Soundblaster Parrot 1

[bdjb]

Hello All,
A complete shot in the dark, but with all of these smart IT people, there should be a few packrats as well. Quite a few years ago, the original soundblaster cards came with a program called Parrot, that basically repeated anything that was said into the microphone onscreen by an animated parrot.

Does anyone have a copy of this, or know of something similar?

Thanks a bunch!
Bob

 

[BuckeyeComputers]

I remember a parrot but i think it was one of the first versions of bonzi-buddy

 

[bdjb]

Thanks BuckeyComputers,
It was software that came with the Soundblaster card, but not Bonzi Buddy. Are you from Ohio? (Buckeye).

Bob

 

[BuckeyeComputers]

yes

 

[bdjb]

Same here, in the Cleveland area. Finally some nice weather!

 

[BuckeyeComputers]

ok found what you was talking about but havnt found where to get it yet...
Prody Parrot (a fun voice recognition software in the form of a parrot)
still looking though
and im on the southern end of the state along the river

 

[bdjb]

Thanks a lot,
I really appreciate your help. You've had nicer weather for a while then. I'm right on Lake Erie (Currently about 50 yards from it where I work).
Bob

 

[BuckeyeComputers]

yes weather hasnt been bad at all...storms seem to always go north or south of us

 

[Dreamland]

Buckeye - you're almost there, but you still have a few years to go back. Prody Parrot was this lame desktop assistant thing that came with the SoundBlaster Live card. Kind of like a more irritating Clipit, if you can believe it.

BonzaiBuddy that bdjb mentioned was famous first-generation spyware of yesteryear. Usually manifested itself as a friendly purple gorilla that helped kids install it on their machine after they visited the site. Some incarnations were reported to be a talking parrot verison.

bdjb - you're talking about the fantastic talkig parrot that came with the ooold 8-bit SoundBlaster and SoundBlaster Pro cards. It never had a name - everyone just called it the talking parrot. Single DOS executable - PARROT.EXE - that displayed a slighly insane looking cartoonish parrot. It would repeat anything you said into the mic in it's own squawky voice. It would laugh when you hit some keys (like it was being tickled) and would squawk something like "Stop touching me!" if you hit other keys.

It was written in Pascal by Dave Norris - I believe he worked for CTM in Melbourne. No idea why I remember *this* of all bizzare things - I'm never even entirely sure what day of the week it is. I think we were trying to disassemble it at the time to... er, toss in a few more amusing comments.

Sorry - no idea where it could be found. You need the two or three orange and blue Creative install floppies. If you happen to find one, be sure to get the Dr. Sabaito thing too. Remember? You would speak to him (it?) and it would convert your speech to text and kind of respond with another leading question like you were talking to a shrink. Text only DOS app. It was fun when you got tired of the parrot.

 

[bdjb]

Hi Dreamland,
You're right, it is the really old parrot that I am looking for, not any of the "assistants", but just the toy.

Thanks,
Bob

 

[bdjb]

Hello All,
Thanks again Dreamland, due to your naming the actual file "parrot.exe", I did a search, and found the files! Who would have thought someone had all of the original files on a web server?

If anyone is interested, here is the link:

http://home.unlimit.com/downloads/drivers/SoundCard/SBPRO/PARROT/

Bob

 

[Dreamland]

Sweeeeeet! I blame my entire compter career on this stupid program. Now why on earth were you looking for the Talking Parrot to begin with?

(You're not with some kind of nutty doomsday cult, are you? )

 

[bdjb]

Hi Dreamland,
I actually have 2 small kids, and wanted it for them to play with. Now I just have to get the program to work under XP!

Seeing this program started you on the Dark Path to computers?

Bob

 

[Dreamland]

Bob,

Your kids will love it - my neice and nephew use to play with it for hours when they were little. Drove me nuts! I had to have a chat with Dr. Sabaito after they left.

Don't bother trying to get it to work under XP - the parrot is much too powerful! I downloaded it and didn't have any luck. After hours of looking for DOS drivers for my sound card (Audigy), I gave up and just loaded some old SoundBlaster ones on a bootable DOS disk. No idea why, but it worked! I don't think I've ever booted this machine with a floppy before.

Now imagine me looking at this insane parrot at 3:30 AM on the university lab's XT and trying to choose between it and a boring management accounting Lotus 1-2-3 spreadsheet due the next morning. Score: Polly 1, Beancounting 0. But I can still do my own taxes pretty darn fast.

 

[bdjb]

Thanks Dreamland,
I'll have to make up a boot disk to use then... every time I tried to run it under XP, it locked at the first screen.

My wife will most likely kill me after the first day the kids play with it

Bob

 

[bdjb]

Hey Dreamland,
It's been so long since I had to mess with sound drivers on a boot disk, I'm drawing a blank. Would you email a zip of your boot floppy? (There's a star in it for you!)

Thanks,
Bob

Robert.Payne@dfas.mil

 

[edemiere]

Hehe, the parrot was ok, but you know what REALLY rocked?

DR. SBAITSO!

Yep, it's time for a walk down memory lane...

Cheers!

 

[bdjb]

Hi Edemiere,
You can get Dr Sbaitso at the site too!

Bob

 

[edemiere]

I still have it and I still have it installed somewhere on my LAN in my basement. Just haven't turned that PC on in a while, I may track it down this weekend and mess around with it...

Cheers!

 

[Dreamland]

Bob - what kind of sound card do you have? I can put the right set of DOS drivers on it for you if I can find them.