It's just big, that's all. Nowadays our keyboards are dwarfed by the screen, but back then it was the other way around 😀

What is wrong with the Tandy Enhanced Keyboard? It uses spring activated rubber dome switches, which are really cheap. It uses these things : http://deskthority.net/wiki/Fujitsu_Peerless Essentially one small step up from pure rubber domes where the key directly pushes the rubber. The resulting feel was really "off" when I had one. Now I use a Model M and the feel is on.

On the plus side, the Tandy Enhanced Keyboard will work with any PC compatible from the IBM PC 5150 to your Core Z97 chipset motherboard with a PS/2 port. It won't work in a Tandy 1000 pre SL and TL however.

Yep the Tandy keyboard is a tad mushy. I've had worse though.

Modified the VSWITCH utility to support switching between TGA and EGA on the fly. This is really cool for those few games that support EGA but not TGA, such as the early ID and Apogee titles. Now to see if I can implement a Voodoo-style passthough using the EGA feature connector.

Norton SI indicating TGA (detected as CGA) on the left, EGA on the right

TGA Lemmings on the left, exited Keen 4 on the right

Started a thread on VCF for updates on the EGA + Tandy video passthrough project. http://www.vintage-computer.com/vcforum/showthread.php?50148

The ESWITCH utility allowing switching between EGA and Tandy video is available here:
http://github.com/bjt42/eswitch

Tested my home-made passthrough daughterboard. Just need to run it to a blanking plate and make a short DB9-DB9 cable to pass video from the Tandy output.

Awesome, I can't wait to try your program in my TL. Could it be at last the ultimate 16-color machine!?!

Here's a video demo of ESWITCH working with the pass through daughter board. Will add some text to indicate which mode is active after switch.

https://youtu.be/gXhxz4y9nVE

Cool Video! Ultimate 16color machine !

Using a tipoff from GH (clear bit 1 at I/O FFEBh) I managed to disable the Tandy joysticks and use the joystick port on the SB16.
Here's a small utility to do that: http://github.com/bjt42/tljoyfix

Also, here's that Landmark speed test

I wish that I would have thought to drill a hole in the bezel for a HDD light back in the day. I was 10 years old and instead popped the bezel, taped cardboard over it, and put a hole in that. I was a dummy because I no longer know where the bezel is.I'm going to have to get creative to replace mine. Maybe a 3D print.

I've been posting in a couple other TL/2 threads, but wanted to check here since you're using the Gotek: are you limited to a 720K version of its firmware, so the computer can read the images? (And for that matter, _is_ there a different firmware for 720K or does it just know based on what you place on the USB stick? I noticed 720K models online and know you can just flash them, so I'm curious how that works.)

Awesome setup. 😀

Oh! And before I forget, I followed a link from the Tandy 1000 FAQ to where I could purchase the chips to bring the TL/2 up to 768K and was wondering if these looked correct? At this cost, I can't really complain, but a second set of eyes never hurts:

https://www.jameco.com/z/41464-10-Major-Brand … DRAM_41574.html

I'm not wanting to go too crazy with my build, but simple, cheap things like this? Why not? 😀

bjt wrote:

Never seen one of these outside a Tandy catalogue so I couldn't resist. 286/8, 640K and the proprietary graphics/sound. Will probably move the 2MB EMS card from my XT over to this and maybe also the SB16. XT-IDE and a quieter fan mod also on the cards.

^^^^THIS!

XT-IDE? the 8bit ISA card version for compactflash - that I can't get working on m'own TL2???

PLEASE elucidate what jumpers are used, (JP1/2/3) and if you had to mod the XT bios at all-

(lo-tech emailed me that I would have to merge Tandy and XT bios with padding - I can't get my XT-IDE to be recognized at all
due to the proprietary BIOS IDE controller conflicting with the card!!)

PS_ after reading all of these fun replies, its clear you had to mod (pad) and re-flash the Bios. That sucks - i wouldn't be able to do it without a step by step guide, sigh.

I got a patch from the xt-ide crew and it works since then on my tandy 1000 RL/HD.

well- 6 months later and James P from the XT-IDE boards and Kevin from Lo-tech haven't responded to my emails asking for how-to.
I have a beautiful condition Tandy 1000 TL2 with a nonfunctioning XT-IDE CF board (due to c800h conflict with onboard HD XT controller)
needing a "simple" debug dump of the Tandy controller rom to a file I can then merge with XT-IDE bin and pad the difference.

Sounds simple but nobody on Vogons can help!

Can't you disable the XT HD interface with the TL setup utility?

mine is at "CC00" perhaps that helps? or do you need the patch?

hey Dr Z
would *love* the patch.
i don't know where to even look in conventional/upper mem to find where the TL2 keeps its (8k? larger?) block of HD bios code that i need to dump...
thanks!
Dr P

here you go: http://www.vcfed.org/forum/showthread.php?431 … 3625#post343625

The flashed "offr566.bin" in addition of the deactivated onboard harddisk-controller did the job.
I tested ist by copying some files form disk to the sd-card and that's it. It works great!!!

bjt wrote on 2015-10-26, 10:35:

Installed a Noctua NF-R8 1200rpm fan in the PSU. This one's almost inaudible but seems to push a reasonable amount of air. […]
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Installed a Noctua NF-R8 1200rpm fan in the PSU. This one's almost inaudible but seems to push a reasonable amount of air.

I am so glad to see someone tried this. My Tandys are SO LOUD, and it's all down to the PSU fans!

EDIT: Did you run into any snags replacing the fan? Any modifications needed to anything?

drphilxray wrote on 2019-08-22, 13:03:

hey Dr Z would *love* the patch. i don't know where to even look in conventional/upper mem to find where the TL2 keeps its (8k? […]
Show full quote

hey Dr Z
would *love* the patch.
i don't know where to even look in conventional/upper mem to find where the TL2 keeps its (8k? larger?) block of HD bios code that i need to dump...
thanks!
Dr P

Did you ever get your TL/2 working? You can disable the TL/2 hard drive controller from the BIOS setup utility's advanced mode ("setuptl2 /a" at the command line). I know this is an older thread, but I'm trying to get my own Tandy 1000 TL/2 going with a XT-IDE from Monotech. I haven't tried to use a padded ROM for the XT-IDE because the card has a number of other I/O addresses. Still... Weirdness: Tandy 1000 TL/2 with Monotech XT-IDE CF: Weird Boot Graphic Glitch