Retro Tech Nibble: Mystery Japanese PC

[@RMCRetro]

Thanks for watching! Can you help? Did you spot anything in the video you can elaborate on to get this running? Perhaps you've used this machine and can shed some light? I'd love to hear from you! If you enjoy my content and would like to show support for The Cave then here's how you can help: ● Support RMC on Patreon: www.patreon.com/RetroManCave ● Treat me to a Coffee with Ko-Fi: ko-fi.com/retromancave ● Leave a tip on Paypal: paypal.me/RetroManCave ● RMC Tool Shop - Find tools seen on the channel for your Cave here: USA Shop | www.amazon.co.uk/shop/retromancave UK Shop | www.amazon.co.uk/shop/retromancave Thank you! Neil - RMC

[@Pixilshooter]

Where did you buy it? Yahoo Japan?

[@RMCRetro]

Buyee.jp which acts as a go-between for Yahoo Japan and other Japanese auction sites

[@mistx7115]

Sadly I cannot help but I wish you the best of luck getting this thing up and running.

[@JohnnyWednesday]

@@RMCRetro - There's an old support page at this address (www.fmworld.net/biz/fmv/support/guarantee/repair/other_pc/) that lists this exact model. This section suggests that there's actually multiple.. configurations? of this model - the model 40, 85, 100 and FA - they list 'body' and 'main unit' as some kind of parent type - system board and case? monitor? the ambiguity suggests a poor translation to english.

[@stumblepuppy606]

That CRT port, looks suspiciously like a VESA Digital Flat Panel port en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VESA_Digital_Flat_Panel

[@LastMS]

Ah a Fujitsu FMR70 HL...The 1 in the HL was added because there used to be a HL2/3 too. As far as I remember those could be seen in any normal office in Japan. CPU should be a 08386DX-20MHz with an optional 80287DX coprocessor. Graphics resolution is 1120x750 dots and it should be able to display 16 colors out of 4096 colors. Japanese characters where displayed in 40 characters x 25 lines (24 dots). Also the Japanese characters where all stored on a special ROM (actually all Japanese pc from that era stored the kanji in a special ROM). Main RAM used to be 2-10MB and graphics RAM was 512KB. The FDD drives use 2HD floppy discs. OS on these machines usually was a customized version of MS-DOS made for the Japanese Market but it was also able to run MS-OS/2 or Kanji XENIX. you also could run Windows 3.x on it. Address space as 768KB instead of the normal 640KB on other machines running MS-DOS. Sorry for this messy post but I am just a native Japanese guy who used a FMR80HL2/3 ( same series but used a i486DX2-50Mhz CPU) and I am just going through my memories and translating stuff off from Japanese Wikipedia and other Japanese sites. Hope this helped a bit.

[@laumpolumpio]

quick question, it is possible to run games on this machine?

[@MattP79]

@@laumpolumpio lol. MOD demos were a thing back then. If that machine could run Juice by Psychic Link then we have a winner!

[@LastMS]

chinitosoccer1 yes there where some games that run on that machine (though Japanese titles only).

[@ropersonline]

> a 08386DX-20MHz with an optional 80287DX coprocessor Are those typos? Wouldn't it be an 80386dx CPU with an 80387 copro? Unless something weird and strange was done in Japan that I'm totally unaware of, the sx/dx thing would only have started with the 386 generation.

[@LastMS]

ropersonline as far as I remember and from what I read on Japanese websites it was a 80287 coprocessor. The 80287 coprocessor should work with a 80386 cpu so no problems there.

[@allan.n.7227]

I used to work for Fujitsu (not in hardware department, though). I have contacted my now former colleague still working there. I hope he gets back to me with some inside info. Hopefully he can dig up some technical specs.

[@JacobTechShit]

Cool

[@tniemi]

Thank you!

[@rickardt3547]

Nice!

[@hipwave]

you rock, man :D

[@eightzerofour9957]

Awesome =)

[@TrimeshSZ]

The I/O card in the end slot is a GPIB/HPIB/IEEE-488 controller. I suspect the card in the 2nd slot is a digital I/O board. Some of these Fujitsu machines were used as controllers for Japanese CNC systems, and I suspect your example might be one of them. Some of the Fujitsu machines had speakers built into the monitors, which might explain the presence of a volume control but no speaker.

[@enigma776]

Yeah I think the same about the sound coming from the monitor, as I suspect that cluster of caps and the 2 chips near the monitor port is some kind of amplifier which would support the idea of sound from the monitor.

[@zaprodk]

My best guess as well. The black dust on the machine tells me it was sitting in a machine cabinet of a big CNC machine for decades until the machine was scrapped.

[@markdavies794]

You beat me to it, I was about to say it looks like a ieee-488 so industrial PC.

[@denshi-oji494]

TrimeshSZ I thought the same about both cards when I saw them.

[@frankens43]

ROFL.. I was thinking same thing .. 488.

[@GeckonCZ]

The internal speaker is mounted inside of the expansion card holder. You can see it at 8:06.

[@toppiegaming5565]

Thanks for the info

[@_techana]

Designer: how many floppy drives you want in this new PC? Project manager: Yes

[@cyberwolfe]

🤣

[@denshi-oji494]

you also need to remember that many office situations already had external floppy drive banks in use, so the extent connector would many times allow you to keep them in use, while using internal bays for hard drives. I always felt you should be able to still have 4 floppy drives, which was normal till IBM entered the market and changed the world of the floppy standard.

[@Kumimono]

Pretty drab looking case made far more interesting by those decals. Adds about 10 speed to the machine. :)

[@B3tanTyronne]

I see that pc has been carefully looked after by the Edward Scissor hands iT department before being shipped over.

[@flyingharuka6691]

This is Fujitsu FMR - 70, is a product of FMR family. FMR - 70 using similar PC98 high-resolution model (PC-H98) to display the 24 x24 kanji fonts. It uses a special CRT interface. like the Macintosh and PC-H98 display port, the CRT port has some different resolution display mode. If you're interested in the FMR series, you can get your hands on fm-towns, which contains the full function of fmr-30/50.

[@martynwade6422]

I was about to post something similar to this :-) What I will add is that I believe the FMR-70HL models were the first ones to use Intel 386DX processors (by contrast, the FMR-60 models (and some FMR-50 machines) used 386SX chips and the FMR-80 range used 486s). Also, the numbers after the HL (1,2 or 3) signified the capacity of the hard drive for that model (I think, although someone from that part of the world will know more than me). I hope you get it working - Japanese computers from that era are fascinating to us Westerners who never got to experience them :-)

[@cambridgemart2075]

I'd totally forgotten about the PC-98 architecture, thanks for the reminder!

[@dnorman2134]

Many PSU in the 80s needed a substantial load on +5VDC before they tried to fully power up. Try a large load resistor (5 or 10 W ) across +5 to negative (or use some jumper wires to an old HDD. a floppy won't likely be enough to trigger it.) The 5 volt rail was more common for this as that was the rail monitored for regulating the output. The 12V rail was just "what ever" as long as it was close. You have test points on the board. Trace them back to the connector to figure out some of the pins.

[@uomoartificiale]

I was very surprised when you opened the case and revealed how clean it was the computer inside compared to its exterior (very grimy) appearance.

[@michac3796]

In huge contrast to his coffeemug in the End...

[@DeViLzzz2006]

Eh that is never buy white or similar colored cases. Also if a smoker was around this it explains some of the color issues of the outside.

[@GeckonCZ]

Judging by the fact that the power switch was connected to the motherboard it must be a soft-start PSU. The main power connector uses 4 wire colors and there are 4 voltage test points on the board: +5V, +12V, -12V and ground. It's likely that they used the standard color scheme, so red will be +5V, orange +12V, blue -12V and black for ground, this should be easy to verify by buzzing out the test points and power connector pins. That leaves the smaller PSU connector for the soft-start signal. So the PSU could very well be perfectly ok, and even if it's not, it can be easily replaced as there are no special voltages or signals present.

[@RMCRetro]

You're logic is undeniable Geckon. I hope to follow up with a closer look soon, that video connector is looking like a real pain though

[@GeckonCZ]

@@RMCRetro Yeah, unfortunately I couldn't find any reliable info about the video connector or the video processor used by these machines. Hopefully it's just a standard VGA with a proprietary connector... Some internet sources mention the Cirrus Logic CL-GD video processor, so perhaps one of the chips on the board is rebadged Cirrus Logic, or a modified version of it. Some more digging will be needed :).

[@greggv8]

@@RMCRetro I'd bet the floppy drive is "3-mode" en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Floppy-disk_controller#%223-mode%22_floppy_drive

[@Malc180s]

Plenty of switch-mode supplies won't do anything until presented with a load.. Plug it in! Would love to see this all solved and restored - what a cool thing.

[@denshi-oji494]

Malc180s I thought that also. I know I have had many for computers over the years that might at most bump the fan slightly with no load, and others that seemed completely dead till a load was attached.

[@VAX1970]

I would guess that machine was used to control a CNC machine or a factory robot in Japan.

[@dj_paultuk7052]

I wondered if it was a control system as well. Given the amount of I/O.

[@timmooney7528]

@@dj_paultuk7052 That would also explain the fancy racing stripes

[@RWL2012]

Vax Buster you're here as well lol! I rarely watch this channel, am subscribed but he didn't get when I said that his voice sounded a bit like the Nostalgia Nerd's and insisted I was American even though I'm British :-P Hopefully he's not actually bothered by that; I want to actually catch up on his videos some time!

[@skjerk]

It looks much like GP-IB ports (the centronics ones). It was used for connecting test-equipment, printers and diskdrives back in the day. Pioneered by HP as HP-IB

[@AlanPope]

Yeah, we had HP plotters at college back in these days. It's deffo HP-IB

[@hawkshot2001]

@@AlanPope GPIB is still in use on instrumentation and test equipment (at least at the places I have worked).

[@denshi-oji494]

Many devices are still in use with GPIB IEEE BUS INTERFACES. very versatile, flexible, with great expansion capabilities!

[@gorak9000]

@@hawkshot2001 GPIB is finally giving way to USB and LXI over ethernet. GPIB was good, but who likes paying stupid prices for cables and gpib adapters

[@radman999]

Neil, you do such a great job on these videos. The production quality keeps getting more impressive and you are a real gentleman. Great work!

[@philipcooper8297]

Those American style electrical sockets describe my face, when you turned the computer around and there were all the clipped wires.

[@TheTurnipKing]

It's possible that there's a fuse in the PSU that's blown, or that it will simply refuse to work without a sufficiently large load being present. In any case, the fact that it's not supplying power AT ALL on any of the rails seems to suggest it's a preventative shutdown measure.

[@chupathingy5862]

Would it be possible to retrofit a third party PSU in there, considering that the system uses standard 5 and 12 volts?

[@TheTurnipKing]

@@chupathingy5862 It's certainly possible, but crazy if the original PSU just needs a fuse changing. In the short term, it could be possible to supply power directly via the test points but not sure if that's a good idea.

[@6581punk]

Well, fuses don't blow unless there's a fault. Bad capacitors for instance.

[@chucktaylorii]

As I watch this it looks a lot like some of the CNC machines we use in our machining department. Love the look into the very proprietary/under utilized hardware. Really look forward to learning more.

[@donaldklopper]

Last time I saw snipped connectors like that was then my wife's office was burgled and all of the "boxes" were taken, but the mice, keyboards and screens were left, all with neatly snipped connectors. The first thing I thought when I saw the rear of your computer was that it might have been stolen ... but of course your explanation also makes sense...

[@framegrace1]

That video connector + Fujitsu rang a bell on me. I remember an old 80's Fujitsu Mini Server with the same video connector (Or very similar). In that case, it connected to a mono CRT. But is possible they kept the same connector for all kind of video systems. It was very common in the era to use propietary connectors that fit all their monitor line.

[@vitoswat]

My thoughts as well. Connector looks like monochromatic Hercules card compatibile.

[@jensmaa]

Take some photos of the ICs near the crt port, that way ist way easier to identify the port or build an adapter.

[@RacerX-]

Fantastic. I love seeing these old computers that we didn't have over here, its fun.

[@MichaelAStanhope]

Those expansion slots are reminiscent of early 68k Mac's NuBus slots. Not sure if they use the same interface. The one expansion card and the port marked "Printer" look like HP-IB/GP-IB ports. A very advanced parallel interface that works similar to SCSI. The 3.5" Floppy looks like it plugs into the SCSI bus as well.

[@schutz85]

If there's a Texas Instruments chip on there such as ACT244x or BCT242x, it very well could be NuBus.

[@SirRandom]

It's probably the brain of a killer robot, ripped from it's head by Godzilla.

[@WhitefolksT]

Armored Core parts

[@slopesgameroom]

Lovely video... know nothing about this kinda stuff but really enjoyed this

[@retro_reflections]

Indeed, looking forward to seeing if this beastie can eventually be coaxed back to life.

[@christschin3708]

Slopes Game Room. Your videos have taken many an hour from me, but in a good way!

[@ivonvoid]

Lived in Japan for 7 years 87 to 94 and worked on these for a while as I'm a programmer. Quirky PCs even in Japan when every manufacture had their own variants of x86. It was hell for developing as you had to recompile and target different hardware depending on the client. Fijitsu. NEC, Panasonic etc. DOS/V then Windows finally meant things became standardized in the end.

[@AnimalFacts]

I'm really surprised you didn't find any specimens for me inside that thing. :-)

[@nickwallette6201]

3:40 That heartfelt "Why..?" hits home harder than it ought to. Retro electronics fans all know that feeling.

[@waterstarrunner]

Interesting. The main system bus has some breakouts to familiar connectors have straight-through wiring to the DIN connector. On the drive breakout board @10:04 , it looks like the upper bays are standard 34 pin 5.25" FDD edge connectors. The lower bays have the resistor arrays that are terminating the SCSI bus, so internal termination on that HDD will be disabled. Both FDD and SCSI look to be straight-through wired to the DIN. The rear panel also shows you have an RS-232 port and a Centronix port on the bus. So your system bus is just a collection of other buses. On the mainboard you'll have multiple SCSI host-bus adaptors (probably surrounded by those blue terminating resistors arrays or wired to driver ICs sitting with term resistors).

[@kellerrobert80]

The POST BIOS is the 32K AM27C256 EPROM in the corner with a sticker on top (SY19 94002B). Virtually all BIOS's of this era where written and customized by US software companies such as Phoenix, Quadtel and AMI. They're not interchangeable so someone wrote assembler code specific to this motherboard. Don't remove the sticker.

[@rogerwilco2]

Yes. Don't remove the sticker on an old BIOS.

[@dennisp.2147]

It's general layout is reminiscent of an IBM PS/2 50/50Z.

[@Bewefau]

Well they all copied IBM they reverse engineered there system and sold them for a cheaper price.

[@cambridgemart2075]

@@Bewefau The PS/2 MCA machines weren't copied very much, most clones stuck with the ISA, E-ISA, then the PCI bus,

[@dennisp.2147]

@@Bewefau No. The PS/2 was closed architecture (MCA!). But what I was referring to was the tool-less case and the central riser the drives plug into.

[@Dr_V]

1. The PSU is not AT, it's a proprietary Fujitsu design that works more like an early ATX. The auxiliary board connector is not for extra power supply, it's a sensor / feedback circuit, so the PSU won't power up unless it's connected to the MB. Also the red back switch is not for power on/off, it's a safety switch like on early ATX models, the PSU gets the power on signal through the main board (via that aux. connector) so to test it properly you have to plug both PSU connectors into the MB and activate the front panel switch. 2. You can add standard ISA slots to the MB by using a dedicated expansion card that goes into the black slot located parallel to the inner-most white DIN connector. The expansion card / plate is internal, offering between 1 and 3 horizontally aligned ISA slots that will be fully compatible with any standard ISA cards, including a VGA card (so this is one way to get video output if you can't find the dedicated RGB connector). You probably won't find this expansion plate as a spare part, but fortunately Fujitsu used this anachronistic expansion solution on most of their machines up the Pentium III generation, so you just have to find a cheap Fujitsu PC from the Pentium era that has horizontally mounted cards (just look at the orientation of the connectors and shields on the back) and take the riser / expansion plate out of it. It's most commonly found inside SFF (small form factor or slim case) type machines. If you're lucky the PSU may be also compatible, that's another thing they kept unchanged for an unreasonable amount of time...

[@preferredimage]

With some of those older machines, they needed a load on the PSU for them to fire up. Maybe you can load some of the rails with a big resistor or something (not the mobo!)

[@zurisunightcore2649]

This is one of the business desktop PCs called Fujitsu FMR70HL, an older Fujitsu proprietary standard about 35 years ago. Japanese 富士通(Fujitsu) Machine spec CPU: i386-20 (probably Intel 80386?) RAM: 2MB HDD: 100MB 3.5 "FDD

[@tcpnetworks]

These machines were used extensively at the Trust Bank of Tasmania. They ran the ATM network - they were installed in the machine cabinet and where what you interacted with when you beeped-and-booped the screen.

[@TheoLubbe]

Being it came out of Japan, that thing -like fax machines still are- was probably in use into the early 2000s.

[@TheoLubbe]

Yes, note I said 'like fax machines *still are*' :P

[@clivejones5880]

Put a load on the power supply. Many SMPS's won't output on the supply rails unless presented with a load. The power supply may also have a crowbar circuit that will prevent the mother board from receiving over-voltage.

[@SkuldChan42]

Back in the 90s in Japan It was typical to cut the power cords on electronics left on the curb to indicate the thing was broken (kind of an ad-hoc system for scavengers to know what to pick up and leave behind). The machine does look like it was left outside for a while.

[@viscountalpha]

I'll ask an engineer who spent 85 to 2001 with Fujitsu. I hate you for bringing this up for me to ask him because the engineer in question is my dad and he is starting down Alzheimer disease.

[@Mishkafofer]

Ask him. I think he will be thrilled to watch the video. If I am not mistaken long term memory is not damaged right away. Use this video to spend time with him.

[@omsi-fanmark]

Trying to provide some info and hoping it may be relevant: Back in the early days of IBM PC and it's compatibles, I remember there was a japanese "PC-Standard" called NEC PC-98, relating to the companies' PC-9800 series of computers. These machines used a lot of the same components as IBM PCs and compatibles did, but they never were fully compatible. There were, however, expansion cards being sold for both the IBM PC/compatibles AND the NEC PC-98 series, for example the Roland LAPC-I (IBM compatible) and LAPC-N (NEC PC-98 compatible) cards, which is why I remember this "odd" NEC PC-98 standard at all, as I have never been in Japan. While the system in this video is clearly not a NEC model, I thought maybe there are "NEC PC-98 compatibles" the same way there are "IBM PC compatibles", so I looked at this article ( en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PC-9800_series ). It mentions Fujitsu several times, and regarding to the i386 CPU in this Fujitsu system and comparing that to the article, maybe this is a DOS/V PC as mentioned in the section "Price war with DOS/V PCs". DOS/V was a DOS optimized for the japanese market, supporting their double-byte character set. More on that here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DOS/V According to the DOS/V article, Fujitsu sold about 200,000 DOS/V units in 1994, the FMV series. Maybe your machine is related to those. I hope you can pull at least something of interest from this comment, may be it helps on further investigation.

[@chriscrossan8034]

Are you going to revisit this one at all Neil? Possibly if not resurrecting the machine we could at least see if the HDD contains anything interesting...

[@WiggysanWiggysan]

I agree with lots of the comments that this was used a controller machine but if that's the case, it must have been away from the work itself. Metal CNC'ing, wood lathes, even water jet (although I think this too old to be a waterjet controller) all create a lot of dust & debris. The inside of the machine was far to clean for that. Odd in fact to see such a clean machine on the inside but so dirty on the outside. Maybe that was from the scrapping procedure, rather then its working life. Last point, its good to see so many *very* clever folks in the comments. I thought I was a bit geeky but it would seem I'm just in good company !

[@WiggysanWiggysan]

@Lassi Kinnunen Yeah that's true!

[@ethanspaziani1070]

Why can't people just respect old technology these pieces of equipment are testaments to what computers really are and should be today...... I just don't understand

[@carlnordstrand695]

You need a trip to electric Town in akihabara, there'll be a bunch of spares available. All for a round trip price of far more than the pc is worth.

[@WiggysanWiggysan]

I used to sell Fujitsu computers but this one was long before my time (selling). They always reminded me of Elonex Computers, very heavy, very well made using good components. Sorry RMC, my knowledge of this model would be only what I (we) can learn from Google. Best of luck my friend.

[@JapanPop]

Love seeing the Japanese hardware. If you need translation support, let me know! Will look for specs.

[@sweetpeachnectar]

wow, this pc is so much better designed than the recent ones by fujitsu. i love the fact that it uses the same connector everywhere on the mainboard. also the easy removal of hard rives and floopy drives are absolutely great.

[@OficinadoArdito]

The second expansion card looks like a GPIB IEEE-488.

[@canadianman000]

It is. Thats the old data port for HP/Agilent test gear

[@OficinadoArdito]

@@canadianman000 In fact I had worked with a lot of those doing instrumentation for research labs. It was the most used digital communication method avalilable those days for robust and high precision instrumentation.

[@AxiomofDiscord]

I work in manufacturing power/grid protection devices and we have a lot of 96 pin connections for expansion boards on our industrial line of controllers.

[@aldwinflores7029]

Definitely a stock code trading machine in the early days. My dad used one of this back then.

[@undeadgamer2347]

It's been over 2 years, is there ever gonna be an update to this PC?

[@sergioavl]

Restoring this Japanese PC will be a beautiful challenge! Good luck...

[@coyote_den]

The custom interface card is labeled TEXNAI FR50/60. Texnai is a company specializing in VR stuff, specifically scanning to create 3D models. Given how simple the card is, it's just bringing the entire system bus out on certain port addresses. If you want to test the motherboard, just use a standard PSU and some alligator clips to apply the proper voltages at the test points.

[@gamedoutgamer]

Great job! Would like to see it working! I can tell it has a massive amount of removable storage with THREE, count them, THREE internal floppy drives supporting rotating disk media! :) My current PC has zero floppy drives so nowhere near as usable in this department.

[@kek23k]

I'm enjoying how the LED colour changes are making you look ill or sunburnt, back to the video :)

[@Kumimono]

I thought my tv was on the fritz!

[@iulianispas8634]

Is a industrial Pc those cards are control board's for producing line robots (I seen a similar one controlling sodering robots in a car factory producing car bodies ) The program was on the 2 top floppy not stored in hdd one of the back conector is for calibration The conectors inside are same as i seen in rig servers no were to conect a home use graphics card (in the hdd they have their on program Linux based I'm afraid I can never be converted for home use but is a awesome pice of technology and I wish to have one on my colection )

[@zxkim8136]

Looking at the outside of the case I thought the inside was gonna be a lot worse so it was a surprise to see how clean it was on the inside. It's an engineer's dream to have all drives accessible without using tools, what a great design. Only hurdle I can foresee is that CRT connector and possibly the power supply. Great teaser episode Neil 😁 see ya in part 2 mate 😁😁 Kim 😁😁

[@AiOinc1]

No speaker, the sound probably goes through the video port to what is likely a special CRT with speakers in it. PSU looks like it has a fairly standard AT connection, just combined into one connector for convenience, I'd guess. Also 4:55 that's not a centronix port, that looks more like the IEEE bus you see on old HP desktop machines of the 70s.

[@iangreenhalgh9280]

I'm fairly sure that PC was used as a controller in a factory environment, being used to control some large piece of machinery. Fujitsu had a large business in factory automation and control systems, they later merged that business with Siemens and today Fujitsu-Siemens are one of the leaders of factory control systems.

[@sakaemusic]

I would like to put some points:- 1. The Display Port : Many Fujitsu Computers of the time uesd the similar port and as far as I can recall, there is an Adapter to convert composite output from the port to VGA. However, I would suggest using an NTSC CRT Display. 2. The Expansion Ports : The 96 pin DIN connectors are period correct for all workstations of the time. Mostly, because many industrial grade expansions were based on similar ports. The expansion cards hold most of the peripherals of the system, including the speaker. By the looks, this particular computer was used to print a lot of stuff. 3. Video Handler : These usually came out with Cirrus Logic chips and had 16-bit colour with 4096 colour pallete which was standard for the time. 4. Build : These computers were usually order built and had specifications according to customers. The HL varients came out in mid-91 and early 92. They were very specific business machines. I hope this information helps and I really had to go throughmy huge catalogue of obselete machines' manuals to get this one. P. S. There was an option to add a soundboard which was powered by a Yamaha YM2151 chip.

[@KJohansson]

Odd and interesting construction! Fun to see a PC not built to a price, but to a function & quality spec.

[@DoRC]

I'm guessing this was used in some sort of industrial control. Running some sort of machinery.

[@x-techgaming]

10:20 Omg, those colored cables are fantastic! :D Never seen a device ID switch before :o The volume slider is the OVERCLOCK control. The higher you OC it, the louder the fans will get.

[@sIDsleeper]

I've seen rotary ID selectors like that before, but never for in-PC devices, those usually get the simple jumpers or in some cases the odd DIP switches.

[@henrywylde]

A work of passion as always 👍👍👍👍👍 I have a piece of feedback after watching you for about 4 months: it would help viewers like me to follow the story if you could include on-screen titles or screenshots when you are referring to other information sources and facts, such as DIN standard or the volume control on Amstrad. The content quality is always high, and you provide so much content per second that it takes me to rewatch a few moments to build a story for myself.

[@RMCRetro]

That's some great constructive feedback thank you, I'll try to incorporate that a little more when I call back to older videos.

[@WorksOnMyComputer]

A local video store in Australia I was a customer of, used to use these machines from memory. They weren't a hundred percent MS-DOS compatible, so the video loan software had been written specifically for them. The machines were reliable enough, but the compatibility thing was a huge pain for the owner of the store.

[@LunaP1]

I remember something similar to this. As a little kid, my school had the early models of the Apple computers (basically beginning 90’s). The floppy disks that could melt in the sun, fun games I used to play during free time in class, the zero knowledge of computer viruses. Ah, the memories.

[@vgtheory]

What a unique opportunity to have such an obscure(to western eyes) piece of computer tech on your workbench. Fujitsu was quite good at making otherwise boxy machines appear aesthetically interesting. Love those decals. I have no information to offer, but I am certainly looking forward to any possible future follow-up videos.

[@Lucasrainford]

Why am I interested in a dirty old Japanese PC? I don't understand 50% of what you're talking about but I just love watching your refurb vids. Nice to see the new lab in action, great work. Looking forward to pt2 :)

[@TheGamingMuso]

Well this is glorious! I do hope you can get it working!

[@SkyCharger001]

power testing: can't you use a multimeter to test the continuity between the test-points and the power-sockets? that should at least allow you to determine what pins require how much.

[@donaldklopper]

I also thought that ... the test points should have fairly beefy tracks leading back to the power supply, for continuity. Should be trivial to trace, if you can get through all that varnish.

[@JamesSmith-rf8wo]

If you are going to have leds coloring the background you may want to set the white balance in the camera to a fixed value so the entire image doesn't shift hue. Excellent video!

[@AffidavidDonda]

exactly, for a good minute I thought there is something wrong with my eyes :]

[@bunnymaid]

Oo, an FMR-70HL1 model 40, I think you're going to need to read Japanese to grok this. Given the boards in it, that was probably used in a factory where all you really need is a 80386dx-16 I think the manuals for this would set you back around 5000 yen *IF* you can find them. (I might be able to find one in Akiba.) Monitor connector = non-standard VGA: www.mls-net.co.jp/shouhin/famrcab.htm Yes, some places are still using this gear but the monitors are long gone. hp.vector.co.jp/authors/VA018718/towns/connect/pinasgn.htm#FMR_RGB There might also be something here: classicpc.org/jp/category/item/itemgenre/fmtowns/

[@denshi-oji494]

Blatantly Fake Name looks like what I expected for monitor signals. The old NEC multi-sync RGB monitors look like they would be a great fit for this. You may need to build a cable, but that pinout is great! It also shows that these computers were also used for industrial applications, as well as the reported office uses. the integrated video and keyboard connection would work very well on a machine for an HMI/MMI interface.

[@bunnymaid]

@@denshi-oji494 I keep seeing them in Akiba.

[@Patchuchan]

Those slots look a lot like Macintosh Nubus slots but are probably something completely different electrically maybe just ISA with an odd connector.

[@aretard7995]

And I thought that I'm the only touhou fan to watch RetroManCave...

[@wdd6864]

I believe so or Processor Direct Slots like the Macs. NuBus was a great architecture as Macs were not the only ones to use it

[@Patchuchan]

@@aretard7995 Yah I'm a geek.

[@aretard7995]

@@Patchuchan I one as well!

[@Patchuchan]

@@wdd6864 Next machines also used Nubus.

[@jameslewis2635]

I did think FM Towns at first glance. I suspect you might find that adaptors for the FM Towns could fit this machine. As a 386 based machine it really does appear to be a beast. It was probably a profesional workstation back in the day but we are still talking about when PC-DOS was still a thing. It does seem like an interesting machine and would be a very good basis for a Trash to treasure series.

[@AbAb-th5qe]

The FM Towns was also 386 based

[@garyclouse4164]

The first thing I spotted was the GPIB buss adapter..GPIB was originally developed by Hewlett Packard as the HPIB interface buss. the buss allowed up to 16 gpib enabled peripherals to daisy chain from the one card. GPIB hardware included printers,plotters, electronic test equpment, medical equipment sensors and industrial controls I have seen the same type of connector - I think its made by amphenol. These were used with a "pigtail" adapter cable to connect to different monitor connections.

[@edbeecher3193]

Howdy It seems to me I remember working on HP workstations that had a similar set of connectors, back in the 80's. You might look there.

[@Zenas521]

It is astounding how little their is on this computer. Not even Fujitsu knows they built this system. I checked their history pages. If nothing turns up, you might have to get a translator, maybe a student at university to help you dig for clues.

[@kcgeil]

Looks like a lot of fancy mystery silicon on that motherboard, I'd guess it's custom display hardware designed for touch screen POS terminals. Probably running some flavour of x86 Unix.

[@ultimas20]

x86 unix in 1991? not a prayer all of the unix systems back then were risc based except for xenix but microsoft didn't keep that around for long. It's probably a proprietary port designed by fujitsu specifically for their own monitors.

[@beatchef]

I imagine this was originally thrown away, as in Japan you have to buy a ticket to get trash picked up and electronics they won't pick them up unless you remove all electrical cables. If you can't then you have to cut them off. This is done to prevent scavengers picking up people's trash to sell on but in this case someone's seen its worth and taken it off someone's doorstep anyway. I'd assume that the damage at the back is cause it was probably dropped cables first onto the pavement. Water damage would have been because it was left outside.

[@soupwizard]

That thing that broke when you tried to remove it from the scsi port is a 50 pin scsi terminator (sits on the end of the scsi's signal bus when no external scsi drive is attached) , they're pretty common and cheap on ebay.

[@x-techgaming]

This PC was probably in pristine condition, before being shipped out onto the rainy, open seas. Those are clearly shark bites on all of the damaged port cables.

[@reaper15a]

The Floppies are High density, IE the 5 1/4" are 1.2MB and the 3.5" are 1.44MB. Hence the labeling, says HDD/FDD (High Density Disk). I could be wrong, but on a few Japanese systems from around that same era, the ones I seen labeled like this were always 1.2MB and 1.44MB.

[@jefflavenz7285]

When getting rid of something in Japan, unless one is selling it on a bidding site like Yahoo Japan, if it is going to sit in a box outside or have any exposure to the elements they always cut the cords. I've sort of interpreted it as them unknowingly throwing something away as junk. Might not be the exact reason why the cords were cut, but might be a possible reason nonetheless.

[@Vermilicious]

Maybe someone wanted the copper in the cables, since it is somewhat valuable, and the easiest way to get it is to cut it off and strip/burn it.

[@firesurfer]

for the copper. kzbin.info/www/bejne/hpWTkqh-oceXmsk kzbin.info/www/bejne/e6fQpaxsoM6ghrc

[@sagrat6235]

FM-R has been used by Nintendo to develop games on SNES. It's a part of devkit of this console.

[@bdhale34]

The stickers on those 5.25" drives would remove any doubts about it, they are the High Density Diskette Floppy Diskette Drive variety (hence the HDD/FDD).

[@coitcordery8501]

The industrial looking connectors look like NUBUS connectors. And they did make sound cards to fit that port. Video cards too.

[@jonadabtheunsightly]

This is a good mystery. The general build quality reminds me almost of minicomputers, but the i386 chip belies that, especially in 1991, which is well into the 486 era. (Although, if this model came out in 1988, that would explain that. And it's specialized enough to have a three-year product lifespan, I guess.) Or perhaps raw CPU power wasn't the main selling point. My instincts suggest this may have been a special-purpose system mostly sold to some very specific market. The ultimate customer probably never interacted with the operating system at all, nor with any common well-known software either: it was probably dedicated to running some specific line-of-business software in the "let us know you're interested and we'll fly in a sales team" price range. Plugging the hard drive into another system may reveal such details. Which in turn may provide clues about what industry the system was being used in, which might provide a clue as to the CRT port, if the system was made to connect to equipment found in some other industry rather than a standard computer monitor.

[@BOBXFILES2374a]

Amazingly clean inside! Considering what the outside looks like!

[@gheffz]

Neil, speaking of mysterious Japanese PCs ... can you do one on the Peach please? ... I had access to one early 80s in my Uni days, and I loved it! It featured a 6809 processor ... years ahead of other 8 bit chips of the day, including my favourite, the Z80.

[@erniemauricio]

That's an IBM compatible personal computer, which means a copy of IBM pc. We used those in high school (1980s). It had about 2mb of RAM, and the two disk drives were for the 7-inch floppy disks (the precursor of the 5-inch disks that is iconised as the save button). One floppy disk which holds 700mb had your software apps, and the other was for storing files. If I remember right, you had to have a boot disk to insert before turning it on, and then switch to you app disk after it has booted. Additional note: those plugged in to the green and black monitors (black screen, green text), and if you were rich, you had the white text on black screen.

[@erniemauricio]

Some of the connectors with high number of pins are SCSI ports or Small Computer Systems Interface. That's where you plugged in the printer, Zip drives (which extended the storage to 100mb)

[@ultimas20]

That looks like a pc-98... I've never gotten a hold of one myself but given the timperiod It's very likely to be a PC-98 clone since it uses PC compatible components with a proprietary bus. Very few PC-98 games have been translated and most of them are H-doujins. They were very popular with indie game devs despite the price since releasing games for PC-98 didn't require a licensing fee. I could be wrong though I'm fairly certain it's not a workstation, especially in the late 80's fujitsu wasn't yet a part of the SPARC commitee but workstations of the time were predominantly RISC based and ran Unix. If it was a workstation I'd expect it to have maybe an SH-2 or some RISC processor and not run DOS. DOS is a dead give away here since highend workstations all used Unix, DOS was entirely a low to mid range OS for non-workstation tasks. Also Fujitsu didn't enter the risc/workstation market until 1992 meaning this is defnitely not a workstation. As for the port on the back, if this is a PC-98 system you might have to reverse engineer and make an adapter to vga, if it even has the signals to support vga. I've only ever seen a port like that with non-staggered pins used for older proprietary ports. Being inline rather than staggered is really odd. You might try asking youtuber lukemorse1 he has a lot of videos on japanese home computers from around that time and he definitely knows his stuff.

[@orangeActiondotcom]

As a PC-98 owner, I can confirm this looks nothing like a PC-98. The expansion cards are completely different. Good thing, too, the PC-98 I/O addressing is completely different to what we know in the west, so while it may run MS-DOS, it has a near completely unique library of supporting software.

[@XaviarCraig]

When I worked at a computer shop from 2004-2010 that specialized in repairs and old used PC parts, I saw a single monitor with that CRT connector. I believe it was a Hitachi model. Sadly we junked it as we had far too much stuff.

[@EscapeMCP]

I used to work on these in the past. They were used for monitoring Godzilla attacks which were a big problem in Japan at the time. It looks like you have the optional karaoke board installed, but it's a shame that it's all bent up - no doubt removed in a panic whilst an attack was ongoing (why else would it be removed in such a hurry?). The CRT port is a special port to allow you to watch manga. I think one of those disk drives is also a sushi maker. I think that covers all bases ;)

[@MariaEngstrom]

Great info, thanks!

[@kellerrobert80]

You're right. We're not supposed to talk about it, but they used two of these in Jurassic Park to battle the Caribbean Godzilla. Call Newman, he knows all about these.

[@ConceptProductions80]

@RetroManCave in north america, we don't call them 'go faster stripes', we call them 'racing stripes'

[@Skaera75b]

Excellent video, dude. I'm in Ilfracombe at the moment, so I can't say I watched this with my cat as usual... but I may re-watch this with him later, just to keep him up to date. Good luck with putting this beauty back together- I really hope you do, but I don't have any advice. I'm not an expert. Just a nerd. X

[@dungeonseeker3087]

This may or may not be relevant but iirc the Jamma arcade machines use a 28 pin connector for CRT. It looks nothing like the one you have, maybe it's an evolution of it? Possibly could be using the same pinout?

[@RichardEricCollins]

Be totally cool if he turns it on and finds it's an arcade machine :D

[@orangeActiondotcom]

I assure you it is nothing of the sort.

[@elektrokinesis4150]

jamma uses 5 pins for video lol

[@orangeActiondotcom]

@@elektrokinesis4150 its also an edge connector and not a plug that fits into a socket but hey post post post lmbo

[@dungeonseeker3087]

@@elektrokinesis4150 Really? www.amazon.com/d/Grown-Up-Toys/Harness-Cabinet-Wiring-Atomic-Market/B074TVPHC2

[@mrlithium69]

I thought it was funny how the floppy drives were hot-swappable except the molex power connector still had wires instead of a PCB edge connector.

[@mrLumen2]

Скорее всего, этот компьютер хотели сдать на переработку. Как правило, приемные центры в Японии требуют минимизировать количество меди в электронике, которая поступает на переработку, заставляя снять всё медное перед приемкой техники. Следовательно, кабели срезали, так как они содержали медь.

[@ricardobornman1698]

What a nice design. Would have loved to have that during the 80's.