[SunRescue] Old holdouts from the pits of hades.....

[Ken Hansen]

I think your best bet will be an older thinkpad (486 variety), but if you
didn't like the sparcbook keyboard, you wouldn't like the thinkpad one
either...

I used to have an IBM P/75 with the awesome 486 DX/33 inside,a nd it was a
mean MCA machine.

The screen was nice, the form-factor was interesting (esp. the "pop-out
floppy drive"), but I sold it to a guy who, AFAIK, is still using it as his
main email machine in his cabin.

He had a real desire for a faster internal modem (56K MCA is a very unusual
combination), and he alway felt that if he had a "real number crunching to
do" he would fire up his P/133 "mainframe" back at the house.

He was able toget a lot of P/75 and P/70 parts at IBM internal flea
markets - do you know anyone at IBM?

HTH,

Ken

----- Original Message -----
From: "BSD Bob the old greybeard BSD freak"
<bobkeys at weedcon1.cropsci.ncsu.edu>
To: <rescue at sunhelp.org>
Sent: Tuesday, March 06, 2001 10:12 AM
Subject: [SunRescue] Old holdouts from the pits of hades.....


<snip>

> Case in point:
>
> For years I have run a low-end dos box (386/20/8mram/ethernet/200mbhd)
> as a portable ftp ferry box and emergency terminal.  Running kermit
> or telnet or ftp off the serial or ethernet port in vt100 mode turned
> out to be a lifesaver, many times.  The large real sized keyboard
> (as opposed to the miniscule klutzy error-prone modern laptop keyboard)
> on the luggable IBM P70 crate, was easy to use, and the red plasma
> screen a joy to read.  Although I would not try to use such a critter
> as a webscraper, as an ftp/cmdlineterminal box it was ideal.
>
> Alas, it went bellyup a few days ago, and parts are unobtainium.
>
> Oh, well, now it is time to scare up one of those Zenith or Toshiba
> early laptops with the biggie keyboards and some sort of ethernet
> to replace it.
>
> The funny thing is the old critter worked way better than my sparcbook
> for ease of use.  The sparcbook is a nicer unix laptop, but its keyboard
> is the worst thing ever put on anything, except for the PC Jr. chicklet
> keyboard.
>
> Oh, well, mebbie it is time to ``modernize'' the ftp ferry crate......
>
> Bob
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Rescue maillist  -  Rescue at sunhelp.org
> http://www.sunhelp.org/mailman/listinfo/rescue