test-drb April 1998

test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

122 participants
678 discussions

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<Dang...I was at a local scrap yard (they bust things down and sell the di <materials) and there was an Altair faceplate (smashed up and unuseable) l <in the top of the bin of steel. I wonder if the person that "donated" it <scrapper knew what he or she had before they did this terrible Whats scarier is the altair with the excepion of the board and transformer was 90% aluminum, especially the front panel. Allison

26 years, 9 months

NOS Bare Boards: What to do?

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 10:54 AM 4/7/98 -0600, you wrote: >I have a NOS SwTPc 6800 MP-A CPU board. This was the first SS-50 [...] >Here's the wrinkle: It's an unbuilt, BARE board. Given the somewhat >historic nature of this article, what would you do? Build it as >originally designed (most of the parts are still available), or >leave the board blank, as is? As with the Mac someone asked about, my answer is leave it as is; you can always build it later. Sure, assemble all the parts while they're still available, but don't do it until necessary. P.S., I still need your new address. --------------------------------------------------------------------- O- Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad roger(a)sinasohn.com that none but madmen know." Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates San Francisco, California http://www.sinasohn.com/

26 years, 9 months

Sale postings to classiccmp (RE: my objection to recent postings)

by jfoust＠threedee.com

Kai Kaltenbach <kaikal(a)MICROSOFT.com> wrote: >Not only that, but offering items on Ebay instead of on this list, opens >them up to the speculative investor masses and creates much higher prices >than trading among collectors would produce. Trust me, it's much better to >have them advertised here than on Ebay. Yes, absolutely. For the first 30 seconds, it seemed like online auctions would be a great way to pick up discontinued items at a good price, but the high quality of information and easy availability drove prices up. Good for sellers, bad for cheapskate buyers. I find the online "auctions" drive prices for conventional PC stuff exactly to the average retail price, or sometimes even above that. As I wrote on 2/23: >Regarding the three Altair machines that were recently posted >to the net auction at ebay.com - they went from $1525 to $2025. >Mind you, these weren't complete systems. The software, extra >drives, etc. were auctioned separately. I was in contact with the guy who sold these before he submitted them to ebay. For a moment, I thought I had a line on a good deal: a well-off surgeon / ham / computer junk had died and his family didn't know what to do with the multiple garages of stuff. For the computers, they turned to the one computer-head nephew, who was smart enough to know the value of the machines as well as how to get the highest price - which I wholeheartedly but sadly supported. :-) Van Burnham <van(a)wired.com> wrote: >van burnham http://www.futuraworld.com >production manager >wired 520 third street fourth floor san francisco ca 94107 united >states Oh, no. Now we know we're cool, if Wired is watching. :-) That'll do wonders for prices if we get on the "Wired/Tired" list. As for list fragmentation, I'm tempted to reconfigure my extranet news server to support a prototype handful of classic computer news groups, just to see what happens. Private news servers make so much more sense than mailing lists. How many people are on this mailing list? Greg Troutman <mor(a)crl.com> wrote: >Me too! After thousands of shipping transactions, I now discourage >would be shippers from using UPS and going with USPS. After thousands of UPS shipments, I say the opposite: the Sloth Office drives me crazy. They don't crush, they simple *lose*. Damage is most often a function of packaging materials. Don't re-use boxes unless they're in great shape. Be sure the box and packing materials match the mass and CG of the item inside. Yes, both UPS and USPS toss the box to the back of the truck and pile other boxes on top. Be prepared. - John Jefferson Computer Museum <http://www.threedee.com/jcm>

26 years, 9 months

It's getting lame in here

by dwollmann＠ibmhelp.com

Come on guys, give it a rest. Half the postings in the last 30 hours or so have been some stupid argument about posting evil capitalist for sale ads on the list. Compare the total size of this drivel with the size of the ads. Talk about computers, OK? -- David Wollmann | dwollmann(a)ibmhelp.com | Support for legacy IBM products. DST ibmhelp.com Technical Support | Data, document and file conversion for IBM http://www.ibmhelp.com/ | legacy file and media formats.

26 years, 9 months

DEC RRD-40 CD-ROM

by emu＠ecubics.com

Hi Zane, ---------- > From: Zane H. Healy <healyzh(a)ix.netcom.com> > To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers <classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu> > Subject: DEC RRD-40 CD-ROM > Date: Wednesday, April 08, 1998 12:53 AM > > OK, I'm stumped. What are the switch setting for the 4-switch DIP switch > on the back of a RRD-40 drive? I managed to come up with a working > configuration, but how safe is SCSI address 0 under VMS? I know the > Hobbyist CD at least boots through the hardware search in Standalone backup > (didn't have time to install tonite). Also what's the 4th switch for? if you have only four of them, should be parity. on the RRD-42 you have five of them, the fifth switching the 512/2048 bytes mode. I'm not sure about the rrd40, but hope it helps... cheers, emanuel

26 years, 9 months

Mindset PC & Fortune 32:16

by dlw＠trailingedge.com

First the Mindset PC... I just received 2 Mindset PCs, one in the original boxes. I plan on testing the one in the original boxes and then storing it away. The other I plan on using. Here is what I know about these so far. They were 80186 based. Base unit came with 64K RAM, 32K for programs and 32K for video and 32K of ROM. It included 2 ROM/NVRAM cartridge ports up front. The expansion unit plugged into the top of the base unit and raised the RAM to 256K and added 2 360K floppy drives. In place of slots, the system has 6 cartridge ports in the back, 3 in the base and 3 in the expansion unit. Things like RS-232 ports, parallel ports, etc came in cartridges which slid into these ports. It also included a mouse. It had enhanced graphic features (for the time) driven by some special chips I believe. Connections in the back provide for RGB, Composite and TV hook-ups as well as Audio connections. And a cool graphics program called Lumena which included some animation capabilities. I understand there was some sort of genlocking capability as well. It almost appears that this was the "Amiga" of the Intel world. I'll know more after I've had a chance to do more than unpack and power up the system. I would like to know if anyone else here has one of these or any info for them. I have the Disk Operating System Manual and the Mindset Operation Guide but no real hardware refs. I'd be interested in any info on the hardware itself or software, carts, etc. Now for the Fortune 32:16... I've had two different models of these for a while now but without the Fortune terminal. These are 68000 Unix based systems and it appears that you need special keys on the terminal to cleanly startup and shutdown the system. I have been travelling and need to look into this a little better. Anyway, if anyone has one of these terminals they would like to pass on or could find out what code sequence the special keys send so I could re-program my terminals I'd really appreciate it. Thanks. ----- David Williams - Computer Packrat dlw(a)trailingedge.com http://www.trailingedge.com

26 years, 9 months

Diamond D5 Wordprocessor

by JRichardson＠softwright.co.uk

Hi, >>> One was donated to me a while ago after standing unused in a garage for >>> a few years - apparently it was working when it went into store. >>> However, nowadays if I put the system disk into the drive it seeks the >>> heads, spins a couple of times, then all goes silent. >> >>Start out by opening the case and reseating all the boards in the >>cardcage. I seem to recall that there's quite a few boards in there, >>using 43 way edge connectors. Then check the PSU outputs - a good place >>to do that is at the 8" drive DC connectors, as at least that pinout is >>standard. I seem to remember that the PSU outputs were good - at least everything was as it should be at the drive connectors. The machine's in storage about 200 miles away from me at the moment, so unfortunately I can't check (one day I will get a place with a bit of space!!!) I never stripped the machine down and rebuilt it though. >>BTW, if you don't have the key needed to open the back of the machine, >>either pick the lock (it's a trivial wafer tumbler one) or flip the >>machine sideways and unscrew the plates on the bottom. That will release >>the back cover. The rest of the case then comes off. Heh heh, yup - I remember doing exactly that... >>> There's no cursor or anything on the monitor, but having never seen the >>> machine working myself I don't know if it should display anything at all >>> before a successful boot completes. >> >>Have you got the monitor cabled up correctly? There's a 10 way (?) ribbon >>cable _and_ a mains lead to connect. The monitor is getting HT power to the tube OK, and from what I remember the ribbon cable would only plug in the back of the system unit one way round, so that should be ok. It bothers me that there's no cursor or anything on the screen, but I don't know if there should be - chances are good that what little ROM this machine has would contain just enough to boot from disk and nothing else. It's a shame that the disks I have aren't known to be good - I have 2 or 3 system disks but all of them give the same results - disk seeks and spins on power up and then all goes quiet. let me know when you get your Diamond running! :) cheers Jules

26 years, 9 months

TRS-80 Model 4 (128k) for sale

by photze＠batelco.com.bh

>And more importantly, personal e-mail should stay between individuals that >the e-mail is communicated to, and not made public without consent. This >posting of private messages to the mailing list that some people have >taken to doing is <snip>, and I swear the next time someone >does this I will go medieval on their <snip>. On this issue, I have to agree with Sam. I mean, personal issues are not what we're talking about here. This is the ClassicCmp mailing list, there's an entire alt.psychology section of Usenet. Use it for personal issues/problems. Also, private messages are PRIVATE. If they were meant for the group to read, then they should have been sent there in the first place. Only publisize messages when it's ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY. >Have some fucken integrity. This is what I disagree with. We're all reasonable. Now, you're going to complain about all of us being toddlers, but before you do, think of this. There are impressionalbe children on this list, myself being one of them. If you have a problem, treat it like a gentleman. We're all civilized enough to let people have their say. Make opinions pleasant for everyone to read. There's no reason to resort to profanity to expres emotions, or, more often then not, not expressing them. Tim D. Hotze

26 years, 9 months

TRS-80 Model 4 (128k) for sale

by peacock＠simconv.com

> > I am afraid most of it is based (obviously) on British and > European computers. > > Why 'obviously'? I'm also a UK collector, but I think I've > got more US > machines than UK/european ones. In fact, when you move towards bigger > iron (minis/workstations/mainframes) you almost certainly end > up with mainly > US machines. > I learn something new almost every day on this list...Today I learned that computers were actually made in Europe and not just in the U.S. Now if someone would just explain why anyone would want to collect a euro-computer? Jack "tongue planted firmly in his US-centric cheek" Peacock

26 years, 9 months

atari parts needed

by SUPRDAVE＠aol.com

I'm in need of a functioning power supply and a copy of ataridos 2.5 on 5.25 disk for a 65xe. private email with price, please. david

26 years, 9 months

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test-drb April 1998