Beer and Boomboxes!

Discussion in 'Chat Area' started by Mister X, Dec 23, 2017.

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  1. Longman

    Longman Well-Known Member S2G Supporter

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    Wondering about what the Video toaster could do i found this



    I bought and quickly flipped a high spec Amiga with Accelerator and CD ROM thirteen years ago. Although I made a decent profit it would be worth four or five times what what I sold it for now. Anyway I still have four Amigas despite having been in the Atari camp back in the day.
    I don't think any of them have been powered up in the last ten years though.
     
    Last edited: Nov 2, 2020
    Longman, Nov 2, 2020
    #241
  2. Mister X

    Mister X Moderator Staff Member

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    Apple IIs had a second life as bulletin boards with some modifications, I would have loved to have done it but you still pretty much needed a second phone line and they weren't cheap back then. Remember when your friends were surfing in the early days and you couldn't get to them?

    I've never seen an Amiga in the wild, but I've seen plenty of Macs, IBMs, Commodores, TRS-80s and even Osborne. The Amiga did have a nitch in video production. Cable TV was regulated by the local cities and the government mandated a certain number of stations for people to do their own shows, called "cable access," I think it's still around. Most of these stations used the Amiga for opening and ending credits and screen labels, they always gave the machine credit. The smaller local UHF stations also used the machine extensively, it had it's own look.

    Our local schools mostly had Apple IIs first then MacIntoshes, Apple marketed heavily to them and it accounted to most of their market share in the 90's. Businesses had IBM PCs which replaced the old Wangs, which were everywhere at one time. I saw a few TIs and Atari's back then but the Apple II had seven expansion slots and blew away everything else at the time.
     
    Mister X, Nov 2, 2020
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  3. Mister X

    Mister X Moderator Staff Member

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    and that program for the Apple II, it unlocked the games discs, that was fun, I think it did a section of the disc at a time so there was a lot of disc swapping.

    8-Bit Guy has been finding some very rare old computers lately on YouTube, it's neat to see all of the machines from back then.

    Here's old BYTE Magazines if anyone is interested.
    https://archive.org/details/byte-magazine
     
    Mister X, Nov 2, 2020
    #243
  4. autoreverser

    autoreverser Well-Known Member

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    Commodore closed theit doors due to terrible mis-managements.

    as they made the mistake not to realize the Amiga‘s potential, they lost the „game-computer“ battle to Atari and others. in the meantime they had big, big projects, like the C900, a UNIX-like desktop with a Zilog8000, running on COHERENT.

    from Wikipedia:

    „The C900 was a 16-bit computer based on the segmented version of the Zilog Z8000 CPU. It ran Coherent, a UNIX-like operating system. Two versions of the machine were developed: a workstation with 1024×800 pixels graphics, and a server with text-only display.
    The C900's case is similar to the Amiga 2000's but slightly larger“

    when the main german Commodore-plant in Braunschweig went in deep financial trouble in 1985, the disassabled (true !) all existing C900 into pieces and sold all parts for almost nothing to an electronic supermarket (Called Völkner - also not existing anymore). so that nobody could reproduce where the parts came from, no store got more than one type of part.
    as a matter of fact i do know some folks, that knew what Commodore was up to - took an old volksie-van, went through the whole of germany and bought all C900 parts they could lay their hands on, and yes, out came at least two working machines plus a few parts. and yes, i have access to one of those (true !), will post a few pics soon. must be one of the rarest desktops ever (?)

    gosh, what a great time back then, when i remember now...
     
    autoreverser, Nov 2, 2020
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  5. Longman

    Longman Well-Known Member S2G Supporter

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    Longman, Nov 2, 2020
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  6. Mister X

    Mister X Moderator Staff Member

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    Busted, crusted and full of dirt but she's still a beast! Ok imagine buying something, sight unseen, in the dark, in a pretty crappy place. No not some craw-dad exchange but an iconic boombox picked up in our local no-go zone. I just requested that the back panel wasn't hanging off and a few some other condition requests. The exchange was made quickly, I really wanted to get out of that area and some of my concerns were confirmed later, but you know what? This is the JVC RC-838, one of the coolest boomers to come out of the 70's. Yes I love the AIWA TPR-950 but the JVC RC 838 is a monster, I don't know the timeline but it has to be one of the first monster boomboxes.

    So my local radio station is actually playing great songs, I just fired up this guy up with Sex Pistols, Holiday in the Sun and now they're playing Simple Minds from the Breakfast Club, I had no idea they didn't write that song, they wanted Bryan Ferry to sing it!

    Anyway a classic that seems to be more available up here than the M70, just a little smaller, not by much but beautiful sonics. Just about everything works, it needs a good cleaning, lots of DeOxit and maybe a belt or two. Of course Duvel is the best way to work on vintage equipment.

    DSC_1156sm.jpg
     
    Mister X, Nov 12, 2020
    #246
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  7. Longman

    Longman Well-Known Member S2G Supporter

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    A great find.

    From the heading I guess the catalogue these pictures came from was 1980.
    JVC 1980.jpg



    The RC-838 was in there after the M70 and M60. The M90 hadn't appeared yet.
    JVC RC838.jpg
     
    Longman, Nov 13, 2020
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  8. Mystic Traveller

    Mystic Traveller Well-Known Member

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    A great catch - love this model!
     
    Mystic Traveller, Nov 13, 2020
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  9. Mystic Traveller

    Mystic Traveller Well-Known Member

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    :reelspin::reelspin: This combination with cabinet and external speakers - cool!!

    838.jpg 838 1.jpg
     
    Mystic Traveller, Nov 13, 2020
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  10. Longman

    Longman Well-Known Member S2G Supporter

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    Longman, Nov 13, 2020
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  11. Mister X

    Mister X Moderator Staff Member

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    I love those accessories! I posted the Biphonic Headphones in the mega-sale thread, they have built in mics for true Biphonic Recording. For some reason I thought the 836 was made before the M70?
     
    Mister X, Nov 13, 2020
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  12. Mystic Traveller

    Mystic Traveller Well-Known Member

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    My understanding as well.
    sel.jpg
     
    Mystic Traveller, Nov 13, 2020
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  13. Philip Taylor

    Philip Taylor Active Member

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    Philip Taylor, Nov 14, 2020
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  14. Longman

    Longman Well-Known Member S2G Supporter

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    It probably was. In fact my point was that in the 1980 brochure the M70 is the first product, the M60 the next, then the RC-838.
    It is also noticeable that the M series boxes get glamorous young ladies in the background while the RC-838 gets some sky.

    JVC-M70.jpg JVC M60.jpg

    The most likely scenario was that the M70 and M60 were the latest products, the M80 and M90 were still on the drawing board while there were still RC-838s in the shops and warehouses so they grabbed a photo from an earlier brochure and put it in the 1980 one.

    It is interesting how everything went silver at the start of the 1980s while ten years later an entirely black HiFi on Black Ash shelves was the epitome of cool.
     
    Longman, Nov 14, 2020
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  15. Jorge

    Jorge Well-Known Member

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    There was a resurgence of sexy ladies next to audio gear 10-15 years ago, some of those ads from Stereophile were even funny!!! They finally realized that hi-end audio crowd is different from car afficionados / arm dealers. No more fun!

    I should get me M60: two motors in a boombox must be a challenge for a tune-up...
     
    Jorge, Nov 14, 2020
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  16. Radio Raheem

    Radio Raheem Well-Known Member

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    i have always wondered why the m90 is grey, took me years to get used to it, the m90 is the only jvc 1 piece to get the m70 is nothing in comparison, i was glad to get shot of mine lads

    jorge the m60 m80 have great decks but even the m70 sounds better than those im afraid

    2 motors isn't that special lads one is for rew ff, the other is for play
     
    Last edited: Nov 14, 2020
    Radio Raheem, Nov 14, 2020
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  17. Mister X

    Mister X Moderator Staff Member

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    The M60 flies a little under the radar, it's a little bit smaller than the M70 but it can still hold it's own weight. It's very beefy, has that cool recessed VU meter that's found on the smaller boxes and has dual antennas. Get them now before the price explodes, it's hard to go wrong on any early JVC.
     
    Mister X, Nov 15, 2020
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  18. Mystic Traveller

    Mystic Traveller Well-Known Member

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    Mystic Traveller, Nov 18, 2020
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  19. Mystic Traveller

    Mystic Traveller Well-Known Member

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    [​IMG]
     
    Mystic Traveller, Nov 18, 2020
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  20. Mister X

    Mister X Moderator Staff Member

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    Shoot, they won't ship the M60 to me......

    Great brochure Mystic, do you have the rest of it? I love anything with skateboards.
     
    Mister X, Nov 18, 2020
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