FW: NeXT cube - test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

5 Oct 1997

The keyboard plugs into the back of the MegaPixel display, then the
display is attached to the cube. The A and B ports are the serial ports.
They are wierd old ones that, on the 68040 boards are compatible with
standard Mac serial cable, though I am not sure if they support hardware
flow control. check NeXT Answers at http://www.next.com/ for more
detailed info, and pinouts.

The removeable cartridge drive is most likely meant for a 230M
Magneto-Optical disks of the 5.5" variety. They are somewhat hard to
find nowadays. Try looking at http://www.deepspacetech.com/ They have
tons of old NeXT stuff, and I believe they have these disks. 

Another nice feature of these machines, is that they know how to handle
removeable media and both DOS and HFS volumes. This means that you can
plug a Zip drive into the SCSI port and transfer downloaded files to the
NeXT until you get it up and running on the Net itself.

The following URL is a terrific archive of NeXT software.

ftp://ftp.peanuts.org/next/

Enjoy it. It's a great machine.

Regards,

Peter Washburn

...
 From: Sam Ismail &lt;dastar(a)wco.com&gt;
To: "Discussion re-collecting of classic computers"
&lt;classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu&gt;
...
 Subject: NeXT cube

I finally got a NeXT cube!  I got it with a MegaPixel Display for $150.

I have some questions.  First, I'm assuming mine is a later revision
because the motherboard has a date of 1990 on it.  The CPU is a 68040.
All my simm slots are filled up.  How much memory does this mean it has?

Now, I can't get the damn thing to boot up, because I can't figure out
where to plug the keyboard into.  I know this sounds stupid and all, but
the keyboard connector is a round mini-DIN type with a peg in the center.
The two connectors on the back that look like it would fit in (labeled 'A'
and 'B') don't have a hole in the center for the peg to fit into, so they
obviously aren't for the keyboard.  Where does the keyboard go?

Also, this looks like it has a hard drive in it, and it also has some sort
of removable cartridge mass storage device in the front.  It looks like
it might fit a CD-ROM cartridge.  Is this the case?

Any help on the NeXT cube would be appreciated.

Sam                                        Alternate e-mail: dastar(a)siconic.com
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