Can you identify this mysterious box of mine? I think it may be a prop.

coder

New Member
Hello everyone! My brother, who is a member here, sent me to this forum after I asked him about a recent eBay purchase I made. He said if anyone can shed light on what I have, it's you fine folks. I enjoy vintage computing and this was listed as a vintage computer. The seller did their best to describe it and I knew it was possible that it wasn't actually a computer. It came today and after taking a peek inside it's definitely not a computer but instead, a mystery. It looks too well constructed to be someone's hobby project. Although I admit it's a possibility, as this forum definitively proves. It also seems to be genuinely old. Everything from the finish of the exterior, to the components that make up it's electronics, appear to be vintage.

The electronics are simple, consisting of just capacitors, resistors, lights, a potentiometer, a switch, and a power cord. No ICs or logic whatsoever. It's designed to randomly flash it's lights, which it does. The front panel says "Portable 7080 Computer" and has a nuclear symbol in the center. Each light has a label, but most don't mean anything to me. From top left to bottom right, they read CM, BT (I think, this one's mostly rubbed off), BK, CH, BB, TILT, BA?, and CA. TILT and BA? are interesting, but they just flash randomly like the others.

Does any of this mean anything to anyone? Does this look like a prop to you? Any thoughts on where from? I'd like to find out more about it!

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Looks 60s. And genuinely 60s, not retro-60s, given the old electrical plug. Are the electronic components vintage?
wild stab: the original Mission: Impossible. Star Trek had similar nonsense labeling on some of its computer props, and the productions had a bit of overlap in their art departments.
 

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