segaloco
Experienced Member
- Joined
- Apr 30, 2023
- Messages
- 235
I'm curious if anyone knows of any archival efforts concerning (or has in their bookshelf...) databooks for Japanese silicon shops like Ricoh and Sharp. Context is I'm trying to pull together a better picture of what components were being offered by these Japanese organizations around the time of Nintendo developing and releasing the Famicom/NES.
I looked on Bitsavers and the earliest Ricoh databook is from 1988 whereas the earliest for Sharp is 1986. I checked the 1983 issue of IC Master too and it doesn't appear Ricoh is even listed and Sharp's offerings are pretty scarce. I would assume these companies have databooks going back a ways for the Japanese market but may not have been involved enough in international technology at the time to need English databooks. Either way, I'm also willing to sit with my Nelson's dictionary and work out bits and pieces of sheets in Japanese if it means I've got quality primary sources on stuff.
Tangential but is anyone aware of any Japanese equivalents of this sort of site or general tech history matters that may be a good starting place for trying to research these matters more closely? I just wouldn't even know where to start on trying to find things like the Japanese equivalent of Bitsavers, VCF, and so on. It makes me quite appreciate all the efforts that have gone into preserving tech history closer to the English-speaking sphere of influence, but Japan has a key place in the developments of numerous ubiquitous technologies and I'm feeling more and more drawn to the world of Japanese tech history. Sometimes I feel like I can find more analysis of eastern bloc Soviet-era computing than I can the situation in Japan, but observational bias and all.
I looked on Bitsavers and the earliest Ricoh databook is from 1988 whereas the earliest for Sharp is 1986. I checked the 1983 issue of IC Master too and it doesn't appear Ricoh is even listed and Sharp's offerings are pretty scarce. I would assume these companies have databooks going back a ways for the Japanese market but may not have been involved enough in international technology at the time to need English databooks. Either way, I'm also willing to sit with my Nelson's dictionary and work out bits and pieces of sheets in Japanese if it means I've got quality primary sources on stuff.
Tangential but is anyone aware of any Japanese equivalents of this sort of site or general tech history matters that may be a good starting place for trying to research these matters more closely? I just wouldn't even know where to start on trying to find things like the Japanese equivalent of Bitsavers, VCF, and so on. It makes me quite appreciate all the efforts that have gone into preserving tech history closer to the English-speaking sphere of influence, but Japan has a key place in the developments of numerous ubiquitous technologies and I'm feeling more and more drawn to the world of Japanese tech history. Sometimes I feel like I can find more analysis of eastern bloc Soviet-era computing than I can the situation in Japan, but observational bias and all.