π«π· Hector 1: Part 2 (Refurbishment) [TCE #0570]
22This was supposed to be a "quick update" on refurbishment of the machine. I've done the following:
[1] Fixed the cassette deck's lid,
[2] Fixed the cassette deck's keys,
[3] Swapped the sticky delete key switch with the unlabelled key switch on the other side of the space bar,
[4] Cleaned the case & keyboard,
[5] Replaced the Euro power cable for an Aussie one.
Still to be done:
[1] Figure out what I want to do with the RGB video output - replacing the SCART plug & possibly cable with a DIN socket,
[2] Figure out how to inject program data audio (i.e. WAV file playback) into the machine to bypass the cassette deck, like I did for the Thomson MO6 (see TCE #0431).
00:00 ... Cassette deck keys
01:35 ... Keyboard & top case
02:30 ... Motherboard & bottom case
06:52 ... Adding "cassette input" socket?
11:35 ... Earlier video ... dirty, dirty machine
13:52 ... Dismantling a key switch
17:40 ... Dismantling the cassette deck
21:50 ... Reassembling a key switch
23:52 ... Channel thanks & outro
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From Part 1:
This odd ordinateur (computer) was originally called the "Victor Lambda 2" but later renamed the "Hector 1" to avoid confusion with another company.
It's the 2nd machine in the "Hector" line, released in 1983, which overall didn't see much success.
The first machine, the Victor Lambda, was released in 1980 and was essentially a rebadged US machine called the Interact Home Computer which used the Intel 8080 CPU.
This second machine uses a Z80 CPU (clocked at 1.7MHz apparently) and has 16KByte of RAM, with BASIC being loaded from tape (according to Wikipedia) ... although there does seem to be some sort of BASIC interpreter available in ROM at boot ... ? It has a built-in power supply and built-in SCART cable.
There were several improved variations also released in 1983:
[3] Hector 2HR (48KB RAM, BASIC on tape)
[4] Hector 2HR+ (48KB RAM, BASIC in ROM)
[5] Hector HRX (64KB RAM, FORTH in ROM)
[6] Hector MX, released 1985 (48KB RAM, FORTH/BASIC/LOGO/ASSEMBLER in ROM)
Some more info here:
http://hectorvictor.free.fr/index.php
http://dchector.free.fr/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hector_(microcomputer)
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