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Info on a 486 generic laptop I found...

aaron7

Experienced Member
Joined
Aug 24, 2003
Messages
456
Picked up a free laptop the other day in a lot I bought.

I wish I could fire it up but it uses a strange round plug with three pins in it that I don't have. It says 20v. If I can get the pinout I'll be able to rig something up.

On the bottom it says this:

NOTEBOOK COMPUTER
FCC ID FMA3500

Serial Number: 92A-50724
Order Date: 08/13/92
Customer: Zymark Corporation


Any ideas?
 
A quick FCC ID search Provides:

Nan Tan Computer Co
2F, No 35, Wu-Gon 6th Road Wu-Ku Ind Park Taipei Hsien N/A Taiwan
FMA3500 Original Equipment 12/13/1991

Nan Tan

Should give you a few different places to look to see if more info is available on the PS.
 
"They're owned by Kapok, and rumour has it that their name is now Clevo, which would certainly shrink the laptop world quite a bit."

Neato!
 
FMA3500 is sold by Eucom, PC Ease and Fujitsu-Siemens.

FMA is the code for
Quote:
Nan Tan Computer Co
2F, No 35, Wu-Gon 6th Road Wu-Ku Ind Park
Taipei Hsien
Taiwan
Winston Chen
04/15/1998

Zymark Corperation made chemical lab equipment and that laptop was probably used to connect to that equipment (do not wipe the HD untill you look around, might be some cool stuff on it).
 
And here it is.

attachment.php


If that plug looks correct...I'd bet it's the same. This is from an Ultinet (rebranded Nan Tan) 386 laptop that I trashed a while ago.
 

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Hah - I love that about the vintage community.. since we all save oddball things "just in case" we often end up having the strange thing that someone else is looking for in desperation (or not bothering to look for due to assumed impossibility). :D
 
I actually kept that one for my own benefit should I find a use for a 20V adapter that puts out decent amperage.

That said...if it's the right part for this laptop, it really belongs with OP instead. And I also know OP has parts that I'd like to have, which creates trade potential.
 
I'm always interested in a trade! That plug does look correct. I'd return the adaptor with the laptop when I was done playing with it as a thankyou if you'd like!

I just opened the laptop up (only a few screws!) and found some neat things:

It has a standard IDE 3.5" hard drive! Conner CFS420A to be exact.

It uses SIPP memory and has four sticks. 512k each possibly?

It uses a standard socketed desktop CPU. I haven't removed the heatsink so all I know is that it's a DX chip (from the model of the laptop).

Video card is removable and uses a Cirrus Logic GD620 chipset.

Looking at the battery connector inside I have four wires. Black, red, yellow, and blue. They are marked DC IN, DC OUT, GND, CTRL. Think 20v through DC IN & GND would fire it? Or were the batteries sometimes lower voltage than the adaptor?

SSPX3134.jpg

SSPX3136.jpg
 
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Holy crap, that's the same laptop I had. Are you sure it's a 486 and not a 386? It's IDENTICAL internally. Edit: eh, lowest level mainboard might be a bit different, and mine had no heatsink. Otherwise it's the same (to the point that I think the parts from the two could be interchangeable).

I still have the SIPPs I pulled out of it, lol.

In my case I'd want to trade the adapter for CF-25 bits, perhaps, but if that laptop you have is working well then I may find that fun (lack of PCMCIA kills the fun a bit, but still neat).
 
I have tons of CF-25 stuff, just let me know what you might need.
 
Yeah that's a 386 (unless I'm misunderstanding the scale, but I don't believe so). If it is definitely a "486", then it's probably a "486DLC" or "SLC" or similar, one of those 486-crammed-into-a-386 chips, possibly a 486DX25 equivalent.

Keep in mind that if it turns out to be a 386SX (though I doubt it seeing as you say it says DX someplace) that it would be a 16-bit only chip that failed the 32-bit component tests at Intel and had them disabled (effectively a fast 286).

Definitely let us know what the specs turn out to be, including what kind of video it has..
 
I'm wondering if the pin connectors that go through the system stacking the "cards" are possibly a condensed ISA bus...would be kinda neat, and potentially enable interesting hacks.

Neat, that it's a 486. I'm inclined to believe it's a modified form of what I had. I took pics before I trashed it so we can compare once I find them.
 
Interesting. Please keep the analysis in the thread as opposed to private, I'm pretty interested! :D

A small proprietary form of the ISA bus certainly would be interesting.. You could mount a SB16 and some small speakers inside, or co-wire it into the PC speaker. :D
 
Enjoy...

Sockets previously contained a 386 and I think also 387, I forget now.

ultinet_nantan_386_3.jpgultinet_nantan_386_1.jpgultinet_nantan_386_2.jpg

I sent both the machine and the battery to the recycler ages ago now, so I can only provide the photos I have.

The keyboard now lived in Japan.
 
Interesting. I've rarely seen systems using SIPPs so pretty cool in general (plus some compatible and removable parts always makes it a fun system). I don't know much about SIPP memory (I've only seen it in a 286 Grid computer) but I'm quite surprised to see it with a 486, that may just be my own ignorance making it a surprise but I certainly thought it was phased out by then.
 
For the most part SIPPs are actually 30-pin SIMMs with pins soldered on (I know mine are). It's an uncommon form factor but not an obscure standard, electrically and logically.
 
re FMA 3500

re FMA 3500

Ok it's a while since this was posted, but I just found the thread. I have one of these notebooks in full and excellent working order. Power and Battery, if it's still wanted and there are any issues I can assist with.
 
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