IBM XT 5160

[Washerman]

5160 Front

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Picked this machine up locally among a pretty large lot 15 machines and tons of parts back in November. It's a US model, ex-Uni of Michigan. Someone had unceremoniously written $1 in texta on the cover! Gave it a clean and took some pics, but unfortunately I don't have a transformer (yet) so I haven't fired her up.

5160 Speaker and tag

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The speaker has a May 1984 tag on it, and there is a sticker under the motherboard with a 9 August (IIRC) 1984 build date. The motherboard is a 64-256kb version, with all banks populated, and it has an 8087 installed as well.

5160 CPU and copro

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The good:
The lack of dust on the PSU fan (and the PSU date code of T8340 - maybe week 40, 1983?) suggests that it's had virtually no use. The system came with 5 expansion cards (CGA, floppy, hard disk, parallel, serial) so the basic IO is covered, and there are slots left over.

The bad:
There's a slightly disturbing bowing to the motherboard on one side, hopefully that doesn't affect the chances of it booting up. The case is clean, but has a knock to the back corner near the power switch, and the backplane is slightly bent too, so it's not quite a perfect fit. Will need a bit of panel beating to get it right.

I've got a 5153 CGA Monitor (it has CGA onboard), a clone XT keyboard (Model F is on its way), and some additional ISA cards to add some 80s multimedia. VGA might be out of character for this build, but I'll test out a couple of cards in any case.

The goals for this project are:

1. Buy step-down transformer, and power up! (and then sort out any issues, such as dried out caps, etc.)
2. Fix up dented case
3. Add 8-bit multimedia
4. Test VGA cards out

[mwd]

Oh yeah, nice machine. Good photos too. 87 FPU too!

Doubt the bowing will cause any issues, although I might be wrong. I have a Q6600 mobo that is seriously bent from the CPU fan and it works fine.

[Washerman]

Thanks! It's a great system, and the insides were a surprise, so hopefully the hard disk is OK too, despite the physical damage to the case. Will aim to post updates when they happen.

[AtariPC.net]

The goals for this project are:

1. Buy step-down transformer, and power up! (and then sort out any issues, such as dried out caps, etc.)
2. Fix up dented case
3. Add 8-bit multimedia
4. Test VGA cards out

Very lovely looking machine. I have a soft spot for 8088's being the very first processor I had experience with.

In regards to point 4, check out the link below if you haven't already for some pointers on which chipsets/cards to look for.

http://www.minuszerodegrees.net/5150/vga/5150_vga.htm

[dacow]

Looks awesome, can't wait to see (hopefully) a video of it powering up! Nice bokeh on those pics too! Take some more!

[Washerman]

Hehe bokeh, haven't heard that word in ages! as the 'togs say, feedback is appreciated!

Here's some more pics from the "photoshoot". Pics have been resized down to 1/3 original size, but they're still a bit massive. Looking at the bowing on the motherboard again - probably not as big a deal as I thought!

5160 damage to rear/UMichigan

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5160 interior

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5160 RAM banks

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5160 rear shot

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5160 bowing on motherboard

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5160 Power supply

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5160 DOS & documentation

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[Washerman]

The goals for this project are:

1. Buy step-down transformer, and power up! (and then sort out any issues, such as dried out caps, etc.)
2. Fix up dented case
3. Add 8-bit multimedia
4. Test VGA cards out

Very lovely looking machine. I have a soft spot for 8088's being the very first processor I had experience with.

In regards to point 4, check out the link below if you haven't already for some pointers on which chipsets/cards to look for.

http://www.minuszerodegrees.net/5150/vga/5150_vga.htm

Thanks! I see that the PC3 was your first machine, your website is awesome, BTW

Have been over to -0 deg, just realised that he has two lists of VGA cards - the 5160 list is a bit shorter, and gives some configuration info: http://www.minuszerodegrees.net/5160/vga/5160_vga.htm

Looking at my inventory it seems I only have one 8-bit VGA card, but plenty of 16-bit ISA cards (ET4000AX, Trident 8900C/D//9000B/C, Paradise, WDC, Ahead V5000). Going to be a bit of an effort tracking down settings to get those into 8-bit mode!

[AtariPC.net]

Thanks! I see that the PC3 was your first machine, your website is awesome, BTW

Thanks! Yes the Atari PC3 is very much a passion of mine, so many fantastic memories. I haven't updated the my collection on my website but I know have 5 however only 3 are in working condition as two have faulty motherboards. I think it's safe to say I have Australia's largest collection of PC3's!

Have been over to -0 deg, just realised that he has two lists of VGA cards - the 5160 list is a bit shorter, and gives some configuration info: http://www.minuszerodegrees.net/5160/vga/5160_vga.htm

Looking at my inventory it seems I only have one 8-bit VGA card, but plenty of 16-bit ISA cards (ET4000AX, Trident 8900C/D//9000B/C, Paradise, WDC, Ahead V5000). Going to be a bit of an effort tracking down settings to get those into 8-bit mode!

I have found that in some cases that even if a 16 bit VGA card has jumper settings to configure 16-bit or 8-bit BIOS support that there's no guarantee. I have a Diamond Speedstar 24X (WDC WD9OC31-LR) which has a jumper clearly marked to configure the BIOS but it won't POST in my PC3 when configured. Works perfectly fine however when installed in my PC5 (386) in a 16-bit slot. From what I've read, 8-bit support can sometimes actually mean 8-bit AT (286 or above) not 8-bit XT, so it can be hit and miss.

If you ever need jumper settings for a particular motherboard or video card, look no further: http://stason.org/TULARC/pc/index.html Fantastic website.

[Holiman]

That is very nice Washerman, congrats on the great build.

[BerythaBeasley]

Comparing processors, AMD Athlon II vs Intel i3.? So I'm no good comparing processors, could anyone compare these two for me?
AMD Athlon II Dual-Core Processor P349 Intel Core i3-370m Processor I'm planning to buy a laptop and the two that jump out at me have mostly similar specs (different in hard drive size) and the processor changes. Which is better? Which is faster?

[Washerman]

You might have bought the laptop by now, but I hope you went with the i3. Intel's Core processors left AMD far behind (until recently, but that's another story).