36
votes
Accepted
What are these 3COM connectors for?
Those are PCMCIA adapters. With laptops, a single PCMCIA card was narrower than Ethernet (or phone lines). You could get a 2 card thing (but I don't recall any from 3COM)
This image:
(Source)
...
- 1,099
31
votes
Accepted
Discovering intended cable orientation with an older IDE controller
This answer is also generic to other applications using this sort of connector (confusing known as IDC- insulation displacement connector), which may have just about any number of pins, not just the ...
- 466
30
votes
Accepted
How did the classic Macintosh come to use Eurocard connectors?
I’m not sure the Macintosh II designers chose the connector as such, but rather the bus, NuBus, developed at MIT and documented by Texas Instruments (Document No. TI-2242825-0001, published in 1983). ...
- 118k
16
votes
What are these 3COM connectors for?
These were designed for 3COM Megahertz networking PCMCIA cards (aka PC cards). These were add-on cards for laptops that didn't have internal network adapters. See bottom device on this picture on ...
- 2,038
15
votes
Accepted
Where is/was the standard V.35 connector defined?
This is the Winchester connector. The form factor is specified in ISO 2593. ISO standards are typically not available for free, which may be why you had trouble finding information on it. I'm not ...
- 266
15
votes
How did the classic Macintosh come to use Eurocard connectors?
TL;DR:
They simply picked an off the shelf connector readily available and fitting their specs (like size, reliability, stability, etc.).
Almost all of the mainstream classic desktop computers that ...
- 213k
14
votes
Accepted
Only "Drive A:" detected with two floppy disk drives
Unfortunately, you can't connect two floppy drives to the motherboard header on that system. Like most motherboards since sometime around 2002–2003, it only supports one floppy drive, probably because ...
- 118k
10
votes
Accepted
Connectors for green screen versus color monitors
The very short answer is no, because no “green screen” standard is compatible with VGA (which is where 640×480 was introduced). The slightly longer answer is yes, but only in a very small number of ...
- 118k
10
votes
Discovering intended cable orientation with an older IDE controller
In this case the pin numbers are marked, which makes it straightforward like user85471's answer shows. But if that is not the case, you can use a multimeter or a continuity tester.
This method will ...
- 1,686
9
votes
Converting SCART to VGA/Jack
Black-and-white hi-res from the 1040 STE on a VGA monitor should work with a direct connection and no tricky electronics at all (just the adapter cable)
Atari VGA
GND ...
- 33k
9
votes
Only "Drive A:" detected with two floppy disk drives
On modern motherboards, the floppy is controlled by the Super I/O chip, and often this chip is only capable of controlling one floppy drive, because the additional drive select/moter pins are not ...
- 26.1k
9
votes
Why were ZIP DRAM packages ever considered if PLCC/SOJ sockets were available?
Most important is that ZIP offered higher density while still being thru-hole, thus compatible with existing manufacturing technology.
Sockets are generally avoided as sockets are a cost factor. They ...
- 213k
9
votes
Discovering intended cable orientation with an older IDE controller
Generically, when designing a PCB it is common practice for through-hole connector footprints to have round pads, except for pin 1 which is square. This can often be seen on the reverse side of the ...
- 461
8
votes
Accepted
How to connect a Dragon32 to a HD TV?
The Dragon 32 has two display outputs. One is a UHF analogue TV signal, which will work if your TV has an analogue-capable tuner. The other is a composite video output on a DIN socket, which you can ...
- 16.7k
8
votes
Converting SCART to VGA/Jack
The problem you have is that most home computers of that era output TV standard signals which VGA is not. As you've mentioned there needs to be some conversion from one standard to the other.
A ...
- 263
7
votes
Accepted
What are these bus/tag connectors for?
Yes, these are bus and tag terminators for mainframe channels that used to run at 3MB/sec speeds. Used as late as 1998 in P/390 development systems. The IBM and Amdahl terminators are equivalent.
- 86
7
votes
Converting SCART to VGA/Jack
You have three problems to overcome:
Separate sync from composite video or CSYNC into H and V to get an RGBHV output.
Upscale/scan double from 15 kHz to the 31 kHz that most VGA monitors accept.
...
- 17.4k
6
votes
What are these 3COM connectors for?
A few things to add to existing answers:
As well as ethernet cards there were modem cards, and some with both modems and ethernet adaptors in one.
There were several similar but mutually-...
- 409
5
votes
IBM Model F XT is typing random characters / what cable is this?
Thanks for the answers and comments. The problem has been intermittent but really bothered me today so now that I have a soldering iron, I took a blade, cut out the damaged part of the cable, stripped ...
- 311
5
votes
IBM Model F XT is typing random characters / what cable is this?
I think what you have there is an IBM Model F keyboard.
The pictured cable is certainly suspect, though it does not have to be the main/only culprit. If you can easily find a replacement cable, it is ...
- 60.1k
5
votes
What PC VGA connector used 2 rows of pins?
Could it be CGA, MDA or EGA connector (DE-9) (as in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_video_connectors#D-subminiature_family) ?
The Pentium !!! era doesn't match, but on Wikipedia, there is this ...
- 659
5
votes
Converting SCART to VGA/Jack
SCART is a connector standard, not a video standard. I think it can carry composite, s-videos (chroma/luma), analog RGB, audio and possible other formats depending on what is producing the signal. ...
- 9,795
5
votes
Only "Drive A:" detected with two floppy disk drives
Back in the day, it was VERY common to encounter an IBM compatible which had only a single floppy drive, invariably designated as drive A.
Do you imagine it phased us? :)
The solution was dead easy....
- 271
4
votes
Converting SCART to VGA/Jack
For my STE, I go straight from RGB to VGA using:
An ST RGB SCART cable (this one)
A sync stripper (Sync Strike)
An LCD monitor that accepts 15kHz VGA (BenQ RL2455HM)
This is a clean solution without ...
- 1,079
4
votes
Converting SCART to VGA/Jack
Another possibility would be to use a cheap USB video capture device, such as this one. (You'll also need a SCART to composite video adapter, which you can buy or wire up yourself).
Connect the video ...
- 785
4
votes
Accepted
Monitor Cable for Atari 130XE. Where to buy or how to build?
Well, 'Television' is just a modulated TV signal on chanel 2 or 3 (see switch) which can be decoded by any analogue TV. A cinch (coaxial) cable to connect the computer to the antena input of the TV is ...
- 213k
3
votes
What are these bus/tag connectors for?
I guess (is that allowed as an answer?) that these are bus terminating resistors. High speed signals are usually passed along impedance matched transmission lines, the termination resistor mostly ...
- 1,035
3
votes
Connectors for green screen versus color monitors
They could be interchanged if you define "some effort" as "a lot of effort". The problem isn't so much the CRT tubes themselves, or the choice of 'color' or 'monochrome', but rather the circuitry ...
- 11.4k
3
votes
What kind of cable do I need to connect a Movemaster EX RV-M1 robotic arm to a PC?
Those cables you're looking at have exactly the right number of pins for GPIB; your issue is that the arm doesn't use GPIB, at least not the arm's connectors used to interface it to a computer.
The ...
- 24.7k
3
votes
What PC VGA connector used 2 rows of pins?
One option is that it was a Matrox video card which had a VGA connector and additional connector for the Rainbow Runner Studio daughter board. Though it was 15-pin DA-15 connector like used for Game/...
- 28.3k
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible