If you grew up in the 1970's or 1980's then this is probably the first computer you ever
owned. Introduced in 1978 at the consumer electronics show, the original price tag was
$50. Adjusted for inflation, that would be around $173 in today's cash. And if you look
closely, you'll see it was actually made in the USA. So this was not just some cheap toy.
And if you don't believe this is an actual computer, then I challenge that because it
has a keyboard, it has a screen, it has a speech synthesizer and even a rom cartridge
slot for new games and vocabulary. It uses a vacuum fluorescent display. I love the retro-futuristic
look of the screen. Interestingly enough, my unit actually has 9 characters but only
8 are used. Where the original model had only 8 characters. The CPU is a TMS1000, which
was one of the first ever microprocessors. And believe it or not, its only a 4-bit CPU.
It's paired up with a TMC0280 speech synthesis chip, and 128K of ROM to hold the sample data.
Which works out to around 200 spoken words. It requires 3 C-cell batteries because the
CPU and display are both energy hogs. On the side it has a headphone jack and external
power connector. This product was so popular, it has been featured in dozens of movies and
TV shows, such as E.T. The Extra Terrestrial and even served as the inspiration for Mr.Spell
of the Toy Story movies. It also spawned several sibling devices, such as this Speak & Math,
for example. Alright, so let's take a look at some of the activities that you can actually
do on one of these Speak &Spells. The primary function is to help kids learn to spell. SPELL
CIRCUIT. C I R C U I T THAT IS CORRECT, NOW SPELL. Notice that the keyboard is in alphabetical
order and not the standard QWERTY layout used today. But, if you think about it, development
on this product started in 1976, long before the personal computer. Now they did have typewriters
back then, but I'm guessing the development team probably just didn't think that kids
needed to learn to type back then. My favorite game is basically a knock off of hangman.
It gives you some dashes and you start guessing letters. As you guess them, it will fill them
in. But, you only get a limited number of guesses. R N C G A YOU WIN. Another interesting
feature is the code word. Here, you can type in a word and it will scramble the word into
a secret code. Which, I suppose you could write down and give to one of your friends
at school. And when they get home, they can use their Speak & Spell to unscramble the
words. Believe it or not, a common use of the Speak & Spell today is by musicians who
have modified them to make interesting sounds for the music. This is referred to as circuit
bending and have been used by dozens of popular bands, such as Beck, for example. Its even
featured on the front cover of one of Depeche Mode's albums. The Speak & Math is designed
to ask you math problems and have you solve them. SOLVE IT LEVEL ONE. LEVEL TWO. 8 PLUS
92 IS WHAT? THAT'S RIGHT. It can also do greater than, less than questions. It can also pronounce
out a long number and have you type it in. WRITE IT LEVEL ONE. LEVEL THREE. ONE THOUSAND
THIRTY SIX THAT'S RIGHT. So here's the ultimate test. Let's find out how this product does
with today's kids. I handed it to my eleven-year-old daughter to have her try it out. I'll give
you the results at the end of the video. There are also some other versions of this device.
Such as the compact Speak & Spell, which lacks any sort of screen. And the Super Speak & Spell,
which finally moves to an LCD screen and a QWERTY keyboard layout, and the Speak & Read.
Also, the original version had raised keys. But most of the ones you'll find on sale,
for example on ebay, are probably going to have the membrane keyboard like mine. OK,
I promised I would tell you what my eleven-year-old had to say about these. She was too shy to
come on camera herself so basically she said they were fun for a few minutes and then after
10 minutes or so they got boring. I'm guessing if you were to go back to the 70's or 80's
when there was no iPods or computers, she might have had a little more than 10 minutes
of fun with it. Since I'm 38 years old, I don't get too much fun out of 'em, but I do
find them very interesting from a technological and historical perspective. I will tell you
this. I never had a Speak & Math. I bought this on ebay for like twenty bucks. And, It's
not actually very fun. The Speak & Spell is actually considerably more interesting to
play with. And you know, one of the more baffling things to me about the Speak & Math is that
it can't even act like a calculator. I mean, you would think with all of this technology
here they could have given you the option to also use it as a calculator. That could
make it at least somewhat useful. I was kind of hoping I could leave this on my desk at
work and use it as a calculator sometimes. People would probably give me some strange
looks about it, but I can't even do that! But anyway, I hope you enjoyed the video,
and I hope maybe you learned something interesting. And I'll see you again next time!