Early Microcontroller Info

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jaem
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Early Microcontroller Info

Post by jaem »

Hey all,

so... I was cleaning the basement recently (not so fun), when I came across an old Milton Bradley "Simon" game that my family's had for years. (Probably since before I came into existence, and I think it's been broken most of that time - I've certainly never played it.) I had originally dug it up last summer, before I went away to University, and at that time, I had tried to research the chips inside, in order to attempt a repair, if possible. I couldn't find any reference to the controller's part number anywhere. The only thing I eventually found was a statement (3rd comment on the link above) that it used a TI TMS1000 chip. The codes on my chip are as follows:
MP3300NLLE
4850
FE 8001

They're somewhat similar (albeit mixed-and-matched) to this one, although of course, that could be completely meaningless. As I said, I haven't looked at it (looked at with a meter, that is) in about a year, but I recall that all the power pins, and possibly some others, matched up with the TMS1000 pinout. Can anyone shed any light on this? Is this one of those times where they put different numbers on that are specific to one company, just to annoy people like me? :P
I'll take another look at it once the cleaning is done, and I've regained my workshop area.
Thanks,
Jeff
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MrAl
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Post by MrAl »

Hi there,


If i remember right, isnt that the game where the machine lights up
various button faces in a random sequence, and when it's finished
you have to press the buttons in the same order as the machine
did to win? I dont remember if it made any sound or not though.

Anyway, if that's the one, then if it comes to this you could use a
new microcontroller to do the same thing. You would have to
program it and trace the button wiring for both activation and
lamps and connect to the uC ports. With todays uC's i would
bet this would be quite simple.
That machine probably used bulbs to light up too, so replacing
them with high brightness white LEDs would lower power
requirements to the point where you could drive them directly
from the uC port pins.
I am guessing that one uC chip will do it.

You could even pump up the game a bit by adding controls to
change the difficulty, or perhaps some other things you might
think up, like keeping score for up to four players, etc., etc.
LEDs vs Bulbs, LEDs are winning.
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jaem
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Post by jaem »

@MrAl: Yes, that's the game. Thanks, but I'd actually already considered rebuilding it and decided not to. The game's case is already in the trash, but I just saved the pcb out of interest's sake. I was primarily curious about the mcu, to see if anyone knew anything about it.
-Jeff
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MrAl
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Post by MrAl »

Hi again,

Ok, i thought you wanted to get it up and working again.
LEDs vs Bulbs, LEDs are winning.
Gorgon
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Post by Gorgon »

TMS1000 was normally used as a custom programmed ROM device, as far as I remember. This means that it is specially designed for this game, and nothing else. I think there was special versions with piggyback external eprom sockets for development, but I might be wrong.

TOK ;)
Gorgon the Caretaker - Character in a childrens TV-show from 1968. ;)
Sambuchi
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Post by Sambuchi »

Interesting.. TMS for TI chips "today" is their DSP line of processors. I've used the TMS320F282x for a little bit now.. very nice.

and then theres always TI's micros MSP's

I would say any micro could be used to restore the function of the game.

I was never good at that Simon game :x
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