Re: Commodore PCs

I always forget about the PC line.

What might be fun is making a souped-up UNIX OS system out of one.  See if
you can run that version of UNIX Commodore was playing around with, forget
the name.
b

On Thu, Oct 15, 2015 at 10:49 AM, Ethan Dicks <ethan.dicks@gmail.com> wrote:

> On Thu, Oct 15, 2015 at 3:04 AM, Baltissen, GJPAA (Ruud)
> <ruud.baltissen@apg.nl> wrote:
> > We are mainly talking about the 8-bitters. But I also tinker with PCs,
> the very old ones of course. And those include the Commodore ones.
> >
> > My questions:
> >
> > - Is anybody else on this list interested in the Commodore PCs?
>
> I have a Commodore PC-10 I need to repair - the NiCd battery leaked
> and I need to repair it (since I doubt I'll find a replacement
> mainboard easily).  The damage is about 2cm x 5cm, so I'll have a
> number of passive components and a couple of ICs to remove before I
> can get into any trace repair.  :-(
>
> > - If so, would anybody object discussing these PCs on this list?
>
> It seems not.
>
> By way of extending the discussion, I used to use this PC-10 to run my
> B&C Microsystems EPROM and GAL programmer.  I put an 8-bit NIC in it
> and the proprietary parallel card for the device programmer.  I used
> Kermit and its internal TCP/IP support (with a packet driver for my
> NIC) to get files into the machine.  When the leaking battery killed
> the machine, I had to switch to a Compaq to burn my devices.  I have
> to use an older machine with this programmer.  There appear to be
> software timing loops that cause it not to function on anything faster
> than about a 16MHz 80286 (a 4.77-8Mhz 8088 is just fine).  Even a
> 25Mhz 386 is "too fast".  It must be something to do with how fast I/O
> bus accesses are when the ISA bus is _not_ directly connected to the
> CPU.  I never investigated wait state or other options.  It was just
> easier to keep an old machine working than investigate new machines.
>
> I do have the XT-IDE drive for mine, but I don't have a lot of spares,
> so when that disk drive dies, I'll probably have to switch to an ISA
> disk - fortunately, I have one or two 8-bit SCSI cards with boot ROMs,
> so I won't have to find a working MFM drive.
>
> -ethan
>
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>



-- 
Bill


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