Mysterious Philips CDI 450 red briefcase

[btbfilms76]

Hey gang, trying to solve a mystery here and I thought I'd bring it to the forum and try to figure it out. So today I was at Pixelvault games run by my friend Armando and he had the strangest item Ive seen in the store so far. This was a red plastic briefcase that held a CDI 450 and a track ball controller, along with the power cord that had a euro plug and some interactive game. The case was not amateur work, this was milled to spec and almost perfect. Here is the mystery - Why would anyone go to the trouble to do this for a CDI? Just kidding, not really but second, Could this have been what a salesman would have brought in to show off the system? What do you think something like this is worth?

 

Would love to hear your thoughts.

[RickR]

My guess would be that it was made for a specific piece of software for some specific purpose.  The key is to figure out what software used that controller. 

[TeddyGermany]

I guess, this was made for salesmen presentations. To use a toploader for that just makes sense. The CD on the photograph is certainly made for tourists, who wants to visit Eindhoven, a city in the Netherlands.  Maybe this briefcase was an equipment of a software salesman, who had presented his software at customer's shops or offices. E.g. there was a CDi-program for driving schools, which was available until 2009.

[Atari 5200 Guy]

Just a guess but others have already probably suggested what I am about to mention.  The CDI was similar, and more popular, than the VIS system I have.  And more portable apparently.  It would have made a great information system on the go.  So I would speculate that the system in question was used to pinpoint areas of interest for tourists.  The trackball was most likely used as a computer mouse to point and click on areas of interest.  The system could then give more information and show images for areas of interest.

 

The NTSC version of the same system in the red case can fetch high amounts in the $150 ~ $200 range.  It's a rare system.  And to see this one that looks to have been kept in mint condition thanks to the red case I would expect to only add to the value.  While it had some games here in the U.S. it was really sold more as an educational and informational system, similar to the VIS I have.  I still remember the late night commercials on TV trying to sell the Philips CDI for $500 bundled with some software.  It's a rare breed of a system similar to the VIS but, as I have learned, the interest might be only for the most serious of game system collectors.