Hi,
> While not quite yet a classic, one of my more favorite series of laptops
> is the Compaq LTE 5000. It supported a total of 4 pcmcia cards when it was
> used with a docking station. These were truly unique machines IMHO, and
> set the standards for removable cdrom and floppy drives in future laptop
> systems. I don't know of any other manufacturer at the time who offered a
> machine with similar features.
Yeah - the LTE 5000 series is nice - I have a 5100 (now out of use -
anyone in the UK want it with a docking station for a sensible offer - it
cost me about 250 pounds, prolly worth <100 now) and a 5250 which is quite
nice :&)
> The multi-bay feature was a big selling point for these laptops. You could
> remove the floppy or cdrom drive from the laptop's multi-bay, and put in a
> second battery for extended road trips. The docking stations had two more
> multi-bays, so when docked, a total of 3 were available.
Yes :&) FDD, CDROM and batteries, although most of my batteries are dying
now :&/ Replacements cost a fortune.
> The MPEG capture/playback module is still a unique feature of the 5000
> series. It was a rectangular box with connectors on the rear that plugged
> into the laptop's expansion connector. It would also fit into a special
> opening on the docking stations.
Never did get one of these, maybe I will someday :&)
> I haven't yet seen another docking station that offers a MIDI/joystick
> port. The docking station also had an ISA slot, and one of the two models
> had built-in speakers for audio playback. The amplifier circuit for the
> built-in speakers was prone to picking up noise from the data bus,
> however.
Both of my docking stations have sound/midi/joystick IIRC, both the slim
docking station (no ISA expansion) and the bigger one (ISA expansion and
better speakers)
> Even with all the extras, this laptop line still had some serious
> limitations which kept it from becoming as popular as it could have been.
> It only offered 16 bit pcmcia card support instead of the 32 bit cardbus
> that was available on other laptops at the time. Only 1MB of video ram was
> available, with no way to expand it. The BIOS of these machine is also
> quite buggy. Compaq never did fix the BIOS bugs, and I doubt they ever
> will, since the product line is abandoned now.
I've not noticed any problems from BIOS bugs, but there are a few things
that annoyed me :&) Mostly problems resulting from plastic getting
slightly brittle and the little clips that hold doors shut loosing their
plastic spring. Also the sound on my 5100 is dead, but I doubt that's
compaq's fault :&)
-- Matt
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Web Page:
http://knm.org.uk/
http://pkl.net/~matt/
Received on Mon Jan 14 2002 - 06:17:10 GMT