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New member, new 5150

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bushmechanic

Experienced Member
Joined
Jan 4, 2015
Messages
93
Location
Carolinas, USA
It's been a long time since I used a machine of this caliber. I've been building custom PCs since the 386 era, and now crank out some very high end gear. It was only a matter of time before I decided to take a trip back and start all over again, so I looked about and picked up a 5150 that looked clean enough for service.

Works fine. The color monitor ended up displaying orange after shipping, but I'll figure that out soon enough. For now, it fires up without a floppy, to a prompt after loading nokey.

Interestingly enough, someone has been inside here and left me a couple of fun surprises. I've attached an image after I popped the hatch for your amusement. It's been fitted with the AMD CPU variant (kind of fun, because I'm one of those annoying AMD guys), as well as a card that had me scratching my head and wondering. It appears to be a hard drive. Perhaps someone knows a bit more about them.

Either way, this looks like a fun community, and I'm looking forward to remembering some of the ropes I've forgotten, as well as perhaps learning a few new ones. :)

Don't worry, I know how to search. :D
 

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Welcome to these forums.

There is a lot of IBM 5150 information at http://www.minuszerodegrees.net

bushmechanic said:
as well as a card that had me scratching my head and wondering. It appears to be a hard drive. Perhaps someone knows a bit more about them.
Click to expand...
There were a few manufacturers that put a hard drive plus its controller onto a single card. Yours appears to be one of those. To see some others, do a Google image search using "hardcard".
 
Welcome. Quite a few members have picked up 5150s recently, must be something in the water ;) Looks like some interesting enhancements added to your system.
 
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Welcome to the forum of yesterday.

If you happen to discover any games on that old hard drive, please don't delete them! send them to me and I'll check them against the total dos collection archive. [this request goes out to everyone who happens to have dos games on their old machines]

I discovered a crazy rare version of Q*bert on an old AT machine I got off a guy on craigslist a few years ago. All the other games were standard issue at the time (bouncing babies, flightmare, etc) but that one had never been seen before. Close call that it could have been easily wiped out forever!
 
Orange is an odd color for an RGB display to come up in. Are you certain that this isn't just a display with an amber phosphor?

e.g.

blury_screen.jpg


FWIW, the web page this came from is kind of relevant to to repurposing vintage gear
 
Define the "AMD Attachment" -- Prior to the 286 I never actually saw an IBM or clone with an ACTUAL Intel Chip inside it. An AMD 8088D was extremely common to be found in a 5150 or 5160, that's NOT a change from the factory; just like the AMD 8088-2's that were in the majority of Tandy 1K's. Dunno if it was a east-coast US thing, but 'round these parts I literally never saw an Intel 8088 chip until after 286's were commonplace.

... and yeah, are you sure it's not just a Amber monochrome display like MDA or Hercules video? Otherwise, have you tried treating the monitor like a toilet?

No joke, jiggle the cable. You'll tend to get a yellow-amber color if the blue data line is disconnected.

Also what is the monitor? I used to have an AMDEK that had both RGBI and composite inputs, that had a three position switch to choose green, amber or full colour.

Though looking at your top-down pic, there's one card I'd pitch in the trash (the dialup adapter?) and that doesn't look like a stock video card.
 
My EGA screen has a 3 position switch you change the screen text colour from white(normal)-green-orange. It's below the power on and brightness switches, in the same position as the contrast switch. The leds under the switches show which colour mode you're you've switched to, as if its not obvious ;). If you run programs in these modes they'll have an orange or green tinge to them. There's some adjustment switches on the back as well.

As others have mentioned it may just be a mono setup. Without knowing the monitor make/model, as well as the video card, it's just guess work.
 

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deathshadow said:
.....Prior to the 286 I never actually saw an IBM or clone with an ACTUAL Intel Chip inside it. An AMD 8088D was extremely common......
Click to expand...

A couple of my 5160's have Intel 8088's, Whether they are factory original i don't know.
 
Malc said:
A couple of my 5160's have Intel 8088's, Whether they are factory original i don't know.
Click to expand...

Seems like a safe assumption I would guess.
My 5160 also has an Intel 8088. Those CPUs last forever at 4.77 MHz, so there would be no need to replace them. And swapping Intel/AMD 8088 at 4.77 MHz in there is not an upgrade, because it is the exact same CPU (in those days AMD was a second source for Intel, the chips are not of their own design), just produced by a different fab.
My Philips P3105 also has an Intel 8088. My Commodore PC20-III has a Siemens however.

It's fun to see an AMD CPU in an original 5150. This is where AMD's career as x86-builder started. IBM was expecting to sell huge volumes of 5150s, and as such, they didn't want to rely on a single supplier for their CPUs. So they basically forced Intel to outsource some of their production to others. AMD was one of them.
After the 286, Intel had grown larger, and IBM had been overshadowed by clone-builders. So Intel decided to cut the ties with the other manufacturers.
AMD responded by cloning the 386 themselves, claiming they had the right to do so, based on the earlier contracts.
AMD actually lost the lawsuit on that matter, and were found guilty of breaching the copyright on Intel's 386 microcode.
However, the judge also ruled that x86 was far too influential in the world of computing to be controlled entirely by a single manufacturer, so Intel was forced to license their x86 instructionset to others.
After AMD had obtained an x86 license and rewritten the microcode, they could finally release their Am386DX to the market in 1991 (Intels 386 was released in 1985!).
 
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Both of my 5150 (built in 1984) have Intel 8088 as well, no AMD.

As for the monitor being orange, it's pretty much what people already said. The graphics card looks like it's not CGA but one of those later short Hercules clone cards. So the monitor is most likely a monochrome one with amber phosphor.
 
No idea, but may I recommend some dust-removal? Funny how you had to clean the cpu in order to read the printing on it. :rolleyes:
 
nestor said:
My 5160 has an IBM 8088. Was that common?
View attachment 22076
Click to expand...
I have this custom IBM marked 8088 in my collection. It appears though to be an Intel made IC (same package shape).

Both AMD and Intel made CPUs are pretty common in 5150s. I think you'll see more AMD processors in a bit later machines (1983+?!). AMD 8088 was a second source / exact copy of Intel 8088, so there are no performance or any other differences. Most 8088 made by other vendors were 100% copy of later (1981 or 1983) Intel chip. Harris/MHS/Intersil 80C88 and later Intel 80C88AH have a subtle difference visible from software. Also being CMOS they have completely different die layout, lower power consumption, and ability to operate on lower frequency, all the way to DC (stop CPU clock). Although all this not really useful for a standard PC :)
Also early Intel 8088 (one with 1978 copyright) had a bug... Early 5150s shipped with this CPU and later IBM offered a free replacement. Also a replacement CPU was included in IBM's 8087 upgrade kit.
 
Apparently, I'm an idiot.

There's a switch on the back of the monitor that allows the selection of both green and amber display colors. The other option displays white, which I suspect is the color mode.

I didn't think to look for a switch. Nothing I've ever used has had one like that. It's all packed up now for transport, but I'll post the model number when I get another look. I found it mentioned in old catalogs on the net when I searched about.
 
Bingo. I'd have seen this post, but I'm still in the heavily moderated stage of my membership. I don't even know when this thread hit the forum. :)

The video card is a Hercules "Color Card".

As it turns out, the ISA hard disc was manufactured by MicroScribe. I don't have a keyboard yet, so I can't explore it, but I sure am curious to see what's hiding in there.
 
modem7 said:
Welcome to these forums.

There is a lot of IBM 5150 information at http://www.minuszerodegrees.net


There were a few manufacturers that put a hard drive plus its controller onto a single card. Yours appears to be one of those. To see some others, do a Google image search using "hardcard".
Click to expand...

That site is great. I found it a few days before I started the thread and I've really enjoyed it.
 
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