Some of our latest additions are shown below - clicking on the link will take you to the items main page and will also show any further photographs.
When inserted into slot three of an Apple II/II+, this third-party expansion board adds the ability to display text in 80x24 character mode.
Release in October 1987, the Sega 3D adaptor and glasses allow specially-designed Master System games to display three-dimensional images. The adaptor card plugs into the Master System's card slot and sends signals to the glasses to selectively block each eye in turn. By synchronising this with the display's vertical refresh, a different image can be displayed to each eye.
The 3D adaptor was initially sold alongside a bundled Master System - such systems had Missile Defence 3D included as the built-in game.
Rubeer gaskets
A stack of eleven core memory planes.
A six-button joypad for all 32-bit Acorn Computers. Features programmable auto fire; 100% Acorn joystick compatible; supports most Archimedes games. Plugs into printer port.
This third-party accessory for the Super Nintendo games console allows you to play US Super NES and Japanese Famicom games cartridges on a European Super Nintendo. It works by having two cartridge ports: you insert a PAL cartridge into port A and the import cartridge into port B. The adaptor passes the region-lock signals to the PAL cartridge and all other signals to the NTSC cartridge, thereby fooling the console into thinking it is a domestic game.
This Nintendo controller is designed for the PAL Super NES (SNES) game console. It is not compatible with early non-PAL (US/Japanese) systems as Nintendo region-locked the controller ports.
Silicone rubber keypad contacts fro cpm keypad
Reference SCSI Hard Drive Features:
- 40MB internal SCSI hard disk storage.
- High performance autoparking NEC/IBM/Conner internal hard disk mechanism.
- SCSI daisy chain port for connection of up to six external SCSI hard drives.
- Autoboots with KickStart/WorkBench 1.3/2.04
- GAME switch (hard drive disable) for game compatibility.
- Internal cooling fan.
Crocodile clips
Probe tips - hoocked
This mechanical sliderule is similar in appearance to a large pocket watch. From the manual:
"The Calculating Circle is an instrument by means of which one can solve all arithmetical operations and consequently all numerical formulae no matter what sciences to which they belong. These operations are not only performed with extraordinary facility and rapidity, but with an approximation to accuracy sufficient for all practical purposes."
The manual has a full explanation of how to use the Calculating Circle; at the end is a handwritten purchase order showing the device was sold for ten shillings on 25th November 1902.
Introduced in 1967 by Facit, this four-function calculator is of the pinwheel type with data entered via a numeric keypad. The mechanism is powered by a hand-crank.
An 1960's era electro-mechanical calculator supporting the four basic arithmetic operations.
The Advance Electronics Mini Executive was an electronic calculator with eight digits precision. It has the standard four functions and an LED display. The calculator was manufactured in UK; this pre-production model is missing the 'Executive' branding in the lower-left and the status LEDs above the float/fixed point and constant (K) switches.
The float/fixed point and constant switches are unusual as they require a press-and-twist action to activate them.
This Acorn Electron has a Turbo Boards fitted. This addition moves the lowest 8 kB of RAM outside of reach of the ULA, allowing the CPU to always access it at 2 MHz. The tradeoff is that the screen cannot be located in that 8 kB. In practice the operating system ROMs always put the screen into the top 24 kB and as a result only broke compatibility with around 2% of software.
This Sinclair QL has been signed by industrial designer Rick Dickinson who designed the QL case.
This Sinclair ZX Spectrum case is signed by it's designed, Rick Dickinson.
Signed by Rick Dickinson, the in-house industrial designer of Sinclair Research Ltd. He designed the ZX80 and ZX81 home computers, including the touch-sensitive keyboard. The ZX81 won a British Design Council award in 1981.
This Acorn peripheral converts the RGB video signal from the BBC Master Compact to a UHF PAL television signal. Unlike other Acorn Computers of the time, the Master Compact did not come with an RF modulator - this converter allows the Master Compact to be used with a standard television set instead of an RGB computer monitor.
This expansion board for the BBC Master Compact is designed to screw onto the right-hand side of the keyboard unit. It has an external cable to connect to the joystick/mouse port. The unit provides an analogue and user port on the side, and the 2MHz bus port on the rear. A ROM application provides a menu to enable or disable the various features.
This core memory plane measures approximately 13x13cm and can store 1024 bits of data. Each bit is stored in a single ferrite ring and had to be individually woven with the two X/Y address wires and the third sense wire.
This trackball was produced by Marconi for several different systems. This RB2-115 model is designed to be connected to the Acorn Electron.
This unit is designed to plug into the ZX81 expansion port. It interfaces to an attached keyboard with full-sized keys. The layout of the keys matches the ZX81, with the addition of a second shift key in the upper-right. The original ZX81 keyboard is not disabled, making it easier for two people to use the same computer (useful for multiplayer games). A pass-through port o nthe rear of the interface unit allows additional Memotech products the be daisy-chained off each other.
This memory expansion unit for the Sinclair ZX81 adds 64KB of RAM. Produced by Memotech Ltd, it retailed for £79 in 1982.
Camera specifications:
- 640x480 pixels/colour CCD sensor
- Frame rate up to 30 frames per second, full motion video
- Display resolution: 640x480, 352x228, 320x240, 240x180, 176x144, 160x120
- Detachable camera base
- Manual focus from four inches to infinity
- Lens focal length 4.6mm f2.3
- USB computer interface with 9.8ft cable
- Captures standard files: AVI, MPEG, WAV, JPEG, BMP, TIFF, FPX, PX, PNG through bundles software
- Standard tripod socket
- Base allows up to 75 degrees tilt movement
- Dimensions: 4.3x2.0x3.2 inches
- Weight: 7.3oz
This hybrid calculator has the standard four arithmetic functions, plus square root, percentage, and memory functions. It also has an abacus attached - the abacus being quicker for simple arithmetic such as addition and subtraction, while the calculator would be used for multiplication and division.
Purchased August 1983 in Kyoto by Dr W J Herbert during a congress of the International Union of Immunological Societies.
Introduced in 1976, this scientific calculator runs off 3xAA batteries or from a 4.5V external DC supply. It uses a vacuum-flourescent display.
This third-party addon for the Tatung Einstein allows you to load Spectrum 48K games and run them on an otherwise unmodified Einstein computer. The programs can be loaded from tape and then saved to 3" floppy disk, speeding future loads. Games which used a non-standard 'fast' loader requried special loading codes which were published by the Speculator developers as they were created.
This portable terminal is a bit of a mystery. The front of the case is branded "British Telecom" and the hinges of the fold-dopwn keyboard read "Tandata", but there are no other model or product markings. The rear panel has two jacks marked "Line" and "Phone", along with an unmarked DB-25F socket and a recessed card edge socket. Power is supplied through a permanently connected 5-pin DIN plug.
Clearly it was designed as a portable modem/terminal, possibly with a serial/parallel connection for a printer - but it has been modified to add a BNC connector and switch. It may be that the switch allows it to be used as a monitor for another system.
This interface box is designed to connect to a microcomputer and switch up to eight 3/6V inputs. Outputs could be connected to switched loads or motors (using two outputs per motor). The connection to the computer is via a DA15F socket.
The DK1 is the first publicly-available development kit made available for preorder through Kickstarter in September 2012. It features low-latency 3-axis gyros, accelerometers, and magnetometers combined with a 7-inch LCD screen to provide a 90-degree steroscopic field of view. The LCD resolution is 1280x800, split between both eyes - although the effective resolution is slightly higher as the left and right eyes images do not fully overlap. The image for each eye is rendered as a barrel-distorted image with correction applied by lenses in the headset. The lenses can be swapped out to accommodate some degree of short-sightedness.
Features:
- Auto-centering
- Four fire buttons
- Non-skid rubber handle pad
- High speed turbofire capability (game dependent)
- X/Y axis adjustments
- Rotary throttle control
- 6-foot cable with 15-pin game port connector
- Four stabilizing suction cups
- Bundled with Quickshot calibration software for Windows
- Compatible with IBM PC/XT/386/486 or 100% compatibles
Compatible with Atari and Commodore game systems (except the Atari 7800). Two fire buttons; 6-foot cable with 9-pin connector.
- Compatible with the Atari, Commodore Amiga, and Commodore 64
- Turbo fire button
- Hands-free autofire capability
- 6-foot cable
- Thumb control direction key
For use with the Amstrad computer.
- Socket included for second joystick.
- Contour grip.
- Suction cup feet.
- Top and side fire button.
- 150cm long connecting lead.
This expansion card shipped inside the Xerox 820-II as standard. It provided support for external data storage drives, which can be dual 5 1/4-inch floppy drives, dual 8-inch floppy drives, or the 20Kg 8-inch floppy and rigid drive combination unit. Drives were supported in several combinations and could be daisy-chained with the secondary connection on the drive unit rear. The default drive assignments were A-D for floppy drives and E-H for hard-disc partitions.
The Xerox 8/16 was the successor to the Xerox 820 series. It has two CPUs: an 8-bit Z80 for running CP/M and an 8086 for MS DOS or CP/M-86. The power supply, display, and disc system weere shared between the two processors which were otherwise independent. This computer was one of the first desktop computers to feature concurrent processing : a task could be started on one operating system and, with a special keyboard command, the user could switch to the other processor to perfom another. Both processors could work at full speed as they shared no RAM or system resources. Only the input/output devices were locked to the user's active processor.
Our Xerox 8/16 is pictured here with the 8-inch floppy drive and hard drive unit.
Manufactured by ASCII Corporation, the Mega Stick is a three-button joystick for the Sega Mega Drive. It was released in Europe as an official SEGA product. In America and Japan it was a third-party peripheral marketed under the names "Power Clutch SG" and "Cluster Stick", respectively.
The Mega Stick an eight-direction joystick, variable speed autofire f or the A, B, and C triggers, and a 'slow-motion' toggle. As with all such peripherals, this was implemented as an auto-fire for the start button. The slow-motion was dependent on the game interpreting this as the player rapidly pausing and unpausing the game.
The 33MHz Archimedes A500 ARM3 CPU with FPA11 floating point accelerator installed.
Kempston Micro Electronics Ltd distributed this rebranded version of the Competition Pro 5000 joystick. Besides the colours, which were matched to the BBC Micro's cream and brown, the joystick's interface was changed to work with the BBC's user port (the BBC did not natively support the Atari-style 9-pin interface used by many other computers of the time).
The Prophet 2 is a modified Atom build by Acorn for Busicomputers Ltd.
Our Prophet 2 is part of the Chris Whytehead collection. More information on this item is available here.
This 16-bit ISA expansion card allows you to capture pictures from any PAL video source.
Features:
- Real-time live viewfinder
- Still & AVI movie capture
- Fast 16-bit ISA hardware
- 256K/512K on-board video VRAM
- Still size 800x520 pixels
- Movie size 384x258 pixels
- Still colours 16.7 million (24-bit)
- Movie colours 256 greyscale (8-bit)
- Windows 95 and Windows 3.1 ready
Technical:
- Input PAL 1V peak-to-peak
- File formats: BMP, GIF, TIF, RVF, AVI
- Rendering: WinG
- Process: DSP colour decoding
The Philips Nino was a Palm-size PC, a predecessor to the Pocket PC platform. It was a PDA-style device with a stylus-operated touch screen. The Nino 200 and Nino 300 models had a monochrome screen while the Nino 500 had a color display. The Nino featured a Voice Control Software and Tegic T9.
The PowerBook Duo 230 was a portable notebook personal computer, manufactured by Apple Computer and introduced in October 1992. Priced at $2610, the PowerBook Duo 230 was the high end model of the two simultaneously released PowerBook Duos. The other one, the PowerBook Duo 210, was priced at $2,250. The PowerBook Duo 230 had a 120MB SCSI Hard Disk Drive. It was discontinued on July 27, 1994.
A light pen for the BBC Micro. Comes with software programme on cassette.
Released in September 2005, the Dell Axim X51 replaced the X50. It shipped with Windows Mobile 5 instead of Windows Mobile 2003 Second Edition.
The low-end X51 has an Intel XScale processor running at 416 MHz, 128MB flash ROM, and had retained for $299. The mid-range model increased the CPU speed to 520 MHz. The high-end X51v had a VGA screen, a 624 MHz processor, 256MB flash ROM, and had a list price of $379.
Released in the 1990s, the Point 510 from Fujitsu Personal Systems, Inc. was a low-cost Windows 95-compatible pen tablet computer with a 10.4" SVGA DSTN display. Along with a 100 MHz processor and integrated communications features, the Point 510 was intended to be used for mobile decision support applications. The Point 510 features a pressure-sensitive resistive digitizer which allows temporary use with a fingernail or other pointing object if the pen is misplaced or lost. The Point 510 features 8 MB of high-performance EDO RAM memory. Maximum memory capacity is 56 MB through two DIMM slots. The Point 510 uses an internal 2.5" hard disk with a 1.6 GB capacity.
The PowerBook 3400c was a laptop computer in the PowerBook line manufactured by Apple Computer from February to November 1997. It was, briefly, the swiftest laptop in the world. Using the PowerPC 603e processor running at speeds of up to 240MHz, this PowerBook was the first to feature a PCI architecture, EDO memory, and a 64-bit wide, 40MHz internal bus. It was also the first PowerBook to feature a PC card slot capable of being used as a zoomed video port. Like all Apple laptops since the PowerBook 500 series, it featured a built-in trackpad as the pointing device.
- Intel Pentium 120 or 133 CPU
- Trident Cyber9320 video controller with 1MB
- 8MB memory standard
- 1 x 144 pin SODIMM expansion slot
- 810 or 1080MB HDD
- ES1688 Audio controller
- CD-ROM drive
- IrDA 1.0
- (2) Type II, or (1) Type III PCMCIA slot
This external RAM disk is designed to be used with the Epson PX-8 computer.
One of the first ADSL modems to be released in the UK by BT.
- Hardware platform:
- LAN interface: USB
- WAN interface: ADSL line (RJ11)
- 180mm x 130mm x 40mm
- Powered directly by the PC
- Line specification:
- Up to 8Mbps downstream
- Up to 800Kbps upstream
- ADSL standards compliant: ITU G. DMT, ITU G. LITE, ANSI T1.413-1998, ITU AUTOMODE
- Protocol support:
- Bridging (RFC 1483)
- PPP over ATM (RFC 2364)
- Support for PPPoE (RFC 2516)
The Model N40 was PowerPC-based notebook developed and manufactured by Tadpole Technology for IBM. It was powered by a 50MHz PowerPC 601. It had between 16 and 64MB RAM. Our N40 runs AIX.
The Microwriter is a hand-held portable word-processor with a chording keyboard. It was sold in the early 1980s by Microwriter Ltd, of London, UK. Microwriter was invented by UK-based, US-born film director Cy Endfield.
The 23 cm x 12 cm x 5 cm device comprises:
- A six-button chording keyboard.
- A single line LCD display.
- An 8 bit microprocessor.
- Complete Word processing software in ROM.
- 16 kilobytes of RAM.
- Rechargeable Nickel-cadmium batteries - sufficient to run the device for 30 hours.
- Various interfaces (see below).
This device is capable of allowing the user to enter and edit several pages of text - and by connecting a printer to the RS-232 serial port connector, documents can be printed without the aid of a separate computer.
The keyboard uses one button for each finger and two for the thumb of the user's right hand. The five buttons immediately beneath the fingers are pressed in different combinations to generate all letters.[2] The second thumb button is used to toggle through a range of modes that allow the user to switch case, enter numbers, insert punctuation and even add ASCII control characters, to be used in editing the document being prepared. To type a letter "T", for example, the user would tap the top thumb button to shift to uppercase, then chord a "t" by pressing the index finger and ring finger buttons simultaneously.
The manufacturers claimed that most people could learn to use it in just a couple of hours. With some practice, it is possible to become a faster typist with the Microwriter than with a conventional keyboard, providing that what is being entered is just text. Typing is slowed if a substantial number of special characters have to be entered using the "shifting" mechanism.
Learning the chords for the basic letters and numbers is facilitated by a set of flash-cards that show simple mnemonics for each character.
Despite a lack of similar products, the Microwriter was not a success, and ceased production in 1985. It is likely that the concept of a chording keyboard put off many potential customers.
- Computer compatible
- Mains or battery operation
- Tape counter
- Pause control
- Auto stop
- Auto level control
This third-party cassette recorder is designed to be used with the Commodore VIC20 and VIC64 home computers.
This calculator was designed in 1967 but sold into the early 1970's. Most of the logic is constructed from discrete transistors and resistor-diose gates, but some small-scale integration silicon IC's are also used. Despite the name on the case, the design and manufacture was actaully carried out by Sharp Corporation. Two memory registers are provided based on magnetic core memory. They therefore retain their values when power is turned off.
For use with:
- Atari video game system
- Sears video arcade
- Atari 400/800 computers
- Commodore VIC-20
- Commodore C64
- NEC DC-6001 computer
- SVI-318/328 computers
