What is this?

[themadhacker]

Ok, I have already posted about this in the yardsale thread, but not many responded about it.

So here's the deal. I bought this thing at the goodwill. It came with a carrying case, but no hookups. I at first thought it was a computer, but then somebody said it was probably a word processor. Now I have searched all over the internet about this, but could not find one bit of info on it.

Now since I have no information on this, I don't know how to make a video or power cable for this either. So I opened this up to see if I could find the required voltages to get this running. I found nothing about what volts it needs, but I discovered something that leads me back to thinking it could be a computer. I found inside what appeared to be a very strange looking hard drive. Plus, on the outside top cover, there is a light that says "H-disk". That and there is a floppy drive on the side.

So now on to more questions. Does anybody have any info on this? Has anybody ever seen one of these? What are some other forums I could post about this where the members are dedicated to old computers?

Well, now that I have talked some, I should show some pictures.






the sticker on the bottom of the unit


the floppy drive


The light that says " H-disk"


hard drive?




the possible hard drive and floppy drive sitting atop the keyboard


the mainboard


some information written on the mainboard.

So if you have any information on this, please tell me!

[Life of Brian]

A quick Google search for XScribe tells me that it was a machine used by court stenographers. See the port on back that says "stenoram"? It would be neat if you can get it working.

[themadhacker]

I saw about the stenographers, but didn't know that they hooked up to this.

[tom61]

Class A means not certified for home or most business use. So, court use as a stenography unit would probably fit in that class. If that's the case, the harddisk is the equivalent of the stenographer's tape, keeping track of everything entered.

As for a forum to ask on, http://www.old-computers.com" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; would be the first I'd go to for this type of thing.

[themadhacker]

Awesome. I'll go to that site as soon as I can.

I wonder if the hard drive is still good? If it is, it will be a load of fun reading through old court cases.

[themadhacker]

Umm. any other recommendations on forums? The one mentioned is the most dead forum I have ever been on.

[samjc3]

If it is, it will be a load of fun reading through old court cases.

totally illegal too, but, i say go for it!

[themadhacker]

My computer, my files. My right to look through them.

[samjc3]

My computer, my files. My right to look through them.

not technically...... but great loophole!

[eagle5953]

I hate to break it to you, but probably 95% of court cases would have absolutely nothing you'd find interesting. If you were lucky enough to get one that was, most of the testimony in that case would still be boring.

Odds are, if there is any recoverable data on that hard drive, it's going to be so mind-numbingly dull that it will turn you off to any profession in the field of law...

[themadhacker]

I hate to break it to you, but probably 95% of court cases would have absolutely nothing you'd find interesting. If you were lucky enough to get one that was, most of the testimony in that case would still be boring.

Odds are, if there is any recoverable data on that hard drive, it's going to be so mind-numbingly dull that it will turn you off to any profession in the field of law...

Yeah, I kind of assumed it would be boring, but would still be interesting to be able to read the files.

[MegatronUK]

From 1986, that hard disk is likely to be an MFM drive. Good luck trying to hook it up to a modern PC!

[themadhacker]

why would I do that?

[Bikerman]

OMG a MFM or RLL harddrive, long time since I saw one

Saw your post on old-computers.com, agree that it is a dead forum (think because it is so slow?) but there is a lot of good post on it though

Did you get it working?

[kibble]

I don't know about that being an MFM drive. That looks more like an old 5MB/s, 50 pin SCSI hard drive and with adapter *may* work on a more modern pci SCSI card. I tried it once with an old like 20MB hard drive with the 50 pin connector and it worked.