This is brilliant! I wonder how much IBM tech's were called out in reality? I say this as I still have a few XTs and one AT, all of which work fine 30 years on. This may not sound that remarkable, but they haven't exactly been wrapped up in cotton wool during their life - I've moved them from property to property several times, stored them in cold damp areas, hot areas, knocked them (by accident) etc, all based on an unknown history as I found them in a skip being thrown out by a school! Basically I believe these computers were built to last!
There is a lot of useful information in this video. I had no idea that the early AT hard drives were full height, EGA was not yet available, or that there was a separate ground wire for the drives. IBM's usual presentations may be dry, but they get the point across.
I am going to show my students (ict hardware class) this video and let them make notes what is still recognizable in a modern system. the same. So far I noticed 3 things (molex connector, POST and pressing F1 to boot past an error
WOW! Talk about memories! I use to build these when I was at IBM Boca Raton. Later I moved into VM/Support and supported the mainframes at Boca and Del-Ray. Great times, thanks for sharing these classics!!
Heheeeee I had this pc in the mid 80's, I actually really miss those days even though technology was so crude it had a special feel to it if that makes sense.
I had my first experience with a PC (microcomputer) using a Tandy Radio Shack TRS-80 Model III with 32Kb of RAM, a 2Mhz Z-80 Microprocessor, and two 5 1/4 floppy disk drives. It's operating system was TRSDOS. That computer was manufactured back in 1980 by Tandy Corporation.
I had my first experience with a PC (microcomputer) using a Tandy Radio Shack TRS-80 Model III with 32Kb of RAM, a 2Mhz Z-80 Microprocessor, and two 5 1/4 floppy disk drives. It's operating system was TRSDOS. That computer was manufactured back in 1980 by Tandy Corporation.
When doing this work ensure you have the serious 'tech-moustache' fashioned on this trainers example.... :) lol. Cool ancient tech curio video. LOVE IT!!
Kids have it so easy these days. You actually had to read manuals and get your hands dirty with the core of the machine. New PC's made everything simple with GUI BIOS, no dip switches required.
Rochester minnesota was known for two place the mayo clinic and the IBM future systems development center, which i had the pleasure of visiting, it was a magical place for the future of computing. The early 80's were a magic time for computers, and yes i was proud to wear a pocket protector..
This video makes me happy that modern day computers are a lot easier to work with in terms of hardware (at the same time, it's cool seeing stuff like POST that's still around today). Thank god we don't have to flip a switch on the motherboard if we use either LCD or CRT monitors back when everyone was transitioning to LCDs. :P Still, this was a fun watch for someone who wasn't around when this was made and discovered how to do computer stuff when everything became simpler and more streamlined. :)
WOW this is very cool! I'm sure if someone build a PC 30 years ago they can still do it! Today's PC are almost similar to the old ones. They have just been improved on over time.
Gotta love watching this stuff. Vintage computing really is fascinating and shows how far we've come with technology. Also he looks like a young Alex Trebek, lol.
We have come far with technology, but even modern PCs are still backwards compatible (at hardware level) with the original PC, which is kind of interesting... Today's PCs are nothing but fancy, evolved IBM PC clones. ;) Windows 10 even has a command prompt which resembles original DOS pretty closely.
Is it just me or am I the only one that wants to go out and buy a computer like this one? To have computer tech from a time before you were born, deck it out to max specs, and experiment with it.
I have a PS/2 Model 60, a 286 from 1987 which isn't quite as old as the PC-AT but it's close. And while the hardware is nice to look at, to be honest they are pretty dull machines. They were behind everyone else on graphics and sound, being basically business machines. I'm glad I've got the massive 42MB full size hard disk drive (it looks like a refrigerator compressor!) but there's not much you can actually *do* with an 80s PC.
wow I did not know about the terminating resistors for the floppys! I know only for MFM hard drives . must I remove the terminator resistor from a second 5.25 drive im my first one is 3.5 ?
Yes. Only 1 terminator should be on device at end of the cable. (Basically the cable needs a terminator resistor at end, for signal to function properly.)
MegaBojan1993 it is love and my history, as i child i played with such stuff and learnt all the noises and meanings. "bacteria sized capacity". Megabytes.... enough space for ever!!!!
No - that's the way the RAM was shipped from the factory. I forget the specifics but they made use of two slightly different chips stacked on top of each other. See minuszerodegrees.net/memory/41128.htm for details.
+ZXRulezzz They stacked them like that in order to increase the memory availability....example, two 4 kilobyte chips stacked equals 8 kilobytes total in one socket.
Terry McKean I understand that, I've just never seen RAM chips factory-stacked like that before. I did a lot of stacking myself while troubleshooting my own Speccies back in the day :)
Remember, these are not stacked for debugging - they have a slightly different pinout. Stacking for debugging is a great technique, and definitely would not work if you had two different pinouts.
An 80286 has a 24-bit memory bus. Even accounting for ROM, up to 12 or 14 MB of RAM should be feasible. Granted, out of the 8 slots two are pre-occupied and one has to be used for a video card. That still leaves five slots free for memory expansion. The largest memory expansion card shown in the video is a 512 kilobyte card. Using five of them adds 2.5 MB of extra RAM to the system. But, given newer and bigger memory expansion cards, five 2.8 MB cards should expand the 512 KB of RAM to a full 14 MB. However, you wouldn’t have any expansion anymore, and frankly I doubt anyone would make a memory expansion card with such an odd amount of RAM.
They forgot to mention to remove two screws before you slide the motherboard out... I was wondering why it wasn't moving until I saw those, haha. This video is rather helpful otherwise though.
I miss those days editing autoexec.bat and config.sys. adding devicehigh= and LH etc etc.
This is brilliant! I wonder how much IBM tech's were called out in reality? I say this as I still have a few XTs and one AT, all of which work fine 30 years on. This may not sound that remarkable, but they haven't exactly been wrapped up in cotton wool during their life - I've moved them from property to property several times, stored them in cold damp areas, hot areas, knocked them (by accident) etc, all based on an unknown history as I found them in a skip being thrown out by a school! Basically I believe these computers were built to last!
There is a lot of useful information in this video. I had no idea that the early AT hard drives were full height, EGA was not yet available, or that there was a separate ground wire for the drives. IBM's usual presentations may be dry, but they get the point across.
I am going to show my students (ict hardware class) this video and let them make notes what is still recognizable in a modern system. the same. So far I noticed 3 things (molex connector, POST and pressing F1 to boot past an error
WOW! Talk about memories! I use to build these when I was at IBM Boca Raton. Later I moved into VM/Support and supported the mainframes at Boca and Del-Ray. Great times, thanks for sharing these classics!!
Heheeeee I had this pc in the mid 80's, I actually really miss those days even though technology was so crude it had a special feel to it if that makes sense.
I had my first experience with a PC (microcomputer) using a Tandy Radio Shack TRS-80 Model III with 32Kb of RAM, a 2Mhz Z-80 Microprocessor, and two 5 1/4 floppy disk drives. It's operating system was TRSDOS. That computer was manufactured back in 1980 by Tandy Corporation.
I had my first experience with a PC (microcomputer) using a Tandy Radio Shack TRS-80 Model III with 32Kb of RAM, a 2Mhz Z-80 Microprocessor, and two 5 1/4 floppy disk drives. It's operating system was TRSDOS. That computer was manufactured back in 1980 by Tandy Corporation.
When doing this work ensure you have the serious 'tech-moustache' fashioned on this trainers example.... :) lol.
Cool ancient tech curio video. LOVE IT!!
@17:39 that bow in the motherboard! Id' seen some bad 5170's before but I didn't know they bowed this bad in 1984! Unreal!
I don't know about you, but even the word "play" at the very beginning gave me goosebumps...those VHS days.
Kids have it so easy these days. You actually had to read manuals and get your hands dirty with the core of the machine. New PC's made everything simple with GUI BIOS, no dip switches required.
Isn't that the point of technology? To make life easier? Geez.
And besides, computers have been using GUIs for a very long time at this point. They're not exactly a new-fangled idea.
Rochester minnesota was known for two place the mayo clinic and the IBM future systems development center, which i had the pleasure of visiting, it was a magical place for the future of computing. The early 80's were a magic time for computers, and yes i was proud to wear a pocket protector..
4:54 Why safety glasses?... will the power supply fan blow dust into my eyes or something? ;-)
Safety glasses that he doesn't even wear.
This video makes me happy that modern day computers are a lot easier to work with in terms of hardware (at the same time, it's cool seeing stuff like POST that's still around today). Thank god we don't have to flip a switch on the motherboard if we use either LCD or CRT monitors back when everyone was transitioning to LCDs. :P Still, this was a fun watch for someone who wasn't around when this was made and discovered how to do computer stuff when everything became simpler and more streamlined. :)
WOW this is very cool! I'm sure if someone build a PC 30 years ago they can still do it!
Today's PC are almost similar to the old ones. They have just been improved on over time.
Gotta love watching this stuff. Vintage computing really is fascinating and shows how far we've come with technology. Also he looks like a young Alex Trebek, lol.
We have come far with technology, but even modern PCs are still backwards compatible (at hardware level) with the original PC, which is kind of interesting... Today's PCs are nothing but fancy, evolved IBM PC clones. ;) Windows 10 even has a command prompt which resembles original DOS pretty closely.
this is pure retrofun like it
My first PC was a 80386 I just love to play games on it...
To the FRU level... and BEYOND!!!
Safety glasses?!
Seriously, these days the capacitors blow up like little fireworks! Also the power supply safety capacitors let out alot of smoke.
Oooh I’d love to play King’s Quest on that baby
make a video like this now and everyone will become computer scientists
Safety glasses for installation. Oh man.
I love this kind of stuff keep it up :)
That hard drive was as big as a small car.
Did they put a drawing of this guy inside the IBM PC Guide to Operations manual? He doesn't have the mustache but I swear it's him.
Is it just me or am I the only one that wants to go out and buy a computer like this one? To have computer tech from a time before you were born, deck it out to max specs, and experiment with it.
I have a PS/2 Model 60, a 286 from 1987 which isn't quite as old as the PC-AT but it's close. And while the hardware is nice to look at, to be honest they are pretty dull machines. They were behind everyone else on graphics and sound, being basically business machines. I'm glad I've got the massive 42MB full size hard disk drive (it looks like a refrigerator compressor!) but there's not much you can actually *do* with an 80s PC.
Nope, not the only one.
wow I did not know about the terminating resistors for the floppys! I know only for MFM hard drives . must I remove the terminator resistor from a second 5.25 drive im my first one is 3.5 ?
Yes. Only 1 terminator should be on device at end of the cable. (Basically the cable needs a terminator resistor at end, for signal to function properly.)
Is there anyway to identify who the narrator/person is, kind of wonder what happened to him, or where they are now, almost 40 years later?
Are you the same M. Brutman who runs Mike's PCjr site?
Late reply due to the UA-cam user interface, but yes, I am the same person ...
10:09 Big-ass hard drive, with microscopic (bacteria-sized) capacity lol
MegaBojan1993
it is love and my history, as i child i played with such stuff and learnt all the noises and meanings. "bacteria sized capacity".
Megabytes.... enough space for ever!!!!
MrTiti Megabytes, enough space for one or two mp3's :)
MegaBojan1993
computers have calculation power and could help in work, so were / are used for sensible use. ;)
MrTiti I'm so glad I skipped these "dark-ages" in computer technology :)
Oh my GOOOOOOOOOOOd! I can't handle all that power!
Huh, at 18:07, there are memory chips stacked on top of each other. Did they troubleshoot the RAM that way?
No - that's the way the RAM was shipped from the factory. I forget the specifics but they made use of two slightly different chips stacked on top of each other. See minuszerodegrees.net/memory/41128.htm for details.
+ZXRulezzz They stacked them like that in order to increase the memory availability....example, two 4 kilobyte chips stacked equals 8 kilobytes total in one socket.
Terry McKean I understand that, I've just never seen RAM chips factory-stacked like that before. I did a lot of stacking myself while troubleshooting my own Speccies back in the day :)
ZXRulezzz
Right on :-)
Remember, these are not stacked for debugging - they have a slightly different pinout. Stacking for debugging is a great technique, and definitely would not work if you had two different pinouts.
nice
2:53 3 MB max RAM... Yikes!
An 80286 has a 24-bit memory bus. Even accounting for ROM, up to 12 or 14 MB of RAM should be feasible. Granted, out of the 8 slots two are pre-occupied and one has to be used for a video card. That still leaves five slots free for memory expansion. The largest memory expansion card shown in the video is a 512 kilobyte card. Using five of them adds 2.5 MB of extra RAM to the system. But, given newer and bigger memory expansion cards, five 2.8 MB cards should expand the 512 KB of RAM to a full 14 MB. However, you wouldn’t have any expansion anymore, and frankly I doubt anyone would make a memory expansion card with such an odd amount of RAM.
IBM always had a way of making the exciting boring.
They forgot to mention to remove two screws before you slide the motherboard out... I was wondering why it wasn't moving until I saw those, haha. This video is rather helpful otherwise though.
Can you hook a IBM CGA monitor to an EGA card?
No, CGA and EGA are totally different, the only way to have support for all those standards is a multisync monitor and that adds VGA as well.
Rubbish, it will work fine as long as you set it to low res on boot and stay away from 640x350 res in apps.
I heard that if you hook CGA to EGA or vice versa, it will damage the monitor. Not sure if that's true tho.