Found a neat old upgraded machine!

[NathanAllan]

I love finding stuff like this. I got ahold of a computer that seems to be made from SO many different others. The case is from a PB, the motherboard is an AT 286 from Magictronix, the drives seems to be from an IBM XT type machine. 360k 5.25" fdd, Seagate ST225 hdd. There was no outer shell when I got it, as there was no power supply. The previous owner had built this thing from scratch using those parts. The drive 'sled' was longer than the case so it was sticking out the front, kinda wedged in and with one screw on the back holding it in. CMOS battery is a pack of AA cells bouncing around the bottom of the case under the mobo. Behind the rive sled all the cables were bunched up and I didn't see an area for the PS to live. Then I found the external connector that had been attached! I had to take the drives out to see what hdd was in it but the sled fits right back in. I'll take pictures and post them probably on my google thing. It looks like something I would have done!

Nathan

[NathanAllan]

http://picasaweb.google.com/nathan.dkassandra4/UntitledAlbum

a few pictures are there, see if you can find the obvious things that make this a truly scavenged computer. Should I power it up and see what I get? And the hdd is an ST-251, not a 225 like above. Faulty memory(error: reseat brain)

There are other pictures in there, too, I'm going to migrate everything from my yahoo to google. Yahoo made it very graphics-y and I prefer a simpler interface.

[nige the hippy]

i did try for ages to get a 286 board that would fit inside the really sexy "Rair 'Black Box'" case I had, couldn't get it to work, and the case went back in the skip it came from DAMN!!!!

After that I managed to fit a board into the Digital Microsystems DMS16 "mummy" computer chassis, after I stripped (and binned!) the dual 8" floppies out of it.

Oh the folly of youth!

(actually it was still in regular use till about 5 years back, so I did a good job!);)

[Mike Chambers]

http://picasaweb.google.com/nathan.dkassandra4/UntitledAlbum

a few pictures are there, see if you can find the obvious things that make this a truly scavenged computer. Should I power it up and see what I get? And the hdd is an ST-251, not a 225 like above. Faulty memory(error: reseat brain)

There are other pictures in there, too, I'm going to migrate everything from my yahoo to google. Yahoo made it very graphics-y and I prefer a simpler interface.

i have an ST-251 in one of my 286s, also. i had it in my 386 for a while and then i picked up an IDE card for that machine and put it back in the 286. still works fine! very solid drive.

that is a really cool find though, i love getting old "junk" computers to mess with.

[Yzzerdd]

I have an ST-251 in my 8086 type processor AT&T 6300

[10 mhz of FURY]

this brings back memories that was my first pc ;) loved it at first but as the years came it was full of problems hardware problems hairline fractures missery for 1 year then it just died mobo failure i stripped it down then i got a ibm aptiva had to many computers and had to get rid of it, i miss my aptiva allot:sad2:

[NathanAllan]

I have it still, it's my backup machine if HAL breaks down. I don't use it for anything much. I'd really like to upgrade it but I have a few other logs in the fire that need tending to. It's solid, though, and hasn't broken down on me yet. I bought it from someone here, can't remember who. It had no hdd and there was a piece of plastic from a keyboard stuck in the PS/2 slot (the little polarizing key). I got it out and it works good.

Forgot to add about the thing I found, it has a packard Bell case. That long slot you see in the pics have "parallel" "serial" and "dip s/w" though the pics don't show it. So much for form factor!