I'm looking for something like that which can run MS-DOS and has a contiguous 
64K upper memory region free or four 16K regions free to work with LIM EMS 4.0. 
The problem I run into with newer hardware is the UMA is so chunked up with 
areas reserved for all the built in peripherals, and disabling them in BIOS 
usually doesn't free up space in the UMA.
My old ProLight 2000 mill uses old DOS software that only works with EMS as a 
place to load gcode. The software must predate the 80386 and they didn't want 
to be one of the few programs using the extended memory capabilities of the 
80286, or use something like DOS4GW or another 3rd party "DOS Extender" to 
access additional RAM. I've run it off a laptop booted from a USB 1.44M floppy. 
Have to use the gcode file splitter utility that's with the mill software to 
chunk it into pieces that fit into low memory after DOS and the PLM2000 
software take their parts. The splitter puts a command at the end of each chunk 
to load the next chunk.

I have all the technical info and some setup/configuration software for the 
Animatics servo controller but nobody is interested in adding support to LCNC. 
Basically it streams gcode out by serial and listens for ack and things like 
hitting an end stop, monitoring the position encoders, and things that will 
cause it to stop the machine such as detecting too much torque on the spindle 
or servos. Curiously it is not equipped with spindle RPM sense, it just assumes 
it's running at the commanded RPM.
What would be very nice is to be able to dump gcode into however much onboard 
RAM is in the Animatics controller then connect a repeat cycle button to the 
mill. Wouldn't be able to do very complicated things but it would be ideal for 
simpler jobs like drilling a few holes in a lot of identical parts.

The controller can do it but the feature was never utilized by ProLight and 
Intellitek completely ignored the model 2000, apparently just sold them until 
running out of inventory. Windows software was made for the stepper motor model 
1000 but not the servo motor 2000.

    On Wednesday, March 31, 2021, 7:09:06 AM MDT, Les Newell 
<les.new...@fastmail.co.uk> wrote:  
 
 I'm a big fan of the Dell Wyse thin clients. They are available in large 
quantities on the second hand market. They are fanless, low power and 
bulletproof. I've killed several PCs in machines over the years, mainly 
due to the fact that my workshop is a bit damp. I've never killed a 
Wyse. The 5020 (AKA Dx0Q) works well. Try to make sure you get the SSD 
when you buy one. They use an odd sized short bare board SATA SSD. Older 
Sandisk 64GB SSDs use this board inside a standard sized housing. It's 
easy enough to open the housing and pull the board out. Some come with 
built in wifi.
If you want a bit more grunt the 5070 is now hitting the second hand 
market. They use a SATA M.2 drive.

I have the Dx0D model in my lathe and router. They work but are a little 
under powered. My network server is a Dx0Q borged out with 3x2TB NVME, 
1x6TB SATA hard drive and 1x6TB USB hard drive. It easily saturates it's 
1Gb Ethernet but the whole setup including a VDSL router only pulls 25W 
at idle (drives spun down).

The only down side I find is that they only have one Ethernet port. I 
generally use a USB wifi dongle to access my network. On later versions 
of Debian/Ubuntu you also need to partition the drive manually. 
Automatic partitioning installs a UEFI partition and locks the drive to 
the computer. It then won't boot if you move the drive to another machine.

Les  
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