FAIRCHILD CHANNEL F

The 'Fairchild Channel F' is the world's second cartridge-based video game console, after the Magnavox Odyssey (although it was the first programmable cartridge system as the Odyssey cartridges only contained jumpers and not ROM information). It was released by Fairchild Semiconductor (though ostensibly by their parent company) in August 1976 at the retail price of $169.95. At this point it was known as the 'Video Entertainment System', or 'VES', but when Atari released their VCS the next year, Fairchild quickly renamed it.

Contents

The Channel F console

Channel F games

Market impact

The Channel F System II

Technical specifications

References

See also

External links

The Channel F console

The Channel F was based on the Fairchild F8 CPU, invented by Robert Noyce before he left Fairchild to start his own company, Intel. The F8 was very complex compared to the typical integrated circuits of the day, and had more inputs and outputs than other contemporary chips. Because chip packaging was not available with enough pins, the F8 was instead fabricated as a pair of chips that had to be used together to form a complete CPU. The video was quite basic, although it was in color which was a large step forward from the contemporary Pong machines. Sound was played through an internal speaker, rather than the TV set.
The controllers were a kind of joystick without a base; the main body was a large hand grip with a triangular "cap" on top, the top being the portion that actually moved. It could be used as both a joystick and paddle (twist), and not only pushed down to operate as a fire button but also pulled up. The unit contained a small compartment for storing the controllers when moving it: this was useful because the wiring was notoriously flimsy and even normal movement could break it.

Channel F games

Despite its initial popularity, only 26 cartridges were released for the system (though some cartridges contained more than one game), typically priced at $19.95. Cartridges for the system were large and yellow, and usually featured colorful label artwork reminiscent of the artist Peter Max. The console contained two built-in games: a Pong clone and Hockey. Hockey was a more complex form of Pong, where the reflecting bar could be changed to diagonals by twisting the controller, and could move forward and backward.
"Dodge It" consisted of a randomly-sized playing field (a rectangle or square) with an increasing number of bricks of a size set for each level, which came out of the wall and bounced around the field. The speed of the bricks was set randomly for each level, and the size of the player's brick (which needed to be moved to avoid impact with the other bricks) was also randomly set per level. Rarely, two computer-controlled bricks would collide, forming a noisy and unstable-seeming "monster brick" that would go to the wall and work its way around it. "Sonar Search" was similar to the game "Battleship". In the game, hidden ships had to be exposed and sunk with sonar pulses. The game supported more than one player, and was popular as a family game, since it had a gamer-controlled pace and fairly simple action, yet contained the challenge of finding the invisible ships. "Maze" / "Cat and Mouse") was another rather simple title. In "Maze", a player simply had to navigate a complicated maze, but in "Cat and Mouse", the player's brick was a mouse which had to not only successfully navigate the maze, but also had to avoid the cat brick. The mail-order Zircon game, "Alien Invasion", which was released after the Channel F was sold by its parent company, was a clone of the game "Space Invaders", and is possibly the most complicated game for the console.
Reviewers often failed to understand the appeal of the Fairchild at the time it was released, because their perspective is swayed by the better quality of the games offered later by systems like the Atari VCS/2600. The Fairchild doesn't stand up well against these later systems, but was respectable when it was the only programmable cartridge-based system on the market. If Atari had not released its 2600 system, it's likely that the Fairchild console's games would have benefited from continuing improvements.

Market impact

The biggest effect of the Channel F in the market was to spur Atari into releasing and improving their next-generation console which was then in development. Then codenamed "Stella," the machine was also going to use cartridges, and after seeing the Channel F they realized they needed to release it before the market was flooded with cartridge based-machines. With cash flow dwindling as sales of their existing Pong-based systems dried up, they were forced to sell to Warner Communications in order to gain the capital they needed. When the Atari VCS gaming system (whose name was coined as a takeoff of the VES) was released a year later, it had considerably better graphics and sound.

The Channel F System II

Fairchild decided to compete with the VCS, and began a console re-design as the 'Channel F System II'. The major changes were in design, with the controllers removable from the base unit instead of being wired directly into it, the storage compartment was moved to the rear of the unit, and the sound was now mixed into the TV signal so the unit no longer needed a speaker. This version featured a simpler and more modern-looking case design. However by this time the market was in the midst of the first video game crash, and Fairchild eventually threw in the towel, and left the market.
Some time in 1979 Zircon International bought the rights to the Channel F and released the 'Channel F System II'. Only six new games were released after the release of the second system before its death, several of which were developed at Fairchild before they sold it off.
A number of licensed versions were released in Europe, including the 'Luxor Video Entertainment System' in Sweden, 'Adman Grandstand' in the UK, and the 'Saba Videoplay', 'Nordmende Teleplay' and 'ITT Tele-Match Processor', from Germany.

Technical specifications

★ CPU chip: Fairchild F8 operating at 1.79 MHz

★ RAM: 64 bytes, 2 KiB VRAM (2×128×64 bits)

★ Resolution: 128 × 64 pixels, 102 × 58 pixels visible

★ Colors: eight colors (either black/white or four color max. per line)

★ Audio: 500 Hz, 1 kHz, and 1.5 kHz tones (can be modulated quickly to produce different tones)

★ Input: two custom game controllers, hardwired to the console

★ Output: RF modulated composite video signal, cord hardwired to console

References

See also

★ TV POWWW (interactive TV game show that used Channel F)

External links

★ Fairchild Channel F at OLD-COMPUTERS.COM

★ Channel F FAQ from rec.games.video.classic

★ History of the companies behind the Channel F @ Link Cable of Time

★ The MESS Project (with Channel F emulation)

★ The Dot Eaters article with a history of the Channel F and games

★ VESwiki make your own software for the Channel F

★ See a JC Penney television commercial for the Fairchild Channel F