2 Feb
2025
2 Feb
'25
8:31 p.m.
Didn't the original TRS-80 have a kind of screw up, where the tape and
display connector were the same?
Actually, years later the Atari Lynx had a similar mishap - the power
charger and headphone jack port look identical? (something like that, and
would cause damage if used incorrectly)
Steve
On Sun, Feb 2, 2025 at 6:53 PM Robert Feldman via cctalk <
cctalk(a)classiccmp.org> wrote:
My vote for the worst connector screw-up is the AT&T (Olivetti) 6300. Its
monochrome monitor used a DB25 to supply both the signals and 12 volts to
power the monitor.
Bob
Message: 31
Date: Sun, 2 Feb 2025 07:29:15 +0000
From: Tony Duell <ard.p850ug1(a)gmail.com>
Subject: [cctalk] Re: RS232 then and now
On Sat, Feb 1, 2025 at 10:54 PM Fred Cisin via cctalk
<cctalk(a)classiccmp.org> wrote:
>
> IBM used a DB25 socket for their printer port at the computer end,
> (male on the card for serial, female on the card for parallel
"Centronics")
> THAT, of course caused some idiots to attempt
to use the parallel port
for
serial
and vice versa. "I just need a 'gender changer'!" :-)
The worst screw-up there (IMHO) came from HP in the HP150 series. This
machine had 2 RS232 serial ports as standard on DB25 sockets, wired
for some inexplicable reason as DTEs. There was an add-on board that
included a parallel printer port. To avoid confusion, this was a DB25
plug. But the board had been laid out for a DB25 socket using the IBM
PC pinout. The result was that stb/ ended up on pin 13, D0 on pin 12,
and so on.
-tony