Looks like the 5200 display has sadly died ..
My rtc battery arrived and has been fitted ..
Obviously I can't reset the bios defaults on account I can't see anything ..
A question for you guys ..
will the vga Dsub output the same info as what I would normally see on the plasma screen before boot ?
If not then I guess there is no way in
unless I can do it blind ?
what would be the key sequence to press to reset bios blind
not my day is it..
doh!

All is not lost ..
problems with the microswitch under the plasma monitor ..
It appears to work in reverse of what I thought it did ..
A bit of tape to hold it down and back in business ..

The service manual will help you greatly when it comes to disassembly of these machines, a lot of things aren't that obvious. You have to dismantle the whole display and guide the cables back through the cable binder in order to be able to get the top of to reach the back part of the planar.

I will try out later if it is possible to use a non proprietary floppy drive over an I/O card for booting purposes.

Thanks jaZz ..
I dont seem to be able to find the service manual and I have looked ..
Dont suppose you have a copy on pdf you could let me have ?
rgds

Here you go:

oerk wrote:

Here you go:

Toshiba T5200 - Maintenance Manual.pdf

Much appreciated..

Back for some more help with the 5200 ..
System now stable an reassembly almost complete..
I can now enter Win3.1
But of course this laptop was never designed for anything other than keyboard use ..and I'd like to add a mouse ..
My options are limited as I dont have serial mouse ..but I do have a ps2 to serial adapter ..
I assume I would have to add a mouse driver ..
hopefully a generic one that would allow me to use a ps2 mouse.
I presume this would have to be added in DOS so loaded before windows starts ..
..and I have forgotten most of what I knew about DOS over the years ..its been so long since I even used it.
I figure once the driver is installed I would then have to edit config.sys and autoexec.bat to load and enable it.
So since you guts have done this already (I assume) ..could you suggest where I might download a suitable driver and walk me through it.
Once win 3.1 has loaded there isn't even a mouse pointer on screen ..so I assume this computer was never used with one?
rgds
VS

Not really winning here ..
I made a 98 Boot disk on one of my laptops and popped it into the 5200 floppy drive ...
tried to view its contents in Win3.1 ...and although it 'sounded' like it was running ..Win 3.1 claimed there was nothing in drive A
I have to assume the floppy drive is defective ..but it doesn't look 'standard'
Can a standard 1.44 mb floppy be fitted ?
If so ..how ..
The header on the main board has less pins ..so again I'm assuming this is a proprietory drive (non standard) ..and the chances of ever finding one are basically zero.
My Head hurts

So ..maybe I simply cannot read a standard DOS floppy ..and the A drive is actually OK ..
Oerk ...
Is this you also ?
https://dos-reloaded.de/forum/index.php/Threa … hiba-T5200-100/
looks interesting and might well be useful info for me ..but sadly I cannot read German ...
But from what I can make out ..this is using a bootable IDE CF system ?
..and possibly running 95 ?
which would be more useful ..
In truth I'm a bit lost here with this project ..
Info is scarce ...
and this beautiful bit of kit is so restrictive ...and I'm thwarted at almost every turn.
Yes it is working ..but for how long with the Connor.
..and I am failing to see a way of upgrading or even getting some improved functionality ..mouse ...storage ..sound etc
ah well ..might as well call it a night and go watch the final episode of H&CF season 4 ..
g'night all ..
VS

Vipersan wrote:

Back for some more help with the 5200 .. System now stable an reassembly almost complete.. I can now enter Win3.1 But of course […]
Show full quote

Back for some more help with the 5200 ..
System now stable an reassembly almost complete..
I can now enter Win3.1
But of course this laptop was never designed for anything other than keyboard use ..and I'd like to add a mouse ..
My options are limited as I dont have serial mouse ..but I do have a ps2 to serial adapter ..
I assume I would have to add a mouse driver ..
hopefully a generic one that would allow me to use a ps2 mouse.
I presume this would have to be added in DOS so loaded before windows starts ..
..and I have forgotten most of what I knew about DOS over the years ..its been so long since I even used it.
I figure once the driver is installed I would then have to edit config.sys and autoexec.bat to load and enable it.
So since you guts have done this already (I assume) ..could you suggest where I might download a suitable driver and walk me through it.
Once win 3.1 has loaded there isn't even a mouse pointer on screen ..so I assume this computer was never used with one?
rgds
VS

Ok first of all, if you load into Win3.1, you dont need to load a mouse driver beforehand, as Win3.1 uses its own mouse driver. But for using the mouse in DOS, you will need to add it to the autoexec.bat.

PS/2 to Serial adapters usually only work with OLDER mice that do support both Serial and PS/2 protocols. If you have an OLDER PS/2 mouse you might as well want to try out the adapter. If it doesnt work then you know the mouse is too new and only supports PS/2.

Yes, a generic mouse driver like for example CuteMouse (CtMouse) should work for you.

If Windows detects no mouse or it is disables in Windows Setup, then no mouse pointer will appear, that is correct.

Regarding the floppy drive..:
It is proprietary, it has its own custom connector that is very different from a normal connector. You could make a pinout adapter cablem but that would be rather difficult. So on the normal floppy drive controller of this computer, you cannot use another normal floppy drive, only this model.

What COULD be possible (what I will try out in the following days), is to use an ISA controller I/O card, and attach a normal Floppy Drive over the FDD connector on the connector card.

Regarding the Connor HDD..:
As you have already learned, you can only use certain Conner drives with this computer. The only way to get around this are 1]Network booting card with XT-IDE to be able to boot from desired IDE device, 2]Flashing the BIOS to a version that actually accepts other drives or 3]Using a SCSI adapter plus SCSI HDD.

Another possible solution 4] would be using a controller I/O card and booting from an IDE HDD connected to taht. But this could also need a flashed BIOS, I am not sure, yet, but will try it out.

I managed to get an SD2IDE adapter with SD card running, but it required the BIOS to be flashed with a custom one that unlocks the HDD bit.

My grateful thanks jaZz..
Not many people appear to have tried to get one of these going ..so info is very limited ..
Yourself and Oerk are my source atm so help from both of you is appreciated.
I'd like to also get my hands on an XT-CF but checking a thread on Amibay ..it appears they are no longer made ..
Always late for a party me ..
cest la vie

Sadly the mere mention of modding and flashing bios leaves me with chills ..
That is a steep learning curve for an old duffer like me.
I'm capable of following a how to guide ..but innovation these days is out of reach.
rgds
VS

I am hoping to solve 2 problems at once here..:

IF it is possible to use/boot from a standard non-proprietary floppy drive AND another non-Conner HDD with the help of an ISA I/O controller card (expansion ISA cards that bring with them extra serial/parallel and most importantly IDE and FLOPPY connections), that would be awesome.

It would enable us to replace BOTH the floppy and the HDD with normal spare ones once the propriatary HDD and Floppy are dead.

Most of the compatible Conner drives are dead nowadays, and even if your Floppy Drive is still working (like mine) it will only be a matter of time until it ceases to work.

Do you have a specific ISA controller card in mind JZ ...?
If so I would like to start searching so as not to miss another party ..🤣
I assume this would use the 16 bit slot ..so adding audio later would be restricted to finding an 8 bit sound card ..(half size)
rgds
VS

There are 8bit and 16bit ISA controller cards, if I remember correctly. I ordered one of the cheapest 16bit ones of ebay that I could find. As with regards to adding sound later: I also thought about possibly adding a Soundblaster card. But as you said it would have to be 8bit then as the controller card will take the 16bit place.

And this is a problem. Both 8-bit sound cards and 8-bit ide/fdd controller cards are getting very expensive and rare. A 16-bit controller card could be easily had for 10-20 bucks, albeit an 8-bit equivalent that can handle FDD and HDD will cost already around 50 bucks. With sound cards it isn't much better.

I therefore settled to try it out with a 16-bit controller card I ordered for 15 Euro.

But I also own the CVX4 and OPL2LPT parallel port soundcard solutions from dreamblaster. So I discarded the SoundBlaster idea altogether, having Adlib sound over parallel would be enough for me. And he is even currently working on a Tandy LPT device, and after that he will work on an OPL3LPT. So I plan on using the parallel port for sound devices and are already looking forward to his future projects.

I guess I need to set my priorities ..
A 16 bit ISA I/O card ...and worry about the sound later ..
but ..I think I might wait to see if you have any success first.
I shall be checking this thread every day to see your progress ..
😁

Yeah, because it could very well be that, although the non-proprietary FDD and non-Conner HDD I aim to try will be successfully detected and are usable over the controller card, the Toshiba still would deny to boot from them. I will put in the old unaltered BIOS for this test to make sure this will work also with an unaltered BIOS.

Vipersan wrote:

Oerk ... Is this you also ? https://dos-reloaded.de/forum/index.php/Threa … hiba-T5200-100/ looks interesting and might well be […]
Show full quote

Oerk ...
Is this you also ?
https://dos-reloaded.de/forum/index.php/Threa … hiba-T5200-100/
looks interesting and might well be useful info for me ..but sadly I cannot read German ...
But from what I can make out ..this is using a bootable IDE CF system ?
..and possibly running 95 ?

Sorry for not replying sooner. Yes, this is me.

That's an XT-CF card. Though I'm not entirely happy with it, because it works in 8bit mode and is therefore very slow, and difficult to copy files to from another computer.

My next option is to try the modded BIOS you found and see if I can use the internal IDE controller. This would free up one slot for a network card. This can take a while though.

No, I'm running pure DOS for now. I want to run 3.11, but since I can't fill the CF card at the moment... you see the problem 🙁

I wouldn't want to run Windows 95 on it. 95 requires a DX40 minmum, and 8MB RAM to not swap all the time. The Toshiba isn't even half of that.

An ISA I/O card certainly won't work without another (XTIDE?) or modded system BIOS.

Also, I'm quite happy that I'm not alone in this anymore 🤣

Thanks for the reply Oerk ..
If you do have success with the modded bios ..I will be begging for you to make me a copy also..as this is beyond my limited abilities.
Win 3.1 it is then & DOS access ...but first we have to future proof ..and hopefully get a working floppy drive.
I splashed out and ordered OPL2LPT kit today ...which hopefully will negate the need for a dedicated sound card.
rgds
VS

The controller card has arrived. I will try out later whether this will help in circumventing the BIOS limitation in regards to booting from HDD and FDD.
I will put in the original unmodified BIOS chip that only lets you boot from Conner hard disks beforehand to make sure this also works with an unmodded system.