I want to pick up an NTSC TT-99/4a What do I need to know

[Papa_Bear]

All I know is.

A. It has a mug warmer.

B. There is a speech synthesizer for it

C. It's a bit modular.

 

Fill me in on the rest The biggest thing I am interested is the synthesized speech.

[vectrexroli]

Maybe this can help as a starting point?:

[+arcadeshopper]

All I know is.

A. It has a mug warmer.

B. There is a speech synthesizer for it

C. It's a bit modular.

 

Fill me in on the rest [emoji14] The biggest thing I am interested is the synthesized speech.

They are plug and play

You need expansion to do most interesting things

Where are you located

 

Sent from my LG-H830 using Tapatalk

[Papa_Bear]

I'm here in Virginia!

 

The TI-99/4a looks gorgeous... although I might just be a sucker for polished metal.

[+Ksarul]

Where in Virginia? I'm there too, and I have plenty of spare consoles. . .and She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed would be happy to see one of the spares disappear.

[CC Clarke]

If you're buying online, ensure the case exterior hasn't been used as a drum set training aid. The brushed aluminum trim is easily removed by bending the interior tabs if you need to swap a piece out.

 

You'll probably want to disassemble the case (it may help to take pictures as you go to make it easier to put it back together afterwards) and clean it out. First, gently pull the grooved power supply switch straight out. Remove the screws holding the case together and separate the halves with the top half facing down. Remove the screws securing the power supply, and shielded motherboard. Note how the power supply power switch fits into the adapter the exterior grooved button slides into. Also note the position of the red LED as it fits snugly in the case.

 

Detach the keyboard by grasping both ends of the connector and gently pulling it straight up from the motherboard. Be careful when re-installing it, or by the time you figure out the keyboard has issues, you get to disassemble and reassemble the case again. (Been there, done that.)

 

Using a can of compressed air, blow under the keys with the keyboard held upside down. Some of these computers are thirty-five years old, so a lot of gunk has had time to accumulate, and anything you can do to keep the keyboard reliable will increase your enjoyment of the Home Computer.

 

You don't have to remove the shield from the motherboard --unless there's something seriously funky going on, like corrosion or someone spilled a drink over the top of the machine, (or it's really, really dusty) but it's a good idea to pull the 90 degree GROM port connector out, and (gently) bend the corner tabs retaining the black "beauty" cover in place --just enough to remove the cover. Inside, --if it hasn't disintegrated into oblivion already, you'll find what started out life as an oil-impregnated foam pad, designed to clean the GROM cartridge edge connector contacts. --Truth be known, it does the opposite, retaining dirt that can ultimately foul the connector pins. (Even in the same sentence, oil and connectors shouldn't be allowed to co-mingle.) Toss the pad and clean the cover thoroughly with IPA (alcohol, not beer!) to remove any traces of old oil and debris. Blow out the GROM port receptacle with the canned air after applying some IPA in there too.

 

Re-assemble and enjoy!

 

CC

Edited December 17, 2016 by CC Clarke

[Papa_Bear]

Where in Virginia? I'm there too, and I have plenty of spare consoles. . .and She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed would be happy to see one of the spares disappear.

I'm here on the west end of Henrico country. So... pretty much a stones throw from Richmond. Wanted to pick one of these bad boys up for my 18th B-Day

[+Ksarul]

I'm in Fairfax, so I'm a stone's throw from DC. Let me look through the box-o-stuff and see if I've got one that works perfectly. . .I'll have to do that next week sometime though, as I have a massive list of family things to finish today and tomorrow.

[PeBo]

To make use of Synthesized Speech you'll need:

 

- a TI-99/4A console

- a speech synthesizer

 

Those two are required. then you'll need at least one of the following:

 

- an extended basic cartridge of some variety (this will give you access to the limited pre-sampled vocabulary built into the synthesizer)

by abridging or concatenating this vocabulary, it is possible to expand the vocabulary (by making new words out of existing words).

- a terminal emulator II cartridge (this is where the fun starts, as it provides the means to build you own vocabulary using phonemes.)

Using this method, the TI can say ANYTHING. Heck it can even sing!)

- the Text To Speech disk based software.

Extended Basic, a disc drive/controller and memory expansion is also required, but it will give you the same capabilities as the Terminal Emulator II cartridge.

 

There are also MANY games and educational software packages that talk right out of the box when you have the speech synth attached.

 

If you are programming savvy (or would like to be), Assembly language and GPL accesses speech while Turbo Forth not only supports the digitized speech built into the Speech synth, but it also allows the TI to speak without pausing the execution of other commands (I might be mistaken (guys, correct me if I am), but it's the only programming language on the TI that I've seen that can pull this off)

[Papa_Bear]

How hard would it be to find all of those things?

 

I'm in Fairfax, so I'm a stone's throw from DC. Let me look through the box-o-stuff and see if I've got one that works perfectly. . .I'll have to do that next week sometime though, as I have a massive list of family things to finish today and tomorrow.

Also you are really freaking awesome man. thank ya so much

[+Lee Stewart]

...

If you are programming savvy (or would like to be), Assembly language and GPL accesses speech while Turbo Forth not only supports the digitized speech built into the Speech synth, but it also allows the TI to speak without pausing the execution of other commands (I might be mistaken (guys, correct me if I am), but it's the only programming language on the TI that I've seen that can pull this off)

 

Both @Willsy’s TurboForth and my fbForth 2.0 can, indeed, speak while other things are going on. They can do this because the speech playback is interrupt driven.

 

...lee

[Papa_Bear]

I am not programming savvy! The most I can do is type-in program And.... maybe some realllyyy basic stuff.

[RXB]

I put a 3 inch CPU fan on top of my TI99/4A using two rubber washers and screws that go thru the vent holes above the cartridge port.

The fan gets power from the plug before the power supply from the brick power unit plugged into the wall.

It is pretty quiet and you can not even feel any heat from the Coffee warmer slot area.

[Tursi]

I put a 3 inch CPU fan on top of my TI99/4A using two rubber washers and screws that go thru the vent holes above the cartridge port.

The fan gets power from the plug before the power supply from the brick power unit plugged into the wall.

It is pretty quiet and you can not even feel any heat from the Coffee warmer slot area.

I did the same thing with my BBS back in the day, it works really well. It was always a trip for me to put my hand on the coffee warmer and not feel any heat.

[RXB]

It died over time but the very best P-Box fan I ever owned was a Video Card Fan I extracted and had two blade spinning in opposite directions.

That fan was a real keeper and very whisper in noise with high CFM!

[Papa_Bear]

Woo I turned 18 and now I have far too many gift cards.... Guess I better find a system now!