Bootable version of the AR-32A thoughts and suggestions

Retro website totally got me. They have a truly remarkable tool (if you know how to use it), impressive bragging rights (supporting every EEPROM since they were invented), even schematics so you can fix your own tool should it break down the road, excellent training tutorials available on hard print only, a locksmithing/crash reset library but the practical applications list & hardware requirements are a bit tough to swallow. If you are not buying a computer specifically to use this tool then it will not be something you want to lug around to mobile locations. Why? The laptops that have native parallel ports are about 20+ years old unless you buy a toughbook which is a non-quad core i7 computer which violates my computer minimum requirements. Or you can build/purchase a desktop with a parallel port and run all sorts of nice hardware ***************

The computer I purchased for my cloning services is a 50 dollar core i7 64-bit quad core windows 7 machine with 8 gigs of ram that I put an SSD in it as soon as I got it with a new longer lasting battery & replacement charger that was missing. No native parallel port. Basically, screwed for operation of this unit. I did not know till after I bought the tool that you cant run its 16-bit software on a 64-bit windows installation even in compatibility mode. Do I really have to buy another computer? Turns out my old M6600 has a docking station option when it first game out that had a native parallel port. Epic fail although I did not invest more then an hour in it. You can run a dos emulator, pass ports to the emulator but I could never get the physical location of the parallel port to actually work with the software inside of this emulator ran in a 64-bit environment.

I had better luck booting from the CD (yes, it is bootable and for this very reason I suspect) using my M6600 and docking station and, after trying all the boot options their software gave me, finally did get it to read/write the tutorial EEPROM chip that came with the unit. I did notice however that I could not save the dumps from these chips into .bin files that actually showed up when I rebooted in windows. Saving, emailing & using these dumps in hex editing software is an important part of this business in a lot of instances. Troubling. There could very well be a work around but I was already to the "I am buying a x86 version of windows XP or windows 7 with a native parallel port." It is the sheer convenience of being able to operate your tool inside a windows environment with access to the internet, email, pdfs and other resources that could be helpful when you are in the middle of working with EEPROM chip data.

Yes I know I will violate my own basic PC requirements but it is not the first time I did that. I built a 14th gen core i5 LG1700 computer for gaming/general use when I retasked my gaming computer as my upgraded server and have been living in self loathing ever since with its terrible performance. I digress. The Dell D800 laptop had versions that were 2500 bucks in 2004 and they were the last computer, according to my research, that ever came with a parallel port outside of toughbooks (which I believe is an accessory add-on card). An ungodly sum of money for a computer in those days and borderline useless in this day and age for any other purpose then what we are using it for. But it was $45 dollars shipped and didn't need anything. A toughbook will set you back 350-400 dollars for a clean working example.

Can I stuff an SSD in it? They do sell adapters but space could be a problem as well as the 32-bit architecture not supporting enough ram to do anything or hard drives big enough to store much of anything with the size of windows installations back in those days. I did have to buy a Mini PCI wireless card to install in it so I could get access to the internet easily for supporting software downloads & email access. It should be noted that mini pci express (pci-e) cards will dominate your search results if you attempt to duplicate what I did here so be careful you are not buying something completely incompatible.

Instructions were a breeze to set up and get operational: like it was designed for the computer I bought (it probably was). Read the demo chip, wrote the demo chip, and worked inside of windows with .BIN files that showed up in explorer. I am still not sure why there are communication problems if you exit the program and restart it immediately with the adapter plugged in but it corrected itself easily enough on its own.

I should do a post or 3 on actually using the software that comes with this tool but it is not high on my priority list right now given all the other tools I have to talk about.