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31 Dec 20, 91 tweets, 24 min read
Tube Time: a 2020 retrospective 🧵
i started off the year by releasing a new Micro Channel sound card, the Plaid Bib CPLD edition. little did i know that this would not be the only sound card i would release this year.
later, i took apart my apple II and found a capacitor inside. and inside that through-hole capacitor, i found a tiny surface mount capacitor!
at my favorite electronics surplus store (the only one left in silicon valley!) i found an incredibly cute computer, and fixed it up and got it working.
in february, i played with some tone reeds, an unusual electronic component.
also at the surplus store i bought a light pen and got it working! it's a really archaic input device that is seldom used now.
i installed OS/2 2.1 (quite early!) on my PS/2 Model 50Z. it was a challenge that involved modifying memory SIMMs!
in march, i plugged the MOnSter 6502 into my AIM-65 and it worked!
sometimes it *really is* a hardware problem!
i even did a cross section! wow, i ought to do more of these.
i explored how people simulated fields before software field solvers existed. fascinating stuff!
while working on another project, i ran into some counterfeit chips. here's how to tell if your chip is fake.
in april, i investigated how the Vectrex produces text and graphics:
i discovered why the schematic symbol for a transistor looks the way it does.
also in april i tried to rick roll Archillect.
the big news in may was when i released the Scopetrex, an open source clone of the Vectrex game console that uses an oscilloscope as the display.
oh almost forgot...in april i also bought a Fischertechnik robotics kit that came with a computer interface...for a Commodore 64!
IBM made a PC expansion card with a prototyping area! i explored a few other obscure details about the joystick card.
talking about weird old IBM hardware, did you know that people wrote PC demos for the EGA graphics card?
digging through my stuff, i found a keyboard keyswitch with a built-in transformer!
why do Amiga computers make a ticking sound while they're powered up?
that same computer came with twice as much memory as advertised! but why would they hide half the RAM?
june rolls around, and i try to upgrade a 486 motherboard. with me, this stuff never goes smoothly!
i managed to resurrect this very beat up Amiga 2000 motherboard without shotgunning it (replace all caps, etc)
apparently during the lockdown everyone started baking bread. so i decided to try it! i've been baking a loaf of sourdough every week ever since.
i acquired a new computer that looks like a stereo component. getting it working naturally involved some epic debugging, like proving that a CDROM drive works by snooping the data interface and comparing the bits with the ISO image!
while working on that computer, i explored electrolytic capacitors in great detail to figure out how they work and *why* they fail.
then i discovered you can still pick up analog TV on channel 6 - called a Franken-FM station! (and not because of al franken)
july: i release Clock-In-A-Can which is an open source substitute for the old-style oscillator cans.
ever hear a dot matrix printer printing a whole line of "#" symbols? it's awful!
oh yeah we got visited by a comet. that was cool.
dug out my old Handspring Visor for nostalgia's sake.
ooh another cross section! this one is of an unusual DIP IC that has embedded surface mount parts!
also in july was the 35th anniversary of the Amiga computer!
wrapping up july, i released my COMIX-35 open source 1802 computer.
neat repair thread on a Nixie tube multimeter. spoiler: it was a bad hex inverter chip.
neat repair thread on *a different* Nixie tube multimeter. this one had a bad JFET.
in august: i fired up a rare electroluminescent display made by Finlux. it looks really cool!
more bread experiments. this time i tried making ancient Roman bread. it was good.
oh hey another neat cross section!
oh and another one too!
and a third!
then i fired up a weird old color video card that supports video overlays.
...and i used that same card to get a triple monitor setup on an ISA-bus PC.
here's an unusual floppy drive i found.
oh and look a cross section of a chip in an IC socket!
and another one!
also i forgot but back in july i started doing a little Twitch streaming. it's been a few weeks, i ought to do another one soon.
then i tore apart a pet tracking tag that i found at the local surplus store.
an old video card created a neat rainbow shimmering effect on their boot logo. how did they do it?
another epic troubleshooting thread, this time of one of my logic analyzers. spoiler: it was a bad zener diode in the power supply and a bad capacitor in the monitor.
wrapping up august, i made a ridiculous chain of adapters just for fake internet points.
starting september off with a bang, i reverse engineered this neat video capture device that transfers data over the parallel port! it has an early Xilinx FPGA inside, too.
built a clever little FM radio transmitter from plans in an old book.
around this time i also started a very ambitious project.
also in september, with the air choked with smoke from all the fires burning in california, i dug into the summary report from the butte county DA's office on the Paradise fire, caused by PG&E back in 2018.
october: i have a network card with a neon bulb on it. why is it there?
i acquired one of the world's first electronic calculators, and took it apart!
i got a book on the windows 95 UI guidelines! quite a fun read.
to my surprise, *fruit* can have a EULA!
i got into 3D printing. funny, my printer is running as i type this! it's only been a few months but i've printed a few dozen designs already.
found a cursed audio plug.
then i dug into the NTSB report from the 2018 Tesla crash in Mountain View, CA. most important concept i learned? passive vigilance puts humans at a disadvantage and causes accidents!
november rolls around, and so i 3D print a connector.
i finally found a lens for an old TV broadcast camera i have! this thread is a wild ride and ends up with me 3d printing replacement connectors!
i bought a laptop with an incredibly strange floppy disk drive. then i fix it up and get it working.
i bought another Amiga! this one is the rare CD32 game console. i cleaned it up and fixed some damage.
found some neat photos of the original IBM PC (5150) motherboard prototype. i wonder if the original still exists...
my magnum opus for the year was probably this, the Snark Barker MCA. i still can't believe this was the *second* Micro Channel card i released this year!
in december, i read another NTSB report. this one was about the Boeing 787 battery fires.
is it possible to use a 3d printer to repair damaged plastic? yes, yes it is!
a cursed connector.
oh yeah i finally got a Thingiverse account. it's a little bare now but i'm adding more and more stuff.
another cursed connector.
i should start a "cursed connector" business.
particularly since i have a 3d printer.
i also started developing on FPGAs using the open source toolchain! i think you'll see more of this next year.
orientation on the build platform matters when you are 3d printing parts that need to be strong and look good. i'm learning... 😀
i found a remarkable recording from 1944!
i hit a personal milestone: something i designed showed up in the Vintage Computing category on eBay!
in this thread, i explore streamer cassette tapes and drives.
did a little reverse engineering work on a very obscure IBM PC variant that can run 370 mainframe software!
made some cookies.
designed some 3d printed parts and a board to let people upgrade the floppy drives in their PS/2 computers.
found a very weird IBM graphics card that is not MDA, CGA, EGA, PGC, or VGA!
fixed my multisync monitor.
and we are basically caught up! it's been a wild ride this year, what with lockdowns and pandemics and election insanity.
looking back, i am frankly amazed at how much i was able to accomplish this year. releasing 4 open source electronics projects, getting into 3d printing, investigating fascinating topics in electronics and beyond, and fixing a ton of old crap!
thank you all for coming along with me. this is a two-way street -- i continue to be encouraged and inspired by all your comments and suggestions.
best wishes to you all for a happy 2021. i really hope it's going to be better; 2020 has been very difficult.
anyway i still have the rest of today to squeeze in a last project or two for 2020. stay tuned!

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1 Jan
so i needed a tool for straightening IC pins because they often come with their leads splayed out and won't fit in a socket or a PC board. this is the version you can find at a variety of online stores. but--i need one *now*
ok, i have a 3d printer, so i'll go on Thingiverse and find one. here's one that looks good.
except--i don't have the right springs. i don't have the right fasteners. it only does 0.3" narrow DIP ICs. it's basically a mess.
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30 Dec 20
today i'm going to look into fixing my NEC MultiSync. this is the original version, the JC-1401P3A.
yesterday it blew the main AC line fuse, and i suspect the degaussing circuit.
i've rigged up a 100 watt light bulb to limit the current so i can test the coil separately from the monitor
Read 15 tweets
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29 Dec 20
here's a very weird IBM PC video card. you've probably never seen it before! there's a lot of weirdness here... 🧵 Image
it's the video card from the IBM 3270 PC (the 5271).
this is a PC configured with up to 5 (!) specialized ISA cards that allowed it to emulate an IBM 3270 terminal.
Read 24 tweets
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23 Dec 20
why am i doing this to myself?
context.
this hex dump is actually *very cursed* for some surprising reasons
Read 28 tweets
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5 Dec 20
let's order strange things from NIST! first up is this jar of reference peanut butter. it's only $881 per jar!
but it's no ordinary peanut butter. it's got a MSDS! and a datasheet!
ok technically it is only $881 per *three* jars.
Read 22 tweets
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5 Dec 20
this happened to a Boeing 787 while it was parked at Boston Logan back in 2013. yes, the infamous🔋🔥. 🧵
it's *very* fortunate that it was parked at the time because the smoke filled the cabin. firefighting was difficult for many reasons, including the fact that the battery disconnect switch wasn't accessible!
the NTSB investigated and found out some very interesting details but never found a definitive root cause. here's the inside of the battery bay where the fire occurred.
Read 43 tweets

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