SerialPort

We're back! Early release: SPARCstation IPX power supply

We're back from a summer break! We recently embarked on a project to restore a Sun SPARCstation IPX that was donated by a viewer. We had no idea what sort of condition it was in, and it ended up definitely needing some work. In this video, we go deep into electrical engineering territory, and end up designing a new controller for the power supply to try to get it working again.

This was a huge learning experience for me (Ben), so forewarning, there may be some mistakes along the way! We...

Rebuilding 1990s BBS software using Git

Last year Mark brought up the idea of revisiting BBS software called Impulse. It was popular with underground scene boards in the 90s, something we frequented as much as we could back then. We were able to get in touch with the original author of Impulse, Brandon Sneed, and he had some incredible recollections of that time period.

We wanted to see if we could bring the software back, but work with it using modern tools that are indispensable to developers today. This ended up being a LO...

Projects update

We wanted to give everyone an update on some of the ongoing projects here at The Serial Port.. of which there are many! We also have a sneak peek at our next video. More updates coming soon!

Early release! 512K Day: The Day The Internet (almost) Broke

We're back with a detailed look at an infamous day in Internet history. On August 12, 2014, the BGP routing table surpassed 512,000 routes, causing issues with certain networking platforms. One of those platforms, the Cisco 6500, was one of the most popular and widespread at the time, especially in Internet infrastructure.

Using a 6500 we got from Abacus Hardware, we recreate the conditions of 512K Day to see exactly what happened on that fabled day.

Thanks as always for your supp...

Early Access: PC Hardware Database

We just wrapped up a video about The Retro Web and its genesis from Total Hardware 99. Thumbnail still TBD but this video is now available for early Patron preview:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sBxGtKmzOHA

Recreating Dell's first Linux PC

We picked up a 2007 Dell XPS 410 at an auction last year, and paid it absolutely no mind for months. Little did we know, but it held a secret... it was Dell's first Linux PC!

This was a fun project with just the right number of challenges.. it took a little work, but nothing too difficult to overcome.

And the channel is almost at 100k subscribers! Thanks to everyone for the continuing support, and let us know how we should celebrate hitting the milestone. Quake free-for-all on the...

Thanks to the TSP community, we got into the bowling alley computer!

The bowling alley PC and terminal saga is complete! Thanks to the community figuring out some solutions, we were able to gain full access to the bowling alley system. This was a completely unexpected journey when we first got these items, and it's been a blast delving into them.

We've got more projects underway already, and thank you as always for your support!

ALTEON

We picked up an Alteon AceDirector2 load balancer several months ago with an interest in getting it working, and without knowing all that much about Alteon's history.

One of Alteon's founders, John Hayes, happened to get in touch with us, and we were blown away by his stories of the company: how they pioneered gigabit ethernet, and how they sort of stumbled upon layer 4 load balancing. That made us even more motivated to get the AD2 working, and to try to tell their whole story.

T...

A Dell PC hiding... SCO OpenServer?!

We picked up a couple of items from an auction recently, and we were very surprised to find out what was hiding on an otherwise unassuming Dell Optiplex 760...

Bringing the ProLiant 6500 back to life!

We've been working on the Compaq ProLiant 6500 that we salvaged from Dialstar. Our last update showed it running, but we took the time to completely clean it and do a few upgrades along the way :)

Radio New Zealand interview

Our first media appearance! Radio New Zealand recently asked us to talk with them about dial-up and our ISP video series for a new segment they put together called "Who Still Uses Dial-Up?" We chatted with the host, Corey Fuimaono, about why we were interested in the hobby and the story behind the Total Control acquisition.

Lab update and reorg

We've been wanting to reorganize the lab for awhile now, and we finally took the time to do so. The collection has been scattered across a few rooms and locations, so we wanted to try to consolidate it into a single space as much as possible. We custom built a shelving unit to accommodate both our larger items and lots of rackmount gear.

And.. it's already filled up! The workbench area has been cleaned up though which gives us more space for ongoing projects. We'll be adding even more s...

Early Release! TWISTED: The origin of twisted-pair Ethernet

Just in time for Christmas, we've finished a video that's been months in the making: the history of twisted-pair Ethernet. We hear from Richard Bennett who helped develop the original twisted-pair standard (1BASE5) as well as Pat Thaler who chaired the 10BASE-T task force.

We had an impromptu livestream this past Sunday where we attempted to get the StarLAN and Lattisnet hubs working. We didn't fully succeed, so we'll be back with an in-depth video looking at the hardware of these two p...

Early-ish release! Setting up PRI for the Total Control

We're finally back with the next step for the Total Control! In this episode we use the Cisco IAD to create a PRI to handle the incoming calls to the Total Control. We also take a look at TCManager, the remote management software for the Total Control.

This was intended to be uploaded last night, but we ran into some technical difficulties. We've uploaded the video here for ad-free viewing, and it will go out on YouTube tonight.

Compaq Proliant 6500 project

Remember the Compaq Proliant we salvaged from the abandoned ISP? We finally take a quick look at it in this video, and actually get it powered on for the first time.

We'll be doing a full teardown and restoration in the future, but in the meantime, let us know your ideas!

Early Release! Do you know the Password?

We're back with another Parallel Port entry where Ben checks out the US Robotics Password. It's a modem from 1983, just a few years after the release of their first models.

Special thanks to mrunix for helping out with the call answer demo, and vivi for the Smartmodem PCB footage.

We've got more Serial Port content in the works so stay tuned in the coming weeks, and thank you for your continuing support!

Restoring the LAN Bridge... or not.

In our latest Parallel Port entry, we go through the process of getting our LAN Bridge repaired and restored. While we demonstrated a working LAN Bridge in our first video, this one wouldn't even power on. It would be really neat to get the fiber optic transceiver working, so let us know in comments here or on Discord if you've got any ideas for next steps.

Let us know if you like these deeper dives into devices like this one, and thanks as always for your support!

Monthly Update & our new merch store!

We catch up on what's been happening on the channel, talk about upcoming content, and share a sneak peek at some new hardware we just received.

We're also unveiling our new merch store built using Fourthwall. It's now open to Patreon members, and you can use the PATREON15 promo code to get a 15% discount. Check it out at https://shop.serialport.org. Let us know if you run into any issues along the way or have any specia...

Early release! Connecting to the Internet from 1987 via the IBM PS/2 Model 25

We finally get around to fulfilling our goal with the IBM PS/2 Model 25-- getting it on the 'net. We try out not one but TWO web servers on the 8086-powered screamer, and do some load testing on both. Definitely a fun project!

Early release! The US Robotics Total Control with 48 modems!

We couldn't wait to get into the Total Control we rescued from the abandoned Dialstar ISP. In this video we take a brief look at the history of the product line and then get right into checking out the unit we procured.

We'll have more coming up soon, so thank you for your support that makes projects like this one possible!

We discovered retro tech paradise at VCFMW 2024

Mark met up with Clabretro to attend and explore the incredible VCFMW 19 festival in Schaumburg, IL. Featuring dozens of exhibits and sellers, this was retro tech paradise!

We've also published to YouTube at https://youtu.be/blzIakpe4QY, but uploaded here as well in case anyone wants to avoid ads :)

Early Release! An IBM PC Server 320, or what's left of one

A link posted on the Discord caught our attention recently. It was for an IBM PC Server 320 and we thought it'd be a great addition to the Serial Port. What we received however was... not what we expected.

Let us know what ideas everyone has! We definitely want to install another CPU to take advantage of that capability, but what are some interesting things to explore with this platform?

In other news, Mark will be at VCFMW this weekend (and friend of the channel Clabretro as...

Early Release! Expanding The Ether: The invention of the DEC LAN Bridge

We're back with another documentary that's been in the works for months. We've had some ups and downs along the way with interviews being cancelled and other delays, but it's finally ready for a release.

We look at early Ethernet and how one device, the DEC LAN Bridge 100, ended up changing networking and laying the groundwork for Ethernet's future success. This was the world's first bridge, and with that came the invention of store-and-forward switching. It's hard to believe tha...

Clabretro Early Release! Will swapping a POWER5 CPU get the p5 back up and running?

Clab is back with an epic entry in the IBM p5 series! He swaps out a POWER5 CPU module, and then we finally get a look at the LPAR (Logical PARtition) setup process. There's also a look at the HMC (hardware management console). Super fascinating look into enterprise hardware that many of us wouldn't have seen before.

Clabretro Early Release! Sun StorEdge S1, tape drives, and SCSI!

Clabretro is back with a look at the Sun Microsystems StorEdge S1 storage array. It gets paired up with a SunFire V120 server through SCSI, and we see the whole process of getting the pair up and running. There's even a quick bonus look at an IBM tape drive :D Excited to see what Clab has in store for these in the future!

Early Release: Cabletron multi-media hubs from the 90s!

Cabletron, aside from having arguably the best name of any networking vendor, made the legendary MMAC chassis starting in 1988. We take a look at a few examples we have, and see if we can get one back up and running.

Anyone else remember Cabletron or have any memories of their hardware or software management packages?

We found an abandoned ISP!

We're really excited to share this with everyone. A few weeks ago we found an auction listing for general "electronics parts" and hiding in the low resolution photo was what looked like a US Robotics Total Control with modem cards. That led to this bizarre but entertaining journey to discover what we thought might be an ISP hiding in a dimly-light room.

We'll have more to share as we make our way through everything we recovered. Thanks as always for your support to make discoveries like...

Multi-node BBS on OS/2 Warp 3!

The BBS is up! We ran into a few problems along the way, but ultimately prevailed in getting our multi-node BBS operational on OS/2 Warp 3.

We still need to add content to the BBS like door games and files, and customize it with ANSI art... but the hard part is done. Let us know if you want to see more BBS content as we've got several ideas for future projects.

Stay tuned here or on Discord for access info!

July Update -- The Serial Port BBS!

We've been hard at work on our next video which will feature the new Serial Port multi-node BBS. Here's a sneak peek of the BBS in action. We've still got a few bugs to iron out, but we can't wait to get it online for everyone to dial or telnet into.

ISP Accounts now available

After rebuilding our VoIP system and getting a RADIUS system implemented, The Serial Port ISP is now ready for dial-in user testing.

you can dial in now at: 252-210-4004 user fredf password wilma

You can also create your own username and view full RADIUS accounting data and authentication attempts through our new https://portal.serialport.org with Patreon login.

If you're interested, try it out and l...