Here it is time for me to express myself yet another time. What could possibly be of interest to the reader’s?
I was hoping to give some information on the Z88 that I sent in to Frank Davis the middle of October for an upgraded ROM (Version 4 needed for the 512K RAM) and for a 512K RAM. When I called November 9th he had several still ahead of me. Seems that there were about 180 on hand to be worked on when mine arrived. At about 2 hours per unit that is 360 hours, more or less, and since Frank is a part timer on the Z88, that doesn’t leave him much time to work on the units. But I finally got in touch with Mike Fink and he has written another book on the Z88. I can’t review it till I get mine back, I did learn from Mike that the highest safe voltage to use for external power is 9 VDC. I would prefer it to be down around 7 VDC. He has developed a carrier to wear that will hold it at the proper angle and place to allow you to stand up and use it.
I have been forced to try to find a checkbook program that I like, I did find one that I liked (I wanted to be able to enter any check number and also the payee in addition to being able to enter the checks and deposits in the order they appear on the checkbook register) I tried to use it but the final balance as against a calculator was not the same. Then I found that the program did screwy things if you had a 0 between the decimal point and the final digit. For instance if you ENTERed $14.04 it would come out in the check listing as $14.04 but when the computer went into the back room to figure the balance it used $14.40. The bean counters used some sort of strange arithmetic. The program is the T/S2069 Checkbook Manager sold by Timex. Anybody got a copy that doesn’t do that and is right? After converting the program to disk it doesn’t work right and looking at the listing I don’t see at the moment where the problem likely is. All I would need is the LISTing of the program to enable me to compare the two. To get a LISTing it will break at the menu. I can get the program to work if I ENTER the dollar amounts as $1404 which means to leave off the decimal point. Or I could use Bob Swoger’s checkbook program which I have but it does not allow one to enter the payee nor does it allow me to save the data (or I don’t think it does), there are no instructions that I can remember seeing.
I went to the Ft.Wayne HamFest and I walked all the tables. They listed 1100 and there were some empties and some dealers had many tables. I went with a want list of wanted stuff but not much. I wanted a power strip, a 9 pin AB box a 9 pin cable and some ICs. I got those items they costed less than ordering.
The power strip was required since the one I use on this computer simply died. It was on the day before the HamFest with everything running and suddenly all came to a halt as the switch lost contact. I have since found that another switch has bit the trail on a power strip, I will have to open them up and try to find a replacement switch that will fit in or use a different type of switch if I can find one to fit.
I needed the 9 pin AB box to use on the Z88 and of course the 9 pin cable to connect it up. If and when I get it back. Seems I do a lot of waiting for stuff. I waited from November of 1988 till sometime in January of 1989 for my LarKen disk interface. And then another month for a disk drive to operate on it.
At the Ft.Wayne HamFest I saw two T/S computers. The first I saw was a 1500 that was in a big attaché type case with tape recorder and all cables and such. It was a course in business but I don’t know what it covered. The course material was there too. The entire deal was for $20. The original owner was the seller and since he completed the course, it took up space in his closet. I left a card with my name and address as a source of T/S information.
The other T/S computer was a T/S1000 that was sitting there with the keyboard (top) raised up and the price was $2.00. I would not go into the value of that I suspect junk. I asked about it and got no history on it, I carefully looked hoping to find a Z88 at flea market price but saw none, I did see a Laser PC3 for $45.00 which is no bargain. I have a Laser PC3 and I don’t need another.
If I didn’t have a surplus of computer disks I would have been able to pick up some used 5.25 DSDD disks 25/$1.00 which would be a bargain. But one dealer had used ones for a buck each for used DSDD but these were all orange color so he must be selling the color not the disks.
Talk about child labor. At one booth two boys, ages I think 6 and 8. were dismantling old IBM types and taking out the disk drives. One of the drives they took out was a Tandon TM100-2A which is a full height double sided double density 5.25 drive. In other words a 400K 40 track drive. They were going at it quite expertly.
I did stop and listen to an argument about software and hardware compatibility. Two men, one the booth man and another man were arguing with what looked like a five or six year old with studious type glasses. The boy was looking for a specific motherboard for a spare computer. He had all the hardware except the proper motherboard which was now obsolete. He was wanting the board so that he could use it to control all the hard drives so that the computer would be networked for that purpose from the other two that he would use, both of which were set up for a specific task. I looked and he had three or four pens in his little shirt pocket and a small notebook in his jacket pocket. Move over Bill Gates – here comes your replacement. I did not ask who he was or if he was a midget, at least he looked like a child and sort of acted like one.
After that heady thought I went to the food bar and got a box lunch, HEY! Dayton ComputerFest take a look at this !! $3.50 and you got a Kaiser bun turkey sandwich, a bag of potato chips, a container of a pasta salad, two containers of a fruit drink, a fruit cup, a piece of brownie or cake, a spoon/fork napkin and a straw. And you don’t wait for the server to think what to do next. They go get the box out of the cold keeper and here it is $3.50 including tax, I figured that it would be one of those teaser lunches. But as soon as I picked it up I knew that it was worth the money.
One way you can tell how the computer technology is progressing is by what appears in the used markets. When you see a box marked $5 or $10 for contents or see a box with various things in it you know that is really from the past and is really obsolete. I saw some IBM with full height drives, motherboards and power supplies for $10 or make offer. With a warning from my wife not to bring anything back I did not even inquire what model they were.
Rod Gowen of RMG mailed back the left over stamped envelopes that I had mailed in since he is not going to mail out any more special sheets. I am sorry that he has to call it quits but if you can’t see you can’t continue a business without someone to help.
My interest in HeathKit stuff is still there. I saw a training module that predated my two which is one for analog circuits and one for digital circuits. Of course no documents. At another place I saw the microprocessor training module with a lot of chips plugged in for $20. Again no documentation. I was strongly tempted. If it had been for Z80 CPU I would have really been tempted. But HeathKit never did have anything for the Z80 that I knew of. I am about to get back into relearning electronics. Sort of hard when they have stuff that was not in existence when I took a course back in 1943/1944. I see in the HeathKit catalog that just the experiment books are available so I think I will order some and get the relearning going faster.
What we need is more articles. I will accept them in any form. While I don’t have anything but a TS-2068 with the AERCO, the LarKen and the Oliger disk interfaces (5.25 40 and 80 track and 3.5 drives) and a Z88 (when it gets back) with an XOB disk drive I can also use a cassette interface (I use mine occasionally), I am willing to type in from hard copy and I have typed in from handwritten notes. In the later case I do like to mail what I’ve typed back to the author for proof reading, sometimes handwriting isn’t always legible. Worst comes to worst and I will use reprints from old newsletters. There is a wealth of material there. If you have questions or suggestions send them in. There are three of us, but just one of us is in the work force (Bob Swoger) and he is really stretched thin with all he does. So send in your material to Don Lambert or Abed Kahale or Bob Swoger. 0/0