test-drb December 2001

test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

243 participants
1096 discussions

by dhquebbeman＠theestopinalgroup.com

> FYI, I think it's a "made up" holiday and just wanted to know > what your thoughts were. The difference between "real" holidays and "made up" Holidays seems to be: if the Holiday was "made up" before you were born, then it's real (like Mother's Day, which was instituted by President Woodrow Wilson); if it was made up in your lifetime, then it's "not real, just made up." January 1 was "made up" into New Years Day by an act of fiat; New Years Day used to be April 1. I believe "Father's Day" was "made up" in the 50s... "President's Day" was "made up" by tightwad businessmen who wanted to combine two Holidays into one. "Washington's Birthday" was made-up into a Holiday by people who wanted to make a big deal out of Washington's Birthday; ditto Lincoln. I hope the pattern is clear... Kwanzaa is as valid a Holiday as any. Regards, -dq

23 years, 12 months

Way OT: Just say no to squirrels & Pascal question

by Robert_Feldman＠jdedwards.com

Last time I had horse meat was with a couple of my professors at the Faculty Club ar Harvard. It was a regular on the menu there. Bob -----Original Message----- From: Don Maslin [mailto:donm@cts.com] Sent: Friday, December 14, 2001 12:51 AM To: classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org Subject: RE: Way OT: Just say no to squirrels & Pascal question <snip> Where on your scale do you put horse meat? The French love it. - don

23 years, 12 months

MITS 2SIO serial chip?

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

From: Richard Erlacher <edick(a)idcomm.com> >would have worked out. I think it might have given the Z80 and edge. Coming up >with a fair and general test might be difficult. I'd liken 6502 VS z80 as one of those depends on what you like things. Both have stood the test of time far better than many others. >The Z80 itself wasn't a bad CPU, but the peripheral set they built for it, with >its compromises in favor of the mode-2 interrupts meant that you couldn't use >wait-states on I/O cycles or on device chip selects to adjust the CPU to the I agree, most designers did too. Look at most Z80 designs out there and it was Z80 with NON-Zilog peripherals. Mode 2 with a little external glue to use with non zilog was a very potent config. >slower peripherals because it had to be looking over the CPU's shoulder to catch >the interrupt acknowledge and the RETI instruction. I've recently worked this >out by switching the clock rate during I/O and during a pending or current >interrupt, but it's still a PAIN! What's more, it seems to require more than >just a PAL. Handshake logic from a 4-bit wide FIFO (16 pins) seems to be the >tool for keeping track of interrupts and their dismissal. :) Me, I dont use slow Zilog peripherals. The last time I used Zilog IO it was the 5330 SCC that ran comfortably at 10mhz with it's own DMA. A TTL implementation of the mode 2 interrupts made for a nice system as it could run fast, though I never bothered with RETI, as that not required and adds much to the logic load. Allison

23 years, 12 months

How did they string core?

by dhquebbeman＠theestopinalgroup.com

> > It was done by hand I think. Mexico comes to mind. > > Some manfacturers did it by hand, some by machine. IBM had core stringing > machines during the S/360 era, for the huge stacks (about 1' by 4') used > in some of the storage units. They also had cores hand strung in the far > East, as the cheap labor was more economical than the robots. The far east manufacture of core lead to a long-running joke in the old mainframe days... the instance of it I will describe was only one of many... Anyway, when we'd boot the COPE (Harris) 1200 Remote Job Entry Station (a PDP-8 clone), there would be a message that would flash by on the console *very quickly*: HELP! HELP! I'm being held hostage in a Hong Kong Core House! Read this thinking "Mike Hunt" and "Amanda Huggenkiss" if you don't (by some chance) get it... -dq

23 years, 12 months

Is there no end

by dhquebbeman＠theestopinalgroup.com

> Matter of fact AMD was subcontracted at one point to MAKE processors for > Intel, when demands were up and they couldn't meet market requirements - and > many of the AMD made Intel branded chips are better than many of the Intel > ones. I don't remember if it was the 386 era or 486 though. iAPX286 era... -dq

23 years, 12 months

Hardest to Find Classic Computers

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

Not likely! Sphere back then was the sloppy introduction and viewed as a grab the money and run, ship nothing operation. I'd say it was one of the first in the Vaproware realm. Many that ordered got skunked as Sphere hit with a splash and really did disappear pretty fast. They were the bad guys right up until the World Power Scam, thats another story. Allison -----Original Message----- From: Michael Nadeau <menadeau(a)mediaone.net> To: classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org <classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org> Date: Monday, December 17, 2001 7:52 AM Subject: Re: Hardest to Find Classic Computers >Stan Veit's History of the Personal Computer has a detailed account of the >Sphere's design flaws and other issues, including kits being sent out >incomplete. Veit was a retailer who sold the Sphere when new. Veit stopped >selling the Sphere and admits that the company might have fixed some of the >problems after that. > >Do you remember the issue in which the review that the former owner refers >to appeared? The earliest Sphere coverage in BYTE is positive, almost >fawning. > >Maybe if the Sphere had been on the cover of Popular Electronics instead of >the Altair people would have been more forgiving of its flaws. > >--Mike > >Michael Nadeau >Editorial Services >603-893-2379 >----- Original Message ----- >From: "Loboyko Steve" <sloboyko(a)yahoo.com> >To: <classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org> >Sent: Sunday, December 16, 2001 9:22 PM >Subject: Re: Hardest to Find Classic Computers > > >> I stumbled upon a link some time ago belonging to a >> very bitter former owner of Sphere. The gist of his >> article was that Byte Magazine destroyed Sphere with a >> very bad review, and, that most computers of that era >> took some hacking to work anyway (example: the "clock" >> - and I use the term clock charitably - of the >> original Altair 8800). >> >> --- William Donzelli <aw288(a)osfn.org> wrote: >> > > Ah yeah. Good pick. That is definitely a rare >> > beast. I've only ever >> > > known one person who had one (I forgot his name, >> > he used to be on the list >> > > a few years ago). He sold it off to someone else >> > and then got out of >> > > collecting computers. >> > >> > Was that me? I have/had three, but they are promised >> > to go out West. One of >> > those deals that seems to be taking a very long >> > time, mostly due to me >> > trying to unearth it all and boxing the stuff up. >> > >> > Anyway, Sphere aparently was one of the early bad >> > guys. The computers they >> > sold (many as kits, I think) basically did not work. >> > Unlike Altair, Sphere >> > was trying to break into the business sector, so >> > there really was not much >> > of an excuse for the crapiness. They all needed a >> > huge number of hacks to >> > get them to function (my favorite is a a few-mH coil >> > made of telephone >> > wire kludged onto one of the oscillators, in order >> > to keep the thing >> > going. Basically, wrap some wire around a pencil, >> > and tack solder it into >> > place, and adjust accordingly). >> > >> > William Donzelli >> > aw288(a)osfn.org >> >> >> __________________________________________________ >> Do You Yahoo!? >> Check out Yahoo! Shopping and Yahoo! Auctions for all of >> your unique holiday gifts! Buy at http://shopping.yahoo.com >> or bid at http://auctions.yahoo.com >> > >

23 years, 12 months

Flashing Light Indicators un Simple Front Panels

by dhquebbeman＠theestopinalgroup.com

> Actually, I think that's a good suggestion, if you can find someone with > the same ROMs. In my experience, most programmers actually do use the same > algorithm -- one of the common CRCs. At least, all three programmers I > regularly use do, and the checksums match the ones printed on SGI ROMs and > a few other ROMs I have that have printed checksums. Well, they wouldn't compare exactly- the microcode ROM sets are serialized... But when I disconnecte the cabinet airflow sensor, I get an error message displayed that's not in the VCP's Z-80 boot ROM, but is only in the microcode ROMs. Now, whether the Z-80 is retrieving and displaying that message, or the microcode is getting loaded and the Prime CPU is issuing the message, who can tell? -dq

23 years, 12 months

Flashing Light Indicators un Simple Front Panels

by dhquebbeman＠theestopinalgroup.com

> Possible, of course, but in the case of an Indy, the processor and PSU are > working, and it gets only as far as the "I think, therefore I am a > processor; I wonder if I have any memory" test in the PROM, and then > executes a loop which controls the LED in the PSU if there's no RAM. At > least, that's what I believe; I've not seen a detailed description of the > PROM startup. I suppose your problem may be something similar, in that the > CPU is running but can't do anyting useful because either it's crippled or > some other part of the system is disfuntional. Does the CPU control the > power supply LED(s), like it does in an Indy? Yeah, pretty sure it does... Interestingly, I remove dthe two 4MB boards last night- no difference in bahavior. However, there are message strings in the ROMs dealing with RAM problems... -dq

23 years, 12 months

[PDP8-Lovers] Re: how to clean a PDP8/A, dishwasher?

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

From: Johnny Billquist <bqt(a)update.uu.se> >> As has been said before, what do you think manufacturers do at the end of a >> production line? > >They wash them yes. They *don't* put them in a dishwasher. There is a >hughe difference. Many did as it was cheaper than the commercial version. >> Be careful about that. Allison's warning about ESD is quite real. Don't >> even think about a feather duster; at least, not if it's a synthetic one. > >ESD should never be ignored, but in the case of computer from the 60s and >70s, ESD is really not an issue. We don't have CMOS, we have old style MSI >TTL here... It is not ESD sensitive. You can literally zap those >circuits, and they will work just fine. Sorry, not so. DEC did a study in the logistics flow to see why DOA boards were a problem. The reason was ESD even on older PDP-8 and PDP-11 modules. The test and solution was ESD procedures or all modules and the fail rate went down significantly. Seems for TTL while ESD generally didn't kill it it can and did damage the passivation or input protection leading to longer term failures that were chalked up to infant mortality. Characateristics that were often seen degraded were input thresholds, input sink currents, output leakage for open collector and tristate devices. With the rarity and parts availability of older machines a bit of care is warrented if only to reduce troubleshooting time and 90 day failures. Allison

23 years, 12 months

Flashing Light Indicators un Simple Front Panels

by dhquebbeman＠theestopinalgroup.com

> > PC that's got my ROM burner/reader, and read each one (if the > > ROMs aren't too large a size for my Needham unit). I'm assuming > > I'll see all 00s or all FFs (or maybe something like FEs) if > > they're blown; been a long time since I've looked at popped > > ROMs... > > What kind of ROMs does it use? Another possibility might be to find > someone with the same model of PR1ME (how rare are they?) and checksum > the ROMs & compare them...most PROM burners will generate checksums, > but now that I think of it, PROM burner manufacturers have yet to > standardize on a checksumming algorithm so it'd probably be useless > unless they're summed with the same make/model of burner. :-( My ROMs are fine; they read OK and I can provoke an error condition that results in a message to the console, and said message string resides in one and only one place- the microcode ROMs. -dq

23 years, 12 months

Flashing Light Indicators un Simple Front Panels

by dhquebbeman＠theestopinalgroup.com

> No, I'm afraid you may have hit it on the head, and it's been the > direction I've been leaning, that the microcode ROMs may have > fried, but that just blows my mind. Tonight, I'll set up the > PC that's got my ROM burner/reader, and read each one (if the > ROMs aren't too large a size for my Needham unit). I'm assuming > I'll see all 00s or all FFs (or maybe something like FEs) if > they're blown; been a long time since I've looked at popped > ROMs... Ok, my microcode ROMs are fine, via direct observation (dumped them to disk then ran them through my LOW7 filter to strip the mark parity bit from the Prime ASCII. I also verified the ROMs are OK by managing to provoke the system to issue an error message that resides *only* in those ROMs. > About the only other possibility is that the backplane got > cooked, but it looks fine... There are still some possibilities other than this, the Primes appear to have been way-overengineered w/r/t making sure the power is OK. Thanks for all the suggestions, folks... -dq

23 years, 12 months

[PDP8-Lovers] how to clean a PDP8/A, dishwasher?

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

Hi, I do cookies. It was something I did years ago{30+} to understand all that stuff. Allison -----Original Message----- From: John Allain <allain(a)panix.com> To: classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org <classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org> Date: Sunday, December 16, 2001 11:33 PM Subject: Re: [PDP8-Lovers] how to clean a PDP8/A, dishwasher? >> {everything about cores} -- Allison > >Thank-You very much for this. What's your consulting rate? > >> thats about it. > >No doubt. > >John A. > > >

23 years, 12 months

"Geeks" and licensing

by dhquebbeman＠theestopinalgroup.com

> Jim Arnott wrote: > > > > And what's the difference between an engineering project and Christmas? > > > > None. You do all the work and the fat guy in the suit gets all the credit. > > > > (did I read that here?) > > > > Jim > > And pay too! Well, The Jolly Old Elf has to deal with some less-than-pleasant happening.... the local radio stations have a Christmas song in rotation titled "I Farted on Santa's Lap"... we should be so lucky that the fat cats in suits would have one land on them... -dq

23 years, 12 months

"Geeks" and licensing

by dhquebbeman＠theestopinalgroup.com

> In practice the solution is to accept the fact that specs, no matter > how much they are labored over, are for most efforts soft, and > then describe mechanism to deal with uncertainty as part of the > development process. Rapid prototype, stepwise refinement, > the understanding that one cannot test their way to correctness and > a willingness to throw at least one implementation completely > away, coupled with small, agile teams that work with an active > user community empirically produce more correct results in less > time that alternative techniques. This all sounds very familiar... > Not like any of this is new. Brooks described this eons ago > in _The Mythical Man Month_... Ah, now I know why... insert <EWOK_WORSHIP_SOUND_EMOTICON> here. I can't tell you how many managers I've wanted to strangle using the prototype code they demanded I push into production... -dq

23 years, 12 months

Should engineers be licensed (Was "Geeks")

by acme_ent＠bellsouth.net

> From: Ben Franchuk <bfranchuk(a)jetnet.ab.ca> > "Should HTML/inline files be banded from EMAIL?" I ask. > As of late I have turned inline viewing off, with all the > stupid viruses around. My vote: ban 'em. Glen 0/0

23 years, 12 months

Troll got me (was Re: Is there no end)

by acme_ent＠bellsouth.net

> From: SUPRDAVE(a)aol.com > >>Gee, a message from an AOL user with no HTML . . . imagine that . . . > harrumph, will wonders ever fuckin cease? Well, gee, no offense, it's just that html messages are a PITA to read with my reader, and most lists and newsgroups frown on HTML posts. > >> Kwanzaa is NOT a real holiday. > > >Okay, I'll bite: why isn't it? > > figure it out yourself, google is around for a reason Google certainly is here for a reason, and I can do a search anytime I like. My reason for asking is that you had stated an opinion, and I was curious to find out more about your stated opinion. Based on the hostility of your reply, I'll assume I was mistaken in asking. Sheesh, man, what are you so pissed off about? This is a friendly list. If you are so afraid of expressing your opinions, may I respectfully suggest that you confine them to alt.flame.niggers, where you will find a lot of other cowards to associate with. FYI, I think it's a "made up" holiday and just wanted to know what your thoughts were. Glen 0/0

23 years, 12 months

Should engineers be licensed (Was "Geeks")

by mythtech＠Mac.com

>does it have a spell-checker? ROFL... well, I assume it does... and so does the email client I use... I just never use the spell checker... sorry, dyslexia has completely destroyed my ability to spell a damn thing, and I (as well as most everyone I write to) have accepted this fact, so I just don't use spell check as often as I really should. Heck... consider yourself lucky, I only made 3 errors in the last email (Strictly and default x2) But just for you... I spel chekt this emial :-) -chris <http://www.mythtech.net>

23 years, 12 months

[PDP8-Lovers] how to clean a PDP8/A, dishwasher?

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

It takes quite a bit to read one bit (the same amount to read all the bits on one sense line). You need to in order: Select the specific word (or bit) and drive it with the X and Y lines, each will be 50% plus a tiny bit extra current needed to switch a bit. And yes that is a regulated current or wire melting may occur! Typically it's a pulse of several hundred milliamps. Then at the right time after the select pulse is applied you will see a big or smaller pulse on the sense line. the difference between a 1 or 0(zero) is the timing and the height of that pulse. That was the nasty item as both timing of the XY select pulse and the time to the read window are current, temperature and specific to the cores used. The resulting signal is quite small and is measured in tens of millivolts for a core that switched and maybe a millivolt for one that did not. Yes, the sense line does have a lot of noise! To do that again or write a 1/0 you need to reverse or leave the XYselect polarity. The inhibit line (for a 4 wire core mat ) can be the sense line for write (three wire mat). To write the opposite data you select the core via XY with enough current to flip the core, to not write that value you apply enough current of the reversed polarity to the inhibit line to reduce the field(from the XY selects) in the selected core to less than the half select value. The basic operation of reading implicity sets all cores in the word line to the same state. To write (a word) along a word line you reverse the currents and also apply inhibit current on a bit by bit basis. The end result is some cores in the word flip (reverse the magnetic field) and those inhibited do not. Now... if you want simpler try this... Wind about 20 turns of wire on a nail (iron, or better yet steel). Wind another 20 turns. We use a lot of wire to get a BIG signal. Now if you hook a simple 1-3V DC meter to one winding and then hook the other winding to say a 1.5V battery you should see the meter pulse (basic transformer action). If you interupt the connection (off on off) you will see another pulse of differing polarity (needle will go the other way for a moment). Do that a few times to note the reaction and then reverse the battery and repeat. When you do that you will not the meter action indicates a bigger pulse the first time and back to like before if you do it again. Now the majik of core. When you magnitize something like that the nail/washer/core takes a magnetic polarity and holds it. If you reverse that magnetizing field you not only get the field but also the change in magnetic polarity. That change significantly greater. The other peice of majik is that while you didn't measure it in that simple rig the current required to magnetize the nail in the opposite direction is greater than if the magnetic field in the in the nail was random(zero). This is the characteristic called hysteresis, IE: to change a field takes more than the amount needed to maintain or initially estabilish it. I might have fluffed the grammer and spelling in my hurry to write this but, thats about it. Allison -----Original Message----- From: John Allain <allain(a)panix.com> To: classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org <classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org> Date: Sunday, December 16, 2001 2:02 PM Subject: Re: [PDP8-Lovers] how to clean a PDP8/A, dishwasher? >> No need to trace, they are quite regular, you can ohm them. You still >> need core drivers, sense amps and a dozens of diodes for current >> steering. > >We were thinking what could a person do to see the output from >just one core bit, not too much more than that... and then work up >from there. > >John A. >

23 years, 12 months

Ampro Little Board questions...

by acme_ent＠bellsouth.net

> From: Richard Erlacher <edick(a)idcomm.com> > A PC floppy cable certainly wouldn't work with the Little Boards I have, since > they use the standard floppy disk cable, which has no twists or cuts. Take a "modern" PC dual-fdd cable and cut off the end which has the twist in it. Glen 0/0

23 years, 12 months

MITS 2SIO serial chip?

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

From: Richard Erlacher <edick(a)idcomm.com> >the "vintage-PC" chipsets were 5 MHz parts, I do believe. That still wasn't >rocket-fast, but it was adequate for the 4.77 MHz i8088. Yes, and NEC and INTEL were selling 8mhz parts before then. The "PC" was slow by contemporary standards. I'd have likend it to building a 2mhz z80 system in 1981, equally poor thing to do. Allison

23 years, 12 months

Should engineers be licensed (Was "Geeks")

by CLeyson＠aol.com

>> From: CLeyson(a)aol.com >> Thanks to AOL I can't turn this feature off :-( > Yes, you can! I have posted numerous messages to this list (and others) > from an AOL account in the past and never sent anything but plain text. I must have missed your posts on the subject. This geek for one would like to know. Chris Leyson

23 years, 12 months

[Fwd: Re: Shall I open it, or does someone want it....]

by rhudson＠cnonline.net

Ok! Ok! I goofed - it's 1987, not 1967... There is one small hole in the plastic (1/2" round tear) There is an Epyx Catalog included as a supplement. (of course all the blow in cards are inside there too) Keith Johnson wrote: >> I have December 1967 inCider, > > > That *would* be an interesting read. Maybe it has a spread on the Univac? > > :P > > Keifer

23 years, 12 months

Shall I open it, or does someone want it....

by rhudson＠cnonline.net

23 years, 12 months

Should engineers be licensed (Was "Geeks")

by mythtech＠Mac.com

>> Thanks to AOL I can't turn this feature off :-( > >Yes, you can! I have posted numerous messages to this list (and others) >from an AOL account in the past and never sent anything but plain text. The latest version of the AOL client for windows no longer offers a way to turn of HTML email. HOWEVER, as long as you use STRICKTLY the defualt AOL email text settings, and NEVER do any kind of formatting, then AOL will still send plain text and not an inline HTML message. If you have changed the default settings, you can reset them. Somewhere in the AOL prefs is a button to reset them to defualt values. -chris <http://www.mythtech.net>

23 years, 12 months

Is there no end

by mcguire＠neurotica.com

On December 16, Bill Bradford wrote: > > > I have little doubt about the appropriateness... of your response. > > > Care to say when its appropriate to own three S/390's? > > It's wholly inappropriate. He should give one to me. > > No, you've already over-filled your Cray quota; you should have to give > one of those away (like say, the EL98, to me..) before you can acquire > any more "big balls" hardware. 8-) Ahh, you THINK so. ;) -Dave -- Dave McGuire St. Petersburg, FL "Less talk. More synthohol." --Lt. Worf

23 years, 12 months

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test-drb December 2001