Mike's PCjr Page

Because of all the testing I had to do when building up the first batch, I always had mine raw without an enclosure plugged into the side. I recently put a side-car enclosure around it with a IDE DoM plugged into it. I drilled a small hole in the front of the side car for a green led to poke-through; hot glued in place. With it all buttoned together, it's a bit weird, surreal, something seeing a traditionally looking hard drive LED flashing on the front of the Jr. It's actually a usable PC now. It wasn't in the late 80s!

I spend a day last weekend playing Sierra games on it.

OK, I'm obviously being dense here, but I ordered the wrong cable for the XT-IDE. I need to go from the male pins of the XT-IDE to the male pins of my Compact Flash adapter, so I need a female to female cable. They're both the same pin count. What exactly do I need, and bonus points if you can give me an Amazon, NewEgg or eBay link to the correct cable. Thanks for the help!

bloguidice wrote:OK, I'm obviously being dense here, but I ordered the wrong cable for the XT-IDE. I need to go from the male pins of the XT-IDE to the male pins of my Compact Flash adapter, so I need a female to female cable. They're both the same pin count. What exactly do I need, and bonus points if you can give me an Amazon, NewEgg or eBay link to the correct cable. Thanks for the help!

What Compact Flash adapter do you have? Unless it has the laptop-sized connector on it, you should be able to use a standard IDE cable like this one:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/18-IDE-PATA-ATA ... 3a824369ee


Did you order one with the key pin blocked or something?

It's this compact flash adapter: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000TM ... UTF8&psc=1 . The pins look exactly the same as those on the XT-IDE. I bought this, but it's the wrong number of pins: http://www.ebay.com/itm/201011689467?ss ... 1497.l2649 . It's two pins short. I also ordered this: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00BSR ... UTF8&psc=1 which hasn't arrived yet, but I'm thinking that's going to be wrong too.

bloguidice wrote:It's this compact flash adapter: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000TM ... UTF8&psc=1 . The pins look exactly the same as those on the XT-IDE. I bought this, but it's the wrong number of pins: http://www.ebay.com/itm/201011689467?ss ... 1497.l2649 . It's two pins short. I also ordered this: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00BSR ... UTF8&psc=1 which hasn't arrived yet, but I'm thinking that's going to be wrong too.

Yeah, both of those are the wrong cable. You see the footprint for the smaller connector on the CF board that isn't soldered in? That's what the cables you ordered are for. The jrIDE uses a standard 40-pin cable for a 3.5" form factor drive, not the 44-pin cable for the 2.5" form factor drive like the one you linked to.

Thanks. So would the eBay cable you linked to work, then?

bloguidice wrote:Thanks. So would the eBay cable you linked to work, then?

It should, as long as those pictures are accurate. It might be a bit long for you if you were needing as short a cable as you originally ordered, though.

jmetal88 wrote:

bloguidice wrote:Thanks. So would the eBay cable you linked to work, then?

It should, as long as those pictures are accurate. It might be a bit long for you if you were needing as short a cable as you originally ordered, though.

The pictures are accurate. Like I said, it's the same connector that's on the XT-IDE. Length is not an issue as I don't plan on putting it inside a case at this time. Thanks for the help!

bloguidice wrote:

jmetal88 wrote:

bloguidice wrote:Thanks. So would the eBay cable you linked to work, then?

It should, as long as those pictures are accurate. It might be a bit long for you if you were needing as short a cable as you originally ordered, though.

The pictures are accurate. Like I said, it's the same connector that's on the XT-IDE. Length is not an issue as I don't plan on putting it inside a case at this time. Thanks for the help!

You're welcome.

By the way, I just noticed recently that you're also a member of the Color Computer mailing list. I don't participate in the discussion that often because it feels a lot more awkward than a web forum to me, but I haven't really found any other active place where people discuss the Color Computer, so I stay tuned in.

jmetal88 wrote: You're welcome.

By the way, I just noticed recently that you're also a member of the Color Computer mailing list. I don't participate in the discussion that often because it feels a lot more awkward than a web forum to me, but I haven't really found any other active place where people discuss the Color Computer, so I stay tuned in.

Yes, I was on the periphery of that group for quite some time until the release of the CoCo book I co-authored. I've been a bit more visible there since as a result. There is also a good Facebook discussion group. As you say, that's about it for good places to talk about that platform. I suppose if there wasn't your forum (and the material you've posted), the same could probably be said of the PCjr as well. We actually talk quite a bit about the PCjr in one of the main chapters of the upcoming "Vintage Game Consoles" book, though it is more of the "warts and all" history rather than a "celebration" of a platform that I usually lean towards. It's basically told in the context of the rise of the PC DOS "platform." I was pleased to see "Wizard of Id" give something of a stealth tribute to the anniversary of the PCjr and its most famous game, however: http://www.armchairarcade.com/neo/node/5646

Anyway, enough off topic. I look forward to getting the XT-IDE running (the cable is now ordered). Thanks to everyone for their efforts with this!