exxos's Atari, Amiga & retro forum

These two small but incredibly heavy computers arrived in the post today.
More to follow as I try to get them to work.

PhilC wrote: 07 May 2026 14:42 These two small but incredibly heavy computers arrived in the post today.

PXL_20260507_133858760.jpg

More to follow as I try to get them to work.

Nice.

I hope they aren't as stupidly complicated as my Epson HX-20's...

So starting with the Helmsman, it looks to be Husky Hunter but set up to do some kind of navigation, hence the name.

Here's it's internals so far.

There was a very dry joint on the battery box. Which left it sitting in the bottom when I took the PCB out :shock:
It looks like it's got all of its ram bank filled with ram, no idea yet how much that is but will find out soon enough.

rubber_jonnie wrote: 07 May 2026 14:52

PhilC wrote: 07 May 2026 14:42 These two small but incredibly heavy computers arrived in the post today.

PXL_20260507_133858760.jpg

More to follow as I try to get them to work.

Nice.

I hope they aren't as stupidly complicated as my Epson HX-20's...

You and me both :lol:

PhilC wrote: 07 May 2026 14:57

rubber_jonnie wrote: 07 May 2026 14:52

Nice.

I hope they aren't as stupidly complicated as my Epson HX-20's...

You and me both :lol:

:dizzy:

Ok, so it's had it's internal battery removed as well. Without this being present and charged the Helmsman won't function. I'm hoping I'm able to replace this with a rechargeable button cell if some description.

PhilC wrote: 07 May 2026 15:35 Ok, so it's had it's internal battery removed as well. Without this being present and charged the Helmsman won't function. I'm hoping I'm able to replace this with a rechargeable button cell if some description.

PXL_20260507_143306304.MP.jpg

Hmm, things are looking a bit crusty there...

@rubber_jonnie oh that's not too bad and I should be able to fit a rechargeable button cell in there.

What's slightly more annoying is that someone has removed the LCD display driver from the board. Fortunately you can still get them, it's a HD61830A00 Hitachi dot matrix liquid crystal graphic display controller.

As for the Hawk. Again it looks reasonable inside, so I've ordered a variable power supply for it. Its 6.5V DC annoyingly but the PSU will also come in handy for other stuff. Even more annoying is the fact I put my bench power supply in the loft the other day

rubber_jonnie wrote: 07 May 2026 15:43

PhilC wrote: 07 May 2026 15:35 Ok, so it's had it's internal battery removed as well. Without this being present and charged the Helmsman won't function. I'm hoping I'm able to replace this with a rechargeable button cell if some description.

PXL_20260507_143306304.MP.jpg

Hmm, things are looking a bit crusty there...

I heard that back in the day they had one at the manufacturers company HQ on display at the bottom of a fish tank full of piranhas as they were meant to be indestructible. How ironic that it was taken down from inside the case. :roll:

Ah well. Im sure @PhilC can unbreak it! :D

@mrbombermillzy I didn't really know anything about them before I'd bought them.

The Helmsman is very well made and id not be surprised to see it working whilst under water. The Hawk isn't so hard wearing though.

Apparently they are both powered by a low power Z80 chip, so should be interesting to mess about with once they are working. I've managed to get a couple of LCD chips from AliExpress for less than £11 shipped.

Just waiting on the PSU tomorrow and then we'll see if the hawk works. It looks to use 4x rechargeable AA batteries to power it, so won't be hard to get another battery for it.