30 Aug
2004
30 Aug
'04
8:38 a.m.
Philip Pemberton wrote:
I've just picked up a Liberty Electronics BT1430A0
CRT terminal. RS232
interface (two ports), 12" CRT with amber phosphor, three keyboards (one
working, two for spares) and very minor screen burn. From what I can see in
the ROM dumps, there's a self-test screen and there appears to be a
full-screen Setup option, in addition to the setup option that only uses row
25 (%DEITY knows how to access it though). Took a while to find the Magic
Incantation (tm) to make it store the current setup - you press F3 to enter
setup, navigate with the cursor keys, SPACE changes the value of the
currently selected option, then Ctrl-F3 saves the settings and F3 closes the
Setup tool. FWICT, the actual "model name" for the '1430 was "Freedom
ONE
Plus" (found that in the ROM dump). Does anyone want to stick the ROMs on
their site for the sake of archiving them?
Now if only I could find a way to reduce the amount of 50Hz EMI the terminal
spews out. My Mitsubishi CRT monitor's picture gains a rolling black bar
whenever the terminal is switched on - even though it's a good 6" away. Set
the refresh rate to 75Hz (from 60Hz) and the picture starts shimmering.
Anyone got some spare mumetal? :)
I have the manual for the Liberty Electronics Freedom One Plus CRT terminal, albeit for a
slightly different model # of terminal: BT1431A0).
The manual mentions a couple of keyboard options, one uses an explicit "SETUP"
key to get into setup and one uses the SCROLL-LOCK key to get into setup, the manual
doesn't mention use of F3 to get into setup (?). Getting into full-screen setup should
be accomplished with Shift-<setup>, where <setup> is whichever
setup-entry-option you have. The behaviour is somewhat unusual in that it doesn't
display the full-screen setup until you *release* the shift key and may be why you
haven't discovered it.
Once you get into full-screen setup:
- Shift-F1 goes into a self-test and displays the firmware version (Version 02.6,
Keyboard 04.3, Copyright 1986 on mine)
- Shift-F3 presents some other self-test screens
- Exiting self-test modes is accomplished with *right*Shift-Break ("soft
reset")
Ctl-<setup> saves setup, as you discovered.
Ctl-Shift-<setup> restores default config.
There are several emulation modes (some Wyse, Televideo and ADDS models and ADM-31).
I'm using the terminal as a console for a minicomputer and something I have found
useful is that the printer/aux port can be set into 'bi-directional' mode, making
it possible to connect another computer to the second port for transparent downloading and
uploading between the two computers without having to switch cables or requiring a switch
box.
If there is some particular info you need from the manual let me know.