Dean,
Very excellent idea about the two hole 7K plugin portable scope. The more I
think about it, the better I like it!
I remember a lunar lander game for the 4081 workstation which I played while
on a group tour of the Wilsonville facility. The 4081 display was large for
the time (19" diagonal?), and had storage plus "write-through" capability.
The game scenery was written first in storage mode, then the animated bits
(the lander and main engine and maneuvering thrusters, and even the dust the
engines kicked up when it was near the surface!) were vectored using
write-through. Control was via a joystick, which at the time was pretty
exotic. The game and animation worked very, very smoothly with all the
proper ballistics (remember this was about 1976 or so).
The rest of you may remember the 4081 as the display often used for computer
screen closeups on the "Battlestar Galactica" TV show. Can't remember if the
workstation was ever shown as part of the set, but the display write-through
and minicomputer speed made a pretty effective 'tactical sensor display'.
I also remember that Asteroids game for the 4051. Did you also get the tape
(remember those clunky 3M tape cartridges?) with the electronic music
programs on it? Played via the "beeper", with some songs in chords! Ragtime
was particularly effective. I remember being astonished at how good it
actually sounded.
Don
