On Nov 20, 6:59, kebabthesheep wrote:
> I have a dual 3 1/2" + 5 1/4" drive, but I can maybe I
> can use one of the drives out of the RM if it doesn't
> do 360K correctly? I'd better check on that one...
Assuming the drive is a "1.2MB" 5.25", it will probably be capable of
reading a 40-track disk, but writing is a different matter -- the track it
will lay down will only be approximately half the width of the track a real
40-track drive will use. You will probably get usable results if you
bulk-erase the media before writing, but it would be best to make a good
copy on the RML drives as soon as you can transfer the disk. Look in the
classiccmp archives for the full debate on 35/40/80 tracks,
single/double/high density, and the rest :-)
--
Pete Peter Turnbull
Dept. of Computer Science
University of York
Ah, does this mean that his computer will go to
heaven?
<Ducks>
On Mon, 20 Nov 2000 15:59:11 -0800 (PST) Cameron Kaiser
<spectre(a)stockholm.ptloma.edu> writes:
> This is absolutely *disturbing*.
>
> http://people.ne.mediaone.net/brochner/bornagain/showme.htm
>
> --
> ----------------------------- personal page:
> http://www.armory.com/~spectre/ --
> Cameron Kaiser, Point Loma Nazarene University *
> ckaiser(a)stockholm.ptloma.edu
> -- FORTUNE: The moon is in Venus' house. This will make no
> difference. --------
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> I have a dual 3 1/2" + 5 1/4" drive, but I can maybe I
> can use one of the drives out of the RM if it doesn't
> do 360K correctly? I'd better check on that one...
Hmmm... I should have read that more carefully. If it's what I think you
mean, it's a single/double density 80-track 5.25" in there. The same
argument about reading/writing 40 tracks on an 80-track drive applies (just
as for a 1.2MB "HD" drive) but you won't have to worry about speed (300/360
rpm) or (de)selecting HD.
If you're using a PC, though, you may have to find a controller capable of
single density.
--
Pete Peter Turnbull
Dept. of Computer Science
University of York
I posted this earlier but never received any response or a return message
myself so forgive me if this actually made it to the list and I am
re-posting........
Just got 2 SGI Personal Iris's 4D/35's today (Thanks again Tom) and no KB,
Mouse, monitor for either. Finally got dumb terminal hooked & working, and
was pleased NOT to find boot password protection, HOWEVER....
1 of them still has a working OS, and the other doesn't. I do not have any
OS media for them at all, and the one that IS working has (Of Course) a root
password which I do not have. What I really need here is a copy of the
installation media here. Pleeeaaaasssee Contact me if you can assist in
getting these systems running. I believe the 1 with the OS problem has the
OS, but has no scsi disk label. Perhaps if someone were to have a root/boot
disk they could copy off for me, I could get them working. I believe they
run Iris 4.0.somthingorother.
I am also in the market for an inexpensive KB and mouse combo for at least
one of these.
I also got an HP Apollo 9000/715. Seems to work fine but has abscent hdd for
right now. I hooked it up using my other HP's HPIB KB/Mouse and monitor.
Problem here is for some reason I can not get a serial console to work on
this machine. Can't figure out what the heck I am doing wrong and was
wondering if anyone here knew if I had to set that up in the HP's settings to
get it to work as it doesn't seem to by default. (Before you ask, I tried
both a null-modem and a regular cable on this on both the rs232 and parallel
ports with no luck)
Also will be looking for inexpensive HPIB KB/Mouse for this..
Thanks for any help you have to offer.
-Linc Fessenden
In a message dated Mon, 20 Nov 2000 3:56:37 PM Eastern Standard Time, James
Jackson <jjackson(a)salsa-digital.com> writes:
<< Sun Sparc Stations (at least the II's) had the ability to allow the
user to boot to single-user mode. (Don't remember the OS.)
When in the single-user mode, then the operator was the 'root'
operator and could change the password.
It was necessary to do this on one system I was using. I just got the
job, the previous employee had set the root password to god knows
what, and I was locked out of several features - since I wasn't the
root operator.
This 'feature' (booting to single-user mode) was not really
publicized, as it was a sort of 'loophole' in the system.
Regards,
James Jackson
>>
Yep, you can still do this on Suns (I have a few). Tried it on the SGI as
well, however right before the "glory prompt" I was asked for a "Single User
Password".. Bummer...
-Linc.
--- David Gesswein <djg(a)drs-esg.com> wrote:
> > From: Ethan Dicks <ethan_dicks(a)yahoo.com>
> > Subject: Re: Anyone have an RK8E to sell?
> >
> > I did happen to go look at my RKV11D
> > and verified that there is an M993 card at the end of it...
>
> I thought that the RK8E needed the IC
Perhaps. I've never owned a working RK8E.
> and the original cable I am using with my RK8E does have it installed.
That's pretty suggestive. OTOH, perhaps that's there for RK01/RK03
compatibility? (Just a WAG)
> I have a schematic in the RK8E printset but it doesn't show the IC.
I, too, have the RK8E printset and the lack of information there is
why I had the question in the first place.
> If find you need the parts on the board I can pull
> the cable and find out what they are.
That would be wonderful. A scan of the board would be more than
adequate. I can puzzle out the component values from there.
> The RK8E (with M993C) and RK05 schematics are on my web site
Roger. As I said, though, I have a set, too.
Thanks,
-ethan
=====
Even though my old e-mail address is no longer going to
vanish, please note my new public address: erd(a)iname.com
The original webpage address is still going away. The
permanent home is: http://penguincentral.com/
See http://ohio.voyager.net/ for details.
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Hi,
Has anyone on the list got any response from DECus lately
(2~3 months)? I tried signing up about 4 weeks ago and got
no response. I would like to do whatever's necessary to join.
John A.
I've played with a number of SGIs over my career, both at home
and at work. I put up a web page a while ago with most of the info I've
gleaned ("This Old SGI", http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Pines/2258)
Unfortunately, the web page is woefully out of date as I haven't
had time to go back and restructure it the way I'd like.
I am still quite interested in SGIs, but I've broadened my interests
to include DEC (PDP-series) and SUN (both old and new) stuff as well.
BTW, I agree with the approach below... although you can do quite a bit
through the serial console, getting the graphics console up would be
much better. The 4D/35 keyboard/mouse is proprietary, but should be
available from places like www.reputable.com, www.mce.com and www.mashek.com
(and many others who's name escape me at just this moment) The mouse
might be fudged using an old Sun mouse and some mods, but I would still
recommend getting a "real" SGI mouse as the modified sun mouse doesn't
work as well as the real SGI version.
Just as in the comments below, I recommend going with Irix 5.3. It will
run reasonably on this machine (with sufficient memory), and provide quite
a bit of functionality.
One thing I _strongly_ recommend... Use an air gun (or canned air) to blow
out the dust throughout the entire case (including air plenums, power
supply and e-module(where the circuit cards are)). I disassembled mine
(including removing the power supply and popping it cover) to clean it.
This critter acts just like a vacuum cleaner and will suck dust and dirt
up from the bottom airgrate faster than you can imagine. At work, we
mounted these things on small (6") pedestals to try to cut down the
amount of internal dust they sucked up. I imagine the accumulated dust
might contribute to the fire problems mentioned below.
BTW, as far a CDROMS go, SGI used Toshibas (I think the models were
3401 or 3501)for quite a while. The important thing is to make certain that
they are jumpered for 512K bytes/sector. I believe some of the older Texel/
Plextors will work also. The recommended SCSI ID for SGI CDROMs is ID 4.
Another Gotcha... SGI uses scsi ID 0 for it's controller ID, so you should
jumper all your scsi drives/devices for id 1-7.
...Good Luck!...
-al-
-acorda(a)1bigred.com (also acorda(a)geocities.com)
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Mark Green [mailto:mark@cs.ualberta.ca]
> Sent: Monday, November 20, 2000 2:47 PM
> To: classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org
> Subject: Re: Need SGI Classic Cmp Help
>
>
> > I posted this earlier but never received any response or a
> return message
> > myself so forgive me if this actually made it to the list and I am
> > re-posting........
>
> I hadn't seen it either, otherwise I would have replied.
>
> >
> > Just got 2 SGI Personal Iris's 4D/35's today (Thanks again
> Tom) and no KB,
> > Mouse, monitor for either. Finally got dumb terminal
> hooked & working, and
> > was pleased NOT to find boot password protection, HOWEVER....
>
> I have about 6 PI's, covering most of the models and options. The
> 4D/35 was the top of the line. There are basically two generations
> of PIs. The first generation is the 4D/20 and 4D/25. The 4D/30
> and 4D/35 were added a few years later. There is considerable
> difference between the two generations. For example the memory
> architecture was changed rather drastically. The 4D/30 memory is
> the same as Indigo memory (but not Indigo2). There were also several
> changes in keyboards. In addition, there was an upgrade path from
> the 4D/20 to the 4D/30 models, which didn't quite produce an off
> the shelf 4D/30. There are a number of very interesting bastard
> configurations out there due to the different upgrade paths. Some
> of my answers will be kind of vague because of this.
>
> I would strongly advice getting the console working. The monitor
> part is easy, most VGA monitors will work. Depending on the graphics
> option that's installed in your machine you should have either a
> VGA or BNC connectors (some of the later graphics options used
> 13W3 connectors). I've had success with a wide range of monitors.
> The standard resolution is 1280x1024 I believe (they came standard
> with 19 and 21 inch monitors), but I've used 1025x768 monitors, a
> bit fuzzy, but it works.
>
> The keyboard and mouse is much harder. There were several models
> of keyboards used on these machines. What type of keyboard
> connector to you have? The popular ones were DB9 and PS/2 (note
> I don't think a PS/2 keyboard will work, but I haven't tried).
> I can look up the part number tonight when I get home. The keyboards
> are not that common, but I have seen them on eBay. The mouse attaches
> to the keyboard.
>
> The easiest way to get these machines running is through the
> console. There is a way to set a terminal to be the console,
> but I'm not sure how its done on the PI. On some SGIs there is
> a hardware mechanism, but on others the console must be use (this
> won't help you much).
>
>
> >
> > 1 of them still has a working OS, and the other doesn't. I
> do not have any
> > OS media for them at all, and the one that IS working has
> (Of Course) a root
> > password which I do not have. What I really need here is a
> copy of the
> > installation media here. Pleeeaaaasssee Contact me if you
> can assist in
> > getting these systems running. I believe the 1 with the OS
> problem has the
> > OS, but has no scsi disk label. Perhaps if someone were to
> have a root/boot
> > disk they could copy off for me, I could get them working.
> I believe they
> > run Iris 4.0.somthingorother.
> >
>
> Its difficult to do much without a console, since all the installation
> and maintenance procedures assume that you are working through the
> console by default. What devices do you have? There are two forms
> of the OS media. The older systems were on tape, and the newer ones
> were on CD. A may have IRIX 4 tapes at home, which could get you
> started. The 4D/35 will run up to IRIX 5.3 (something I recommend),
> and the CDs can be found regularly on eBay. Note that these machines
> are a bit picky about the CDROM drives they use, older ones are
> better.
>
> It sounds like the previous owner on your second machine wiped
> the disk. The lack of a disk label is a good indication that there
> is nothing on the disk. Note, these machines can be network booted,
> so you could boot from the other machine.
>
> Do you have access to any of the accounts on the first machine?
> Quite often the guest account had no password, so you could
> try that. If you are successful, run hinv to get your machine's
> configuration.
>
> If you have a console the easiest way to change the root password
> is to boot a mini-root (this may be on partition 8 of your disk).
> From there you can modify the /etc/passwd file.
>
> SGI tended to use there own file system structures, so you may
> not be able to read the disks on other UNIX systems.
>
> Let me know if this helps you. My machines are at home, so I
> can provide any detail until tonight. One word of warning the
> 4D/30 series machines had a habit of catching fire. The CPU
> used in the 4D/30 machines generated much more heat than the
> 4D/20 machines, and the cabinet really wasn't designed for them
> The upgrade included an extra fan. If any of the fans fail the
> system overheats. Also run with all the skins on for better
> heat flow. One of the 4D/35s I had a work caught fire one
> day, filled the room with smoke.
>
> PS: Are there other SGI collectors on the list? I have a fair
> amount of documentation on the early systems, I also have a
> working 3130 at home.
>
> --
> Dr. Mark Green mark(a)cs.ualberta.ca
> McCalla Professor (780) 492-4584
> Department of Computing Science (780) 492-1071 (FAX)
> University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, T6G 2H1, Canada
>
I also have a couple of the CBM books on PET BASIC that were printed
very early on.
I'm doing this from memory, but I believe that one of the authors was
Adam Osborne (of the same Osborne computer fame?).
I also have a very early book by him about computers and computing in
general. It was used as a 'textbook' for a class I took at a junior
college here called 'Microcomputer Kit Building'.
All of the students were required to start assembling a computer -
some even completed their kits. I was about middle-way through with my
SwTPC 6800 kit at the time.
It was a really cool class - I didn't understand very much of it - way
over my head at the time. <grin>
Regards,
James Jackson
In a message dated 11/18/2000 10:36:35 PM Eastern Standard Time,
spectre(a)stockholm.ptloma.edu writes:
> For people who
> don't know what one is, visit
>
> http://www.retrobits.com/ckb/secret/pet.html
Hey Cameron:
Thanks for posting this -- I'd never heard of this machine and it looks like
a lot of fun. A $199 system with support for five mainstream languages?
Seems like they could have sold a million of them just to developers and
students . . .
Glen
0/0
