"David V. Corbin" <dvcorbin(a)optonline.net> wrote:
> As shown by the above quote, there is a strong anti "PeeCee" bias by many
> here.[...]
but this forum centers on variance, if everything is the same, what is the
point of discussing/preserving it.
The differences/peculiarities/innovations exhibited by many of the old
machines make them so fascinating. If you give me a 20 year old PC,
it will take me no time to setup it up with DOS and even networking.
But what would be the point, I can do the same thing in a VMware
window on my Linux workstation.
The neat thing about the old machines is that it takes for ever to set
them up and this is what's so intriguing about them. I remember a
posting (not in this forum), about a guy who got an old IBM 360
mainframe working. He said that once it was working there wasn't much
to do with it.
> IF the computer industry had remained with a large number of completely
> different hardware/software environments which required trained operators
> for even the most basic operations, then computing would not have become a
> household commodity.
> [...]
> Standardization of both hardware and software HAD TO HAPPEN, if computers
> were to become the commodity they are today.
I am afraid that computing standardised too early causing everybody to
get locked into a technology that is too clunky. Microsoft's "innovation"
essentially boils down to two things:
a) adding useless junk to their already bloated platforms, and
b) adding "essential" applications (e.g. Web, or audio) to their
base platform so as to dictate the standards and eliminate
competition.
This strategy, although excellent for Microsoft, is to the detriment of
everybody else.
I have PCs running windows because I must, but I don't need the latest
and greatest Microsoft offering, I am running Windows NT4.0 with Office
95 (which btw will soon be covered by the 10 year boundary :-). I will
soon have to move to something more recent mainly because vendors do
not support Windows NT, so I will not have the drivers to run Windows
NT on my new hardware. PC hardware *is* a commodity, but never be fooled
into thinking that Windows software is also a commodity.
**vp
I've got a pair of non-working Commodore SX64's here.
One machine powers up, but the floppy drive light remains lit and I can
hear the drive spinning continuously, and there's a 50% grey pattern
filling the screen (i.e. pixels look to be alternating white/black).
Actually, there's also short run of pixels middle-bottom of the screen
which aren't illuminated at all. Pressing reset has no effect. Pressing
caps-lock does result in the caps-lock light illuminating, but I don't
know if that's a simple circuit hardwired to the key and doesn't go via
the CPU...
The second machine is totally dead - no activity whatsoever. There's a
*very faint* humming noise from the monitor area, typical of a display
that's at least getting power though - but on the CPU side of things no
chips seem to be getting remotely warm, suggesting that there's no +5V.
Before I start digging deeper, does the fault with the first machine
sound familiar, and are there any common PSU faults which affect these
systems? Plus, anyone have schematics they could scan?
Be nice to get one of them going. One keyboard is damaged (plus I only
have the one original keyboard cable), so it's only really viable to
have one running, but I'd like to get to the bottom of what's up with
both of them...
cheers,
Jules
Crisis Computer in San Jose has the equipment to write CE packs.
They aren't going to be cheap. I'm guessing $300 to $500.
They are probably the only place in the world left that has the
gear to do this.
Realigning 2315 heads isn't something you want to do if you don't
absolutlely HAVE to, since you run the risk of making the packs
that you have unreadable, if they were written on drives that are
off spec.
-------------------
I believe I have to consider this. I have no packs with any data on
them that I need. They were all just data packs with automotive
parts in inventory and such. I cleaned a pack and loaded it into
my RK05 drive zero and it would not pass the read/write test. I don't
remember what happened when I tried to use drive 1. I believe it failed but in a different manner. I thought if at least one drive
was working I'd be Ok for awhile. I am not sure if I want to spend
$300-$500 on trying to get a CE pack that may not help me if my drive
is failing for some other reason than alignment.
_______________________________________________
Join Excite! - http://www.excite.com
The most personalized portal on the Web!
Thanks Pete for your fast answer.
Yes it is a BASIC 4 Machine with these 4116-4 RAMs.
You wrote the correct substitute for the ROM chips are
Texas Instruments TMS2532 or equivalent. Is this right for
all the chips I will list below? I hope the TMS2532 are
easy to purchase here in Austria. Looking through my
little library I found the datasheet (at least a good
start) but I couldn't find a refence for substitutes - do
there exist any? Are the TMS2532 fully Pin-compatible with
the MOS ones? And my last question: Do I need anything
special to write these chips? I'd put together a little
circuit to hook on my Pc's Parallel-Port (this would be
the easiest way for me). I'm already googling for
information, but would be very glad of some links to
schematics and software.
Best regards,
Wolfgang
====================================================
Ing. Wolfgang Eichberger cell.: +43-664-240-65-92
http://www.eichberger.org
email: wolfgang(a)eichberger.org
----------------------------------------------------
Gruentalerstr. 24 - 4020 Linz ? AUSTRIA
====================================================
On Jul 21, 7:55, wolfgang(a)eichberger.org wrote:
> a couple of days ago my Pet 2001N (the 2000 Model without
> the cricklet-keys) gave up :(.
> Could somebode
> please provide me some Info, what Eproms I could use as
> replacement for the original Commodore ones (Basic 4)?
If it's BASIC 4 and dynamic RAM chips, it should be 4K ROM chips, and
the EPROM equivalent is Texas Instruments TMS2532 or equivalent. Note
that this is not the same as the more common Intel type 2732.
> I'm
> also a bit confused what image I should use (see
> http://www.funet.fi/pub/cbm/firmware/computers/pet/index.html)...
It depends on exactly what type of PET you have. But I'm not sure
there's a whole set there, for the later PETs.
I *think* you need:
kernal-4.901465-22.bin
basic-4-b000.901465-23.bin
basic-4-c000.901465-20.bin
basic-4-d000.901465-21.bin
and possibly one other that I don't see (901465-29 or equivalent). I
can't remember what's in the E000-EFFF space. The best thing to do is
look at the ROMs you have, see what the numbers are, and try to match
them. As far as I know, you can't mix parts of sets.
--
Pete Peter Turnbull
Network Manager
University of York
The Smalltalk software has been taken.
Michael Holley
swtpc6800 at comcast.netwww.swtpc.com/mholley
----- Original Message -----
From: Michael Holley
To: cctalk at classiccmp.org
Sent: Tuesday, July 20, 2004 9:01 PM
Subject: Smalltalk Software
I have a Smalltalk software package that is available for the cost of
shipping.
This is Digitalk Smalltalk/V Windows 2.0. I purchased it in Aug 1994 (10
year rule) for a course I took. I have the complete package: manuals, disks,
and box.
Email me
Michael Holley
swtpc6800 at comcast.netwww.swtpc.com/mholley
Hi,
a couple of days ago my Pet 2001N (the 2000 Model without
the cricklet-keys) gave up :(. See
http://www.portcommodore.com/commodore/pet/petfaq/models.html
for reference. It's the 2nd machine from top, equipped with
32k RAM. When trying to boot it puts random characters on
screen. As far as I found out this _should_ be a ROM-Problem
(could be RAM too, but I hope it's ROM as I ran a Ram-Test
successfully before the Pet died). I would like to try
replacement ROMs before I have to use one of these
replacement solutions plugging a little board into the CPU
socket and providing it's own ROM and RAM. Could somebode
please provide me some Info, what Eproms I could use as
replacement for the original Commodore ones (Basic 4)? I'm
also a bit confused what image I should use (see
http://www.funet.fi/pub/cbm/firmware/computers/pet/index.html)...
As you see, I have a lot of questions. Please excuse my
horrible english. I'd be habby about every hint, trick etc...
Best regards,
Wolfgang Eichberger
PS: It'd be great too, if somebody could provide me burnt
roms as my only eprom-burner is for C=64.
====================================================
Ing. Wolfgang Eichberger cell.: +43-664-240-65-92
http://www.eichberger.org
email: wolfgang(a)eichberger.org
----------------------------------------------------
Gruentalerstr. 24 - 4020 Linz ? AUSTRIA
====================================================
I have a Smalltalk software package that is available for the cost of shipping.
This is Digitalk Smalltalk/V Windows 2.0. I purchased it in Aug 1994 (10 year rule) for a course I took. I have the complete package: manuals, disks, and box.
Email me
Michael Holley
swtpc6800 at comcast.netwww.swtpc.com/mholley
There were probably a lot, but I remember "Call/370", which I think was
one of the first commercial ones.
==
I have an Auerbach report on timesharing services which I'll try to dig
up, which gives short company histories for many of the early commercial
services. Most of the major computer companies were offering some service
by the late 60's. Part of IBM's antitrust settlement with CDC was that
CDC got IBM's service bureau operation. GE timsharing stuck around for
a while. Tymeshare was one of the earliest independents, bootstrapping
themselves and fixing tons of bugs in the GENIE code.
I also forgot to mention HPs timeshared basic and 3000 systems, also from
the very early 70s ( the 3000 being HP's 'real' timesharing machine, so
they said)
At 20:42 18/07/2004 +0100, you wrote:
>> Btw, do you (or anyone) have the pinout for 4564 DRAM's? I'm wondering
>> if they are in backwards (as noted previously, someone "worked" on this
>> unit) - 16 pins, showing +5 on pin 8 and Gnd on pin 16 - backward to
>
>That is the conventioanl pinout for 64K DRAMs (like the 4164). The old
>3-rail 16K ones (4116, etc) had -5V on pin 1, +12V on pin 8, +5V on pin
>9 and ground on pin 16 (this is burnt into my brain).
>
>I don't think your RAM is in backwards. Certainly don't turn it round yet!
>
>-tony
Hi Tony,
Thanks - I hadn't "turned them around" as I wanted to be sure before doing anything
that could cause more damage than may or may-not have already occured. I did recall
that some 5v DRAM's had "weird" pinouts.
Looks like the machine is zeroing RAM (causes a screenfull of '@' on apple display),
and then getting "lost" before it ever makes it to the disk ROM (or at least doesn't
turn on the drive motors) - Bad RAM would have explained that nicely (bad stack)
- I'll do some more conventional debugging to see what it is accessing and see where
that takes me.
Regards,
Dave
--
dave04a (at) Dave Dunfield
dunfield (dot) Firmware development services & tools: www.dunfield.com
com Vintage computing equipment collector.
http://www.parse.com/~ddunfield/museum/index.html
