Blow my mindstorm

I managed to find time for a second build this evening which was fewer bricks than I expected... the mindstorms "droid developer" (9748) from way back in 1999.  This must have been one of the very first Star Wars tie-ins for Lego.  

I have to say that this was a complete surprise to me when I found it while browsing Rebrickable and I had missed this and its bad twin from my list of Lego Star Wars.  So I got hunting on Ebay and picked up this very much second hand set.  There are a number of quite rare parts in here, including the technic R2 head pieces.  However, at the heart of it, is a mindstorms control block, which unfortunately is a bit temperamental so I've not been able to get it to do much more than beep a bit.  

I've only built the R2 model but the book has two more builds in it - remembering back to my 1990s Lego technic, this was pretty common with multiple builds documented with the one set of bricks.  Here's a photo:

I've got lots of spare parts!

I can't help but compare this to two other sets.  Firstly, there is the 2002 technic R2-D2 (8009) which, despite the lack of the specific headpiece that you get here, is otherwise a much more satisfying model (the series of technic characters has some really cool sets, with my favourite being the tan battle droid).  

Also, there is the modern equivalent Droid Commander (75253) which also has an R2 unit in it and is actually remarkably similar in idea.  However, with much more modern tech, it makes this one seem quite outdated.

It's really hard to put myself back 22 years and think what this would have been like for someone at the time - probably pretty cool.  Sadly, it's dated...