test-drb February 1999

test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

178 participants
709 discussions

by Anthony.Eros＠digital.com

This looks like a great candidate for a well-documented restoration -- I'll be taking a ton of photographs and will welcome any and all suggestions and pointers to parts, etc. Thanks! -- Tony ---------- From: Christian Fandt[SMTP:cfandt@netsync.net] Reply To: classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu Sent: Monday, February 01, 1999 5:50 PM To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers Subject: Re: 1130 has been claimed Very good! Now Tony, you have the responsibility to completely photograph this machine and try to find a correct keyboard and PSU. Some of us will appreciate seeing the photos and comments to learn (or relive!) this interesting machine. I know I'll keep an eye cocked for the parts to help get this machine restored. And to think this machine was only about 3 or 4 hours drive from here! Good luck with it :) Regards, Chris Upon the date 05:35 PM 2/1/99 -0500, Brad Ackerman said something like: >Tony Eros was the first to respond (by 90 minutes), and so claims the >computer. Thanks for all the offers -- I really didn't want to see this >computer junked. > >Christian: [re your query] The machine has been sitting in an office as >is for a while. I imagine the missing parts got Dumpstered(tm) long ago, >unfortunately. > >Brad Ackerman N1MNB "...faced with the men and women who bring home >bsa3(a)cornell.edu the pork, voters almost always re-elect them." >http://skaro.pair.com/ -- _The Economist_, 31 Oct 1998 Christian Fandt, Electronic/Electrical Historian Jamestown, NY USA cfandt(a)netsync.net Member of Antique Wireless Association URL: http://www.ggw.org/freenet/a/awa/

25 years, 3 months

Plato terminal

by SUPRDAVE＠aol.com

In a message dated 1/30/99 3:33:03 AM US Eastern Standard Time, geoffrob(a)netcafe.pirie.mtx.net.au writes: > I vaguely seem to remember that the Plato Courseware also ran, or they had a > version for, the TI99/4A. > They were pushing it at schools and the like IIRC. > My first real computer was a TI....Still got it here somewhere, complete > with the expansion box and 24k of additional ram, and a 5.25" FDD. yes, you are correct. I bought a complete unused CDC version of the ti computer at a radio rally and got about 50 plato courseware titles. it was indeed made for schools.

25 years, 3 months

Need help on old Tandy stuff -- Allison? Anyone else?

by nerdware＠laidbak.com

Hi, group. I'm going to be putting up my annual exhibit at the local library and I need some help with my facts so I don't screw anything up. I have two display cases to work with. One will be tracing the development of the portable pc, and will include the usual Compaq Sewing Machine, a Compaq III, and a Compaq LTE286; a Kaypro II, an Osborne, a Mac Portable (non- backlit), IBM Convertible, and a Tandy M200 and Pocket Computer. (I'm really trying to get an M100, but all the reporters I know who still use them would rather have their fingers removed first before they'd give 'em up.......) Can anyone give me the original release dates and some tech specs on the 200 and the Pocket? The 200 has the parallel printer card, the external floppy drive, all the books, and several floppies with stuff on them. The Pocket is the original model, and has software, all the docs, the original boxes, the original carrying case, RS-232 interface and the neat little color plotter/printer. Any info, anecdotes, whatever would be greatly appreciated and acknowledged in the display. Thanks. Paul Braun NerdWare -- The History of the PC and the Nerds who brought it to you. nerdware(a)laidbak.com www.laidbak.com/nerdware

25 years, 3 months

Bernoulli cartridges

by dburrows＠netpath.net

>In a message dated 1/30/99 8:58:55 PM Central Standard Time, >dburrows(a)netpath.net writes: > >> I recently picked up about 30 150meg Bernoulli cartridges that have never >> been opened. According to the chart on the back they should work on the >> 90meg. >> Dan >> >hmm, i don't have any new ones, so the chart you are talking about makes >no sense to me. Can you write to the 150's with the 90M drive? perhaps, >format the cartridges as 90's? Is that what it means? > >just curious. >kelly I have no clue other than the vague chart on the back. It looks like a 150 drive will read write format with a * for reduced performance a 90 meg cart. It does not say anything about using 150m media in a 90m drive. This makes me think the media will fit but will have to be formatted. To be sure I would contact IOmega. The only Bernoulli drive I have ever used was a just released 20m (I think) back on a then new 286. If you are still interested contact me off list. With the arrangements I have with the scrapper I got them from to list members I am only looking for $5.00 ea. plus shipping. If they are to be going into commercial use that price WILL be higher. Dan

25 years, 3 months

tube CD player (was Re: sizes (was Re: vacuum tube computer))

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<> The part I haven't figured out is the photodetector. Even those early L <> players used a phototransistor for the detector. < <Would a selenium cell be fast enough? A CdS photresistor probably wouldn' <be, I think. Silicon photodiode predated the transistor. You would need that or a photo tube to be remotely fastenough as the selenium or CdS is far to slow. In the early 50s when the tube was king germanium and silicon diodes were reality and very common in computer and other uses. The problem is the LASER postdates transistors! The optical light source would have to be a collminated point source. Memory is easy, delay lines really big ones! BACK OT... A vacuum tube computer using germanium diodes and tubes in under 400 of them would eb hard even with a 12bit word. It takes a minimum of 1/2 a duo triode to make an inverter and a FF needs at least one dual triode tube and a few diodes for steering. AND and OR gates using diodes are trivial but a 1 bit full adder would eat several tubes and lots of diodes. a full function ALU like '181 using tubes would easily eat about 50-100 of them for 4bits though some logic economies could gotten by using pulse coupled logic. Register and ALU are the primary consumers of transistors/ICs/Tubes with gating of signals being a next level user. Allison

25 years, 3 months

Euro on old computers

by pete＠dunnington.u-net.com

On Feb 1, 15:49, Frank McConnell wrote: > ObCC: so what did you UKans do to get your funny-looking L on > computers, terminals, and printers imported from ASCII-speaking > countries? It's character 0xA3 (decimal 163, octal 243) in ISO Latin 1, and most systems that don't have a special key for it map it to the "#" key. On older systems, quite often the drivers replace the "#" character with the pound symbol, but some replace the "$". -- Pete Peter Turnbull Dept. of Computer Science University of York

25 years, 3 months

TI99: WP and PC

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<Except for a significant penalty in register access time, maybe. Could <be worth it if you expected lots of context switches. Access penalty is high as ram in '77 was slow. <Sounds to me like the 1802. Is there any shared history between them? <Were the 1802 designers consciously influenced by the TI design, or was <it derived again from scratch? Not even close. There is no shared history either as noth evolved from the larger systems each made. The registers in the 9900 were very general in use and symetrical in adressing modes. The 1802 the registers were not general. They were mostly for pointers, stacks, and maybe storage. The 1802 had the ability to use any register as the program counter (via sep and interrupts). The TI9900 the PC is one of the few hardware registers. The 1802 is a primary accumulator machine and the 9900 is anything but as all registers are the target for the result. <Hmm, 1802's were used in satellites, right? Do satellite apps need lots <of context switching? They would like that but the 1802 was used as it was available as RAD hard and CMOS (low power!). The latter is more important as 10mW is nothing compared the the ~600mW of the 9900 cpu never minding clock generation (ttl 4 phase clock generator) support. Allison

25 years, 3 months

vacuum tube computer

by Jgzabol＠aol.com

Hi all, I have recently joined the list, not yet contributed too much, but enjoyed reading quite a bit. My personal preference is older stuff - if it contains integrated circuits, I am not too much interested (with the possible exception of a Cray-1). I did not succeed in finding any serious equipment in vacuum-tube technology. Therefore, I decided to design and build a complete computer with vacuum-tube technology from scratch. A short description of the project is enclosed, for those of you who might be interested. The attachment is best viewed with some straight ASCII editor, like the MS-Editor. Thanks to Hans Franke for a reading of a draft version and constructive comments. BTW, I am located in Munich, Germany. John G. Zabolitzky

25 years, 3 months

Daily Laugh!

by yakowenk＠cs.unc.edu

On Fri, 29 Jan 1999, Sam Ismail <dastar(a)ncal.verio.com> wrote: ] On Fri, 29 Jan 1999, Derek Peschel wrote: ] > I wonder if I can change the configuration so that only subscribed people ] > can send things to the list? Is that really a good idea? ] ] Yes and no. ] Yes because it would eliminate the riff raff postings we get every now and ] then (pet peeve). ] No because its really convenient for me to forward messages I get on a ] different e-mail account (which is not subscribed) from people wanting to ] give away or sell vintage computers. It would be a big pain in the ass if ] I had to first forward the message to my dastar account and then forward ] it from there to ClassicCmp. You could subscribe from that address, and then tell the list processor to postpone sending you anything there, and never cancel the postpone order. I *think* you could still post from that address. Of course, the list processor may eventually explode, holding back all that postponed mail... (Would it actually hold copies of all that, or just drop it?) ] Sellam Alternate e-mail: dastar(a)siconic.com ] ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ ] Always being hassled by the man. ] ] Coming in 1999: Vintage Computer Festival 3.0 ] See http://www.vintage.org/vcf for details! ] [Last web site update: 01/15/99] Cheers, Bill.

25 years, 3 months

CDC 9766 Drive and packs

by jpl15＠netcom.com

Is anyone on the List, in the Southern California area, interested in a CDC 9766 350MP top loader, with three disk packs? This unit was attached to the Prime system I got recently, but is *not* going to be used with the way I have the Prime configured. I have gotten an offer of $100, but I have to deliver the damn thing, and it's 600lbs. I would like to sell this unit for a little more than $100, or I would consider donating it to a worthy situation, ie. needed for a systems restoration, or to supply parts made of Unobtanium. Replies by e-mail.... Cheerz John

25 years, 3 months

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test-drb February 1999