Aswayze
Member
- 250
- 6
- 18
- Location
- Martinsburg Wv
I know it may seem weird to be looking for parts for an outdated
monochrome 486 computer in this day and age but there is method to my
madness.
I spend all year gathering bits and pieces to run one annual event.
Operation East Wind www.operationeastwind.com East Wind is set in the
closing days of the Cold war and pits US and NATO allies against
Soviet and East German troops over the course of 9 days and 8 nights
of 24 hour operations. We work tirelessly to get every little detail
we can right for the event to give our participants (Most of whom were
in diapers back then) an environment that matches Cold War Europe as
much as possible.
We have correct radios, (US and Russian), We have correct vehicles
(US, British, and Russian), we serve the correct food from the correct
MKT, we have the correct tents, we have the correct chairs, We have
the correct heaters, all that minutia. We also like to keep track
of the events as they unfold plus of course deal with administrative
tasks (Like holding the VOLUMES of field and tech manuals on all the
gizmos) so computers are a fairly big part of the background
infrastructure.
In years past, this has always involved ruggedised Itronix laptops
since they are fairly capable machines and certainly look clunky and
boxy enough to be from that era but I was never really happy with that
solution (although I do love the Itronix laptops). Recently, I
happened into an old SAIC V2LC and separately a ruggedised lightweight
dot matrix printer for it. I have powered it up and it operates just
fine but I am missing a good bit of the supporting cables and such for
this thing and thought I would pop in here and see if any of you guys
have some leads.
I need:
The 24 volt vehicle cable that goes to the power supply (I do have the
power supply)
The cable that runs from the power supply to the computer itself (10
pin thingy)
The cable that runs from the power supply or the aux power port on the
computer over to the printer (3 pin cable)
Either a replacement ribbon/cartridge for the printer or at the very
least a cross reference or source.
Information about the thin network adaptors in this thing? From what
I see, it has no driver for Win 95 (installed OS) and only runs in
DOS? Anyone ever networked these things? I’d like to get my hands
on a second one at some point and network them.
Any hints, leads, sources or tricks would be much appreciated. I’ll
make sure to post pics of the younger guys (who never got to see how
goofy computers used to be) getting frustrated with this thing for all
of us to enjoy later. While I could obviously wire this thing up with
lamp cords and jumper cables, it would be nice to have the correct
stuff for it.
monochrome 486 computer in this day and age but there is method to my
madness.
I spend all year gathering bits and pieces to run one annual event.
Operation East Wind www.operationeastwind.com East Wind is set in the
closing days of the Cold war and pits US and NATO allies against
Soviet and East German troops over the course of 9 days and 8 nights
of 24 hour operations. We work tirelessly to get every little detail
we can right for the event to give our participants (Most of whom were
in diapers back then) an environment that matches Cold War Europe as
much as possible.
We have correct radios, (US and Russian), We have correct vehicles
(US, British, and Russian), we serve the correct food from the correct
MKT, we have the correct tents, we have the correct chairs, We have
the correct heaters, all that minutia. We also like to keep track
of the events as they unfold plus of course deal with administrative
tasks (Like holding the VOLUMES of field and tech manuals on all the
gizmos) so computers are a fairly big part of the background
infrastructure.
In years past, this has always involved ruggedised Itronix laptops
since they are fairly capable machines and certainly look clunky and
boxy enough to be from that era but I was never really happy with that
solution (although I do love the Itronix laptops). Recently, I
happened into an old SAIC V2LC and separately a ruggedised lightweight
dot matrix printer for it. I have powered it up and it operates just
fine but I am missing a good bit of the supporting cables and such for
this thing and thought I would pop in here and see if any of you guys
have some leads.
I need:
The 24 volt vehicle cable that goes to the power supply (I do have the
power supply)
The cable that runs from the power supply to the computer itself (10
pin thingy)
The cable that runs from the power supply or the aux power port on the
computer over to the printer (3 pin cable)
Either a replacement ribbon/cartridge for the printer or at the very
least a cross reference or source.
Information about the thin network adaptors in this thing? From what
I see, it has no driver for Win 95 (installed OS) and only runs in
DOS? Anyone ever networked these things? I’d like to get my hands
on a second one at some point and network them.
Any hints, leads, sources or tricks would be much appreciated. I’ll
make sure to post pics of the younger guys (who never got to see how
goofy computers used to be) getting frustrated with this thing for all
of us to enjoy later. While I could obviously wire this thing up with
lamp cords and jumper cables, it would be nice to have the correct
stuff for it.
