Lets take a trip down memory lane to back to 1976 - 1977 . 

What an absolutely fantastic video. You're an example to us all Michael.

The end of this video is so genuinely touching. You recreated the whole project, and then recreated the whole cover photo. And Mrs Stanfield looked very focused in the game.

Great package of electronics, nostalgia, graphics and the recreation of the magazine cover! What a treat.

i remember building this exact same thing at school . happy times

all that effort into correcting /decoupling issues - then fix the telly with a good old fashioned bit of impact maintenance - loved it

I really enjoyed your trip down memory lane and the front page reenactment - it turned out great . Takes me back to the days of religiously buying Practical Wireless, Electronics and Practical Television, most have my copies long gone now. 10 years older than you Michael, now retired but still like to keep my hand in and keep abreast of modern tech, I look forward to your videos, keep them coming ! Cheers .

nice work mate

Made me smile.

Oh my goodness, those were the days. Can you imagine what we would have thought way back then if we were handed a fully activated iPhone 14? Awesome video

What a fantastic video Michael, I am 5 years older than yourself but watching this video reminded me of myself as I had that ETI book with many others like that. as a 12 year old I was always in a shop in Liverpool called Super Radio buying lots of components and valves to build stuff at home like amplifiers transmitters and a disco system using a push pull pair of 807 valves in the output stage, I did all our school end of term discos and any others I could do taking all the kit about with my Dad in his Mini. You have given me so much enthusiasm to re-visit it all again so I have found all my components that I had kept from those days and have been to Ikea to buy some drawer units and a large worktop so I have built new workshop in our spare room at home, so at this moment sitting on the bench is a signal generator, a variable power supply, spectrum analyser, frequency counter and an oscilloscope also lots of component storage drawers. You have with your videos and great enthusiasm sparked me off again ,Happy Christmas to you and all the family keep up the good work ***** Regards Dave Fletcher.

This was one of the most enjoyable videos I have seen in a very long time. We thought back then this was fantastic, how things have changed. Merry Christmas to you and Mrs Dranfield. And love to see more videos like the in the new year.

Ah, I remember doing hand drawn PCBs as a kid too. Our electronics teacher at school always told us to "colour in" any open spaces on the board to make super wide tracks or ground planes. I think they were more interested in reducing acid usage though. ;-)

This is brilliant, you built a very nice looking machine there and good quality too, thank you for sharing.

Hello Michael from Melbourne Australia are used to work for NEC in the 80s did you know Rank Arena was in actual fact and NEC TV I remember those 70s ETI circuit books I had as a 1617-year-old kid noticed the Australian price on regards Mike PS keep up the good videos

Absolutely brilliant Michael. All the best!!

Love it - I made one of these in the 1980's, it had an Astec modulator. Hours of fun. It was in the same style of case. Not as good as your graphics MD

Really fun video Michael, very nostalgic and interesting, love the way you knocked up the paddles out of surplus clutter 😂

I was 5 in 1976 haha..I got a belt from the teacher on my first week and til they outlawed corporal punishment around 1982 here in New Zealand I received many others from teachers and principal, but...I turned out alright 😆..great video Michael

I confess I got a bit misty-eyed at this, Michael. Thank you for sharing the work. Wonderful trip down memory lane. Don't forget the dry joint fix in the TV, now. :^)

Certainly brings back happy memories, I got a bright orange Binatone for Christmas 1976, it was amazing back then to have one of the first video games, it got so much use that it burnt the screen on my 1960;s dual standard Ferguson personal TV! I still have it, and it still works after 46 years, the only replacement parts were the pots in the paddles, it was later used as a pattern generator in my early TV repair days.

What a great video,real good watch. Merry Christmas to you and your family.

Nice one. I have that chip somewhere. I bought it back in the '70s intending to make up a similar project. I did assemble the project on a prototyping board, played around with it for a while, got bored, and never completed it. I have many ETI books including that one, and Top Projects as well. Also 100s of the actual magazine. Many people don't realize that ETI began here in Australia as Electronics Today, but soon branched out to other countries, becoming Electronics Today International. I have some of the early issues, when it was Australian only. I've built many projects from the magazine and books, but have found that they usually require some modifications to get them to work satisfactorily. 😊

Great video which started my grey matter, I've still got that magazine, saw it in the summer when clearing out my garage....and yes found it :). I think I built the sound to light project in that edition. I also built a 'tele tennis' but cant remember which magazine it was from may be Everyday Electronics, ETI, PW etc. It a UHF module. Happy days. Keep up the excellent work. Thank you for the memory.

Great video thanks, I watch each and every one of your videos and especially enjoy the trips down memory lane. I started my TV apprenticeship at 16 (1973) so have a few years on your good self, left the trade at 21 (Argos had started selling a portable TV for arouind £59 and a VCR for £99 so the writing was on the wall) to work for ITV then at 25 started my own business repairing coin operated video games, strange how so many people I know got a good electronics grounding in the trade then moved to all different careers as repairing TVs etc became a dying art. Although now retired I still like to keep my hand in. Keep up the great work and a very merry Christmas.

Man, what I'd give to be able to spend some time with you and your huge passion for all things electronics. You would have a really difficult job to try and find another Michael Dranfield out there, if any. Have a great Christmas to you and your family Michael, from all my family in Galway, West Ireland 🇮🇪🎄

Love the build, Them AY-3 chips were a box of magic, the 80s would not be the same without the AY-3-8910.

This is so good on many levels thankou. There is something comforting about covers on electronics magazines from these times. I remember an earlier one a drawing of a valve project on a table with a smoking soldering iron and a warm mug of ttea

Fantastic project Mr Michael...!!! 👏👏👏👏

This video really touched to me. I remember my young age, when I built this game as well. Thank you and Merry Christmas.

Fantastic, brings back great memories of building electronic projects. I used to get most of mine from the Maplin magazine. I started of with simple things like a voice operated switch and eventually moved on to a NOAA weather satellite receiver, decoder & frame-store. The great thing with Maplin projects was you could get all the components from Maplin, very convenient for Maplin 😊.I’ve made many many PCBs over the years, started off drawing them like you and then moved onto printing them onto a special film using a Laser printer, the film was then ironed onto the copper clad board. Then once you removed the film you were left with the track layout, then you just washed the board in Ferric Chloride and you ended up with really professional looking boards. Of course now you can send off a design to China and get a multi layer board, not as much fun as making your own though. Thanks for the great videos, Happy Christmas to you both.

You are an inspiration I love your videos and Someone with so much passion for electronics at component level

Fascinating build. Great fun to watch.

Actually this video is much more interesting than it appeared by its present title. I think you should rename it like, for example: "Building one of the first gaming consoles from scratch from a 1976 project" to achive more views.

Another really interesting video Michael. Your vids are relaxing to watch, and a nice change from the usual information overload. I like the way you also greet your female viewers. Your loft is tidier than mine! I had a bench up there, but the loft is too hot in summer, too cold in winter. There are long forgotten projects under the tangled mound on my bench. So I envy your relative lack of clutter. I have never thrown anything away hobby-wise, so I still have that eti circuits book, and all the ETI magazines, Elektors, PW from 1963 onwards, PE, PTV, WW and so on. I wonder if you remember the Ambit catalogue of the mid 70's which had a lot of useful information in it? Anyway sorry for the waffle. I wish you and Mrs Dranfield a very happy Christmas, and I look forward to seeing more videos in future.

What a brilliant recreation. Thanks for the video and I hope you and your family have a lovely Christmas!

That, Michael has got to be one of your best videos. I remember building the 20W slave amplifier too, from scrap television parts mostly, around 1981. What are the chances of that happening? Our local TV repair shop often had several non-viable sets behind their premises for the taking. I even repaired a few to make some cash. The mains transformer was an old vertical output type from a valve set which, when regulated, did the job and worked well. I used an aluminium box and built the entire circuit on Veroboard. It actually sounded quite good. I also had fun with DX TV for a while - receiving French TV on the UK south coast and having to reverse the modulation detector diode... happy days! The magazines of the day were very inspiring: ETI (as you showed and one of the better publications), Everyday Electronics, Practical Electronics and Elektor (Elektuur in the Netherlands). I am four years older and have been delightfully transported back in time thanks to you. Who said time travel wasn't possible? As you said you have the original articles of ETI, would you know please what the original recommended supply for the Slave Amp was? I seem to remember it was around 25-30V (single rail). It was building projects like those that inspired me to start a career in electronics. Great video! Steve in Dorset

I remember having a console that had this game on...when i got fed up of playing it i built a infrared remote paddle for it and the family enjoyed not having to sit on floor to play..Merry xmas..Phil..

Another extremely interesting video - thank you for sharing it with us. Even dating from 1976 the workings of the game itself looks so simple in terms of its circuitry. The retro game you made is excellent - you should start making them commercially as there is a big market for that type of game today.... Merry Christmas to you and Mrs Dranfield.

This must be the project you mentioned a few weeks ago. Great recreation of the front cover, Michael. Interestingly a few mods were needed to get it stable.

18:20 If you and your wife swapped places, then it was identical like on the front page of that magazine 🙂 Nice project and with quality builded.

I presume you already had the chip? I remember wanting one of these in about 1976. They were very expensive. I finally got one in 1978 in America, we were on a big road trip and i remember connecting to every motel we went to. It did still work on out TV back in New Zealand despite the different number of lines.

Hi Michael I built one of these tv tennis games from a circuit in practical wireless (I think). Still got the photod. Absolutely full of "descrete" ics

Absolutely wonderful stuff Michael, your attention to detail is brilliant. Great video. A very merry Christmas to you and yours.

I remember that PE mag!! I had it with all my others in binders, but I had to get rid of them all after I left home :( . I never built the game though. Now I collect car, computer and astronomy magazines!

This is awesome.

I had a working Thorn 1400 dual standard "buzz box" given to me when I was an apprentice at D|E|R in 1983. I kept it for quite a few years. I can't remember what happened to it. Wish I'd kept it. I think it had a wooden cabinet and looked quite nice. The pong machine you built was quite nifty. I liked the fact that you built the regulated power supply from the ETI magazine too. Happy Christmas to you and yours. 🌲🌲🌲

Heh...we're the same age. But the Spirit of Radio Electronics took me as her own in 1985...I bought someone's project a couple of years ago, a 1952 PW Mini-Four. It's mostly restored.

WOW! You just caused my brain to race back into my memory of childhood at or around "18:26" and further. I played this at my grandparents house.

That was fascinating to watch and with experience you even improved the original design. I think I have that very magazine in my collection too. I used to make my own pcbs the same way. The days when you could post ferric chloride ! Merry Christmas !

Definitely built one of those but my memory is failing (probably magnetic core) so can't remember what became of it. Retro games still being played by many. "I don't have an oscilloscope in the loft", life's a bitch, ho, ho.

Awesome little project Michael, i remember taking one of the commercial manufactured games of the same kind apart and using it to flash lights and make the beeping sounds in a primary school project back in the 70's ✌👍

Wow takes me back Michael very impressive. I had this game on early Apple computer software rather than hardware Wondered how you etch the çct board. Thank you

Great video Michael, I have ETI circuit 2 in my hand right now. £1.50 March 78. I built a lot from it too and brought it to Australia when we moved from uk 32 yrs ago. It has mostly transistors and moving on to 741s and 555 projects. They came out with a 3 or 4 later but never used it as much as 2. Would be interesting to see how many viewers remember these excellent magazines .

That was an excellent video. Very much enjoyed it. I have been building circuits from magazines since the early 1980's off and on. With the archives now available at the World Radio History website, I have enough projects to last me the rest of my life. Plan on building an electronic Tic Tac Toe over the Christmas Holiday. Just received the final parts for the project in the mail this morning. That circuit was in the November/December 1978 issue of Elementary Electronics. Plan on building the capacitor tester in the same issue named "Count Capacita" next month some time.

that same chip was used in alot of pong /tennis machines in the day ,and were probably sold by the bucket load a ay-3-8500,had some other functions which i cant remember right now but still really simple and interesting

I made a similar one that was published in TV magazine. I remember I had so much trouble getting a steady picture, I didn't make the pcb though as you could order all the parts as a kit. great vid!

How many more AY-38500's have do you have? Those are a very rare chip these days. GREAT time warp video thanks Michael. I've got that magazine, and others from my youth. Cheers Pete' New Zealand.

Great project, thanks for the interesting video and Merry Christmas! Michael, could you tell please, how did you do those writings on the heatsink of that 20W amplifier? I've also seen writings made by same technology on many of component storage cells along the walls of your workshop.

I enjoyed this video and have been looking for a game like this to incorporate into a CRT display I have, I did a search for the IC and found a few available (I could use the 625 or 525 version) but I'm wary of fake or faulty components, do you know of a reliable source ?

Hi Michael, I would be interested in knowing how you made a copy of the games PCB. It looks like you transferred it from the magazine article - perhaps using a photocopier? Because there is a strip line on the board, I assume keeping dimensions are important. On the question of striplines, I never understood them, so if you want to do a RU-vid video on them - that would be great. Finally, where did you get the chip from; can you still get them today? Thanks again for a great video.

An *NTE107* is a replacement for the *2N3663* .

Took so little to entertain children in the 70’s …🇬🇧👍🏻

How much expensive was at the time to build this console? Because I seem to remember that the first gaming consoles of this type were quite expensive to buy.

I have to ask, where did you obtain the GI AY-3-8500 pong chip from?