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Vintage Computers Any vintage computer systems, calculators, video games etc., but with an emphasis on 1980s and earlier equipment.

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Old 25th Nov 2020, 10:27 am   #1
Peter G3YJE
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Default Fujitsu LIFEBOOK B110 + Port Replicator

I was given one of these at a rally but it has me foxed.
It boots up in Windows OK from its HDD.
BUT no information.

It has a serial port, parallel port and a monitor port and appears to have a PCMCIA slot but I have not found out how to communicate with it or connect a FDD or CD. Too early for a USB port!

Peter
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Old 25th Nov 2020, 11:02 am   #2
SiriusHardware
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Default Re: Fujitsu LIFEBOOK B110 + Port Replicator

PCMCIA slots were the laptop equivalent of the 'card slots' you get on PC motherboards, and just as with that situation, you could get PCMCIA cards to add almost any kind of interface to a compatible laptop, including PCMCIA ethernet cards and PCMCIA USB port cards - bear in mind though that USB wasn't really supported by Windows until about Win '98 SE though.

Any cards you try to plug in there will need the appropriate drivers for the OS, unfortunately.
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Old 25th Nov 2020, 12:44 pm   #3
chriswood1900
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Default Re: Fujitsu LIFEBOOK B110 + Port Replicator

The B110 range were designed as powerful but small laptops and were sold with usually Win 95, 98, 98SE but a few were also used with Win NT later some users also played with XP Vista etc. These needed quite a few special drivers as most things did at this period and some are still available from the Fujitsu support pages. Fujitsu provides support for a lot longer than most.
https://support.ts.fujitsu.com/IndexDownload.asp?lng=en
This link will take you to support and then search for B110.
The CD for these was also a special PCMCIA one that ran from the port and was often the route for loading software. I did have and used one a long time ago but its hard to remember the details.
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Old 25th Nov 2020, 1:46 pm   #4
duncanlowe
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Default Re: Fujitsu LIFEBOOK B110 + Port Replicator

Yes, PCMCIA CDs, and so on were certainly common. I reckon I still have the ethernet card PCMCIA from my first laptop. The ethernet cards had an interface cable so if you do look to obtain one, make sure it comes with that.

There were also some interfaces using the parallel port. Iomega Zip drives for example.
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Old 26th Nov 2020, 7:56 am   #5
Peter G3YJE
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Default Re: Fujitsu LIFEBOOK B110 + Port Replicator

Thanks for the tip about the Iomega Zip drive, I still had one of those!
I went down the Spectrum, BBC Master and Amstrad PC route and never
did get to use PCMCIA, so comments were very helpful.
During a management enforced clear out I found the matching CD drive
so I should have two ways of being able to talk to it now!
Peter
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Old 14th Mar 2021, 7:03 am   #6
slavedata
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Default Re: Fujitsu LIFEBOOK B110 + Port Replicator

I have a spare PCMCIA Ethernet card drop me a PM with your address and I'll stick it in the post.

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