Information on ETON ZX 48K clone?

[pkersey]

Hi. I'm a serious ZX collector and DIYer from Brazil, and a great admirer of Russian scene. I'm writing this in English as I can't write in Russian, for what I ask you to forgive about this, but I have no other ways of getting in touch with you unless it's in English.

I always had the wish of having a Russian clone in my collection. I couldn't get me a Scorpion or Pentagon yet, but I saw this very curious ETON computer for sale on eBay and decided to buy it. It's an amazing piece of retrocomputing, seems all made by hand!

Nevertheless I have no information about it's expansion ports, they are all incompatible with Sinclair standards, so I come here to ask you a few questions. Do you have any information on it?

For instance, the tape ear/mic ports... how to connect to them?

Looks like it's got an RGB port, but what's the pin-out? Do you have a hint on how I can discover the pin-out?

And the joystick port... which standard is it?

Thanks in advance for any information!

[Protom]

Can You make a picture of computer and what is inside?.

[BYTEMAN]

Is it ETON (ЭТОН) like on this photo (hanging on the wall)?
http://zxbyte.ru/blog/pic/retro1/retro16.jpg

[pkersey]

@PROTOM
Sure! I'll take more pictures when I get home but for now, I think you can view some photographs of it at the eBay listing.

Scroll down the page and there you'll see lots of pictures, nothing much technical yet.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/350582856174?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1497.l2649

I'll post pictures of it open as soon as possible.

---------- Post added at 23:17 ---------- Previous post was at 23:15 ----------

@BYTEMAN
Yes, that's the computer!

[BYTEMAN]

Prusak has this computer even in box, but if I remember, without original book. Computer is fully working, just another clone of ZX. Nothing interesting except of keyboard and rarity.

[Shadow Maker]

Дайте ему распиновку разъемов кто-нибудь, пусть подключит.

[BYTEMAN]

Shadow Maker, там антенник торчит изначально, распиновки по памяти не помню, а Prusak в отпуске.

[AlexFantasy]

Мда..а.а.а... Глядя на Этон снова вспомнил :v2_cry:, как еще школьником пошёл покупать самый первый в своей жизни компьютер.

[pkersey]

Shadow Maker, там антенник торчит изначально, распиновки по памяти не помню, а Prusak в отпуске.

If anyone knows the pin outs, please let me know. I want to load a tape into it! And the joystick which came with it... I doubt one could break it!

I'd like to have pictures of its box. Sounds interesting! There's this friend of mine who works with graphic arts and makes replicas of cardboard boxes and polys. This is a sample of his work.

http://www.casadosnerds.com.br/?page_id=642#more-642

---------- Post added at 06:21 ---------- Previous post was at 06:06 ----------


Nothing interesting except of keyboard and rarity.

I'm aware this computer has nothing technically interesting, it's just a poor 48K clone with a bad keyboard and all but it looks very *real*, like hand-made by one person... I like it very much! There's a picture in its power supply, looks like a factory furnace... the machine is unique in my collection, it has a very "brute" look!

I'd like to have a Scorpion ZS. If anyone is interested on selling one, please contact me. I've seen many of these Russian clones, they are all very peculiar, I'd have one of each if I had the money! And I like Beta and TR-DOS, they were very popular in Brazil.

I'll post pictures of ETON when I have the time to open it up. I guess if I follow the ULA tracks to the expansion ports I may end up figuring it all out, but it's safer to ask to someone who already knows it... I don't want to break accidentally this amazing rarity!

[pkersey]

Hi! I managed to sort some things out.

The square ports in the back of the console should be obvious for you but as I can't read Russian, I had the aid of Wikipedia to read what's written on them. They read "Joystick" and are Sinclair Joystick compatible.

The round DIN plug in the back is the tape interface, there it reads "MAGN" (as in Magnetic Tape). Pin 5 is "ear", pin 4 is "mic". I don't know what the other pins are, I don't think they are unused as there are wires coming from them to the board, but I wasn't able to sort them out yet.

The round DIN plug at the side looks like a kempston interface. Not sure. All pins are 5V.

I couldn't dig anything else further because its TV system is SECAM, my TV can only show either NTSC or PAL-M. The image output is almost useless in this TV. I had the hopes to find a composite video out, but to no avail. No hopes for a RGB signal, I think.

Let me know if you have any information, please.

Thanks again.