Coleco Telstar PONG Clone (6040)

The Coleco Telstar was released in June of 1976 for $49.99 USD, barely. Coleco had not gotten the Telstar to pass it's initial FCC approval. Given one week to fix the problem, Coleco needed a way to block the signal from interfering with important equipment. The shield came in a form of a ferrite ring that had gotten the signals within acceptable limits. In the Christmas season of 1977, nine new designs of the Telstar were released, each of them doing virtually the same thing. It was labeled "Video Sports" with four different games, all of them PONG clones. During it's lifespan, Coleco had produced about nine different variations of thier machine and tossed about one million 'obsolete' machines. One interesting feature is that the RF cord which is permanately attached (similar to the cord found attached on the Atari 2600) can be stored inside the system by feeding it back through the hole it protrudes out of. The unit takes 6 C batteries and can be ran off of Coleco's Perma Power Battery Eliminator (#2298). The games on the Telstar include Tennis, Hockey, and Handball.

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The back of the Telstar unit showing power input and the RF output (dangling cord)