American Pickers - Vintage Computer Edition

[JP!]

I went on a neat adventure today. This guy I met through Craigslist bought an old elementary school over 20 years ago had loaded the building with a ton of stuff including computers, printers, keyboards, typewriters and electronics. It was like I was on an episode of the American Pickers. There also was a TON of old specialty medical gear originally destined for a hospital in Haiti. It was really fun going through this place. No beamsprings though. The beamsprings the seller thought they had were actually IBM Selectric typewriters I got some unusual finds and will take me a while to fully go through it all. I spent a lot more than I wanted though but at least the money is going to good cause. The seller is a pastor who does missionary work in Haiti.

The gymnasium area:

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Not sure if these are worth buying or what a decent price would be. Looks like part units.

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Medical stuffs

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I bought this, among others things. A complete Medical IBM 5150 PC, monitor, and matching blue XT keyboard. Case has some rust. Has anyone seen anything like this?

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Perhaps this XT is wiki worthy? It has buckling spring switches. Reminds me of the industrial variants but for the medical industry.

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[emdude]

Looked like a great time, I would love to go through a treasure trove like that.

The typewriter in the top-left is an IBM Electronic Typewriter. That for sure is very interesting, I know alh84001 here would be very interested in picking up the keyboard assembly!

[Techno Trousers]

Nice one! Bummer about no beamsprings, but I figured it was a long shot anyway. The double branded 5150 keyboard is really cool, and I like that case color. It would have been even better if it were an AT model!

The typewriter in the back center is a wheelwriter, yeah? Did you pick that one up? At the very least the keys are Model F/M compatible, and you'd get a "Code" key out of it.

[JP!]

Looked like a great time, I would love to go through a treasure trove like that.

The typewriter in the top-left is an IBM Electronic Typewriter. That for sure is very interesting, I know alh84001 here would be very interested in picking up the keyboard assembly!

Yeah, that typewriter caught my eye as well.

[taylorswiftttttt]

removed

[JP!]

I went on a neat adventure today. This guy I met through Craigslist bought an old elementary school over 20 years ago had loaded the building with a ton of stuff including computers, printers, keyboards, typewriters and electronics. It was like I was on an episode of the American Pickers. There also was a TON of old specialty medical gear originally destined for a hospital in Haiti. It was really fun going through this place. No beamsprings though. The beamsprings the seller thought they had were actually IBM Selectric typewriters I got some unusual finds and will take me a while to fully go through it all. I spent a lot more than I wanted though but at least the money is going to good cause. The seller is a pastor who does missionary work in Haiti.

The gymnasium area:

The attachment 1.JPG is no longer available

Not sure if these are worth buying or what a decent price would be. Looks like part units.

The attachment 2.JPG is no longer available

Medical stuffs

The attachment 3.JPG is no longer available

The attachment 4.JPG is no longer available

I bought this, among others things. A complete Medical IBM 5150 PC, monitor, and matching blue XT keyboard. Case has some rust. Has anyone seen anything like this?

The attachment 5.JPG is no longer available

Perhaps this XT is wiki worthy? It has buckling spring switches. Reminds me of the industrial variants but for the medical industry.

The attachment 6.JPG is no longer available

The attachment 7.JPG is no longer available

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[mike52787]

holy shit! looks like a treasure trove. would love to look around in there!

[MrDuul]

JP you should have a youtube show on finding vintage computers / keyboards.

This is an amazing find!

Those monitors might be PVM which would be a jackpot.

[JP!]

JP you should have a youtube show on finding vintage computers / keyboards.

This is an amazing find!

Those monitors might be PVM which would be a jackpot.

Which ones, the medical related ones? Also what kind of market is there for that kind of stuff?

[MrDuul]

Depends here are some links:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/SONY-PVM-20L2MD ... SwuMZZHxlf

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Sony-PVM1943MD- ... SwhvFZDVrm

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Sony-PVM1943MD- ... Sw-0xYUw59


People use them for RGB retro gaming (NES, SNES), PVM and BVM CRT displays amazing vivid colors instead of washed out ones on a standard generic CRT.

[codemonkeymike]

JP! if you are in the north east united states, i know some people in the gaming community who would be interested in quite a few of the monitors. Also that ECHOFLOW looks awesome, I would buy it if in a heart beat. I love old lab equipment

[JP!]

whoa, I seen some miscellaneous screens vaguely like those.

[codemonkeymike]

whoa, I seen some miscellaneous screens vaguely like those.

IMO a 19in medical PVM is not worth $400, you really have to be in the right market to get that price (you can't get that much in the mid west, maybe in San Fan or NYC) but a BVM with analog RGB card... thats worth at least $400

[MrDuul]

whoa, I seen some miscellaneous screens vaguely like those.

Try looking on the back of the monitors for serial number and search on your phone

Or take pictures of the serial numbers. You might find a BVM

[JP!]

whoa, I seen some miscellaneous screens vaguely like those.

Try looking on the back of the monitors for serial number and search on your phone

Or take pictures of the serial numbers. You might find a BVM

Thanks for the tip. I will keep a look out. Also tune in for episode 2 later today!

[Scarpia]

That's a nice haul even with no beamsprings -- thanks for documenting it, I love these threads! Good luck digging!!

[JP!]

So today I picked up the rest of the items I previously bought and of course searched for new finds.

What have we here? Looks like a PVR with a broken bezel.

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Unloading the truck.

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I don't recommend large cash registers. This one was all metal and very heavy. The typewriter is very light in comparison.

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Complete Multitech system

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Keyboard for this system comes with those neat blue Alps switches

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Complete Tandy system

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Apple II - I got a few floppy's in a box and one looks to have Apple dos on it. Also got some games.

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Got a couple IBM PS/1's with their monitors. One came with a very nice Model M.

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I believe this was used in the medical field. Have not found anything about these. Has a 3.5 floppy in the drive though.

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Heathkit Computer. Model # tag was hard to read

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I very quickly running out of space now!

[Gnohio]

Wow that blue model f looks cool as hell. Definitely a pretty neat find. Good luck with finding somewhere to put all that stuff lol.

[MrDuul]

You made out like a bandit!

You are a space pirate, great finds!

[seebart]

Yes, that is indeed a very nice vintage haul JP!

[snuci]

Very nice mini-collection. The Tandy CoCo 3 and the Apple II+ computers are nice but the early example of the Acer computer is pretty cool. The Heathkit H89 (the Zenith) is a good CP/M example. I have one that needs a little work. The keyboard is a Hi-Tek Linear example. Cool computer. The VIP-I is a mystery. Any other details or labels (perhaps on the floppy)? I'll see what I can find out about it.

[JP!]

Very nice mini-collection. The Tandy CoCo 3 and the Apple II+ computers are nice but the early example of the Acer computer is pretty cool. The Heathkit H89 (the Zenith) is a good CP/M example. I have one that needs a little work. The keyboard is a Hi-Tek Linear example. Cool computer. The VIP-I is a mystery. Any other details or labels (perhaps on the floppy)? I'll see what I can find out about it.

I definitely appreciate any info on this stuff. I started out collecting keyboards and now have a vintage mini computer collection within a day. A bit out of my comfort zone. I should have taken a closer look at the VIP-1 though as I found nothing online. The floppy had no label but I recall a label or sticker on the side that looked medical related. It will be a couple days before I will be back home to take a look. I may try and power it on. Hopefully the magic white smoke stays inside.

[Mr. J]

Wow, what a nice haul! Thanks for posting this!

[Gnohio]

JP, do you plan on selling that blue F XT you've acquired individually or with the computer and monitor? It would kind of be a shame to break up the family but that board is too cool not to fix up and use.

[JP!]

JP, do you plan on selling that blue F XT you've acquired individually or with the computer and monitor? It would kind of be a shame to break up the family but that board is too cool not to fix up and use.

That is a good question. I am glad to see others that think this is cool as well. Perhaps this blue might inspire others to do XT/AT paint projects in the future. I think even a blue 5150 computer with a vanilla XT is a cool find unto itself. Perhaps I could get more money selling the keyboard and computer separately but I am thinking they should stay together. No immediate plans to sell at the moment. I do plan to cleanup the keyboard and paint the metal barrel plate.

[XMIT]

You mentioned you were in Michigan. Did you reach out to ohaimark? He may be able to help in some way, he's got some experience with this sort of thing.

[Parak]

More importantly, what switches were on the echoflow?!

[JP!]

More importantly, what switches were on the echoflow?!

They are Keytronic foam and foil switches.

[drevyek]

The Heath looks exactly like the fallout terminals lol.

[Techno Trousers]

The Heath looks exactly like the fallout terminals lol.

More like the other way around, eh?