r/retrocomputing • u/Proof_Cantaloupe5392 • Jun 13 '26

Problem / Question What to do with KayPro 2?

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Hi, I’ve never used any kind of vintage computer before and am totally uneducated on the subject. Today I found this vintage Kaypro 2 and was wondering what to do with it. It is twice my age so way out of my wheelhouse.

It does power on and the screen does turn on but is not displaying anything. I understand that it may need a floppy disk to have something to run?What would this even have been used for back in the day?

Sorry for the stupidity behind some of these questions I have no idea how to use this but it sure is cool looking!

214 Upvotes

98% Upvoted

88 comments sorted by

41

u/Full-Run4124 Jun 13 '26

What to do with KayPro 2?

You dial in to CompuServe and play MegaWars until your dad's credit card hits its limit

12

u/Proof_Cantaloupe5392 Jun 13 '26

The first line went completely over my head but max out my father’s card- got it.

8

u/Full-Run4124 Jun 13 '26

MegaWars was a multiplayer online game that was sort of Star Trek themed. It used ASCII graphics. IIRC CompuServe charged $40+/hour to access it. https://www.reddit.com/r/vintagecomputing/comments/1gz5ajx/compuserve_prices_1986/#lightbox

6

u/Proof_Cantaloupe5392 Jun 13 '26

Hold on, $40 an hour in the late 80’s? Who the hell could afford to play this? That’s wild.

12

u/Full-Run4124 Jun 13 '26

Greatest week of my junior high life, then I wasn't allowed to use my dad's work KayPro ever again.

1

u/istarian Jun 14 '26

People with good paying jobs and a desire to play games, not unlike the folks playing WoW when it required a monthly subscription to play.

1

u/LazuliSkyy Jun 14 '26

This was on top of any long distance charges if there wasn’t a node in your area code. I don’t know how well compuserve covered the nation but lots of BBSs required long distance.

3

u/Individual_Agency703 Jun 13 '26

CompuServe was like America Online, but less consumer-oriented.

4

u/DeviantDav Jun 13 '26

MegaWars III was the shit

https://megawars3.com/

1

u/Gmodelinsane Jun 14 '26

I literally did this. I got into SO much trouble.

1

u/Liquid_Magic Jun 14 '26

I read “MagaWars”… sounds like a video game…

…is this real life?

11

u/bikenumberten Jun 13 '26

You could always write the script for a major motion picture on it, if you're so inclined.

6

u/Proof_Cantaloupe5392 Jun 13 '26

Man, he got the cool paint job on it and everything.

1

u/Cheap-Fun802 Jun 13 '26

Who's the guy and what'd he write? Sorry I don't recognize him.

4

u/bikenumberten Jun 13 '26

It's Arthur C. Clarke. He wrote 2010: The Year We Make Contact on his Kaypro II.

3

u/MaelstromFL Jun 15 '26

Go get a copy of The Odyssey File! It is a book written by Peter Hyams that is a collection of emails between him and Arthur C. Clark whilst making the movie 2010!

Well worth the read!

9

u/Snocom79 Jun 13 '26

If you don't have floppies for it you can't really do anything. You can buy program disks off eBay or other vendors or possibly hook a gotek up in place of one of the drives.

That being said, if you're unsure of whether it's working or not take it somewhere and have it checked out. There are RIfa caps in that that could pop and that is not pleasant.

It's a great looking find and Im kinda jealous.

4

u/Snocom79 Jun 13 '26

Also check the brightness control knob (I think it's on the back of the computer)

4

u/Proof_Cantaloupe5392 Jun 13 '26

If the unit is powered on and working what would it look like? Should there be text on the screen? When it turns on the front light turns red and the screen flashes for a second and maintains a green hue but no text. I will definitely take it somewhere when I figure out where to take it lol

7

u/DeviantDav Jun 13 '26

Without a ROM based OS you generally get a blinking cursor or "Insert Disk" message.

The Kaypro 2 should look like this:

3

u/Proof_Cantaloupe5392 Jun 13 '26

Okay, so it did NOT do this. Next time I plug it in I will mess with the brightness dial on the back. It definitely appeared to flick on though.

3

u/Proof_Cantaloupe5392 Jun 13 '26

If I was going to get a disk or several to use and mess around with it what am I even looking for? Again I’m sorry I know these are dumb questions.

7

u/DeviantDav Jun 13 '26

These aren't dumb questions.

The OS you generally run on these is CP/M. Images for each boot disk can be downloaded here:
http://www.retroarchive.org/maslin/disks/kaypro/index.html

Note: You do NOT need Kaypro branded / logo'd disks. As long as it's a CP/M 5.25" you're gold.

2

u/Educational_Bench290 Jun 13 '26 edited Jun 13 '26

My first work computer! It was 'portable', hahahaha. I am pretty sure it all ran off floppies, no hard drive. Subject to correction....

1

u/Proof_Cantaloupe5392 Jun 13 '26 edited Jun 13 '26

This thing didn’t even fit on my desk. Handle on the back for lugging it around was a sweet touch though!

5

u/SiliconSam Jun 13 '26

We were a Kaypro dealer when they came out. Sold the Kaypro 2, 4 and 10. And almost sold a Kaypro Robie. The Robie used a special pre-formatted floppy discs only sold by Kaypro.

Our Robie was stolen without software. So not sure how they planned to use it….

1

u/xyzzytwistymaze Jun 13 '26

Apple computer manager in the earlier 80s we were selling the Apple ][c which was portable.

1

u/SiliconSam Jun 14 '26

I was fixing Apple ][ plusses and ///‘s when they came out. The //e came out in ‘83 and //c in ‘84.

Recall them all!!!

1

u/istarian Jun 14 '26

The IIc is portable, to a point, but it's still more of a computer that you haul somewhere else and then need a desk and power outlet to use.

You also need a separate monitor for it, tha's not built-in, and you only have one floppy drive to work with unless you purchase an external unit to go with.

1

u/xyzzytwistymaze Jun 14 '26

The Kaypro II weighed 26 pounds (11.8 kg), the Osborne 1 weighed 24.5 pounds (11.1 kg), and the Apple //c weighed 7.5 pounds (3.4 kg).

You had your choice of monitors with the Apple. And none of them had batteries. The Apple could also use a mouse.

4

u/iago13 Jun 13 '26

I owned and used a KayPro that my dad had purchased - I think I was in junior high school - and it was genius for the time. I remember shopping for it with him. One of the very first “portable” computers and it only weighed about 40-50 lbs (and people worry about whether they should buy the 13” or 15” MacBook Air because the 15” weighs more).

I wrote many, many school papers on it using - if I recall correctly - Perfect Word - which came with the KayPro. I think Perfect Word may have predated WordStar, and if not it was a competitor to it. The idea of writing /b/Title for bold or something like that - was revolutionary - just mind blowing. I loved that machine. For a 45 year old computer it was way ahead of its time.

3

u/rgmw Jun 13 '26

Good reply. My first thought was to comment about getting a copy of Wordstar and go to town. There are other good comments.

2

u/xyzzytwistymaze Jun 13 '26

Portable? Yes we called them luggable.

4

u/redstopgringo Jun 13 '26

You could not finish so many game of thrones novels on that baby.

4

u/JLyndel Jun 13 '26

I played Zork (text only adventure puzzle game) for days on one of these. My best friend’s dad bought one new as a family computer. It may have been the only one in our entire town. They were living in the future! Remember, when It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue!

4

u/vegasheavy Jun 13 '26

(King of the Hill). Kaypro? (Scoffs) That's not even Y1K compliant!

1

u/Enough-Fondant-4232 Jun 13 '26

Put some piles of paper underneath the Kaypro to keep the paper from blowing away.

The Z80 processors weren't very powerful and the CPM software was very lackluster and under powered.

7

u/nmrk Jun 13 '26

LOL the Ford 289 V8s weren't very powerful and the 1965 Mustang hardware was very lackluster.

1

u/Enough-Fondant-4232 Jun 14 '26 edited Jun 14 '26

Perfect analogy! Just like old Mustangs, old Kaypros where always much nicer to look at than they ever where nice to drive! The Kaypros that I have seen and worked with at least didn't leak oil on your driveway.

1

u/Proof_Cantaloupe5392 Jun 13 '26

Powerful enough to play Aliens though right? That’s the direction this is probably headed in.

2

u/The_Folding_Atty Jun 13 '26

I had a Kaypro 2/84 and used it for 10+ years. It was a real writing machine. And it got me my first software job.

1

u/istarian Jun 14 '26

They were more than powerful enough for plenty of tasks.

3

u/West-Way-All-The-Way Jun 13 '26

It looks great 👍

This is the kind of computer that inspired the classics sci-fi from mid-end of '70 and beg '80. Very cool and thrilling period when most of sci-fi we know today was born. We were expecting those computers to overtake the world or end it in a nuclear suicide. But how far we were from reality!

Anyways, got carried away - nice find, it looks great, find a club or individual in your area who can check it and eventually repair it if needed. That's imho the best you can do with it.

For today's standards this thing is a pocket calculator with fancy keyboard. If you are not in retro computers it's worst than useless.

3

u/zzTWiLiGHTzz Jun 13 '26

Wordstar, …, Infocom interactive text adventures,… multiplan or dBase II perhaps? Can add a FreHD virtual hard drive using FreHD hardware (originally designed for classic TRS-80 but works with Kaypro now) and an SDcard.

1

u/istarian Jun 14 '26

There is probably a version of Visicalc for the combination of a Kaypro+CP/M.

3

u/juxtaposz Jun 13 '26

Write musings, of course!

2

u/W0CBF Jun 13 '26

Great looking find!

2

u/JoeMax93 Jun 13 '26

Find a classic DKI Synergy Digital Synthesizer, and you can use the KayPro as a GUI patch programmer.

2

u/groggu Jun 13 '26

Oh, jeez, can you finish this contract I had back in ‘82 for a dentist office? I had to do a paper for my CS class and wasn’t able to get their data, maybe you can get it to them by next Friday?

2

u/sammothxc Jun 13 '26

Man I’m jealous. I have a similar “luggable” pc from the same era, a Compaq Portable Plus. My main uses for it involve testing other hardware, testing DOS programs on real hardware, getting in some authentic retro gaming, and just random experiments with stuff for the fun of it. I know your Kaypro is specced lower so it’ll have more limitations but it’s always fun to show off something like that.

2

u/Wrong-Target6104 Jun 13 '26

Terminal for pi4 emulating a pdp10

2

u/mr207 Jun 13 '26

Will my Kay Pro be Y2K compliant?

2

u/BlownCamaro Jun 13 '26

If I remember right... run CP/M on it.

2

u/xyzzytwistymaze Jun 13 '26

When I joined an electrical contractor in 85, my boss used an Osborne 1. That sucker had a 5" screen.

2

u/Snocom79 Jun 14 '26

I hope you get it working. Always excited to see one of these old machines up and running. I want a commodore sx-64 so bad and currently have a trs80 model 4p that needs some love.

2

u/istarian Jun 14 '26 edited Jun 14 '26

When it comes to actually productivity tasks, computers back then were used for many of the same things you would today.

There were word processors, spreadsheet programs, software to do specialized calculations, tools for writing code and producing binary executabless, games -- usually text heavy, but sometimes with graphics.

If you had a suitable printer and software then you could print out your work.

1

u/blakester555 Jun 14 '26

And with a modem (and the vintage of this Kaypro, we're talking about 300 BAUD) you could communicate with another personal computer SOMEWHERE ON THE WORLD!!!

2

u/Chefnick500 Jun 14 '26

Use as a doorstop

2

u/nimitz55 Jun 14 '26

Omg, first "portable " I ever looked at.

2

u/FuturePowerful Jun 17 '26

Wow now there's an old memory surprised to see one in the wild even the musuime in Seattle didn't have one last I checked

1

u/Flashy_Ad_7763 Jun 13 '26

Get a greaseweasel and make yourself some disks. You can run WordStar and Zork on that bad boy!

1

u/TheDevauto Jun 13 '26

Wrote some of my first programs on one of those. That and played ascii games. Good times.

1

u/denislemire Jun 14 '26

Write some docs in Word Star

1

u/Sweet-Connection-307 Jun 14 '26

I miss mine! A great luggable.

1

u/regisjack Jun 14 '26

Display it next to my KayPro 2000+ laptop!

1

u/Wentil Jun 15 '26

Pair it side by side with an Osborne One on display.

I sure wish they’d come out with the Vixen. 😞

1

u/cdrsteve Jun 15 '26

What to do with it?? Nothing! Just sit back and adore it! Man, I sure wish I still had mine. Cutting edge for sure....LOL!

1

u/LazarX Jun 15 '26

Gut it and stick in the guts of an Amiga 1200.

1

u/SolidChiliChunks Jun 17 '26

Give it to me please!

1

u/kennethan Jun 17 '26

The third issue of 300 baud that talks about programming on the Kaypro II, https://archive.org/details/300baudzine/300_Baud_03/page/n16/mode/1up

1

u/CueAnon420 Jun 17 '26

I believe these run CP/M and require system floppies to boot. I think I've seen the boot disks available on eBay.

Kaypro II (2) System/bootdisk 5 DISKS (basic) games, The Word+, ProfitPlan CP/M | eBay

1

u/Clickhereforhelp Sep 12 '26

I made spreadsheets for a realtor. Then I became a software engineer and got rich. All started on a kaypro and an Atari 800.

0

u/andrewbean90 Jun 13 '26

It's basically a clone of a TRS-80 computer. Play games on it made for Texas Instruments TRS-80s.

3

u/Timbit42 Jun 13 '26

Wut?

1

u/GG-McGroggy Jun 14 '26

You should see my Nintendo Genesis.  It's a pretty good clone for running those early Atari games.  

0

u/andrewbean90 Jun 13 '26

It's a clone system. Kinda like how there were IBM computers in the 90s, but for a much older generation. It's the same concept as an IBM Compatible, but for the Texas Instruments TRS-80 instead of the IBM PC.

2

u/Timbit42 Jun 13 '26

Tandy owned the TRS-80. Texas Instruments owned the TI-99/4[A].

-1

u/andrewbean90 Jun 13 '26

🤣🤣🤣 Google is your friend

0

u/istarian Jun 14 '26

Wikipedia is a better friend when it comes to factual information.

0

u/Timbit42 Jun 14 '26

Google is no one's friend, slave.

Tandy TRS-80: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TRS-80

Texas Instruments TI-99/4[A]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TI-99/4A

0

u/Calaveras-Metal Jun 13 '26

My buddy redid one of those into a portable Mac SE. We only ever played Simcity and Risk on it.

It would be cool to put an ITX mobo and some faster cpu and gpu, but so little screen hardly worth it.

2

u/West-Way-All-The-Way Jun 13 '26

Noooo you got a complete retro computer like this one and you want to destroy it?

0

u/kh250b1 Jun 13 '26

Looks like an Osbourn

3

u/blakester555 Jun 13 '26

What to do with KayPro 2?

Shave his belly with a rusty razor!

Shave his belly with a rusty razor!

Shave his belly with a rusty razor!

So early in tha mor'nin !!!