Get connected

The aero was one of the first notebook that came without an own floppy-drive. The external PCMCIA-floppy wasn't sold with all of the models - in my case I bought the aero without to save some money. More than five years I didn't have a floppy and I didn't miss it.

What made the work without floppy possible is a small piece of software called "winlink".

Winlink 1.21c

Winlink is comparable with the standard Laplink. It connects over parallel-port as well as via serial-cable. There is even the possibility to "map" drives from different machines to the Aero.

With the introduction of Windows 95 the decline of winlink began. It doesn't undestand long filenames. It just displays them in 8.3-format, so sometimes you had to guess the filenames. Windows 95 came also with the "cable connection" feature, so winlink became obsolete if you installed Win 95 onto the aero.

The aero was originally shipped with a serial laplink-cable. I found it more useful to buy a centronics-to-laplink adapter - in the 90's a printer cable was available everywhere where you could find a computer. That may have changed now with usb.

The adapter can be plugged into the printer-side of the cable and turns it into a parallel connector that you can easily plug into the aeros parallel-port. You can see such an adapter on the image beneath.

The adapter has the size of a matchbox so carrying it around is much easier than a cable. It is available in most electronics-shops and won't cost more than 10 Dollars.

Winlink consists of three parts:

You also should take a look at the update-possibilties. The original manufacturer has changed to the Business Logic Corporation.

As you can see from their winlink product-page the software is still developed: After Winlink 2000 and Winlink 2001 the new product is called "Ultra Winlink".

So you may give them a try - they provide a demo which can be used 8 times. The full version is 29 Dollars. Above you can see a screenshot made while connecting to the aero.

A possible alternative to winlink is the DOS-freeware FileMaven or the windows-shareware LinkMaven from Briggs Softworks.

Ver. 1.21C Rev A

Download the content of the original compaq-disk from 1994:

-german version
-english version