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Unbelieveable! Someone is dumping a "museum" of vintage computing!

L

liudr

Member
Joined
Jul 28, 2012
Messages
23
Location
MN USA
I just signed up for this forum last Friday since I got a compaq portable over the weekend. I have been a collector of processors, support chips, vintage ICs, but collecting complete systems or hardware more than the size of a credit card has been hard for me, with no house or storage. But since last week, I've seen more vintage computing items than my entire history as a CPU collector, right under my nose. Someone in my university has been dumping 1980 era computing equipment like crazy. Lots of these items seem to have been packed decently for storage. I went in the pile and pulled out:

1) Compaq portable (popped out all keys since the foam pads all degraded into dust) in fairly good condition with original DOS 1.1
2) Tandy 1400lt (perfectly working condition except for battery) with DOS 3.2
3) Atari 400 with dead ac adapter (no problem I got a compatible one), BASIC, SPACE INVADER, PAC-MAN, joystick, some paddles (don't know what they are, no markings, just big knob and side button)
4) Pulled out operating manuals, magazines, and books of vintage computing of late 70s and 80s, left and right. Including some very complete manuals of TRS-80 model III with 5" and 7" discs, 2 copies of DOS3.2 with one sealed, Atari 400/800 manual.
5) Pulled 6 8088/6502 processors from old computers (mostly those with moth balls and rat droppings or rusted out connectors)
6) Took some PDP-10 cards and a manual (flip chip, is that a company name?)

I still see the following useful items left in the pile:
1) Atari tape recorder, several more joysticks
2) An apple ][e fairly good-looking condition and two apple drives one with bite marks on cable
3) A seeming complete TRS-80 system with keyboard, expansion unit, 2 drives, and a radioshack display
4) An Osborne portable (no discs)
5) A TRS-80 model III with a dust cover
6) A number of IBM keyboards
7) An IBM 5150 with a strange screw (I couldn't remove it)
8) IBM mono display
9) Small apple display with a stand that looks like a sideway letter U
10) A few other items and old old calculators

Not so good on the look, ie rusted, damaged or became home with critters:

Several apple ][ e and c, Franklyn Ace 1000 (someone modded it), Tandy 1000 etc.
Did someone dump a small vintage computing museum or not? I went by the pile today and several new items appeared. I swear these "junk" should have been disposed off about 10 years ago but they just didn't. What to do?! Find more space for these things?
 
Several of those items might make you a few bucks, depending on where you live. I'm not suggesting a lot of money, but getting them into the right hands and ending up with a 6 pack or lunch money would be a good thing. :)
 
I'd grab especially the 5150 system, along with any accessories for it if you see any, and the //e.

For the past two E-Waste events I've gosted here, I thought that the oppotitunity for vintage computers was going to dry up in this years event, since so many vintage systems came in last year. This year, the local Berry Home Center cleaned out their (must've been very large) closet full of old intercom equipment (I did save some speakers), a bunch of dot matrix printers, a few vintage computers (including a 5170), and four pallets of old monitors! So it seems the vintage megaload can pop up anywhere.
 
If you're asking our opinion then most of us would say the obvious "Grab it!" comment. Offer it up here for a few bucks or whatever and it'll justify the temporary clutter and cost of gas (and future gas/beer) probably. Great finds! The trs-80 is worth grabbing for sure, the 5150 usually is and of course the osborne. None worth a fortune but all are easy to get to others who don't have one. Calculators are also interesting market wise. If they're a collector some calculators have their own following like the ti-59.
 
I'll echo the TRS-80 gear. It seems to consistently pull money, especially the expansions, external disk drives, system software, and even the "TRS-80" binders. Apple IIe stuff is dime a dozen, though some of the expansions are valuable, as are the off-models (platinum, Apple IIGS conversion for the IIe, II+, etc). The 5150 is worth pulling, and any clicky IBM keyboards (Model M/F) are worth pulling (in decent shape, they're consistent sellers at $25 or more on the 'bay). Also grab the 5150 and any classic IBM-branded display. Be on the lookout for old NEC Multisync's as well. Pull anything Osborne (you'll be glad you did)

Good luck, and nice finds!
 
I'm in Minnesota. The stuff supposedly came out of a math storage room. Thanks for all the advice! Gosh, today I went to work and saw a truck and crew hauling everything away. I was only quick enough to grab an RF converter and a floppy disc container. Now everything on my second list is gone! Should have got there 15 minutes earlier. :( If you work where I do, you are not paid for summer and are expected to do something for the school. I was not motivated to go there so early.

This truck did solve my delima of having no space for all of them. I'm still kicking myself over the osborne and the ibm and ....

I heard some loud bangs with the recycling crew loading the stuff. Guess the next stop will see these pieces in a more banged up state. At the least I rescued 3 systems and some literature.
 
Follow that truck!! j/k That's the way it goes, but on the bright side you did get some good stuff anyway. You didn't happen to take note of the truck company?
 
Next time I will find the courage to follow the truck, when I get some storage space to keep these items. On a separate issue, I successfully rebuilt a PIII system for my work. Got too many ISA interface boards and not enough slot on my current PIII. Had a student help me take it apart and put in a different MOBO and added a hard drive. Now it works with 2 ISA cards. These cards (analog/digital converter and GPPIB cards) are expensive. I have no fund to buy new PCI ones or USB ones, so one happy PIII 550MHz is together with 768MB of ram and win xp. I just have to swap out the dead CD drive some other time. Some people I work with are keeping an old system (Pentium to PII) around since their old hardware can only work inside these older machines. I've kept those PIII parts for the past 5 years and today they finally got put together, again!
 
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