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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 7th Jan 2013, 2:18 pm   #1
kayrich
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Default 1980's Portico Miracle Computer found in attic.

The computer is an early 1980's Portico Miracle. It is a portable computer with a CRT and two 5.25in. disk drives and comes in a large shoulder bag. It has a Z80 cpu and the motherboard was made by Rade Systems in 1981. There is no boot disk.

Anyone know anything about this beast?
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Old 7th Jan 2013, 5:59 pm   #2
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Default Re: 1980's Portico Miracle Computer found in attic.

Never heard if these, but I wouldn't be surprised it ran CP/M rather than DOS, if indeed it runs a common operating system.
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Old 7th Jan 2013, 7:37 pm   #3
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Default Re: 1980's Portico Miracle Computer found in attic.

Hi Kayrich, is it possible inside there is a hard disk?

If so, it would boot from this. However if the battery has run down it might not be able to 'see' the hard disk, as BIOS parameters can reset to default settings.

Good Luck - Mike
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Old 7th Jan 2013, 8:26 pm   #4
kayrich
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Default Re: 1980's Portico Miracle Computer found in attic.

Mike,

It actually asks for the floppy. It's too old to have a hard disk.

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Old 7th Jan 2013, 9:58 pm   #5
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Default Re: 1980's Portico Miracle Computer found in attic.

See here for a pic if nothing else: http://www.bobmockford.co.uk/pcn/029/

And gets a passing mention here: ftp://ftp.worldofspectrum.org/pub/si...rse0900009.pdf
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Old 8th Jan 2013, 12:09 am   #6
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Default Re: 1980's Portico Miracle Computer found in attic.

I am pretty sure this is a CPM based machine it'll have 64-128k of memory. Nice find.

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Old 8th Jan 2013, 11:03 am   #7
kayrich
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Default Re: 1980's Portico Miracle Computer found in attic.

The motherboard has a 64k memory extension board plugged in and what looks like space for more. It would be good if issue 29 of Personal Computer News was available somewhere as details of the computer, and even Portico, seem to have been well buried. I have found a full copy of the issue of the Home Computer Course, from Nickthedentist's link, on line (in Spanish!) but that gives no further details than the page scanned. It's such a pity that the operating system disc has been lost.

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Old 8th Jan 2013, 8:18 pm   #8
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Default Re: 1980's Portico Miracle Computer found in attic.

A generic copy of CPM may run on it. I have the cpm disks for my Cambridge 380Z I am mega busy with work at the mo but if you aren't in a hurry I could try making you a boot disk. My drives are single sided single density so may be compatible.

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Old 8th Jan 2013, 8:54 pm   #9
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Default Re: 1980's Portico Miracle Computer found in attic.

Although machines such as this were sold as 'Portables', among users they were known as 'Luggables'.

Regards - Mike
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Old 9th Jan 2013, 10:34 am   #10
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Default Re: 1980's Portico Miracle Computer found in attic.

Thanks for the offer Jay. That would be great.
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Old 9th Jan 2013, 2:05 pm   #11
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Default Re: 1980's Portico Miracle Computer found in attic.

The fun bit will be getting CP/M to run. From memory you write a boot loader that gets CP/M into memory and then you patch the basic I/O routines. This allows you to get something up and going that you can then write a full BIOS for.

The problem is that you need the hardware details of the I/O, including the disk controller. A further wrinkle would appear if the display is memory mapped rather than just a serial port.

Now, it is theoretically possible to write all of this on another CP/M machine and create a boot disc that this one will load but it is a little involved. However it would be fun if you could do this.

Given that it is a fairly late CP/M box there is the possibility that it's got banked memory and is supposed to take CP/M 3 which was a Z80 version that would support such things rather than 2 which was a generic 8080/8085/Z80 version.

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Old 13th Jan 2013, 2:40 pm   #12
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Default Re: 1980's Portico Miracle Computer found in attic.

Hi Kayrich,
Back in the day Rair used to make boards for OEMs, I remember going to a trade show and seeing them there. Small companies bought the Raid boards and packaged them into their own machines.

One company that used them, IIRC, was Transtec. I think their B2 and BC4 used Raid Z80 boards. So if you can find a disk for one of those, you nay be lucky.
I had a Transtec Krypton and I think that by then they had designed their own Z80 board.

It's sad how many small makers there were back then that went to the wall and how much info has been lost forever.

Good luck finding info on this. Keep us posted.


Cheers,

Andy.
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Old 14th Jan 2013, 4:22 pm   #13
kayrich
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Default Re: 1980's Portico Miracle Computer found in attic.

Thank you everyone for your help. To get any meaningful results seems complicated! I have spoken to the lady who found the computer and also two museums and the best solution seems to be to donate it to one of them.
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