All machines linked to their forum thread (full comment import)

1,289 discussions, 9,527 archived comments; pages no longer carry the comments themselves.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01YDRjtmAiNpo5mK5N3d7QwZ

content/museum/video-technology-laser-128-128ex-128ex2.md

@@ -66,6 +66,7 @@ params:
   - photos
   - hardware
   - docs
+  forum_thread: 34
   photos:
   - title: SYSTEM
     subtitle: ''
@@ -165,74 +166,6 @@ params:
        compiled/archived by Mark Frischknecht\
        type of document : PDF\
        source : [www.old-computers.com](http://jef.raskincenter.org/)
-  comments:
-  - author: Numanoid (Norway)
-    date: Sunday 25th April 2021
-    text: In several ads in Compute! magazine during 1988, vendors off the Laser 128 offer it at less than USD400. So if the launch prize was USD700, it must have quickly started to fall.
-  - author: Adam (Flushing, MI)
-    date: Tuesday 22nd August 2006
-    text: I had one of the PC XT Laser clones, which I got to replace my TRS-80 CoCo2. This was around 1989. I used the Laser in high school and my freshman year in college. I found it much more useful after getting an external 3.5" drive. Overall, not a bad system for the money. Light gaming (only CGA graphics), word processor, spreadsheet, etc. I actually ran some applications for some engineering courses on it, which saved me some trip to the computer lab. Something happened with the power supply and the computer quit booting. It would beep and go crazy. I dumped it in the attic at home and I think my mom ended up throwing it away.
-  - author: Alexei Udal (Seattle)
-    date: Friday 12th May 2006
-    text: |-
-      Ron, just flip the switch on the keyboard from "40" to "80."
-
-      As an aside, anyone else in the USA or Canada (or hell, even Mexico, just preferably somewhere in North America so I don't have to pay too much shipping) have the power supply for this? I found my old 128EX in my basement, but can't find the power supply. I'd build my own, but I want to avoid taking risks if possible.
-  - author: Mark Frischknecht (San Diego, California)
-    date: Sunday 11th December 2005
-    text: The Laser 128/EX/EX/2 uses a 15Vdc 12amp 18w Power brick. Also the External slot was switchable from Slot 5 (Which Disables the extra ram) and Slot 7. Also on the EX/2 if the external slot was set to 5 then the internal 3 1/2 floppy was disabled.
-  - author: Ron (Columbus, Ohio)
-    date: Wednesday 20th July 2005
-    text: I have a Laser 128EX. It is connected to a Packard Bell monitor. When I tyried to boot GEOS the message that appeared on the screen said "extended 80 column card needed". Where can I obtain such an animal?
-  - author: Peter Baillie (Scotland)
-    date: Friday 25th February 2005
-    text: |-
-      Having recently bought a Laser 128 Apple IIC clone\
-      I am in need of a copy of the Red User Guide \\Programming Manual. If anyone has one for sale or swap even a scanned copy would be nice. Even a swap got some retro books
-  - author: Taavi Burns (Canada)
-    date: Friday 27th February 2004
-    text: |-
-      I have the user manual at home which contains the pinouts for all of the ports. I'll see about scanning and passing the important parts around in the next few days.
-
-      I'd also be really interested in getting my hands on the Technical Manual, if anyone knows where I could get a copy.
-
-      This page seems to have some good info on extracting files from disk\
-      images:\
-      http://home.tiscali.se/pausch/apple2/dsk.html\
-      One of the links there might help you find out how to extract disk images, unless you feel like doing it the quick'n'dirty way:\
-      http://www.skrenta.com/a2/snarf.txt
-  - author: Ben (Southern California)
-    date: Wednesday 28th January 2004
-    text: |-
-      My wife has one of these, but no cables what-so-ever.\
-      I'm fairly good at splicing/dicing/soldering, any idea where I could find documentation on what the cables should be/do so I can make my own? Or anywhere I could get cables that only require a few tweaks?\
-      If I am successful, I'll post a link to a how-to w/ pictures here.
-  - author: J. Mclean (White Plains, NY)
-    date: Sunday 4th January 2004
-    text: Does anyone have information on how to transfer Laser 128 data files to a PC?
-  - author: bhtooefr (Ohio, USA)
-    date: Sunday 23rd November 2003
-    text: |-
-      I had one of these - a 128EX. I've heard the difference in the models was maximum clock speed. Anyway, mine broke down when someone bumped into the person using it at the time. It fscked the floppy drive!
-
-      BTW, da, they used the same AC adapter as the Apple IIc - just a non-grounded, VTech branded one for the Laser. If you can find an Apple IIc power adapter, that'll work great (I had both a IIc and a 128EX, and I moved them around a lot, but I never had to move the PSUs with the computers).
-  - author: da (skow)
-    date: Saturday 4th October 2003
-    text: anyone have a spare AC power adapter for a Laser 128 EX computer I seem to have lost mine.
-  - author: Blake Patterson (Alexanadria, VA)
-    date: Thursday 25th September 2003
-    text: |-
-      I owned one of the earlier model Laser 128's...
-
-      http://66.240.157.66/personal/randall/images/MVC00490.JPG
-
-      ...that were generally more reliable than the newer models, pictured in this spread. I also had the card cage...
-
-      http://www.trhonline.com/obscure/l128/allthree1.jpg
-
-      ...that plugged into the single side-slot to offer two, sheilded slots that I used for a Mockingboard C sound board and a Prometheus ProModem 1200A. Good stuff. I got lots of use out of the machine and never felt it was any less of an Apple than any of the other Apple II's that I've gone through - it's expansion slot capabilities made it more of an Apple than my //c's. Ahh, nostalgia.
-
-      blakespot
   oc_id: 13
   source:
     url: https://web.archive.org/web/20230403152315/http://www.old-computers.com/museum/computer.asp?c=13