Projects for the Heath-Zenith
Z-100 8080/8088 Dual-CPU Computer
Gemini Board PC Emulator for the Z-100
Gemini Board: Photo courtesy of Steven Vagts of Z-100 LifeLine The Gemini Board was a PC emulator circuit board designed to plug into the Z-100 motherboard and provide better IBM-PC compatibility mainly at the BIOS level. The board had a separate 8088 processor dedicated to handling BIOS and video compatibility.
Z-100 Fan Replacement
All of this noise from such a little fan. The stock fan inside of the Z-100 power supply is a 12 volt Panasonic Panaflo FBP-08B12H with an airflow rating of 32.9 CFM (Cubic Feet per Minute). The acoustical noise rating is a stunning 39 dbA! While the stock fan moves a
The Definitive Z-100 Software Archive
After months of 19.2K and 38.4k serial data transfers, I now present to you a Z-100 software and manual archive like no other on the Internet. The bulk of my Z-100 manuals have been scanned and OCR’d and all 232 5 1/4″ and 8″ disks have been digitally archived for
High Speed Imp v2.46
With my collection of CP/M systems growing, I decided to make my high speed version of IMP platform independent. I’ve removed the hardware-specific code from the main program but kept the code changes to support baud rate tables up to 115k. This means you can apply any existing IMP overlay now as
Serial Port Interfacing to the Z-100 – Part 2 (CP/M 2.2)
Establishing a serial link in CP/M 2.2 was a little bit more challenging than on the ZDOS side of things. There were no CP/M terminal programs on disk so I had to download a CP/M terminal program with a ZDOS client first onto a DOS floppy, then use a program
Serial Port Interfacing to the Z-100 – Part 1 (ZDOS/MS-DOS)
Sleep! Serial Port Interfacing in ZDOS With a fully functional Z-100, the next step was to configure one of the Z-100’s serial ports to interface with my MacBook Pro laptop so that I could begin transferring files between the two systems. I wanted to be able to both archive
Z80Pack CP/M Emulator and NZ-COM
Z80Pack by Udo Munk is a great CP/M emulator. It will emulate a number of hardware architectures including the Altair and IMSAI systems, but I primarily use it CP/M development environment. I can quickly write or edit CP/M programs and on my MacBook and then transfer them over to my Kaypro or
Repairing an 8″ Floppy Drive
When I first powered up the Z-100 for testing, everything worked except one of the 8″ disk drives, a Tandon TM848-1E. The drive light would make three short flashes, then one long flash and was not detected by the OS (neither CP/M nor MS-DOS). The Tandon manual didn’t list this particular blink