Down ROMemory Lane

IMSAI 8080

History

The IMSAI 8080 (December 1975) was a direct clone of the Altair 8800 with a more robust power supply and the iconic blue/orange toggle switch front panel. It became famous as the computer from the 1983 film WarGames.

The S-100 bus (100-pin expansion bus) allowed adding memory, I/O, and other cards.

WiFi Modem Setup

Many IMSAI replicas and emulators support a WiFi modem card that allows connecting to telnet BBSs and services.

Connect to WiFi

The modem typically appears as a serial port. Use the built-in terminal or a terminal program:

ATDT 192.168.4.1        Connect to access point config page

Access point configuration at 192.168.4.1:

  • Enter your WiFi SSID and password
  • Save and reboot modem

Connect to a Telnet BBS

ATDT bbs.example.com:23

Or using Hayes commands:

ATZ                     Reset modem
AT&C1&D2                Enable carrier detect
ATDT towel.blinkenlights.nl    Star Wars ASCII animation

CP/M on IMSAI

The IMSAI ran CP/M 2.2 very well. Same commands as Altair CP/M:

A>DIR
A>PIP dst=src       PIP = Peripheral Interchange Program (copy utility)
A>SUBMIT batch.sub  Run batch file