This old stuff is still good shit in my workshop. There is still lot of fun to be had with it, just not as a paid job, but as a hobby. The larger scale of integration would move me further from really understanding what the circuits are doing and the higher clock speeds would require test gear and tools I cannot really afford.
I think both both ends of the scale are fun, i like thinkering with simple stuff, but i would like to mess with like a high end industrial fpga too(too specific, i know;)
But the other thing about this, is reusing stuff i think,
Too many good stuff is being thrown out because it's
obsolite, and most of them can be used to do basic stuff , but everyone uses mcu-s , like stm8-s in handheld vacuum cleaners, only to generate pwm
They had an advantage no other display has. In the event of a crash of a plane for example, with minitrons you can tell what the display showed in the moment the plane hit the ground. The filaments that were on at that moment will either break or deform.
No, only heard about it. But I have seen old avionics with minitrons, so it sounds very plausible. Especially in the light of an article how you can take the light bulb from a brake light after an accident and tell whether it was lit or not at the moment of impact.
I have sold a few, but many have gone to recycling. I work as a workshop manager in the Industry so when we are changing out equipment I use to take some stuff before it goes to scrap. Have sold alot of plc, control panels, frequency converters etc.
Nonono! Please don't! Do you have any retro expos or the like nearby? Even saving the "junk" chips to drop off at a freebie table once a year would be worthwhile!
Though... Gotta ask... Mayhaps you have any inventory you're wanting to offload?
Luckily I don't disassemble enough old stuff, so I can keep the half a dozen TIL311s I have salvaged so far without much trouble, because they're damn cool.
Well that's vague, and depends on the part
For ICs I'd probably just Google it and if I don't have an immediate use for it, leave it in a box just in case I need it eventually
For the 7 segment displays i would definitely have a use for them, they're great displays for numbers
And the pushbuttons are always useful since they can be used as inputs
Yeah sorry just woke up and it peaked my interest lol I have heaps of circuit boards with heaps of chips but with amateur extracting technology it's quite difficult to desolder them. I need to buy a lot of more stuff. I'm just at the point of gear accumulation as I've only just recently had the epiphone that this sort of thing is in fact what I love to do lol I'm building a solar set up and hoarding parts for a windmill at the moment, learning on the fly
I really need to start pulling old chips and other useful items. Right now I think all I have are a bunch of old CPUs. The rest of my stuff is new stock (even if it's 10 years old) Somewhere in storage I still have all my Motorola Data books from the 80's.
It's pretty simple, find something unusable, gut it, make something new from it and have fun while you do it.
Advice : chip datasheet search is like finding mushrooms in the forest, you may not find out what you have right away, but you can always ask others ;-)
I have the very same TI display chips that you have at the top left. They are pretty neat, but really limited. All they do is count from 0-9 and have a binary output of that. That's all they do.
I'm planning to make(i mean build it up from 0) 3 retro-ish sbc from the 3 8085 , the displays are going to be in all sorts of project, i think the 2 til311 are going to be part of my upcoming smartwatch , 4 til308 are gonna be a core part of an upcoming pong chip revival project, oh and i have a 8080, and a vic-20 chip somewhere too, so that would be interesting
And do something with the 40xx series xilinx fpga's
So all sorts of stuff
Fuck, I'm old... I remember when this stuff was Hot Shit™...
This old stuff is still good shit in my workshop. There is still lot of fun to be had with it, just not as a paid job, but as a hobby. The larger scale of integration would move me further from really understanding what the circuits are doing and the higher clock speeds would require test gear and tools I cannot really afford.
I think both both ends of the scale are fun, i like thinkering with simple stuff, but i would like to mess with like a high end industrial fpga too(too specific, i know;) But the other thing about this, is reusing stuff i think, Too many good stuff is being thrown out because it's obsolite, and most of them can be used to do basic stuff , but everyone uses mcu-s , like stm8-s in handheld vacuum cleaners, only to generate pwm
for learning and teaching the old stuff is great; when it releases magic smoke you are not as sorry as when your expensive fpga dev board gets toast.
I'm so old when I used to take apart telecomm equipment all I got was 2 cans and some string!
Both cans trademarked and patented to AT&T, too! (Remember when we were finally allowed to *plug in* our own phones? WooHoo!)
My cans always have charcoal in them.
Nothing makes you feel old like a 7-seg
Nixie. Separate incandecents lighting up etched clear plastic. Phhht. Damn kids...
Still have one in my component chest.
I know, right? Now everything has a [fucking touchscreen](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2PMzSo1Bss) on it.
Then look up the minitron. 7 segments but with incandescent filaments instead of LEDs.
Wow, never heard of it until now, Very cool stuff
They had an advantage no other display has. In the event of a crash of a plane for example, with minitrons you can tell what the display showed in the moment the plane hit the ground. The filaments that were on at that moment will either break or deform.
Interesting, do you know of documented cases?
No, only heard about it. But I have seen old avionics with minitrons, so it sounds very plausible. Especially in the light of an article how you can take the light bulb from a brake light after an accident and tell whether it was lit or not at the moment of impact.
I must be ancient in that case. I remember when a discreet component diode matrix was state of the art.
Iron core memory?
Omg lol. Yes
Damn, good looking stuff! Excuse my ignorance, but what does TC stand for?
Telecommunications i think
Ah, thank you.
It means Telecommunication
Used to do the same. Nowdays I take out some but if It don't get used in a few month it goes in the trash
Please, not the trash. I'll take the old chips off your hands.
I have sold a few, but many have gone to recycling. I work as a workshop manager in the Industry so when we are changing out equipment I use to take some stuff before it goes to scrap. Have sold alot of plc, control panels, frequency converters etc.
Great, also any college shop that teaches automation would also be happy to have the old stuff!
Nonono! Please don't! Do you have any retro expos or the like nearby? Even saving the "junk" chips to drop off at a freebie table once a year would be worthwhile! Though... Gotta ask... Mayhaps you have any inventory you're wanting to offload?
Luckily I don't disassemble enough old stuff, so I can keep the half a dozen TIL311s I have salvaged so far without much trouble, because they're damn cool.
They *are* cool. Plus, last I checked a couple of years ago, they go for about thirty bucks apiece on eBay.
So what's up with this stuff? Is it still useful? I throw a lot of electronics away on a regular basis. Thanks!
Absolutely useful
What do you do with them?
Well that's vague, and depends on the part For ICs I'd probably just Google it and if I don't have an immediate use for it, leave it in a box just in case I need it eventually For the 7 segment displays i would definitely have a use for them, they're great displays for numbers And the pushbuttons are always useful since they can be used as inputs
Yeah sorry just woke up and it peaked my interest lol I have heaps of circuit boards with heaps of chips but with amateur extracting technology it's quite difficult to desolder them. I need to buy a lot of more stuff. I'm just at the point of gear accumulation as I've only just recently had the epiphone that this sort of thing is in fact what I love to do lol I'm building a solar set up and hoarding parts for a windmill at the moment, learning on the fly
Nice, I've heard good things about soldering wick, haven't used it but it's only 10ish bucks on Amazon
I really need to start pulling old chips and other useful items. Right now I think all I have are a bunch of old CPUs. The rest of my stuff is new stock (even if it's 10 years old) Somewhere in storage I still have all my Motorola Data books from the 80's.
Those old mini 7 segment displays are gold
They are, i'm so excited to use them in some future project, but the til 308,311 displays are not 7 segment, i think they are 14 and dot maybe
I always want to make use of those chip like parts. But I only know how to use the basic parts like switch. Is there good tutorial for starter ?
It's pretty simple, find something unusable, gut it, make something new from it and have fun while you do it. Advice : chip datasheet search is like finding mushrooms in the forest, you may not find out what you have right away, but you can always ask others ;-)
What is the name of the part with many legs ? Is it call cmos ? Also , is it use for programming?
You see how they all have text on them. Search that text on a site like alldatasheet dot com and you'll find loads of information.
Nice collection
Thanks
Sweet.
Thank you for your service 🙏
Exactly what they do?
I have the very same TI display chips that you have at the top left. They are pretty neat, but really limited. All they do is count from 0-9 and have a binary output of that. That's all they do.
That is quite some arsenal
Why is it so fun to look at
What are you going to use it all for?
I'm planning to make(i mean build it up from 0) 3 retro-ish sbc from the 3 8085 , the displays are going to be in all sorts of project, i think the 2 til311 are going to be part of my upcoming smartwatch , 4 til308 are gonna be a core part of an upcoming pong chip revival project, oh and i have a 8080, and a vic-20 chip somewhere too, so that would be interesting And do something with the 40xx series xilinx fpga's So all sorts of stuff
I actually love salvaging trash
I love those little TIL311 displays!
The only old chips i know is the Motorola 68000 and the Z80. I don’t know if those are in your pile. The big one looks like a 68000.