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Found an Old IBM

G

Gallium

Member
Joined
Sep 27, 2008
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24
Location
California, USA
I recently stumbled upon an IBM XT. I'm not new to computers but I think this computer predates myself. I imagine the learning curve to the software and hardware will be quite great. I'm on the road to fixing it up. It's labeled as a 5160, and looks like it has an added graphics card (as it has two). I don't have a monitor for it yet but should there be any steps I take before starting it up?

I'm glad I found such a neat forum for vintage computing:cool:

Picture005.jpg

Picture006.jpg
 
Wow.. that looks like new!

Do you have a keyboard with it? Remember it needs to be an XT one, or switchable.
Hopefully the harddisk works.
If you can get hold of a 5,25"floppy, it might be a good idea to make a bootdisk.


On the back, left to right I'd say:

I/O Card with 2x Serial connector
Controller card with external floppy connector
MDA Video card with MDA and printer connector (below)

So you'd need a mono/hercules display (IBM 5151 or compatibel)
If you have an old ISA VGA card to put in, it might work if it supports 8 bit mode, and you can use a modern monitor.
But then you might need to change some switches inside

(Open it up and let us look inside pleeeease :D :D )

This might be an interesting page for you: http://www.uncreativelabs.net/xtreview/xtreview.htm
 
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Awesome link; just what I was looking for.
Oh, you should have seen my face when I saw the hard drive in this thing. That thing is massive. Interestingly I found 3 layers of memory stickers, I'm guessing the memory was upgraded twice (it's now at 256-640).

I hope to get Win 1.01 running on this thing. I did get a switchable keyboard. I might be able to get some floppies from my mother who worked for Apple back in the 80's. I'm guessing Apple and IBM were both running versions of DOS back then.

Here are some internal pictures:
Picture009.jpg


Picture007.jpg


HD30mb.jpg


Picture011.jpg


Picture010.jpg


I'll try to track down the battery (if it has one) and replace it.
 
Gallium said:
Awesome link; just what I was looking for.
Oh, you should have seen my face when I saw the hard drive in this thing. That thing is massive.
Click to expand...
Not really.. it is a "Half Height" version- this machine originally came with a harddisk double as high :D

I'm guessing Apple and IBM were both running versions of DOS back then.
Click to expand...
No, Apples did not run DOS. But you might be able to format the disks in the IBM and use them.
 
That looks like a genetic MDA card... The IBM one was a full-length card.

I'll try to track down the battery (if it has one) and replace it.
Click to expand...
You won't find any on the motherboard at least. The XT doesn't have either a CMOS-setup firmware or a CMOS settings IC. However, you might find one if any of the cards have a real-lime clock buildt into it.
 
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per said:
That looks like a genetic MDA card... The IBM one was a full-length card.
Click to expand...

Ah, so a full length card will extend across the whole case? I see a plastic card supporter on the opposite end of the case (not in use).

I should figure out what type of graphics the card puts out before getting a monitor.
 
Gallium said:
Ah, so a full length card will extend across the whole case? I see a plastic card supporter on the opposite end of the case (not in use).
Click to expand...
Yes, of course. You can still get full length cards for todays PC's (SCSI adapters for an example).

The IBM one does only display text (no graphics at all). Hercules can display graphics with special software support. Both outputs to a MDA (or compatible) monitor. I can say for sure that the card is outputing for a MDA monitor (such as the IBM 5151) and a printer because of the conectors on the back side, but I can't say for sure if it is a Hercules card or a MDA clone.

Would be nice if you could get the numbers on the big squared chip in the middle of the card.
 
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Very nice! It looks a like a late-model XT that has had a replacement hard drive and graphics card. So, the memory should be 640kB. If you tell us what position DIP switches 5 and 6 are, it could confirm what type it exactly is :) Or a clear photo of the card...

BTW, your speaker is not plugged in from the photo!
 
per said:
Would be nice if you could get the numbers on the big squared chip in the middle of the card.
Click to expand...
It's a Yamaha chip:
8214791
V6363
6102B-Y

dongfeng said:
If you tell us what position DIP switches 5 and 6 are, it could confirm what type it exactly is :) Or a clear photo of the card...

BTW, your speaker is not plugged in from the photo!
Click to expand...

I found a switch box about 2" from the 8088. The 5th switch is in the "on" position and the 6th switch is in the "off" position.
I'll have to plug the speaker back in.
 
very nice! sexy 5160 you found there. as far as finding a monitor, it may or may not be easier (for sure cheaper though) to just get an 8-bit ISA VGA card and hook it up to an existing monitor, but that is your call of course.

hopefully the hard drive still works, it probably does. those old seagates tend to last quite a while. mine just died recently, and so did my miniscribe unfortunately. keep us updated on how it works!

those things were built like tanks, and built to last so the worst possible scenario is likely just the hard drive or power supply is dead.
 
Yeah lol, that's kinda awesome to watch you learn this stuff with such a great example of a classic system.

Brings me back to my first learning experiences with those systems at a younger age. Fun times. Let us know how things are going while getting it up and running. Then maybe you can get some fun stuff on it to see what else was available to do back then.

For sure if you're bored and interested you should find a copy of basic for the IBM XT (possibly just an old version of Mircrosoft Basic) but you can play some "BASIC" games and then write some of your own eventually.

Allegedly one of Bill Gates' first programs was "Donkey" in early versions of dos. The fun part was checking out his source code and comparing it to mine at that age. I saw a few simple tricks that could have been better but yeah it was a quick and dirty game.

Anyway, nice pictures, and very nice shape system.
 
Nice! It's always fun to discover a new system like this.

Yes, a monitor might be a problem. I'm not sure how common CGA (or MDA if that's what it is) monitors are ..I suspect they are quite rare. The VGA card idea might be a better option.

As others have said, that hard drive is small considering what the first XTs came out with :)

Tez
 
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A bit of googling with that graphics card chip number seems to indicate it's a Hercules.

The only question is why are the DIP's are set to color. I don't recall how important this setting is - if a wrong setting prevents correct booting, perhaps just in Basic.
 
paul said:
A bit of googling with that graphics card chip number seems to indicate it's a Hercules.

The only question is why are the DIP's are set to color. I don't recall how important this setting is - if a wrong setting prevents correct booting, perhaps just in Basic.
Click to expand...

From what I've read the Hercules is a CGA emulator, and maybe the DIP was set to color in order to fool a CGA monitor?

I guess I could go with an 8-bit VGA, but I'll lose the printer port:( I was hopping to get a dot matrix printer:p I don't think the machine would like two graphics cards...
 
Gallium said:
From what I've read the Hercules is a CGA emulator, and maybe the DIP was set to color in order to fool a CGA monitor?

I guess I could go with an 8-bit VGA, but I'll lose the printer port:( I was hopping to get a dot matrix printer:p I don't think the machine would like two graphics cards...
Click to expand...

--------
Not quite; a Hercules-type MGA card could display graphics and with software could also emulate monochrome CGA, but always on a TTL monochrome display (NOT compatible with a CGA monitor).

Actually, it *can* use two graphics cards, but not an MGA and VGA; mono TTL & CGA works.
If you replace your card with a VGA, there may be a jumper on your card to disable the MGA; if not, printer cards are fairly common.

Finally, if you can find a CGA card, most of them have a composite output that you could connect to the video in on a TV, VCR or RF modulator.

Good luck; if you happen to pass through Toronto, stop by and I'll have a monitor for ya.

m
 
I used an MDA card with an 8-bit VGA card in an AT for a while in the 80's, defaults to the VGA for bootup then can switch with "mode mono" command.

AutoCAD supported both cards at once - the MDA for command text and the VGA for the graphics screen. The BIOS was set to 80-col CGA.

I think all MDA's, Hercules (monchrome), and clones I've seen had a printer port. Isn't there something specific about the LPT IRQ or base address on that card to avoid conflict with the add-in's?
 
A text-only MDA could work with a VGA, but I'd expect a conflict with a Hercules-compatible MGA; anybody know for sure?

Yes, the printer port on the MD/GA had its own address, so you could have three printers with the standard BIOS; IRQs were rarely used.

m
 
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