Now THAT'S what I call a 286.

A nice looking clean machine.

Back in the day the OEM machines were the solidly built stylish one while home built and clones were the crappy ones. These days OEM machines seem to take retail boards and cheapen them up until they barely work.

Anonymous Coward wrote:

Now THAT'S what I call a 286.

The camera is impressive, too! 😁

Wow that is one amazing pc. That thing is built like a tank, ready for 30 years of service 😎

Of course we should not forget that such pc's were very expensive. And this is just a 286, imagine what a 386 would have cost..

Take care of it.

Yeah I found the original price for this machine in an old Info World magazine, $2,995 in 1987, by 1990 the price had dropped to $2,395, not sure if that was with or without a monitor. Of course I managed to pick it up for about $25.

What a stunning machine, thanks for sharing!

PgrAm wrote:

Sound Blaster 16 Value, hope to replace this one day with an Adlib

I've never really been comfortable with the sound options I've tried in my 286, which is a 16MHz hotrod from '91. I currently have a SB 2.0 in there and am pretty happy with it - nice OPL2 sound but they are pretty noisy little cards, i.e. they pick up a lot of "thinking" sounds.

I find myself really digging on PC speaker for that era though, I think it's underrated 🤣 And it can really resonate nicely in those old, heavy cases.

That looks a lot like my 386 from 1989 - Those grounding straps, and lack of smaller MOLEX connectors for the floppies. XT style power supply too.

I ALSO have a "modern" soundcard in mine (from 1993) and I too am looking for either an 8 bit Soundblaster or an Adlib. It'll do for now though.

PgrAm wrote:

Yeah I found the original price for this machine in an old Info World magazine, $2,995 in 1987, by 1990 the price had dropped to $2,395, not sure if that was with or without a monitor. Of course I managed to pick it up for about $25.

That's interesting, where in Toronto did you get this thing?

Hi PgrAm,

nice PC.

I am currently working on restoring an AST Premium/286.
Unfortunately, the Mainboard does not work.
It doesn't even beep when turning on the PC.
A possible problem could be a defect in the BIOS ROM chips.
Would it be possible for you to share dumps of the two ROMs?

Thank you in advance!

A Trident VGA is not really out of place in that machine. Trident began making VGA cards in 1987.

On another note, get a CRT you heretic!!!

Half-Saint wrote:

... get a CRT you heretic!!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZ5QleN03DU

cricket wrote:

Hi PgrAm, […]
Show full quote

Hi PgrAm,

nice PC.

I am currently working on restoring an AST Premium/286.
Unfortunately, the Mainboard does not work.
It doesn't even beep when turning on the PC.
A possible problem could be a defect in the BIOS ROM chips.
Would it be possible for you to share dumps of the two ROMs?

Thank you in advance!

Hey man, I'd love to help you out. Never dumped a BIOS rom before though, can you recommend some software to do this?

As for the CRT, I have a few, and I am using one with this machine now, but for whatever reason I didn't have one on hand when I was shooting these pics. Sometimes my CRTs aren't the most reliable and I need to substitute an LCD.

Wouldn't worry about using a LCD monitor at all. They are light, use less power and work well. I got rid of most of mine except for an EGA, the AIO Compacts with built in 14" and two 19" CRTs. Generally prefer 17" and above because of poor eyesight.

Caluser2000 wrote:

AIO Compacts with built in 14" and two 19" CRTs

One 14" adn two 19" CRTs? Doesn't sound like a very compact AIO. 🤣

AST was nearly IBM-level build and documentation, from what I've seen recently of their earlier models. By the time I got my AST 486SX, they seemed to be moving a little more toward consumer retail. Still a nice machine though, and it came with a custom diagnostics disk that hinted toward their days of more rigorous standards.

Jed118 wrote:

I ALSO have a "modern" soundcard in mine (from 1993) and I too am looking for either an 8 bit Soundblaster or an Adlib. It'll do for now though.

Even an SB 1.5 seems a little superfluous in a 286 - at least to me, but probably somewhat because I spent the first couple years with a 386DX and no sound card. I've decided my PS/2 model 30 will get a home-brew card with CMS, OPL, and Covox DAC. It's really just more an excuse to build something though.

NEW clone adlib cards are available. https://monotech.fwscart.com/AdLib_Sound_Card … 4_19478748.aspx

My first sound card was a Media Vision Thunderboard. It was an 8-bit ISA card that was Adlib and Sound Blaster compatible. Suited my 286 quite nicely.

Another 8-bit sound card is the Aztech Sound Galaxy BX II

Does this motherboard require the external memory board to work?

It’s too bad AST bought Tandy then dropped the “Industrial Asthetic” and the quality dropped

The boards were well sorted, though I question the quality of the quality when you got a 2lb jar of screws distributed through every machine, because of course it took 24 of them to hold the bracket-bracket to the bracket-bracket to the bracket that held an LED.