Finally got a Apple II+ With Goodies

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NovellNetware's picture
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Finally got a Apple II+ With Goodies
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I guess my entire post was not posted with pictures. So I'll attach the pictures and leave the story telling for another day.

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Details? Which version. What

Details? Which version. What kind of goodies?

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That will wait.

That will wait until July 4th when I get it in my hands. I didn't think or get a chance to download pictures before the add was deleted. It showed the Okidata printer, bottom of the Apple with serial number and a few other things. I do know it has the apple paddle controllers and the sticker I think was marked 48k. So it was a 48k version. As for goodies. That is what I call software and stuff. Most of the Apples II's I  see is just the hardware only. Anyway, once I get my hands on it. I'll be posting pictures, cleaning and asking for help to get it working. I do know I have one mystery. If you noticed the aux video output on the picture shows a cable to it. On the other end is a round black din connector. From my understanding packed with the monitor is more cables. But I have yet to identify it.  Cards was identified as the following on AtariAge.

 

1. Lanuage card or mostly a microsoft 16kb upgrade card to boost the machine to 64k.

2. Printer card I think is centronics but might be Serial. The printer manual says serial. But on another picture I don't have. I believe it was a Graphler + Card.

3. Hayes modem.

4. Standard disk II controller.

But you should be able to see all of that from the pictures I posted that I was sent.

 

Thank You,

 

Josh

 

 

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Congrat's on your new acquision

Congrat's on your new acquision.  You have a late model Apple ][ Plus.  A most popular model among Apple ][ fans.

The 16K language card installed and the modem card were both among the better quality cards of the era.

The Printer card is likely matched to the printer you mention.  Apple touted the Super Serial Card and the ImageWriter at the time but there were several competitors to that.

 

If you want to improve the memory of your 'new' Apple ][+, consider getting a Saturn 128K Ram Card for slot 0.  This will require that you carefully re-install the RAM chip that was removed for your 16K mamory Card back into the motherboard where it belongs.  There are modern versions of the Saturn Card available on eBay from time to time.

 

Consider removing the Modem Card.  Though it is a cool relic, few use this for actually transferring data anymore.  There are a few (very few) Bulletin Board services out there that service Apple ]['s, (one of which is often advertised here) but if you don't have a land line to plug it into, you should consider replacing it with a modern storage card like the CFFA, or SDisk or Floppy EMU or several other Disk ][ emulator cards available that contain  SD memory.  This allows transtfers direct from your PC or Mac  to the Apple ][.  It's my opinion, but you should always keep your Slot 6 Floppy Drives intact and available to your Apple ][, as those are a big part of the true character of this computer.

 

Enjoy your new (to you) find.

 

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Oh I know all about Dram chips, well at least testing.

I really wish my first post didn't get muched. But my first job was in 92 at the small town local computer store. My boss had a really simple dram tester. I cannot tell you how many early 386 machines I fixed with it. It was a simple box that had a knob and a button. You set the knob to the speed and pressed the button. I found out that if you set the speed slighlty higher it would weed out all the bad dram chips. Talk about a time saver. Esp. if the machine didn't post at all. I also cleaned and replaced several other chips. I even cleaned and reseated chips in an apple III computer for sale. I tried to beg my boss to purchase it. But it was already sold.

If you guys are interested in my tales of old from when I was a child in the 80's and a teen in the 90's. I can post as much as I remember.

 

Thanks,

 

Josh

 

 

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Josh, you should fill in your profile ...

That would tell us more about yourself.

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The parallel card is probably

The parallel card is probably not terribly useful these days, as few people want to run a dot matrix printer.  I agree with the modem card.  Not at all useful in this day and age as there is practicallt nothing to call with it and 300bps was painfully slow even back in the day.  I'd disagree with the Saturn card.  Leave the 16k RAM card in slot 0, and just add the Saturn card to another slot.  No reason not to use both.  Davit Mutimer makes an excellent Saturn compatible card that is very small and low power usage.  And very reasonably priced too.

 

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My list is small but I'm sure will grow.

So when I was a young lad my parents purchased a used Apple II+ in oriignal box with printer and monochrome monitor. It also had a nice collection of software. Stupid me sold it to upgrade my used PC. Not understanding why parts for the Apple II+ (though older computer.) was still more expensive than a pc.

I kind of realized my mistake when I listed it in the local pages and have about 6 people calling for it after being sold. I sold if for the same price my parents purchased it for. $350.00.  Stil in high deminds. Not sure what the year was. 91-92 perhaps. Anyway that is a story for another time.

 One thing I remember or two things I remembered was wanted a 80 column card and 2nd floppy drive. Not realizing the 80 column card I was looking at was more common in the IIe. So this is the 2 items on my list to start with. Once I get it working. Though somebody is selling a magnavox color monitor in the next time over from that time frame. Might be tempted to get it.

The old story if I would have known now back then. I would have never sold it. I always wanted to tinker with CPM and finding out a z80 card existed for it among over things. WOW. My experaince with cpm was used kaypro's and a few other machines.

As for the printer card. I got my hands on a Epson lq-590 printer with all the pieces, manual and tons of extra ribbons for free. Unlike other printers I pass up that is missing the covers and such. This had all the covers. One peice is broken for one cover. But it still works just fine. Even for single sheet feed. Even though I do have some tractor feed paper. The printer looked brand new. Though I had to blow dust bunnies out of it and lube it a tad. Prints like new. Though in my heart I hate Epson and I"m a fan of Panasonic or Oikidata dot matrix printers. Can't remember why though.

The modem will be nice to play around with since I have a old telephone system that can be used to connect 2 modems together and ring them. Last year I picked up a old us robotics v-everything external. 

As for the 128k card. I can't seem to find a good use for it at this moment if I get one. So that will be a later purchase. I do plan to load this thing up.

1. 2nd drive

2. 80 column card

3. cpm card

4. Serial or Parallel card. (I'll find out what one is what when I get the computer on july 4th.)

5. Floppy Drive emulator. I did see that nice new card that runs 3.1/2" hd disks and other things.  But that is a big pricey for a project.

6. Scsi card. I have a nice 20meg third party scsi drive in a box. Says it is for a macintosh. But I think it might work on an apple II+

7. Who knows at this point.

 

Thanks,

Josh

 

 

 

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Pictures and pics of problem.

Well it is more dirty than expected but nothing broken. Well except for the problem I was told about. I got all the updated pictures. So the pictures of the issue is when you turn it on. Hit the reset and what not. When you turn it on. It beeps. When you reset it beeps. After is ctrl reset into basic. I can hits keys on the keyboard and I can see the lines move around. I did find one loose memory chip and reseted it. No change. No change with all the cards out. Not change with removing banks of memory. So I'm thinking a video chip issue or it needs a cleaning. All the ram chips had this garbage on the pins. Farther into the slot seemed okay. But if the rest of the chips have that garbage. Possible. Anyway let the fun being.

 

Thanks,

 

Josh

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Testing done so far.

1. Tried Monitor on vcr. Works fine.

2. Remove all cards

3. Remove mainboard from case

4. check powers supply. All volts are good. Well two volts was just a tad under what they should be.

5. Removed all memory chips except first row closet to keyboard.

6. Take all memory chips from Microsoft 64 k upgrad card and put them in first row.

7. Swap chips around that matched.

8. Removed and reseated almost all chips.

9. Only tarnish found was on original apple memory chips. But only so far down. Not all the way into the socket.

10. Removed apple special rom. Just got a big black green screen. (Assume this is normal.)

11. 820-0044-d apple 2 main logic board rf1 (thus no memory jumpers.)

12. inside of case is stamped march 1982

Oh and one more thing. When I keep pressing return. It keeps beeping and the picture keeps changing. This is after pressing ctrl reset. I also check the bell on the keyboard and it does beep. So I'm pretty sure it is booting. Just not giving me a picture. LIke one of the switching ic chips is busted.

 

Thanks,

 

Josh

 

 

 

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more testing

Okay. So I tried the gr command.

 

1. press ctrl and reset

2. gr

3. return

 

Get blank screen. Only difference I noticed is now no matter how many times I press enter. I have a blank screen. If I do not use that command. I get lines in different spots on the monitor or not lines at all.

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just an update.

Just wanted to post a small update. I have not done any hardware stuff today. But I was reading through the apple ii official diagnostics. I'm surprised about how much is just replace a chip or check with a volt meter. When I first started in computer around 1992. I always figured it was a hack thing to do. As time passed on. I got better at locating and reading what part of the board does what. So that narrowed down the search during a repair. i remember towards the end having it down pretty good for certain fixes. The biggest problem being in a small town (even the next town over.) didn't have a place you could just go in and get stuff. Well except for the Radio Shack. That was limited for parts. I considered the real people who built and used o-scopes to be the true repair people or what I call board level repair. The video I was watching on you tube explaining by the time the apple iie came around. If it wasn't a simple fix. You would just send the board back to apple and they would send another repaired one back to you. So for you guys who are trying to go it alone. Give yourselves a pat on the back.

 

TTFN,

 

Josh

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Update and good news.

Update:

Got a picture. Joined a group on face book and they asap pointed me to the right bank of chips. One suggested to swap them out in pairs. After messing around I had three results.

1. same issue

2. no picture

3. picture of APPLE II repeated several times and unable to get a scroll lock.

 

So I'm going to source out some 161 chips and see what happens.

Thanks,

Josh

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chips on the way...

Got the chips on the way. Should arrive by Thursday. I'll keep everyone posted. Once again thanks...

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Video issue resolved. Now keyboard.

Okay so I got the new ships in. Mitsubishi 74LS161A chips. Now we have a working display and mostly a computer. I still have to clean the printer and disk drive. But now I have a great keyboard problem. I was hoping to avoid this. I'm pretty sure it is dirty. Though this machine is pretty clean. What I get is repeats, some keys not working, some keys working fine. Sometimes I have to smack it a few times. The T key don't work at all. most keys work great. Like the space bar, return, and greater or less than. To name a few. This is what I get for putting the machine back together. Now I have to open it up to pull the keyboard. So I'll keep you guys updates. But for now. This issue is resolved.

 

Thanks,

Josh

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Reports of Contact Cleaner

Reports of Contact Cleaner and vigorous key working are around.  They are after all mechanical switches, periods of long disuse can see the contact surfaces corrode...

 

 

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I really like that Zenith

I really like that Zenith monitor.

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Funny about that.

When looking through the old computer magazines depending on what year it was. It was the cheapset monitor out and about. I think in one magazine was below $100.00. Then again we are talking about 1980's money. But it reminds me the nec green monitor I had when I was a kid on the used apple ii plus my parents purchased me. But even when I looked at that style of green monitor. Still almost twice as much. 

 

TTFN,

 

Josh

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