[Coco] Donated "pimped out" CoCo 1 arrives today...

[Roger Taylor]

Well, occasionally a stray CoCo user who I've never seen or heard of 
e-mails me from the site and says they have a CoCo with a few gadgets 
they'd like to give to a better home.  If the time is right sometimes 
I'll take these donations, especially if there's something about the 
CoCo that I haven't seen before.  The thing is, this was described by 
the person as just a CoCo 1 with a few games and manuals.  So I said 
I'd take it to use in my projects.

Today this CoCo 1 arrived with the following:

1 normal Tandy Deluxe Joystick (nothing out of the ordinary here).. but wait...
1 KRAFT brand clone of the Tandy Deluxe Joystick, gray (never seen 
one of these)
1 64k CoCo 1 with:
	lowercase kit (it's a small board plugged into the 6847 socket, with 
components and a socketed 6847
	power LED mounted on the case
	front-mounted reset button (low profile, hard to easily press on accident)
	-> a TRS-80 Model 1? 2? 3? keyboard that is actually plugged in 
normally and has no solder hacks that I can see
A 3x3" grid of air vent holes drilled nicely over the power supply area

This is by far the most pimped out CoCo 1 I've ever seen, with a worn 
paint job and ugly first impression, but it was free :)

The panel around the keyboard was custom cut out more to fit the 
alternate keyboard.  The keyboard appears to be one of a TRS-80 
"Model" type.  Apparently, it is matrix compatible, as I can't spot 
any hacks yet.

I haven't turned this CoCo on yet since he sent it with the screws 
missing from the case, and it arrived with the keyboard hanging 
almost out of the case and some keys had popped off.  He didn't pad 
the box well at all, and everything was very loose and slung around 
during shipment.  I plan to repaint the case and glaze it if the 
thing actually works.

I'll post my results of the ugly-but-free pimped out "Model 1" CoCo 1 
this weekend.  :)



-- 
Roger Taylor