Radio Shack TRS-80 Models I and III available near NE Ohio

[Tony Duell]

> I did get this last Sunday - about 5 large boxes of manuals, binders,
> floppies and tapes, plus the computers.  I did find time to fire up
> the Model III, unfortunately, it seems to have a problem - no text on
> power-on, and no indication of anything running except for the usual
> drive 0 spin up and access light for about 2 seconds.  The screen has
> power - you see a white flash and squiggle on power off (usual mono
> CRT shutdown kind of flash and squiggle), but never any text or
> fragments of text.  Pressing the reset button does get a power-on-type
> reaction from drive zero, but that's it.

Have yopu tired powering up (or pressing reset) while holding down the 
Break key? A Model 1/3/4 fitted with a disk controller will normally try 
to boot from drive 0, but if you hold down Break, it'll go into ROM 
BASIC. You should get a CASS? prompt (hit enter), then MEMORY SIZE (enter 
again), then get the BASIC sign-on.



> 
> It's been about 22 years since I used a Model III, so my memory is a
> little faded about it.  Are there any ROM-based diagnostics?  Anything
> ever get spit out of the serial port?  I wish I had a Z-80 pod for my
> Fluke 9010A (have 68000 and 6502) - it's a great way to sleuth around
> inert micros.

The Mofrl 3 is actually quite easy to work on. If you pull the cover, the 
monitor section comes off with the cover (be careful not to break the CRT 
neck when removing or refitting that cover!), you can then tip the cover 
on to the left hand side and put it alongside the base part of the 
computer and leave all the cables connected. The machine will run like that.

The CPU board stabds vertically at the back, possibnly covered withe a 
metal shield. Remove that, and you're looking at the component side of 
the PCB. The model 3 is mostly TTL, with some RAM (4116 DRAMs, 2114 SRAMs 
for the video), ROMs, and a Z80.

> 
> Any and all suggestions (including schematics) are welcome, especially
> if anyone knows of a site remotely resembling funet, but for TRS-80
> stuff.

I am pretty ssure I found a site with TRS-80 service manuals, etc. 
Something like www.trs80.org, or www.trs80.com...

-tony