This little bugger suddenly appeared while I was searching for something else... https://www.amazon.ca/SinLoon-AdapterCompact- … a/dp/B07YSJ12T3 wondering if it will work on these. Cheap enough I might just throw it i with my next order to try on mine.

Sure, why not? I just bought an old low rpm ide drive for mine. Might be more energy efficient with a CF card, yes mine has a working battery. 😀

Mine still works, but only lasts about an hour. Though on stuff as old as this I'm happy when it lasts 5+ mins, enough to shuttle between power outlets.

Yeah, that is probably what I get as well..

I really should give mine some work, but similar to the old guy I bought this from, I never seem to get more. More time that is..

Joakim wrote on 2022-01-25, 16:38:

Yeah, that is probably what I get as well..

I really should give mine some work, but similar to the old guy I bought this from, I never seem to get more. More time that is..

Ain’t that the understatement of the day. I’ve got about eleven computers or laptops sitting around in various states of build, setup, repair or half-nakedness…

Does anyone have a fix / solution for getting into the BIOS of the 1750?

I have what looks to be an original HDD inside this 1750 but can only get as far as a 'Non system disk error. Press any key to reboot' error even with a Win95 boot disk or Win98 boot disk (official) installed in the FDD. I know the BIOS is stored on a separate partition on the HDD with these models but what does one do if the original HDD is dead or needs replacing with an SSD / CF card?

pixelatedscraps wrote on 2022-02-01, 09:12:

Does anyone have a fix / solution for getting into the BIOS of the 1750?

I have what looks to be an original HDD inside this 1750 but can only get as far as a 'Non system disk error. Press any key to reboot' error even with a Win95 boot disk or Win98 boot disk (official) installed in the FDD. I know the BIOS is stored on a separate partition on the HDD with these models but what does one do if the original HDD is dead or needs replacing with an SSD / CF card?

Here is the boot disk:

chinny22 wrote on 2021-05-24, 12:36:

Yeh BIOS on the HDD was one of the things that made Compaq "different" till around the P2/P3 era Someone tried to tell me it was […]
Show full quote

Yeh BIOS on the HDD was one of the things that made Compaq "different" till around the P2/P3 era
Someone tried to tell me it was to make life easy for System administrators. 1 Central disk so replicate the same settings on multiple machines.
I'm not sure I'm buying that though 😜

Anyway looks like sp8975.exe is the "softpack" your after. Run that and it'll create the boot disk for you.
http://cwcyrix.duckdns.org/ftp-archives/ftp.c … paq/sp8501-9000

Don't know much about the laptop itself but think it'll be late enough to work on generic drivers... probably, maybe

I think this is the windows 95 restore cd and that will partition the disk for you if I remember correctly.
https://archive.org/details/compaq_quickresto … 100_40212100295

I was skimming through a PC Mag scan from 98 or 99 and came across a Compaq advertisment mentioning 1700 series machines. Interestingly it said nothing about a floppy drive but said they took an LS-120... wat??? Is there a lot of these with LS-120s in?

BitWrangler wrote on 2022-03-13, 14:46:

I was skimming through a PC Mag scan from 98 or 99 and came across a Compaq advertisment mentioning 1700 series machines. Interestingly it said nothing about a floppy drive but said they took an LS-120... wat??? Is there a lot of these with LS-120s in?

No, they are very rare, most came with a standard laptop floppy drive, but it is a removable bay (unlike the cdrom which is fixed), this bay was interchangeable with a second battery or other accessory device like LS120 (not I don't know if there were other devices for that bay)

The 1700 series has split into two major revisions: The 1700 is older, and has a graphics chip that's not very good for gaming, using full screen can make the pixels distorted. The second revision 1750, brought pentium 2 processors up to 450mhz I think. It had an 8MB ATI Rage card, and TV-out, and full-screen games would present a nice smooth image.

Both were available with 12, 13, and 14-inch displays, there was a 14-inch display with a resolution greater than 1024x768 as well.

Hmmm superdisk option seems to be 316257-B21 while regular floppy is what I've got in mine which is 316266-001

Will have to look at the Ex00 series machine I've got too, when I remember where it went.

edit: E500 only got the 1.44 too... man I gotta use this, it's pretty nice, nominally wifeys, but she hasn't touched it in a decade, so I think Ima steal it. ... the jerks still only put one USB port on it though.

Does anybody tried to upgrade CPU? I have Armada 1750 6333. I see these modules all over the internet. I was thinking to try
PIII 500.
Anybody?

Take a look in the service manual, it should say which components are compatible. I'd trust it more than random strangers on the internet. Ok Bitwrangler excepted, always trust BitWrangler. Legend sais he writes all his posts on a pc junior and lives in a house made out of IO plates.

Karolkm wrote on 2022-03-20, 20:56:

Does anybody tried to upgrade CPU? I have Armada 1750 6333. I see these modules all over the internet. I was thinking to try
PIII 500.
Anybody?

I believe the chipset and connections (pinout) are the same, but there will be no support in the BIOS.

I think the best you will get is the pentium ii 450mhz

If anyone else gets this laptop, before you use the recovery cd from the archive, clone the HDD and get the serial number from the diagnostics partition! I had cloned but forgotten to copy the serial number. If you use a different serial number you get 'non system disk errors' and when you try to create the diagnostics and setup disks using an incorrect serial number the computer will let you know and delete the diagnostics partition. I was able to get my original serial number by going into the diagnostics partition using the clone. FN 10 gets you in the diagnostics partition

stefanvl wrote on 2022-05-18, 21:12:

If anyone else gets this laptop, before you use the recovery cd from the archive, clone the HDD and get the serial number from the diagnostics partition! I had cloned but forgotten to copy the serial number. If you use a different serial number you get 'non system disk errors' and when you try to create the diagnostics and setup disks using an incorrect serial number the computer will let you know and delete the diagnostics partition. I was able to get my original serial number by going into the diagnostics partition using the clone. FN 10 gets you in the diagnostics partition

I simply extracted the compaq restore files, and overwritten a clean install of windows 95, and it worked perfectly for me

I am not sure then. But for me when I used this recovery disc and serial number:

https://archive.org/details/compaq_quickresto … 100_40212100295

I kept getting a non system disk error, and creating the diagnostics and setup disk did not want to work, the computer indicated the diagnostics partition was invalid and deleted it.

Only when I found out I could actually retrieve the original serial number from the diagnostics partition and I used that one was I able to create the disks without getting the invalid message. I thought maybe the laptop compared the serial number somehow to see if it matched the computers serial number.

It took me weeks to get it to work properly. It is still early days, maybe this was not the solution and maybe I will get the non system disk error soon 😀 But this morning it started up without a glitch

stefanvl wrote on 2022-05-19, 06:38:

I am not sure then. But for me when I used this recovery disc and serial number: […]
Show full quote

I am not sure then. But for me when I used this recovery disc and serial number:

https://archive.org/details/compaq_quickresto … 100_40212100295

I kept getting a non system disk error, and creating the diagnostics and setup disk did not want to work, the computer indicated the diagnostics partition was invalid and deleted it.

Only when I found out I could actually retrieve the original serial number from the diagnostics partition and I used that one was I able to create the disks without getting the invalid message. I thought maybe the laptop compared the serial number somehow to see if it matched the computers serial number.

It took me weeks to get it to work properly. It is still early days, maybe this was not the solution and maybe I will get the non system disk error soon 😀 But this morning it started up without a glitch

The compaq machines of this time have a serial number in the bios, at the time when I worked providing technical assistance for compaq, there was a program similar to a keygen that would generate serial numbers compatible with the software from the serial present in the bios .But this check is just a small step present in the "unzip" of the restoration software. You can still bypass it in several ways. The compressed files of the restore software are basically zip with password, they were silly 4 digit passwords, and there must be some of them scattered around the internet

Rikintosh wrote on 2022-05-19, 04:02:

stefanvl wrote on 2022-05-18, 21:12:

If anyone else gets this laptop, before you use the recovery cd from the archive, clone the HDD and get the serial number from the diagnostics partition! I had cloned but forgotten to copy the serial number. If you use a different serial number you get 'non system disk errors' and when you try to create the diagnostics and setup disks using an incorrect serial number the computer will let you know and delete the diagnostics partition. I was able to get my original serial number by going into the diagnostics partition using the clone. FN 10 gets you in the diagnostics partition

I simply extracted the compaq restore files, and overwritten a clean install of windows 95, and it worked perfectly for me

Would it be possible to add usb mass storage in this way?

Regarding serial I'm pretty sure I am using someone else's without a problem. Mine came without a hard drive (and caddy).

I haven't had a problem like that with mine (yet?).. I did recreate the diag/setup partition with a softpaq, I can only assume it read the serial from the BIOS and okayed it with no intervention. However, I have noticed this sort of thing on other Compaqs long ago, and the issue then was using a setup not intended for that specific model.

Bought a non working armada 1520D for 10$ to salvage parts from.