Another 6128

[chinnyhill10]

Went on a car journey today and picked up a CPC 6128 I have been staking out on Ebay. Wanted a spare 6128 for some time.


Couple of things surprised me when I got it. It's a German model complete with the odd connectors at the back and all the colours on the disk drive on the front also in German.


It's in good condition apart from the metal bit on top of the disk drive which is oddly marked.


It also has its CTM 644 which I really don't want. While it's been novel playing a few games on it this evening I realised I spent 7 years staring at that flicking blurry mess and I'm surprised I didn't go blind or have some eyesight related condition!


Question is, can I get an HxC connector complete with the drive select mod (so the CPC thinks the HxC is the A drive) for this machine?


And how did a German model end up being sold in the UK? Did Amstrad offload stock?


Here she is before I cleaned her up:





And if you go to that there Twitter and look for @chinnyhill10 you can see lots more photos from when I collected it.

[Bryce]

Hi Chinnyhill,
     good catch. Yes the same cables for external HxC with the switches are available just like the edge connector ones. It's more likely that someone from German brought the machine over or someone in the UK bought it on ebay from DE.

Bryce.

[Gryzor]

I don't think it's very likely that Amstrad got rid of German stock in the UK precisely due to the difference in the ports hardware. It's most likely one of the models from after Amstrad took over German distribution.

[gerald]

I don't think it's very likely that Amstrad got rid of German stock in the UK precisely due to the difference in the ports hardware. It's most likely one of the models from after Amstrad took over German distribution.

Say that to the poor French guys that got one of these.
Amstrad did not really cared about the port difference. You can find German CPC (ie centronics connector) with a french disk drive plate 
At least it opened the market of 'adapters' ....

[chinnyhill10]

I don't think it's very likely that Amstrad got rid of German stock in the UK precisely due to the difference in the ports hardware. It's most likely one of the models from after Amstrad took over German distribution.

You say that but I was speaking to someone just the the other day that bought a grey keyed 464 in the UK.


Amstrad frequently offloaded stock to whoever would take it when it was end of line (look at how the Penpad ended up at Tandy for LESS than it cost to make). In the case of the CPC, perfectly possible Amstrad offloaded excess stock in 1990 to any discounter who would take them.


Not saying mine didn't originate in Germany, but knowing how Amstrad operated I'm sure they would have just dumped the stock when the time came.

[Terje_Norway]

Hi,


If You could give us the serial number of the machine, that could make it much easier to figure it out 


That way it could be confirmed WHEN it was manufactured. Personally, I do also have some ODD CPC464 machines in my collection. Mine was manufactured in December 1990 and January 1991. I bought them from Weeske in Germany. My theory (for these machines) is simply that they do represent the last batch of the old CPC464 machines. Amstrad used what ever that was left at the factory.


You could have a look at the following post I made Years ago :


CPC Mainboard Versions


Thats it for now.


Yours

Terje Grind
NORWAY

PS This looks to be my 100th posting on cpcwiki

[chinnyhill10]

Serial is: 533-8429256

[Terje_Norway]

Serial is: 533-8429256

Hi,


Have had a look at the serial number, and it reveals the following info :


5xx = Manufactured in Korea
x33 = Plant number in Korea
84xxxxx = Made in 88, April
xx29256 = Machine made in that month


You could read more on the subject of serial numbers below 
Info taken from a post back in November 2011. 

If Your extra interested, You could also check out the link below.

Interpretation of the 2nd type:
In the form of 10 digits (often with a dash between the 3rd and 4th digits)
=> = 1st digit country code (5 for Korea, Thailand for 6)
=> 2nd and 3rd digit = plant code (found on 31 and 32 but also 33, 35, 41 and 71 for Thailand)
=> 4th and 5th digits (possibly preceded by a hyphen) = production date (year and month as the previous system)
=> 5 the following figures correspond to the sequence number of the chain of production (per site per month now)
Examples: some examples:
5326604065 => Korea Factory 31 - June 1986 (it's a 6128)
533-7316093 => Korea Factory 31 - March 1987 (it's a 464)
671-9408078 => Thailand Factory 71 - April 1989 (it's a 6128)

Well, I hope this is helpful.
If you find counter-examples or if you have more information (the precise location of plants for example) do not hesitate to know. And to inform the database that aims to understand what exactly are the various "letters-codes" and "Mfrs-version" ...
Tilt

Amstrad CPC hardware(i-need-french-member)/msg34099/#msg34099

Hope this information is of any use for You.


Yours

Terje Grind
NORWAY

[chinnyhill10]

Hi,


Have had a look at the serial number, and it reveals the following info :


5xx = Manufactured in Korea
x33 = Plant number in Korea
84xxxxx = Made in 88, April
xx29256 = Machine made in that month


You could read more on the subject of serial numbers below 
Info taken from a post back in November 2011. 

If Your extra interested, You could also check out the link below.


Amstrad CPC hardware(i-need-french-member)/msg34099/#msg34099

Hope this information is of any use for You.


Yours

Terje Grind
NORWAY

Wow! This should be a sticky and is hopefully on the Wiki. Cheers.

[TFM]

Well, I'm very glad that all my CPCs have Centronics connectors, the PCB edge connectors are always dodgy and just c64 like. Brrr. Terrible. Praise the lord for golden contacts and Blue Centronics. 

[chinnyhill10]

Just reviving this as I've been in the box of stuff that came with my German 6128. It has a UK manual with it. Which suggests somehow it probably was indeed dumped on the UK market by Amstrad.

[Gryzor]

Probably, indeed, but not clearly...

[chinnyhill10]

Probably, indeed, but not clearly...

Do we know the dates of the last production run of standard CPC's

Also, come to that, the dates on which the Plus machines were made?