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kaypros acquired in the stash

Sharkonwheels

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OK, so I'm perusing the K's I acquired.
You know, popping them open, see what rev MoBo prepping them for either a KayPLUS ROM or an Advent TurboROM.

K10 #1: Works, boots, it's a 10/83. Casing is about a 8/10
K10 #2: Needs HD (got a few around), it's a 10/84. Almost PERFECT casing!
K10 #3: Needs HD, 10/83, casing about a 6/10
K4: 4/84...Peek in the right side vents with a flashlight, and I see a board and chips.

Hmm, thinks me - that;s a bit close to the edge.
Could it be?
Could it?

Pop it open, low and behold, there sits a Kaypro +88 board.

<sigh>

I'm gonna have the friggin' most bad@ssinest K10 on the planet!
Gonna move THAT motherboard over to K10 #2 chassis (all options installed).
Pop in a seagate ST251-1
Pop in either a TurboROM v3.4 (got original ROM, manual, AND disk!) or
a KayPLUS ROM - will play with both and see which I like better.
Going to move the +88 over to it

AND it's gonna be Sweeeeeeeeeet.

EDIT: Added pic of K10/84


Tony
 

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OH I must disagree!

That is gonna be one wicked Kaypro 10!

Dude, you almost make me wish I had stuck with the Kaypro line.

ALMOST!!! But my arms would've stretched out so far I could never find long sleeve shirts!
 
Yeah - having a hard time doing the KayPLUS upgrade at the moment...
The only unit I have that has a booting HD, is giving sector errors when I try to copy the KayPLUS utils over...

gonna try to gen a bootable floppy, and maybe do the K+ utility floppy-to-floppy on the K4.

We'll see...


T
 
I had noticed others were having trouble with the KayPLUS ROM in the K10's (USeNet), and I encountered the SAME thing.

When you boot off the KayPLUS gen'd disk, and run HDCNFG, it never stops looking for the drive.

Advent TurboROM seems to be working, though, Gen'd the floppy, copied the tools over (thanks SyDex), initialized the drive, verifying for bad tracks as we speak, and it looks liek smooth sailing...'course, I probably just jinx'ed it!!!!

:nervous:


Tony
 
Well, got the original software reload done - it now has all the MicroPro *Star software on it as factory.

I made a copy of AutoLoad Disk 1, and gen'd a TurboROM boot sector on it, and then I was able to boot from the FDD and run the reload SUBmits

Man - haven;t had this much fun in a long time!
CP/M is fun - been having to shake loose some cobwebs...


Tony
 
(Chuck - this might've worked for the original PC-8's I sent you, if I had known I only had 27512's)

So....Tony runs out of 2764 8K EPROM's for upgrading these K10's...
So Tony gets a hairbrained idea: Hey, copy the ROM binary twice into one file (copy /b file.rom + file.rom New128.rom), figuring it will only look at half the ROM...

Dang if it didn;t work!

Copied the Advent TurboROM twice into a larger file, sent it to the burner, popped it onto a 27C128, tried it in the K10/84, and the bugger came up!

Dang...SOMETIMES things just work out....

Found a HUUUUGE stash of original Osborne 1 SSDD and DSDD original media.
CP/M 2.2, Personal Pearl, dBase II, SpellGuard, all kinds of junk I had sitting on my shelf in the garage for at least 8 years now. Also found another set of K10 reload disks. Apparently they had 2 sets: 1 was all the MicroPro stuff (WordStar, MailMerge, CalcStar, DataStar, dBase II) and the other had the Perfect series (PerfectCalc, PerfectData, PerfectWriter, dBase II).

Seems there's downloadables of the Perfect series, but not of the MicroPro series. I sent a note to Dave Dunfield to see if he wants me to image them and send 'em to him, seeing as how he has a ton of other stuff.

Also, was it here that someone was asking about VT180 CP/M disks? I seem to have some in that same box.

Mebbe it was UseNet....


Tony
 
Also found another set of K10 reload disks. Apparently they had 2 sets: 1 was all the MicroPro stuff (WordStar, MailMerge, CalcStar, DataStar, dBase II) and the other had the Perfect series (PerfectCalc, PerfectData, PerfectWriter, dBase II).

Seems there's downloadables of the Perfect series, but not of the MicroPro series. I sent a note to Dave Dunfield to see if he wants me to image them and send 'em to him, seeing as how he has a ton of other stuff.

Would you use Dave's Imagedisk program to image the K10 reload disks you have? He has a set of K10 disk images on his site, but it's not clear that they're images of the originals. It would be helpful.
 
The version (2.2G) on Dave's site is one a copy of the set on Randy McLaughlin's page. I sent a copy to Randy and he sent the images to Dave. The images were the original file that Don M sent to me years ago. Randy also has a bootdisk of version 2.2F, which boots up with a startup banner that I hacked a few years ago.

If you need help with getting the Plus 88 running, holla at me. I think I remember (most of) what we had to do to make the conversion (you might wanna bone-up a little on your DDT). I also have the software, versions 1.25 & 2.11 for the Plus88 board(s). The 1.25 runs on the 4+88, and the 2.11 works on the 10. It takes just a little hacking to swap them around (I/O address jumpers, bios mods, etc.)...

--T
 
Guess there ain't gonna be any hacking needed, considering I'm swapping the 4/84 motherboard WITH the +88 into the K10/84 chassis, right? Is is hacking still needed?

Yeah - the software would be cool - I don;t remember which version was on ftp.mrynet


T
 
Guess there ain't gonna be any hacking needed, considering I'm swapping the 4/84 motherboard WITH the +88 into the K10/84 chassis, right? Is is hacking still needed?

Yeah - the software would be cool - I don;t remember which version was on ftp.mrynet


T

I don't know, it's been awile. I'll drag out my 10 and see how much I can remember. Keep us posted how you make out.

--T
 
Man - I just went through 4 boxes of manuals and software for osbornes and Kaypros. There's even the original purchase receipt for one of the kaypro 10's!
Original software, manuals, 2 COMPLETE sets of original Osborne Executive software, original manuals set, original reference set, the 5-volume tech reference set...

Man...UNBELIEVABLE stash!

Shame neither of the Execs works - I know one does, but has some sort of video issue - no display on the built-in screen, but displays fine on the external port.

I'll try to sort the pics out and get them up somewhere.
You guys have GOT to see this stuff!!!


Tony

EDIT: Link to pics:

http://s92.photobucket.com/albums/l33/Sharkonwheels/Vintage%20Computer%20Stash/
 
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Hey hey HEY! DON'T RAISE YOUR VOICE AT ME!!

Guys - ain;t no need to be envious...

Whatcha'll need? Line forms over there <pointing>


T

EDIT: Oh, 'cept stay away from my K10's and K4-84. Well, maybe a K10-83 ya'll can fight over...
 
What I'm needing is a good video out of an Osborne Exec! I've got 2 that are toast!

Of course reading your posts, sounds like you need one too!

th_DOh.gif


Hey hey HEY! DON'T RAISE YOUR VOICE AT ME!!

Guys - ain;t no need to be envious...

Whatcha'll need? Line forms over there <pointing>


T

EDIT: Oh, 'cept stay away from my K10's and K4-84. Well, maybe a K10-83 ya'll can fight over...
 
I guess the onitor suck or something.
1 of mine did absolutely nothing, the 2nd one beeped, but no video, so I plugged the video-out port on the front to one of those little Apple monitor //c monitors, and i got video. I wonder if maybe the screen on the other one is good, while other things may be bad....

Heh - remember i got the tech ref manuals for the Exec, if you need me to photocopy anything to scan and email to you. i don;t know if those are online.


Tony
 
Nope don't need schematics.

Guess mine has a little more life than yours. I get a vertical line down the middle. External is good.

Oh well, such is life.
 
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