tezza
Veteran Member
Hi,
It pays to get to know your local recycling centre.
I'd been looking for a replacement PS/2 30-286 so I could snitch a planar from it, to replace my TWO non-working ones. Anyway, I dropped a printed photo of a PS/2 30-286 off to the local e-goods recycling centre and asked the friendly guy there if he could phone me if any of these came in for scrapping.
About a week later I get a call. He had something there that looked like what I had in the photo but it was a model 70 not a 30-286. Did I want it?
Of course I wanted it! I had an IBM PS/2 microchannel architecture model on the wanted list These machines had some historical significance as a blind alley IBM went into where no-one followed. It would be a good addition to my collection.
Anyway, I uplifted it and bought it home. It was without a monitor or keyboard but the box itself was ok, albeit a little grubby. (I haven’t cleaned it yet, so sorry, no photo) . I’ve had incredibly bad luck with PS/2s . Of all my machines, they are the only ones that don’t go! Would this be any better? I plugged in and flicked the switch.
No smoke, no bangs….I was surprised at how quiet the fan was
……the usual expected 161 and 163 errors…. Then a big red OK with a line through it and an arrow pointing to an IBM document.
Ok, no problem. I knew what to do. I pressed F1…the floppy disk activated then the machine fell through to ROM BASIC.
Well, a non-configured CMOS and dead battery as expected but at least the planar worked!
Ok, the next task was to find a reference disk. That was no problem (Google is indeed a friend) and soon I had one. I also had a standard MS-DOS boot disk just as a check. If things didn’t work I wanted to know if it was the floppy drive, or the reference disk image.
Unfortunately, the floppy drive DOES appear stuffed. I’ve had a good search through the threads on this forum and it seems this is a common problem. It’s a 1.44 MB drive but it has that unconventional edge card connection into a socket on a vertical board. I’ve also found a thread on here where someone has made up a cable which will allow a more conventional drive to be used. I might have to resort to that.
Anyway, I haven’t finished checking out the drive yet. I’ve used a disk cleaner (that didn't work), but I’ll try to disassemble the drive, clean the heads manually and lube it, then see what happens. If I can’t fix it, I might start a thread in the 386/486 forum asking for some ideas.
Just thought I’d let you know of my latest acquisition. If I can get the drive going I’ll be very happy. These IBM machines are not that common here.
Tez
P.S. One of my broken PS/2 30-286s had a similar floppy drive and I tried that in the model 70. It seems that drive is stuffed too!
It pays to get to know your local recycling centre.
I'd been looking for a replacement PS/2 30-286 so I could snitch a planar from it, to replace my TWO non-working ones. Anyway, I dropped a printed photo of a PS/2 30-286 off to the local e-goods recycling centre and asked the friendly guy there if he could phone me if any of these came in for scrapping.
About a week later I get a call. He had something there that looked like what I had in the photo but it was a model 70 not a 30-286. Did I want it?
Of course I wanted it! I had an IBM PS/2 microchannel architecture model on the wanted list These machines had some historical significance as a blind alley IBM went into where no-one followed. It would be a good addition to my collection.
Anyway, I uplifted it and bought it home. It was without a monitor or keyboard but the box itself was ok, albeit a little grubby. (I haven’t cleaned it yet, so sorry, no photo) . I’ve had incredibly bad luck with PS/2s . Of all my machines, they are the only ones that don’t go! Would this be any better? I plugged in and flicked the switch.
No smoke, no bangs….I was surprised at how quiet the fan was
……the usual expected 161 and 163 errors…. Then a big red OK with a line through it and an arrow pointing to an IBM document.
Ok, no problem. I knew what to do. I pressed F1…the floppy disk activated then the machine fell through to ROM BASIC.
Well, a non-configured CMOS and dead battery as expected but at least the planar worked!
Ok, the next task was to find a reference disk. That was no problem (Google is indeed a friend) and soon I had one. I also had a standard MS-DOS boot disk just as a check. If things didn’t work I wanted to know if it was the floppy drive, or the reference disk image.
Unfortunately, the floppy drive DOES appear stuffed. I’ve had a good search through the threads on this forum and it seems this is a common problem. It’s a 1.44 MB drive but it has that unconventional edge card connection into a socket on a vertical board. I’ve also found a thread on here where someone has made up a cable which will allow a more conventional drive to be used. I might have to resort to that.
Anyway, I haven’t finished checking out the drive yet. I’ve used a disk cleaner (that didn't work), but I’ll try to disassemble the drive, clean the heads manually and lube it, then see what happens. If I can’t fix it, I might start a thread in the 386/486 forum asking for some ideas.
Just thought I’d let you know of my latest acquisition. If I can get the drive going I’ll be very happy. These IBM machines are not that common here.
Tez
P.S. One of my broken PS/2 30-286s had a similar floppy drive and I tried that in the model 70. It seems that drive is stuffed too!
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