IMHO, the Sol is the next most important early commercial microcomputer
after the Altair and IMSAI. Although it had 5 S-100 slots, it really was a
single-board computer with built-in 64x16 video, serial and parallel ports,
keyboard, cassette tape interface, and ROM monitor which supported its use
as a serial terminal supporting VDT escape sequences as well as being usable
as a true computer. Cassette-based software included 5k BASIC, 16k Extended
BASIC, FOCAL, PILOT, ALS-8 (Assembly Language System), arcade style "real
time" games (Target, Trek80) as well as BASIC games and 8080 Chess. Its 8"
Helios disk system was expensive and the PerSci drives finicky - which is
why so many SOL users opted for a NorthStar controller and 5.25" drives.
Contact jordan_ruderman_at_supermac.com - he has been compiling an audio CD-ROM
of all the cassette software. You can substitute a portable CD player in
place of the SOL's cassette player, or just dub copies onto cassette (to
capture that ol' time flavor!). Also, if your keyboard is acting flakey, it
may be because the little foam pads inside have deteriorated over the years.
Contact Jim Willing at the Computer Garage
http://www.rdrop.com/~jimw for
DIY replacements or he will do it for you. Jim is very knowledgable about
SOLs.
Bob Stek
Saver of lost SOLs
On 25 Aug 1998 22:29:33 GMT, george_at_agora.rdrop.com (George Rachor) wrote:
>I've got a SOL Terminal computer dug out from a pile of stuff I obtained
from a
>Goodwill several years ago. Unfortunatly there is no disk drive with it.
Ie:
>I don't want to part with it but surely I can do something with it besides
>displaying it. Is there anything I can do with this critter without a disk
>this creature usuable for anything?
>
>George Rachor
>
>george_at_racsys.rt.rain.com
Received on Wed Aug 26 1998 - 08:53:46 BST