Byte Back had a more serious side to it in the shape of the Doomsday Project,
From memory, the story goes that this chap found a BBC Master and a laser disc player in a school store room... the Doomsday Project and from then on they have tried to restore it.
Here's a quick summary
... from what I remember talking to him the BBC Master had SCSI added to it which was the means of connecting the laser disc player. These laser discs are quite heavy and when warp a little when in use so the player has a sensor to correct the read height of the laser which at the moment is a little temperamental.
Anyhow I'm sure there are people on this forum that are far more knowledgable about the project and will add more.
Here are a couple of pics of the kit which he kindly opened up to see it running in the nude (oh dear, I am GEEKy ain't I)
From memory, the story goes that this chap found a BBC Master and a laser disc player in a school store room... the Doomsday Project and from then on they have tried to restore it.
Here's a quick summary
http://www.iconbar.com/forums/viewthread.php?newsid=937Peter Armstrong was 20 years a film maker and Head of Department at the BBC. He set up the BBC's Interactive Unit to make educational multimedia. In 1983, Armstrong wondered if it would be possible to celebrate the 900th anniversary of the original Domesday Book by producing a modern day equivalent. It was an ambitious idea, but it captured the imagination. It was planned that the first copy would be given to Prince William, the "poetic successor to William the Conqueror".
Funding for the project - an estimated budget of £2million - was relatively easy to source. Multimedia was an exciting, upcoming technology; people involved in education, national archiving as well as computing were keen to push it forward. The BBC put together a team of around 60 staff to develop the project and recruited pupils from over half of all the schools in the country to help produce the content. In all, around a million children were involved from 14,000 schools.
... from what I remember talking to him the BBC Master had SCSI added to it which was the means of connecting the laser disc player. These laser discs are quite heavy and when warp a little when in use so the player has a sensor to correct the read height of the laser which at the moment is a little temperamental.
Anyhow I'm sure there are people on this forum that are far more knowledgable about the project and will add more.
Here are a couple of pics of the kit which he kindly opened up to see it running in the nude (oh dear, I am GEEKy ain't I)