Acorn A4!

[robcfg]

I'm so happy right now! 


I managed to win an Acorn A4 (the first ARM laptop afaik) on an eBay auction, and it's even working as you can see from the picture below:





Cheers!

[Bryce]

Very nice. Change the battery as soon as possible, so that it continues working

Bryce.

[robcfg]

Hehe, it would be nice to have a working battery, but it's not that I'm going anywhere with it anytime soon.


Though it would be nice to play Hero Quest while flying 


BTW, would it bee difficult to find a nice laptop frame and put a Raspberry PI into it for the ultimate portable RiscOS experience?

[mr_lou]

I think what Bryce means, is that the battery can spit out acid on the motherboard and ruin it, if it's very old and such.
So better to change it now before having it powered on for too long. Otherwise you may end up not so lucky.
Not for certain, but better to not risk it.

[Bryce]

Exactly. I mean the clock battery soldered onto the PCB, not the main battery.

Bryce.

[robcfg]

Ok, I just misundertood you 


You're right about that. I have also to do a replacement for the batteries of my A3010 and A3020 which I took off, and was planning to change them for AA batteries.


A bit more difficult on th A4 because of the tight room inside the case but the smaller battery is (maybe) easier to find than the old big full-of-acid batteries of the bigger models.

[Bryce]

There's a few tips on using alternative areas for the A4 battery here: A4 CMOS Battery Replacement

Bryce.

[robcfg]

Thank you very much, Sir!

[Gryzor]

Ooh, sexy! Pity about all those tiny screens the early laptops had, but this is exotic Going to read some more!

[Bryce]

Ooh, sexy! Pity about all those tiny screens the early laptops had, but this is exotic Going to read some more!

Na, the tiny screen just adds to its "Retroness", if it had a screen to the edges it just wouldn't feel right. It would look too modern

I like the manual brightness and contrast knobs, they are so cool. There was a very similar Toshiba at the time, it was one of my first laptops when I started working.

Bryce.

[robcfg]

Ooh, sexy! Pity about all those tiny screens the early laptops had, but this is exotic Going to read some more!

Well, you can always connect it to a VGA monitor, but again it would look funny.


The machine is quite charming, I have to say... 

[MaV]

They don't make'em like that anymore! *sniff*

No, really, they don't. I want a 15" - Notebook with ARM, and a proper ATA-chip (instead of the crappy USB integration) for the hard drive, Linux (not Android) and no proprietary drivers. Instead you have a ton of ARM-based crap theses days ... the ARM deserves better.

[Sykobee (Briggsy)]

It's only a matter of time now before you get your wish. Well, maybe 13" instead of 15".

[MaV]

I can settle for 13", but it's the waiting that drives me nuts these days. With all those half-assed solutions around now, you'd expect someone finally comes to their senses and goes one step further. *sigh*

[TFM]

Therefore you finally end up buying a CPC! 

[Gryzor]

Well, I can see how the small screen can add to its charm. It's just that I was taken a bit back from the "old-crappy-laptop" looks.


640x480, isn't it? Should look very crisp and nice at that size!

[robcfg]

Sure it looks quite good!


Also, by using the external vga port, you can use a vga  monitor up to 1152x864 (methinks).

[Bryce]

Sure it looks quite good!


Also, by using the external vga port, you can use a vga  monitor up to 1152x864 (methinks).

At 3fps?

Bryce.

[TFM]

It's not a PC, so multiply by 100