Today I received.....

[Elminster]

A pair of bionic legs then?

[topcat96]

A pair of bionic legs then?

We have the technology, we can rebuild him ...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EoKwX5fLJ5E

[Lardo Boffin]

Will find out tonight if they work!

Pity the manual is missing from Exile.
I’m not sure what came in the SS big box version of Elite?

Edit - both working!

[Elminster]

I have these two book in the BBC micro versions, same publisher date. Be interesting to see if I can play spot the difference, other than the cover.

[flaxcottage]

Managed to get my hands on a Plotmate A4 plotter. Yippee! I have always wanted one of these.

I have tested it without a pen attached and it appears to be fully working. I do love that warm, musty, old electronics smell.

Now the challenge will be to source a suitable pen. I know BITD I used sellotape around a biro. I'll also need the software for this, especially the ROM, but that is for another thread.

[1024MAK]

My Q68 arrived today

Q68 case front

Q68 case rear

Thanks Derek



Mark

[derek]

Hi Mark,

The only thing missing is a Q68 logo on front of case.

I tried to get 8mm letters 1mm thick. But not being successful.

I did do a 3D model in FreeCad of the Front Plate with raised logo letters. But no 3D printer to test it out.

[1024MAK]

A kit of PCBs and parts for the Acorn Master and Electron cartridge breakout err, 'system'

Acorn Master and Electron cartridge breakout

Thank you fizzyade

Mark

[marcusjambler]

A few hidden gems in a cheap Beeb off tinterweb

[1024MAK]

I presume the keyboard fits okay when EPROMs are installed all along the bottom row?

If so, nice design

And a nice find

Mark

[Andy1979]

A jiffy bag of capacitors, allowing me to bring this sorry looking Pentium 3 motherboard back to life after 10yrs in the loft. Amazingly it now works, although I also had to swap out the PSU which is similarly affected (smaller bag of capacitors now on order). This will form the basis for a Windows 98 system, giving me access to some old games that Windows 10 doesn't like, and the programs from my university masters, which were written in Microsoft QBasic

Before:

After:

[JonC]

A jiffy bag of capacitors, allowing me to bring this sorry looking Pentium 3 motherboard back to life after 10yrs in the loft. Amazingly it now works, although I also had to swap out the PSU which is similarly affected (smaller bag of capacitors now on order). This will form the basis for a Windows 98 system, giving me access to some old games that Windows 10 doesn't like, and the programs from my university masters, which were written in Microsoft QBasic

Before:IMG_5570.JPG
After:IMG_5578.JPG

Have you tried Dfend reloaded? Loads of games in there running in DOSBox and works fine on 10.

[aotta]

A new from old stock Olivetti Prodest 128S, the italian remake of Master Compact tried by Olivetti.
With new warranty ready to fill with my name...

[danielj]

Wow - good work

[aotta]

Wow - good work

Thanks danielj, but no work at all, i will leave this in the box as i bought it! for the dirty jobs, i will use one of my other pc128s, wich is filled with turbommc, videonula, mouse adapter, ecc. ecc...

but about working... the A4000 in the background got a lot of my time.. bought on the bay last week with battery damage and floppy and drive not working... now it has a ps2 mouse and keyboard, new battery and repaired tracks for a working gotek floppy! Waiting for the right cf card for final testing

[hoglet]

At the weekend BigEd, Revaldinho and myself visited the Frome Radio Rally.

I had rather low expectations, so was very pleasantly surprised to pick up this animal:

It's a crazily fast scope, sold by HP and the Agilent between 1998 and 2001:

It was pretty cheap because it has a minor fault with offset calibration on channels 1 and 2. But that doesn't stop it being very useful. Heaven knows what an 8 GSa/s scope would cost, even today.

Here's it measuring it's own calibration signal, an edge with a 350ps rise time.

Here's the data sheet:

Inffam.pdf

(330.89 KiB) Downloaded 6 times

Oh, and thanks to the internet it now has the latest software and voice control

Dave

[cmorley]

Nice find!

[flaxcottage]

Good enough for a Beeb then?

[Lardo Boffin]

An Atari 520STFM! Also the mouse, leads and some games.

Is there anything I need to check before switching this on? No sources of magic smoke etc.?

[hoglet]

Good enough for a Beeb then?

Somewhat surprisingly, there have been times where a 100MHz scope wasn't quite good enough. Optimising PiTubeDirect is a good example, where each GPU clock cycle saved in critical code shifts the read data timing by 2.5ns.

Dave

[1024MAK]

An Atari 520STFM! Also the mouse, leads and some games.

Is there anything I need to check before switching this on? No sources of magic smoke etc.?

Magic smoke, not normally, no.

Typical faults are:-

• Faulty PSU on/off switch, non-functional or crackles when operated (either clean the contacts or replace)
• Dry joints on some of the components on the PSU PCB (resolder)
• Crashes, picture disturbance, floppy disk operation erratic (life expired capacitors in the PSU - renew capacitors)
• Faulty reset switch means machine does not start up (spray with a solvent cleaner if it's just gunk, if it's fallen apart, renew)
• As with any machine with socketed chips, a loose chip will cause various problems (reseat chips)
• And then there are the normal floppy disk drive faults... (although keep in mind the original 520STFM machines were supplied with a single sided drive)
• Often the mouse and joystick 9 pin D-connectors on the keyboard PCB will need resoldering due to dry or broken solder joints.
• The mouse rollers and ball will need cleaning, there may be a internal break in the mouse cable.

Mark

[cmorley]

Good enough for a Beeb then?

Somewhat surprisingly, there have been times where a 100MHz scope wasn't quite good enough. Optimising PiTubeDirect is a good example, where each GPU clock cycle saved in critical code shifts the read data timing by 2.5ns.

I know what you mean. On my external Tube 6502 2nd processor prototype I had a memory issue (a setup time violation) must have been a few hundred ps out. No chance seeing this on a 100Mhz (hacked) Rigol 1054z 4ns resolution (4 channels active) you just can't see +-250ps!

[jonb]

Oh yeah, those STFM mouse / joystick connectors under the keyboard. What a poor design.

[jonb]

At the weekend BigEd, Revaldinho and myself visited the Frome Radio Rally.

But the big question is, how much was it?

[hoglet]

But the big question is, how much was it?

You really want to know?

...

OK then, it was £3.00 to get in.

[Lardo Boffin]

An Atari 520STFM! Also the mouse, leads and some games.

Is there anything I need to check before switching this on? No sources of magic smoke etc.?

Magic smoke, not normally, no.

Typical faults are:-

• Faulty PSU on/off switch, non-functional or crackles....

Mark

Thanks Mark. Doesn’t sound like anything likely to kill it, cause it to explode or set the smoke alarms off then! I will switch it on and see what is what.

[Lardo Boffin]

Oh yeah, those STFM mouse / joystick connectors under the keyboard. What a poor design.

From what I can see they used to be where the disc drive ended up being put when they started fitting them internally. Shame they didn’t put a but more effort into finding a better home for them.

[1024MAK]

Oh yeah, those STFM mouse / joystick connectors under the keyboard. What a poor design.

From what I can see they used to be where the disc drive ended up being put when they started fitting them internally. Shame they didn’t put a but more effort into finding a better home for them.

The original Atari ST (without internal PSU, modulator or disk drive) was in a case that was considerably smaller. The mouse / joystick ports were on the side of that model.

On the STF, STFM and STE models, the mouse and joystick ports are actually scanned by the intelligent keyboard micro-controller. So in some ways, it's logical that the connectors are soldered to the keyboard PCB.

The normal work around back in the day, was to buy 9 pin D connector extender leads

Normal D connectors need a bit of bending of the metal tabs, but if your eBay foo is good, you can find long joystick/controller leads (search for "Extension cable for SEGA controller"). Then if too long, you can cut it in half and fit a normal male D plug on the end

Mark

[Lardo Boffin]

Well sadly it is doa. When I switch it on nothing happens and neither of the leds come on, nor does the disc try to spin. I have cycled the switch a good few times but to no avail.
Having taken the lid off, the rf shield (of which there is a lot) runs under the PSU at the back so presumbly the PSU has to come off first. The tear down videos I have found so far seem to just skip the shielding removal...
I don’t touch the 240V side of things so I will have to send it off to be looked at I think. The fuse is ok on the PSU and none of the capacitors look to have leaked or have bulges.
Given that I can’t remove the shielding I can’t reseat ROMs but I suspect that if the leds don’t come it may not be getting that far anyway.

[danielj]

Check the voltages coming out of the PSU. And the fuse in the plug. don't fret the mains stuff, just don't touch it whilst it's on, and use a screwdriver with a nice rubber handle to discharge the mains caps after you turn it off...