Getting an Altair 8800c Computer SetUp and Going

AltairReferenceCARD.pdf Created by Thomas Niccum 66 Various Books on BASIC 8080InstructionsQuickRef.zip

Altair 8800c Hardware Assembly & BOOT to CP/M & MBASIC

Altair 8800c Basic Boards .

Inserting the Boards .

Run FDC+ Serial Drive Server .

Front Panel Power ON & BOOT .

PC/TeraTerm .

Useful CP/M & MBASIC NFO .

Swapped out the MITS 8800 CPU board for a TDL ZPU board .

Front Panel Board Set + Altair 8800c Cabinet = $398 Reproduction MITS 88 CPU rev.1 board = $125 . . . Martin Eberhard 88-2SIOJP I/O board = $125

FarmTek FDC+ board = $170 Three Mean-Well Power Supplies = $80 . . . 9-Slot Backplane $26

10x EADC 346-100-500-202 S-100 Edge Connector $180 Miscellaneous Parts = $100 . . . SubTotal = $1,204

. . .

So you bought an Altair 8800c cabinet from Mike Douglas/Farmtek Then got the other recommended boards & Power Supplies etc. .

9-Slot Backplane Manual No components needed other than the S-100 Edge Connectors a jumping the fuse points .

Search criteria "100 pin 2x50 S100 Bus Backplane Pitch Card Edge Connetors" or "card edge connector dual 100" EADC 346-100-520-202 or EADC 346-100-500-204 or EADC 346-100-520-802 or FUPH8010-100MTNE DigiKey.com or Mouser.com

The Mean-Well Power Supplies You need TWO: "RS-25-15" for +15V and -15V Digikey.com or Mouser.com or JameCo.com and ONE: "HRP-75-7.5" for +8V Digikey.com or Mouser.com or JameCo.com

DigiKey.com is one source for the power connectors WM2104-ND 0009503061 Molex CONN RCPT HSG 6POS 3.96MM WM2300CT-ND 0008500105 Molex CONN 18-24AWG CRIMP TIN WM4624-ND 0026604060 Molex CONN HEADER VERT 6POS 3.96MM

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Altair 8800c Basic Boards

Altair 8800c Front Panel Interface . . . . .

Reproduction MITS 8080 CPU . . . . .

Martin Eberhard's Altair 8800c 882SIOJP . . . . . SW1 = 00011111 ... SW2= 11011100 ... SW3 = 00000000 ... SW4 = 000100000 ... SW5 = 000100000 J1 = 4-5 ... J2, J3, J4, J5, J6, J7, J8, J9, J10, J11, J12, J13, J14, J15 = OPEN J16 = 1-2 ... J17 = OPEN ... J18 = JUMPER, J19 = OPEN ... J20 = CC/8080 .

Mike Douglas/FarmTek Altair 8800c FDC+ board . . . . . SW3 = 00000111 ... SW1 = 00000000 ... SW2 = 01110000 ... SW4 = 00000000 ... J3 = OPEN .

Inserting the Boards

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Altair 8800c Front Panel Interface . . . . .

Reproduction MITS 8080 CPU board . . . . .

Martin Eberhard 88-2SIOJP . . . . .

Mike Douglas FDC+ . . . . .

Run FDC+ Serial Drive Server

First, Get the FDC+ Serial Drive Server Software or the FDC+ Serial Drive Server Software Modified by Patrick Linstruth

Now a folder on your PC with a set of .DSK files including a BOOT .DSK . . . . . My Stash of .DSK files all zipped up CACHE-O-DSKs.zip for sharing

FDC+ Serial Drive Server . . . . .

Disk 0 = the CP/M or DOS BOOT .DSK file Disk 1 = Other Program FDD .DSK

Disk 2 = Other Program FDD .DSK Disk 3 = Other Program FDD .DSK . . . . .

Front Panel Power ON & BOOT

Set the Sense Switches as in the photo . . . . . Address FF00 = PROM MONITOR on FDC+ board A15, A14, A13, A12, A11, A10, A9, A8 = UP A7, A6, A5, A4, A3, A2, A1 = DOWN

Switch DOWN to Power ON .

Switch UP to STOP . . . . .

Switch UP to RESET . . . . .

Switch UP to Examine . . . . .

Switch DOWN to RUN .

PC/TeraTerm

Connect Port A from the 88-2SIOJP board to the PC via a RS-232 to USB adapter cable Use the "Device Manager" to identify the COM port used by the RS-232 adapter cable . . . . .

Install and SetUp TeraTerm on your PC < Setup > - < Serial Port > - < Port: > . . . . . Enter the COM Port number from the Device Manger

< Speed: > = 9600 . . . . . < Transmit delay > = 10 and 100 msec/line

After "RUN"ing the BOOT from FFOO . . . . . On the PC/TeraTerm display you will see;

You are at the CP/M Prompt . . . . .

From here you can type DIR or LS to see the files on a drive . . . . .

The command line to run MBASIC from the A: drive and the GALAXY.BAS program on the B: drive . . . . .

Useful CP/M & MBASIC NFO

SetUp LPRINT to Port B address 12h/13h or 18d/19d . . . . . B:STAT LST:=UL1: .

Now in a MBASIC program you can PRINT to the console screen, or LPRINT to the Utility Serial Port B This simplifies sending $trings of Data to the Utility Port B .

The "LS" command provides a listing of the files on the selected disk drive e.g., . . . . . A>LS D:

IF you perform the LS command for each drive, then run the "STAT" program and then the "SURVEY" program . . . A0>STAT .

A: R/W, Space: 7940k B: R/W, Space: 7188k . . . C: R/W, Space: 28k

D: R/W, Space: 34k . . . A0>C:SURVEY

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . *** System Survey (June 82) *** . . . Drive A: 244K bytes in 26 files with 7940K bytes remaining

Drive B: 996K bytes in 159 files with 7188K bytes remaining Drive C: 272K bytes in 35 files with 28K bytes remaining . . . Drive D: 266K bytes in 31 files with 34K bytes remaining

Memory map: . . . 0 . . . . . . . . 8 . . . . . . . . 16 . . . . . . . 24 . . . . . . . . 32 . . . . . . . 40 . . . . . . . . 48 . . . . . . . 56 . . . . . . . 64

| . . . . . . . . . | . . . . . . . . . | . . . . . . . . . | . . . . . . . . . | . . . . . . . . . | . . . . . . . . . | . . . . . . . . . | . . . . . . . . . | TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTCCCCBBBBBBBBBBBRRRR . . . T=TPA C=CPM B=BIOS or unassigned R=ROM or bad

BIOS at C403 iobyte 55 drive 00 BDOS at B606 . . . 61439 Bytes RAM 4096 Bytes ROM 46598 Bytes in TPA

0 Bytes Empty 65535 Total Active Bytes . . . Active I/O ports:

08 0A 0B 10 11 12 13 . . . . . F0 F1 F2 F3 F4 F5 F6 F7 F8 F9 FA FB FC FD FE

22 Ports active . . . A0>

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Swapped out the MITS 8800 CPU board for a TDL ZPU board

. . . . . Original Reproduction MITS 8800 CPU board .

TDL ZPU board ... slightly modified for maximum speed .

. . . . . . The TDL ZPU board allows the computer to handle 8080 and Z80 instructions . . . . .

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