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Motherboard debugger

Given the amount of work that you're going to have to put into this thing, what do you anticipate that the demand will be? It seems to me that the skilled people would rather resort to the test equipment on their bench. There can't be that many tyros interested in repairing vintage (pre 80286) systems, can there?
 
Chuck(G) said:
Given the amount of work that you're going to have to put into this thing, what do you anticipate that the demand will be? It seems to me that the skilled people would rather resort to the test equipment on their bench. There can't be that many tyros interested in repairing vintage (pre 80286) systems, can there?
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Thats why I asked.

We're on page-3 of this thread with a couple hundred views without any interest expressed, so it appears I should look for another project! :)
 
I've had a somewhat more modest goal in mind for a while now:

Write (or modify) a PC/XT BIOS that tries really really hard to provide feedback about what it's doing during POST.

So that probably would mean twiddling the speaker outputs on the 8255 PPI as the very first step (using a tight software loop instead of programming the 8253 timer) followed by a series of speaker 'clicks' during the memory test (similar to what some 386/486 era BIOS would do). Followed by the standard repertoire of POST checks, but sounding a beep code prior to halting the CPU when a test fails.

Regardless, a totally dead motherboard is very tricky to debug no matter how it's approached.
 
While the consensus of Those Who Know Things seems to be that this would be a difficult or impossible task, which seems a reasonable prognostication, what's the harm in trying it? It seems like it would either quickly show its true teeth or turn into something interesting. Why don't you just start it and write detailed, regular updates of what you are encountering?

Is there some motherboard that could be easily purchased for cheap in quantity on eBay that other people on the forum could acquire to test your kit? Something where introducing issues to then test wouldn't destroy anything important and, ideally, be reversible?
 
The prime issue to me is "will this see an audience to make it worth the effort?"

Last year (?), I uploaded some code for a Blue Pill to transform the cheap IBM-branded IR keyboards into a PS/2 interface unit. (As of yesterday, you could pick one up from Goldmine Electronics for $3.95). I said to myself "surely, there will be someone out there excited to try this out on their legacy systems". Nothing, no issues, bupkus. Was it worth the effort to develop? Sure--I use the things routinely. Was it worth the effort to document and post to github? Probably not.
 
Chuck(G) said:
The prime issue to me is "will this see an audience to make it worth the effort?"

Last year (?), I uploaded some code for a Blue Pill to transform the cheap IBM-branded IR keyboards into a PS/2 interface unit. (As of yesterday, you could pick one up from Goldmine Electronics for $3.95). I said to myself "surely, there will be someone out there excited to try this out on their legacy systems". Nothing, no issues, bupkus. Was it worth the effort to develop? Sure--I use the things routinely. Was it worth the effort to document and post to github? Probably not.
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Isn't it practically the definition of vintage that the audience is niche and the audience for a specific application to a specific product is a niche of a niche? Also, is a year sufficient to see if someone someday finds it useful? It could be that the answer to "is there an audience to make it worth the effort?" is always no when it comes to vintage stuff, even "popular" vintage stuff, but don't we all find, from time to time, that piece of information someone preserved for no discernible reason that is actually quite useful for us at that time, even if it is a report that the path was tried and found to lead into the bramble patch?

Also, for the IR to PS/2 project, is that a problem that people have for which that would even occur to them as a potential solution? Is the lack of interest from discoverability of possibility, not applicability?
 
I can't answer that last one--I've certainly posted several times here on the subject--and there are various postings on the web for people trying to figure these things out. The keyboards, while rubber-dome are definitely a notch above the usual garbage--and they're new IBM stock, though made in China.

I picked one up originally because (a) it was too-temptingly priced and (b) I was looking for a reasonably-priced "space saver" keyboard. I got what I wanted, and mistakenly thought that others might be interested. With a little tinkering with the firmware (the decoding is already done), it could be converted into, say, an alternative to the PCJr "chiclet" keyboard or the like.

I currently own 4 of the things.
 
I've always found that no project goes wasted--it just needs to find the audience. I bet the keyboard communities would appreciate this effort even if they don't use it for that particular IBM keyboard. :)
 
Maybe, but I don't particularly care for those people's technique of mangling a keyboard to work with a PC by making it not work with the original equipment.
 
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