26 Apr
2002
26 Apr
'02
1:14 p.m.
Well, I'm now the (proud?) owner of a Commodore PC-20-III. Ironically, this
is a Commodore I know little about although it is a more or less vanilla
PC clone, but there are some weird things about it.
First, there's a composite video out on it. What kind of graphics did these
have in them? I haven't cracked the case yet, but there's also apparently a
video card in one of the slots (with six DIP switches? used for what?) and
a two-port card with two DB-15s on it that I can't immediately identify.
Anyone out there own one of these and can tell me a little about it?
--
----------------------------- personal page: http://www.armory.com/~spectre/ --
Cameron Kaiser, Point Loma Nazarene University * ckaiser(a)stockholm.ptloma.edu
-- If at first you don't succeed, don't go skydiving. -------------------------
26 Apr
26 Apr
6:40 a.m.
I have one but haven't had it out for several years. Ray Carlsen had a PC10
and posted some stuff about it on cscbm. I used a Commodore1402 monitor
with it that I had acquired at a different time and IIRC later my Tandy CM-5
RGBI monitor. Jim Brain's list catalogues the 1402 as a Hercules ( In the
monitor or on the motherboard of the PC20 ?).
I'm wondering if you have a different model. Mine is labelled "PC10C /
PC20C" . The PC10s and 20s were virtually identical I believe except for
configuration. Mine has no cards and with 2 slots missing cover plates. It
also has a sticker saying "ATI 2400 modem installed" but no modem.
All the ports are labeled. It has a 9pin "Mouse" port, a f-db25 "parallel
port",
m-db25 "serial port", "comp video" RCA port, 9pin "RGBI",
and 4sw. "config"
block with 3 possible configurations. "Color40", Color80", and
"Monochrome".
Possibly yours is an earlier model. If you like I can send you my switch
setting list later.
However I am about to embarque on a trip west to Vancouver and won't be
back for about 3 weeks.
Still haven't found the pinouts for the Commie L-T 386. Guess I'll have to
probe it.
Lawrence
Well, I'm now the (proud?) owner of a Commodore
PC-20-III. Ironically, this is a
Commodore I know little about although it is a more or less vanilla PC clone,
but there are some weird things about it.
First, there's a composite video out on it. What kind of graphics did these have
in them? I haven't cracked the case yet, but there's also apparently a video
card in one of the slots (with six DIP switches? used for what?) and a two-port
card with two DB-15s on it that I can't immediately identify.
Anyone out there own one of these and can tell me a little about it?
--
----------------------------- personal page: http://www.armory.com/~spectre/ --
Cameron Kaiser, Point Loma Nazarene University * ckaiser(a)stockholm.ptloma.edu
-- If at first you don't succeed, don't go skydiving. -------------------------
lgwalker(a)mts.net
bigwalk_ca(a)yahoo.com
3:14 p.m.
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3:39 p.m.
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4:12 p.m.
A little more information, now that I've found my
folder of PC10/PC20
schematics...
The 'motherboard' is really I/O only (looks to be a serial port, a
parallel port, and an FDC). The CPU card plugs into a special slot on
this board -- it appears the CPU is an 8088 with (optional?) 8087
coprocessor.
There were at least 3 video cards : Monochrome (looks to be MDA), Color
(looks to be CGA) and 'Advanced Monochrome' (looks to be Hercules). I
can't be absolutely sure about that because all the cards have programmed
PALs or PLAs on them and I don't have any info on what's inside them. The
only one to have a composite output is the Color one. And none of them
have DIP switches that I can see.
So I would guess the card you have with the DIP switches is a generic
clone card. As is the one with the 2 DA15s on it.
For some ungodly reason I can't find a screwdriver around here to open the
case, but I did boot the machine up. It seems to have DOS 3.21 on it but
the Commodore-specific tools I distantly remember having to use are still
there such as the software SPEED.EXE and something called SETCLOCK.
The card is, unbelievably, VGA -- it's a Cirrus Logic of some iteration
based on the startup with an Award BIOS?
The disk seems to be around 20MB. I'm assuming this is *not* IDE.
Whoever had this last made a hash out of it, files scattered everywhere :-P
The BIOS identifies itself as (C)1986 Commodore Electronics Ltd and seems
to be a Phoenix type. I can't figure out how to get into the BIOS setup.
Neat feature: all the devices are identified with their detected port
addresses.
There is a SHIPDISK.COM utility which I'm assuming parks the heads, unless
people have another suggestion. Hope so, since this machine will travel about
120 miles on Sunday :-)
Any other ideas until I can get some tools to crack this open and clean up?
--
----------------------------- personal page: http://www.armory.com/~spectre/ --
Cameron Kaiser, Point Loma Nazarene University * ckaiser(a)stockholm.ptloma.edu
-- Mmmm, Windows user. Crunchy and good with ketchup. -- Dave McGuire ---------
27 Apr
27 Apr
11:18 a.m.
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29 Apr
29 Apr
12:57 p.m.
--- Tony Duell <ard(a)p850ug1.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> The disk seems to be around 20MB. I'm
assuming this is *not* IDE.
What do the cables look like?
I would guess it's an old ST506-interfaced drive.
Alas the diagrams I
have don't mention a hard disk at all (it probably wasn't a Commodore
design, but a standard part).
I have a "Colt" - it has a 40-pin *XT* IDE. It was a flash in the
panopoly of disk variations in the 1980s... existed in only, IIRC,
20MB and 40MB varieties. Seagate models have an A/X at the end of
the part number, WD end with X, ISTR. I can dig out exact part numbers
if needed, but if you post your part number, it'll be easier to
tell.
For reasons I can't recall, I couldn't get a particular XT IDE drive
to work on the internal 40-pin connector of my Colt, so I removed a
hard-card from its frame (it was a later model _with_ XT-IDE) and
put the short XT-IDE card in one of my three ISA slots, and mounted
the WD drive where it would have gone if I'd hooked it up directly.
Perhaps I missed a switch or something, but I could *not* get anything
to work with the native controller. OTOH, the machine _was_ free, so
perhaps the onboard controller is/was defective.
XT IDE drives also appeared in the A590 and _could_ be stuck to an A2091,
but you had to clean out the solder from the connector spot and install
your own 40-pin header. I'm sure in this case it was the classic
Commodore management cry to the Engineers to use up whatever parts
they had 10E+06 crates of (cf. 2114 SRAMs in the VIC-20, et al.)
-ethan
ObLore - today is the 8th anniversary of the day Commodore "voluntarily"
entered bankrupcy (29-Apr-1994 - check your "Deathbed Vigil" shirts).
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26 Apr
26 Apr
7:22 p.m.
On Sat, 27 Apr 2002, Tony Duell wrote:
Tony, the Paradise Autoswitch EGA 350 Card has two RCA jacks and a DE-9
receptacle along with an 8-position DIP switch. The unit will auto
select between EGA, CGA, and Hercules or MDA at the DE-9. The RCA jacks
are not composite video and are to conform to the IBM EGA card
configuration.
- don
Well, I'm now the (proud?) owner of a Commodore PC-20-III. Ironically, this
A little more information, now that I've found my folder of PC10/PC20
schematics...
The 'motherboard' is really I/O only (looks to be a serial port, a
parallel port, and an FDC). The CPU card plugs into a special slot on
this board -- it appears the CPU is an 8088 with (optional?) 8087
coprocessor.
There were at least 3 video cards : Monochrome (looks to be MDA), Color
(looks to be CGA) and 'Advanced Monochrome' (looks to be Hercules). I
can't be absolutely sure about that because all the cards have programmed
PALs or PLAs on them and I don't have any info on what's inside them. The
only one to have a composite output is the Color one. And none of them
have DIP switches that I can see. So I would guess the card you have with the DIP
switches is a generic
clone card. As is the one with the 2 DA15s on it.
-tony
27 Apr
27 Apr
11:54 a.m.
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11:23 a.m.
Tony Duell wrote:
As it happens I have a PC-10 lying around here. I just looked and it has
a NEC 8088 and an empty slot for an 8087 on the motherboard. There is a
special slot on the board, but it's just memory expansion (256K installed)
There's an ATI "Graphics Solution Rev 3" CGA/MDA/(Hercules?) board in
one of the ISA slots, with a 9-pin female "D"-sub connector that has a
cable with a 6-pin male DIN connector plugged into it. The monitor is
around here somewhere, too, but I forget what model it is. There's an
FDC on the mobo, but no hard disk controller.
jbdigriz
Well, I'm
now the (proud?) owner of a Commodore PC-20-III. Ironically, this
A little more information, now that I've found my folder of PC10/PC20
schematics...
The 'motherboard' is really I/O only (looks to be a serial port, a
parallel port, and an FDC). The CPU card plugs into a special slot on
this board -- it appears the CPU is an 8088 with (optional?) 8087
coprocessor.
There were at least 3 video cards : Monochrome (looks to be MDA), Color
(looks to be CGA) and 'Advanced Monochrome' (looks to be Hercules). I
can't be absolutely sure about that because all the cards have programmed
PALs or PLAs on them and I don't have any info on what's inside them. The
only one to have a composite output is the Color one. And none of them
have DIP switches that I can see.
So I would guess the card you have with the DIP switches is a generic
clone card. As is the one with the 2 DA15s on it.
-tony
8097
days inactive
8100
days old
9 comments
6 participants
participants (6)
-
ard＠p850ug1.demon.co.uk -
donm＠cts.com -
erd_6502＠yahoo.com -
jbdigriz＠dragonsweb.org -
lgwalker＠mts.net -
spectre＠stockholm.ptloma.edu