Hey everybody!
Well just got back from a vacation in the (California) bay area...
(Petaluma/Santa Rosa area to be more exact) and had a pretty
dissapointing time in my rummaging for goodies at thrift shops... Of
what I saw that took my notice were a Commodore 1902a monitor ($49, no
thanks..) and an un-priced 800 XL keyboard unit. I balked at how much
one place wanted to sell TRON figures ($15-$25 yikes!); I did get a
certain Pac-Man lunch pail I had my eye on for a few years...
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=---=-=-=---=-=-=--
Of course as it normally seems to go for me, my local stops prove more
fruitfull. Some of the recent finds include a long sought-after October
1977 issue of Popular Science magazine (I remember seeing it on the
newsstands) which displays what seems to be a prototype PET on the cover
(w/rounded plastic case, only seen in promotional literature as far as
I've seen, PS seems to have added wood-grain contact paper for an
enhanced 'homey' look). Have scanned it and hope to put it on the site
within the upcoming month or so. Also picked up the March '79 and May
'83 issues as they had some cool pics of other early computers and home
robots in them.
Another very unexpected magazine find was four issues of ANTIC
magazine (thier focus is Atari 8-bits), a couple notable articles were
on building a lie-dectector and rigging your dot-matrix printer into an
image scanner, both utilize the paddle port pins and other easy to get
components and also sould be adaptable to the Commodore 64/VIC-20/128.
:)
Also bought a Fast Load Cartridge and C-64 Dust Cover (with a Protecto
logo, remember them?) for a couple bucks. Stuff passed by were a few 64
units (overpriced if you ask me), a couple Plus/4s (one unbeleivably
overpriced), and a PET (3.0 ROMs, 32k, w/book) that one was very
tempting, but I know how little space I have after my last trip to the
storage unit... Also passed a low-profile datasette (I have 30+
datasettes already but can you ever have enough cassette program
recorders?)
Saw a pretty complete ADAM system too: cpu (one tape drive), printer,
controllers, carts, tapes, books (including a misplaced PET book), a
couple extra ribbons all for $130 (choke!) though on Staturdays and
Wednesdays they sell stuff for 1/2 price (still way too much to me....)
Mac 512 (with doumentation), Mac SE, Tandy Model 100, etc.. I could
go very broke quick If I started collecting everything, good thing I
have control (ok... limited control, which is better then none at all.)
One of these vacations I'll get corrdinated enough with one of my
friends and spend a couple days in the Palo Alto/Silicon Valley area
combing thrift shops, I think I might find some suprises there...
Larry Anderson
--
-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
Visit our web page at: http://www.goldrush.com/~foxnhare/
Call our BBS (Silicon Realms BBS 300-2400 baud) at: (209) 754-1363
-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
Received on Sun Sep 07 1997 - 03:26:21 BST