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AtariVox rev2


Richard H.

Add Vectrex support to the AtariVox?  

108 members have voted

  1. 1. Would you like to see Vectrex support added to the AtariVox?

    • Yes
      76
    • No
      3
    • Don't care either way
      29

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Someone is helping back this as soon as I get the plans together and fill them in with the details. Right now I'm behind on other prepaid customer jobs and I need to clear that stuff out. It'll happen.

 

Is it a matter of time or money? If it's money how much do you need to start on these AtariVoxes? You mentioned donating broken classic systems. Are there any other things one could donate to the cause?

 

More AtariVox/SaveKeys in Atari fans hands means more reason to make 2600 games with a SAVE function..!!

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Is it a matter of time or money? If it's money how much do you need to start on these AtariVoxes? You mentioned donating broken classic systems. Are there any other things one could donate to the cause?

 

More AtariVox/SaveKeys in Atari fans hands means more reason to make 2600 games with a SAVE function..!!

 

It's a bit of both really. I end up not working on projects for Atari Age people when the 1st of the month rolls around, until my bills are covered. After they are covered whatever time is left in a month I can plug away at whatever there is on my line-up of stuff needing to be done. Some months I really struggle until the 20's other months I'm done by the 12th or 15th. This month I still have to cover $800+ in bills before I can get back to AA work. Since sales threads have not been working out on Atari Age very well (marketplace is sick of seeing my huge listings, or my prices are wrong... whatever) I've been trying to unload stuff on Amazon. I actually sold more than half my past sales thread from AA in two weeks on Amazon and cover the Mortgage at least. I've gotta go where the buyers are. If I could just do mods, soldering, chips, and repairs for AA and cover the bills I would.

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It's about time I break silence here.

 

 

DO NOT spend money to make new AtariVoxes.

 

 

DO NOT DO IT.

 

I have a mountain of hardware, more than there could possibly be a need for, even if you just factor in the ones I've soldered together already.

 

I have no excuse for not sending them out. I have this procrastination streak in me, and once something like this gets far enough, I feel too ashamed to even fix the situation, so it festers.

 

When I put this aside, I became really engaged in Xtranormal hacking, and from there my personal life went through a roller-coaster after 7+ years of single-parent isolation.

 

Last year I became so invested in the animation-work that I quit my programming job and started feeding off my MySpace nestegg to try to make something of this.

 

Basically what this amounts to is a David and Goliath sort of battle between me and Xtranormal, which is a dysfunctional company right up there with the worst of Atari's mismanagement.

 

What's also similar is that what I've done to extend the animation software is equivalent, in its own way, to what I once wanted to do with the Chimera project for the 2600. This software was left completely open for hacking.

 

I will get this stuff packaged up and sent either to AA or GoldenAxe. Just don't beat me up over the delay.

 

Mid-life crisis stuff is heavy heavy sh*t, folks. Only now have I really kind of figured out what I want to do with my life, and that has a way of completely overtaking you when you feel like you're resembling the song Pink Floyd about 10 (or 20 or 30) years have gone and you missed the starting gun. That is why something as seemingly trivial as packaging this up and going to the post-office didn't happen yet.

 

It's not a deliberate act of douchebaggery. At times during this whole drama (the relationship breakups) I probably should have been on anti-depressants. And now I'm coming close to having burnt through half my nestegg money and am legally prohibited by XN via a change of their TOS from making money off of my videos. I've spent over 3 years to become literally the most skilled animator on the planet using this software, and the fact that my hands are tied by those a-holes is a source of stress and a motivator to keep hacking this stuff so I at least have an animation tool that, "obsolete" or not, will fit me like a glove.

 

That's the whole drama in a nutshell.

 

I probably should not have volunteered to do the project as I was already kind of on my way out of the hobby, but I thought it would be a way for me to learn soldering. I am still really into speech synthesis, but it's just on the PC side, with SAPI voices that I use for my animation. I tried to get a job with Acapela and I'm going to send my resume to Nuance (who is located in Massachusetts). I doubt they'll want me. 30 years of using speech synth and knowing how to make even things like AtariVox sound good (AKA "You Looose! Good Day Sir!" in Juno First) apparently doesn't matter if you don't have a PhD framed on your wall or something.

 

Such is life for a 40 something nerd.

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It's about time I break silence here.

 

 

DO NOT spend money to make new AtariVoxes.

 

 

DO NOT DO IT.

 

I have a mountain of hardware, more than there could possibly be a need for, even if you just factor in the ones I've soldered together already.

 

I have no excuse for not sending them out. I have this procrastination streak in me, and once something like this gets far enough, I feel too ashamed to even fix the situation, so it festers.

 

When I put this aside, I became really engaged in Xtranormal hacking, and from there my personal life went through a roller-coaster after 7+ years of single-parent isolation.

 

Last year I became so invested in the animation-work that I quit my programming job and started feeding off my MySpace nestegg to try to make something of this.

 

Basically what this amounts to is a David and Goliath sort of battle between me and Xtranormal, which is a dysfunctional company right up there with the worst of Atari's mismanagement.

 

What's also similar is that what I've done to extend the animation software is equivalent, in its own way, to what I once wanted to do with the Chimera project for the 2600. This software was left completely open for hacking.

 

I will get this stuff packaged up and sent either to AA or GoldenAxe. Just don't beat me up over the delay.

 

Mid-life crisis stuff is heavy heavy sh*t, folks. Only now have I really kind of figured out what I want to do with my life, and that has a way of completely overtaking you when you feel like you're resembling the song Pink Floyd about 10 (or 20 or 30) years have gone and you missed the starting gun. That is why something as seemingly trivial as packaging this up and going to the post-office didn't happen yet.

 

It's not a deliberate act of douchebaggery. At times during this whole drama (the relationship breakups) I probably should have been on anti-depressants. And now I'm coming close to having burnt through half my nestegg money and am legally prohibited by XN via a change of their TOS from making money off of my videos. I've spent over 3 years to become literally the most skilled animator on the planet using this software, and the fact that my hands are tied by those a-holes is a source of stress and a motivator to keep hacking this stuff so I at least have an animation tool that, "obsolete" or not, will fit me like a glove.

 

That's the whole drama in a nutshell.

 

I probably should not have volunteered to do the project as I was already kind of on my way out of the hobby, but I thought it would be a way for me to learn soldering. I am still really into speech synthesis, but it's just on the PC side, with SAPI voices that I use for my animation. I tried to get a job with Acapela and I'm going to send my resume to Nuance (who is located in Massachusetts). I doubt they'll want me. 30 years of using speech synth and knowing how to make even things like AtariVox sound good (AKA "You Looose! Good Day Sir!" in Juno First) apparently doesn't matter if you don't have a PhD framed on your wall or something.

 

Such is life for a 40 something nerd.

 

Heck, I'll send you prepaid boxes! I need the income badly.

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mos6507, are they the rev2 Vox? I need one for that Vectrex game Debris that uses it for shots/explosions & speech.

 

Also, they are really cool as well as useful. Man Goes Down is so funny with its speech!

The last game to use AtariVox was that adventure game Duck Attack in 2010.

Now I can design Wizard Of Wor Arcade 2600 with all that goofy speech!

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I encouraged Richard to come up with a single-purpose design. I thought it would be a win-win in the long-run. I did kind of get into the spirit of this but then I fell out of it by the time I really had to think about following this through to completion. I just wanted to make boards and have someone else handle the rest, and I certainly could have done that and reached a point where the hobby thanked me for my efforts rather than the last thing I did going down as a flake-out worse than Vernon's was with the Chimera. Really, it's me not wanting to deal with the shame that just made it worse. I still have a copy of my student film I promised the family of a girl that filmed a scene for me. She's probably now pushing 30 and she's never seen the video, and I'm in a similar paralysis there. But the fact that I'm writing now I guess is progress.

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Many people have started and stopped projects for some people disappearing with others money some people just giving up on the hobby. You will always be welcome here. Anyone that can't forgive should just be ignored. In the end it's just a hobby. And with the classic system like 2600 there's only so many people a few hundred or so active at any particular time. Having fun with these classic systems is my midlife crisis and I'll continue to have fun and be amazed about what can be pushed out of such an ancient system!

 

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No prob! We're a patient lot. Glad we're moving. That's all that matters..

Just don't beat me up over the delay.

 

Not a chance.. We have all had the "life" thing rear it's ugly head. And it can be really ugly sometimes...

As said, you're always welcome here...

 

It's not a deliberate act of douchebaggery.

 

And THAT is my favorite quote of the year. ;-) Yes, the year is still young, but I think it's got a chance in the finals.. ;-)

 

Take it easy.. This is a wonderful hobby, but it is just a hobby.. Perspective.

Thanx for all you've done..

 

desiv

Edited by desiv
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Anyone care to chat more about this thing? Ship the parts to me, ill solder that baby together myself.

I cant find an atarivox, vecvoice or vecvox anywhere.

I am having no success in making my Vectrex more awesome...

I started to do just that. I have all the parts.

Two hurdles in making a Vox 2. You need a programmed PIC chip (I don't have the code or know how to program a PIC), and you need to send the SpeakJet a character from a computer to change its baud rate.

I suggest to wait a bit more if MOS has more boards and parts than there is probable demand.

I know how you feel, I need one for my Vectrex & haven't found any.

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Weekly Bump. I haven't been following the development of Atarivox, and I only discovered the Atari in 2012. I saw the old stock of AtariVoxes sitting in the Atariage store and wondered if there was any real use for them. I'm kinda bummed that the couple homebrews I have that make use of it (Strat-O-Gems) sound pretty devoid of any complex audio, and I'm wondering if the AtariVox2 would help in that regard. Also, Chetiry and a couple of the newer homebrews have high score tables that permanently save to the melody boards instead of using Savekey/Atarivox. It seems that AtariVox fad is dying out and other homebrew authors have taken notice and jumped ship. And also if you factor in that there are virtually no videos on Youtube showcasing the AtariVox in any capacity. I'd love to see what the games sound like with the added audio. Also, I noticed that the Synthcart is the number one selling homebrew in the AtariAge store (it even has volume pricing!) but the AudioVox is nowhere to be found. Maybe it is would-be chiptune authors buying the Synthcarts, not for playing games but making music? Alas, I don't have the required keypad controllers anyway...

 

I hope this product (AtariVox2) gets released, but with it's long term absence and uncertain future, I can't blame homebrew authors for not supporting it more...

 

Mos6507, my advice to you is back up some big flat rate boxes and ship out what's left of your stock to Albert or the.golden.ax and get your priorities straitened out. Life comes first, my friend...

Edited by stardust4ever
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My living conditions are hoarder-grade, not really by design, but by virtue of living in my parents' house.

 

I now have dug out (literally dug) most of the stuff I need to ship out, but I appear to be missing my stash of assembled PCBs. I have the cables, the cases, the unassembled PCBs, but I need the assembled PCBs, my soldering iron, the USB programmer I was using, etc... It's a huge mess.

Edited by mos6507
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My living conditions are hoarder-grade, not really by design, but by virtue of living in my parents' house.

 

I now have dug out (literally dug) most of the stuff I need to ship out, but I appear to be missing my stash of assembled PCBs. I have the cables, the cases, the unassembled PCBs, but I need the assembled PCBs, my soldering iron, the USB programmer I was using, etc... It's a huge mess.

 

Just PM me, or email me (my user name at gmail dot com) I'm ready to go on these.

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I have a gallery up now that shows what I now have. I think I found everything except for the installer and USB cable for the programmer and I also need to dig up all the notes I used to build these. There's still more than enough already assembled to meet demand but building these is tricky because there is one surface-mount part. Learning to solder that part correctly was the main challenge and it is NOT easy to do. I eventually got on a roll and that's why I made so many in a batch, but if I were to get back into it it would take some time to really get into a groove.

 

Here is the deal. I have really let down the hobby in how I handled this, but the upside is that I was eventually hoping to break even on this and now it's been so long since I invested the money that I am just giving this away for free. I was originally going to cut some sort of deal with AA or self-distribute. I'm glad I didn't self-distribute because the way things were going I might have let customers down and I've NEVER been guilty of doing that before.

 

Who I feel I let down the most is Richard. He set me up right and gave me some gear and things and I blew it. And I offer my apologies to him. Hopefully I can make amends.

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I have a gallery up now that shows what I now have. I think I found everything except for the installer and USB cable for the programmer and I also need to dig up all the notes I used to build these. There's still more than enough already assembled to meet demand but building these is tricky because there is one surface-mount part. Learning to solder that part correctly was the main challenge and it is NOT easy to do. I eventually got on a roll and that's why I made so many in a batch, but if I were to get back into it it would take some time to really get into a groove.

 

Here is the deal. I have really let down the hobby in how I handled this, but the upside is that I was eventually hoping to break even on this and now it's been so long since I invested the money that I am just giving this away for free. I was originally going to cut some sort of deal with AA or self-distribute. I'm glad I didn't self-distribute because the way things were going I might have let customers down and I've NEVER been guilty of doing that before.

 

Who I feel I let down the most is Richard. He set me up right and gave me some gear and things and I blew it. And I offer my apologies to him. Hopefully I can make amends.

 

PM and email sent again. I'm ready to go on shipping supplies, boxes, prepaid labels. Also for your completed stuff you would still see the profits as well. I'm ready to go.

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Also, the boards are the easy part. The main expense is the speakjet chip. Each chip needs to be programmed as well as that little SMD chip (I think it's a PIC). I don't know the current availability of Speakjet chips. I have to do some sort of inventory and see how many loose ones I have left. I think I installed every one that I own but I'm not sure. I had a sweetheart deal on pricing for these chips that was between me and the supplier. That is going to be the main stumbling block if all of these wind up getting sold.

 

The OTHER hard to find item are the extension cables. These were Sega Genesis extension cables and I found a supplier on Ebay or something. You need the 9-pin straight-through cables in order for this to support both the Atari and the Vectrex.

 

Lastly, there is one very important failure-point on these boards. The dip switches MUST be set properly in one mode or the other or you risk frying your board. So you can share these boards between the Atari and the Vectrex but you must be mindful of what you're doing. There should be a little sticker stuck inside with the dip switch settings so when you crack it open, you change it accordingly. I can't recall the proper locations but I probably still have old emails I can consult that had the details.

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"PM and email sent again. I'm ready to go on shipping supplies, boxes, prepaid labels. Also for your completed stuff you would still see the profits as well. I'm ready to go."

 

I don't want any money back. Just feed the money back into components for future runs. Let it sit in a bank account or something. The reason the AtariVox and VecVox never hit critical mass was that the speakjet chip was too much money.

 

My idea was that by a combination of getting a decent bulk pricing on chips and selling a combined unit that worked on both the Atari and Vectrex it would be possible to keep the price down while doubling the value (for those who have both units).

 

I still think it's a good formula and I know the hobby has chugged along without me. It's just that when my attention shifted, the hobby may as well not have existed as far as I was concerned. So I didn't feel an overwhelming urgency to make this happen. I have been so out of the loop that I don't know how many games have been written in the last few years with voice in mind. I just kind of assumed that by the time I decided to get out of it that it might be a sign everyone else was too, but apparently not.

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To potential developers of AtariVox-enhanced games: Stella supports communicating with an AtariVox plugged into a USB-serial converter, making development much easier. At least that's true of the original AtariVox (for sure, as I was playing Man Goes Down about an hour ago). Of course, if this new AVox isn't compatible in the same way, then perhaps I'd need a test sample to make it fully compatible with Stella. Hint, hint ;)

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Glad to see a reply. Don't worry, the speakjets have been located in bulk. I was going to make everything from scratch and started getting my ducks in a row before the holidays. A new source is available for the cables as well. ;)

 

I think I did a run of 1,000 boards in black. There's no reason to make new boards--ever. I'm pretty sure I have over 100 boards assembled with Speakjets installed. All the components are pretty standard except for the PIC and the Speakjet. I also made certain to socket the speakjet rather than soldering it directly to the board. I still have a partslist which I can order from for the raw components down the line. I got good deals on the resistors and such.

 

 

I can't remember whether I tested it with Stella or not. I think I did, since I used my laptop to burn the chips and such.

 

You know, if I could live multiple lives, I'd still tinker with this stuff, but I just had too much to juggle and this was the odd man out.

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