Through my searching at Second Hand shops, looking for obscure consoles and computers, i snagged this thing for around $7 CAD. I have absolutely no idea what it is, nor what it can do. now, I'm fairly certain that it's not a game console, but it certainly falls into the realm of Obscure Computing. I'm hoping at least one of you guys knows what this thing is. If this is not allowed here for whatever reason, most likely this not being an actual game console, as far to my knowledge, I’ll remove it. In my honest opinion, it looks like a VCD Player, but a VCD Player would not have some of the ports on the back of the console that this thing has. I searched through google for answers but found nothing of value. This place being the home of the obscure, I figured someone here could provide some insight into this machine. VideoFax VF-3000 Front Side Here you can see Several Buttons (In Order of appearance): Red Coloured Power Button Clear Button. Not sure of use. Button that selects between Colour and Mono output? Blue Start Button Freeze Button. Not sure of use. Also pictured is a Card slot, which made me think it was a VCD player, but that was thrown out the window when i looked at the back of it. VideoFax VF-3000 Back Side Here you can see the back side of the unit. I'm fairly certain no VCD player has all this on it's backside. Lets take a closer look at these. Here you can see the Serial Number, the AC Input Slot ( Yeah, this thing takes AC Direct Input) and a 250V (Model 2A) Direct Fuse. Lets add to the confusion. We got 2 Video Monitor Jacks, an RS232C Network Port, a 20 Pin Proprietary RGB Monitor Port, and what my best guess is a PI/O Port for a keyboard, or some other peripheral. The port is Label Parallel Cont, but does not support Standard Parallel Cables. Moving on, There More Video Input. For how old this thing is, it sure has a lot of video output options. Those looks like Proprietary Video IN/OUT. Not sure what the R G B Holes are for. Could be indicators of some sort. There's a 52/53 Pin Floppy Disk Port, which most likely used it's own proprietary Floppy Disk Unit. Next to it we have a row of Dip Switches. Not sure on their purpose. Beside that is a toggle for Phone/Fax, with Line and Phone in ports. VideoFax VF-3000 Underside A look at the underside provides nothing of value. I have no pictures of the insides of the device. I have yet to open it. I’ve been pretty sick the past few days so once I feel better, I’m going to pry it open and take a look at it's insides. At this point, i can only speculate on what it's for and how it's used. Anyone have any ideas?
Probably some old pc that looks like it was a old expensive computer from the mid 80s. It even has a virtually unknown propritary format! That just screams obscure.
RS232C: is just a serial port (could have been used for networking over serial I suppose) PANEL CONT: (not parallel)so maybe a keypad type of device was connected to this that had the same buttons/functions as the front panel buttons. RGB MONITOR: Looks to be like a SCART Video port, was popular over seas. R. G. B. : Looks to be standard adjuster for red green blue using a phillips screw driver. FDD: possibly an external SCSI Floppy Disk Drive/Optical Drive, looks like the old 50 pin SCSI. Overall, looks to be a device that accepted incoming faxes, instead of printing them on paper they would be saved, then the user could scroll through them on the monitor that was connected to it. Connect a phone line to FAX and a video source to a monitor/video OUT and send a test fax!
