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  • Just acquired 2 incomplete Apollo computers.

    From [email protected]@21:1/5 to All on Sat Nov 17 20:08:23 2018
    Is there anyone still active here? I acquired 2 incomplete Apollo computers. Digging around online it seems to be the computer, keyboard and mouse from a DN4500 (no monitor) and likely monitor, computer and floppy/HD from a DN300 (no keyboard/mouse).

    I'd like to first try getting the DN4500 going. Problem is, there is no video cable and I cannot find a pinout online.

    http://i65.tinypic.com/os963s.jpg

    Anyone have a pinout for this?

    Anyone have parts for sale? If I'm going to try getting the DN300 working, I'll need a keyboard and possibly more.

    I hope there are some people still active?

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  • From Jim Rees@21:1/5 to [email protected] on Sun Nov 18 13:39:47 2018
    On Saturday, November 17, 2018 at 11:08:23 PM UTC-5, [email protected] wrote:
    Is there anyone still active here? I acquired 2 incomplete Apollo computers. Digging around online it seems to be the computer, keyboard and mouse from a DN4500 (no monitor) and likely monitor, computer and floppy/HD from a DN300 (no keyboard/mouse).

    I'd like to first try getting the DN4500 going. Problem is, there is no video cable and I cannot find a pinout online.

    http://i65.tinypic.com/os963s.jpg

    Anyone have a pinout for this?

    Anyone have parts for sale? If I'm going to try getting the DN300 working, I'll need a keyboard and possibly more.

    I hope there are some people still active?

    There are still some of us here, although I don't know if any of us still have working equipment.

    That video card puts out RGB, with sync on green. You don't really need a pinout, just try all six possible combinations and use the one that works. More info in the Apollo Archive at https://jim.rees.org/apollo-archive/monitor-info .

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  • From Lothar Paltins@21:1/5 to All on Tue Nov 20 12:19:39 2018
    Am 18.11.18 um 22:39 schrieb Jim Rees:
    That video card puts out RGB, with sync on green. You don't really need a pinout, just try all six possible combinations and use the one that works. More info in the Apollo Archive at https://jim.rees.org/apollo-archive/monitor-info .

    You must try only one combination:

    _________________________
    \ _ _ _ /
    \ |_| |_| |_| /
    \_____________________/
    R G B

    That's the rear view of the video card as shown on your picture. It's
    easy to build an adapter cable with a VGA connector on the other side.
    You need a 3W3 D-type connector with 3 75 Ohm female coax contacts, but
    50 Ohm should also work. Your video card looks like the 8-plane card, so
    you need a monitor that supports sync-on-green and the non-standard
    resolution of 1024x800.

    --
    Lothar Paltins [email protected]

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  • From [email protected]@21:1/5 to All on Sun Dec 9 16:25:57 2018
    There are folks still active here, and there’s also the cctalk list at classiccmp that has Apollo folks.

    Others have addressed your question about hooking up a display, for actually finding a usable display I can recommend one of the 17- or 19-inch NEC MultiSync LCDs, you should be able to get a used one inexpensively. (One of mine was only US$10 on
    CraigsList.) As long as you get one of the right models, which should be easy as all the PDF docs are available with a little online searching, it’ll sync to pretty much anything within its frequency range, and show it pixel-for-pixel centered on the
    display rather than stretched out.

    Another exciting thing for you is going to be finding and installing an operating system. The only source of an OS that I know is Bitsavers, and to boot native hardware you’ll have to figure out how to get the contents of the tape images onto actual
    tapes you can then use to boot and install. (I’ve tried and failed; I used information in MAME’s “ctape” emulation to extract files from the tape images, but writing the files to DAT with “dd” on UNIX and then attempting to “DI C” and “
    EX INVOL” from the DAT just crashes with an illegal instruction after reading the tape. There’s obviously something more or different I need to do... And I’ve used the tape images to install in MAME so they do actually have the right data in them.)

    In any case, congratulations, this will be a fun journey!

    — Chris

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