Restoration: how far should it go??

From: Dwight K. Elvey <dwightk.elvey_at_amd.com>
Date: Tue Jun 17 14:34:01 2003

Hi
 Well, some would consider what I've done to be
real bad while others might see the reason behind my
actions. I have an Olivetti M20. This is one of the rare
desk tops that was made with a Z8000 processor ( there
were a couple of s-100 boards as well ). I wanted to
be able to bring up CP/M-8000 on this machine. The
problem was that it didn't have enough memory. They sold
two versions of the memory boards, 32K and 128K. I
didn't think I'd ever see any 128K boards ( most everyone
I know that has one of these machines has the 32K boards ).
 I did the unforgivable. I modified the boards to use
64K chips instead of the 16K chips. This required some cuts
and jumpers since the boards were almost the same ( power
planes are different ).
 While I was reluctant to do these mods, I felt that
bringing this software alive was more important than
preserving the original condition of the machine. After
all, it is the software that completes the computer.
The hardware is just the means.
 So shot me.
Dwight
Received on Tue Jun 17 2003 - 14:34:01 BST