Dan Williams wrote: Disk hardware for a 480Z seems to be extremely rare. It appaears that RML wanted people to really use the 480Z with cassette units, and floppy was really only for a shared disk system on a network - so whilst finding a 380Z is pretty difficult, finding a disk unit for a 480Z is an order of magnitude harder. Having said that, I haven't heard of any available 480Z's for a few years now - they seem to have vanished (surprising, given that they must have been *reasonably* common in schools at one point - did RML offer trade-ins for Nimbus hardware and then crush all the 480Zs or something?) I've put a message out to the museum folks to see if they can rescue this disk; I don't think we have the welcome one... cheers Jules

That bid ended today. I was looking for a copy of a 480z system disk and found that Paul Williams (Who I think you know Jules) has most of the software I want. I also found on his webpage that he is the one who I outbid on the 480z and pushed up the price on the system disk. Must be Karma. Dan

Tony Duell wrote: I think we've been here before :-) Yep, you're absolutely correct - it does use the same controller in the drive. I've got one of the (museum-owned) drives back in the UK, along with the Shared Disc software so that the drive could be made visible across a network (one step down from the full CHAIN network fileserver that I have). One day when I have time I'll try and make it Do Something... I'm lacking the connecting cable, but as there are SIOs at either end that shouldn't be a problem to figure out. I believe that the 480Z hosting the drive then becomes a decicated fileserver in this setup; it can't be used to run normal programs. The software on EBay would sure be nice though as it seems that's designed to allow a single user to boot CP/M from a 480Z, without futzing around setting up a full network (not all 480Zs come with the analogue side of the network hardware fitted anyway) Hmm, can't check from here - I left all the ROM dumps at home. Actually, it could well be the same. I think the stock 380Z controller ROM supports both bussed and serial transfer modes - so it just needs the board fitted in the 480Z drive to notice that it's hooked up to a serial link and everything should just work (assuming the 480Z talks the same protocol) That's certainly been my (limited) experience. Shame really, as they were pretty good machines - a lot better than much of the other 8-bit stuff floating around at the time IMHO. Somewhat let down in the graphics department though, even with the hi-res hardware fitted - plus of course they don't have all the nice expansion options of a BBC micro. (I've got a plastic-cased 480Z set aside for you btw, just in case you'd forgotten!) Lack of software's the main problem with the machines though - they never really hit the home market, and much of the educational software that was produced for them seems to have vanished :-( cheers Jules

I missed that, but thanks for the hint. I am now the proud of owner of a 480z with colour monitor and floppy drive. There is a nimbus for sale as well, which says it comes with quite a lot of software on 5.25". I'm guessing this is either 480z or 380z. Is anyone on here bidding on it ? I think I'll try and get it for those disks. Dan

Tony Duell wrote: The Nimbus is indeed a 186 machine from a later era. But Dan seems to be correct - the Q&A suggests that the disks are nothing to do with the Nimbus, just some stuff that also came from RM. Plus the Nimbus has 3.5" disks, which is what probably led to the question on ebay. Q: What software is on 5.25. It is probably not for this machine. More likely a 480z or 380z. 02-Oct-05 A: Hi the software on 5.25 discs is: - TXED V4, ZASM Z80, BCPL for the Z80, Extended Basic V5, Wordstar V3.0, CPM operating system, SBAS, ED.com, ASM.com. Hope this helps. Antonio -- Antonio carlini arcarlini at iee.org

Dan Williams wrote: Looking at what's listed, I don't think there's anything on those disks that isn't already out there, possibly with the exception of BCPL. Oh, it's worth keeping an eye out for a Nimbus Domesday system by the way. They did exist, although I don't know of any survivors anywhere. Other than that there's nothing really special about the Nimbus hardware, it got boring after the 480Z days! (there's actually nothing special about the Domesday Nimbus, except nobody seems to remember what model of SCSI controller it needed) cheers Jules

For whatever it's worth, when citing eBay auctions all that is necessary is the item number. In this case, 8701459056. It is very easy to find on any page and cut-n-paste into an email. A search for that number will find it quickly. Full URLs always get wrapped in an inconvenient place. Gil ... 459056QQcategoryZ4193QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem ...

On Mon, 3 Oct 2005, Jules Richardson wrote: How about some good old fashion common sense? It seems that's asking too much these days. (Yes, I'm grumpy today. F the world :) -- Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org [ Old computing resources for business || Buy/Sell/Trade Vintage Computers ] [ and academia at www.VintageTech.com || at http://marketplace.vintage.org ]

On Mon, 3 Oct 2005, Sridhar Ayengar wrote: Drink-soaked popinjay is my favored invective these days ;) -- Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org [ Old computing resources for business || Buy/Sell/Trade Vintage Computers ] [ and academia at www.VintageTech.com || at http://marketplace.vintage.org ]

Vintage Computer Festival wrote: It only seems to do this if you're not logged in. Gordon

Dan Williams wrote: Hmm, I *think* that's a first edition; I'm pretty sure that's the manual we have, although we have a second edition (which contains a picture of the hardware on the front cover). If I'm right, then that book's more of a user guide (obviously rather useful still!) - what I've not ever seen is any kind of technical manual which presumably accompanied the system (unless RML did something odd like send in support engineers to set up and administer their systems) One day I'll bump into an ex-RML employee who can fill in details, but so far they seem rather elusive! cheers Jules

Jules Richardson wrote: They're rare? I have a beige 480Z and a beige dual floppy to go with it. 5-1/4" 720K (IIRC). It was working when I last used it umpteen years ago. Are we talking about the same thing? Separate from the 480Z unit itself (obviously). Drives are vertical, positioned side by side in the (heavy) metal case. Antonio -- Antonio carlini arcarlini at iee.org

I am pretty sure RML never made or badged a monitor for the 380Z. The We had 380Z's at school (heck, that's over 20 years ago!), they had those little 9" Hitachi monitors that come in a roughly cubical metal case on them. While I was at school, we bought one RGB output module for the RGB board (you know, the bracket on the back with 4 BNCs). It didn't come with a monitor, and AFAIK none was speficially recomended. I do remember dismantling the school's Barco colour monitor, and armed with a circuit diagram, adding RGB inputs (Back then, schools were not so dumbed down that the kids weren't allowed to do anything even moderately dangerous, thankfully!) -tony

And remember that the 40 column text VDU card in the 380Z even had the standard Astec modulator can on it, to link to a TV aerial input :-). I got my 380Z at a radio rally, and it didn't come with any monitor at all. Not that that bothered me. My guess is that RML did sell those Hitachi monitors for a time, or at least the standard supplier to schools listed them (did schools deal direct with RML, or was there a dealer in between?). They were common on many machines at that time, of course. And AFAIK that monitor was not even badged by RML I would be suprised if RML started designing monitors for the 480Z. More likely, if they supplied anything at all with the RML name on it, it was a Microvitec Cub of some flavour. Well, the -12V line is used to power the emitter load of the 3 output transsitors, but said load is 3k3 or something. Most likely, there's a shorted decoupling capacitor on the board somewhere if it is blowing the -12V fuse. What RGB board? The Hi-Res board has a 8 bit output, that's encoded to RGB by 3 resistor DACs on the little board behind the BNC sockets. Isn't that the board we're talking about. I dod remember learning a lot about monitors..... FOr some odd reason they trusted me to take all sorts of fun toys apart and do intenral modifications. And to doing things after school that these days would be totally banned (making the CRT was one such project, I suspect :-(). -tony

Not really RGB... There's a colour lookup table (a couple of TTL RAMs) on the hi-res board. It outputs an 8 bit value depending on its contents and the contents of the video memory for the current pixel. The output of that lookup table goes to 2 places. The first is an 8 bit DAC on the hi-res board. That's used for the monochrome greyscale output. The other is to the 26 pin connector. To that you can connect the RGB output board or a PAL encoder (which I have never seen). The RGB output board, which is mounted on the bracket for the BNC connectors, is 3 simple DACs (3 bits each for R and G, 2 bits for B) and a circuit to produce sync-on-green if you need it. No. If the hi-res board works without the RGB board, then the problem is on the latter. -tony

It's OK, I know what they look like. I have one somewhere. I think I even have a schematic somewhere too... The common model had an approximately 9" CRT. I think I once saw a similar unit with a 12" CRT, the case being somewhat larger in all directions. I think the internals were all much the same, though. -tony

They are plain composite video monitors. Equally suitable for CCTV or computer output. -tony

On Mon, October 3, 2005 5:05 pm, Jules Richardson said: Given that I've got 2 Nimbus machines (nimbii? :) is this something I could build if we find out which SCSI controller was used? -- adrian/witchy Binary Dinosaurs creator/curator www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk - the UKs biggest home computer collection?