Hello,
Before I continue with my Vax 3400, I want to get my PDP11 put together,
physically. I have a few things I would like to find, and a few
questions.
My 11 came with a 3 4-port serial cards. They are M8043 boards. I
can't see myself using that many serial ports. Does anybody have the
little blank steel plates to put in a BA23 chassis so I can remove the
plates that have the 4 db25 connectors?
Also, I need the plate that fits into the space below the serial ports.
It looks to be slightly larger than a centronics 50 SCSI connector.
Would anybody have the dip switch and jumper settings for a M8190-AE,
that's a KDJ11-B from a 73 or 83. My 11 was upgraded from a 53.
How about memory? If I use the memory that came with it, and do a "map"
it tells me the memory is parity. I bought a few surplus boards and one
appears to be ECC memory. I don't know anything about ECC, is it better
than parity? I have a 2-meg ECC board and 2.5 megs worth of parity
memory between 2 boards. One of my parity boards says "Mos RAM" What
is that? It is a M8067 LJ.
I am thinking that I would like to keep the chassis out of the tower.
Does anybody have a spare plastic bezel for a rackmount setup. I don't
have a rack, but it would take up less room if I keep the tower in
storage.
What to call this thing? It has the cpu board from an 11/83, but it
doesn't have the PMI memory of an 83. I would like to upgrade the
little square badge to reflect its current config.
Also, does anybody want a big Cipher tape drive? I also have a Emulex
TCO2 (I think that's it) to drive it, although I don't have the cables
to hook the two together. It would be free for the taking. I don't
think I want to ship it.
Chad Fernandez
Michigan, USA
>> In fact... I seem to remember that the Ultrix-11 installation
>> manual specified this action during the installation process.
>> No urban legend.. I remember doing it on a home -11...
>> sync; sync; sync; halt
>Years ago (so far back in another year it will be ontopic), this was
the
>correct way to shutdown Linux as well.
And years before that - SCO XENIX and then SYSTEM V Unix - we were
told the same thing, though this way
sync
sync
sync
shutdown / halt (or whatever the command was)
Delurking here for a bit.
My sole collectibles are TI 990's and the TI PC (the first computer I
owned). Most haven't been fired up in a while. Was once a field
service tech for TI way back when. Still have a good bit of
documentation and half-forgotten knowledge of those machines. I also
know a much smaller bit about the TI Unix and LISP boxes.
FWIW.
Guntis.
Hello, all:
I'm muddling through this a bit. I found an old CGA monitor up in
the attic that I attached to the TrackStar. I'm able to boot the TS into
Integer Basic successfully. I still don't know if the composite output works
since I think that there is a problem with the Apple Composite monitor I
have (it displays only a yellow background). I think that the updated FAQ
mentions that it's a video level problem.
Using the TS utilities, I was able to create a DOS3.3 disk image in
the TrackStar format. the TS will not "boot" that image, nor will it boot
the image included with the drivers. I still can't get it to boot.
I just checked the Apple2 FAQ and the TrackStar page was updated
about 1 month ago. It mentions that some TS disk images are available from
the GSWorldview archive, a link which doesn't work. Does anyone have a link
to the working archive?
As a result of this experimentation, I think that I'm going to do a
TrackStar Web page this weekend.
Rich
>> also, does anyone know of anything that used 68450 chips?
(they're 4-channel
>> DMA controllers for the 68k apparently). I found a couple of
these amongst
>> the piles of junk I have and am curious as to where I might have
got them -
>
> In a 64 pin DIL package or a 68 pin (?) PGA package?
64-pin DIL.
> I've seen the former in sevaral machines, including the Torch XXX.
The
> latter was used in the PERQ3a. Although if you stripped either of
those
> machines for parts, I would feel justified in stripping _you_ for
parts :-)
hmm, strip away :-)
It's possible... I never had a complete XXX system, but Torch used to be my
local source of PC bits (around 1990 or so) and I knew the guys there via a
friend of mine. I remember piles of XXX machines on the shelves gathering
dust, not sure what happened to those (are Torch still around? Unlikely).
Occasionally I used to get other odds and ends from there (I have a set of
XXX floppies someplace) so may have had a dead XXX system board or something
>from them which I pulled the 68450's from.
I used to work for a place up in Cambridge that was primarily a PC repair
shop, but they used to sell anything computer-related so long as it was
mainstream-ish (ie. lots of Amstrads etc. too). Occasionally we'd get
oddities in, which is where a couple of my bigger systems have come from.
The boss always wanted such machines stripped for useful parts (typically
just memory and disks, workstation monitors if they were there) and then the
rest was scrapped :-(
Unfortunately he always wanted a ridiculous amount of money for any of these
systems complete, otherwise I would have saved whatever I could (anything
with SCSI disks seemed to automatically command a tenfold price increase!).
I have a vague memory of at least one XXX system which passed through there,
an IMP system, several big Apricot towers, and some Acorn Unix system of
some sort. It's possible I scavenged the 68450's from the bin awaiting
disposal, although I have no idea what I thought I was going to do with them
:)
I seem to remember a big white cabinet on wheels (3' high, 18" wide by maybe
4' deep) which we used to ride around the warehouse on :-) No idea what the
innards of it were though! Oh, for some reason video memory was never saved
- if we had a dead PC SVGA card it just got thrown out as-is. I had a nice
little scam going pulling memory off these dead boards and selling it to
people wanting to upgrade their PC video cards from 512KB to 1MB.... the
video memory was usually intact even if the boards were toast.
cheers
Jules
>> does anyone have a spare 16MHz 68k CPU...
>
> Was the MC68000-12 rated to 16Mhz, or did people just run it that
fast? I
> remember it was an issue for people who tried to clock-double
their A500s.
how did you know? :-)
I have an old A500 which it'd be nice to increase the speed of, add an IDE
disk to it, increase the memory etc. It had been left outside and all the
metal screening's gone pretty rusty, hence it makes a nice project machine!
The information I've seen suggests that SGS-Thompson parts were 12MHz and
Motorola-badged ones would run at 16 (even if they were badged as 12's). If
I can find one of the chips I'll find out :-)
> I've seen at least one Amiga peripheral that used a Motorola DMA
chip (forget
> if it was 2-channel or 4-channel). Microbotics SCSI? Software
Results had
> a WAN router box that was never released, that used a 68450 per
serial card
> for high-performance serial (vs the non-DMA 8-port low performance
card). I
> doubt if you got it from that - I have the boxes (and 8-layer
boards!) up
> in the attic. ISTR they used 600 RPM 3.5" drives, too.
Nope, none of those. I had all of the boards from a phone exchange at one
point (that was a *lot* of silicon) and pulled many Z80 + support chips off
those, but don't remember there being any 68k-family stuff. Strange...
cheers
Jules
Hi Steve,
How much would you be after for the Apple ///? I understand shipping might
be expensive :) And the Mac portable for that matter.....
> Date: Tue, 24 Apr 2001 14:55:03 -0700 (PDT)
> From: steve <tosteve(a)yahoo.com>
> Subject: Computers for swap or sell
>
> Hi,
>
> I have some extra systems, see if there's anything
> that you like!
>
> 1.Apple IIc with monitor (small green screen)
> 2.Apple IIc Plus
> 3.Apple III with Monitor III
>
> 4.Macintosh Portable (model 5120)
cheers
adrian/witchy
www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk - the Online Computer Museum
0:OK, 0:1
Wow, I just did a search at http://groups.google.com and they've now got
all of the DejaNews archives back online! It was actually a problem, I was
expecting to only pull up a couple hits, and I got a LOT!
Just thought I'd share the good news!
Zane
--
| Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator |
| healyzh(a)aracnet.com (primary) | OpenVMS 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.aracnet.com/~healyzh/ |
On Apr 26, 22:50, Iggy Drougge wrote:
> >> I have no respect for a system which needs to be pampered before one
> >> may hit the power switch, so nowadays, I just flick the switch when
> >> I feel like it, be the system Windows, Mac or UNIX. Haven't had the
> >> opportunity with VMS yet. =)
I can do that with my SGIs running UNIX, because they have soft power that
actually works. The OS intercepts the sinal from the switch and does a
clean shutdown. (Unlike the Sun Ultras I've used, where the soft power so
rarely works when we want it to, that we've often ended up yanking the
power cord because nothing happens).
> NetBSD and OpenBSD boxes seem to boot fine, albeit slowly.
Because they have to check and sometimes fix the disk. If shut down clean,
they don't have to do that.
> So what if they're writing to disk? If they have proper file systems that
> won't really matter. Mind you, at least I always check that the drive
lights
> aren't on.
Having a proper file system won't prevent corruption at some level. What
do you mean by "proper", anyway? Even a journaling file system like XFS
can't preserve data that was being written when it was interrupted, and you
WILL get some data corruption, even if it doesn't corrupt the structure of
the disk (making a bad block). Just because some systems silently deal
with most problems next time they start up doesn't mean you've not done
some damage. One day it won't be repairable without intervention.
--
Pete Peter Turnbull
Network Manager
Dept. of Computer Science
University of York
The PCjr in question with the expanded memory is only counting
up to 128 when it POSTs, so I am pretty sure that the expanded
memory isn't getting any power at all. If the memory would
appear during the POST, my life would be wonderful. My other
extended PCjrs POST past 128KB.
So are there any Rapport Drive II owners out there that want
to tell me what the external power supply looks like? Does
it output the same as the PCjr power brick, or is it a different
beast?
The Rapport looks like a pretty neat device. The standard
PCjr diskette controller can only support one drive. They
use the standard controller, but they "borrow" some of the
lines on the floppy cable and run it through some additional
logic to add two drive support. It also looks like it has
a parallel port and a clock/calendar on it. It's also got
a switch labelled "PC/PCjr" - it either disables all of the
addon crap, or it adds a feature that I'm unaware of. Any
guesses?
Mike
Hello, all:
Well, I've finally gotten around to playing with the Diamond TrackStar
board. Has anyone gotten this to work successfully?
I've downloaded all info that I can find relating to the TS, but it only
includes the "hardware" portion of the install manual. Does anyone have the
"software" portion of the manual?
Anyway, here's where I am so far:
The board's installed and the software that I have seems to recognize the
board and allow me to do certain things, like configuring the drive slots
and assigning PC ports to the virtual Apple ports. I was also able to create
a 10mb ProDOS volume on the C drive of this test system (a 486/66 with 16mb
of RAM).
I have a genuine Apple ][ floppy drive connected to the TS. I can "boot"
the Apple ][ drive, but it does not seem to recognize the disk. I've tried
ProDOS8 and DOS 3.3 disks, neither one of which works. I did have the cable
upside down initially, and then reversed it. The drive light comes on at the
right time, so I'm hoping that I did not trash the drive.
The TS has a composite video output, so I figure that I can connect it to
the Apple Color monitor I use for the ][+ I have. All I get is yellow
streaks. I don't have a generic 9-pin RGB monitor to try the direct video
output.
I also noticed that the TS has an empty 16-pin socket at position U63.
Since I have an incomplete manual, this may be for Apple Paddles or
something else. Any info on this?
As always, any information is greatly appreciated.
Rich
Rich Cini
Collector of Classic Computers
Build Master for the Altair32 Emulator Project
Web site: http://highgate.comm.sfu.ca/~rcini/classiccmp/
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