What is your Ti-99 grail item?

[schuwalker]

I was thinking about this week rummaging through my stuff. I was thinking my Ti 99 4 model, but I'm thinking I'm going w/ my family's original TI unit my dad purchased in '82. Sooooo many good memories tied w/ that specifc computer! I *think* I would replace this though if I had a TI-99 2 or 8!

 

What's yours? Could be software, peripheral, a book? It would be too cool if anybody had in marketing items (displays, standees) stores had when TI was still relevant.

[jaybird3rd]

I wish that I still had my original 99/4A, a beige model that my parents bought for me. It was my very first computer, but I sold it around 1990 so I could buy a used Atari 800 instead (I've still got the 800, at least).

 

In my present collection, my 99/4A "holy grail" item would have to be the MBX Expansion System. For some reason, I love esoteric add-on products which had lots of potential but never got the support they would have needed to exploit it fully; I suppose I enjoy the ECS Computer Adaptor for the Intellivision for the same reason. My MBX is in remarkably good shape, and I've got a few of the games that support it, and I still enjoy playing them and thinking about what more could have been done, both with the MBX and with the 99/4A itself.

[BassGuitari]

Mine would have to be the Pbox/disk system I got for $10.

[+save2600]

By sheer definition, guess it used to be the Espial cart I had, but swapped it for a Micro Pinball cart. Oh well. Would rather play that than Espial.

[Matt Fisher]

In my present collection, my 99/4A "holy grail" item would have to be the MBX Expansion System. For some reason, I love esoteric add-on products which had lots of potential but never got the support they would have needed to exploit it fully; I suppose I enjoy the ECS Computer Adaptor for the Intellivision for the same reason. My MBX is in remarkably good shape, and I've got a few of the games that support it, and I still enjoy playing them and thinking about what more could have been done, both with the MBX and with the 99/4A itself.

 

I am the same way, and my grail would be my MBX as well. I have all of the games and overlays except the Trolley game (can't recall the whole title). We had a 99/4A when I was growing up, and I LUSTED after the MBX. Voice control! Are you kidding! Alas, my dad could not be convinced to purchase one, even if one could have been found. Well, finally picked one up on eBay and it is just as cool as I thought it would be, although I don't have as much time to play as I would like. Also picked up loaded PEB at a pawn shop (who took that in?) and so now I can play Tunnels of Doom off of a floppy instead of the cassette deck I had to use back in the day.

 

I also am a sucker for add-ons and oddball controllers as well, and own many such failed products, like the ECS, the Vectrex light pen and 3-D imager, the 32X, the SMS 3D glasses and adapter, etc. I've always thought it interesting that so many of the games meant to highlight these products were baseball games. The MBX, ECS, and ColecoVision Super Action Controllers, at least, all had baseball games as their "flagship" titles. I doubt if this is a coincidence, and I suppose it reflects the overall popularity of baseball in the early 80s. Today I suppose all the games would be football games.

[JamesD]

A TI-99/4A in an FPGA.