Re: Osborne-1 with prototype-based motherboard
On 12/29/18 6:59 PM, Brad H via cctalk wrote: And then other boards used a 3A-xx number instead of the 2A2001 number. Kind of confusing. For what it's worth, looking at a photo, my[1] machine's board looks more like "3P10083 REV A" down by the front edge of the board, unless there's some dirt or other debris making it look like a 'P' rather than an 'A'. Unfortunately I don't have a photo of the entire board, so I'm not sure what the serial number top-left is (and if the data there typically differs from the data along that front edge). IC date codes appear to be early 1982, and the case is one of the more rugged 1a ones. [1] At least I think it's mine :-) I picked up two machines from another collector a few years ago, and one of them went off to another list member, so it's possible that the photo I've got is of that one. Interestingly the main Wikipedia article for OCC says that the first machines went out in July and they sold 11,000 in the eight months after that - but the article specifically for the Osborne 1 seems to suggest that systems went out in April (but again with 11,000 sold in the eight months after). The main article mentions a 10-15% failure rate, which seems incredibly high - presumably pressure to meet demand and repair faulty systems was enormous, which could explain how a prototype / early board found its way out into the wild. Jules
RE: Osborne-1 with prototype-based motherboard
> Some small companies would give employees extreme discounts if they assembled one themselves using mostly parts which had been deemed too > >obsolete for production. I was thinking something like that, or it was repaired at one point and this particular board was on hand to use as a replacement. The key would be figuring out what the apparent serial number '1-00494' means.
RE: Osborne-1 with prototype-based motherboard
I'd love to see a photo of the innards of the prototype if anyone knows where to find them. There were 10 built, and someone took a photo recently enough for it to be of decent quality (the one that appears on oldcomputers.net). Someone must have one somewhere. I think Al might be onto something with the tech manual. The question is, how did the revision scheme work? I have two Revisions noted on the board.. the 2A2011-00 Rev D (in marker), and 3A3005-00 Rev C. Looking at later boards like this one: https://www.flickr.com/photos/eevblog/31731875815/in/photostream/ ... It looks like the trailing 2 digits on the 2A2011 number changed to either 02 or 20. So is a 2A2011-00 Rev D and a 2A2011-20 Rev D the same thing? Don't' know. And then other boards used a 3A-xx number instead of the 2A2001 number. Kind of confusing. Brad -Original Message- From: Sam O'nella [mailto:baryth...@gmail.com] Sent: Saturday, December 29, 2018 2:48 PM To: Brad H ; General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Re: Osborne-1 with prototype-based motherboard Maybe too easy but have you asked the seller if they know anything about it's origins? I'd also guess maybe an employee or it could just be one of the 6 motherboard types as someone else commented. Pretty awesome though with the low serial. Thanks also for the blog. I had no idea about the different designs and cases. I'm curious which one I have now. Sent from my Apple /c > On Dec 29, 2018, at 2:53 PM, Brad H via cctalk wrote: > > Am just posting this as I am hoping someone out there knows someone > who was involved with Osborne back in the day to find out more this > Osborne 1 motherboard I found in a low serial O1 I picked up for $100. > > > > I reached out to Lee Felsenstein on it and he suggested it was related > to the boards produced for the 10 prototypes Osborne built, or a > derivative of them. He couldn't say for sure how it ended up in mine. > But I was hoping if anyone knows any Osborne experts that might help > me on this - it is not currently working and I'm hoping to find > schematics, etc to get it going again. Obviously with the radical > differences in layout, the schematics for the production motherboard isn't terribly helpful. > > > > I've posted a blog about it here with a picture of the board for those > curious: http://bradhodge.ca/blog/?p=1186 > > > > Brad >
RE: Osborne-1 with prototype-based motherboard
There are definitely some differences. For example, the ROM BIOS on mine is contained on two 2716s instead of a single 2732 as in the later boards. There's a few jumper wires on the board too. I imagine it's largely the same, although if it were completely I'm not sure why they'd do a full redesign and not, like you said, use some of that extra space for more RAM or something. Lee himself didn't really know.. all he said was that that space, in the prototypes, was occupied by linear voltage regulators that were changed/designed out after. Maybe what I'll do is make a complete list of the ICs and see how it lines up with a later production board. And then compare other components. -Original Message- From: cctalk [mailto:cctalk-boun...@classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Jules Richardson via cctalk Sent: Saturday, December 29, 2018 4:21 PM To: cctalk@classiccmp.org Subject: Re: Osborne-1 with prototype-based motherboard On 12/29/18 2:53 PM, Brad H via cctalk wrote: > Am just posting this as I am hoping someone out there knows someone > who was involved with Osborne back in the day to find out more this > Osborne 1 motherboard I found in a low serial O1 I picked up for $100. Is it just the board layout that's different, or does it appear to be a completely different animal, schematic-wise? (I mean, is there a possibility that the common schematics could still be used for fault diagnosis, despite the different chip locations) I wonder why the board layout changed? I mean sure there was a lot of unused space in yours, but it's not like the production boards were physically smaller. I'm surprised that additional space couldn't have been used for some other potential future purpose - RAM expansion or whatever. cheers Jules
Re: Osborne-1 with prototype-based motherboard
On Sat, 29 Dec 2018, Sam O'nella via cctalk wrote: Maybe too easy but have you asked the seller if they know anything about it's origins? I'd also guess maybe an employee or it could just be one of the 6 motherboard types as someone else commented. Pretty awesome though with the low serial. Thanks also for the blog. I had no idea about the different designs and cases. Some small companies would give employees extreme discounts if they assembled one themselves using mostly parts which had been deemed too obsolete for production.
Re: Osborne-1 with prototype-based motherboard
On Sat, 29 Dec 2018, Chuck Guzis via cctalk wrote: I first saw the O1 when Richard showed me into a room with the various bits strewn about on a tabletop (no case yet). I opined that it would never sell with the tiny display. I had known that Lee was working on something like that, but no details until Adam was hanging around while they built one of the most lavish Computer Faire booths across the aisle from mine (which was flush doors on short filing cabinets) with Joe Garner's "Elcompco" already on display, with a couple of sales. We opined, "They've got enough room for larger; first big upgrade will be a bigger screen." Joe's Elcompco also had a 5" screen in a Halliburton attache case, without room for more, but with an RCA jack for external monitor. In those days, my eyesight was so good that I had no problem with it. I sometimes used a viewfinder form a video camera as a portable monitor. -- Grumpy Ol' Fred ci...@xenosoft.com
Re: Osborne-1 with prototype-based motherboard
On 12/29/18 2:53 PM, Brad H via cctalk wrote: Am just posting this as I am hoping someone out there knows someone who was involved with Osborne back in the day to find out more this Osborne 1 motherboard I found in a low serial O1 I picked up for $100. Is it just the board layout that's different, or does it appear to be a completely different animal, schematic-wise? (I mean, is there a possibility that the common schematics could still be used for fault diagnosis, despite the different chip locations) I wonder why the board layout changed? I mean sure there was a lot of unused space in yours, but it's not like the production boards were physically smaller. I'm surprised that additional space couldn't have been used for some other potential future purpose - RAM expansion or whatever. cheers Jules
RE: Osborne-1 with prototype-based motherboard
Yeah, I'm thinking mine is a Rev C that met the requirements for Rev D (seems to be a D in marker). If the board serial is what's in marker there, and is 1-00494 - that's pretty close to the serial, so that would kind of line up. I just haven't been able to find any other machines in the same serial range or even lower that don't have the Revision that came after. -Original Message- From: cctalk [mailto:cctalk-boun...@classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Al Kossow via cctalk Sent: Saturday, December 29, 2018 2:09 PM To: cctalk@classiccmp.org Subject: Re: Osborne-1 with prototype-based motherboard On 12/29/18 12:53 PM, Brad H via cctalk wrote: > I reached out to Lee Felsenstein on it and he suggested it was related > to the boards produced for the 10 prototypes Osborne built I'm pretty sure I threw one of those out about five years ago. Will dig through the archive to see if there are any earlier schematics seems like most out there are for the multi-layer board the original technical manual mentions there were 6 revs of the pcb http://bitsavers.org/pdf/osborne/osborne1/2F00153-01_Osborne1TechnicalManual_1982.pdf page 13
Re: Osborne-1 with prototype-based motherboard
Maybe too easy but have you asked the seller if they know anything about it's origins? I'd also guess maybe an employee or it could just be one of the 6 motherboard types as someone else commented. Pretty awesome though with the low serial. Thanks also for the blog. I had no idea about the different designs and cases. I'm curious which one I have now. Sent from my Apple /c > On Dec 29, 2018, at 2:53 PM, Brad H via cctalk wrote: > > Am just posting this as I am hoping someone out there knows someone who was > involved with Osborne back in the day to find out more this Osborne 1 > motherboard I found in a low serial O1 I picked up for $100. > > > > I reached out to Lee Felsenstein on it and he suggested it was related to > the boards produced for the 10 prototypes Osborne built, or a derivative of > them. He couldn't say for sure how it ended up in mine. But I was hoping > if anyone knows any Osborne experts that might help me on this - it is not > currently working and I'm hoping to find schematics, etc to get it going > again. Obviously with the radical differences in layout, the schematics for > the production motherboard isn't terribly helpful. > > > > I've posted a blog about it here with a picture of the board for those > curious: http://bradhodge.ca/blog/?p=1186 > > > > Brad >
Re: Osborne-1 with prototype-based motherboard
On 12/29/18 12:53 PM, Brad H via cctalk wrote: > I reached out to Lee Felsenstein on it and he suggested it was related to > the boards produced for the 10 prototypes Osborne built I'm pretty sure I threw one of those out about five years ago. Will dig through the archive to see if there are any earlier schematics seems like most out there are for the multi-layer board the original technical manual mentions there were 6 revs of the pcb http://bitsavers.org/pdf/osborne/osborne1/2F00153-01_Osborne1TechnicalManual_1982.pdf page 13
Re: Osborne-1 with prototype-based motherboard
On 12/29/18 12:53 PM, Brad H via cctalk wrote: > I've posted a blog about it here with a picture of the board for those > curious: http://bradhodge.ca/blog/?p=1186 If you can run down any of the old Sorcim crowd, say, Richard Frank or Marty Herbach, they might have saved some information. I first saw the O1 when Richard showed me into a room with the various bits strewn about on a tabletop (no case yet). I opined that it would never sell with the tiny display. --Chuck
Osborne-1 with prototype-based motherboard
Am just posting this as I am hoping someone out there knows someone who was involved with Osborne back in the day to find out more this Osborne 1 motherboard I found in a low serial O1 I picked up for $100. I reached out to Lee Felsenstein on it and he suggested it was related to the boards produced for the 10 prototypes Osborne built, or a derivative of them. He couldn't say for sure how it ended up in mine. But I was hoping if anyone knows any Osborne experts that might help me on this - it is not currently working and I'm hoping to find schematics, etc to get it going again. Obviously with the radical differences in layout, the schematics for the production motherboard isn't terribly helpful. I've posted a blog about it here with a picture of the board for those curious: http://bradhodge.ca/blog/?p=1186 Brad
