Fwd: compaq's portable computer

From: Joe R. <rigdonj_at_cfl.rr.com>
Date: Tue May 4 07:42:53 2004

At 07:00 PM 5/3/04 -0500, you wrote:
>> I think the first one was the Portable (8088 w/ 256k, then the Portable
>>II (smaller but still 8088 and 640K) then the Portable 286 (286 CPU and
>>640k(?)), then the Portable III (the small lunchbox sized computer (I don't
>>remember if theese were 286s or 386SXs)) and then the Portable 386 (it had
>>a full fledged 386DX). FWIW I have a P-II sitting about five feet from me.
>
>FWIW, the Portable III is a 286 machine. I have pictures of mine posted on
>my site if anyone wants to see one.
>
>If anyone has the original setup disk for the Portable III, I would love to
>get an image of it - the "generic" AT setup disks work in that you can
configure
>the drives and get it to boot, however Compaq apparently "rolled their own"
>checksum algorithm, as once configured with any of the generic disks, it
gets a
>CMOS Checksum error.

  Mike Haas has has the setup disk. I gave it to him along with the P-IIIs
that I had. The setup program should also be one several of the machines.
FWIW I once found a third party setup program that worked on them. I don't
remember the name of it but I'm pretty sure that it was put out by a
company in Clearwater Florida that was later bought out by Quarterdeck. I
may still have a copy of it or the Compaq setup program. I'll look and see.
One thing to be aware of is that only the very first few drive table enties
match that used by IBM so be carefull setting the hard drive type.

   Joe


>
>Regards,
>--
>dave04a (at) Dave Dunfield
>dunfield (dot) Firmware development services & tools: www.dunfield.com
>com Vintage computing equipment collector.
> http://www.parse.com/~ddunfield/museum/index.html
>
>
Received on Tue May 04 2004 - 07:42:53 BST

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