Jump to content
IGNORED

Exidy Sorcerer


Recommended Posts

I was reading the obituary of Exidy founder Pete Kaufman in which the article mentioned the Exidy Sorcerer. Apparently not a lot of people ever heard of this thing.

 

800px-Exidy_Sorcerer.jpg

 

CPU: Zilog Z80, 2.106 MHz (later 4 MHz) RAM: 4 kB, expandable to 48 kB. larger sizes came standard in later runs ROM: 4 kB, cartridges could include 4 to 16 kB Video: 64×30 character display, monochrome Sound: none (external additions possible) Ports: composite video, Centronics parallel, RS-232, sound in/out for cassette use, 50 pin ribbon connector including the S-100 bus.

 

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exidy_Sorcerer

Link to comment
Share on other sites

As far as games go, the Sorcerer is probably about on the level of an Ohio Scientific; good text, very limited graphics. I'd love to play around with one, but it's not hard to see why it didn't succeed (and why nobody remembers it today).

 

Interestingly (IIRC), Sorcerer cartridges used shells from 8-track cassettes.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

As far as games go, the Sorcerer is probably about on the level of an Ohio Scientific; good text, very limited graphics. I'd love to play around with one, but it's not hard to see why it didn't succeed (and why nobody remembers it today).

 

Interestingly (IIRC), Sorcerer cartridges used shells from 8-track cassettes.

Actually they had pretty decent graphics. Very Hi-Res for the time, but they weren't sprites. Check this emulator out: http://www.liaquay.co.uk/sorcerer/

Link to comment
Share on other sites

That's been up forever. There's always two or three Sorcerers up for sale on ebay at any given time but they're usually overpriced. That collection is pretty cool though and the expansion unit is even rarer than he Sorcerer itself, if I had nothing but money to blow on this I'd be all over that.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The ironic part is that once upon a time when the liquidator of Jupiter Cantab sold out remaining stock, about spring 1984, it supposedly was the cheapest computer on the (UK) market, cheaper than any ZX-81 clones, VTech Lasers and so on.

 

I doublt even placing £300 in the stock market of 1984 would have paid off as much buying 10 Jupiter Aces at £30 or whatever they cost back then, and then resold them 30 years later at £300 each, a profit of £2700 or 900%. But who knew back then this unpopular Forth computer would become rare and desired several decades later?

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

The ironic part is that once upon a time when the liquidator of Jupiter Cantab sold out remaining stock, about spring 1984, it supposedly was the cheapest computer on the (UK) market, cheaper than any ZX-81 clones, VTech Lasers and so on.

 

I doublt even placing £300 in the stock market of 1984 would have paid off as much buying 10 Jupiter Aces at £30 or whatever they cost back then, and then resold them 30 years later at £300 each, a profit of £2700 or 900%. But who knew back then this unpopular Forth computer would become rare and desired several decades later?

They were indeed £30, I remember seeing them being sold for £29.99 with a RAM pack, If only I knew then what I know now, Sinclair QL's were also being practically given away at one point.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

With ALL the Sinclair ZX-81 and Timex-Sinclair 1000 out there, someone should clone the Jupiter Cantab Ace ROM and make a new Keyboard Overlay, so that the ZX-81/TS1000's can be converted.. I have Eight of them, I wouldn't miss one or two being made into a Jupiter Cantab Ace.

 

 

MarkO

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I seem to recall the Jupiter Ace has been reverse engineered and there is a kit/replica to build your own, but of course it wouldn't look just like the original one.

 

But yes, this thread was mainly about the Exidy Sorcerer, a machine that I've never seen, only read about. I hope those who want one will find their specimens one day without offing an arm and a kidney.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If you have a ZX spectrum + an Interface 2 (or compatible) you can run an emulator ROM :)

 

http://www.fruitcake.plus.com/Sinclair/Interface2/Cartridges/Interface2_RC_New_Jupiter_Ace.htm

 

 

With ALL the Sinclair ZX-81 and Timex-Sinclair 1000 out there, someone should clone the Jupiter Cantab Ace ROM and make a new Keyboard Overlay, so that the ZX-81/TS1000's can be converted.. I have Eight of them, I wouldn't miss one or two being made into a Jupiter Cantab Ace.

 

 

MarkO

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

In 1981 I worked at a store that sold Exidy Sorcerers, Vector Graphics S-100 CP/M machines, and Ataris. I played around with the Exidy. It had a nice, sharp, monochrome display. No bit-mapped graphics mode, but half the character set was user-definable in RAM, so it had some fine-looking games.

 

I have a working Sorcerer board (which I repaired and fully socketed) but no Exidy case and keyboard. In the day, I modded the ROM for a third-party keyboard and modded the RAM to 57K. I meant to make a CP/M machine out of it but never finished.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

The boss had repaired a customer's Sorcerer S-100 box but had no Exidy cards to try. I suggested trying a Vector Graphics card and when he turned it on it went poof. There was some difference in power circuits. The Sorcerer board was dead and I felt terrible. He didn't blame me though. He replaced the customer's board and gave me the dead one to fix as a project. I didn't know enough to troubleshoot it so I desoldered ALL the chips and bought new chips and sockets, and it worked!

 

I bought a JDR keyboard, a nice surplus unit with long, smooth travel. It has an 8x8 matrix where the Exidy had 16x5. I designed a decoder circuit to make it appear as 16x4 plus Shift. Then I reprogrammed the Monitor ROM's keyboard map to match. I also rewired the DRAM interface to address 1 row of 4164s for 56K contiguous RAM. The plan was to interface a floppy and write a CP/M BIOS. Now I would like to keep it as a 56K Sorcerer and replace the cassette interface with an Arduino and SD card.

post-18605-0-97193300-1439329654_thumb.jpg

  • Like 4
Link to comment
Share on other sites

The boss had repaired a customer's Sorcerer S-100 box but had no Exidy cards to try. I suggested trying a Vector Graphics card and when he turned it on it went poof. There was some difference in power circuits. The Sorcerer board was dead and I felt terrible. He didn't blame me though. He replaced the customer's board and gave me the dead one to fix as a project. I didn't know enough to troubleshoot it so I desoldered ALL the chips and bought new chips and sockets, and it worked!

 

I bought a JDR keyboard, a nice surplus unit with long, smooth travel. It has an 8x8 matrix where the Exidy had 16x5. I designed a decoder circuit to make it appear as 16x4 plus Shift. Then I reprogrammed the Monitor ROM's keyboard map to match. I also rewired the DRAM interface to address 1 row of 4164s for 56K contiguous RAM. The plan was to interface a floppy and write a CP/M BIOS. Now I would like to keep it as a 56K Sorcerer and replace the cassette interface with an Arduino and SD card.

attachicon.gifES.jpg

Nice machine! You could use the cassette interface to load from ipod, what's the BUAD rate on the Sorcerer?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...