Jeanie's Altair: March 2010

The widow of a good friend has an Altair 8800 computer system for sale, and we needed to make some photos available. This blog will attempt to make all of the info that we can get on the system available for anyone who is interested.

We know virtually nothing about the Altair, so we can't answer any technical questions! We have not plugged the system in, and will not do so. We have no idea whether it works or not, as we have never talked to anyone who has tried to make it work.

The computer was bought and built starting in 1975 by Charles, a local engineer, who died several years ago. His widow passed it on to Frank, my friend, who died without ever hooking the system up. His widow has asked me for help in selling the system.

We have extensive documentation, including Charles' correspondence with MITS, the original build manuals and documentation, operating manuals, etc., for the computer and all of the system equipment, and much of the documentation for the included software. We also have several copies of "Computer Notes", which appears to be a magazine about the Altair, and several copies of Atlanta Users Group newsletters, etc. There are also a few odd bits of documentation, such as a TRS-80 manual, etc.

We have about 150 8" diskettes of software - we have not tried to catalog this! There are also about twenty new blank diskettes.

The system consists of:

- Altair 8800. Cosmetically near perfect. Loaded with cards. CPU card is Rev 0.

- Disk Drive A. Cosmetically near perfect. One scratch on top of case.

- Disk Drive B. Cosmetically near perfect.

- Paper Tape Reader. Cosmetically near perfect.

- Several cables to connect the units.

- Lots of Documentation.

- Lots of software.

There is also a Bernouli Box with two drives that came with the system - no idea if it was originally part of the system. I did not find any cartridges.

Here are some selected photos of the system. I have more, especially of the cards in the main system case.

Altair 8800