FYI,
scroll down to the bottom of this page and you will see a very
famous ASR 33 Teletype machine at work in a Harvard Dorm!
One recently sold on e-bay for $375.00, values must be increasing?
<A
HREF="http://www.microsoft.com/mscorp/museum/exhibits/onceupontime/revolution.
asp">Click here: Microsoft Museum Pre-Computer Timeline Exhibit: You Say
You
Want A Revolution?</A>
Dennis Aruta, Owner ShipFix (c) & International Commerce List (c),
<a href="http://members.aol.com./denicny/trade.html">
INTERNATIONAL COMMERCE + SHIPS </a>
<a href="http://www.InsideTheWeb.com/mbs.cgi/mb522111">
Visit my Message Board
</a>
FireTalk 34260 denic
ICQ #174727
Mailing address:
Denar Chartering Inc.(since 1971) Phone: 516-326-2300
P.O. Box 1147, Denar House Fax: 516-326-2519
New Hyde Park N.Y. 11040 Tlx: 4971419
U.S.A. email: Denic(a)liii.com
DenicNY(a)aol.com
I wonder what happened to the "app-note" type designs that were floating
around about 15 years ago. It was hard to get them to stop sending them to
me when I was working at the "Rocket Ranch." They were purported to be
small and simple, intended for ganging up on a task, and not my cup of tea,
so I never bothered to save them. They must have had a serial (RS-232)
version, because I considered them for a hugely parallel test fixture for
proving that yet another Honeywell-Bull system proposed to the Pentagon
didn't work as advertised. We built a single board system which filled a 6'
rack, with 68701's on both sides to perform the test. It proved the system
didn't work, but the Pentagon bought it anyway.
<sigh>
It's nice to know that your work matters.
Dick
-----Original Message-----
From: Ram Meenakshisundaram <rmeenaks(a)olf.com>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Saturday, November 13, 1999 4:47 AM
Subject: RE: Need a RS232 interface transputer tram
>> > I really dont have any preference to a serial chip other than
>> that it should be
>> > reliable and easy to source. I have no spare T2s either. All
>> the spares I have
>> > are the T400 (2-link) transputers.
>>
>> I've never used one of those. I may have the odd spare T414 (or maybe
>> even a T8 of some kind) that I can use for this project, though. I
>> wouldn't be hard to convert the design to use other transputers, of
>> course.
>>
>Sure that seems fine. I also realized the T400s would be a mess as it
would
>break the pipeline on a B008. Some extrnal ram would be nice. How about
>64K of SRAM. That should be plenty for most work I would think.
>
>> I don't know who owns the copyright on the transputer card I designed (T4
>> or T8 + 256K DRAM + interfaces to some custom hardware), but if it's me,
>> or I can get permission to hand it round, I'd be happy to release it for
>> non-commerical use. I will look into this sometime.
>>
>
>That would be nice. I dont have any freely releasable transputer card
>designs. People always ask me where they can get transputer cards, with a
>design spec, they can build one themselves. Thanks Tony. I really
>appreciate it.
>
>
>Ram
>
Anyone want some freebie RRD-40 drives, get hold of the fellow in the
attached message. He's got three.
-=-=- <snip> -=-=-
On Thu, 11 Nov 1999 20:18:46 -0700, in comp.os.vms you wrote:
>>From: Phillip Williams <phdevax(a)sleepy.lobo.net>
>>Newsgroups: comp.os.vms
>>Subject: rrd40 cdroms
>>Date: Thu, 11 Nov 1999 20:18:46 -0700
>>Organization: Southwest Cyberport
>>Lines: 7
>>Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.20.9911112012120.990-100000(a)sleepy.lobo.net>
>>NNTP-Posting-Host: lobo.net
>>Mime-Version: 1.0
>>Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
>>Path: news1.jps.net!news-west.eli.net!sdd.hp.com!enews.sgi.com!news-feed.fnsi.net!WCG!feeder.nmix.net!198.59.136.4.MISMATCH!feeder.swcp.com!sloth.swcp.com!sleepy.lobo.net!phdevax
>>Xref: news1.jps.net comp.os.vms:5102
>>
>>hello
>>I replaced the rrd40s from 3 infoservers with sony cdroms, so
>>the rrd40s are free to anybody that can use them. Sorry only have
>>2 caddies. also if you want the caddies the 40s come along as a
>>neat package.
>>phillip
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Bruce Lane, Owner and head honcho,
Blue Feather Technologies -- kyrrin (at) bluefeathertech [dot] com
Web: http://www.bluefeathertech.com
"...No matter how we may wish otherwise, our science can only describe an object,
event, or living thing in our own human terms. It cannot possibly define any of them..."
I have been thinkin' lately that perhaps I oughta stick strictly
to DEC Stuff... and I am trying to reduce the tonnage around here.
So I gets to lookin' at the bee-yoo-tee-full PR1ME mainframe that
I actually paid to rescue. And it ain't got no DEC logos on it nowhere.
Is anyone withing the purview of The List and within trucking
distance of LA CA interested in this machine? It is in working
condition, has a lot of software loaded on it (exactly how mnay app
I don't know) and has extensive and complete software doc. It laso
has several 1/2" tapes, tow with the OS and one 7"-er marked 'games'.
Peripherals are 1.2G SCSI Seagate Sabre w/front panel, 350M CDC SMD
(spare SMD avail) 32 user ports and Kennedy 9100 1/2" drive. Power
runs on 110 single phase... not in original cabinet, so some
cooling fans will need to be added. Unit is in 6' rack with casters,
Kennedy is seperate and loose, tho I have the rack slides for it. 35
serial cables are included, and one spare CPU and two spare 1M
memory cards. The original control panel is also present and
functioning.
IDEALLY... I'd like to sell it, but the price is variable
according to the situation of the prospective adopter. I *did* pay
good money to keep this old girl out of the scrapper's.
Any van or small pickup truck can handle the whole thing in one go.
I want it to be loved and *run* and played with. Now's your chance
to do a little Pick hacking... from what I read in the Doco, that's
included in there somewhere. OS rev is 20.2.8 for the PR1ME literate
among you.
Any takers in or near SoCal?
Cheers
John
>Check outghis article, it appears that somone recently patented the
>idea of using a pivot date, such as 30, and having the computer
>consider numbers below that pivot point as being in the year 20??, ie
>as being from 2000 - 2029. and he's trying to force companies that
>used that programming technique to fix their Y2K problems, to pay him
>millions. 70% of companies supposedly use that concept.
Just another argument for me to believe that no individual programming
techniques should be patentable, only total products... How many of
us have used that technique for years for things even before Y2K was
an issue?!
Megan Gentry
Former RT-11 Developer
+--------------------------------+-------------------------------------+
| Megan Gentry, EMT/B, PP-ASEL | Internet (work): gentry!zk3.dec.com |
| Unix Support Engineering Group | (home): mbg!world.std.com |
| Compaq Computer Corporation | addresses need '@' in place of '!' |
| 110 Spitbrook Rd. ZK03-2/T43 | URL: http://world.std.com/~mbg/ |
| Nashua, NH 03062 | "pdp-11 programmer - some assembler |
| (603) 884 1055 | required." - mbg |
+--------------------------------+-------------------------------------+
>OK, that just how the date was entered, not how it was stored internally,
>but it's not that different. I would claim this is certainly 'prior art'.
>And I doubt if this is the first time it was done either.
Just because it was done before doesn't mean that a patent won't
be granted, especially when it comes to patenting algorithms. Witness
the discussions in comp.arch earlier this year about IBM patenting
a well-known (has been in textbooks since the 1960's) algorithm for
converting multi-digit decimal numbers to binary.
Tim.
I just acquired 3 convergent technologies computers. They are a series of
modules that plug together, each module is the size of a very thick book.
They have external power supplies with a 2 foot long cable with snap
connectors to connect power supply to module. The modules plus together
along the side and a latch locks the connection. No tools needed to
add/remove memory. The computers power up and LED's come on. The
information I got from the web doesn't say what kind of CPU chip was used,
what the computers were designed for and if they are still supported. From
several web searches I think these machines ran CTOS which was dropped by
Unisys.
The date on the inside of the cases is 1983 and 1984.
Module 1 CPU with 3 extra memory modules, one labeled datapoint, one
convergent tech, one burroughs
Module 2 Hard disk 10MB ST225
Module 3 5 1/4 floppy drive
Module 1 CPU
Module 2 hard disk 90MB
Module 3 5 1/4 floppy
Module 4 40-60 MB tape drive
I picked up 8 power supplies, and 10-20 cables, no manuals. One cable has
two right angle db9 connectors that seem to be made to connect "cluster
controller" connector in the side of the CPU. Other looks like terminal
cable. Does anyone know what kind of terminal would work? Any other
information would be appreciated.
Thanks
Mike McFadden
Thank you for being so helpful. I will run the tapes and see what happens. I
trust the SA is usually 200 (except for Tic Tac Toe which I know is 400).
BTW: Does DECUS still sell this stuff?
john
-----Original Message-----
From: Lawrence LeMay <lemay(a)cs.umn.edu>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Thursday, October 21, 1999 6:55 PM
Subject: Re: DECUS Paper Tapes
>> I am just starting to go through the software I got with the 8/s and I
don't
>> know what some of these older tapes did:
>>
>> 5/8-9 [(PDP 5/8) - Tape #9] - Analysis of Variance
>> 5/8-15 - A.T.E.P.O. Program
> Auto Test in Elementary Programming and Operation of a PDP-5 computer
>
> The program will type questions or instructions to be performed by
> the operator of a 4K PDP-5/8. The program will check to see if
> the operator has answered the questions correctly. If this is the
> case, it wil type the next questionor instruction.
>
>> 5/8-45 - Remote Time Shared III System
> A time-shared programming system which allows remote stations
> immediate access to the computer and a wide selection of programs.
>
>> 5/8-54 - Tic Tac Toe Learning Program (figured this one out)
> Needs FORTRAN Object Time System
>
>> 8/8s -77 - Dual Process Sys.
> The purpose of this system is to expedite the programming of
> multiprocessing problems on the PDP-8 and PDP-8/S. It maximizes
> both the input speed and the portionm of real time actualy used
> for calculations by allowing the program to run during the
> intervals between issuing I/O commands and the raising of the device
> flag to signal completion of the command. The technique also allows
> queueing of input data or commands so that the user need not wait
> while his last line is being processed, and so that each line of input
> may be processed as fast as possible regardless of its length. The
> system uses the interrupt facilities and has less than 3% overhead
> on the PDP-8/S (about 0.1% on the PDP-8).
>
> This method is especially useful for a slower machine where the
> problem may easily be calculation limited but would, without
> such a system, become I/o bound.
>
> The program may also be easily extended to handle input from an
> A/D converter. Here, the input would be buffered by groups of
> readings terminated either arbitrarily in groups of N or by
> zero crossings.
>
> This program can increase the I/O to computation efficiency of
> some programs by 100%. It can do this even for single Teletype.
> Each user will probably want to tailor the program to his individual
> needs.
>
> Storage Requirement: 600(base 8) registers for two TTY's plus
> buffer space. (Several device configurations
> are possible).
>
>>
>>
>> Some of these I can tell what they did by the name but does anyone have
any
>> information about any of them? (I haven't had time to go through all the
>> documentation yet).
>>
>> Thanks
>>
>> john
>>
>>
>
>-Lawrence (just got a 1975 DECUS catalog 2 days ago) LeMay
>
Stan Sieler gave me this email address - We have a "new" 917 up & running
and have some ADCCs, memory, processor boards (series 42) if anyone wants
them...Also a couple of ET terminals
I am in Sacramento, CA
Bill Brandt