V-tech Alphabet Desk

iqoruvuc · March 28, 2007, 06:18:15 PM

I recently found one of these in a carboot sale. There are schematics on the sailormouth site though the circuit board on mine was different. Anyway I fried mine; it only cosy me a few pence and I was not that bowled over by what I found so I wasn't very careful. Apart from a couple of distortions (which made the voice quite funny) most of the bends just caused it to re-trigger sounds really fast, although there were two glitches which were funny too, although they produced the same results each time.

Here is a board scan with some points marker penned on, although a couple won't do anything at all since I was also marking where certain components were. Basically you need to use (+) connection for the speaker and connect it to any of the solderpoints marked in black. The two crosses are glitches.

Signal:Noise · March 28, 2007, 10:31:21 PM

Hmm, i bent a vetech letter fun pc recently and that was amazing, seriously wierd noises and drones.

ne7 · March 29, 2007, 10:55:47 PM

i bent one of these - they are AMAZING

- just bring the battery power down a bit with a 1k pot and u have some super crashes hehe and weird loops... also if u ever think u have fried it - remove the resistor in the plastic shielding (just bypass it) and it'll work fine again heh

iqoruvuc · March 30, 2007, 09:08:07 AM

Hi - I replaced the resistor all certain that I hadn't fried it but it didn't work again. I was using a DC power supply and turning the voltage down didn't do anything exciting, however a 1K pot may have created better results but I never got that far before I broke it

Did you have the same version as this? If you have a look on the squarewave website he appears to have bent the a desk that sounded like the one I had http://thesquarewaveparade.com/litphabet-dek.html

It only cost me 50p, had no battery cover, so I was abit heavy-handed with it! I have another one anyway, so I will open that one up and see I have any more luck.

ne7 · March 31, 2007, 08:54:55 AM

ah

my one is read and says "little phonics" under the alphabet desk writing...
hrm - have you tried shifting the + connector from the battery around the board? i found this worked on another vtech machine that blew up

iqoruvuc · March 31, 2007, 03:34:54 PM

I opened up the other alphabet desk I have last night and had a play-around inside. Bizarrely the circuit borad is exactly the same but it behaves completely different.

Some of the bends that worked on the other one have absolutely no effect whatsoever, I can't get the same excorcist-like distortion the other one did, this one glitches much more, and hardly does the trigger-repeat thing which was pretty much all my other on did. I have only tried connecting points from the speakers (+) side so far, but I am surprised it behaves so differently. Also doesn't seem to respond to power crash either. Strange.

damientheomen · April 02, 2007, 06:11:14 PM

One of my first bendz and probably one of the most minamilist.

I only managed to find one bend but it's really good. It's just spewz forwardz a mix of letterz, numberz and soundz like a bat outta hell.

Meatloaf would be proud.

iqoruvuc · April 03, 2007, 08:52:03 AM

yes this does that too

Signal:Noise · April 03, 2007, 03:01:17 PM

My g/f's just bought a little smart alphabet desk for me to mod, by the sounds of it, it''ll be a beast.

Signal:Noise · April 03, 2007, 09:13:37 PM

I got bored, I wired up my little smart letter fun pc (which i'm guessing is pretty close to teh alphabet desk) to my rx17.

here's what it sounds like

http://www.soundclick.com/bands/songInfo.cfm?bandID=549081&songID=5191312

AttDestroyers · April 04, 2007, 03:28:27 AM

that's awesome, I like it! My Vtech "talking whiz kid plus" sounds very similar.

mcguinty · April 15, 2007, 06:07:30 AM

I actually got the same one. It even has the same serial number. I have messed around for a long time in but I can only get cycles of noises already on it. how do I get the great distortions I that guy made. This is actually the first time I have circuit bent so don't flame.

Circuitbenders · April 15, 2007, 04:39:11 PM

Quote from: mcguinty on April 15, 2007, 06:07:30 AM
This is actually the first time I have circuit bent so don't flame.

Anyone getting involved in flame wars on this board will suddenly find themselves without an account.

iqoruvuc · April 16, 2007, 07:01:31 PM

QuoteI have messed around for a long time in but I can only get cycles of noises already on it. how do I get the great distortions I that guy made.

Are talking about the alphabet desk? I only cycles on mine and a few glitches nothing as interesting as V-tech PC

Signal:Noise · April 16, 2007, 08:10:13 PM

Yeah, I#m quite dissapointed with teh alphabet desk, only a couple of useable bends.