This has been an interesting resto-project. While there are a good number of IBM PCs, IBM XTs, and IBM ATs still floating around, you don’t see very many IBM XT/286s. It was a computer IBM released after the first IBM AT came out, and it was an XT sized case with a 80286 motherboard similar to the IBM AT 5170 but sized to fit. It has a 6Mhz 80286 like the first AT, but is ever so slightly faster due to 0 wait-state memory.

The one I have is pretty amazing condition and with a very original configuration. It has the original factory installed 20MB hard drive (ST506) as well as the 1.2MB 5 1/4 floppy drive.

There is only one BIOS revision from IBM for this platform, and it does not with with the XT-IDE-CF ISA card (which gives you a compact-flash based hard drive). I pulled the EPROMs for the BIOS out and repalced the BIOS with a period correct AMI 286 BIOS, and that allowed the XT-IDE-CF to work correctly.

It has 640k, which we all know is more than anyone will ever need. 😉

I have the CGA output going into an RGB2HDMI converter that drives a display, so you get those awesome 4 color graphics!

The memory and the machine test out fine, which is pretty cool given it was first sold in 1986, 36 years ago. It was $2500 back then, which would be about $6400 now. Premium!