Toshiba Libretto 100CT

[Stephen Coates]

I think I meant to make a post about this system when I got it, but I obviously didn't.

A few years ago, I bought a Toshiba Libretto 100CT. Its a late 1990s subnotebook. Its approximately the size of a VHS cassette, and features a Pentium MMX @ 160MHz with 32MB RAM. This one is in very good condition, and came with a docking station which adds Serial, parallel, 2x PS/2, and a USB port. The libretto itself has 2 Cardbus slots, and the dock adds an additional two.

It has a 2GB HDD. It is designed to use PCMCIA floppy and CD drives, but unfortunately I don't have either of these.

The battery is good and lasts an hour or so.

It is running Windows 95 B. Looks like it originally came out of a corporate environment. It has MS Office 97 installed with some corporate documents and emails on it, which were last modified in 2000. I bought it off someone who used it for games.

Its a really awesome machine. I've taken it to a few LAG meetings and it always get a few positive comments, despite it running M$ stuff.

Anyone got any ideas for fun games I could run on it?

Here's a few pictures.

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Here it is showing a corporate email in MS Outlook:

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Designed for Windows NT and 98, but this one is running 95:

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[Kin Hell]

Awww, Innit cute! :D

Maybe upgrade it to 98SE?

So far as gaming goes, an hour of battery life & no real graphics to speak of, you could be flogging a dead horse.

Still a really cool thing to see though Steve. :thumbs:

[Stephen Coates]

I think I will try and upgrade it to Windows 98SE at some point. I'll try and get either a bigger hard drive, or a CF card, and some more memory.

I should try and get the current HDD imaged, as it has all the toshiba drivers and software installed on it.

[J T]

There's something about the Windows 95/98 icons and display (and the way DOS games of that era) look that really stands out - they are -not exactly characterful- but are characteristic of that platform.

Is that little nub on the side of the screen for controlling the pointer? With the L and R buttons on the outer shell it looks neat but also a bit cramp-tastic. How well doest it work?

Also, anything salacious on the work emails? I do hope the owner of the Marks & Sparks tie was located. Was there any follow up? I NEED TO KNOW.

[Stephen Coates]

I do rather like Windows 98's hi-colour icons.

Yes, the pointer is the thing on the side of the screen. Its usable once you get used to it, but its a bit fiddly. I don't know why they didn't just put a 'trackpoint' type thing in the keyboard like most laptops.

Unfortunately there was no follow up to the tie email. Looks like we'll never know if it was claimed from reception. The other emails on it weren't particularly interesting. There were a couple of HR announcements where the email body tells everyone to 'see the fax or notice board'. It also looks like someone was doing some work in Canada. And there was some stuff about chiropractors for horses.

[Kin Hell]

<snip>

Also, anything salacious on the work emails? I do hope the owner of the Marks & Sparks tie was located. Was there any follow up? I NEED TO KNOW.

ROFL! :lol:

[Harrison]

Win98se would be a good upgrade. Have you also considered Linux?

As for games. How about point and click adventure games? They are 2D and should run ok. Something like Monkey Island. Or puzzle games.

It definitely is a nice little system and probably quite sort after at the time. I'm wondering if with more ram you could run emulation? Linux or pure DOS would free up more resources.

Sent from my SM-G900F using Tapatalk

[Stephen Coates]

I might have a fiddle with Linux, but i don't think there's much benefit to it running Linux. I prefer Linux for more modern systems.

I have been wanting to try out Mac and Amiga emulators on it. I'm not sure how well they'd run, but it'd still be fun to try.

[J T]

Is there any scope for mischief in the emails or documents? I would assume that it can't connect to email servers anymore, but it's got to be ripe with contact data or some other info that could be used for LULZ.

Can you identify the company/office that it came from?

[Stephen Coates]

Looks like it came from a company called TI Group. Not quite sure what they do/did. There's a few dial up networking connections which look like they were used to remotely connect to the company's network. Some of the emails have names/email addresses/phone numbers associated with them.

I don't think there's much mischievous stuff we could do. I'll see if I can post a few screenshots later, but I don't want to put anyone's personal information on a forum.

[Stephen Coates]

I'm pleased to say I finally got some emulation running on the Libretto.

I installed some old versions of WinUAE, WinFellow, DOS Fellow, and DOS UAE, and had mixed results.

The emulators under windows were perhaps barely usable but a bit too slow. Worked much better under DOS, but I didn't have a DOS mouse driver or sound driver installed at the time I tried it.

Fellow exhibits a problem where it doesn't display the character in some games. As you can see in the screenshot, Superfrog runs OK, but Superfrog himself is invisible. I seem to recall having this problem years ago.

I took the machine to the Lincs Amiga Group a few months ago which is where the photos were taken.

PS. Its always fun having that PCMCIA Wireless card there for scale :D.

http://stevecoates.net/photos/lag_other/lag60_libretto2.jpg

http://stevecoates.net/photos/lag_other/lag60_libretto1.jpg

[Harrison]

Nice. Could it run Linux? You might have better emulator performance with less overheads from the OS?

Or even native Amiga emulation such as Amiga Forever.

[J T]

And yet, the tie saga remains unresolved.