Yay, now I need some Osborne boot media!

[Jules Richardson]

On 11/23/2014 08:36 PM, drlegendre . wrote:
> The 5.25" drives in the Vixen utilize the standard 34-pin edge-connect
> cabling and 4-pin 'Molex' type power connection, as with any conventional
> 5.25" floppy or 3.5" IDE HDD.
>
> Of course, at this time I can't say if the voltages or signals are correct,
> but the form-factors do seem to match up; they're plug-compatible, in any
> case.

They probably are; it seemed weird that Osborne went with the non-standard 
drives for the Osborne 1 - I'm not sure what the benefit was supposed to 
be. Sure, they probably saved a buck on a power harness, but I don't know 
if that negates the hassle of getting custom drive units made.

> Seems like the best route is to hang out 'till someone with a working
> Osborne offers to send me some bootable media.

Well if it comes to it I'm sure we can figure out something when the OCC1 I 
have finds its way to you. But I expect that the Vixen uses DD by default 
though, doesn't it? In which case - if the Vixen drives aren't anything 
weird - you should be able to hook one up to a PC and write some media; any 
old PC FDC should handle it.

> Thing is, I don't think I
> even have a User's Guide for this thing - isn't there some sort of ROM
> monitor you can invoke from the boot screen? Maybe not, but it seems like
> something that ought to be there..

I really don't know about the Vixen - I don't think the OCC1 has anything 
like that though, it's pretty basic.

cheers

Jules