IBM ThinkPad 760CD

PC Mag, November 1995

"The first notebook that can equal, and in some cases exceed the abilities of a desktop PC"

-PC Mag, December 1995

The ThinkPad 700 series traditionally represented the pinnacle of IBM's mobile technology, shoehorning lengthy wishlists of features once reserved for high-end desktops and workstations into a powerful, portable package. The 760CD was no exception to this rule, carrying a Pentium-90, a 1.2GB hard drive, a CD-ROM drive, a 12.1-inch 800x600 color display, and even hardware MPEG decoding for seamless video playblack. These impressive features, of course, came with an $8000+ price tag to match it.

The 760CD was not the first Thinkpad with CD-ROM capability; that distinction, as well as that of the first CD-equipped laptop to hit the market, belongs to the earlier 755CD.

Aside from hardware specifications, the 760CD also incorporated design features like a keyboard that rises and tilts forward when the lid is opened for more comfortable typing and an LCD indicator on the keyboard that shows battery life in the form of a percentage or time remaining estimate.

Although the 8 pound, 3 ounce 760CD is already a fully fledged desktop replacement, a number of docking options, such as the Thinkpad Dock I/II and the massive SelectaDock could add additional features such as onboard SCSI, sound, multiple hard drives, 5.25'' drives, and even fullsized ISA/PCI expansion slots, further extending the utility of the system.

The Guide's 760CD:
  • Intel Pentium 90 with 256K external L2 cache
  • 8 MB of RAM soldered to mainboard + 2 additional expansion slots, one with a 32MB module
  • 1.2GB IBM Travelstar XP EIDE hard drive
  • Trident Cyber9320 graphics controller with 1MB RAM
  • MWave DSP audio/modem chipset
  • MS-DOS 6.22 + Windows 3.1

Setting up the system


     After removing the existing Windows 98 install on the machine, the installation of MS-DOS was straightforward. No special drivers or software needed, and the system will perform basic tasks without any fuss. However, if you wish to install Windows 3.1 on a 760CD, you might find it a little challenging.

     The problem, as always, is the availability of drivers. Lenovo's page for 760 drivers is, at best, sparse. And anyone installing Windows 3.1 with unsupported hardware is greeted with a bland, 640x480x16 display that, in the case of the 760CD, looks terrible because of the non-native resolution. Luckily, there are quite a few mirrors of IBM's PC BBS, which hosted hundreds of drivers for IBM systems through the '90s. The Video Features Diskette I (that can also be used on a number of other models) for Windows 3.1 is necessary to get full use of the 760CD's exquisite 800x600 display.

     Getting audio support on a DOS/3.1 760 requires a number of disks that can also be found on the BBS. The MWave 2.24 drivers for the 760CD also support a number of other 760 models as well as much of the 755 series.

     The MWave drivers, and its MIDI components, require 9 diskettes to install. If you lack that amount, as I did, you can simply re-write the same diskette every time a new one is requested. The following files are self-extracting and self-writing files, just run them on a 32-bit machine with a floppy drive.
  1. main driver - disk 1
  2. main driver - disk 2
  3. main driver - disk 3
  4. MIDI - disk 1 - unsure of this one
  5. MIDI - disk 2
  6. MIDI - disk 3
  7. MIDI - disk 4
  8. MIDI - disk 5
  9. MIDI - disk 6
     The MWave DSP is SB compatible and should run most (but not all) SB software. I've found getting sound on games like Doom and Wolfenstein rather difficult in straight DOS, while Wolfenstein will run perfectly in Windows and Doom will play music but no effects when run in Windows. Games like Need for Speed will not run with sound in either Windows (where it doesn't run at all) or in DOS.

     Other pieces of IBM software like the utility driver and the service diskette may also be useful.

     Finally, if you plan on running a few games, UniVBE is recommended, as the driver package didn't have much in the way of VESA support.

Performance


     As a general-purpose DOS machine, the 760CD performs admirably as one should expect from such a high-dollar machine. It is capable of running games like Doom and The Need For Speed at good framerates, however SB support in these games has so far proven to be flaky at best. Doom will play music, but only when run through Windows 3.1. TNFS refuses to play any sounds at all, and fails to detect the VESA drivers when I attempt to run it in Windows.

     Basic multitasking operations like running multiple Microsoft Office windows is perfectly doable with the machine's huge RAM compliment, and the spacious 1.2 GB hard drive allows for plenty of storage for any 3.1/DOS software I come across. Overall, the 760CD is an excellent performer.


Conclusion


     The many bells and whistles and excellent IBM quality make the 760CD a great portable DOS/3.x workstation and something worthy of any collector's consideration. However, compatibility problems and hard-to-find drivers and software packages can make the system a pain to set up for a beginner.

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Compaq Deskpro XL 590

InfoWorld, December 1994

The Deskpro XL series was released in the summer of 1994 as a replacement for Compaq's high-end Deskpro/M lineup, updating it with Intel Pentium microprocessors, and Compaq's first implementation of the new PCI expansion bus. XLs also included the "Vocalyst" keyboard, which featured an integrated speaker and microphone that plugged into a proprietary connector on the back of the machine.

The 590 is a later iteration of the XL family, introduced in late 1994. While Compaq was one of the last major companies to release a 90 MHz Pentium system, it was still a respectable flagship, with a Pentium 90, 16 MB of RAM, PCI graphics, and a spacious 1.05 GB SCSI hard disk. Those specifications, along with a price tag at or exceeding $4,000, made this machine more suited for the corner office than the cubicle.








 
The Guide's XL 590:
  • Intel Pentium 90 on proprietary CPU card
  • 16 MB of RAM soldered to CPU card
  • 1.05 GB IBM Deskstar XP SCSI hard drive
  • Compaq QVision 1280/P PCI Graphics Card (Motorola XC02 + 1 MB VRAM)
  • NEC MultiSpin 6X SCSI CD-ROM
  • AMD PCNet SCSI/Ethernet controller
  • Analog Devices SoundPort AD1847JP (audio controller)
  • MS-DOS 6.22 + Windows for Workgroups 3.11

Setting up the system

 

     Two years of disuse drained the soldered CMOS battery on the mainboard, requiring the machine to be re-configured. While the system will boot without being configured, the 590's default settings will only read 720k floppy disks. If you find yourself unable to read from 1.44 MB disks on an XL, this is likely your problem. The CMOS battery on the motherboard is non-replaceable, and an external battery pack is required to return function to the system. Compaq's setup utility is a set of three bootable floppy disks that will automatically configure your system for you after you enter the date and time, and then reboot with little fuss. With the system completely configured, the real challenge began.

     The XL 590's proprietary hardware, particularly its SCSI controller, made installing MS-DOS on this system more of a chore thanks to driver requirements. Luckily, HP still hosts drivers for XL lineup. The AMD PCNet SCSI drivers are a necessity to allow your DOS boot disk to interact with the drive.

   For anyone planning to install Windows 3.11, the QVision 1280/P drivers are a necessity to raise the quality level above 640x480 in 16 colors. It's also recommended to download the VESA driver (and add it to your AUTOEXEC.BAT) if you plan on running any games. The video drivers allow for a maximum resolution of 1024x768, with 256 colors, while 800x600, offering 65K colors, is the best choice for overall quality, though some may find a lack of screen real estate disheartening.

 
800x600, 65K Colors

     As of yet, I have been unable to find functional drivers for the AD1847JP audio controller in this machine.

Performance

     The CMOS battery problems have rendered the daily use of this machine rather difficult, but it performs decently in both Windows and DOS, able to easily multitask and play most DOS games. The lack of sound drivers means this is an impractical machine for DOS gaming, although as a machine for testing and running older software, the 590 is still perfectly functional.

Conclusion

The non-replaceable CMOS battery is a seemingly pointless engineering blunder, and the case is quite cramped. The proprietary floppy drive form factor means drive failure can be fatal to the utility of your machine, and the use of mounting brackets for the 5.25'' drives may make adding a second drive difficult. These issues aside, Compaq's build quality is superb, and the features of this system are compelling for a high-end DOS workstation. The XL 590 is, overall, very worthy of consideration for any task that doesn't require some form of sound output better than the PC speaker.
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Intel Xeon 1.2 ES



     Not a common find. Engineering samples like this are reserved for big-name OEMs, software companies and reviewers to make sure that a CPU has hardware, software and fanfare to support it on launch. This is a a somewhat early (note the 1999 copyright) sample of the NetBurst Xeon DP with the Willamette-based Foster core in Socket 603 packaging, running at 1.2 GHz, 200 MHz slower than the slowest production model.

     This chip, like its production-grade siblings, is easily outdone by the faster and more efficient big-cache (Cascades 2M) Pentium III Xeons in the majority of server applications, and this never-released 1.2 GHz variant is just as much a guaranteed under-performer.

     This chip still POSTs and does indeed run at the speed marked on the corner. Markings on the chip indicate it was manufactured in July 2000, 10 months before Foster hit the market, and 4 months before the NetBurst architecture was announced.
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