test-drb November 2002

test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

252 participants
556 discussions

Some more info on the Philips P3800, and P4500

by julesrichardsonuk＠yahoo.co.uk

Will, > I came across a site today which provided more information on this critter, > and as Fritz had suggested, it is indeed a TurboDOS machine.. I have a copy > of TurboDOS around, but I don't know if Philips used a custom version or ? no idea on the data front. Did TurboDOS have built in multi-user support (I know nothing about it)? If not then I'd definitely think that the version on this machine was custom, as it has support for at least 4 if not 5 terminals in its current state. That's just going by the cables at the back; there's a lot of unused pins on the card edge connectors, so given that the website claims support for 62 terminals I expect it could make use of some breakout box arrangment to give more 25-pin terminal connectors. > Not to mention that I don't have a clue how I'd copy it, or even what > TurboDOS runs on. Here's the link I found to the info on the P3800: > http://www.digidome.nl/philips1.htm unfortunately I hit a bit of a snag with my machine. Following the flood damage the previous owner had tried to fix the system. Trouble was, the machine has two backplanes to it - the upper one with one row of card sockets and the lower one with two rows. System cards from the top rack will also plug into the bottom rack (which contains the PSU, mains voltage, and a spare slot for some unknown board). The disk controller had been plugged into that spare slot... :-( It wouldn't have got any mains voltages but it would have got +5 and +12V on all sorts of pins that it shouldn't have. I also found that the disk data bus (SCSI? SASI?) terminators had been misaligned and so it's possible some of the data lines were shorted together or at least had a low resistance connected across them. Curiously, the disk controller and the board the converts the system's SCSI/SASI bus to MFM look to be identical on the P3500 (from the photos on the website that Fritz posted about). So if one of those ever shows up, at the very least it'd be invaluable for checking that the hard drive on this 3800 is still operational - and in the absence of schematics for the 3800 it'd probably be very useful for fixing the 3800's disk controller. > Also, the P4500 is a minicomputer of some kind, apparently.. I'm not sure - I did a quick hunt on the web and there was very little information around. One site seemed to imply that it was much older technology than the 3800, but another site gave the impression it was much newer. Uless the model number was reused they can't both be right :) cheers Jules __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Everything you'll ever need on one web page >from News and Sport to Email and Music Charts http://uk.my.yahoo.com

21 years, 10 months

Tales of VCF 5.0?

by wh.sudbrink＠verizon.net

Anyone out there want to enlighten us poor slobs stuck on the wrong side of the continent? Anyone putting any pictures on the web? Thanks

21 years, 10 months

The "universal Retro-computer replacement"

by bpope＠wordstock.com

And thusly Jens =?iso-8859-1?Q?Sch=F6nfeld?= spake: > At 10:49 AM 10/31/2002 -0500, you wrote: > > >Am I correct in saying that the C1 now can "be" many other > >non-Commodore systems instead of a system with a native mode and just > >the C64 mode? > > Right. I'm really looking forward to playing Atari 2600 games on it, and to > turn it into my first machine ever, the Sinclair ZX-81. > > I visited Jeri and Courtney this summer in Miami, and only a day after I > left, Jeri wrote to me and said that she had produced a version that makes > the board a VIC-20. > > Although Jeri never really told the Schneider-CPC guys that she would help > them making a new machine (they announced it, but did not get her > permission), her board is now the "universal Retro-computer replacement". I > guess Schneider CPC is a fairly low priority, 'cause neither me, nor any of > my friends ever owned one, but it's possible. Just download a file from the > internet, write it to the CF card, plug it in and you have a new machine. > That's what "reconfigurable computer" is about. > > ciao, > -- > Jens Sch=F6nfeld

21 years, 10 months

NEC PC 8001-A, Commodore SX64, Mac Color Classic for Trade

by elmo＠mminternet.com

I picked up the following this morning: NEC PC 8001-A keyboard & base unit. Commodore SX64. Mac Color Classic 4/40 Left behind (like-new condition) Commodore 64 (no power brick) 1541 Floppy Drive Commodore Cassette Drive A cartridge labeled "SMORE". Comrex CR220 Serial Bus Printer None of these have any use or value to me, so if they do to YOU, please contact me off list for fair trade. Regards, Eliot

21 years, 10 months

TRS80 Model 3 i/o connectors

by acme_ent＠bellsouth.net

> From: Tony Duell <ard(a)p850ug1.demon.co.uk> > True, but you'd be amazed at what some people have problems with :-) Well, even at my advanced age I can still spot a mains connector ;>) > > Thanks for the information. I'll be poking around this critter more this > > weekend. Any gotchas I should know about? > > If you take the case apart, you need to realise that the monitor is not > separately enclosed inside/ This means that (a) there's high voltages > around (actually, there are also high voltages on the non-encased SMPSU > boards in there too...) and (b) the CRT neck is exposed and vulnerable. > It is possible to catch the end of the neck on the CPU board chassis when > putting the case together, and crack it. Then you're looking for a new CRT. > > The monitor PCB + CRT are fixed to the top part of the case, everything > else is on the baseplate. The service manual was helpful in opening the case. I show a lot of respect for CRTs when handling them! I had to remove the deadly-looking bare PSU mounted on the drive enclosure in order to work on the drives, so it also got the kid-glove treatment . . . What I meant by gotchas was: anything troublesome about the serial or parallel i/o? Any known bugs in the ROM? The manual very nicely documents the ROM routines (if the book is accurate) so this thing should be fun to do some assembler programming on. So far, despite all I've heard about "trash 80," this system looks pretty friendly. Later -- Glen 0/0

21 years, 10 months

avail: ATARI Hitchhikers Guide disk

by rschaefe＠gcfn.org

Pulled a 5.25" floppy out of an old PC clone I picked up. It's an original `The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy'. Got a number on it: IS4-AT1-FD1, and -FD2 on the flip side. I dunno what condition it's in, but there's no mechanical damage and no write-enable notch, so there's a reasonable chance that it hasn't been reformatted into a PC disk. Anyone want it? Bob

21 years, 10 months

QBUS UC04 SCSI ctrl

by Antonio.Carlini＠riverstonenet.com

>I'm looking for a manual for the EMULEX UC04 qbus SCSI ctrl. >I will pay for copying plus postage. I have a scan of something with the title: "UC04 Intelligent Host Adapter Technical Manual (MSCP Compatible)" It's nearly 200 pages and about 80MB, so it's too big for email. If you have (or someone else has) an ftp site, I can try uploading it. Antonio arcarlini(a)iee.org

21 years, 10 months

cctech digest, Vol 1 #191 - 35 msgs

by Maddog1331＠aol.com

Hi everyone, I am new to the board, and hope you might be able to help me figure something out. I have bought locally and resold old computer items over ebay, and I have come across what looks to be an old Honeywell dummy terminal, with keyboard. Here is a link to a pic: http://server3001.freeyellow.com/maddog1331/honeywell.JPG What I would like to find out is exactly what I have here, what it hooked into, what kind of value, when it came out, etc...I have checked on the net but have came up with nothing on this. Any help would be greatly appreciated! Sincerely, Mark Saarinen Kentucky, USA

21 years, 10 months

BBSs & PPP

by acme_ent＠bellsouth.net

> From: chris <cb(a)mythtech.net> > Although I haven't activated it and played with it yet... shell access > comes with my SpeakEasy DSL account. (I get 30 hours of dialup time a > month with my account). I don't know what exactly they define as shell > access, but they do seem "alternate OS" friendly, so it might be a real > honest shell dialup. > > I think they recently started offering national dialup only service, so > you might want to check them out to see what their shell service entails. > Go to www.speakeasy.net for info. Thanks, Chris. Speakeasy's shell accounts are available through dial-up, but the client system must run PPP & TCP/IP. Glen 0/0

21 years, 10 months

halloween thoughts

by cb＠mythtech.net

>Ok, maybe not. How about drawing eyes and a mouth on a broken >monitor... a Jack-o-CRT? Jack-o-CRT? Humm... maybe my wife should have made one of those last night. Instead she spent 3 hours carving a really nice ornate design into a pumpkin... to come home this afternoon and find that a rabbit ate the entire front out... now it is just an orange ball with a giant hole in the middle. Needless to say... I'm staying at work EXTRA late today... I'm not going home till she's a tad less pissed off. -chris <http://www.mythtech.net>

21 years, 10 months

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test-drb November 2002