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VIDCONT.TXT
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.IF DSK5.C6
.CE 4
TI'S "VIDEO CONTROLLER": YEARS AHEAD OF ITS TIME
(and still "Pending FCC Certification")
described by Charles Good
Lima Ohio User Group
HISTORICAL BACKROUND:
"MULTIMEDIA" is the hot concept described today in many
computer magazines. Today the term usually refers to
combining CD ROM text and graphics and digitized sound files
and graphic images from various other sources in a managed
sight/sound presentation all under computer control. In
1981 CD ROM did not exist, but VCR's and video disk players
playing sight/sound disks the size of LP phonographic
records did. At the May 1881 Consumer Electronics Show TI
exhibited a side car peripheral called the VIDEO CONTROLLER
designed to mix VCR and video disk sound and audio with
99/4A sound speech and screen displays, all under the
control of a running TI BASIC or Extended Basic program.
This first showing of the VIDEO CONTROLLER is described in
words and photos in 99er Magazine v1 #2 (July/Aug 1981). The
"Video Controller" Bill Cosby video tape we have available
in the Lima UG library came from this 1981 show. This video
shows a cigar smoking Bill asking people to press the number
1,2, or 3 key on the computer next to him in order to see
specific video demos of TI software located at specific
places on the video tape.
The November 30 and December 7, 1981 issues of INFOWORLD
contain announcements about the release of the Video
Controller side car peripheral and associated Course
Designer software. This side car VIDEO CONTROLLER
peripheral was at the Jan 1982 Las Vegas CES show, the same
show that TI used to introduce the Peripheral Expansion Box
to the world. Vol.1 #4 of 99er MAGAZINE has a good photo
and article about the VIDEO CONTROLLER at this show. List
price in 1982 was $699.95 with one set of cables, plus
$99.95 if you needed another set of cables to hook the VIDEO
CONTROLLER to a different kind of VCR or video disk player,
plus $199.95 for the "Course Designer Authoring Package".
Thats a whopping $1000!
The Course Designer Authoring Package is a two disk
Extended Basic package which includes TI's Text-To-Speech
It is designed to aid in using the VIDEO CONTROLLER for
Computer Aided Instruction but can also be used to develope
CAI lessons that don't use the VIDEO CONTROLLER. CDAP was
reviewed in 99er MAGAZINE v1 #6. I have this very rare
software and may review it in a future article. The CDAP
subprograms are dated in REM statements as late as 5/12/82,
so the CDAP could not have been available in late 1981 as
TI's publicity states. Thanks to Bill Gaskill, I also have
a copy of an official TI bruchure dated 1982 showing the
VIDEO CONTROLLER side car and a fancy looking video disk
player. The bruchure suggests business training
applications for the VIDEO CONTROLLER.
TI listed the side car peripheral as PHP2300 in its
Jan-June and June-Dec 1982 retail price lists, stating "The
Video Controller is intended for industrial and commercial
use, it is not intended for use in the home". This
statement means that the peripheral DIDN'T have FCC Class B
(home use) certification. Some dealers in 1982 advertised
the side car VIDEO CONTROLLER (at below list). The earliest
example I can find of this is a $539.95 price quoted in an
ad on the inside front cover of 99er MAGAZINE v1#4 (early
1982). Later TI developed the VIDEO CONTROLLER as a PE Box
card, PHP1290. This card is listed for "$399.95 (Pending
FCC Certification)" in TI's last official 99/4A price list
dated June-Dec 1983.
And yet-- in spite of the press releases, the displays at
those computer shows, the listings in official TI price
lists over a period of several years, and dealer ads as if
the dealer had the item in stock-- TI sold few or no side
car video controllers and definately didn't sell any video
controller cards. The card and probably also the side car
peripheral are, I believe, "Never Released Peripherals".
Also, in spite of being listed as PHD5068 ($199.95) in TI's
last official price list, TI apparently never sold its
Course Designer Authoring Package software. CDAP is another
"Never Released" product.
Why was the VIDEO CONTROLLER and associated software
never released? I suspect the answer has something to do
with price, and the initials "FCC". The peripheral was
(after the impact printer) the second most expensive 99/4A
item in TI's price lists, and connected to VCR's or video
disk players costing (in 1982/83) $1000+. That's a lot of
money for the typical "Home" computer owner. Since TI
specifically states in my June-Dec 1982 price list that the
VIDEO CONTROLLER is for "industrial and commercial use", and
since TI's last catalog says "pending FCC certification", I
suspect that because of radio frequency interference TI
never did obtain FCC permission to sell the VIDEO
CONTROLLER. Evidence discussed below supports this
hypothesis.
DESCRIPTION OF THE VIDEO CONTROLLER PE BOX CARD:
Thanks to the generosity of Charles Stringer and Mike
Wright I have an actual VIDEO CONTROLLER card, its 1982
user guide, and a circuit diagram of the card sitting in
front of me as I write this. The card comes in a TI clam
shell with an official looking printed label that says
"Video Controller Model No. PHP1290". The serial number
space on the label is blank and hand written are the words
"Qual Unit Not for sale". Sticking out the back of the
card is a 26 pin edge flat edge connector and a female mini
phono jack like those on a TI cassette program recorder.
Once removed from the clam shell you can see lots of chips
that say El Salvador, Malaysia, and Korea. Most of these
chips have the TI logo, but none say U.S.A. I can see why
many TI products are labeled "Assembled in USA with
domestic and foreign parts"! The important chips seem to
be a PAL12l6CN/8237 and an AMI8145CDZ/1501392-19. My
circuit diagram identifies the AMI chip as a "TMS4732 4k x
8". My circuit board has "VIDEO CONT. 1050217-2" engraved
on it, apparently a TI part number. My schematics indicate
that the "Formal Release" product number would have been
1050218. These schematics from TI's consumer products
group have several signatures dated between June and August
1982. Of great significance is the "1-3-84" date of the
signature immediately below the words "Final Release" (over
two months AFTER TI left the Home Computer market), and the
fact that the "FCC APVD" box lacks a date or signature. My
unpublished preliminary PHP1290 doc says the card has FCC
class A (commercial, not home use) certification, but the
lack of a signature on the schematic suggests that even
this low level certification was not achieved.
In addition to the RF modulator or video cable we
normally use, 5 other cables are needed to hook the VIDEO
CONTROLLER to a VCR. One cable goes from the card's edge
connector to the VCR's remote control. Other cables go
from the VCR, the monitor, and the console's audio/video
out jack to a "relay box". This box, under control of the
VIDEO CONTROLLER, switch the monitor back and forth between
computer audio/video and VCR or video disk audio/video.
Unfortunately I don't have a set of cables or the relay
box, so I can't make my VIDEO CONTROLLER card do its
tricks. When I put the card into my PE box, the Horizon
Ramdisk config program tells me that the card has a CRU
address of 1C00. From BASIC command mode I can enter OPEN
#1:"VC.H",INTERNAL without getting an error message. The
docs say this means my card is installed properly.
CAPABILITIES OF THE VIDEO CONTROLLER:
Although I can't test my VIDEO CONTROLLER because I
lack the proper cables, my documentation tells me what I
should be able to do. What follows is based largely on this
documentation.
The VIDEO CONTROLLER hooks up to some 1/2 inch (VHS or
Beta) or 3/4 inch ("professional" size) VCRs or a Pioneer
video disk player. TI provides a list of 1983 machines
known to be compatible, but some other VCRs of that era,
not on TI's list, are probably compatible. Even if I had a
proper cable set I can't today go out and buy a VCR to use
with my VIDEO CONTROLLER card. You need a VCR with a WIRED
remote control jack and an audio dub input jack. This is
not the same as the "audio in" on the back of most VCR's.
Audio dub allows you to add audio to prerecorded video
without erasing the video. Such VCRs were sold in retail
stores in the early 80's for about $1000. Most were top
loaders. I once owned one and now wish I still had it. The
OSU Lima Campus still has a couple of these machines. Few
modern VCRs sold for home use have audio dub, and WIRED
remotes are unheard of these days.
The VIDEO CONTROLLER allows you to use a VCR as a mass
storage device, almost exactly as one would use CS1. "SAVE
VC" saves a BASIC (either BASIC) program to video tape
starting at the beginning of the tape. "SAVE VCA" saves a
program starting at the current tape position. "OLD VC"
automatically moves the video tape to the beginning and
OLDs a program from there. "OLD VCA" attempts to load a
program starting from the current tape position. You can
also store data files on video tape by first OPEN
#2:"VC",INTERNAL and PRINT #2:"DUB" to open the VCR dub
channel, and then PRINT #1:"DATANAME",FIXED to send
computer data to a previously OPENed data file stored on
video tape. Just as with cassette tapes, record length must
be fixed at 64, 128, or 192, and APPEND, VARIABLE, and
RELATIVE are not allowed. You can PRINT, INPUT, and LINPUT
to and from such video tape files. Of course you can't
use a video disk as mass storage since video disks (like CD
ROMs) are read only media.
Another type of OPENed file allows the 99/4A to control
the video unit. First you OPEN #1:"VC",INTERNAL and then
you PRINT #1 the commands that control the VCR. The
following comands are available:
PRINT #1:"ONRL" sends video tape (or video disk) audio
and video to the monitor.
PRINT #1:"OFFRL" turns off the relay box and sends
computer audio and video to the monitor.
PRINT #1:"INIT" marks the start of the tape. I don't
know if this means the current tape position as "start" or
whether the tape rewinds to its beginning.
PRINT #1:"GOTO",LOCATION-NUMBER forewards or reverses
the tape to a specific location. Each number is 16/30 of a
second of tape time on VHS systems.
The following PRINT #1:"COMMAND"'s do the same thing as
pushing buttons on the front control panel of the VCR:
STOP, PLAY, FWD, REW, REC, and PAUSE. With a video disk
player, commands are available to display specific still
image frames or chapters. A chapter is a large group of
frames. Viewing a chapter is similar to playing a specific
track on a modern audio CD.
The VIDEO CONTROLLER's capabilities were all designed
to allow interactive computer/video training. These
lessons could consist of computer segments with computer
text/speech/graphics, video segments, test questions
(multiple choice or T/F), and branch points depending on
the answers to the questions. Multimedia! A modern
example- at Michigan's interstate highway tourist
information centers just across the Indiana border you can
walk up to a computer terminal displaying a multi color
Michigan map with numbers on the map, press a number on the
keyboard, and see a short computer AND VIDEO TAPE segment
showing the neat tourist stuff at that location. You are
then returned to the Michigan map where you can press
another location number. Michigan could have done this in
1982 if the 99/4A VIDEO CONTROLLER had been available.
This device really was years ahead of its time.
.PL 1