The Vintage Computer

A virtual computer museum and private collection of computing devices from the era of about 1980 to the early 2000s.

Category

All Items

My collection of vintage, 30+ years old IT hardware with focus on IBM and Unix systems as well as early portable systems.

/

Feedback and donations

Drop an email with questions or feedback to: info@thevintagecomputer.de

Do you have old computer stuff you don't need anymore? donate@thevintagecomputer.de

Follow on youtube

Join me in this let's make episode and make yourself a pocketable mainframe computer that can run the big iron IBM operating systems like MVS, OS/390 and VM. We use easy to get components - a raspberry pi 4 will be the hardware basis, however you can adapt the steps to any other hardware you like as long as as it can run Debian Linux. To run IBM mainframe software, we use the Hercules 390 emulator and the MVS 3.8j Turnkey system. Finally, we will compile and run a COBOL program. Links DietPi: https://dietpi.com Hercules 390: http://www.hercules-390.org MVS Turnkey System: https://www.prince-webdesign.nl/tk5 x3270: https://x3270.bgp.nu Timeline 00:00:00 Intro 00:00:26 Software 00:00:52 Hardware 00:01:11 3270 Terminal Emulators 00:01:16 Begin the build 00:01:19 DietPi 00:02:54 Package install 00:03:56 Build Hercules 00:05:29 Let’s now install MVS 00:07:12 IPL 00:09:20 Connected to the pocket mainframe 00:09:31 TSO 00:10:54 ISPF 00:11:46 Edit and compile Cobol code 00:12:28 See job output 00:13:33 Shutdown and outro Enjoy! #retrocomputing #ibm #mainframe #raspberrypi #hercules390 #Linux
Let's Make Episode III - A pocket mainframe #ibm #mainframe #s390 #raspberrypi #hercules
Welcome to a new episode where we continue with the IBM Mainframe restoration. In this episode, we try to fix the PSU that blew up in the last one, and we'll add a new BIOS battery to silence the complaints on boot. With that done, we'll circle back to backing up the software on the disks, configure networking in OS/2 and we'll try out some quality of life improvements. Enjoy! Timeline 00:00:00 Intro 00:00:20 Recap from last episode 00:00:32 What is a varistor? 00:00:55 Filter caps 00:01:14 Desoldering components... 00:01:49 New caps go in 00:03:49 Inspection 00:05:16 Now I use an isolation transformer - worst case its fuse blows 00:05:52 Power LED is on... and no explosion! 00:06:10 Moment of truth... 00:06:34 Oh crap - OCA fault! 00:07:14 Do you remember these little cards? 00:07:35 There are subtle differences between the cards... 00:07:41 The componets that are installed here identify the card type. 00:08:22 Back together and re-installed 00:08:36 Flicked the switch... 00:09:37 Let’s now address the BIOS battery 00:12:18 Board is re-installed, let’s test... 00:12:31 Applying the settings as per IBMs service manual 00:13:29 Finally, we can come back to the backup :-) 00:14:05 the “tape” command is for controlling the drive 00:14:41 Using the “tar” command (Tape ARchiver) to backup the C: drive 00:16:22 22GB VMESA folder on E: 00:16:32 Will it run DOOM? Let’s find out. 00:16:40 Network config for DHCP 00:17:20 I found FTP-It on hobbes as well, a GUI ftp client 00:18:29 I unzipped the downloaded dmos219s.zip file to “Games” 00:20:26 Yes - it runs DOOM, and not too badly 00:21:22 Summary and outro. #retrocomputing #IBM #mainframe #S390 #restoration #integratedserver
IBM Mainframe Episode 6 - fixing a dead OCA, making backups the hard way and OS/2 networking.
Join me in this video where we continue with the IBM Mainframe restoration. In this episode, we finish the assembly of the system and we will try to boot it up for the first time. Hopefully it will start off the SSA disk array into a copy of OS2 server. Enjoy! 00:00:00 Intro 00:24:20 35 Torx screws and a crap tool 00:54:14 Let’s install a pile of stuff 01:15:07 SSA drives go in 02:00:03 Front is done 02:57:22 Back finished 03:04:13 Moment of truth 07:38:00 Hooray - it boots! 08:48:22 Let’s check out those SSA disks 10:45:13 There’s OS/2 Server 13:50:07 Have to RTFM to find out what the password is 14:02:03 Have you seen this card? Get in touch! 14:22:17 Let’s check out the games... does it run DOOM? 14:45:06 Vintage Netscape here 15:23:02 How to make tape backups on OS2? 16:40:17 I begin to understand why OS2 failed 18:00:00 Another drama 19:21:15 Some issues to work on 19:58:12 Thank you and outro #retrocomputing #IBM #mainframe #S390 #restoration #integratedserver
IBM Mainframe Epsiode 5 - final assembly, first bootup and drama
Subscribe

© 2026 The Vintage Computer