On Sat, 6 Dec 1997, William Donzelli wrote: Of course there's always the Unix laptops made possible by our friend Linux. My friend once loaded Linux onto his 386/?? laptop. It worked like a champ. Sam Alternate e-mail: dastar(a)siconic.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Computer Historian, Programmer, Musician, Philosopher, Athlete, Writer, Jackass Coming Soon...Vintage Computer Festival 2.0 See http://www.siconic.com/vcf for details!

;-) Ward Donald Griffiths III head-scratched, yawned, then typed: Sam had it wrong -- His friend loaded Linux "once," not the 542,000 times required by Win95 before it might last 1/2 hour between crashes!!! ;-) Oh, Roger: My vote for the "add-to-list laptop:" The first internal floppy-based laptop, the Tandy 600. OEM'd by Zenith (not Kyocera like the M100/T102/T200) and I believe somewhat rare as they went over like a lead balloon (too bad - pretty good machine). I run a Tandy 600 listserver and a Tandy 100/102/200 listserver as well, if anyone wants info, please feel free to inquire. Thanks, Roger "Merch" Merchberger -- Roger Merchberger | If at first you don't succeed, Programmer, NorthernWay | nuclear warhead disarmament should *not* zmerch(a)northernway.net | be your first career choice.

I can't speak for the other services, but the Army has produced a number of portable computers under it's Common Hardware/Software (CHS) program. CHS I systems included the Handheld Terminal Unit (HTU), an AT-class system which looked (loosely) like a militarized TRS-80 Model 100. These were manufactured by Miltope. Miltope also produced the CHS I Tactical Computer Unit (TCU), a ruggedized HP-9000. The 300 series-based units are starting to show up at the military surplus auctions. Most were upgraded at some time to 9000/370's, but you may still see some 350's and 330's out there. These look like a rugged version of the original Compaq portable (but a *lot* heavier. Associated with the TCU was the Mass Storage Expansion Unit (MSEU), a ruggedized SCSI box which usually contained a 660MB MO disk, a CD-ROM drive, and space for a removable 1/2 height hard disk. Ruggedized HP monitors and Okidata printers were also available as part of the CHS I contract. The TCU, MSEU, and periperals were all ruggedized by Miltope. CHS II was awarded to a GTE/Sun team. The TCU and better are ruggedized Sparc 20's. The HTU is a pentium-based slate-like device with a fold down keyboard (Manufactured by Litton). Also part of CHS, but awarded under a different set of contracts was the Lightweight Computer Unit (LCU), a portable 486 (later Pentium, etc). The LCU comes in two varieties: the v1 and the v2. The early v1 LCU was a Zenith Mastersport (?) 486 (the one with the ISOBar mouse) fitted with a custom underbelly (looks like an oil pan) to give it 3 or 5 ISA slots. Later v1's are pretty much off-the-shelf Compaqs. The V2 LCU is a custom rugged lunchbox-style system with built in LCD and removable hard disk. The earliest v2's were 486/33's with mono screens subsequent upgrades have taken them to Pentium power and color screens. A special version of the V2 LCU for the Army's Applique program has seperate screen/KB and CPU sections, connected by cables. The LCU SOW called for it to act as a general purpose PC, Unix workstation (Interactive, later SCO), and also serve as a platform for test equipment. Consequently, you can see LCU's fitted with cards such as DVM's, IEEE-488 cards, and ethernet cards, all available under the contract. The LCU team is headed by SAIC. <<<John>>>

On Fri, 5 Dec 1997, John Ruschmeyer wrote: Not quite, John. I have a rather battered and beaten one also. Unfortunately, I don't know either! - don donm(a)cts.com *-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-* 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. Sysop - Elephant's Graveyard (CP/M) - 619-454-8412 *--*--*--*--*--*--*--*--*--*--*--*--*--*--*--*--*--*--*--*--*--*--*--*--* see old system support at http://www.psyber.com/~tcj