4 Mar
1998
4 Mar
'98
11:21 p.m.
On Wed, 4 Mar 1998, Seth J. Morabito wrote:
Howdy folks,
I've spotted an ALTOS computer at WeirdStuff today. At first I thought
it was a disk drive only, but it appears to be the whole computer.
Could someone help me identify it? I think I'll swing by and buy it
tomorrow to make sure it doesn't disappear, but right now I'm working
from memory.
I remember seeing lots and lots of ALTOS ads and info in my old BYTE
collection (sadly, 3000 miles away from me right now), so I'm guessing
it's not all that rare of a beast. The front is black and says only
"ALTOS", and the case is metal with a faux wood-grain. (mmmm, how 70's!)
There is one 8" floppy drive on the left-hand side of the box, one push
button (reset?), and one flat-toggle switch (Must be power). That's
it.
It looks like your standard desktop late-70's-early-80's vintage S100 type
computer, about IMSAI-sized. Should I pick it up? It's $12.50, seems
like a rip-off to me :) Although it does have two manuals (!) with it.
A rare find in themselves, probably.
The ALTOS is not an S-100 machine. But, more nearly a single board
computer. I would assume that the one you describe is an 8000-? version
from your description. They are Z-80 based and usually
ran MP/M.
- don
Although I do have an IMSAI 8080 in Connecticut
(argh... again, 3000
miles away :) my experience with S100 is very, very slim. I'm a bid
DEC fan kinda-guy, so I'll need all the help I can get :)
-Seth
-Seth
donm(a)cts.com
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Don Maslin - Keeper of the Dina-SIG CP/M System Disk Archives
Chairman, Dina-SIG of the San Diego Computer Society
Clinging tenaciously to the trailing edge of technology.
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