Chip Talk: Projects in Speech Synthesis

Giving electronics a voice

Published in 1987, Dave Prochnow’s book approaches speech synthesis from the electronics experimenter’s bench, bringing together speech hardware, circuit diagrams, chip connections, and practical construction guidance.

Its appeal is the range of voices gathered between its covers. A contemporary hardware reference identifies coverage of the Votrax SC-01A, General Instrument SP0256-AL2 and CTS256A-AL2, National Semiconductor DT1050 Digitalker, Silicon Systems SSI-263, Texas Instruments TMS5110A, and Oki MSM5218RS, along with standalone speech systems.

A book for builders

The book’s emphasis is practical. Its schematics, pinouts, and construction hints make it a guide to experimenting with speech hardware rather than an extensive treatment of speech theory. For a collector, that gives it another kind of value: it documents how these components were presented to people who wanted to put them to work while the technology was still contemporary.

Its usefulness continues beyond the original generation of computers. In 2014, synthesizer builder Jean-Luc Deladrière consulted Chip Talk while connecting an SSI-263 to an Arduino. He noted that its SSI-263 discussion largely directed readers toward Steve Ciarcia’s earlier construction article, making the book a bridge to the wider literature of hobbyist speech synthesis.

Why it belongs in the museum

Books like Chip Talk preserve the invitation to experiment with them.

Viewed today, it offers a window into a time when giving a machine a voice meant choosing the hardware, the interface, and the computer—then discovering what they could say together. That makes it a fitting companion to the museum’s working chips, recordings, and talking machines.

Related reading

Steve Ciarcia’s Build a Third-Generation Phonetic Speech Synthesizer appeared in BYTE, March 1984, beginning on page 28. Ciarcia’s Circuit Cellar, Volume V collects projects from July 1983 through December 1984. Earlier speech projects are represented by Ciarcia’s Circuit Cellar, Volume III and Ciarcia’s Circuit Cellar, Volume IV.

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