12 Oct
2002
12 Oct
'02
11:38 a.m.
A Mattel Aquarius. It's not something that I would have normally picked up,
but it seemed to be reasonalbly complete, CPU, mini expander, printer, tape
deck, RAM cart, and a half-dozen carts. Most in original boxes, if not
packing. After reading all the "coming soon"'s and "under
development"'s,
all I'm really missing is a few carts and the 16K RAM cart (the one I've got
is 4K). Alas, the thrift store I found it at has succumbed to the
parts-are-worth-more-than-the-whole, and each piece was priced seperately.
I haven't added up the total yet. :/
Bob
12 Oct
12 Oct
2:11 p.m.
Oh yeah? Well I found today a Dark Tower game almost complete and in working
order.
Only missing the four figurines and a few buildings. The Tower is in working
order after
cleaning up all the contacts and the brushes of the motor. Cool find for GW.
Oh and only $5
Francois
----- Original Message -----
From: "Robert F. Schaefer" <rschaefe(a)gcfn.org>
To: <cctalk(a)classiccmp.org>
Sent: Saturday, October 12, 2002 1:36 PM
Subject: latest find...
A Mattel Aquarius. It's not something that I
would have normally picked
up,
but it seemed to be reasonalbly complete, CPU, mini
expander, printer,
tape
deck, RAM cart, and a half-dozen carts. Most in
original boxes, if not
packing. After reading all the "coming soon"'s and "under
development"'s,
all I'm really missing is a few carts and the 16K RAM cart (the one I've
got
is 4K). Alas, the thrift store I found it at has
succumbed to the
parts-are-worth-more-than-the-whole, and each piece was priced seperately.
I haven't added up the total yet. :/
Bob
5:31 p.m.
On Sat, 12 Oct 2002, Robert F. Schaefer wrote:
A Mattel Aquarius. It's not something that I would
have normally picked
up, but it seemed to be reasonalbly complete, CPU, mini expander,
printer, tape deck, RAM cart, and a half-dozen carts. Most in original
boxes, if not packing. After reading all the "coming soon"'s and
"under
development"'s, all I'm really missing is a few carts and the 16K RAM
cart (the one I've got is 4K). Alas, the thrift store I found it at has
succumbed to the parts-are-worth-more-than-the-whole, and each piece was
priced seperately. I haven't added up the total yet. :/
That's an incredibly nice setup. It entails everything I had at the time
I sold my Aquarius to fund the purchase of my first Apple ][+.
A lot of the stuff that Aquarius promised never came out. However, I did
just buy a modem off of eBay. And I missed (by a couple hundred dollars)
an incredible auction that include the ultra-mega-rare Aquarius disk drive
(3" mechanism) and 4-color printer. If I had more money I would have bid
more (it ended up being something like US$350). There are only two
Aquarius disk drives that I know to exist.
I do have the even rarer Aquarius II, but I really want the disk drive
(and I know a certain someone on this list who has the 4-color printer ;)
Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org
* Old computing resources for business and academia at www.VintageTech.com *
13 Oct
13 Oct
2:05 a.m.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Sellam Ismail" <foo(a)siconic.com>
To: <cctalk(a)classiccmp.org>
Sent: Saturday, October 12, 2002 10:33 PM
Subject: Re: latest find...
That's an incredibly nice setup. It entails everything I had at the time
I sold my Aquarius to fund the purchase of my first Apple ][+.
I don't feel so bad now. Still not going to add up the total. Whoever runs
the thrift stores in Texas should move up here. :/
A lot of the stuff that Aquarius promised never came out. However, I did
just buy a modem off of eBay. And I missed (by a couple hundred dollars)
an incredible auction that include the ultra-mega-rare Aquarius disk drive
(3" mechanism) and 4-color printer. If I had more money I would have bid
more (it ended up being something like US$350). There are only two
Aquarius disk drives that I know to exist.
The modem would be neat to have. I wasn't sure if it had been released.
I'm missing the so-called printer cable, but I now believe it's merely a
three-conductor headphone cable. Can anyone confirm this?
I do have the even rarer Aquarius II, but I really want the disk drive
(and I know a certain someone on this list who has the 4-color printer ;)
Sellam Ismail
Bob
9:44 a.m.
On Sun, 13 Oct 2002, Robert F. Schaefer wrote:
The modem would be neat to have. I wasn't sure if
it had been released.
Me niether until I saw one on eBay. They come up from time to time. Mine
was still shrink-wrapped even. There are a few sellers on eBay who seem
to have bought out the remaining stock of Aquarius game carts when it was
discontinued. They come shrink-wrapped. You can find them by searching
on "mattel aquarius".
I'm missing the so-called printer cable, but I now
believe it's merely a
three-conductor headphone cable. Can anyone confirm this?
Me too. Notice that it uses two different sized jacks though.
Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org
* Old computing resources for business and academia at www.VintageTech.com *
10:13 a.m.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Sellam Ismail" <foo(a)siconic.com>
To: <cctalk(a)classiccmp.org>
Sent: Sunday, October 13, 2002 2:45 PM
Subject: Re: latest find...
Hadn't yet. Found some reference that claims it's a subset of RS-232C, as
in GND, Rx & Tx. Maybe I'll open 'em up and take a look.
On Sun, 13 Oct 2002, Robert F. Schaefer wrote:
None current, and I didn't see your modem either. Might I inquire how much
you paid for it?
Judging from the prices on epay, it would seem that the whole *is* worth
less than the parts.
The modem would be neat to have. I wasn't
sure if it had been released.
Me niether until I saw one on eBay. They come up from time to time. Mine
was still shrink-wrapped even. There are a few sellers on eBay who seem
to have bought out the remaining stock of Aquarius game carts when it was
discontinued. They come shrink-wrapped. You can find them by searching
on "mattel aquarius". I'm missing the so-called printer cable, but
I now believe it's merely a
three-conductor headphone cable. Can anyone confirm this?
Me too. Notice that it uses two different sized jacks though.
Sellam Ismail
Bob
6:13 p.m.
On Sun, 13 Oct 2002, Robert F. Schaefer wrote:
None current, and I didn't see your modem either.
Might I inquire how much
you paid for it?
I think $23.
Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org
* Old computing resources for business and academia at www.VintageTech.com *
4:30 a.m.
Sellam,
Does your count of 2 Aquarius disk drives include the one I have here in
Brisbane, Australia? We have communicated about several things over the
years, but I can not remember if the Aquarius came up.
What is particularly interesting about the one I have, perhaps, is the
serial number RH0100001. I know these numbers can be misleading, but it
certainly looks like a low number!
The disk manual is just a set of photocopied pages. There are a total of 7
AQ-DOS commands (DIR, INIT, SAVE, LOAD, KILL, WRITE, DISKCOPY). The DOS has
a MicroSoft copyright. Each side of the 3"(?) floppy holds 51,200 bytes
which means 102,400 bytes alltogether (which is exactly 100K).
This was one of my first ever vintage purchases, from a local classified ad,
and the whole Aquarius kit including the drive cost me $A20. At the time I
had no idea how rare the floppy drive was, but I soon found out as I started
to investigate it. I would love to know how it got to this city.
Cheers
Phil
----- Original Message -----
From: "Sellam Ismail" <foo(a)siconic.com>
To: <cctalk(a)classiccmp.org>
Sent: Sunday, October 13, 2002 12:33 PM
Subject: Re: latest find...
A lot of the stuff that Aquarius promised never came
out. However, I did
just buy a modem off of eBay. And I missed (by a couple hundred dollars)
an incredible auction that include the ultra-mega-rare Aquarius disk drive
(3" mechanism) and 4-color printer. If I had more money I would have bid
more (it ended up being something like US$350). There are only two
Aquarius disk drives that I know to exist.
9:50 a.m.
On Sun, 13 Oct 2002, Phil Guerney wrote:
Does your count of 2 Aquarius disk drives include the
one I have here in
Brisbane, Australia? We have communicated about several things over the
years, but I can not remember if the Aquarius came up.
I don't know...where did you get your disk drive from? It doesn't
surprise me a whole lot because that is where I got my Aquarius II from
(by way of a friend). Andrew Davie (now in Tasmania) found two Aquarius
II's for sale in a newspaper ad several years ago. My friend Doug found
the Aquarius disk drive in a local electronics surplus shop in around
1997 or thereabouts. He traded that for an Aquarius II from Andrew plus
some carthridges that enabled a Commodore 1541 to be connected to the
Aquarius. I traded an ASR-33 for the Aquarius II.
Andrew Davie recently sold the disk drive to someone else. I found his
website. I don't think it was you or else I would have recognized the
name.
What is particularly interesting about the one I have,
perhaps, is the
serial number RH0100001. I know these numbers can be misleading, but it
certainly looks like a low number!
It looks like the first!
The disk manual is just a set of photocopied pages.
There are a total of 7
AQ-DOS commands (DIR, INIT, SAVE, LOAD, KILL, WRITE, DISKCOPY). The DOS has
a MicroSoft copyright. Each side of the 3"(?) floppy holds 51,200 bytes
which means 102,400 bytes alltogether (which is exactly 100K).
Interesting.
This was one of my first ever vintage purchases, from
a local classified ad,
and the whole Aquarius kit including the drive cost me $A20. At the time I
had no idea how rare the floppy drive was, but I soon found out as I started
to investigate it. I would love to know how it got to this city.
Me too! I wonder if maybe you bought it from the same fellow that Andrew
got the Aquarius II's from? The Aquarius II was never officially
released. The fellow Andrew bought them from was a developer writing some
teletext software for it and so had some pre-release machines for
development. However, they were production models, not prototypes. I
imagine the disk drive went out to several developers as well.
Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org
* Old computing resources for business and academia at www.VintageTech.com *
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8 comments
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participants (4)
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fauradon＠frontiernet.net -
foo＠siconic.com -
guerney＠bigpond.com -
rschaefe＠gcfn.org