Re: I'm New

[utcke@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]

> I was given a PC-3100 as my 12th birthday present. The person who
> gave it to me hadn't used it in years and didn't seem to know much
> about it.

Oh dear.  Well, it might be easiest if you could dig out someone in
your family who still remembers the old days of DOS --- or maybe get
an old book out of your local library, or from a garage sale...

> I have no manual. 

Parts of a German manual and a complete dutch manual (from memory, or
was it something else?) are available from my website --- probably not
much help to you though :-)

http://www.informatik.uni-freiburg.de/~utcke/Laptop/sharp-pc3100.html

> I do have a laplink cord 

Good!

> and 2 PCMCIA type 1 (I think) cards.  

If they are about 3mm thick they are type I, otherwise they are type
II (which can be inserted, but are hard to extract, and might possibly
damage your Sharp, although so far they haven't damaged mine).

> According to the previous owner they game with the laptop. They are
> completly unmarked.

Not even a manufacturers name, or any other label?  Your best bet
would be to get someone with a Linux-Laptop and have him insert the
cards.  The computer will then tell you (in the /var/log/messages or
/var/log/syslog file) what the cards are...

> When I try to format them by typing 'format a:"(or format b:) I get
> an error message saying 'Drive Not ready" What is happening?

Well, tis should work _if_ the cards are sram-cards and you didn't
write-protect them.  If they are sram than they probably do have a
battery of their own (some, few, cards came with a rechargable
battery).  Check the battery, if they got one, and perhaps replace it.

If they don't have a batery, they _might_ be flash --- have a look at
my site.  In that case you will need special drivers and special
programms sdisk and sformat.

Or they might be something completely else...

> I can't acccess the FTPftp://hawk.psychol.ucl.ac.uk/pub/sharp-pc3k/ 

Hmm, ftp://hawk.psychol.ucl.ac.uk/pub/sharp-pc3k/ works fine for me...

> I should be able to get laplink working

You'll probably need
ftp://hawk.psychol.ucl.ac.uk/pub/sharp-pc3k/laplink.zip, at least to
communicate with any PC manufactured during the last 5 years or so...

Hope this helps some

Sven
-- 
      IBM Thinkpad 701C, 80486 DX4/75, 40MB RAM, 3.2GB HDD, Linux 2.0.36