A beautiful, rare and impressive unit
made by Fidelity.
My unit speaks English.
Fidelity advertised it in a brochure as an OLD WORLD CRAFTMANSHIP!
The Decorator was released in 1981. It was essentially
commercialized in America.
The Decorator is sharing the same architecture and electronics than
the Grand Master Voice.
However, there are many differences between these two boards:
- the Grand Master Voice has a keyboard and display recovered by a
wooden plaque in the tone of the rest of the board. The
keyboard/display of the Decorator has a metallic aspect (similar to the
one of the Chess Challenger Voice).
- the Grand Master Voice has not the 4 carved legs of the Decorator.
- the Grand Master Voice is lighter than the Decorator: the frame of
the Decorator is more massive.
Conversely, the board of the Grand
Master Voice is closer to the aspect of wood than the Decorator.
Their similarities:
- both have 2 drawers for the Chessmen.
- both have a cable with 2 prongs to connect to the classical adapter
Fidelity 8.5VAC, 1.5A.
- both are equipped with a full Fidelity Chess Challenger Voice
Advanced. However, the Decorator has 12 KB of ROM (8KB in the Chess
Challenger Voice Advanced).
- the chessmen of the Decorator and Grand Master Voice are classical
Staunton made in France.
Finally, the size of the Decorator (28-1/2 x 23-1/3 x 4-3/4 inches)
is giving squares of 5.5cm. On this board, were attached the 4 legs
adding to the height of the board... A true piece of furniture!
The Decorator was coming too late... The ARB was not so far with its
Spracklen, Sargon 2.5 program, its board with 64 LEDs and its full
massive wood: twenty one inch square with a beautiful technology for
the period.
Still the Decorator and the Grand Master Voice stand beautifully in
this Gallery of Dedicated Chess Computers as the way the era of the
Dedicated Chess Computers was starting...
This one is particular by the borders not painted in
black: the borders have the natural color of the wood.
