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What is this thing?

Capt. 2110

Experienced Member
Joined
May 23, 2015
Messages
362
Location
Texas
I got a small Intel 8088A CPU board for about $3 at an electronics surplus store. It has a 2*16 LCD, some pins on the bottom, and a 9v battery. It's missing a chip, and it's from 1989(This particular one is 1991 I believe). Does anyone know what it is?

t_img_0095_148.jpgt_img_0092_128.jpgt_img_0091_364.jpg
 
It looks like a very generic board. If you can read the EPROM (if it has one), that could provide the information as to what original device that board was placed in.
 
I don't think it has an EPROM, but I can tell you the chips. Left: Toshiba TC5565APL-10 Middle: Intel P80C88A-2 Right: Oki M1C55-5
I think it still works, but it doesn't do anything.
 
The EPROM probably goes where that big empty socket is.

May have help some proprietary data on it so the original owner "sanitized" it by pulling the EPROM.
 
Yeah very generic board. With that LCD display i guess it was some kinda control computer for simple tasks, maybe for some machinery or house automation.
 
Well, the TC5565APL is static RAM, and next to it is the blank, so that probably was ROM, or "maybe" more RAM, but without a company printed on the board somewhere, or accessible code on board which might give an idea as to usage, I'd say you got about $3-$5 worth of good embedded design parts, in the chips and LCD display!

P.S. IS there a company or LOGO printed on the board? That might tell us a little more about what this controller does/did???

gwk
 
Oops, sorry, it is an M81C55-5.
The board says
Rel 2
Model 88-1
Hamptech (c)1989
Houston, Texas USA

I only found an owner and location, and the amount of time it took probably qualifies me as a stalker.
I did ask this on another website, but I don't know if the answer is correct or not. I would like a second opinion.
 
I'm trying to find what the pins at the bottom of the board connect to, and I found the last one connects to a pin on the OKI called PB4. Does anyone know what PB4 is?
 
Maybe. I know it's a RAM chip and a timer, but I don't remember how it accesses the data. Maybe as simulating a pushbutton?
 
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