Couple of interesting items on ebay

[RWAP]

Just seen a couple of interesting items on ebay:

A Sinclair QL printer - not sure how that can be claimed to be an unreleased one - I have had one boxed which I sold to Urs some years ago - it was a rebadged Seikosha SP-100....

http://rover.ebay.com/rover/1/710-53481 ... =824&kw=lg

The other thing is a nice Sinclair Research RAM Interface - I don't think these were ever released onto the market... I wonder if it's a 256K or 512K version (I know Urs has one in his collection - but don't think it has the plastic cover on it...)

http://rover.ebay.com/rover/1/710-53481 ... =824&kw=lg

[prime]

The other thing is a nice Sinclair Research RAM Interface - I don't think these were ever released onto the market... I wonder if it's a 256K or 512K version (I know Urs has one in his collection - but don't think it has the plastic cover on it...)

http://rover.ebay.com/rover/1/710-53481 ... =824&kw=lg

Looking at the pictures of the RAM card it seems to have 4164 (64K by 1 bit) RAM chips on it so I'd say it's more likely to be a 64K or 128K card.

Cheers.

Phill.

[Derek_Stewart]

Hi,

The price looks a little high and the end case looks to wrong.

There was a QL with a Schon keyboard on Ebay recently that went for 104 pounds, which I bid a maximum of 70 pounds. All too expensive.

My idea was to try and copy the Schon keyboard with a view to making more. But looks like this is not going to happen now.

[dilwyn]

The other thing is a nice Sinclair Research RAM Interface - I don't think these were ever released onto the market... I wonder if it's a 256K or 512K version (I know Urs has one in his collection - but don't think it has the plastic cover on it...)
http://rover.ebay.com/rover/1/710-53481 ... =824&kw=lg

Looking at the pictures of the RAM card it seems to have 4164 (64K by 1 bit) RAM chips on it so I'd say it's more likely to be a 64K or 128K card.

This is a picture of a Sinclair 128K RAM card (it's labelled as 128K, someone familiar with the chip numberings might be able to confirm), which turned up at a Quanta workshop in one of the History exhibitions (April 2006). I can't remember whose it was. It's labelled Issue 0 version 2.

Sinclair 128K RAM card.jpg

[dilwyn]

Hi,
The price looks a little high and the end case looks to wrong.
There was a QL with a Schon keyboard on Ebay recently that went for 104 pounds, which I bid a maximum of 70 pounds. All too expensive.
My idea was to try and copy the Schon keyboard with a view to making more. But looks like this is not going to happen now.

Hopefully, when Dave's new peripherals start filtering out later this year, it'll bring down the auction prices of these original items. Perhaps

[prime]

This is a picture of a Sinclair 128K RAM card (it's labelled as 128K, someone familiar with the chip numberings might be able to confirm), which turned up at a Quanta workshop in one of the History exhibitions (April 2006). I can't remember whose it was. It's labelled Issue 0 version 2.

Sinclair 128K RAM card.jpg

Yep 128K, 4164 x 16 so 2 banks of 64K like the internal RAM on a QL.

For a fair number of the RAM chips of this era there is a digit that tells you how wide the chip is in bits, e.g. 4164 are 1 bit wide, 4464 are 4 bits wide, so for a bank of 64K bytes you need 8 x 4164s one for each bit, or 2 x 4464s one for each group of 4 bits. Same applies to 41256 & 44256 etc.

Cheers.

Phill.

[RWAP]

What is interesting is the serial numbers on those two RAM cards - the one Dilwyn supplied a photo of (which I think is Urs) is 1026 - the one on ebay is 1057 - now, assuming that the 1 is not part of the item count, that suggests at least 57 of these cards were made..

Wonder what happened to them all, as Sinclair never advertised them....

Maybe 0001 to 1025 were all issue 0 version 1 cards which didn't work....

[Dave]

Sinclair always started S/Ns at 1000....

I have a QL printer, so either the poster of the printer ad is mistaken, or they're misleading buyers. This printer has a serial number that suggests several hundred were sold in the US alone.

[RWAP]

Not sure the advert is misleading - it says that it was a prototype - there is no identification underneath on the pictures for example and that Sinclair QL label doesn't look very good.

I think the printers sold by SInclair had some identification underneath at least - although it has been a few years since I saw one!

[Dave]

The identification is a label on the rear of the printer - there is just a compliance label on the bottom.