At 07:34 PM 4/12/99 GMT, you wrote:
>Recently I was given an AST 486 with 2MB RAM, no
>- Can I simply remove the 5-1/4" high-density floppy
>drive from the 286 and add it to the 486 without frying
>anything?
You'll have to set it up in the bios, but it should fasten onto the same
cable as the 1.44" floppy, or a cable modified to allow it's connector. I
had to go out and purchase a new cable with the correct connectors for both
my newer 3.5" floppy, pin connectors,e 486, and for the older, slide
connector rather than pins,5.25" floppy. I have them both on this cable,
one past the twisted section, one below it, and thence to the floppy
controller. Then I reset the bios which had a spot for a second floppy and
selected the appropriate designation. Voila!
concerning various harddrives and ram, I would consider a 486 well worth
the upgrade of a decent hard drive and to 16 MB ram, at least. a 486 can
do a lot, especially if you run linux, although I'm using win98 still,
having upgraded the cpu to a 586.
About the cdrom, it is also possible to pop one of those on, same cable as
the harddrive, and set it in the bios, on this machine it was type 3 blank.
You could also use a "backpack" cdrom which works off the printer port.
I've seen them in the compatibility lists for linux, so they can be used,
although they are more grief.
Nowadays the older cdroms are to be had for a song, but watch out, some
only work off of proprietary sound cards.
bye,
Yolanda
UIN 4898262
http://members.home.net/pippi5
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