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Pocket 386 Computer


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6 hours ago, Forrest said:

Saw a very thorough review of the Pocket 386 on Youtube

 

The reviewer mentions several improvements found on the Pocket 386, compared to the Book 8088 from last year. Most notably, the normal/widescreen aspect ratio switch and the improved video quality both on the built-in monitor and on an external monitor. Biggest negative was the rudimentary OPL sound in Windows games. Soundblaster audio would be an improvement. PicoGUS might be the solution, but testing would be needed as the PicoGUS had some issues with the Book 8088 from what I’ve read on the PicoGUS GitHub page.

Yep. Saw this today. I’m pretty impressed with the review. It was thoroughly enjoyable and he covered just about everything you’d want to know. I think the maker has hit on the ideal price-performance-usability format. It’s unfortunate that the reviewer thinks that 486 or Pentium SOC modules will be harder and more expensive to come by. I’d love to see a Pocket 486 in similar format and price. 

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On 4/11/2024 at 7:20 PM, AtariPhreak said:

I would have ordered it today if it had a serial port. If it can do modem via dos, it aint for me. otherwise looks like a dream come true.

There's an optional serial port for it. It costs $11.99 from AliExpress.

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1 hour ago, toml_12953 said:

There's an optional serial port for it. It costs $11.99 from AliExpress.

yea, I ended up stumbling across it again and read a little more carefully and also spoke to the vendor so i think i’m set. looking forward to see how it runs old DOS bbs software…

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  • 1 month later...

Pocket386 Installed DOS/Win95 image for you here:-

 

https://we.tl/t-cSdIKACbiv

 

Never use WinImage before so, I hope I did it right. If I messed up just send me a message and I'll give it another try. Please let me know if it works. 

 

By the way, I'm trying to install it on a 16GB SD Card using a CF/SD adapter card. I'll let you know if it works.

 

Pity you can only use 2GB, but if it works it will save me money as I've got lots of SD and Micro SD cards from mt Raspberry Pis.

 

Cheerio

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success, it worked...thank you.  One note about my image...it's fat16...it loads the usb driver so if you connect a usb drive it should read it...but it has to be fat16...and yes the usb has a limit of 4gig...I went with 2gig for my usb.

Your image doesn't seem to load the driver in the config.sys, if you want that you can add it to your windows 95 image.  it's the ch375dos.sys driver, in c:\.

had to size down a 32gig usb to get that.  You have to delete the partition and then setup a smaller one then windows format will give you the option for fat which is fat16...otherwise fat32 is about as basic as it get.

 

When I get a chance I will post perminant links for both images incase someone comes here looking for them...the wetransfer links I used was only good for a week.  I will create a google drive link for each one..have 15gig there

using it for NOTHING...so a public link can point there and never disappear.  

 

Does your machine give a FDC error then simply move on without intervention at startup...I went tnto the bios and enabled Floppy Controller support to see if this would go away.  kinda silly as I could back a usb 1.44 floppy to it.

but if i do that I am going with a usb stick and put anything on it.  Don't know if a boot from floppy would work with one of those usb floppies...I don't have that hardware...I do have a usb cdrom/dvd drive.  But I have not tried that, I am 

curious if it works or doesn't.  

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The file was a copy from CF card to HDD I made so perhaps boot Niro would not get picked up. Haven’t tried too much, but I did find I needed to change the BIOS settings to read a mouse and external keyboard.

 

At present I’m getting comfortable with a Linux/Win10 dual boot to see if it suits me. Not sure I’m going to afford a new PC just for Win11. That’s consuming most of my time these days. I want to explore gaming on Linux Mint to see if I can break out of the Windows environment.

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  • 2 months later...

This is super cute, but 200$ is a bit much for something I don't really need. Still, maybe one day...

 

If I did get it, I wouldn't bother with Win95. It probably can run sluggish at best, but there's enough cool software for DOS and even Win 3.1 to keep me busy anyway.

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The Pocket 386 is a genuine Intel 386SX based computer in a modern(ish) industrial computer package. It is not a Raspberry Pi emulated computer. Therefore, all of the faults, limitations and frustration of a late 1990s computer are built into the package. Equally, all of the primitive charm and simplicity of the original, is also built in. 
 

Thereis lies the charm, or distaste, of such a machine. There is no super-powerful (relatively speaking) ARM processor idling away for you to fall back on. No, it’s good old (bad old?) MS DOS 7 and Windows 95 all the way. Break out your old DOS manuals and dive right in. 
 

If you are too new to remember the “good old days” of DOS you will probably have a shock when you see how primitive it is. How did we ever get anything done? Well, we did….because it was the best available. You had to be there to understand.

 

Now, if that makes you curious to spend $200 US feel free to dip your toes into our recent past. If not, then happily move on and forget the pain of programming batch files and typing (ugh!) to achieve modest results.

 

cheers all from Ian

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59 minutes ago, ianhollis51 said:

If you are too new to remember the “good old days” of DOS you will probably have a shock when you see how primitive it is

Actually, I still use Total Commander - a grandson of Norton Commander - as my main "desktop" on Windows 10. So, not that far off ;)

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  • 1 month later...

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