Wang 300 Calc

[Mini-DIN plugs] Those mini-DINs are the worst (common) connectors to solder, but the 6 pin ones are easier than the 9 pin. The Acorn Archimedes uses the latter for its mouse interface (it's a quatrature mouse with 3 buttons, the 9 pins being +5V, ground, the 4 quatradure signals and the 3 button signals). Anyway the first Arc I obtained came without a mouse. Obtaining a 3-button quadrature mouse was easy in those days (about 10 years ago), they were commonly sold as add-ons for the ST and Amiga. And getting a 9 pin mini-DIN plug wasn't hard either. But wiring it was,. Worse than that, as we all know, if you get the 2 quadrature signals for a given axis the wrong way round, the cursor moves the wrong way relative to the mouse motion. So while I could connect up the power lines and the buttons with some certainty, I had to 'edit' the quadrature signals to get things going the right way. And that was downright painful Acutally, I can see very little that's good about the mini-DIN connecotr. It's painful to wire, it doesn't have a good contact area, it's difficult to insuer (particularly 'blind', it's not that robust. I can see no reason qhy they should be used at all. -tpny