DATAMATH CALCULATOR MUSEUM
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DATAMATH CALCULATOR MUSEUM |
Texas Instruments Mr. Challenger
| Date of introduction: | 1980 | Display technology: | Fluorescent |
| New price: | $40.00 | Display size: | 8 alphanumeric |
| Size: | 6.2" x 3.4" x 1.1" 157 x 86 x 29 mm3 |
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| Weight: | 5.7 ounces, 163 grams | Serial No: | |
| Batteries: | 9V | Date of manufacture: | wk 47 year 1979 |
| AC-Adapter: | Origin of manufacture: | USA | |
| Precision: | Integrated circuits: | TMC0273, TMC0355 (CD2601) | |
| Memories: | |||
| Program steps: | Courtesy of: | Joerg Woerner | |
| Download manuals: | 
(US: 2.8M Bytes)
(US: 1.8M Bytes) |
The
Mr. Challenger educational toy is
preprogrammed to teach the spelling of simple words through different games. A
nice feature of this game is an added buzzer to give some noisy feedback.
The Mr. Challenger was one of three similar games:
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Math Marvel: Basic mathematics • Mr. Challenger: Word games • Spelling B: Spelling games |
All
products use the same housing featuring a colored key plate to
cover some unused keys of the matrix. The display is either numeric for the
Math Marvel or alphanumeric for the two word games.
From
a technical point of view the toy makes use of the technology introduced in 1978
with the Speak & Spell: The
TMC0273 microcontroller is derived from the
TMS1000 series and adopted to control both the keyboard and the display, the TMC0355
Voice Synthesis Memory (VSM) is known as "128kBit Speech-ROM".
Compare this game with the German LETTERlogic,
the LETTERlogic sold in France and the LETTERlogic sold in United Kingdom.
Some parts of the toys housing could be found in an industrial product, view the Model 510 PLC programmer.
If you have additions to the above article please email: joerg@datamath.org.
© Joerg Woerner, December 5, 2001. No reprints without written permission.