Are the manuals in Russian or english? -Mike -----Original Message----- From: Andrew Davie &lt;adavie(a)mad.scientist.com&gt; To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers &lt;classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu&gt; Date: Thursday, June 24, 1999 1:52 PM Subject: Russian computers in hand :))) I wrote a while ago about Russian microcomputers. A couple of days ago I received my first two, and throught I'd write a brief description to the list. "Microsha" Appears to be a (souped-up) Spectrum clone in functionality, but looks totally different. Quite cool, actually... Keyboard unit in dirty yellow (Atari 800-style colour and basic appearance) but much flatter (about 1.5" thick). Red and blue keys in a really weird cyrillic layout. Each key has two labels, shown in pairs here. Many of the Cyrillic letters are unreproducible in ASCII, so I'll enclose a best guess in [...] The first of the pair is the TOP marking on a key, the second is the lower marking. Top row: (;+) (1!) (2") (3#) (4[circle with 4 prongs]) (5%) (6&) (7[triangle]) (8[left bracket]) (9[right bracket]) (0) (-=) (red: cyrillic [GT]) (red: cyrillic [AR2]) row 2 ([backward n with accent][right square bracket]) ([CH]C) (yU) (KK) (EE) (HN) ([G]G) ([sch][left square bracket??]) ([sc??][right square bracket??]) ([zh]Z) (XH) (:*) (red: [PS]) (red: [VK]) row 3 (red: yC) ([ph]F) ([bI]Y) ([B]W) (AA) ([P]P) ([R]R) (OO) ([L]L) ([D]D) ([??V]V) ([3]\) (.>) (red: PyC LAT) row 4 (red: [HP]) ([backward R]Q) ([sort of y]^) ([C]S) (MM) ([bacward N]I) (TT) ([b]X) ([b with bar]B) ([circle with half plus]@) (,<) (/?) ([b with bar overhang left]_) row 5 two small space keys for left/right thumb. Keyboard has a "keypad" section at right, with contents left diagonal up arrow, F1, F2 left arrow, up arrow, right arrow F3, f4, f5 down arrow, CTP What a bizarre organization!!! Keys are i correct positions - size differences confirm this. anyway, the gist of it is that the keyboard isn't QWERTY, but more like CUKENG It looks so very alien. Weight: abot 2lbs at a guess. Unit has an expansion interface at back (RAM?) which plugs in at right angles (ie: a bit like a cart slot on an Atari 800, again). Several other interface ports on back, the most interesting is a square unit simply marked (interface 2) with a 3 x 10 female connector. I have the manuals and power supply for this machine. I'll do a picture if there's any interest. I also have about ten cassette tapes of original software for this one. The other machine is a PDP-11 processor-clone machine called BK-0010 It's in original box, with all documentation. More about that later, if there's any interest. Cheers A