Reply to Matthew Nielsen

Matthew Nielson commented on September 3, 2016:

"Also, you may like to know, I opened mine and found there are some differences on the motherboard to yours. My serial number is 015287. Model number is the same."

My reply: "It is usual to find some differences in electronic components, labels, dates, etc., even more when a company made few or many batches and also when they (the game consoles/systems) were manufactured in two or more companies.

Just by the serial number, we almost have 10,000 serial number apart. Didn't know that Memorex made more than 10,000 of these, quite facinating."

Matthew: "I have a ROM IC (not an EPROM, no window) in socket U36, and there is nothing in socket U35 next to is. There are solder pads, by no IC socket and no IC, just a placeholder. The ROM is labeled:

(C)TANDY CORP 1992
9242 AJ002
8040202
10/92

In socket U1 (just below the large brown slot), I have an IC with a label on it that reads: "SFEB 10/16/92 8810405 2327"

My reply: "As you have a later made system, Memorex made some revision to cut production cost so that explain why you have one IC than two for the embedded Windows. Your Windows IC can be dumped but i am curious if yours and mine are exactly encoded but i also suspect that yours have a revision too. We can only know if we dump it."

Matthew: "If you ever get the the time in the future, it would be super helpful to also document the IR signals sent from the remote control and gamepads. I don't know if they use standard Memorex IR codes but the two-player nature of the pads makes me think that they are something proprietary to this console.

If the codes were know then, hopefully, someone could build a SNES-to-VIS adapter to replace lost gamepads."

 My reply: "I no wizard to decoding IR signals but Tandy supposely made a wired conroller which was available by a special order (model: CMC 16-2014). And if you check the guts of the wireless controller, you can see that there is a "Z86E0812PSC" which is a OTP Microcontroller (OTP for One-Time Programmable), a 14001B (Quad 2-input NOR gate) and a 14069U (Hex Inverter). 

The input in the back called "AUX IN" is where you plug the wire controller and the plug is a PS/2 type jack". Now it only leaves on how to bypass the Z86E0812PSC and to wire it on the PS/2 jack. Now i'm thinking...Whai if we use a USB controller, put a USB-to-PS/2 adapter and plug it in the VIS ??" Anyone wants to try this out ?"