Easiest Vintage Computer Restoration Ever!

How often does this happen to you?

So I'm over a friend's house, checking out his VR setup, when his system simply refuses to work long enough for me to play any of his new VR games from Steam. While he's troubleshooting the issue, I bring up the topic of a computer I found and am thinking of buying -- an old TRS-80 model 4. He asks why would I want to buy a 30 year old computer? So I tell him that it's sort of like antique collecting or old car restoration. Instead of needing a garage to house them, though, your vintage computers would fit in your bedroom or living room in a display case. Much more than simply old computers, they are parts of history, and if they still work, you can show people what it was like back in the olden days, when there was no mouse, and you had to type complicated commands like

"COPY frogger.* :0 :1 x"

So during this conversation, he tells me, "So would you be interested in an old Mac. I'll give it to you for exactly what I paid for it."

"What did you pay?", I asked.

"Twenty bucks." was the reply. He told me that he got it for a small project that involved getting a friend's files copied from one old original mac to his PC, and that the LC was a cheap and quick way to do it. The price was right, also. He said it comes with the 12" color monitor, a Stylewriter printer, and a couple of boxes full of discs that, the last time he used it, worked fine.

I had seen this computer sitting on his bookshelf several times before, and he asked me several times before if I was interested, but this was the first time I actually had the interest. So we hopped into my car, drove to an ATM, and I gave him $40, because it was still a steal at that price.

When i got it home, I was amazed. It's almost as if it were never really used.

When I got it home, I plugged it in, and turned it on. The 40MB hard drive was noisy, but that's sort of expected for a 25-year-old computer. The fact that it still spun up was amazing enough. Below are images of the exterior and interior. I took out the hard drive and the floppy drive to show how shiny and clean everything was.

Thankfully, the thing was never owned by a smoker. It came in the original boxes, too, with the address of the single previous owner on it, complete with her mailing address, because it was shipped to her home. There was just a tinge of yellowing on the keyboard and mouse, from age. I quickly wiped them down with peroxide, and the original light grey came back. The mouse just had a tiny amount of dust inside.

The Macintosh LC, along with all of the Macintosh 2 computers, like the 2, 2X, 2C, 2CX, 2Ci, LC, LC2, LC3, and others, was built with the technician in mind. Only one screw on the back was needed to keep the case on. And most people left it off. The Case lid snapped into place, and stayed on just fine, without a screw. Even better, all the components in the case simply snapped out of their places. In seconds, you could remove and replace a bad floppy drive, hard disc, or power supply. There were very few PC-clone cases that were put together with such forward-thinking conveniences in them. Even today, no PC manufacturers make their cases so that you can snap everything into place. You still need a pile of screws which can get lost, fall into the case and be difficult to remove, as well as adapters for certain components.

The old Macs were a technician's dream come true. You could have any problem fixed in a few minutes, with no screws.

So here is what I saw when turning it on:

It's alive!

System 7.1

10 MB of RAM

40MB Hard drive (Yeah, not GB!)

All in all, hardly any restoration was required. Just a little blown air for a tiny amount of dust, and some hydrogen peroxide to whiten the plastic parts, mostly just the keyboard and mouse. The monitor is still as sharp as it was when it was new. The Software works, but I'll be getting some disk tools to put a fresh new OS on it, as it would be from the factory. The first entry into my vintage computer collection is going to be useful in getting any original Macintosh running, as I can make copies of the system 6 discs, or even better, the original 5.4 system that shipped with the first Macintosh in 1984.

Since I currently have no discs with Macintosh software (I forgot to pick them up when my friend and I did the transaction, Doh!), I'll have to wait for that. Once I get the discs, I'll see if I can put together a 720K disc to test my first original Mac. I still have the T-handle Hex wrench and case spreader used to open them.

ADDENDUM 19-FEB-2018 -- 2 things I didn't mention before. The clock battery and the speaker did not work. I located a source of LC Batteries, and bought a pack of 3 for $5. The Mac now retains all the settings for color, date, and time.

The other issue I found was the speaker was really low -- almost inaudible, even when the settings are cranked up to the loudest. I located a replacement speaker at You Do It Electronics, desoldered the original Mac speaker, and re-soldered the wires to the new one. Problem solved.

I have the software that I left at my friend's house, and there are no Macintosh System discs among them. Fortunately, I think I can find some online somewhere. However, most of the dics are readable, and the software is intact. I should be able to get moving on getting more stuff together soon.

USB Arcade Console

So you've gotten yourself a copy of M.A.M.E., or RetroArch, and you want to use it as the heart of a video gaming system, with authentic arcade controls? My previous article on building a JAMMA multigame arcade machine, though Similar, was an all-in-one project. This project was to make a console box that you could hook up to any computer to play your arcade and/or home console games on.

Though just a glorious plain old pine box at heart, this was my first time working with arcade controls, and the box ended up being much larger than required -- at least taller.

Just a plain rectangular box, based on the amount, and placement of buttons and joysticks. The top of the box is where all the controls are located, and I hinged it to the box so that there would be easy maintenance.

The holes are 1-1/16th size holes, based on the width of the threads on the buttons. I tested a variety of bits on this. The worst to use are the blade-type bits. They're too messy and tend to make rough holes and sometimes break the wood. A standard drill bit is hard to find in that width, without it being really long, and expensive. In the end, I went with a hole-boring kit that I got from Harbor Freight. This is the type of bit that is used for putting holes for door-knobs into doors. The kit had a variety of different size head, including 1-1/16".

Here I am testing the size of the holes.

The Joysticks use the same size holes as the buttons do, but you need to account for the square body of the joystick, when planning out the locations of your controls. Here is the finished console.

I decided on the trigger/flight-style joystick for maximum compatibility. With a trigger finger button and a thumb-button, the joysticks will allow you to easily play games like Battlezone, Tron, and other games where triggers on the joysticks are important for control. They are not analog -- they're just 8-way, so analog joystick games are not possible. If you're wondering what games use analog sticks, that would be arcade classics like Williams' Blaster and Sinistar, Atari's Red Baron, and Cinematronics' Tailgunner.

With this arrangement, complex game controls like those of Taito's Assault, could be duplicated for near-perfect arcade feel.

I added a spinner knob so that games like Omega Race, Mad Planets, Tron, and other games that used a combination of joystick and knob, could be played.

The wiring from the underside. Pardon the out of focus photos.

The USB controller being used is the one from X-gaming. There are cheaper ones you can use, but this has the support for a trackball and a knob built into it. I got the joysticks and knob from Ultimarc.com. They are one of the few places wher e the trigger-finger sticks are less than $20 each. The spinner knob is expensive. I have no idea why, but suspect it's because of the fact that it weight a pound, and is made of solid steel.

Finally, testing the box on my laptop running MAME.

The biggest advantage to this is that it's universal -- it works on any computer with USB support.

One thing I decided on doing was actually mounting a Raspberry Pi or tiny NUC-sized computer inside of the box, so that it would be an all-in-one system. You would just have an HDMI cable going to your TV, and a power cord for the computer inside.

There is certainly plenty of room in the box.

Building a Retro Arcade Machine with Modern Style

Making a Flat, Wall-mounted Arcade Machine

Building your own working arcade machine has been a thing for a while, and when I got into it, I was inspired to do more than the traditional and typical designs that most people do. Since my apartment is small, I wanted something that would save space, and be out of the way, but still be available when you wanted to get your fix. So I came up with a design that filled these needs.

I decided that the bulk of a traditional Arcade Machine is wasted space. The Refrigerator-sized cabinets are mostly full of empty space, with all the necessary bits being the console and monitor. Since we live in the age of flat-screens, I decided that a real arcade CRT monitor was not required. I could make a machine so flat that it would take up no more space than a picture frame on the wall. My original concept was to simply hang an LCD monitor in a picture frame, and simply plug in a cabled console to it. But I decided that having an all-in-one machine had certain benefits. So I designed something that would have the appearance of a traditional Arcade Cabinet, but which would be flat, and hang on the wall, looking like a machine that was pushed into the wall.

For about $35, you can get a kit like this on Ebay. This kit has more buttons that you'll need, 2 real arcade joysticks, and a JAMMA Wiring harness. Thee are two major choices when constructing an arcade machine: JAMMA and USB. With a JAMMA system, you retain the hardware of most post 1980 arcade machines. JAMMA stands for Japanese Amusement Machine Marketing Association, and was an attempt to standardize arcade machine hardware so that upgrades and maintenance would be easier and more flexible. Prior to the introduction of JAMMA in 1981, every arcade machine manufacturer had their own proprietary controls, boards, power supplies, etc. If you ran an arcade, getting things fixed was a pain, because you couldn't mix and match any parts. After Jamma, a single arcade machine could literally be transformed into any other machine with the simple change of a circuit board, and console top. I decided on JAMMA for one simple reason. I wanted it to be cheap -- I didn't want to have to build a whole PC Clone, Raspberry Pi computers were too slow at the time, and I'd like it to be simple enough to upgrade if I wanted.

The same company that makes this uses PC/USB interfaces (Pictured above) for about $45 or $50. The USB interface costs more, and I don't really know why. The best board is the I-Pac (Not in this Picture), which has connectors for everything, including Trackball and Spinner-knobs. It's $45 - $65, depending on options. The board in this picture is a Chinese knock-off of the I-Pac, and likely only handles the sticks and buttons.

Here is a JAMMA wiring harness. This one set of wires and the connector socket is what all JAMMA systems have in common. You can swap out everything without having to re-wire your console.

This is the JAMMA power supply. Most of the ones on the market are this very brand. This is about $15, and beats the $35 or $40 AT PC Power Supply that you can also use -- it's smaller and you won't be wasting wires and connectors. One thing you need to know is that it provides +12 Volts DC and +5 Volts DC -- in Standard Yellow and red, which is standard in most computers (both the voltages and the wire colors). With this one power supply, you can power pretty much everything in the machine -- the computer, the monitor, the speakers, lights, and other things.

This is the 620-in-One Game Elf board from Holland Computers. This Chinese-made board is ubiquitous, and contains the actual ROMS of over 620 actual arcade machines. The Bulk of the games are junk -- multiple knock-offs of the same game, but at it's core are a group of about 20 or 30 games that everyone knows -- Galaxian, Galaga, Pacman, DigDug, Frogger, etc. The Picture below it is a picture of the board itself, without it's plastic cover.

Most importantly, this Game Elf is one of about a dozen different JAMMA "multi-game boards", which play hundreds of games. At any point, I can simply buy one of the other boards, and either add up to 2000 games to my machine, or simply change the available games. The board that plays 2000 games is obviously more expensive,but the menu software is similar, if not the same, on all the boards -- you use the joystick to select a game, and a button-combination returns you to the menu.

What Follows is a progression of building the wooden cabinet to house the Machine.

The Dell 1909FP monitor was hung on a cheap VESA Wall Mount. The Wood is pine and thin paneling, so it's really light, It really needs to be, because it will be hung on walls, sometimes without a stud to screw into. It was tricky to get the monitor in place. I didn't account for the bottom of the marquee box, because I bought the monitor mounting kit long after I assembled the box. I didn't have enough space to slide the monitor onto the bracket, so I had to loosen the top screws of the mount, and allow for slipping it in at a slight angle. The good thing is that it can be mounted. The better thing is that the monitor can't slip out, once the screws are re-tightened after mounting.

Top Photo is my controller template. The buttons and stick configuration is being done according to the Game Elf's manual, with very little modification. In spite of the fact that not you don't really need 8 buttons per player, I am putting all the buttons in, because you never know if the person who ends up getting this will actually like the 3 or 4 games that use buttons 7 and 8. In the bottom photo, After drilling 20 button holes, 2 Joystick holes, sanding, and spraying a coat of primer, the control panel is almost done. Just a couple of coats of black gloss paint, and it will be ready for mounting the buttons and sticks. Unfortunately, I did not start by planning the control panel, first, and making the machine around the dimensions of the control panel. As a result, I couldn't use the trackball. However, I discovered that the Game Elf only supports 6 buttons, so I eliminated buttons 7 & 8 from both players, gained a couple of inches on either side, and now have plenty of room for the trackball. I quickly made a new control panel, painted and filled it with the controls.

The new control panel top and underside.

The square buttons light up. I aimed all the terminals in the optimal directions, to make wiring easier. This is most likely going to be the only 3" trackball I put into a system. These particular trackballs, though authentic, take up too much space. Oh -- it can be lit from below -- I can have a glowing trackball! I may put a multi-changing RGB LED light below it to make it glow all colors while you play.

To make the task of wiring less of a hassle, I decided to label the wires. The cheap-ass Chinese JAMMA wiring harness was all in Chinese, and the individual wires had no labels, and no consistent color scheme, so if I was going to be testing, disassembling, and re-assembling, the labels would make that process take much less time.

So after Painting, assembling, and wiring, this is the front view of the unit with the control panel attached. I need to get some plexiglass for the bezel, and some plastic channels for the marquee to slip into.

Here is a side view to show off the profile. This is a very thin unit, and it will take up very little space in a room. The measurements are 26.5 inches wide, 38.5 inches tall. It should be mounted at least 28" from the floor, to bring the console to playing height.

Here's the guts of the system. The jamma power supply ($15), Jamma game elf box ($89), wiring harness ($10), el cheapo PC speakers ($10).

So I finally put it together and took it to our family's house for Thanksgiving weekend. I dubbed it "The Retard Machine" because all the 50-something people were being kids again, getting drunk and acting like retarded adults. I believe the machine contributed to it.

I also got requests to make more! So I guess I'll be finishing this ASAP to make the next one.

I'm not the only person with this idea. Other people decided on the slim wall-mounted arcade machines, including this guy, whose work is outstanding!

Useful Links for Building your own Arcade Machines

X-Gaming, Makers of arcade consoles and kits
Ebay's Arcade/JAMMA sales
Arcade Spare Parts Dot Com
Ultimarc -- makers of the best Arcade parts and PC/USB adapters for Arcade gear
Holland Computers -- Great resource for JAMMA equipment and arcade equipment upgrades
Red Floor Arcade -- Sellers of arcade parts
HAPP MartEven more obscure and userful parts that many of the others don't have

Historic Computing and Computer projects

This blog is my attempt to document the different computing projects I'm working on, provide useful links to me and other people concerning specific projects and useful products. I've been into computers since 1979, when I was convinced that I needed to take computer courses in High school because that would lead to high tech jobs, which presumably would pay more. Well, I never ended up a burger flipper or a stock boy at the grocery store, so I guess in one sense, whoever told me about computers being the future was correct. I think we all make less money than we thought we would, because corporations see computer specialists as just a different kind of janitor these days -- janitors who clean up the messes made by executives who ruin their computers.

But I digress...

Our High school had a Digital Equipment Corporation(DEC) PDP-11/60, which was a mini-computer about the size of a fridge or two, with 20 or more terminals hooked up to it. It was donated by DEC as long as they had a preventative maintenance contract on it. I made my most memorable friends in the computer room, and was accepted as one of the admins on it. We all tried to program our favorite arcade games to run on the terminals, none of which had hires graphics, but we made it work using what capabilities the terminals did have.

From there, it was TRS-80 computers, IBM PC clones, and Apples. I got rid of all my old computers at one point, mainly because they took up a lot of space, and I didn't want to move them any more. Of course, now I kick myself, because most of those same systems are now worth much more in the Vintage Computer market.

SO currently, I will be documenting several computer projects:

(1) The restoration and modification of a TRS-80 Model 4 computer. This project was created on a whim. I saw one for sale at a surplus website, and bought it on a lark. Then, after I realized the task at hand (locating software to run on it, the lack of 5.25" double density floppy discs, and the problems with 30-year-old disc drives, power-supplies, and other issues) I decided to locate possible alternative ways to get the software needed to make it run. The great thing is that all the software ever written for this computer is available more or less for free in internet software archives and hobby sites. I located a device that you can plug in, which lets the TRS-80 Models 1, 3, and 4 use an SD card as a hard drive, so I'll be documenting that, as well.

(2) The construction and programming of a reproduction of DEC PDP-11/70, and PDP-8 computers, which are available in kit form, and run off of a Raspberry Pi. I've done a lot of small projects with Raspberry Pis, such as arcade machines, and this is sort of a pet project. I want to recreate the operation of a computer like our High school had -- which is arguably the oldest computer I've ever operated -- and if possible, make a mock-up of a computer room from the period in my home, as a conversation piece, which I might later donate to a museum.

(3) The Resurrection of a couple of Apple computers, and my attempts to empower them with abilities they didn't originally have -- like Internet access, USB ports, and other things.

(4) My quest to locate a working DEC terminal or two from the 1970's and 80's, to use with the mini-computer project (2) above.

(5) To Document the construction of my arcade machine emulators, which use tiny Windows PCs and Raspberry Pi boards, and genuine arcade parts to recreate the 1980's arcade experience.

(6) To document the construction of various modern computer projects and design of computer furniture and workstations to make my hobbies easier and more comfortable.

(7) The Documentation of the restoration and/or modification of other vintage computers I acquire.

(8) Document the various emulators I've played with, and how to set them up to easily run old computer software on your PC.

(9) Document the construction and setup of Retro-Console Gaming devices I build, and the software setups for various console emulator packages.

When all is said and done, I should have lots of photos, links to relevant sites, and give viewers the information they need to do similar projects. Of course, having everything organized will have to be done, too, but after I've written a few articles.