Entex Video Space Battle, Video Space Force and Video Turtles (DVG II series)
(1982, LCD, 4 C batteries, Model# 3077, 3080, 3081)
Case designed by Ortega Orr / Ron Chesley
Electronics designed and programmed by Rick Dyer & AMS
Not quite a self-contained handheld, but these look really neat (and Id love to get one). This was apparently Entexs answer to Atari and such, what you see in the picture is the complete game, you just plug it into your TV and off you go. At least 3 were planned (Video Space Battle (like Space Invaders, seen on the TV here, Video Space Force (Asteroids clone) and Video Turtles). Entex made about 100 of each of these. Im not sure if these were for focus groups/internal testing, or if they were sold in store in test-markets. Either way, they were unpopular and are thus extremely rare, and if they were only used internally, theres a good chance most (if not all) of them were destroyed. This picture is from the 1982 Entex dealer catalog.
Gameroom Tele-Pong es un pong fabricado por Entex Industries en 1976.Es en blanco y negro y dispone de marcador manual en la propia maquina.
Entex Tele-pong (3047)
Binatone la comercializo como TV Game Unit (model n° 01 / 4990)
Elementos internos GAMES one (pong)
Mandos 4 built-in knobs. Two for each player (vertical & horizontal movement ?)
Puntuacion On the system himself
Colores Black & white
Sonido No
Tamaño/Peso W 182mm x L 345mm x H 84mm / 1.5 Kg
Puertos de entrada/salida RF TV video output (channel 3 or 4)
Pilas 4 x 1.5V
Fuente de alimentación Superior limit DC-6.3V, Inferior limit DC 5.5V
Pistola No
 
So, what the heck is it? From Jeff Adventurevisions correspondence with the owner of Entex (with an interesting digression):
MAC Was a computor for children intoduced before MS DOS .
Entex made the first MSDOS computor
called Envision before IBM but had to remove it from the market as the
gurus predicted PCs had no future.
This would have been true if the phone cos had been on the ball with an
advanced web. and the ability to cope with the demand ,which is not yet
the case. This is a very long story.
We tried to create a Lan. in 1972 but the phone lines could not handle
the transmission in many states.
Very best wishes,
(Entex guy)
Actually, that seems to have little to do with the MAC Im talking about- the goofy red toy.
The programs were on little cards (I guess) and there were no cartridges.
Its native recognizable modes include annoying and obnoxious.
Seriously they include Piano and Organ.
I havent tried very hard to figure out what the other programs are,
but Im sure they involve the mode button, as there seems to be no provision for storage/cartridges.
MAC Computer pic#1
MAC Computer pic#2
MAC Computer screen shot
The screen has both led lights (a 4x4 matrix) and LED calculator type display.
Check out the specs on this bad boy:
Many pre-programmed sub-routines included
Easy-to-read 16 LED display matrix
8-digit fluorescent numeric display
Full 4-function calculator, with memory
TMS 1600 N2LL Micro-processor
TMS 1170 NLHL Micro-processorTMS 1024 NLL Input/Output Expander
6,000 Bytes of ROM
1,024 Bits of RAM
Did you hear that? 6 THOUSAND Bytes of ROM and over 1 THOUSAND Bits of RAM. Wow. Entex was truly ahead of their time. Even Apple wasnt innovative enough to include an Organ/Piano/Off switch on their Macs.
Read more: http://technabob.com/blog/2009/08/30/rare-red-original-mac-computer-on-ebay/#ixzz37jfff8PS
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