VOGONS


First post, by xgamer777

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So I bought an AT&T 6386 WGS... It came with 4MB of RAM on the memory card. I want to upgrade to 16mb. I can't find the service manual online for 6386 but, the 6386 is really just a rebadged Olivetti M380 and I did find the service manual for that. Being a old vintage computer, naturally there a DIP switches to mess with. The manual has this "formula" for setting the DIP switches depending on the memory type and capacity. I think I have it right, but the PC is not booting up. It powers on and beeps, but nothing on the screen. The manual says you need 1Mx9 SIMMs x 16 for 16MB. I bought 4 kits of 4 x 1M 30PIN 9 chip parity SIMMs from Memory Master on eBay (Item 163030966355). They are Fast Page Memory that I know the 6386 supports. Does someone know the correct settings for this or offer any insight as to why it's not booting. Also... I've removed all other cards except for a Paradise 256 VGA card?

Reply 1 of 3, by Horun

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Wow what a chart to figure the switches 🤣. Ok I think you have L07LL set proper but think you have L06LL set wrong.
So L07LL sets Ram amount and L06LL sets some type of board addressing...
Using their chart for Board One: Capacity =16 -1 =X, and Y =0. Then L06LL should be: 1-4 = off, 5-8 = on >>> IF I read the chart proper 😀

Hate posting a reply and then have to edit it because it made no sense 😁 First computer was an IBM 3270 workstation with CGA monitor. Stuff: https://archive.org/details/@horun

Reply 2 of 3, by xgamer777

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Actually I used a little utility app called SIMMS.EXE that helps much more easily figure out the DIP switch settings.
The setting in the attached picture is for 16MB.

Reply 3 of 3, by xgamer777

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Horun wrote on 2022-10-01, 16:48:

Wow what a chart to figure the switches 🤣. Ok I think you have L07LL set proper but think you have L06LL set wrong.
So L07LL sets Ram amount and L06LL sets some type of board addressing...
Using their chart for Board One: Capacity =16 -1 =X, and Y =0. Then L06LL should be: 1-4 = off, 5-8 = on >>> IF I read the chart proper 😀

Thanks for reply. The chart is very confusing. The SIMMS.EXE utility is very helpful.