> ----------
> From: Ward Donald Griffiths III[SMTP:gram@cnct.com]
> Reply To: classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu
> Sent: Monday, October 19, 1998 11:34 AM
> To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
> Subject: Re: TOPS-20
>
> Sean 'Captain Napalm' Conner wrote:
>
> > I think what most people lament is that 20 years later, Unix still
> doesn't
> > have the user friendliness of TOPS-20 nor are we likely to see anything
> like
> > it any time soon.
> >
> > -spc (Yea yea yea it could be done, but doing it right (or even
> reliably)
> > under Unix is a real pain ... )
>
> Well, nobody's stopping anybody from doing a TOPS-20 lookalike for
> current hardware. Linus Torvalds did his. (And as the old quote
> goes, Unix is just as user-friendly as any other operating system,
> it just isn't so promiscuous about who it's friendly with). You
> could do a TOPS-20 "shell" over Linux or you can do your own kernel.
> You decide. Never used TOPS-20 myself, though I'd like to try it
> sometime, Eric Raymond speaks highly of it even though nowadays he
> mostly hacks Linux and has even convinced my wife into installing
> Red Hat onto an otherwise unused Pentium-90 box so she'll learn
> skills not included in her nursing education.
> --
> Ward Griffiths <mailto:gram@cnct.com> <http://www.cnct.com/home/gram/>
>
> When I was crossing the border into Canada, they asked me if I had any
> firearms with me. I said "Well, what do you need?" -- Steven Wright
>
> [Why is TOPS-20 so much better than Unix?]
> Umm... It runs on a PDP-10?
Thats a Minus.....
> Seriously, now, I like the idea of being able to
> [DETACH CONTINUE]
> [^T]
> [^C^C]
> [CONTINUE]
> Various other nice things too...
Tja that's the problem with Unix - minimal service
and no inteligence providet :) To support a solution
like above, The OS must be aware of the user at all
time and special keycodes have to be reserved for
the OS. Personaly I also prefere more inteligent
OSes - BS2000 for example offers the same functionality.
Press the K2 key and the programm is interupted and
the OS prompt comes up - get information, even start
orther tasks - use any OS command needed (maybe without
loading a new programm into your task, since this will
destroy the old :). And because the debugger is just a
set of OS commands, you're free to poke around ...
Sigh. Brave old world :)
Gruss
H.
--
Ich denke, also bin ich, also gut
HRK
All,
I spotted the following at the Village Thrift Store in Laurel,
Maryland (on the north side of 198 about a mile west of the
Baltimore-Washington parkway). I was travelling and couldn't pick them up,
but one of you may want to take advantage of them.
TI-99/4a. In box. The box was bent and crushed a bit but all there. The
unit looked to be in good shape. There was packing materials, manuals,
power supply, rf modulator, speech synth module. It was the silver version.
I didn't test it, but nobody would take that much care with packing
everything back up if it weren't working. I think the tag said $12.90. I
sort of wish I'd grabbed this.
Mac Plus: with KB, no mouse. Security attach point on back. System unit
powered up nominally, but I just tested the main unit, not the KB (no boot
floppy, no HD).
PS/2 looking thing but narrower and with a montor attached. Didn't look at
this much.
Assorted 386 etc. boxes.
Hope that helps someone! - Mark
Someone out there had the technical reference for the original IBM PC
model 5150. I need the pinout for the cassette port if possible.
TIA
Russ Blakeman
Harned, KY
Hey,
I have a Hyundai Super 16 computer (no keyboard or monitor) that I need to
get rid of. It has an 8088 Processor, an MFM? 5.25 floppy, a full height hard
disc, a disc controller card (8-bit), an EGA? video adapter and a dirty case.
I hate to waste something that someone else might be able to use so, if you
want it email me at:
arfonrg(a)allSPAMERSmustDIEhorribly.richmond.infi.net (remove the
"allSPAMMERS..." stuff).
Thanks,
Arfon
>< used in the 7000-series computers to SLT (hybrid integrated circuits on
>< ceramic substrates, first used in System/360 in 1964).
> Yep.
> I disagree that a 286 had more raw cpu performance than some of the big
> transistor machines. I still remember the BOCES/LIRICS KA10 running some
> 300 users. I've never seen a 286 run more than 4. Same applies to IBM
> 2060s.
It's a thruput problem - if the main CPU has to handle every
byte in and out, you're just doomed. Just about calculating
(Additions per second etc.) a 286 can catch up. It's more
about the I/O concepts and devices. Add a versitale IOC and
blockmode operations and you could run dozends of users on
a 286. Even when using a clumbsy unix like byte orientated
OS. And wehn using applications, specialy designed to be
aware and operate in blockmode even a hunded might be possible.
Ten years ago I designed a small 286 system to act as a
terminal/dial up server running a stand alone aplication
and accesing a database/transactionsystem running under
SIEMENS BS2000 (an /390 compatible system) - in a testrun
we had up to 64 users with an accestime below 1s per full
screen, with up to 12 concourent requests, even including
the mainframe transaction (needed in about 70% of all
requests). And still only a CPU usage of less than 20%
on a 6 MHz 80286!
To be honest, this system had a little helper - all serial
I/O has been handled by an I/O subsystem with one Z80 for
each two ports - only if a reciving transmission was completed
the 286 had to act - and for sending only the data had to
be transmited to the Z80 memory window via DMA.
The host connection was based on a 230 kbit serial line
also operating in a kind of blockmode, using a HDLC like
multiplex protocoll.
The neat thing was that the OS was just linear and message
driven - no real time and no preemptive multitasking.
Everything was just so fast that a cooperative sheme did
work out quite well.
So don't underestimate the power of a micoprocessor. We
just bring them unde a yoke, no 'real' processor ever
har to carry.
Gruss
H.
--
Ich denke, also bin ich, also gut
HRK
< Hmm... If I'd seen that out of context, I'd have assumed it was 1000
< millifarads, not microfarads. Over here, we'd write that as "1000=B5F"
That was the point. the user of uf instead of MFD was late '60s when I
started noticing it. It's still sometimes used.
< 1000mF =3D 1Farad :-) But I know what you mean. I used to have some ol
< 50mfd 450V caps --and they were big, in those days.
I still do.
Actually part of the scaling things of capacitor values is related to the
way they are used and the math for RF circuits. Also caps are generally
two significant digits just like resistors and that is related to the
common 20% tolerance applied to them (10% for resistors).
I was more used to using number like 10^6 (megahertz) and 10^-12 pF from
my RF days.
< Err, I think there's an extra "0" in there somewhere, Allison :-)
Damm, he lied. Actualy just a dumb typo. ;)
Allison
On Oct 18, 21:17, Allison J Parent wrote:
> Subject: Re: Need Info on DEC 11/84 Board, M8190
> < But this doesn't explain why some units are not common even in
scientifi
> < fields. Like the millifarad, for example.
>
> This is because that is an odd size 1000mF (10^-6) is rather uncommon
Hmm... If I'd seen that out of context, I'd have assumed it was 1000
millifarads, not microfarads. Over here, we'd write that as "1000?F" (if
using ISO 8859-1 or Unicode character set) or possibly "1000uF" ("u" being
the ASCII character that looks most like "mu") or possibly even "1000mfd"
(often found on old circuits).
> when standard values and notation came about. Back then a 50mF cap was
> a large value! It was the advent of transistor circuits and their lower
> voltage power supplies that 1000mF were common. Then again we see caps
> now in the full Farad sizes.
1000mF = 1Farad :-) But I know what you mean. I used to have some old
50mfd 450V caps --and they were big, in those days.
> Then again from a womans point of view, it may be that 1400mm sounds
> bigger than 5 and a half inches. ;)
Err, I think there's an extra "0" in there somewhere, Allison :-)
--
Pete Peter Turnbull
Dept. of Computer Science
University of York
< bit small! Nothing on the scale of the Pentium II has ever been
< achieved with transistors, never mind relays, and I'm sure they
< tried. For example, it would be possible to place transistors at
< 1 per cubic inch, and have the cool adequately, but it's clearly
Your unaware of many systems of the 60s that were large on performance
and transistors. Your one transistor per cubic inch is far to low.
I've worked with cordwood modules that were more in the 6 per cubic
inch. Even flat boards were fairly dense.
What is missed if the PII uses transistors where other logic systems
would employ resistors, capacitors and pulse transformers. Also CMOS
requires two transistors to do what can often be done with one using
alternate forms of logic.
What would be hard to attain is the extreme speeds and that is limited
by incterconnections. Putting a few or alot of transistors on one die
is not a speed matter in itself. The shrinking of the interconnectivity
IE: shorter wires is! When machines got to the Cray speeds the length of
wires was an issue as electrons propagate at 1ns a foot. To put that in
perspective a PII running at 333mhz is clocking at 3ns! Distributing
high speed signals around computers is an art, still.
< never been attempted, because if it were, there would be boxes
< to plug into a PC XT to get Pentium II speeds.
The XT bus and IO are slow, even using a PII would be slowed. BEsides it
was done using 386s...
Allison
Van,
You may get a good response if you also post
your request to the newsgroup <rec.games.video.arcade.collecting>.
Bob Wood
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