🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <923690579snz@noelsys.demon.co.uk>, Ernest
<ernest@noelsys.demon.co.uk> writes

>> o  the BIOS might auto-disable the onboard video if it detects an
>> external card
>
>yeh right, not a hope in hell :)

It's quite common on some IBM machines.

>The other Mike (H) in this thread mentioned it and as I know my
>way around ast stuff, it surprised me. It turns out his ms p/75
>is a diff model and hence the confusion. I thought all the *uk*
>supplied models were the same but it seems not.

You've only got to look at the model listings in Pronto to see how many
model variants there are.

>These ast boxes are in use every day and have been so for quite
>a few years with nary a problem. :)

They seem to use good quality components (Intel motherboards, Astec
power supplies, etc.) but I always felt the whole was somehow less than
the sum of the parts.

It's academic, anyway:  they don't make desktops any more.

Just remembered: we had difficulty with a Bravo some time back which
wouldn't accept a memory upgrade, even though a neighbouring machine
with the same 501nnn number worked happily with it.  I sent the PC to
our fourth-party repair service and they said it needed FPM parity
memory, which sounded unlikely to me (especially as the original memory,
bearing AST part numbers, didn't look like parity memory.)  I ordered
some in, at huge expense, from Hypertec, and the machine worked.

-- 
Mike Tomlinson
See the sci.electronics.repair FAQ mirror at  
http://www.jasper.demon.co.uk/repairfaq/