#71 IMSAI 8080 talks for the first time in 33 years

Forgive me for asking, but is the speech produced by the SP0256 chip by General Radio (now Microchip Technology)? I was listening, then looking in the comments for a mention and might've missed it.

It boots faster than Windows!

Shall we play a game?

Sounds like the clowns on the Telstra help line. Maybe call centres are full of the IMSAI 8080 computers.

Greetings professor falken

Does it use an SP0256?

My first paying job that I ever had was with the school district as a computer programmer for the Special Ed department. I was a junior in high school and it paid $5 dollars an hour. It was 1978 and I believe the min/wage was around $2.50 an hour. I was stoked! Yes, this was a stand-alone computer amongst several teletypes and it had BASIC loaded on it and that was the software that I used. They also had a line printer that puked out paper so fast that I couldn't believe it. This brings back some great memories.

Send that computer membership of The Tandem Club immediately!

HAH! Classic... Wargames and 2001 Space Odyssey!

Greetings Professor Falken

I remember going to a "Byte" shop in the early '80s, I think, and seeing one of these demonstrated. They were expensive and, at the time, wondered what possible use they could be but I was hooked and bought an Apple II a couple of years later. I went on to study then work as a programmer 'till I retired.

wargames ..love it .. however in movie its very unlikely he could have afforded such a machine as it was a massive expensive in day around $931 dollars = $4,824.62 in 2022 just for the base unit alone

What were these used for ?

I almost bought one way back when, but too pricey for my meager salary.....

I would have been disappointed if you didn't have it ask the famous question. Well done.

If I ever become a professor, I would want to be one that I stuff like this all over my office.

Beautiful work! :D

"Would you like to play a game of chess?" lol .. man I love Wargames.

Greetings Professor Falken.

I am such a nerd. I loved it.

What's the voice synthesis setup in there? The voice makes me think of the Magnevation Speakjet from the mid 00's. The correct wording might be the other way around - the 00's synthesis chip mimics the sounds of a 70's synthesis chip.

Oh, very nice! I never had blinkenlights on my North Star Horizon back in the day, that looks awesome. I did spend many hours in front of a PDP-11/40 and it's console lights and switches, though... and then 30 years later, acquired a PiDP-11 scale replica. So many hours in CP/M, and learning the C language with BDS C on the Z-80. I never had a FORTH on my CP/M computer, though dabbled with it a little on my Amiga years later. I can see how that'd be a great environment to interactively play around with the speech synthesizer.

Really amazing setup ! I really admire your skill and work in getting this lovely piece of hardware working.

Ma dice : "SCEMO" ???

This IMSAI 8080 sings with an Irish accent. Creepy. ;O)

:) nice one, compliments!

If I would be locked up in a box for 33 years, unable to speak, then on my return I would at least exclamate some profanities to express my feelings. A song about Daisy would not come to my mind.

Your happiness reached my heart. I would love owning such a beautiful setup myself. Is that a Votrax SC-01 there in the protoboard or a different chip?

Thats in really nice shape. Congrats

For what it's worth, I have several rails of old VOTRAX chips out in the shop, real antiques. I have no use for them. I also have other yellowed rails of chips (the rails crack and shatter as I handle them they are that old). However the chips are still good. :-) I have VIC chips and 8048 chips and things like that -- all of which have about zero value to me. Just putting that out there in case any young folks want to build using a very old voice synthesis. :-)

Do you want to play a game?

Cutting edge stuff back in the day! We have come so very far in the silicon technology world!

It's funny the roads you accidentally travel on the internet late on a Saturday night... something led to something which led me to think about Wargames, which is the movie responsible for my interest in computers, so I went looking on eBay for an IMSAI and I wanted to find out if they actually had a voice modulator and here I am... great stuff IMSAI Guy!

Back from the age when computers made noises.

Wonderful #### I want one too !!

Greetings professor Falken! :)

Curious, have you ever sold one of these things? Came into possession of one and wondering what I can get for it .

Greetings Mr. Falken...

"Hello Dr. Stephen Falken".

"A strange game. The only winning move is not to play" - Wargames - I had to say it.

It sounds more human and outgoing than I do

In Wargames to make it more theatrical they recorded “to win the game” but backwards (game the win to) and then played backwards and that’s why it sounds so creepy!

Singing about a Daisy Girl ?

lol right out of wargames, i love it :)

My IMSAI 8080 was last running at our computer club 25 year celebration, making it 1977 +25 = 2002. Sadly running at arrival, left with lid open and lots of people looking inside, left dead during the day. Have not tried running since. Has 256k banked Cromemco memory (64k per card), twin Persci 8" floppy (fast voice coil drive), home brew 20Mbyte HD, Accel Graphics -1024x535 256 colour (homebrew) Runs CPM, MPM CDOS AND CROMIX ( Cromemco Unix system) as OS choices, supports up to 8 user time share on MPM or CROMIX. Note CROMIX supports Dual CPU card with Z80 / 68000. I have only a Z80 card though.

lol you are so geeky! I am happy for you ... nice job..

Sounds like Stephen Hawking. RIP.

Boy this brings back memories. I helped a friend build an Imsai 8080 around 1977 (???) maybe. Does that use the S100 buss? I suppose you were booting from floppy? And what was the O/S, CPM ?

Thanks for the video's this is so cool. I wanted one when I saw War Games on a RCA CED videodisk back in the 80's

People sometimes make mistakes