29 Apr
2007
29 Apr
'07
12:22 p.m.
I obtained one of these at a computer show yesterday.
I was told that the 3" disks are still available in
the UK. Is this so?
This page: http://www.seasip.demon.co.uk/Unix/Joyce/
states that there is a "hideous hybrid" of an upgrade
that effectively turns it into an PEECEE/AT. I demand
to know where I can find one.
And I was aware that Mallard as in Mallard BASIC was
a reference to a steam engine, cuz I'm shmott. I
almost got my fingers on a "TT scale" version in kit
form, but I decided not to because it wasn't after all
real TT scale, but rather a decadent hideous hybrid.
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29 Apr
29 Apr
12:58 p.m.
On 29 Apr 2007 at 12:22, Chris M wrote:
I obtained one of these at a computer show
yesterday.
I was told that the 3" disks are still available in
the UK. Is this so?
You might even find some old stock on this side of the pond. They're
known as "CF2" floppies and I sometimes see them on ePay.
I just picked up a Joyce for the floppy drive. I'll probably scrap
the rest of the unit, since there doesn't seem to be a lot of
interest in the PCW in the US. I do know that people replaced the CF
drive with standard 3.5" drives quite often. That may be your best
bet if you're interested in running software. IIRC, there was also a
Yamaha diskette drive (MDR-1) that hooked to Yamaha organs like the
FX-20 that also used them. You can still get them NOS from overseas,
but the prices aren't for the squeamish:
http://www.clive.nl/detail/24336/
This page: http://www.seasip.demon.co.uk/Unix/Joyce/
states that there is a "hideous hybrid" of an upgrade
that effectively turns it into an PEECEE/AT. I demand
to know where I can find one.
Looks a little ridiculous to me--just like that thingummy that fit
around the Classic Mac to get you PC capabilities--it cost more than
a PC IIRC. I don't remember the name of it.
CHeers,
Chuck
1:17 p.m.
--- Chuck Guzis <cclist at sydex.com> wrote:
Looks a little ridiculous to me--just like that
thingummy that fit
around the Classic Mac to get you PC
capabilities--it cost more than
a PC IIRC. I don't remember the name of it.
There was also something for the TI 99/4a or whatever
it's called. My boss years ago used to bug me
incessantly over it, him being unwilling to part with
his blessed TI.
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1:56 p.m.
> Looks a little ridiculous to me--just like that
> thingummy that fit
> around the Classic Mac to get you PC
> capabilities--it cost more than
> a PC IIRC. I don't remember the name of it.
Dayna MacCharlie is what you are thinking of..
Personally, i like the amstrad pcw's. Sold as a cheap wordprocessor, it
also came with cp/m,a strong basic and a dot matrix printer for as
little as ?200.
Despite the awful monitor, non standard floppy's and lack of standard
ports was good value
roger
2:12 p.m.
> Looks a
little ridiculous to me--just like that
> thingummy that fit
> around the Classic Mac to get you PC
> capabilities--it cost more than
> a PC IIRC. I don't remember the name of it.
Dayna MacCharlie is what you are thinking of..
Hang the Mac as a terminal on an Ampro Littleboard, but market it as "a
drive for the Mac that gives it PC capabilities". Clever marketing.
Personally, i like the amstrad pcw's. Sold as a
cheap wordprocessor, it
also came with cp/m,a strong basic and a dot matrix printer for as
little as ?200.
Despite the awful monitor, non standard floppy's and lack of standard
ports was good value
Aww.
3" and 3.25" floppies aren't really "non standard". Try
3.9"
3:10 p.m.
On 29 Apr 2007 at 21:56, roger pugh wrote:
Dayna MacCharlie is what you are thinking of..
That's it! For *only* somewhere between $1200 and $1800 (1985
dollars), you could have a slow PC that could sort of run PC mono
text applications on your Mac.
I miss the wackiness of the old PC days when nothing was too silly to
get funded. I do recall being taken to lunch sometime in 1984 and
being pitched to join a firm back around then. What was carefully
fished out of a briefcase was a mock-up of a very small laptop
computer--barely big enough in footprint to contain the keys of a
keyboard and VERY slim.
I was excitedly told that some genius had figured out how to cram the
electronics for a PC into it. When I asked where the battery went, I
got the reply "we haven't figured that out yet". I passed on the
"opportunity" and AFAIK, the venture never went anywhere.
Cheers,
Chuck
3:49 p.m.
--- Chuck Guzis <cclist at sydex.com> wrote:
What
was carefully
fished out of a briefcase was a mock-up of a very
small laptop
computer--barely big enough in footprint to contain
the keys of a
keyboard and VERY slim.
Speaking of laptops, and I'm sure I'm drifting off
topic here, but anyone familiar with early colorful
laptops? One of the first I remember seeing (in a
magazine) was probably one of the if not the earliest
color laptop. Yep full color lcd, probably sported a
386. Problem was the lcd was only on the order of 3" diagonal!
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3:52 p.m.
--- roger pugh <rogpugh at mac.com> wrote:
Personally, i like the amstrad pcw's. Sold as a
cheap wordprocessor, it
also came with cp/m,a strong basic and a dot matrix
printer for as
little as ?200.
What do you mean "came with"? On disk, or in rom.
Obviously I haven't turned it on yet...
Is there software out there? I feel that if it came
with all that groovy stuff, I should be entitled to it
(even though I ain't got it :).
Despite the awful monitor,
that bad? :(
and mine came repleat with the printer BTW.
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30 Apr
30 Apr
1:34 a.m.
What do you mean "came with"? On disk, or
in rom.
Obviously I haven't turned it on yet...
Aaahh.. On disk.. 3 inch floppys are reversable, you can turn them
over. One side had the WP software and the other had CP/M 3.3 with
utilities and also basic. GWBasic as i recall
There must be disk images on the interweb somewhere!!! I think there is
a PCW8256 emulator called Joyce aswell.
There is a very high chance that the floppy disk drive has a broken or
streached drive belt preventing it from turning the floppy. A Rubber
band is a good temporary substitute.
> Despite the awful monitor,
It is a TV screen..
and mine came repleat with the printer BTW.
the printer has no logic onboard but is driven directly from the main
unit, so is useless by itself
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2:52 a.m.
On Mon, 2007-04-30 at 09:34 +0100, roger pugh wrote:
There's a little idler pulley you can adjust. When there's no more
adjustment left, one of the belts in a Ferguson 3V23 belt kit just about
fits (a little tight IIRC).
I used to do dozens of these in the early 90s when I worked in a
computer shop in Aberdeen. They were incredibly popular on oil rigs for
some reason.
All the ones I've seen are green-screen, but the monitor electronics are
similar to a simple monochrome telly.
There's a weird problem where the printer stops being detected. It
seems to be something to do with either the driver ICs or the series
resistors in the lines.
Gordon
What do you
mean "came with"? On disk, or in rom.
Obviously I haven't turned it on yet...
Aaahh.. On disk.. 3 inch floppys are reversable, you can turn them
over. One side had the WP software and the other had CP/M 3.3 with
utilities and also basic. GWBasic as i recall
There must be disk images on the interweb somewhere!!! I think there is
a PCW8256 emulator called Joyce aswell.
There is a very high chance that the floppy disk drive has a broken or
streached drive belt preventing it from turning the floppy. A Rubber
band is a good temporary substitute. > Despite
the awful monitor,
It is a TV screen.. and mine came repleat with the printer BTW.
the printer has no logic onboard but is driven directly from the main
unit, so is useless by itself 
3:19 a.m.
roger pugh wrote:
There is a very high chance that the floppy disk drive
has a broken or
streached drive belt preventing it from turning the floppy. A Rubber
band is a good temporary substitute.
I know I've said it before on here... the owner of the first computing place I
worked at used to make a fortune out of replacing those belts. We used to have
a lot of Amstrad stuff come in, and 9 times out of 10 on those machines the
culprit was a stretched or broken belt.
It was an easy five minute fix, but I think the repair charges were a flat
rate for the first hour or something, so he used to make an absolute bundle
out of those systems.
10:03 a.m.
On 30 Apr 2007 at 9:34, roger pugh wrote:
There must be disk images on the interweb somewhere!!!
I think there is
a PCW8256 emulator called Joyce aswell.
Believe it or not, Locoscript is still in business and is selling
software for the PCW:
http://www.locoscript.com/
Cheers,
Chuck
3:11 p.m.
> Despite
the awful monitor,
It is a TV screen..
2:59 p.m.
Personally, i
like the amstrad pcw's. Sold as a
cheap wordprocessor, it
also came with cp/m,a strong basic and a dot matrix
printer for as
little as =A3200.
What do you mean "came with"? On disk, or in rom. and mine came repleat with the printer BTW.
Be warned that the printer interface is not Centronics, or even close.
It's a very low-level interface, essentially drive lines to the stepper
motors, printhed coils, etc (the actual driver stages _are_ in the
printer).
If you want to use some other printer with the PCW, there was a
serial/parallel interface module that plugged onto the expansion bus
connector (which is basically the Z80 bus). I have no idea where you'd
find one.
-tony
3:55 p.m.
--- Tony Duell <ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk> wrote:
Interestingly, there is no ROM chip in a PCW. Part
of the ULA acts as a
tiny bootstrap ROM (it outputs the correct states
onto the data bus
depending on the state of the address bus), just
enough to read the boot
sector into RAM and execute it.
Holy freeholy Batman. Now that's a first for me.
If you want to use some other printer with the PCW,
there was a
serial/parallel interface module that plugged onto
the expansion bus
connector (which is basically the Z80 bus). I have
no idea where you'd
find one.
Gee thanks mate. Leave me hanging. Yes I was made
aware of the interface. But for starters I think I'll
need to worry more about hacking up a ribbon. As if
I'd find the time...
Contrariwise I guess it wouldn't be any big deal to
create an rs-232* interface from scratch. I can dream
can't I?
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1 May
1 May
11:11 a.m.
Interestingly,
there is no ROM chip in a PCW. Part
of the ULA acts as a
tiny bootstrap ROM (it outputs the correct states
onto the data bus
depending on the state of the address bus), just
enough to read the boot
sector into RAM and execute it.
Holy freeholy Batman. Now that's a first for me. no idea where
you'd
find one.
Gee thanks mate. Leave me hanging. Yes I was made
aware of the interface. But for starters I think I'll
need to worry more about hacking up a ribbon. As if
I'd find the time...
Contrariwise I guess it wouldn't be any big deal to
create an rs-232* interface from scratch. I can dream
can't I?
29 Apr
29 Apr
1:50 p.m.
I obtained one of these at a computer show yesterday.
I was told that the 3" disks are still available in
the UK. Is this so?
I don;t think they're still being made anywhere, but they're not that
rare over here. The drive interface signals are much as you'd expect (and
it's the standard data rate, 250kbps MFM), so you can link up a 3.5"
drive without too much work if you want to.
FWIW, I have the service manual for this machine. Like most Amstrad
service manuals, it's just the schematics, layouts, and parts lists, but
it's a lot more use to me than a boardswapper guide. Let me know if you
want me to try to find it and post any specific information (like the
drive pinout)
This page: http://www.seasip.demon.co.uk/Unix/Joyce/
states that there is a "hideous hybrid" of an upgrade
that effectively turns it into an PEECEE/AT. I demand
to know where I can find one.
That's the first I've heard of it!
-tony
6487
days inactive
6489
days old
16 comments
7 participants
participants (7)
-
ard＠p850ug1.demon.co.uk -
cclist＠sydex.com -
chrism3667＠yahoo.com -
cisin＠xenosoft.com -
gordon＠gjcp.net -
julesrichardsonuk＠yahoo.co.uk -
rogpugh＠mac.com