Votrax Type N Talk or PSS, Intextalker, Microvox

[Gavin Scott]

I had an RS-232 Votrax and also the Heathkit EE-3403 Speech Synthesis
course for the ET-3400 Microprocessor Trainer, which came with an
SC-01 chip as one of the parts if I recall correctly. Both long ago
faded away through downsizing here sadly.

I do still have the test-to-speech input file from 1988 that was used
to have the Votrax sing the 12-days-of-Christmas at the company
holiday party that year, and the HP 3000 utility to feed it out a
serial port.

On Wed, Dec 2, 2020 at 8:37 AM Tony Aiuto via cctalk
<cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote:
>
> On Wed, Dec 2, 2020 at 7:05 AM Jules Richardson via cctalk <
> cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote:
>
> > On 12/1/20 7:28 PM, Tony Aiuto via cctalk wrote:
> > > Oh.. That brings back memories. We had a Votrax with a serial interface
> > in
> > > the computer room.
> > > I configured it as a printer so I could yell into the room..
> > >
> > > echo Hey Alan. Look at the console and change the tape to the one
> > requested
> > > | lpr -Pvotrax
> >
> > That's actually... useful. I've never really known what people did with
> > them, beyond the occasional little bit of amusement.
> >
>
> There was certainly amusement too. We would hide the box in one of the
> cabinets
> and have it play things to noob users who were in the room alone.
>
> I've got a serial-interfaced one based around an RCA 1802 which I last had
> > hooked up to an Apple II a few years ago, but it's one of those "cool to
> > have" things rather than really serving any purpose.
> >