Jump to content
Have You Played Atari Today?
2600|5200|7800|Lynx|Jaguar|Forums|Store
IGNORED

TI Related -- Ebay / Heads Up Notice

Omega-TI

By Omega-TI
in TI-99/4A Computers

 Share

Recommended Posts

Serafini Lapo Chopper Commander

Serafini Lapo

Posted
Posted
5 hours ago, GDMike said:

Sbrigati finché le scorte durano $ 3000 solo per questo

https://www.ebay.com/itm/313999570374?hash=item491bd535c6%3Ag%3ACnoAAOSwpvhigtYR&LH_BIN=1

Non è possibile.. ma come si fa?? Ma nemmeno completo di Peb con tutte le schede.. avete letto di quella società la Wata games? Che metteva le fantomatiche cartuccie di Nes, Snes e altri a prezzi folli?? Queste persone rovinano il mondo del retrogaming.. per fortuna che sono stati fermati, almeno loro...

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites
mvancopp Star Raider

mvancopp

Posted
Posted

Hi Everyone,

I am going to assume this topic is not EBAY specific. I found the Windy City 99 group president, or former group and president???, has listed TI items on Craigslist. I contacted Mr. Mickelsen and he has given me permission to post the link here on AtariAge. He said he is willing to ship items, which is not usually the case with CraigsList sales. He currently does not have a list of the items he has for sale put together yet but hopefully will soon. I am interested in many items he has so I have asked him to let me know when he has a list and an idea on pricing (the budget is always the limiting factor ? ).

It would be good to help out Mr. Mickelsen, so drop in and see some of the items here on CraigsList:

TI-99/4A Computer TI99/4A - computers - by owner - electronics sale (craigslist.org)

 

Mark

 

  • Like 7
Link to comment
Share on other sites
PeBo Dragonstomper

PeBo

Posted
Posted
On 5/16/2022 at 9:50 PM, GDMike said:

Hurry while supplies last $3000 only for this

https://www.ebay.com/itm/313999570374?hash=item491bd535c6%3Ag%3ACnoAAOSwpvhigtYR&LH_BIN=1

Looks to be in nearly as good condition and complete as the one I bought a few years ago for $75 CAD.

(and mine included the bilingual Canadian box and manuals - documentation for two languages, and a speech synth*, for a $2, 925 less)

Inflation I guess.

 

nb.: no amount of phoneme manipulation can make the speech synth speak french (or Spanish or Portuguese, or Italian) without a locked-in english accent. If you have proven this not to be the case, please upload your code so I can steal it. (I have tried unsuccessfully for 40 years).

Link to comment
Share on other sites
PeBo Dragonstomper

PeBo

Posted
Posted
On 5/16/2022 at 11:18 PM, HOME AUTOMATION said:

...What will you do with the money!?

Selling a 4A for $3000?

 

Hell, flip it for a 030 Falcon! (but only of I had two 4/A's so I'd get to keep one - a Falcon would not compensate for the TI separation anxiety)

  • Haha 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Ksarul Quadrunner

+Ksarul

Posted
Posted
13 minutes ago, PeBo said:

nb.: no amount of phoneme manipulation can make the speech synth speak french (or Spanish or Portuguese, or Italian) without a locked-in english accent. If you have proven this not to be the case, please upload your code so I can steal it. (I have tried unsuccessfully for 40 years).

You would have to go all the way down to the allophones to try and get there successfully. You might want to talk to @Stuart about the devices TI made to take spoken words and convert them to properly formatted allophone strings. You might also want to try to experiment with the Blue Wizard program that does the same on a PC and can target the TMS5200 chip for its output (it defaults to the TMS5220, but can be set otherwise).

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites
PeBo Dragonstomper

PeBo

Posted
Posted
7 minutes ago, Ksarul said:

You would have to go all the way down to the allophones to try and get there successfully. You might want to talk to @Stuart about the devices TI made to take spoken words and convert them to properly formatted allophone strings. You might also want to try to experiment with the Blue Wizard program that does the same on a PC and can target the TMS5200 chip for its output (it defaults to the TMS5220, but can be set otherwise).

I'll look up Blue Wizard, that's new to me.

 

My best successes have been when I work on an english word, and find my attempts results in a nasal sound (such as the french words « on », « mon » or « ton ». The Synth has an inherent nasal quality, so I have fluked into coming close occasionally.

 

otherwise my attempts always result in my giving up. Looks like TI programmers gave up too, as all programs that make use of the speech synth only 'speak' English regardless of the language you chose from the menu.

  • Like 4
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Ksarul Quadrunner

+Ksarul

Posted
Posted
3 hours ago, PeBo said:

Looks like TI programmers gave up too, as all programs that make use of the speech synth only 'speak' English regardless of the language you chose from the menu.

Not quite true--the SNUG SPVMC will speak a short statement in German during system powerup, but it is the only contrary example I know of.

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites
PeBo Dragonstomper

PeBo

Posted
Posted
25 minutes ago, Ksarul said:

Not quite true--the SNUG SPVMC will speak a short statement in German during system powerup, but it is the only contrary example I know of.

Thank you for the cool trivia. It is such a rarety that I believed none existed...

To be fair, German is a similar sounding language to English (for obvious historical reasons) and I'm sure even the harsher "ch" sound could be approximated with a little effort.

Sad that TI never developed speech modules for the Speech Synth. That would have allowed for easy language swapping in cases where the sounds are not as easily mirrored using an English base. I was certainly obsessed enough to have collected all of them just to play Alpiner in all the languages listed on the menu.

 

 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites
mizapf Quadrunner

+mizapf

Posted
Posted

I remember I tried that a year ago with the "python_wizard" tool. The velar "ch" ("ach", "Loch", "Buch") is good, the palatal "ch" ("ich", "Löcher", "Bücher") is a bit too close to "sch" (English "sh"). Sadly, my last name "Zapf" is hardly understandable; both affricates (z = "ts" and pf) are not really good and sound more like "s" and "f" ... a bit like English speakers would try to say them. I guess the reason is the sample rate; the t before the s is just too short, and the same happens to the p of the pf.

 

Load the SPEAK program from the disk image in Extended Basic, then merge one of the speech files to it and run it. The zip file contains the sample files as spoken by me, used as inputs for the encoder.

speech.dsk sptests.zip

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites
PeBo Dragonstomper

PeBo

Posted
Posted
20 hours ago, mizapf said:

I remember I tried that a year ago with the "python_wizard" tool. The velar "ch" ("ach", "Loch", "Buch") is good, the palatal "ch" ("ich", "Löcher", "Bücher") is a bit too close to "sch" (English "sh"). Sadly, my last name "Zapf" is hardly understandable; both affricates (z = "ts" and pf) are not really good and sound more like "s" and "f" ... a bit like English speakers would try to say them. I guess the reason is the sample rate; the t before the s is just too short, and the same happens to the p of the pf.

 

Load the SPEAK program from the disk image in Extended Basic, then merge one of the speech files to it and run it. The zip file contains the sample files as spoken by me, used as inputs for the encoder.

speech.dsk 360 kB · 4 downloads sptests.zip 144.91 kB · 4 downloads

very cool, thank you for sharing.

 

In my fake Turing-test program, I was very surprised with how difficult it was to create a intelligible approximation of the english word "Destiny" using phonemes and allophones. The synth struggles with enunciating the "des" (it comes out more as an exhale sound rather than an actual prefix). It works fine if the word appears on screen, so that you have a visual reference, but otherwise it is quite difficult to discern. (It is likely a similar problem to emulating the German eszett's 'ts" sound you describe)

 

I would have thought that the sound "Dess" would have been straightforward, but I ended up spelling it as Deztiny, to make it more recognizable (albeit mispronounced). I guess 1980's speech synthesis is no competition for Majel Barrett's voice as the computers in the 23rd century.

  • Like 1
  • Haha 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites
mizapf Quadrunner

+mizapf

Posted
Posted
19 minutes ago, PeBo said:

(It is likely a similar problem to emulating the German eszett's 'ts" sound you describe)

It's the z that is pronounced like "ts" ("tset"); the ß ("es-tset") is an unvoiced s, called "sharp s" because the German s before vowels is voiced.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites
PeBo Dragonstomper

PeBo

Posted
Posted
22 hours ago, mizapf said:

It's the z that is pronounced like "ts" ("tset"); the ß ("es-tset") is an unvoiced s, called "sharp s" because the German s before vowels is voiced.

My high school German teacher is retroactively fired. (although she's likely passed away by now - she was as old as I am now - 50 years ago - ouch!)

  • Haha 1
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...
×
 Share
Go to topic listing

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
AtariAge
Forums
Store
General
Follow AtariAge

Copyright ©1998-2023 AtariAge

×
×
  • Create New...