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Thunderbird Club

#82,221
Chucky Stiletti said:
Yes! My folks spent 695.00 on the first generation TRS 80. Big deal for me.
It used to take 10 minutes to load Pong from an audio cassette recorder..
695 today gets you a smoking desktop! My dad then went and spent 7k on an IBM XT that did not even run windows.
It was obsolete in one year when the PC was introduced...
Click to expand...

The Model III was $999. The dot-matrix printer was $299. Tape drive was another $99. Add NY State sales tax(7% at the time) and BAM! $1,500!

BTW, I still have it in pristine condition with all the manuals and programs and dust covers. I just couldn't put it to the curb.
 
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#82,222
Larry V said:
The Model III was $999. The dot-matrix printer was $299. Tape drive was another $99. Add NY State sales tax(7% at the time) and BAM! $1,500!

BTW, I still have it in pristine condition with all the manuals and programs and dust covers. I just couldn't put it to the curb.
Click to expand...
Don't blame you. Keep in mind they were Zilog (long gone now) Z80 based. There's probably a market for those now.
I jumped to the Motorola camp and built an Altair 6800. Those go for a nice amount these days. I even built a Heathkit Hero 1 robot that's gathering dust somewhere. Great times. You could literally got to Radio Shack and buy components to build anything....
I then got my BSEE and what was fun became a job.....BOO!!!
 
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#82,223
Chucky Stiletti said:
I remember reading a late 70's early 80's interview with him (Simmons) in GP where he described his stage setup as a bunch of folded horn cabs powered by (if I recall right) BGW amps. He then said they would send a line to the monitor and FOH mixers to "add the mids and highs" which I found peculiar since the practice became the opposite of that at the time by way of a mike or a DI from the backline. He said something like "you just can't go up there with an SVT and plonk" which I found interesting. He also mentioned Jim Dunlop medium picks cause he liked the grooves in them which kept them from slipping off when sweating. He finally mentioned Rotosound roundwounds cause as he put it "it doesn't matter how low you go, you can still get that twang". I used to read those mags from cover to cover like 10 times! It was the only way to learn about what was out there...
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When it comes to amps, Gene is a moving target, but always seems to come back to the SVT sound in one form or another. In '74 and '75 it was all full SVT rigs. The folded horn enclosures (they actually looked like Perkins-style PA cabs) first appeared in late '75 - early '76, when they had moved up to playing bigger places - I guess he needed longer throw than the 810s provided. Those cabs were around until '78, but depending on the tour, there is a line of SVT heads either atop or stacked vertical alongside those bins. The BGW amps must have been offstage. The interview to which you refer also mentions (IIRC) that he would bring in some Marshall heads to get a little more edge for certain venues. He went to Sunn for a couple years, and then back to Ampeg, where they briefly produced the Gene Simmons Punisher rig - basically a dolled-up SVT350H and 2x15 bottom with JBLs. Last I heard, he was going through a pair of offstage Tech21 1969 heads, which are essentially modeled to sound like the early SVT. There is a video clip of him recording "Sonic Boom" with a vintage Gibson Ripper and 70s SVT head behind him.
 
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#82,224
lowend1 said:
When it comes to amps, Gene is a moving target, but always seems to come back to the SVT sound in one form or another. In '74 and '75 it was all full SVT rigs. The folded horn enclosures (they actually looked like Perkins-style PA cabs) first appeared in late '75 - early '76, when they had moved up to playing bigger places - I guess he needed longer throw than the 810s provided. Those cabs were around until '78, but depending on the tour, there is a line of SVT heads either atop or stacked vertical alongside those bins. The BGW amps must have been offstage. The interview to which you refer also mentions (IIRC) that he would bring in some Marshall heads to get a little more edge for certain venues. He went to Sunn for a couple years, and then back to Ampeg, where they briefly produced the Gene Simmons Punisher rig - basically a dolled-up SVT350H and 2x15 bottom with JBLs. Last I heard, he was going through a pair of offstage Tech21 1969 heads, which are essentially modeled to sound like the early SVT. There is a video clip of him recording "Sonic Boom" with a vintage Gibson Ripper and 70s SVT head behind him.
Click to expand...
Yes, that's the interview. The one where he says he plays bass because guitarists sway their shoulders back and forth in a "feminine fashion" where he just as well would rather smash a bass over someones head LOL..
would you happen to have the link to that clip?
 
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#82,225
Chucky Stiletti said:
Yes, that's the interview. The one where he says he plays bass because guitarists sway their shoulders back and forth in a "feminine fashion" where he just as well would rather smash a bass over someones head LOL..
would you happen to have the link to that clip?
Click to expand...
It's two short sections - comes in at 2:04 and then again at 2:20.
 
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#82,228
Man oh man, the things that get discussed on TB. One thread reads "Best Bass for the Royal Wedding"..
I posted this..
f9b0b2270d0e70b9eea14b6a23ef2551.jpg
 
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#82,229
Larry V said:
The Model III was $999. The dot-matrix printer was $299. Tape drive was another $99. Add NY State sales tax(7% at the time) and BAM! $1,500!

BTW, I still have it in pristine condition with all the manuals and programs and dust covers. I just couldn't put it to the curb.
Click to expand...

Hope you still have the box, you know, just in case you want to sell it...

Is it wrong to expect a box with purchase of a new pedal

Chucky Stiletti said:
Don't blame you. Keep in mind they were Zilog (long gone now) Z80 based. There's probably a market for those now.
I jumped to the Motorola camp and built an Altair 6800. Those go for a nice amount these days. I even built a Heathkit Hero 1 robot that's gathering dust somewhere. Great times. You could literally got to Radio Shack and buy components to build anything....
I then got my BSEE and what was fun became a job.....BOO!!!
Click to expand...

So, my Dad started working in computers in the 60s. When he died, we cleared the computer stuff out of the basement - boxes of punch cards (in precise order), reels of magnetic tape, and hard drives (the old ceramic ones that were huge, heavy, and held perhaps a megabyte) - containing the programs he had written.
 
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#82,231
heatheroo1 said:
The problem with that scenario is that there are currently enough threads to just go the full length of the truss rod nut. If I shim it, there will only be a few threads engaged in the nut.
Click to expand...
Gotcha. That makes sense. Hold my beer crashes and burns again.
 
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#82,232
PillO said:
For the most part, I have stopped collecting dead trees. Since the last move 8 years ago, I still have a few hundred pounds of books in boxes. The vast majority of my books are now digital. It adds two huge benefits for me; I can carry around some very large volumes and they are searchable. As an example, I never take Applied Therapeutics with me anywhere as it is about 15lbs. On the other hand, I carry Harrison's Internal Medicine as an eBook everywhere; in real life it is 2 volumes coming in at 20-30lbs.
Click to expand...
I'm a hopeless luddite when it comes to books and records. When the big earthquake hits Seattle, all that mass will knock down our house. There's nothing quite like the feel, smell, and sound of a book. The ritual of putting on a record to listen to it is its own thing, too. You can't beat either one.
 
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#82,233
PillO said:
Hope you still have the box, you know, just in case you want to sell it...

Is it wrong to expect a box with purchase of a new pedal



So, my Dad started working in computers in the 60s. When he died, we cleared the computer stuff out of the basement - boxes of punch cards (in precise order), reels of magnetic tape, and hard drives (the old ceramic ones that were huge, heavy, and held perhaps a megabyte) - containing the programs he had written.
Click to expand...
Great story. I worked for E-MU systems as a hardware engineer for years. When Creative Labs bought us (I worked on "Nomad" code name for the first MP-3 player as well) and Ensoniq, E-MU as an entity started ti fizzle. Bill Putnam jr. son of Bill Putnam Sr.
Putnam-Feat.jpg


who developed the LA-2 and 1176 compressors for Teletronix (later sold to Urei) who lives in Santa Cruz started going through his dad's (after Sr. passed) stuff in the garage and found all of his notebooks and engineering stuff and reissued the LA-2 and 1176 and started Universal Audio (UA). Needless to say, many if not most of EMU engineering fold work there now. They now make plug ins and all kinds to of audio s/w. They recently released The OX, a reactive modeling power soak for guitar amps. Incredible success story! Thanks Dad..
 
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