Old Laptop

Tim Ganz

Member
T
Join Date
Dec 2010
Location
Dallas, Texas
Posts
685
We had an old Toshiba laptop with windows 95 on it and it died today. We use this to maintain the SLC 150 PLC's that we have.

These are old PLC but there are a lot of them where I am and management has been slow about giving us funds to upgrade them.

We have vmware for newer equipment but our IT person said that vmware won't make a windows 95 or 98 machine any longer and we do not have the cd or license either.

Is there anywhere to still buy a good laptop that has windows 95 or 98?

Does the forum have any other solutions other than chnaging the plc's which we can't afford to do at the moment?

IT threw their hands up so now we are trying to figure something out.
 
if the hard drive is still usable you might be able to reconstitute a PC with that drive and a of 2.5" adapter.
this could get you out of trouble for a brief time.
I think I recently threw out my Win 98 CD
it might be battery/adapter or power Socket issue with the notebook.
maybe cut the casing (don't bother trying to pull it apart) and access the power input socket.
 
Craigslist has local guys that sell older stuff. I have both a 95 and 98 machine behind the seat in my truck and that is where I get them.
I use them for customers like your company. I can charge quite a lot to get an old machine going again.
 
In the same line as Mickey's post... you can run that software on Windows 7, its better then running it on 95 or 98, they take to long to boot up :)
 
I still keep a win 95 and a 98 machine for the old hardware that just won’t give up. I think the Compaq is a Screaming 25MHz processor 4 or 8 MB of ram. I use my XP machine dual boot with 98. (There are tutorials on how to do this on the WWW) I still have my original copies of win 95 on floppy and win 98 on cd. You can still find them look at yard sales and your local thrift store. I have even see people put a working computer out by the road with all cd's and documentation when they upgrade. I still keep copies of the old legacy stuff because I find I still use it from time to time.
 
+1 for DosBox, I communicate to SLC150s using PCIS with my windows 7 machine via a usb to serial converter with no issues.
 
For the DOSBox users out there... try this code in the config file, the one below is for version .74

Use this if you are using COM1 and a true serial port, if you are using a USB adapter then change this line ((serial1=directserial realport:com1)) change the COM number to match your device manager, mine on this PC is :com2

After you add the bottom [autoexec] code it will start up auto and NO MORE TYPING... is just a nice short cut that Paul told me about, works GREAT!! (thanks Paul)

I have my DOSBox and PCIS located on the root dir of C, if you have it in a sub folder yours may need to look a little different

You will also need to have your cable plug in before you start DOSBox as it will not see the USB port if started before

Code: 
[serial]
# serial1: set type of device connected to com port.
#          Can be disabled, dummy, modem, nullmodem, directserial.
#          Additional parameters must be in the same line in the form of
#          parameter:value. Parameter for all types is irq (optional).
#          for directserial: realport (required), rxdelay (optional).
#                           (realport:COM1 realport:ttyS0).
#          for modem: listenport (optional).
#          for nullmodem: server, rxdelay, txdelay, telnet, usedtr,
#                         transparent, port, inhsocket (all optional).
#          Example: serial1=modem listenport:5000
#          Possible values: dummy, disabled, modem, nullmodem, directserial.
# serial2: see serial1
#          Possible values: dummy, disabled, modem, nullmodem, directserial.
# serial3: see serial1
#          Possible values: dummy, disabled, modem, nullmodem, directserial.
# serial4: see serial1
#          Possible values: dummy, disabled, modem, nullmodem, directserial.

serial1=directserial realport:com1
serial2=dummy
serial3=disabled
serial4=disabled

[dos]
#            xms: Enable XMS support.
#            ems: Enable EMS support.
#            umb: Enable UMB support.
# keyboardlayout: Language code of the keyboard layout (or none).

xms=true
ems=true
umb=true
keyboardlayout=auto

[ipx]
# ipx: Enable ipx over UDP/IP emulation.

ipx=false

[autoexec]
# Lines in this section will be run at startup.
# You can put your MOUNT lines here.
mount c c:\pcis
c:
pcis
 
We just send our old stuff out to our fix-it guys.

Recently had an old Dell 286 DOS Laptop resurrected from the dead.

My HP laptop is going in tomorrow for surgery. I don't like this new Dell POS.
 
I have connected to SLC-150's with a Windows XP machine, with a com port (port replicator). There must be enough of a DOS kernal in XP yet to do this (and also GE LM-90).

Mike
 

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