> I hope you don't send me any mail or post any messages from your
>earthlink address. I've gotten tons of SPAM from earthlink and they're a
>permanent part of my SPAM filters now.
I find this all rather disturbing. What am I supposed to do if I want to
get in contact with one of you guys who is blocking email from earthlink?
Surely not use Hotmail or my AOL account!
Tom Owad
--
Sysop of Caesarville Online
Client software at: <http://home.earthlink.net/~tomowad/>
I have for sale a TRS-80 Color Computer with 4k of memory (Catalog
#26-3001). This is the first version of the Color Computer. It is in
original condition and works great. I already have one in my collection
so I will let this one go. The asking price is $40 plus shipping and
handling. If anyone is interested please send me email.
--Alan
--
Computing since: 1982, VIC-20, CoCo, PC, CP/M
Military Computers: COMTRAN 10, Nida 250
Amateur Radio since: 1971, WN8JEF, KA6EXR, N8BGR, AA4ZI
BASIC, dBASE, Assembly, C++
http://www.bright.net/~oajones
I don't suppose exchange has any sort of built-in SMTP autoresponder (or
anyone know of an autoresponder address anywhere?) - be nice to be able
to send emails out to an SMTP-only site and get a reply back just so's I
can check that I *don't* have any stupid formatting in my outgoing
mail...
it bugs the hell out of me that I'm forced to use exchange here at work;
I'd rather not use all the 'extensions' that exchange gives you - all of
them being unnecessary - but the software's very good at not making it
clear what a sent message is going to look like at the other end of the
wire... (give me standard SMTP and uuencode any day! :)
(apologies in advance if this comes out with strange indentation,
formatting and useless attachments... at least I don't think I'll have
squeezed any HTML in there... :*)
oh well, rant mode off... sorry for the off-topic!!
Jules
>
OK, I've been getting adventurous today. I've been digging through a bunch
of my parts and tapes. I discovered that I've got two ESDI controllers,
instead of the one that I knew about, one is a Emulex QD21 which I found
the manual online for, the other a "Webster WQESD" which I have the manual
for. Figured out how to get both to work, and verified that at least one
of the three 150Mb ESDI drives I've got work. I decided to go with the
WQESD controller since the directions are easier to follow (the ASCII files
are a bit messy on the QD21).
Plus the WQESD controller looks to be the better of the two controllers.
My configuration is as follows for reference
BA123 Cabinet
M8192-YB {11/73}
M8067-LF {RAM}
M8043 {DLV11J, used for console}
Dilog DQ606 {floppy controller, boot ROMs} CSR=17772150
Webster WQESD {Quad-Height, boot ROMs turned off} CSR=17760334
M7504 M7546 {TK50 controller}
NOTE: The DQ606 and WQESD both had the same CSR initially
The drive is a CDC, and I identified all three drives as 150Mb drives when
I got them, but for the life of me I can't find any kind of ID on it at the
moment. It was formated on the WQESD controller.
Next I decided to see about getting RSX11M onto the drive. So I started
looking through my media, including for some reason my TK50's. Based on
the labeling they are backups of DU disks, so the system that I got with
V4.3 must have had DU disks at one point, despite the fact it was running
on a single RL02 when I got it.
I booted off one of my bootable TK50's, giving the RSX equivalent of
Standalone Backup the proper CSR for the WQESD controller, and pulled out
the manuals to try to figure out what I'm doing. Unfortunatly when I try
to "BAD" the disk I get the following:
BAD>du0:/list
BAD -- DU0: Uncoverable error -65.
BAD>
And a "BRU" in the following:
BRU>/ini
From: mu0:
To: du0:
BRU - Starting Tape 1 MUA0:
BRU -- *FATAL* -- Home block write error
I/O error code -65
BRU>
According to the Utilities manual error -65 needs to be looked up in the
"IAS/RSX-11 I/O Operations Reference Manual", which I'm not sure if or
where I've got.
The manual for the WQESD mentions that non-DEC drives must be compatible
with those listed below:
*RX50
*RD51
*RD52
*RC25
*RA60
*RA80
*RA81
So does this mean that it needs to look like one of these drives for the OS
to like it? If so, I guess that explains the above error.
In order to test this theory, I was threatening to replace the ESDI
controller and drive with a RQDX3 and RD52, however, I don't seem to have a
documentation for the RQDX3, just the 1 & 2. Are the 11 jumpers at the
bottom of the board for setting the CSR, and are they the same as on a
RQDX2? They appear to be.
I realize that using the DQ606 and DLV11J in the place of a proper board,
such as a MXV11, to boot off of is far from ideal, unfortunalty it's
currently the best solution I've got. I'd thought of trying to use the
PDP-11/23+ CPU I've got, but discovered it doesn't support TMSCP tape
drives as a boot device, where the DQ606 does. Somehow I don't really feel
like trying to type in the bootstrap for a TK50 if I can help it (yes, I'm
being lazy).
Does anyone have any thoughts or suggestions on this mess?
Zane
| Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Adminstrator |
| healyzh(a)ix.netcom.com (primary) | Linux Enthusiast |
| healyzh(a)holonet.net (alternate) | Classic Computer Collector |
+----------------------------------+----------------------------+
| Empire of the Petal Throne and Traveller Role Playing, |
| and Zane's Computer Museum. |
| http://www.dragonfire.net/~healyzh/ |
Hey gang!
I have a TK50 tape from DECUS labeled "The DECUS VMS Startup Set" with the
part number VS0108TB. It came with the uVAXII I recently got. Title sounds
quite intriguing as I will later be bringing up that machine and am a
novice at DEC goodies so far.
I cannot find, by searching, anything about it on the DECUS software site.
Nor can I find anything by searching newsgroups or the web under either the
description or the part number.
Anybody have any info on this from either their own tape library or old
archived DECUS S/W catalog listings?
Thanks for the help.
--Chris
-- --
Christian Fandt, Electronic/Electrical Historian
Jamestown, NY USA
Member of Antique Wireless Association
URL: http://www.ggw.org/freenet/a/awa/
>Recently I added a Texas Instruments TI-99/4A to my collection. Since
< >then I also bought one in a off white or beige case (I'm not sure what
< >you would call the color). Was the non-metal case version of the
< >TI-99/4A a later model? I also need to know if anyone has a schematic
< >for both of these models?
The sequance was the TI99/4 (chicklet keys), TI99/4a enhanced display and
real keyboard and the beige TI99/4a revised roms.
< The silver and black model is the original one. The beige, all plastic
< case is the later model. IIRC the later model has circuitry which preve
< it from running third party cartridges.
It was not a hardware change that I know of and I have several of the
black and later beige units. It is a firmware difference.
Allison
< Recently I added a Texas Instruments TI-99/4A to my collection. Since
< then I also bought one in a off white or beige case (I'm not sure what
< you would call the color). Was the non-metal case version of the
< TI-99/4A a later model? I also need to know if anyone has a schematic
< for both of these models?
The beige was a later model and is the same circuit as far as I know
though the roms are a bit different. The beige will not play some non
TI games that the black/metal trim one would.
There is an active TI99 list. I not have the Listserv address beyond
the ti99(a)theriver.com (there is a different address to subscribe).
Allison
Hi!
(I think this is old enough hardware to be on topic.)
In my off hours, I'm trying to put together a driver for NCR53C80-based
SCSI controllers for it i386 port of NetBSD. (For those who know NetBSD,
I'm doing some patches to the MI 5380 driver and writing an i386 MD
front end.)
I have it working with the very dumb Chinon controller (non-bootable,
no IRQ- polled only), but was trying to set up a test box with a card
capable of being interrupt driven and (ultimately) bootable. Unfortunately,
my ancient SUMO SCSI-AT seems to have given up the ghost as it will no
longer detect any connected drives and seems to actively screw up the
bootting of floppies from another card.
So, I was wondering if one of you might be able to loan (or cheaply sell)
me a spare NCR53C80-based SCSI card. I guess I would ideally be looking
for another SUMO or similar card. My second choice would be a Trantor
T130 with boot ROM. I am, however, open to other suggestions.
Thanks...
<<<john>>>
Would someone be kind enough to direct me to a good FAQ or URL for
diagnosing/repairing monitors? There has been some excellent information
passed around on this list since I've subscribed but I need something a
bit more basic. For example, descriptions of different types of problems
(flickering, only 2 colours) and the possible causes and interventions. I
realize that its not quite as simple as I'd like it to be but I have to
start somewhere. I keep finding SVGA monitors that need some work and
would like to get them up and running.
TIA
Colan
