>
>Subject: RE: Ultrix for DECstations
> From: "Bill Sudbrink" <wh.sudbrink at verizon.net>
> Date: Sun, 13 Nov 2005 22:10:41 -0500
> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org>
>
>Allison wrote:
>> Bill Sudbrink wrote:
>> >Allison wrote:
>> >
>> >> First choice when all else fails, vi.
>> >
>> >Can't resist... really, when _ALL_ else fails, ex.
>>
>> Did you mean ED??? That loathsome excuse for a tool!
>> I'd rather hurt myself before using that. Scratch that.
>> Every time I've used it, I did hurt myself.
>
>Uh, no, I meant ex, the line level editor that runs under vi.
>When you can't even get vi to run right (termcaps messed up
>or, in one case I experienced, most control characters being
>filtered/screwed up between me and the system I was trying to
>edit a text file on) give ex a try.
OH! Yes I've done that with good success. ED (CP/M {ED},
DOS{EDLIN}) is their very unadorned line editors designed
to inflict pain.
Allison
I saw this in today's copy of my local newspaper
on-line. The location of the building is in New
Windsor, NY. Stewart International Airport -as
some of you know- sits on the border of the Town
of Newburgh and New Windsor. It used to be and
still is to a degree, a major Marine, Army and
Air Force base. More currently, it is a
commercial international airport and a base for
the Air Force, local Army and Air Force Reserves
and touts a pair of the biggest runways in the
USA. It is the 3rd location on the list for
emergency landings for the Space Shuttles if
something should go wrong. Unfortunately, as this
piece suggests, the military has already removed
the actual SAGE equipment from the building. I
used to go on walks past this building as a kid
as there is a path near it that my family would
take through a wooded area (scenic stuff) and up
until recently, was open to the public, sort of
like a park. I figured I'd send this to cctech
because it has a lot of historical relevance.
-John Boffemmyer IV
STORY AS FOLLOWS:
July 16, 2005
Cold War building faces colder reality
By Jeremiah Horrigan
Times Herald-Record
jhorrigan at th-record.com
New Windsor ? You'll find it on the edge of
Stewart International Airport, a windowless,
four-story concrete cube that looks like it could withstand a nuclear blast.
And that's exactly what it was built to do.
If things had gone as many Americans feared
during the Cold War, if the Russian bombers had
finally come over the horizon, the Semi-Automatic
Ground Environment building was the key to the
country's military defense system.
The building that once thrummed with the
tensions of a time when nuclear Armageddon was a
constant threat was abandonned by the military
decades ago. The unnerving skeleton of its legacy
remain, including the war room, where
etched-glass maps of the Eastern U.S. display
likely Russian targets. Above the maps looms a
doomsday tote board, meant to track the "progress" of World War III.
Even before the '50s faded and ICBMs became
the weapon of choice among the world's
super-powers, the SAGE building had become as
antiquated as an Edsel. It's now slated for the
wrecking ball under the airport's new 20-year master plan for development.
And that plan is under siege by a group of
people who for years have been laboring to
transform the SAGE building into what they call a Cold War Peace Museum.
Ulster County Legislator Susan Zimet has
spearheaded the effort, lobbying, fundraising and
proselytizing on the building's behalf for the past five years.
To her, the building isn't a dead relic but a
living reminder of an era she believes we forget at our peril.
"All the stuff we deal with daily ?
terrorism, the possibility of nuclear terror or
the situation in Korea ? it all began with the Cold War."
Zimet's not much of a history buff herself,
and, after years of exploring possibilities,
she's doubtful the building is suitable for becoming a first-class museum.
But that, she argues, doesn't mean the
building should be demolished. Taking it down (at
an estimated cost of nearly a million dollars)
would be no different than destroying
Washington's headquarters in Newburgh, she says.
Tanya Vanasse toured the building's interior
recently. She wasn't impressed. Vanasse is the
airport's director of marketing. She sees no
reason to keep the building around.
The airport's master plan calls for the
building to come down sometime between 2008 and
2012, to make way for a rail yard that would be
part of a new train station, according to Zimet.
"I can see no viability of making this into a
public space. It's far too dangerous, it's got
far too many accessibility problems," she said
last week. "I could see removing the (etched
glass) pieces and building a display around them."
Vanasse said the plan is open ended, that no
hard-and-fast timetable exists. Nevertheless,
Zimet's group is urging people to sign petitions
that would preserve the building.
In the meantime, the SAGE building, silent
and foreboding as a tomb, continues to do what it has always done: It waits.
Anti-blast from the past was built to last
If it goes, the Semi-Automatic Ground
Environment building won't go easily. Its thick,
lead-reinforced concrete walls were intended to
withstand the ravages of a nuclear holocaust.
Only a direct hit could have taken it out.
The building was designed in the mid-1950s as
part of a network of identical
information-gathering centers built throughout
the country that was supposed to protect the
country's nuclear bomber fleet. Its designers
intentionally made it so nondescript that only a
handful of military personnel even knew of its existence or purpose.
Its computer system was beyond compare,
requiring thousands of square feet and at least
as many delicate transistors to track potential
intruders. Watching the skies at a SAGE building
console, said one retired Air Force veteran, was
like something out of "Buck Rogers."
But, like so many other state-of-the-art
defense systems, this one was obsolete almost
before it became operational. It was designed to
combat nuclear bombers. By the end of the decade,
intercontinental ballistic missiles had become
the bomb delivery system of choice.
The structure was officially decommissioned
in 1969. Since then, it has served as a
free-trade zone. Its ground floor is now occupied
by a chocolate- packaging factory.
Jeremiah Horrigan
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HI , i hope this is a ok adress , i think that 4 yrs is a bit much i bought a tandy 1400 lt and
it works fine ... when i try to format a disk , i get a 360 not the 720 ????
,
i have and old ibm lt that willl make 720 that the tandy will use ok , so what gives
thanks george
>
>Subject: Re: semi-homemade micro
> From: Mike <kenziem at sympatico.ca>
> Date: Sun, 13 Nov 2005 20:29:35 -0400
> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org>
>
>On November 13, 2005 6:18 pm, woodelf wrote:
>> Allison wrote:
>> that I know of that you could get source for to adapt to your
>> computer. Once the PC arrived
>> open source vanished. Sure linux is open source but who can read or
>> adpt the several meg
>> of source to a small machine.
>
>Linux supported CPU's
>Dec Vax
In rumor only!
However Linux (or elks) on TI9900, PDP-11, Z80, 6502, 6800 and 6809
seems to be missing.
For those you have CP/M, OS9, and others but not linux. However
the Z80 there is UZI-unix.
Allison
>
>Subject: Re: semi-homemade micro
> From: "Chuck Guzis" <cclist at sydex.com>
> Date: Sun, 13 Nov 2005 17:33:32 -0800
> To: cctalk at classiccmp.org
>
>On 11/13/2005 at 5:19 PM woodelf wrote:
>
>>>Want to try an emulation project? take a 8048 or 49, strap EA
>>>(uses external rom then) and write a program to make port 0 and
>>>some latches and stuff on the bus port look like a version of
>>>your favorite CPU of any word length. Sure it will be slow
>>>(8049 @11mhz run instructions at 1.3us) but different! hang
>>>ram rom and IO even front pannel on the emulation and you have
>>>anything you can imagine and fit in 4k or eprom and 128bytes
>>>of internal ram (8049).
>
>Why not something like an Atmel ATMega? Fast and cheap.
That would work too. I picked 8049 or 8051 series as they are also
cheap often found in useless equipment and tools to work with them
are free and I have a coffee can full of them. ;)
At the other extreme a PIC might do a it too. The idea remains
no differnt than using a PC to emulate Xyz save for a smaller
machine IE: a chip maybe slower and embeddable. The side benefit is
the "microcode" can have a debugger built in.
Allison
>
>Subject: Re: semi-homemade micro
> From: woodelf <bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca>
> Date: Sun, 13 Nov 2005 17:19:15 -0700
> To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts <cctalk at classiccmp.org>
>
>Allison wrote:
>
>>What do you mean by "Well what about them?"?
>>
>>
>>
>Tell me more about them! Non 8 bit word length computers.
I think there is a 22bit forth machine out there and ofcourse people
have done FPGA PDP10 and I also heard once someone doing an 18bit
PDP7.
>All my small C stuff is stored safe in my bitbucket. It has too many
>8080 design gotya's to generate code for the cpu design I have now.
>I don't have register to regsister addressing and indexing from the
>A register.
And that stopped you? really I have a SmallC compiler that produced
ok 8080 code. By OK it's as good as an 8080 can do.
>Out here all the junk is dead PC's. :(
Thats largely what we have here these days. However 386 and 486
board have nice cache rams some TTL and the like. That and I find
in piles.
>>Want to try an emulation project? take a 8048 or 49, strap EA
>>(uses external rom then) and write a program to make port 0 and
>>some latches and stuff on the bus port look like a version of
>>your favorite CPU of any word length. Sure it will be slow
>>(8049 @11mhz run instructions at 1.3us) but different! hang
>>ram rom and IO even front pannel on the emulation and you have
>>anything you can imagine and fit in 4k or eprom and 128bytes
>>of internal ram (8049). Those 8048s and 49s are common and
>>easily found in keyboards (LK201 has the faster better 8051!)
>>and is a cool old cpu to work with.
>>
>That is a nice idea!
Everyone has done the PC emulating whatever. Why not take a single
chip micro and use that to emulate another micro as hardware? Same
idea maybe slow but for a lot of things speed is not the whole world.
I did it on paper for PDP8 and it was possible using an 11mhz 8049 to
come within 1/10 the speed of a real 8. I guess a 36bit machine could
be done as well (though really slow.). Also a front pannel could be
programmed into it as well (maybe a speed hit). Any cpu that gets
an instruction from memory and then executes it can be emulated that
way.
Allison
>
>Subject: Re: Wangtek DC-300 drive and controller
> From: "Chuck Guzis" <cclist at sydex.com>
> Date: Sat, 12 Nov 2005 22:00:06 -0800
> To: cctalk at classiccmp.org
>
>On 11/13/2005 at 12:44 AM Allison wrote:
>
>>It might be QIC, QIC02 or QIC24 and definately not SASI or SCSI though
>>they existed at the time.
>
>Allow me to clarify:
>
>The interface from the controller to the host is what I'm asking about, not
>the interface from the controller to the drive, which I'm almost certain is
>QIC-02 or some variety thereof.
>
>Cheers,
>Chuck
If not sasi/scsi it could be "host" as in the hard disk bridge boards.
Host interface is IDE of the time as it's a register interface with
re/, wr/, a few address lines, data and reset more or less. Makes
it generic.
Allison
>
>Subject: Re: semi-homemade micro
> From: Scott Stevens <chenmel at earthlink.net>
> Date: Sun, 13 Nov 2005 19:11:13 -0500
> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org>
>
>On Sun, 13 Nov 2005 17:42:02 -0500
>Allison <ajp166 at bellatlantic.net> wrote:
>
>> >
>> >Subject: semi-homemade micro
>> > From: compoobah at valleyimplants.com
>> > Date: Sun, 13 Nov 2005 11:22:23 -0600
>> > To: <cctalk at classiccmp.org>
>> >
>> >All the talk about building a mini from TTL got me thinking about homebuild
>> >micros, and what one would look like if I decided to build one
>> >(been playing with my IMSAI, too, which probably accounts for some of it)
>>
>> >=0D=0A
>>
>> Using RTF??
>>
>> >RISC would be out, due to difficulty of assembly coding,
>> >and 8086 seems a bit dull.
>> >Z-8000, TMS9900, and RCA1802 seem unavailable, and 6120 doesn't
>> >have many registers.=0D=0A
>>
>>
>> The 1802s are available as is the 6120 (spare time gizmos has kitted both).
>> (Harris makes the 1802 and 6120.) old 1802 can be salvaged from EFjohnson
>> made VHF mobile radios of early 80s vintage and 6120s from defunct
>> DECmateII/IIIs.
>>
>
>(echoing a sentiment expressed here earlier) Perfectly good DECmateIIs??
No I mean defunct ones or as I found a few as just the main board from
DMII/III as salvage (no case PS or ??). Good ones work and you use
them as is and enjoy them. Besides a working DM runs OS278 and WPS
both useful!
>I have 6100s, too, if you want a scaled back version. The 6100 is a
>great 'easy' first processor to use- all static CMOS with very lax
>timing requirements for the clock signal. 12 bits, though. And,
>of course, the PDP-8 instruction set.
PDP-8 interuction set reminds me how programming can be fun.
Enough of the things needed to write practical code but not
one drop more. That and you can remember the whole instruction
set and it's opcodes!
I have a base 6100 machine, Intersil super sampler with with
4kram and the monitor, (rom can be dropped after loading ram
low).
Allison
>
>Subject: Re: semi-homemade micro
> From: woodelf <bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca>
> Date: Sun, 13 Nov 2005 16:18:41 -0700
> To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts <cctalk at classiccmp.org>
>
>Allison wrote:
>
>>Uhm, what about 12bit[OS8 srt-8]? There are few othter word lenths
>>than those that are not unobtainium.
>>
>>
>>
>Well what about them?
What do you mean by "Well what about them?"?
>>>You can only get the 16 machines easly and resonable source of a OS.
>>>
>>Explain that from your perspective.
>>
>My perspective is things that I have seen in my past other than DEC or
>IBM or other BIG IRON.
>That was mostly 8080's , Z80's and other items advertised in BYTE. CP/M
>was the only one
>that I know of that you could get source for to adapt to your
>computer. Once the PC arrived
>open source vanished. Sure linux is open source but who can read or
>adpt the several meg
>of source to a small machine. Minux was a nice try but it lacked a C
>Compiler. Small C went
>a DEAD end route as you could only use it if you bought the out of print
>books.
Really! theres more stuff about smallC than ever on line. Maybe back
then life was hard but now with the 'net and Google I'm getting to try
and use those things that back then were either too exotic or hard to
find and maybe even too expensive [especially hardware]. Even Minix
has evolved (V3.x now).
>>>The 68000 yes still works best with 64k addressing.
>>>Oddly the only micocomputer chip I like ( other than the 6800/6809) is
>>>National Semiconductor's 16032 is another chip that you could never get.
>>>
>>
>>T-11 regular instruction set of the PDP-11. Not too hard to find.
>>Z8001 and Z8002s I have a few of. Z280, theres an interesting varient
>>of Z80 with 24bit MMU that looks like the DEC PDP11 MMU (even I&D!).
>>
>Yes I know I keep forgeting the 11 but I got forced into using PC's so
>only now do I have the time and a tiny amount a money for classic computers.
My last employer went downhill as did my job with it so I have time and
very little expendable cash. However with junk, spares and imagination
I achieve a lot with near nothing. PCs I find costly and less productive.
Maybe I'm more of the do it and don't tell me how it's hard person. I'd
be dangerous if I had gobs of cash and free time converge.
>From scrap and salvage I'm building a lot of stuff around here from 6M VHF
SSB radios to really oddball 1802 systems.
Want to try an emulation project? take a 8048 or 49, strap EA
(uses external rom then) and write a program to make port 0 and
some latches and stuff on the bus port look like a version of
your favorite CPU of any word length. Sure it will be slow
(8049 @11mhz run instructions at 1.3us) but different! hang
ram rom and IO even front pannel on the emulation and you have
anything you can imagine and fit in 4k or eprom and 128bytes
of internal ram (8049). Those 8048s and 49s are common and
easily found in keyboards (LK201 has the faster better 8051!)
and is a cool old cpu to work with.
Allison
>
>Subject: semi-homemade micro
> From: compoobah at valleyimplants.com
> Date: Sun, 13 Nov 2005 11:22:23 -0600
> To: <cctalk at classiccmp.org>
>
>All the talk about building a mini from TTL got me thinking about homebuild
>micros, and what one would look like if I decided to build one
>(been playing with my IMSAI, too, which probably accounts for some of it)
>=0D=0A
Using RTF??
>RISC would be out, due to difficulty of assembly coding,
>and 8086 seems a bit dull.
>Z-8000, TMS9900, and RCA1802 seem unavailable, and 6120 doesn't
>have many registers.=0D=0A
The 1802s are available as is the 6120 (spare time gizmos has kitted both).
(Harris makes the 1802 and 6120.) old 1802 can be salvaged from EFjohnson
made VHF mobile radios of early 80s vintage and 6120s from defunct
DECmateII/IIIs.
Bob Armstrong [Spare time gizmos] has both the ELF2k and Embedded ELF
(1802) with an option for IDE/compactflash disk to run ELF OS. The
6120 has IDE interface and even a front pannel option. they aren't 100%
kits but all the seamingly unobtainium [PCboard, PALS/GALS, PROMS and CPU]
are covered.
Z8000 can be found but takes a bit of hunting.
The easiest source for 9900s is an old 99/4 console thats munged.
the 6120 (PDP-8 with EMA) is a great programming machine. Minimal junk
to get in the way and it has the PDP-8a dual stacks as well.
>Looks like the best available ideas from an ease-of building and
>obtaining would be Z-80 (or variant), 6809, or 68000 (close to
>top in complexity, esp. if a front panel is wanted).
>6502 could also be a possiblity.=0D=0A
>I suppose either native IDE or another system serving as a storage
>server would be the way to go, the IDE could either connect to a
>old drive or a smallish CF card, and flash firmware would probably
>be best, or EEPROM. SRAM seems to be the way to go for smaller
>systems.=0D=0A
IDE is a easy interface for most micros and it's been put on
1802, 6120, 6502, 6809, Z80(family), 8085, TI9900, Z8000,
68000 and likely I've forgotten a few dozen.
One you didn't mention is the T-11 (base pdp-11 40 pin chip) as
these can be salvaged from VT240/241 terminals, HSC50s, RQDX1/2/3
controllers and a few other DEC boards. Interface is 8085ish and
that and 32k of ram would be a PDP11, the IO is tough as if you
wish to run DEC OS you must simulate DEC devices (some are easy).
>Just wondering what the thoughts of the list would be for specs
>of a "new" hobbyest micro.=0D=0A=0D=0A
First off any cpu is reasonable. Depends on preferences, what you have
and maybe phase of the moon. Same for level of complexity.
At one end you have the COSMAC ELF with 256bytes of ram and rudimentary
front pannel simple and inexpensive. At the other extreme some of the
Z80 flavors like the P112 (everything including the kitchen sink).
Then there is do you want a bus or no, expansion or no, fully loaded
or just minimal.
I consider 1802 8085, z80, 6502 and 6800/6809 all very easy to use and
interface. Even the TI9900 is not to bad if you have the clock
generator chip [9904]. Believe it or not the 68000 is fairly
straight forward and only bit worse than 6809. the Z8000 is hardest
of the ones mentioned as the bus is more complex.
For most a front pannel adds significant complexity, notable exception
is 8035 (8048) and 1802.
If I'm doing Z80, I pretty much expect to run a language in rom or OS
such as CP/M. with those in mind the must haves are:
Z80, z180, Z18x
RAM at least 32k (more is good)
boot rom
2 serial ports Console and link to PC for download.
1 Parallel port for printer
some kind of mass storage (Floppy, IDE, CF, Flashram)
However you really asking an open question with no direction given.
Allison
