[wplug] mini-computers available cheap ($15?)

[David Tessitor]

Friday I talked to the vendor who had $15 mini-computers (notebook
size) for sale at the October MarketPro Show.  They brought several
hundred and  sold most of them. They will be getting in some more
sometime this week, but they weren't sure if the price will be the
same.  These are great for firewall routers and quiet, too.  If
anybody wants one or more, we can get a better price by pulling the
orders together and buying in bulk.

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Specs:

Unisys, Intel 486-66DX2; 12 MB RAM; one floppy; one 340 MB
harddrive; and one expansion slot;  on the motherboard:  internal
nic & video w/1(?)meg RAM, one parallel port, two serial ports, ps2
keyboard and mouse ports.  The back of the case has a special outlet
for the monitor or other peripheral (turns on with the computer),
and the power supply  fan is a generic pentium processor cooling fan
(small and quiet).

Additional RAM is available at less than $1/MB.   The controller can
take two drives, but there is only room for one in the case (a cable
could be fished out the expansion slot).  It reportedly can take
large (multi-Gig) hard drives (but I think it probably relies on the
operating system to access them rather than the bios).

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Brian Sammon has been using one of these work horses as a firewall
for a while (you may have seen it at a GUM or Installfest), and he's
getting a couple more.  I bought 4 at the last show and will be
ordering double that for my purposes (loaners to volunteers, etc.).
Several people have already asked for a one or two each.  At this
point I think the total is around 15 or so.  That should be enough
to get them for the earlier price or less, even if the single unit
price goes up.

If you want to order any (heck, at this price and size you can
afford to also get one or more to keep as spares) LET ME KNOW.   I
plan to call the dealer later in the week.

Dave
412-343-6177
412-343-2332