Wow. I can't believe I've never thought of nor heard of this from anyone else. Bad ass. I think I'm about to spend the night heat shrinking my screwdrivers. lol
I know some people hate coming into non original vintage stuff....but I genuinely love when i see modified old computers, you KNOW someone really loved it and spent tons of times playing games and learning new things, interacting with it and finding out ways to make it do even more, everytime it's been something done with talent by someone well before my hands... i've always cherished it and left it alone, or built on their idea even more. awhile back I saw someones 1970's looking absolutely home made wooden PC speaker and tv switcher box for a commodore system of some type discarded at a thrift store. I wish I had enough money at the time to get it, but the price (45$) was way more than I had and was honestly really overpriced for somebodys little speaker box and metal switches...so cute though and i must of spent 10 minutes looking over and tinkering with it.... hope it found a good home.
When I was a field engineer working on computers and printers for HP in the '90s, the "Unreasonably Long Screwdriver" was a frequently used tool. I also recommend you put heatshrink on the length of the shaft. Also, get some bees wax to put on the tip for those times when you need to temporarily stick a screw to it while you guide it deep into a machine.
13 Ghosts was written by Bryan Eggers, formerly from Software Affair - if you search for his name you'll find him on the VCFED forums in a 2004 post where he introduces himself and provides an enormous amount of additional TRS-80 lore.
Adrian, I love your whimsical videos which help us take our mind off the sad things in life. You are a gem. I've just become a member because you deserve it for the value you;ve added to my life.
This was my first computer, too, although I was beginning 11th grade in late 1982 when my high school purchased 2 for the students to take turns using after school. Whenever I think back to my junior year I remember this specific model computer, "Fast Times At Ridgemont High" and KISS, "Creatures Of The Night". 😀
Back in my high school days we had a lab of TRS-80 Model III. I took my first programing class with this machine. A year later I got a Coco-2 for Christmas. Thanks for the video!
I too cut my teeth on a TRS-80 Model III in late 1982 after my high school purchased 2 of them for the "media center" which was formerly known as the "library". I still have the sheets of paper with the original hand-written source code of the very first program I ever wrote. I never finished it though until 30 years later when I found a TRS-80 Model III emulator for Linux in 2012. Such fun!
I added an internal LM386 based amp and speaker to my model III and used the cassette player remote relay control line to switch the audio on and off so that you didn't have to put up with, or turn down, the sound when tape IO was being done. My model III had a factory fitted FDC but I swapped out the floppy drives for a couple of second hand full height double sided drives and later on added two more externally.
Good audio mod, I also added a speaker and amp (probably also a '386) but the relay bit never came to me. By this time though I was pretty much over cassettes and onto disks. Actually having the option to hear the cassette signal (at low level) I found handy as it let me know things were working properly
The clearance for the back of the picture tube is no joke. Years ago I managed to vent the CRT on a Model IV when putting the lid back on, and it really deflated my interest in working with the real hardware. It was a nice green screen CRT too. Regarding a speaker mod and cassette noise... add a second relay on the the motor control output, for a normally-closed relay. Then it can disable the speaker output whenever the cassette is being used.
My first computer was a Model 3. It was cassette based 48k ram purchased from a previous owner. Used it a lot, especially BASIC programming stuff. Good times!
Wow... this brings back memories. A TRS-80 Model 3 is what I cut my teeth on. It was the first computer I ever touched. The one I used was at a school library and it used a tape drive... I learned BASIC on it, played Oregon Trail and loved it. Wish I could find a cheap one in working condition since that computer has a lot of nostalgia for me.
Very entertaining episode I have to say, starting with first use of ULS (unreasonable long scrudriwer), "lululu" with wiggling drive mounting frame and ending with testing joystick on 13 ghosts. 😁
Fun! I bought a Model III with my paper route money, back in the day. My supportive parents subsidized the purchase; I only had to cover half the price, but even with that I could only buy the 4K model initially. I did eventually save up enough money to get it upgraded to the 16K/Level 2 BASIC, which was _huge_. Not only could I now fit programs in memory that did anything interesting, the level 2 BASIC upgrading the character set and included fun statements like INKEY$ that allowed for asynchronous keyboard input, so you could do more than just simple prompt/response UIs (e.g. for games). One of my favorite programs was Dancing Demon. If I recall correctly, it used the cassette port for sound, as you've described here. But I do recall several programs that took advantage of the RF noise from the PC and a nearby AM radio, to provide audio output. Crazy!
If it helps, I read online that Krylon 1403 Metallic Paint is a very close match to the TRS-80 silver paint. You could always Scotchbrite (or lightly sand) the case and repaint it.
"Krylon 1403 Metallic Paint" is probably the non-industrial name for the paint they sprayed onto TRS-80s of the late 1970s to the mid-1980s. Even though the paint wears, it doesn't go yellow like the Apple II ( ][, +, IIc, IIe, IIGS, or the Apple III) or Commmodore computers.
It's nice seeing that screwdriver be put to work so quickly. It was also nice watching Adrian chill for a bit with some gameplay. I really wouldn't mind seeing more of that. For great demonstrations of the hardware and Adrian's fun commentary. That bit about the spiders was amusing.
I don’t own a TRS 80 and probably never will it since I live in a tiny city apartment, but I really appreciate it. Love you clearly have for all these old machines as you point out tips and tricks for preserving them for the folks who do have room to on all this hardware :-) love your channel and really appreciate all the work you do! I feel like I’m living vicariously)
I love your TRS-80 stuff! When I was in grade school, our library had a TRS-80 network with a Model 4 with dual disk drives as the master and if memory serves we had 5 Model 3 computers connected to it. The only thing I think most kids did was play Oregon Trail. I also had a CoCo 2 at home, but I only had a cassette deck for storage, and my cable had a short and I was never able to save anything. I always wished we could get a floppy drive. Lots of great memories. Thank you so much for all of your videos!
On other systems you looked at the keyboard had wear marks from using the arrow keys. For a serious gamer the joystick mod would save the paint on the case as a nice bonus.
I always love seeing you break into an old PC like that. It makes me feel so modern when I work on my 10 year old Dell XPS 8500. LOL! Thanks Adrian for another great lesson.
Totally bizarre, I've worked on plenty of TRS-80 computers and the thin-line drives were usually on the Mod-12, ... and maybe the MSDOS machines. This was an awesome find.
Well, this one certainly shows less wear than one would expect :D. This is a nice video, i would like to see a series of videos, if possible of course, of a "full cycle", sort of like what you did with the PET. It would be nice to see a TRS-80 Model 3 being fixed, cleaned/restored? and upgraded as much as possible.
@@8bitwiz_ Well yeah that might be, but i really would say that it is more related to the fact that it was likely relegated because it was "odd". I have seen that happen so many times :S
I bought one of these in high school. Yes, 16K was cassette only. When I got the floppy disk and FDC installed, it did boot up 16K, but TRS-DOS ate so much memory the computer couldn't be used as a practical matter, so I immediately had to get the 64K upgrade. This was the easiest computer to learn simply because there was nothing surprising or particularly clever about the design. For example, video memory was on the memory map, so there were no modes and ports to learn, just poking characters onto the screen. It was easy to add a printer to it as it had both Centronics parallel and RS-232 serial and Radio Shack had a rudimentary word processor for the system called Scripsit. Though I'd probably have preferred an Atari 800, the Mod-3 wasn't a bad computer to start with.
I can't find pictures because I don't know what it's called, but my dad had a device that held the computer tilted back, and you had to kinda type at an odd angle (fingers way down.) Maybe that's what caused the scratches on the side. The device I remember was either aluminum or steel and looked like a short arcade cabinet you could sit in a desk chair at. Huge thing. Dunno if it was custom or anything but when I saw the sides were all that was scratched, I had a flashback! Love the content!
I added a joystick to my model 1 back then, same method as most games use those keys. I didn't see it in a mag, just figured it out from the circuit diagram. (arrows and space are on the same scan line) The only issue is the keyboard lines are multiplexed, not static DC levels, meaning this is all sent up the joystick cable, so it could be an issue with extra long joystick cables, or joysticks that have smarts in them, like rapid fire etc. I was going to add a logic board to take the joystick lines back to Atari standard DC levels, but as I kept getting away with it I never bothered. Later on, with all rebuilt into a model 4 case (bought as a spare part from Tandy) I also had two half hight drives in the upper bay, with the lower disused, I thought it would look nice to add a cassette transport from a front loading HiFi cassette deck, the 'sloped back' variant, complete with an illuminated well, but never found a suitable donor tape deck. Probably would hardly ever be used, just look way better than the blank filler panel, no more "Replace with Radio Shack disk drive" lettering pestering me.
i have visited the center for computing history in Cambridge, its a lovely place, many old vintage computers on display where the visitors can interact with them, some of them are slightly more modern but a lot of them are extremely old, they have a few items that are seen on your channel including a swtpc6800
I remember my non gate array model 4 seemed to have the Rev C style power supply from the 4P for some reason .. the screen was a little wobbly but I reflowed the solder joints and changed the RIFAs and it was fine.
The scratches on the side appear to be mostly horizontal, which to me indicates that the computer was slid back in between other items. I learned to program on an original 4K Level 1 TRS-80, long before it became the "Model 1", the one with the kkkeeyybbbounccceee issue. After I upgraded to Level II (I sweet talked the tech at the Computer Center into selling me just the chips), I don't know how much programming I lost to the infamous "llist" lockup. Some time later, I was "gifted" a used Model 4, which I absolutely fell in love with. It was the single drive 64K model, and over time I upgraded it to 128K, 4x 360K half height drives, and the Hi Res Graphics kit I got on closeout. It had the good keyboard in it, and all of my college papers were written in Super Scripsit. I really miss that computer; Mom decided to clean out the attic and didn't ask if I wanted to keep it.
I modded my Timex-Sinclair 1000 for an Atari joystick in just that way back in 1983. Made games a lot more fun. There was an article in Sync magazine explaining how. First hardware project I did.
Contact cleaner sprays do a nice job in cleaning any flux ,capacitor juice and other dried liquids from the boards(i have no idea about drinkables,i have not tried yet,assuming it should work though).
The model III was the first computer I worked on. They had them at the Library, and a friend's brother managed a Radio Shack, and he'd let us play with them.
Unreasonably Long Screwdriver my colleague called them slacker screwdriver (Faulenzer Schraubenzieher) for the people who want to be as far away as possible from the work.
You mentioned that this model doesn't have graphics, but it does. It has the same graphics as all previous models, which is "coarse" graphics. Each character position can display six "pixels" in a two across by three down configuration. This means that the display can show the coarse graphics along with text, but each character position can only show either graphics or a text character, never both at the same time. As I understand it, the graphics pixels were part of the character ROM and were activated by using ASCII codes from 128 on up.
True. BASIC had set/reset statements that could address pixels individually -- 128x48, i.e. two pixels horizontally in each character position, and three pixels vertically -- but doing so would just replace the current character in the screen position with the appropriate one from the character set. With six characters per pixels, that used up 64 characters to cover all the possibilities, and the character code offset was essentially a numerical sequence based on the bit of each pixel within the character. The set/reset statements did all the math for you so you didn't have to worry about that, but of course anything written in assembly had to handle the pixel addressing itself. Obviously with this approach, it was not possible to have a character on the screen at the same time as having any of the six pixels for that character position visible. Setting a pixel would remove any other character, and vice a versa.
@@harvey66616 I remember on the Model 1 with "Level 1 BASIC", it wasn't possible in BASIC to scan for a keypress while allowing the program to continue. However, I discovered that the keyboard was always active, even when a program was running, so if you pressed a key on the keyboard while the program was running, that key would perform its function and print the evidence of that on the screen. I noticed this especially because of a program which used the key for clearing the screen as the "fire" button for a text-based-graphics game. It would set a single pixel on the screen and continually look to see if it was still set. If it wasn't, that was the signal to "fire" and then set the pixel back on, ready for the next shot. I figured out that by setting pixels on the cursor position, in the two character positions behind the cursor and in the two character positions after the cursor, it would be possible to detect "Clear Screen", "Enter", "Backspace", "Space" (or any printing character), and "Up Arrow" separately.
Oddly enough I'm working on an LM386-based audio amp circuit to fit inside my 64DTV in a TV project, very simple little ICs and pretty cheap to boot, though a LOT easier if you get the pre-made boards (I just happened to have a stray IC in a bag of loose mixed capacitors)... :D
LOL @ Unreasonably Long Screw Driver. It's interesting that these SKUs didn't ship with the drive mounting chasis or have easily removed knockouts for the drives. I guess Tandy wasn't too interested in selling upgrades to users? Neat mod job by the original owner.
This video helped me salvage my parents’ TRS-80 that was sitting in the barn (fortunately covered) for 30 years 😅😁 thank you! At 8:55 you mentioned it might be possible to run a composite feed into the crt - would it be possible for me to pay you to show me how to do that? I would love to use this screen to create art with!
Omg! I had that game on my model 3. Played it a couple of times and then started experimenting with commands and formatted it and everything else....I was maybe 12 lol
@Adrian's Digital Basement ][ do you think sometime you could make a video on how you would go about finding these machines (broken or not) if they weren't being donated? I really would like to get more in to finding these machines, but aside from EBay I have no idea where to look.
8:50 What does he mean by "not designed for composite video"? Are the sync signals separated from the luminance signal in this computer? I.e. using separate wires from the computer video circuits to the monitor input.
I got curious so I tried to find out what's in a RIFA cap. Best I can tell, these are part of a class of film capacitors that use alternating film and metallized paper for dielectric. If the film is celluloid-based, yeah... that would explain the stink and the conductive nature of the burned goo - carbon conversion. Is there a good source of information about the health risks?
Is the TRSDOS splash screen accurate? It was reporting 48K of memory, so if that's accurate then it looks like this machine has also had the RAM upgraded.
Adrian, I got one of these today at e waste (48k dual floppies) it was damp so I’m letting it dry out for a week or so, (got a gorgeous Tandy 102 as well) my question is what do I replace the rifa with? Soon as I open it I want to just replace it and if it lives I will begin looking for discs with applications.
I was pretty common to patch TRSDOS's format program to improve the sector interleaving and improve program load times. I think 3 was as low as a standard CPU speed model III could handle without misses. Other DOSes allowed the user to specify the interleaving via configuration parameters.
For the IBM PC DOS, there was a set of two programs collectively referred to as FDFORMAT which allowed you to alter the format with the aim to gain a bit of extra space on a floppy. Some changes were compatible with DOS while others required you to have a TSR (Terminate and Stay Resident) program running in the background to handle the formats which DOS didn't natively recognise. You could get something like 1.7M onto a 1.44M floppy by adding an extra sector per track, adding two more tracks (82 tracks), and reducing the number of root directory entries.
Weird, my TRS-80 model 3 is a 26-1062 according to the sticker but the guy that sold it to me said it was a 32k model and it has the duel floppy like a 26-1063 would have. Wonder if mine was a case swap like your other TRS-80 now.
Hey Adrian, I watch your videos all the time and was just curious about something. How many computers do you have in your house and where do you keep them all?
![Adrian's Digital Basement ][](http://yt3.ggpht.com/ytc/AIdro_k7CrQRe71qN6c0Ua7A1P_I8KkxjqLa70u0zYeCvdvnKw=s48-c-k-c0x00ffffff-no-rj)
A long piece of shrink tubing on the screwdriver shaft is a great upgrade. Less worries about touching things you shouldn't touch
i used fish tank tubing. it works great on phillips heads :D
Heat shrunk -- yeah I'm doing to do that
Wow. I can't believe I've never thought of nor heard of this from anyone else. Bad ass. I think I'm about to spend the night heat shrinking my screwdrivers. lol
I know some people hate coming into non original vintage stuff....but I genuinely love when i see modified old computers, you KNOW someone really loved it and spent tons of times playing games and learning new things, interacting with it and finding out ways to make it do even more, everytime it's been something done with talent by someone well before my hands... i've always cherished it and left it alone, or built on their idea even more.
awhile back I saw someones 1970's looking absolutely home made wooden PC speaker and tv switcher box for a commodore system of some type discarded at a thrift store. I wish I had enough money at the time to get it, but the price (45$) was way more than I had and was honestly really overpriced for somebodys little speaker box and metal switches...so cute though and i must of spent 10 minutes looking over and tinkering with it.... hope it found a good home.
I remember playing ScarfMan (knock off of Pac Man) on a TRS-80 Model-1.
When I was a field engineer working on computers and printers for HP in the '90s, the "Unreasonably Long Screwdriver" was a frequently used tool. I also recommend you put heatshrink on the length of the shaft. Also, get some bees wax to put on the tip for those times when you need to temporarily stick a screw to it while you guide it deep into a machine.
The Mac tool kits had a very long torx driver.
Excellent tip about the heatshrink :) thanks
13 Ghosts was written by Bryan Eggers, formerly from Software Affair - if you search for his name you'll find him on the VCFED forums in a 2004 post where he introduces himself and provides an enormous amount of additional TRS-80 lore.
Adrian, I love your whimsical videos which help us take our mind off the sad things in life. You are a gem. I've just become a member because you deserve it for the value you;ve added to my life.
I predict that unreasonably long screwdriver will have it's own channel within 12 months.
Co-starring Rammy! It'll be like Aqua Teen Hunger Force
I think Unreasonably Long Screwdriver opened for Nine Inch Nails here in Buffalo back in the 90's. ;)
I think that's a good name for a New Wave Electronic Band.
Their first album, called "It freakin' works!"
Don't google that... Just don't... 😂
That's the first computer I ever used back in 7th grade. Can't imagine my life without computers and it was this one that started it all.
This was my first computer, too, although I was beginning 11th grade in late 1982 when my high school purchased 2 for the students to take turns using after school. Whenever I think back to my junior year I remember this specific model computer, "Fast Times At Ridgemont High" and KISS, "Creatures Of The Night". 😀
Back in my high school days we had a lab of TRS-80 Model III. I took my first programing class with this machine. A year later I got a Coco-2 for Christmas. Thanks for the video!
I too cut my teeth on a TRS-80 Model III in late 1982 after my high school purchased 2 of them for the "media center" which was formerly known as the "library". I still have the sheets of paper with the original hand-written source code of the very first program I ever wrote. I never finished it though until 30 years later when I found a TRS-80 Model III emulator for Linux in 2012. Such fun!
I added an internal LM386 based amp and speaker to my model III and used the cassette player remote relay control line to switch the audio on and off so that you didn't have to put up with, or turn down, the sound when tape IO was being done. My model III had a factory fitted FDC but I swapped out the floppy drives for a couple of second hand full height double sided drives and later on added two more externally.
Good audio mod, I also added a speaker and amp (probably also a '386) but the relay bit never came to me. By this time though I was pretty much over cassettes and onto disks.
Actually having the option to hear the cassette signal (at low level) I found handy as it let me know things were working properly
I'd love to have an empty one of these cases to play around with.
I used to write COBOL and FORTRAN with this model. Such a nostalgic watching the machine where I started my carrier as a programmer..
The clearance for the back of the picture tube is no joke. Years ago I managed to vent the CRT on a Model IV when putting the lid back on, and it really deflated my interest in working with the real hardware. It was a nice green screen CRT too.
Regarding a speaker mod and cassette noise... add a second relay on the the motor control output, for a normally-closed relay. Then it can disable the speaker output whenever the cassette is being used.
You made my day. Glad you liked the screwdrivers. I saw you struggling with the deep screws in a previous video.
My first computer was a Model 3. It was cassette based 48k ram purchased from a previous owner. Used it a lot, especially BASIC programming stuff. Good times!
Wow... this brings back memories. A TRS-80 Model 3 is what I cut my teeth on. It was the first computer I ever touched. The one I used was at a school library and it used a tape drive... I learned BASIC on it, played Oregon Trail and loved it. Wish I could find a cheap one in working condition since that computer has a lot of nostalgia for me.
Adrian likes big screwdrivers and cannot lie.
Very entertaining episode I have to say, starting with first use of ULS (unreasonable long scrudriwer), "lululu" with wiggling drive mounting frame and ending with testing joystick on 13 ghosts. 😁
This was the first computer I ever used. Very cool to see it up and running after 40+ years.
I suggest that the screwdriver is reasonably long. I bought a reasonably long screwdriver last summer and it changed my life. Highly recommended.
Fun!
I bought a Model III with my paper route money, back in the day. My supportive parents subsidized the purchase; I only had to cover half the price, but even with that I could only buy the 4K model initially. I did eventually save up enough money to get it upgraded to the 16K/Level 2 BASIC, which was _huge_. Not only could I now fit programs in memory that did anything interesting, the level 2 BASIC upgrading the character set and included fun statements like INKEY$ that allowed for asynchronous keyboard input, so you could do more than just simple prompt/response UIs (e.g. for games).
One of my favorite programs was Dancing Demon. If I recall correctly, it used the cassette port for sound, as you've described here. But I do recall several programs that took advantage of the RF noise from the PC and a nearby AM radio, to provide audio output. Crazy!
If it helps, I read online that Krylon 1403 Metallic Paint is a very close match to the TRS-80 silver paint. You could always Scotchbrite (or lightly sand) the case and repaint it.
"Krylon 1403 Metallic Paint" is probably the non-industrial name for the paint they sprayed onto TRS-80s of the late 1970s to the mid-1980s. Even though the paint wears, it doesn't go yellow like the Apple II ( ][, +, IIc, IIe, IIGS, or the Apple III) or Commmodore computers.
Don't Know why I remember, but it was "Mercedes Silver" but Kylon may work. @@MrJohndoakes
I know this my be uncool of me but this looks better than most PCs today. What a great look.
even your towel is retro!!!!
had one very similar growing up decades ago
It's nice seeing that screwdriver be put to work so quickly.
It was also nice watching Adrian chill for a bit with some gameplay. I really wouldn't mind seeing more of that. For great demonstrations of the hardware and Adrian's fun commentary. That bit about the spiders was amusing.
Thanks for the video. I'm about to pick up a TRS-80 Model III 26-1066 in a few hours and this definitely helps!
I don’t own a TRS 80 and probably never will it since I live in a tiny city apartment, but I really appreciate it. Love you clearly have for all these old machines as you point out tips and tricks for preserving them for the folks who do have room to on all this hardware :-) love your channel and really appreciate all the work you do! I feel like I’m living vicariously)
I love your TRS-80 stuff! When I was in grade school, our library had a TRS-80 network with a Model 4 with dual disk drives as the master and if memory serves we had 5 Model 3 computers connected to it. The only thing I think most kids did was play Oregon Trail.
I also had a CoCo 2 at home, but I only had a cassette deck for storage, and my cable had a short and I was never able to save anything. I always wished we could get a floppy drive. Lots of great memories.
Thank you so much for all of your videos!
That joystick mod is pretty cool
On other systems you looked at the keyboard had wear marks from using the arrow keys. For a serious gamer the joystick mod would save the paint on the case as a nice bonus.
That long screw driver makes a great barbeque stick 😀.
I used a 4d in high school in 1985. Fond memories.
that towel would give an iconic merch 😅
Hooray for shooting ghosts and character-based particle effects!✨
I about did a spit take when he said "it sprayed it's nasty juice everywhere". Yeah I know but I own it😁. Thanks!
I always love seeing you break into an old PC like that. It makes me feel so modern when I work on my 10 year old Dell XPS 8500. LOL! Thanks Adrian for another great lesson.
Love it, learned to program BASIC back in the day on a 16k Model III with cassette. That joystick mod is indeed cool!
Totally bizarre, I've worked on plenty of TRS-80 computers and the thin-line drives were usually on the Mod-12, ... and maybe the MSDOS machines. This was an awesome find.
Well, this one certainly shows less wear than one would expect :D.
This is a nice video, i would like to see a series of videos, if possible of course, of a "full cycle", sort of like what you did with the PET. It would be nice to see a TRS-80 Model 3 being fixed, cleaned/restored? and upgraded as much as possible.
I have to wonder if the RIFA blew relatively early in the life of this computer and kept it from getting much use.
@@8bitwiz_ Well yeah that might be, but i really would say that it is more related to the fact that it was likely relegated because it was "odd". I have seen that happen so many times :S
I bought one of these in high school. Yes, 16K was cassette only. When I got the floppy disk and FDC installed, it did boot up 16K, but TRS-DOS ate so much memory the computer couldn't be used as a practical matter, so I immediately had to get the 64K upgrade. This was the easiest computer to learn simply because there was nothing surprising or particularly clever about the design. For example, video memory was on the memory map, so there were no modes and ports to learn, just poking characters onto the screen. It was easy to add a printer to it as it had both Centronics parallel and RS-232 serial and Radio Shack had a rudimentary word processor for the system called Scripsit. Though I'd probably have preferred an Atari 800, the Mod-3 wasn't a bad computer to start with.
I can't find pictures because I don't know what it's called, but my dad had a device that held the computer tilted back, and you had to kinda type at an odd angle (fingers way down.) Maybe that's what caused the scratches on the side. The device I remember was either aluminum or steel and looked like a short arcade cabinet you could sit in a desk chair at. Huge thing. Dunno if it was custom or anything but when I saw the sides were all that was scratched, I had a flashback! Love the content!
nice machine....love how you were getting into that ghost game!!and the nintendo controller hook up is so cool!!!nice play !
Jam in all new ceramics too.
I had one of these back in the 80's.. 48Kb of RAM, dual disk drives, one in each bay.
The uneven stacking the drive faceplates against the case hole asks for slight repositioning - it would be enough to move the drives by 0,5 cm down.
I added a joystick to my model 1 back then, same method as most games use those keys. I didn't see it in a mag, just figured it out from the circuit diagram. (arrows and space are on the same scan line)
The only issue is the keyboard lines are multiplexed, not static DC levels, meaning this is all sent up the joystick cable, so it could be an issue with extra long joystick cables, or joysticks that have smarts in them, like rapid fire etc.
I was going to add a logic board to take the joystick lines back to Atari standard DC levels, but as I kept getting away with it I never bothered.
Later on, with all rebuilt into a model 4 case (bought as a spare part from Tandy) I also had two half hight drives in the upper bay, with the lower disused, I thought it would look nice to add a cassette transport from a front loading HiFi cassette deck, the 'sloped back' variant, complete with an illuminated well, but never found a suitable donor tape deck.
Probably would hardly ever be used, just look way better than the blank filler panel, no more "Replace with Radio Shack disk drive" lettering pestering me.
He needs a jingle when he presents the spray cans to the camera. Like Mr. Eric from south main auto when he uses brake cleaner.😁
i have visited the center for computing history in Cambridge, its a lovely place, many old vintage computers on display where the visitors can interact with them, some of them are slightly more modern but a lot of them are extremely old, they have a few items that are seen on your channel including a swtpc6800
I miss playing Android Nim and Zork on my TRS-80 Model III
@12:15, it did not spray any juice anyware, it is a paper cap not electrolytic. Sorry to be picky but im sure you should know this already....
I remember my non gate array model 4 seemed to have the Rev C style power supply from the 4P for some reason .. the screen was a little wobbly but I reflowed the solder joints and changed the RIFAs and it was fine.
Love that joystick mod. I’ll definitely be adding it to one of my Model 3s! Or maybe all of them 🤣
Thank you Adrian another great episode
The scratches on the side appear to be mostly horizontal, which to me indicates that the computer was slid back in between other items.
I learned to program on an original 4K Level 1 TRS-80, long before it became the "Model 1", the one with the kkkeeyybbbounccceee issue. After I upgraded to Level II (I sweet talked the tech at the Computer Center into selling me just the chips), I don't know how much programming I lost to the infamous "llist" lockup.
Some time later, I was "gifted" a used Model 4, which I absolutely fell in love with. It was the single drive 64K model, and over time I upgraded it to 128K, 4x 360K half height drives, and the Hi Res Graphics kit I got on closeout. It had the good keyboard in it, and all of my college papers were written in Super Scripsit. I really miss that computer; Mom decided to clean out the attic and didn't ask if I wanted to keep it.
that wobbly disccage killed me :)
I modded my Timex-Sinclair 1000 for an Atari joystick in just that way back in 1983. Made games a lot more fun. There was an article in Sync magazine explaining how. First hardware project I did.
I learned on one of those. 2x 128kb single sided 5.25” disks and 16kb of ram. BW monitor.
Contact cleaner sprays do a nice job in cleaning any flux ,capacitor juice and other dried liquids from the boards(i have no idea about drinkables,i have not tried yet,assuming it should work though).
The model III was the first computer I worked on. They had them at the Library, and a friend's brother managed a Radio Shack, and he'd let us play with them.
have a philips that's longer than that. A friend got me one for back when I was working on televisions with deep screw pockets.
mine has the same keyboard, also the stickers. there is also a sticker on top that says work safely with explosives.
Unreasonably Long Screwdriver my colleague called them slacker screwdriver (Faulenzer Schraubenzieher) for the people who want to be as far away as possible from the work.
You mentioned that this model doesn't have graphics, but it does. It has the same graphics as all previous models, which is "coarse" graphics. Each character position can display six "pixels" in a two across by three down configuration. This means that the display can show the coarse graphics along with text, but each character position can only show either graphics or a text character, never both at the same time. As I understand it, the graphics pixels were part of the character ROM and were activated by using ASCII codes from 128 on up.
True. BASIC had set/reset statements that could address pixels individually -- 128x48, i.e. two pixels horizontally in each character position, and three pixels vertically -- but doing so would just replace the current character in the screen position with the appropriate one from the character set.
With six characters per pixels, that used up 64 characters to cover all the possibilities, and the character code offset was essentially a numerical sequence based on the bit of each pixel within the character. The set/reset statements did all the math for you so you didn't have to worry about that, but of course anything written in assembly had to handle the pixel addressing itself.
Obviously with this approach, it was not possible to have a character on the screen at the same time as having any of the six pixels for that character position visible. Setting a pixel would remove any other character, and vice a versa.
@@harvey66616 I remember on the Model 1 with "Level 1 BASIC", it wasn't possible in BASIC to scan for a keypress while allowing the program to continue.
However, I discovered that the keyboard was always active, even when a program was running, so if you pressed a key on the keyboard while the program was running, that key would perform its function and print the evidence of that on the screen.
I noticed this especially because of a program which used the key for clearing the screen as the "fire" button for a text-based-graphics game. It would set a single pixel on the screen and continually look to see if it was still set. If it wasn't, that was the signal to "fire" and then set the pixel back on, ready for the next shot.
I figured out that by setting pixels on the cursor position, in the two character positions behind the cursor and in the two character positions after the cursor, it would be possible to detect "Clear Screen", "Enter", "Backspace", "Space" (or any printing character), and "Up Arrow" separately.
Oddly enough I'm working on an LM386-based audio amp circuit to fit inside my 64DTV in a TV project, very simple little ICs and pretty cheap to boot, though a LOT easier if you get the pre-made boards (I just happened to have a stray IC in a bag of loose mixed capacitors)... :D
LOL @ Unreasonably Long Screw Driver.
It's interesting that these SKUs didn't ship with the drive mounting chasis or have easily removed knockouts for the drives. I guess Tandy wasn't too interested in selling upgrades to users?
Neat mod job by the original owner.
bet those chassises were expensive to make - probably more to keep cost down?
what a great fun video Adrian loved it
This video helped me salvage my parents’ TRS-80 that was sitting in the barn (fortunately covered) for 30 years 😅😁 thank you! At 8:55 you mentioned it might be possible to run a composite feed into the crt - would it be possible for me to pay you to show me how to do that? I would love to use this screen to create art with!
Oh man...memories...I cut my teeth on the Model 3 in HS. I had a Coco1 at home, but this is what we had in HS for "real" programming.
I think a really cool audio mod would be to put a car stereo in the bottom floppy area... and then put some car speakers on the sides:)
Omg! I had that game on my model 3. Played it a couple of times and then started experimenting with commands and formatted it and everything else....I was maybe 12 lol
An entertaining video, as always.
I think an ultrasonic IPA bath could get that RIFA gunk off the PCB :)
That joystick mod originated on the model 1. It became obvious almost from the start that this was needed and possible.
Ok, now I'm going to have to get the model 3 that I rescued from recycling and get it running.
I had a joystick for playing big five games it was a 2600 clone it connected to the port underneath the trs30 model 3.
I also remember having to go to radio shack to convert me model 1 games to moddel3 because i only had one floppy lol
I think it's time for Adrian to start a TRS-80 Twitch channel!
@Adrian's Digital Basement ][ do you think sometime you could make a video on how you would go about finding these machines (broken or not) if they weren't being donated? I really would like to get more in to finding these machines, but aside from EBay I have no idea where to look.
8:50 What does he mean by "not designed for composite video"? Are the sync signals separated from the luminance signal in this computer? I.e. using separate wires from the computer video circuits to the monitor input.
I read that as "Test and Fry"
Ahhh, a Trash-80. Reminds me of my time in elementary school.
I got curious so I tried to find out what's in a RIFA cap. Best I can tell, these are part of a class of film capacitors that use alternating film and metallized paper for dielectric. If the film is celluloid-based, yeah... that would explain the stink and the conductive nature of the burned goo - carbon conversion.
Is there a good source of information about the health risks?
Is the TRSDOS splash screen accurate? It was reporting 48K of memory, so if that's accurate then it looks like this machine has also had the RAM upgraded.
This computers mind me of the classic 1980's cyber thiller of WARGAMES on vhs back in the day-DLH
Adrian, I got one of these today at e waste (48k dual floppies) it was damp so I’m letting it dry out for a week or so, (got a gorgeous Tandy 102 as well) my question is what do I replace the rifa with? Soon as I open it I want to just replace it and if it lives I will begin looking for discs with applications.
I think we all want to know whether you removed the can of fader lube from inside the machine before putting the lid on.
Are there any mods for these machines?
I was pretty common to patch TRSDOS's format program to improve the sector interleaving and improve program load times. I think 3 was as low as a standard CPU speed model III could handle without misses. Other DOSes allowed the user to specify the interleaving via configuration parameters.
For the IBM PC DOS, there was a set of two programs collectively referred to as FDFORMAT which allowed you to alter the format with the aim to gain a bit of extra space on a floppy. Some changes were compatible with DOS while others required you to have a TSR (Terminate and Stay Resident) program running in the background to handle the formats which DOS didn't natively recognise. You could get something like 1.7M onto a 1.44M floppy by adding an extra sector per track, adding two more tracks (82 tracks), and reducing the number of root directory entries.
HI Adrian, did you ever fix that apple II keyboard? I was curious what was wrong with it
This episode had a very Mr. Roger's vibe to it! Are Coleco Adams hard to find on the West Coast?
Did the second drive work?
In fact my TRS 80 model 1 compatible Video Genie has solder points on the keyboard PCB to do exactly that joystick mod.
Weird, my TRS-80 model 3 is a 26-1062 according to the sticker but the guy that sold it to me said it was a 32k model and it has the duel floppy like a 26-1063 would have. Wonder if mine was a case swap like your other TRS-80 now.
Unreasonably long? More like unreasonably useful! 😉
You get to keep your retro computers upstairs? Definitely not married.🤣
That's a pretty scary game!
I learned BASIC and played Zork for the first time on A TRS-80 Model 3
you could even drop one of those wireless atari joysticks inside the case and power it off of a spare 5v if you don't want to mod the case.
Nasty RIFA juice sprayed out! BWAAAHAAAHAAA!
14:18 needs the SMA sound.
Hey Adrian, I watch your videos all the time and was just curious about something. How many computers do you have in your house and where do you keep them all?
You need a bigger bench for your next upgrade :)