Does anyone have any upgrade board for PCs? I said 486, but I mean
any such thing. This is part of a desire to find a way to salvage some
systems. Does anyone have any MCA upgrade boards? There are some PS/2
286 towers, which I would take if I could upgrade them to something
32-bit
______________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com
[tony duell]
:> "lart"?
:Lusr Attidute Readjustment Tool... What you want to use on the idiot
:who's just fed a banana through the card reader :-)
hehehe :> the only irritating thing about you, tony, is that everything
we say we want, you pop up and say you've got ;> we have a feeling that
eventually all obsolete computer equipment in britain will gravitate to
chez duell...
:I always thoguht the Commodore method of keeping the disk turning
:at the same speed and changing the data rate made more sense.
:Certainly seeking would be faster as you wouldn't have to wait for
:the disk speed to change and stabilise.
on the other hand, it makes the electronics more difficult, as suddenly
you have to design a pll that will reliably lock to about 10 different
data rates, rather than just one, not to mention making sure the
controller can handle it. to make it practical to decode in software,
the apple probably got it right - and let's face it, certainly in later
years commodore never really got the hang of the speed disks should run
at... also, it's worth bearing in mind that the mac had a very fine
grain of control over the speed of the disk drive originally, and could
bump it up a notch (out of 400 or so) if it was running a little on the
slow side. because the data decode was in software, that was feasible.
:> it wasn't a cheap design, but it was what the ibm should have
:>been if it *had* to use that particular architecture...
:Having looked at a number of non-PC 8088/8086 machines, I am
:convinced that _all_ of them are superior to the IBM PC...
not hard, given the design principles of the pc. on the other hand,
they're still hamstrung by the basic architecture of the thing.
were there any non-pc-compatible 286 machines produced? the original
apricot xen series springs to mind, but how good was that?
[daybreak]
:> hmm - so how much did you pay for it then...? :>
:\pounds 10.00 including 19" mono monitor, floppy drive and tape
:streamer, but missing the keyboard and mouse. You're right - I did
:buy it.
just call us psychic ;>
[tiger]
:Rumour was that the selling price for the CPU unit (The CPU was in
:the keyboard case - it looks a little like a BBC micro with
:multi-coloured function keys) would have been around \pounds 3000.
:No wonder they never sold any...
no wonder. a case of not only completely missing the market, but also
the point...
-- Communa (together) we remember... we'll see you falling
you know soft spoken changes nothing to sing within her...
Net-Tamer V 1.08X - Test Drive
That's one of the things with PC's... they're all software-standard, but
hardware versatile. For 486's, there's the Pentium Overdrives that some
boards were equipped with (but Intel cut off the overdrives early), then
there's also about 50 differnet chips that actually plug into the ZIF
Socket, the fastest being the Evergreen one, which is based on a AMD K5 133,
and has equivelent performance to that of a Pentium 102MHz. For the Zeineth
PCs that the government bought in the 80's, the CPU was on a daughterboard,
so that you could upgrade that to a 386, but God help you try to find one of
those.
-----Original Message-----
From: Max Eskin <maxeskin(a)hotmail.com>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Tuesday, March 03, 1998 2:13 AM
Subject: 486 upgrade boards
>Does anyone have any upgrade board for PCs? I said 486, but I mean
>any such thing. This is part of a desire to find a way to salvage some
>systems. Does anyone have any MCA upgrade boards? There are some PS/2
>286 towers, which I would take if I could upgrade them to something
>32-bit
>
>______________________________________________________
>Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com
Found in a box of stuff rescued (via a friend)..FWIW the box this
thing was in,
was IBM factory labeled... Board, measuring approx 6 in x 3 in. at the
top left is
a centronix female connector. About 3/4 in to the right, is what appears
to be a RCA
type phono jack. The part number on the board is 79F4761.. There appears
to be
two (memory?) sockets on it, one of which is empty, the other has a
label on it, that
reads as follows:
239X .STD
V0.86
92-2-27 23A7
Inscribed directly on the chip is:
-150DC
1506NOT
(copyright symbol) 1988 AMD
Can anybody clue me in on this thing?
AdvTHANKSance,
Will
To: Jim Sciuto, "Gold Recovery Expert"
http://www.tiac.net/users/quiksand/goldtek.htm
I invite you to take the time to discover the wonderful efforts a group
of dedicated individuals around the globe are engaged in to preserve
some of the historically significant vintage computer equipment that you
may be scrapping for its precious metals. In some cases, the machines
you are melting down have more historic value than any monetary value
you may be extracting from their circuits.
I realize this is how you make your living, but I think you will find
the efforts of these computer preservations at least interesting, if not
compelling.
Any assistance you can afford us in preserving the more rare artifacts
of our computer heritage that you come in contact with or possesion of
would be much appreciated. I invite you to visit the Vintage Computer
Festival web page:
http://www.siconic.com/vcf
Sincerely,
Sam Ismail
Vintage Technology Cooperative
http://www.siconic.com/vcf
Greetings list-friends....
Though I mainly Lurk here, with your kind indulgence I would like to
add another fiber to the 'WRU' thread now extant, because it is so
fascinating seeing the "unity-in-diversity" theme alive and well.
I am 46 and currently chief engineer at one of the big LA movie
studios. It's an awful lot of fun with a little stress thrown in
>from time to time, just to keep me awake.
I have two inter-related Main Interests: music and electronics. I
began piano at 6, organ at 12, and in HS and college played also
various things with bows and strings. When I was 11, my father took
me to his work one saturday, and I was allowed *inside* the
glass-enclosed shrine where the newly installed GE 635 lived in all
it's glory. I was utterly hooked. I had to have one, right then, in
my room, mine all mine. It was the *smell* also, the warm
electronics, the smell of the tape, and the sound...
After college (BSEE) and the Draft, I worked at various
music-related tech jobs thru the 70's and early 80's, then did some
years as a systems analyst and data comm products manager for a Big
Phone Company. Got my fill of computer-programming; I'm a hardware
guy. Along the way I filed some patents, wrote a few papers and some
short stories, and recorded hours of often-forgettable music.
Then the movie business happened, and the rest is geography.
Currently I have six PDP-11 systems in various states of being and
about twenty or so micros and related items strewn all over the
house... my living room now looks like a circa-Seventies college
computing center. I also have a Pent-100 machine under W95, an AST
486/33 for fax and voice mail, and a Mac PPC and MAC SE in my home
studio... which brings up my other (sort-of related) collection,
vintage electronic instruments. I have many older keyboards and synth
modules, including a pretty big Moog and a few ARPS, etc. I have a
fantasy of running Music IV (or Csound) under Unix on the PDP 15 with
period DACs providing signals to the Moog.... a living early 70's
music research lab. Maybe the Minc-11.... naw, never mind.
I've held a Ham radio ticket for many years, and just now I'm
about two weeks away from getting a pilot's license, *if* the
examiner and the weather are co-incident and *if* I pass the damn
checkride... oops, off topic. sorry.
I share Tim Shoppa's concern for preservation of recorded media,
and I am very active in the restoration and preservation of the
record of our society before it is gone forever. This is the main
drive for my collection.... also I have, like Sam, many thousands of
books, and among them several dozen computer-related ones, from the
late forties on. It's very true: anyone can get hardware, but the
docs, well, there's another thing entirely.
I have a webpage, which I need badly to revise, but here is a view
of some of the collection: www.lightsound.org. Now I really *must*
get it brought up-to-date.. ;}
Okay: enough bandwidth for one evening. E-mail is welcome and
checked often.
Cheers
John
Well, here's my bio:
I am a 31-year-old banker in Syosset (Long Island), New York. Many of my
waking hours involve lending millions to near-bankrupt companies without a
clue. It's not sexy, but it's a job <g>. As expected, I worked at Radio
Shack from high school through college (I even got a 5-year service pin)
Anyway, I digress. I really began collecting old computers about three
years ago. It all started with the VIC-20 that I got when I was in junior
high school (my all-time favorite; I learned 6502 machine language on that
machine. Snif, snif. Sigh). From there, I added a Fat Mac that I owned in
college. Then, a PET 4032 system (a gift from my former junior high school
computer teacher), an IBM Datamaster (blown F8 ROM :-( Now a useless POS),
two Tandy Model 1's (one 4k, one 16k, with expansion chassis; works fine), a
complete Model 100 system (with DVI and monitor), and an original IBM PC
with expansion chassis. That was it for a long time. Then, I found this
group...
Well, I've loaded up on an Apple ][+, an Apple /// with a ProFile HD,
several more VIC-20's (spares if anyone needs parts), a C64, several other
CBM parts, a Compaq SLT/286 and dock (not really a classic, but free, all
25+ lbs of it), an original Atari 2600 in the box, a complete Apple //gs
system, a Mac SE/30, and a Northstar Horizon with many random boards (this
is my next fix-up project).
I also have some software that I've collected (not all originals,
though): DOS 1.1 through 6.22, Windoze 1.01, 2.0, 3.0, etc., VisiCalc,
Lotus, and others.
Then came my "drive and get it" phase, aka, the too big and heavy to
ship. I have a Sun 3/50 and shoebox (more on this later), a DEC uVax-I in a
BA23 case with several RD52 drives, and a complete PDP-11/34 system. This
was the best - a complete system, just as if the guy ordered it 20 years ago
with all manuals and enough spares to last a lifetime. I still don't have a
complete inventory of the spare parts, but the rack has 2 RK05 drives, the
CPU, and an expansion chassis. I just picked-up several RK05 disk packs with
the original RT-11 distribution on it. It came with several boxes of
documentation, and several binders that clip into a metal holder (like would
hold the OED dictionary).
My major focus from here on (because my wife has *suggested* that I have
enough computers) is fill-in stuff:
* Commodore software/hardware (cartridge slot expander, speech synth,
IEEE card, games)
* Apple game software/hardware (i.e., paddles and joysticks)
* Apple Lisa (not really fill-in, but I can always slip one by...)
* IMSAI 8080 (this one is pre-authorized by the "computer police")
* Copy-II-PC card
* PDP stuff for transferring files (maybe a paper tape reader/punch).
I'm also in the process of
getting an RX02 drive for my system.
* Embedded/SBC stuff (like a KIM-1 or SYM-1)
* Intel iAPX432 processor set
I also am looking for non-classic stuff along the lines of embedded-PC
stuff (x86 PC card on an ISA backplane, for example; for experimentation). I
also have a passing interest in robotics (I'm specing a Mars rover style
autonomous robot), gardening, and golf.
Rich Cini/WUGNET
<nospam_rcini(a)msn.com> (remove nospam_ to use)
ClubWin! Charter Member (6)
MCP Windows 95/Windows Networking
============================================
[tony duell]
:> Looser Attitude Readjustment Tool. LART. Usually a big stick,
:>but can be anything handy that can inflict pain and suffering
:>upon loosers who don't know a calculator from a computer and
:>think Bill Gates is Good.
:Well, my calculator has a homebrew I2C interface on it, which I've
:used to control a robot arm,etc. I've written self-modifying RPL on
:it, and I've programmed it in its native (Saturn) machine code. I'm
:not sure I can tell a calculator from a computer...
erm... doesn't that beg the question - does hewlett-packard actually
know the difference between a calculator and a computer...?
(or do their design engineers just design things they can hack between
meetings? ;> )
-- Communa (together) we remember... we'll see you falling
you know soft spoken changes nothing to sing within her...
Net-Tamer V 1.08X - Test Drive
I have heard enough on this topic without understanding what it meant!
What is the difference between vector and bitmapped graphics, and who
was first to use each? Why are vector graphics stereotypically used
in mainframes and bitmapped used in cheap weenie "home computers"?
______________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com
Sam:
> 1 SB180 with SCSI adaptor and 20meg HD(also used frequently).
I think that that is Steve Ciarcia's 64180-based SBC, which ran various
forms of CP/M. It was featured in the Sept and Oct 1985 issues of Byte
(which I just happen to have; I can fax you the article if you want).
I'd love to get one of those...I even saw a message once in comp.os.cpm
that one of the co-authors was trying to work a deal with Steve to unearth
an old stock of those and offer them for sale.
Rich Cini/WUGNET
<nospam_rcini(a)msn.com> (remove nospam_ to use)
ClubWin! Charter Member (6)
MCP Windows 95/Windows Networking
============================================
Date: Sun, 1 Mar 1998 19:29:47 -0800 (PST)
From: Sam Ismail <dastar(a)wco.com>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Subject: Re: Demography?
Message-ID: <Pine.GSO.3.96.980301192615.1620D-100000@shell>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
On Sun, 1 Mar 1998, Allison J Parent wrote:
> Far as I can tell one of the few active women in legacy(old machines are
> us) computing. For me thse old system were the computer I couldn't afford
> when I was playing with them new.
Well, unless someone else pops up, you're probably the ONLY woman into
this sort of thing. You're like the Grace Hopper of vintage computer
enthusiasts :)
> 1 SB180 with SCSI adaptor and 20meg HD(also used frequently)
BTW, what's this? Someone is going to sell me one and all I know is that
it runs CP/M.
Sam Alternate e-mail:
dastar(a)siconic.com
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
---
Computer Historian, Programmer, Musician, Philosopher, Athlete, Writer,
Jackass
Coming Soon...Vintage Computer Festival 2.0
See http://www.siconic.com/vcf for details!
