... to provide arpeggio Manic Miner accompaniment?

Hmmm, when I visited Collossus it was proudly wearing its "Year 2000 compliant" certificate, and it looked (and sounded) just like the Strowger exchange I used to work in. I was hoping the "Beautiful Music" would remind me of the constant chatter of register translators or the staccato rattle of the group selector rack, but alas not. Good effort all the same. Mine's the one with the Fred Goodwin Voodoo Doll in the pocket.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pmfHHLfbjNQ

Always worth a listen. Including contributions from:

Sinclair ZX Spectrum - Guitars (rhythm & lead)

Epson LX-81 Dot Matrix Printer - Drums

HP Scanjet 3c - Bass Guitar

Hard Drive array - Act as a collection of bad speakers - Vocals & FX

Seem to recall that the Data General Nova we had at school (back in the days of teletypes and fast 300baud VDUs!) had a program (on paper tape, of course) that when run would play a tune that could be picked up on an AM radio placed next to it

that's be the performance rights society?

which supposedly collect payments to support the rights of artists to make sure that they don't go cold and hungry when pubs are playing their music, or bands playing in pubs are playing covers of their music...

I fail to see where in the PRS there is scope for funding new music.

"Seem to recall that the Data General Nova we had at school (back in the days of teletypes and fast 300baud VDUs!) had a program (on paper tape, of course) that when run would play a tune that could be picked up on an AM radio placed next to it"

I was at a meeting of the Homebrew Computer Club in 1977ish when someone (Steve Dumpier?) demonstrated that trick with an Altair 8080. It took him about 30 minutes of toggling switches to get it to play "Fool on the Hill" or "Bicycle Built for Two". Someone watching (Roger Melen? There were a lot of CROMEMCO folks there that day, if I remember correctly ...) commented that it was the most useful thing he'd ever seen an Altair do ... Kind of sad commentary on what we were doing with computers in Silly Con Valley back in the day ... Still, onwards & upwards!

@Tim ... I dunno about the BOFH (I don't read that anymore ... it was boring and derivative of itself before it left Usenet), but I personally fired an engineer for purposely making a drive "walk" when I was at DEC ... Was NOT a good thing, tended to reduce hardware & media lifespans by quite a bit.

What no C64

I just got a phone call from a friend who was at the same meeting. He thinks I might be right on the names I mentioned ... He also pointed out that I typoed "8080" instead of "8800" ... The processor was an 8080, the box was called 8800.

Regardless, it was the very definition of "flipping [switches] useless".

From tiny acorns ... Hang on, that's not what I meant! :-)

The same friend wonders why nobody has commented on the "music" of the machine room back in the day ... We knew from the sound of the card decks, the paper/mag tape, and the fan noise, the background of the blinkinlights, the printer chatter, and later the sound of the hard drives (and sometimes the overall smell) if all was well with the data center.

Times change. Hardware & software still suck. Life goes on.

Pah! Our washing machine has perfect Flamenco rhythm. It can even dance across the kitchen floor on full spin. Let's see Colossus do that.

Halogen, haha!

Did you mean "halcyon"? Though halogen gives the thought a bit of a creepy, Phillip K. Dick quality.

Regardless, I wish I could be there, but alas, I live on the other side of the ocean.

-dZ.

You are right about the 803 being able to play 'music' via its built-in speaker. When I was at Bletchley Park in the 70s we used their 803 to play carols at Christmas - someone had produced a paper tape with a selection of tunes on it.

Note: the 803 that is in the museum is not the 803 that was in 'D' Block, I still wonder what happened to that one.

Rob

Vote for Bletchley as the building of which Britain is most proud.

http://www.buildingwithpride.co.uk/