What is this vacant chip socket for on my ADAM motherboard?

[nectarisneo]

It's the socket next to the ribbon cable. Just wondering.

[NIAD]

The FOUR chips sockets (U22, U9 and I forget the other two designators starting with a U) are for the E.O.S. (Adam's Elementary Operating System) and SmartWRITER rom chips. The very first revision of the ADAM Logic Board (motherboard) that was sold in systems was R57 and these four sockets were populated as follows from left to right (see provided pic as well):

 

U# - SmartWRITER chip #3

U22 - E.O.S.

U9 - SmartWRITER chip #1

U# - SmartWRITER chip #2

 

IIRC, all four sockets were populated up to Revision 79 of the motherboard, at which time Coleco reduced the number of chips needed for SmartWRITER to two and this freed up the U9 socket in Revision 80 motherboards.

 

Over the years, many people replaced these chip sets to personalize their systems. Some completely removed the EOS andSmartWRITER chip sets and replaced with CP/M, T-DOS (a supped up version of CP/M) or even SmartBASIC... so that the ADAM would boot-up in the Basic Interpreter like most other computers of the time.

 

A company called Walters Software also provided any program, SmartBASIC for example, that was 32K or smaller on cartridge for those that did not want to open up their systems and you would have the best of both worlds. Turn on your system and ADAM's EOS and SmartWRITER boot-up as normal, then press the Cartridge Reset switch and you are instantly in SmartBASIC.

 

There was also a Clock Chip that was sold for other systems that could be installed in the U9 socket of R80 systems and with the software developed by Trisyd Video Games, you had yourself access to a clock in SmartBASIC and CP/M.

 

Lot's of cool stuff was developed over the years for the ADAM. Here is a text list I assembled that lists everything out and you could also read thru the old NIAD Newsletters for more complete details.

ADAM & ColecoVision Hardware.rtf

[nectarisneo]

Thanks for the detailed explanation and for the hardware listing. I didn't know that there were so many options available. I noticed that the motherboard in your post didn't have heatsinks on any of the chips. Was that something that was added with later board revisions?

[NIAD]

Thanks for the detailed explanation and for the hardware listing. I didn't know that there were so many options available. I noticed that the motherboard in your post didn't have heatsinks on any of the chips. Was that something that was added with later board revisions?

Always glad to help out. As far as the heatsinks, I can't say with 100% certainty as I seem to recall some R57 and R59 boards having heatsinks on a number of chips and some not. Maybe the older revision boards that had heatsinks were defective systems returned to Coleco and they repaired whatever the problem(s) was and then added the heatsinks.

[nectarisneo]

It's always reassuring to see heatsinks on chips. I was actually rather impressed when I saw them on the board. Speaking of chips, does the ADAM suffer from any common failures like the C64?

[NIAD]

It's always reassuring to see heatsinks on chips. I was actually rather impressed when I saw them on the board. Speaking of chips, does the ADAM suffer from any common failures like the C64?

None that come to mind. Seeing as there are actually two motherboards in the Stand-Alone Memory Console (ADAM Logic Board and Delta Game Board (ColecoVision)) you might think that there could be some VERY COMMON issues, but for the most part there are not. One of the biggest problems with the ColecoVision Game System lies in the Power Switch and this is completely circumvented due to the removal of the switch in Stand-Alone ADAM systems since it is powered by the power supply in the ADAM Printer as well as turned on and off via the switch at the back of the printer.

 

Issues with RF Output can still be experienced, but not as likely since the ADAM offers Composite Video output.

 

Issues with the two Octal Buffer ICs (controller ports) seem less likely, so maybe Coleco improved this in the time between the CV release in 08/82 and the ADAM's eventual widespread release in 11/83.

 

Usually, the biggest issue with the ADAM are Data Drives that go bad and this is usually with the controller board built-in or the small rubber timing wheel wearing away and finally shredding and in some cases melting from increased temperatures due to contiuous use... especially high speed seeks where the tape is in constant motion fast forwarding or rewinding.

 

Last year I picked up in excess of 10 ADAM systems via numerous means and out of those, only 1 was not salvageable... aside from the prestine housing. I would venture a guess that this one unit which was completely dead was the recipient of a direct lightning strike. On the other hand, about 6 Data Drives were bad and out of those 6, I was unable to fix 4 of them.