The Sinclair QL Forum

So I would required to stock the following power supplies:

UK: 240V 5V
EU: 240V 5V
USA: 110V 5V
Rest of World: No idea of the mains electricity in every country.

You don't you just need a standard switch mode 5V regulated supply with figure 8 mains input (cant remember the official connector name). That will deal with all input voltages (except maybe North Korea) local user just supplies standard figure 8 lead for their locale.

XorA wrote:....don't you just need a standard switch mode 5V regulated supply with figure 8 mains input (cant remember the official connector name). That will deal with all input voltages (except maybe North Korea) local user just supplies standard figure 8 lead for their locale....

Internal power supplies is where it gets very dicey not having CE certification. You CAN still self-certify, but it is still about 4x the paperwork, and closer to £6,000 instead of £1,000 or less.

A big overhead for just a few dozen units.

Dave wrote:

XorA wrote:....don't you just need a standard switch mode 5V regulated supply with figure 8 mains input (cant remember the official connector name). That will deal with all input voltages (except maybe North Korea) local user just supplies standard figure 8 lead for their locale....

Internal power supplies is where it gets very dicey not having CE certification. You CAN still self-certify, but it is still about 4x the paperwork, and closer to £6,000 instead of £1,000 or less.

A big overhead for just a few dozen units.

No-one said anything about internal!

XorA wrote:No-one said anything about internal!

You did, maybe without realizing it. That figure 8 socket type is reserved for double insulated applications. The power supply can be outside the device, but under CE rules it must still be double insulated and bear the double square mark. The device has to meet all the same specs as if it were internal.

All's well that end's well - the new power supply arrived 10 minutes ago and my Q68 is now fully functional (I also got that keyboard that was mentioned). Hurrah! My USB to PS/2 mouse adapter does not work , so I've ordered a PS/2 mouse to complete the setup.

Thank goodness that it's the weekend tomorrow - I am itching to spend some quality time with my new best friend. Reading the SMSQE manual yesterday, it's clear that I have several years worth (decades!) to catch up on

Thanks all for your advice and help.

Great news! You are all set now

Please note that if the Keyboard is connected to the Green Mouse port of the Belkin PS/2 Splitter, then the Q68 will not boot at all, it stops on the Boot Screen after displaying the PC.CLOCK.

I have also found a PS2 mouse that will stop the Q68 boot after displaying the PC.CLOCK. Avoid, see below

http://qlforum.co.uk/download/file.php? ... ew&id=1823

It was attached to the PS2 mouse socket and keyboard in keyboard socket.

Curiously an old and cheap optical USB mouse works perfectly with a USB to PS2 adapter.

Hi,

Is it normal for the QL/E environment to take ages to initialise on first run? It opens up fine, but at the bottom is a green bar that has some text that changes repeatedly with the most common text being "Object icon" and "wait" ? This has been going on since I switched it on and opened QL/E this morning.

Is this unzipping a whole bunch of stuff, or downloading from the internet ? Just wondering as I have never seen QL/E before, except in screenshots, and I'm curious as to what it's up to.

Hi,

QL/E runs in Mode 33 Hi Colour mode, and as stated in the Q68 Hardware Manual:

DISP_MODE 3 : Q40/Q60 highcolour mode 1024x512 pixel (65536 colours)
DISP_MODE 5 : Aurora mode 1024x768 pixel, 256 (colours)
DISP_MODE 7 : High resolution highcolour mode 1024x768 pixel (65536 colours)

Due to memory bandwidth limitations, using the video modes 3, 5 and 7 slows down the system siginficantly. The loss of speed is approximately 37%, 28% and 56%. These modes are not recommended when speed is relevant.

I only included QL/E because of the work put into making a ready made distribution.

I created a sample Q-DOCK setup, which runs in DISP_MODE 6 : 512x384 Mode 33

Personally, I prefer to use DISP_MODE 4 : 1024x768 Mode 4, work very nicely.

But if you want to use QL software from Digital Precision then DISP_MODE 1 Mode 4/8 is the best QL compatiable screen mode. All DPs software runs in the mode.

I have been using ACT lately, time permitting, works great in the Q68.

How are you getting on with ACT? I'd love to hear about that