Got the Compaq Portable 286 on Thursday and did some initial testing.

At first, it would power cycle and that was because of the MFM Miniscribe 20MB drive that wasn't working (well, not powering on since the motors were stuck). And after I disconnected the MFM controller, the data cables, and the power connector (Compaq proprietary), it booted up to the press F1 to continue message.

I then took the drive out, reinstalled the floppy/parallel/serial and the Compaq VDU CGA card, and inserted the User Programs boot diskette.

It boots the diskette without issues, however, the enter key isn't working and that get addressed this weekend since there might be either something obstructing it or the foam and foil pad is done for.

On the plus side, it boots up and almost every key works on the keyboard (haven't tested the alt or del keys yet to do the Ctrl-alt-del sequence to reboot the system).

It needs some TLC, a new battery, and it'll get some features and/or upgrades in the future (might even upgrade the video card to an EGA and build another internal monitor header board like my XT system).

Has 640KB RAM, either a 6MHz or an 8MHz 286 installed (haven't checked that at the moment), 2x ISA 16-bit slots, 3x XT 8-bit slots (video and floppy controller are using 2 of the slots), a proprietary PSU (the Molex connectors are 5-pin headers that are keyed to only have 4 pins), 8" green phosphorus display, much like the Portable XT and the later Portable II, AT style keyboard (similar to the Model F AT, except it's foam and foil or probably a different style), 360K 5.25" FDD, tape drive, and MiniScribe 20MB MFM drive + controller (disconnected at the moment).