com/?p=408

I remember Brian Flint from when I worked briefly at Sinclair Radionics on the development of plastic box TV1B. I worked on the audio section circuitry which was a single IC. Brian and Sir Clive worked on the floor above us where he had a prototype electric bicycle outside his office, even back then, late 70's.

John

I have one of those as well. I got it at a car boot sale a while ago for about £2, but they are selling on ebay for crazy prices, for what they are. I still have not used it for anything, but for £2, I was not going to say no. :-)

In the late 1980s, I found one of the sinclair flat screen TVs in a box next to a rubbish bin, and took it home, but never really used it. I wish I still had it, but back then, it was "old crap", and worthless.

You worked for Radionics John? They are my favourite, "and that is putting it lightly", electronics set. They are wonderful, and I had one when I was about 12 years old, and collected them from car boot sales, until prices for them went stupidly high. When I made the big mistake of moving back up north, I sold all of my lovely Radionics X type electronics sets to pay for the move, including the X20, X30, X40, and X40A. How stupid I was.

Yes, it was my second job after my first job of a year at Neve, the studio mixer people then in Melbourn, just South of Cambridge.

I was hired as a development engineer on the cheaper plastic box TV, the TV1B which was just for the UK market, unlike the original TV1A, a multistandard TV with VHF & UHF tuners and selectable sound IF frequencies.

I remember rummaging in a filing cabinet and finding original hand drawn circuits for many of the old audio products, presumably by Clive himself. I should have taken copies!

I wasn't there for long and moved to a company in Royston, my first proper design role, but it wasn't as much fun as my time at Sinclair.

John

So I suppose you weren't there for the Anamartic Magic Wafer times at Sinclair? I saw this in one of our display cabinets (in the museum) and thought of you John! I think it's single wafer dynamic ram array, from the late 1980's.

Charlie

Yes I remember that technology but it was rather later than my time there (around 1978/9) and was when Clive Sinclair had left Sinclair Radionics who made the calculators and TV's and had decamped to Cambridge to work on the micro products.

From his early days he had a fascination with using surplus and reject (below spec) semiconductors, one of the ways he kept his costs lower.

John

I saw that a certain individual was involved with the silicon chip scheme: a certain Ivor Catt. Does anybody know/remember him. If you took Wireless World magazine and read the letters page then you most certainly know of him. I argued with him over something, via the letters column and in the end brought him to the computer museum. That was a day I will never forget!

Charlie

Yes, I remember the interminable correspondence in WW. A bit over my head unfortunately. Tell us more about his visit!

John

Hello friend, I'm leaving you a link where the CRT is at a very low cost with free shipping. I hope it helps. Regards.


https://es.aliexpress.com/item/1005001892618952.html?spm=a2g0o.productlist.main.3.28c46403JmJc92&algo_pvid=bd86c16f-02d3-49f5-88b8-2ccd3429c5b8&algo_exp_id=bd86c16f-02d3-49f5-88b8-2ccd3429c5b8-2&pdp_ext_f=%7B%22order%22%3A%22567%22%2C%22eval%22%3A%221%22%7D&pdp_npi=6%40dis%21MXN%21335.69%21321.90%21%21%2117.41%2116.69%21%40210318c317543666860316073e215f%2112000018035487703%21sea%21MX%21122644563%21X%211%210%21&curPageLogUid=YueKnaaewDy7&utparam-url=scene%3Asearch%7Cquery_from%3A

John L: I will when I get back from Devon, we are there until Friday.

Charlie

I arrived back from interstate to find the CRT display had arrived with a cracked picture tube, the seller gave me a full refund. The device looks better than I expected with a lot of SMD components. Another unit has been ordered from a different supplier so again I wait . The first seller did not want the unit returned, it now becomes spare parts.

I'm now looking for a schematic.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mh_9LUYnDv0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8cU9x23w4YE

John L asked about Ivor Catt's visit to our museum at Bletchley. It must have been back in the 1990's and I had had some interactions with the Letters column in Wireless World. Ivor Catt was (as you say John) a very active contributor to this column. He mentioned Arnold Lynch in one of his letters and I recognised the name as the man who designed the photoelectric tape reader for Colossus. Ivor's background was electronics and he was later involved with Clive Sinclair and semiconductor wafers.

To cut a long story short, I invited Catt to come and see (mainly) Colossus. As soon as he arrived he started saying how he wouldn't have done things this way and that, and generally upsetting most of the team I belong to. Nothing like the wonderful visit that we had with Les. Ivor is sadly no longer with us, he died in June this year. But what a character. I searched Google for him and found this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47lcjbyqF_k

Charlie

(I think he was responsible for the design of Emitter Coupled Logic at Texas Instruments.)