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IBM PC AT 5170 Diagnostics Disk

J

joe sixpack

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Feb 11, 2005
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Around Here... Somewhere
Im sure this has been brought up before however i spent an hour
searching the forum without any luck of finding a link or any real information.
Google is no help either.

Im looking for the Diagnostics Disk (Bios Setup) for an IBM PC AT 5170
i know the disk also worked on several other IBM systems.
I have a generic AT setup program. However i would really like to get
ahold of the IBM disk. I know this much, The file name is atdg207.exe
IBM had this on there ftp server a few years ago, However the directory
is empty now so it looks like they cleaned house and i can't find it anywhere
even the P2P networks are dead ends. I know someone has got to have
this file. The kind webmaster has offered to send it to me via snail mail
however he would have to dig his system out and copy the disk.
It is a very very nice offer but if someone can give me a copy of this
file i should beable to do the rest my self and save time and work.

If there is a reason why this file is so rare please feel me in.
Other wise as soon as i finish my quest for said file. Im going to find
some web space to host it. i can't believe google failed me!

If you do not have the file above i will take a older version but
im pretty sure that was the last version 2.07.
Or a RAW BINARY dump of the disk would be great as well, rawrite should work
if not i have a very simple program called "FIRM" that does the samething
maybe even better.
I hope someone can help me as i have put in real time looking for
this thing not just some cry baby. After saying that i hope it's not
something obvious i've overlooked :lol:
 
Jorg said:
Do you know, what kind of 5170 you have?
Click to expand...

Not sure i don't remember what the model number is on the back
but it has got to be the
5170-319 - 286 8Mhz, 84 key, 512kb, FDD/HDD adapter, 1 x 5.25 inch 1.2MB FDD, 30MB HDD, Serial/Parallel adapter
I have the original monitor and keyboard however the keyboard
is very very x 10000 dirty nasty. It's missing the cord from they keyboard tot he KB port
looks like some kinda large phone jack of some sort.
so i have the keyboard in a bag. it's of no use with out the cord anyway.

I do remember it was made in mid 1986 i think. I know it had to be one of
the last ones made. It is the stock configuration with original parts including hdd & battery!
It bitched a little once, The first time a turned it on about low cmos but
that was months ago and seem to still be kicking so idunno.
the bios date i think is 11/15/85
it has a little bit of rust and scratchs on the case but not too bad
it's very clean inside however. i do not have the keys to the KB lock

THE STORY:
well it's very simple i found this machine on the way to my aunts
just before you turn on to her road, There it was going 45 MPH at night
ah but i spoted it sitting there half in the trash.
it was mid summer and we had seen a lot of rain this year.
it sat next to several large bags of fresh cut grass, covered in it in fact. But i did'nt care!
loaded it up in the back seat, Preowners sitting there watching me on there
front lawn just down the drive way.... oh well screw'em.
i could'nt find any disks or power cables it was dark and no flash light or street lights even.
Once i got it home we have this thing where anything we dont know the history
has to spend 7days in a air tight plastic bag so any nasty bugs die.
after a week i take it out of the bag. there was a old dot matrix printer
too but i tossed it because it was nasty rusted and missing parts.

The machine was hella dirty with dead bugs all over the place and spider webs.
It had that musty, I've been sitting in a basement for 10 years kinda smell/look.
I thought a week would kill them but there was a preying mantis in there
as well so he cleaned up (yum) thing is he was one of the dark brown
kinds and he scared me.. a quick reflex i smashed him with my open hand.
after words i noticed what it was and felt sad... oh well screw him i got a 5170.

So i start taking it apart to see whats in it and clean the bugs out. funny there
was hardly any inside the machine. after giving it a heavy dose of
91% alcohol and a little bit of sand paper to remove the rust.
I turned to the monitor and did the same thing. Then i started looking at
the keyboard seen the cable was missing and was like ahhh screw it im not
cleaning this thing and back in the bag it went.
After hooking everything up i turned "The Big Red Switch" and you could
here it's rather large hdd startup.. like a damn jet engine, Things louder
then the PS fan. The screen was very bright for it's age.
Well let's see what she can do. To my supprise DOS 6.22 installed
with some neat app's too benchmark apps & somekind of design program
but im pretty sure no co-processor so i dunno. it also had mail list & inventory software.
seems who ever owned it had a auto repair shop. also the misc files like
letters, lists, & the sort. One such letter was some women writing to her
mother about using dads old computer (5170). Newest file i found was
dated sometime in 97.

I tried getting into the bios before going on google and finding some
infomation on it. Then i started looking for the bios disk but no luck.
Anyway it's been sitting in the back room of my house for the last few
months, Amazing as that find was i found 12 computers in the trash
just a week later, So did'nt have time to mess with it.
Now that i have some more free time and i keep seeing it everyday back
there saying DO SOMETHING! DAMNIT!, DON'T, JUST LET ME SIT HERE AND RUST!
So i looked and looked for the disk, with no luck. It upsets me that ibm would delete the files.
After all is it such a burden on them to host a few megabytes?
I really praise a company when i can easily find old files/documents, I really love that!

I remember my uncle had one of these when i was little. Without giving away
my age i'll just say i was about 3 or 4 years old when he had one.
He would always let us kids play games on it. I did'nt know what model/brand
it was of course i was very young so i don't think i even knew what it was a computer.
But i remember what it looked like from top to bottom.
I can't believe he let us play on it seeing as it cost a small fortune at the time.

Future plans:
Well im thinking about some upgrades of sort.
Memory seems like a good idea, I have a 14.4 isa modem just itching to get in there.
I just happen to have a isa Super-IO (Floppy,IDE,Serial,Parallel) card
and a conner 126mb hdd
A 1.44mb 3.5 floppy drive with 5.25 faceplate also seems good to me
Swaping out the CGA for VGA seems like a good idea too but
i kinda like the original monitor.
Of course im just thinking about it as im not sure if the machine would
take some of that stuff. Then again it's kinda nice having fully original, stock machine.

wow... my fingers hurt!
 
That IBM 5170 is fairly rare nowadays. I rescued a PS2 Model 70 but it's onboard VGA was flakey and I couldn't find any microchannel boards for it. It DID have a 486 accelerator in it. Sadly, it was IBM proprietary.
 
I have seen Diagnostics 2.05, but not 2.07 - thank you for making that available!
 
And yes, I read the thread, so my comment was directed at Jorg ...
 
I wish I had a nickel for every time I mis-interpreted something. :)

We need picture posting ability here ... I have some 'geek porn' (5170 photos) that are just beautiful ...

Here is my favorite:

http://www.brutman.com/ibm_pc_at.2.jpg


If I'm not mistaken, that's a CGA monitor (not EGA) and a Model M keyboard on that AT. CGA is ok, but EGA is the way to go. Was this a later model AT that actually came with the Model M, or is that a replacement keyboard? (Earlier models would have had the PC AT keyboard with the function keys on the left.)

Also, What's with the MS DOS on that thing? You need a copy of IBM PC DOS to make things right. I'm offering 3.3 or 5.02 to you so that you can get back on the straight and narrow path ... MS DOS is for clones, and don't you forget it.

:)

My original AT was gutted about 13 years ago and turned into a 386-40 clone. I still have all of the original parts for when it comes time to restore it. The 386-40 lurks in the AT case and serves as my DOS development machine for software I write for the PCjr. At nice as ATs are, they are horrificially slow for compiling code. (Turbo C++ 3.0 wouldn't run on my AT at 8Mhz, which is what forced the upgrade to the 386-40).

I have two other ATs in original, unaltered state. One of them even has a working CMI hard drive in it. I'm scared to turn that one on ...



Mike
 
oh nah the keyboard is just some AT i had laying around
i think it's a keytronic dont remember. as for the monitor
ya im pretty sure it is a CGA. Im pretty sure i have the original keyboard
but it's hella dirty and missing the cable from the KB to the computer (looks like a oversize phonejack)

as for the dos it's what was on it when i found it i have not touched any of the files.
The 3rd screen shot was a program that was already on it.
it also has some neat compression tools and a intresting cad program that
i dont understand as i thought all cad programs needed a math co processor (I thought)
Dont know cuzz i've never used CAD anyway.
The system it self i talked about before it's a stock machine bios: 11/15/85
i think the system was made round march 86 if i remember right.

Thats a nice picture, i never knew they had stands for the monitors all the ones
i've ever seen was like mine.

BTW i happen to like MS-DOS 6.22
 
If the original keyboard uses a phone jack style connector, then that's a Model M. The later ATs came with the extended Model M keyboard, and an upgraded BIOS to handle the addition keys. (The original PC, XT, jr and AT keyboards don't have F11 and F12, among other things.) Your date of March 86 would agree with it being a later model.

CAD programs run faster with a co-processor, but it's possible that the program did not require it. In the event the co-processor is missing, the math can still be done in software. Many language runtime libraries will look for the co-processor and call it automatically if it is there, or fall back to emulation if it is not.

I have MS DOS 6.22 and use it sometimes as well. But I find that DOS (MS or PC) 5.x has everything you need. CD-ROM, network drives, etc. are all in DOS 5. DOS 6.22 memory management might be slightly better and the EMM386 might be appropriate for PCI based machines, but other than that I think DOS 5 is better because of the smaller memory footprint.
 
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