Atari PC2 questions

[Alfh]

I just bought this beauty and need some information about it. Just got it cleaned and tested it without monitor nor ISA cards and it seems to boot alright with one beeb and working keyboard lights.
There is one ISA slot on motherboard which have four slot ricer card attached. There it have HDD controller card, modem and card with leaked battery on it. I haven't found any CMOS battery in motherboard.

So question is that do this card have any other purpose than keep the real time clock setting? It doesn't have any external connectors on it.





I don't own a EGA monitor, but i do have Amiga Philips CM8833-II monitor which should support CGA mode. There are some dip switches next to PC2 monitor port, but i haven't found any manual to Atari PC2 or information of how those should configurate. I did found Atari PC1 manual online and hope that those settings are same and not blowing up my monitor again (it's atm in TV repair shop cause it left smoke out earlier when I was using it with my Amiga).

 

[1ST1]

XT does not save BIOS settings in NVRAM/CMOS. It's only clock. The DIP switch settings are all the same for Atari PC 1-3.

Do you know this website? http://www.ataripc.net/pc2-8088/

 

[Alfh]

Thanks for quick reply. That was new information to me. Yes i found that PC1 manual from that website.
Next step is try to clean that battery corrosion from the card. It was already going on to riser, one port was quite green. I did manage to get most of it out from riser with isopropanol and vinegar. But it's nice to know that i don't necessarily need to have it being installed.

 

[Flamin Joe]

Great to see another PC2 out there! Besides the one I own I've only ever seen a few other examples out there so they seem to be very rare to come across.

I can confirm the DIP switches are all the same across the PC1, PC2 and PC3 for the display output. Essentially the motherboards in these models are the same with of course the expected changes in layout due to the different form factors across the 3 models and some minor variations dependent on board revision. But basically anything which applies to one will apply to the others as well.

 

[Alfh]

I finally got my CM8833-II monitor back (it was dead flyback), set DIP switches to "color monitor" and got rolling picture. Tried with cheap direct connection db9 cable and another cable without pin 7 connected. Damn.

 

[jedie]

I have this Adapter https://github.com/necroware/mce-adapter attached to my PC1... It works with one of my TFT...

 

[Alfh]

I got lucky and found an EGA monitor (IBM clone) so i can confirm this computer works. Didn't boot from HDD but did allow to do a directory listing. I did a low level format and installed DOS 3.3 and HDD seems to work as it should.