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what is the weirdest piece of hardware/software in your possession?

If you have an actual uses-the-cga-connector PC light pen, I'm jealous; I've been looking for one for 30+ years. (I know I could build one, but I'm looking for any commercial pen that came with software.)

This light pen is SMC PCP-202
Yes, it has a 6-hole (only 4 actually used) connector to the header on a CGA.
And yes, it came with software, but no diskette - example programs for BASICA are listed in the user's manual.

My "weirdest piece of hardware" is probably my M-Sound Audio LPT sound device.

Well, sound "cards" for LPT weren't that rare, see eg. Logitech Audioman or Portable Sound Plus, the later even providing SB emulation via V86 mode.
 
I have a TRS 80 Color Computer 2, in the white case, but it has the chiclet Coco 1 keyboard. Never seen another like it. I don't know if the first runs used leftover old keyboards or the previous owner swapped it out. It came from the place I used to work, and seeing how they wired a commodore serial port printer thru a PC parallel port and bitbanged the commodore protocol in windows 3.1 visual basic , I wouldn't put any inappropriate hardware modifications past them.
 
@caleb

Compared to the other solutions at the time and even modern tracking systems which still rely on IR transmitters the fluxgate system actually works really nice so long as you are not standing next to an active microwave or other massive emi emitter
 
This light pen is SMC PCP-202
Yes, it has a 6-hole (only 4 actually used) connector to the header on a CGA.
And yes, it came with software, but no diskette - example programs for BASICA are listed in the user's manual.

If you ever want to trade it for something, I'm your man!

Well, sound "cards" for LPT weren't that rare, see eg. Logitech Audioman or Portable Sound Plus, the later even providing SB emulation via V86 mode.

Re-read my description -- the M-Sound Audio had a user-programmable DSP, which was one of its selling points. It also didn't require any resident drivers. The devices you listed were dumb LPT DACs (which also relied on drivers).
 
This light pen is SMC PCP-202
Yes, it has a 6-hole (only 4 actually used) connector to the header on a CGA.
And yes, it came with software, but no diskette - example programs for BASICA are listed in the user's manual.

That is actually pretty cool. Any chance you could post the code snippets on how to interact with the pen from the manual?
 
Strangest thing in my collection is surprisingly recent. It's a 19" Dell 1600x1200 LCD... that shouldn't be too strange, and by all appearances it LOOKS like their 2001FP model -- It's a dead ringer from the case standpoint BUT...

It has a lot of things the 2001FP doesn't have, and there's no labels to say exactly what model it is apart from molded onto the plastic it says "Model No AS502X" -- I can find no reference from Dell on them ever having made such a display.

It has an NTSC tuner, Pal Tuner, SCART in, SVHS in, component in, composite in AND out, and amplified stereo out. Even stranger is that it has two each of VGA and DVI.

... and one of the best in-built scalers I've ever seen on a LCD. Right now I use it on my C64 as it's bloody brilliant using a little home-made Commodore to SVHS cable.

I've never seen its like, and I've never seen so many inputs stuffed into what should be a decade old display. I picked it up off of e-fence listed as a 2001FP and was EXTREMELY pleased when I got it and noticed "hey, this is NOT a 2001FP"

That the base pivots is just icing on the cake. I rank it up there with my 17" Viewsonics (1280x1024) on picture quality and usefulness.
 
That Dell part number appears to be for a monitor sound bar, not the monitor itself. Weird.

Is there any Dell logo on the bezel? It might not be a Dell monitor to begin with. Some photos would be cool.
 
Strangest item in my collection ... an Amiga 600 - the most pointless Amiga ever and proof that C= management where clueless morons!
 
Re-read my description -- the M-Sound Audio had a user-programmable DSP, which was one of its selling points. It also didn't require any resident drivers. The devices you listed were dumb LPT DACs (which also relied on drivers).

I'm not sure about Logitech Audioman, but the Portable Sound Plus did have a DSP and an FM synth, and supported CD-quality playback.
No resident drivers needed for native software, though I doubt if there was any native software other than the Windows 3.1 driver.
The PSP had everything that any SB-clone had, only it was all at the LPT addresses, hence the need for V86 SB emulator.

That is actually pretty cool. Any chance you could post the code snippets on how to interact with the pen from the manual?

OK, but not so soon, no scanner at this moment.
 
I have some odd hardware, dunno if it qualifies. One piece is a Zenith Minisport, but without the 2" floppy. The other is an Epson QX-16.

Odd software? I have an MS-DOS copy of Fontrix. No idea if I still have any fonts for it. The only mention I've seen is for the Apple version. For a long time I thought I had tossed it, but found an original floppy last year.
 
I have a Roland CMU800 here, a 4-part polyphonic analog synth intended to be connected to a computer (think proto-MT32!) that could also function as an 8-channel CV/GATE interface for controlling other synths. (CV/GATE was a primitive voltage-based note-on/off + pitch standard that was popular before MIDI.) With the right interface adapter you can connect it to a C64, Apple 2, Sharp MZ-80 or NEC PC-88. Really cool and versatile piece of gear, from the era when nobody had any idea how personal computers were going to be used yet so they threw everything they could out there.

They're not super-rare but you definitely don't see them very often. Unfortunately I don't have any of the adapters or software at the moment. I'll get around to that DIY MIDI interface eventually...
 
The "weirdest" one I can think of at the moment is my Xedex Baby Blue CPU Plus ISA card. It has a z80 processor and allows you to run CP/M-80 software from MS-DOS. First you run a DOS executable that patches CP/M-80 executables with a little code that, when executed, turns over control to the z80 chip and allows the CP/M-80 program to run as if on a native CP/M machine. I think it's neat, though I haven't been able to find a huge amount of software to throw at it, for testing.
 
Probably a iTronix T7000 ruggedized palmtop that has the original Southwestern Bell software on it, or a Data General One that used to belong to WordStar project head Rick Chapman.
 
Antex SX-9 DSP card. Other than that, a "TB-1" datasette copier. There's nothing weird about it, but it's weird in that information surrounding it or the company that made these things is zilch.

There's also a drive in my ColorBook which refuses to operate unless the "Drive A" option in the BIOS is set to 2.88 MB.
 
Well it's hardware, but more of a system than an accessory. Some of you have probably already seen me talk about this before, but since it's back on the workbench...

FileNet Cluster Workstation
- 68020 main CPU
- 16MB RAM
- 4 x video cards with 512KB VRAM and 68000 CPUs
- 4 x 25" high resolution CRTs, keyboards, and mice.
- Fibre optic connections for video, sync and keyboard (+mouse).
- No local storage

DOWOtprUEAA3RDW.jpg

If anyone knows anything about these, or what I can do with it rather than just looking at it and listening to the 8W fan on the back, please send me a message.
At the moment all I get is diagnostics/POST codes from the RS232 port - but the notes I got with it say I should get a ROM prompt where I can enter commands.
 
I no longer have this piece as I traded it off years ago...but I've never seen another like it. In the mid-90's I acquired a SupraDrive FD-10 for the Atari ST. The drive put 10MB on specially formatted 5-1/4" floppy disks and could supposedly read both 1.2MB and 360k DOS floppies as well. I wish I'd never gotten rid of it but at the time I couldn't locate any of it's formatted disks. Here's a small write-up about it:

http://www.atarimagazines.com/startv2n6/newsnotesquotes.html

It was about the same size as the SH-204 hard disk I used with my Meag-ST2, and it's metal case was just as heavy.

Jeff
 
There was more 5.25" FDDs with capacities greater than 1.2MB, see eg. this Kodak/Verbatim 6.6MB drive - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SLn5EDvc3eE
I've also seen 2.4MB drives.
And I've got a few diskettes with the following markings:

Verbatim
A Kodak Company
MD/HD 12MB
Double-Sided/High Density
Servo Written Disk Cartridge
78 Sectors/333 TPI

Edit: but these diskettes are noticeably thicker than regular 360KB/1.2MB ones, and overall different, which means that the 12MB drive can't possibly support 360/1.2
 
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Those would probably fit my DTC "TakeTen" drive. DTC, Qume, Kodak and Verbatim were all mixed up in a high-density floppy venture. See, for example, the higher-density brother, the Hyperflex HF24, 24 MB drive.
 
I feel like I've been collecting so long I have almost completely lost my sense of "weird".

I have a box of stuff from one rescue I labeled "inexplicable lundberg devices", half-full of homebrew interface boxes and odd cables. I still don't know which of the 8-bit micros from that rescue they're meant to be used with, never mind what their purposes may be. They are definitely weird. I don't know that they're particularly interesting, though. My sense is they're mainly like "reset button for a ZX-80" type not-particularly-interesting.

Most of the properly interesting things I've collected, though, I have a hard time considering "weird". Unusual, or out of the ordinary, sure. But not weird.

I guess I could find a way to consider the DuPont MacBlitz card "weird". What makes it weird to me is that anyone would have thought that it made enough sense to create as a product in the first place. Or, for that matter, the Apollo DN660. Apollo engineered a full two-board bit-sliced CPU to emulate the MC68020 and then designed the DN660 around that, when they might've just waited six months or so for Motorola to begin shipping the actual MC68020. That seems pretty weird to me, but OTOH does a lot to explain the kind of engineering culture that I imagine contributed significantly to Apollo's continually dire financial straits.
 
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