> I'm not a collector, but I have run into a type that
> you might not have seen... oriental rug mousepads.
> There's the Mouse Rug, but that's a fake -- just an
> oriental pattern printed on a plain old mousepad.
> But there are also woven rug type pads, which are
> far nicer.
> I got mine from oldcarpet.com.
Yup - got me one too. Still using it at this moment. I picked it up at a
Las Vegas Comdex convention some 7-8 years ago.
The main reason I purchased it was the fact that it claimed to
automatically clean your mouse. In fact, printed on the backside of it is:
"Automatically Cleans Your Mouse"
I don't remember ever having to clean my mouse since. (And yes - I still
use a mechanical mouse with said mouse ball. Haven't gone optical yet.)
>From: "Vintage Computer Festival" <vcf at siconic.com>
>
>On Mon, 28 Feb 2005, Tom Jennings wrote:
>
>> On Mon, 28 Feb 2005, Vintage Computer Festival wrote:
>>
>> > If I then try to DIR the disk the head backs up a track or so but can't
>> > seem to recalibrate to track 0. The head vibrates as if the drive is
>> > sending the signals to the stepper to retract the head but it only manages
>> > to move back a track or so each time I issue DIR. If I do it enough it
>> > eventually gets back to the stop position but it still gets sector errors.
>>
>> Wrong step rate! Poke a new on eint othe chip, or does it use the old
>> table of junk INT 13h used to supoprt?
>
>Um, I'm not sure. I'm not sure I understand the question either. This is
>a standard ISA IDE+floppy controller. Should I try an older one? Or hook
>this up to an oldr PC from the 1980s?
>
Hi
There is a table that one stores the step rate
for the drive. You need to alter the value for
slower drives, like your 8 inch. I forget where
is it but it is in that lower area someplace
( 40:xxx or something ). It isn't a problem
of the controller. It should work with any controller,
you just need to find the table and change it.
It has been a while since I've fiddle with it
to make my drives step with less noise ( and wear ).
Dwight
Just grabbed an ASR-33 on ePay.....LOCAL so no shipping damage (except what I induce).....
Since I dont carry my reference manuals with me, can anyone post the "proper" size for the hold-down bolt(s)??????
I want to pick this up on the way home this evening....
I wonder if there is some incompatibility when reading 60MB
tapes in a 150MB device.
--
I've read hundreds of 60 meg tapes on 150 meg drives.
What probably has happened is the end of the tape where the direction
reverses either has been damaged
due to the tape being slightly sticky with age, or there is now a pile
of oxide and binder where the direction reversed.
Whoever developed serpentine transports apparently never thought about
the problem of oxide and binder
shedding as the tape ages (or gets sticky). You end up with gunk on the
head, which deposits itself on the
tape when the head reverses direction.
Since the real size of a QIC tape block is 512 bytes, you might try
reading 512 bytes at a time to keep the drive
>from trying to form a larger block near the far end of the tape out of
parts from the forward and backward tape
directions. This also minimizes the data lost if a block can't be
recovered. The down side is it can slow transfers
down a lot.
>From: "Tom Jennings" <tomj at wps.com>
>
>>> From: "Tom Jennings" <tomj at wps.com>
>>>
>>> Unlike film, you can'y simply open the shutter and integrate the
>>> image over time arbitrarily. CCDs are extremely noisy; silver
>>> nitrate (etc) it's at atomic scale.
>
>On Wed, 2 Mar 2005, Dwight K. Elvey wrote:
>
>> Actually, once compensated, CCD's have much more
>> dynamic range than film. They can be used to integrate
>> over long periods of time ( usually cooled ). They
>> have issues but don't confuse poorly compensated
>> camera's with the ability of a CCD.
>
>I realized astronomical cameras for example use CCDs, most
>definitely cooled, for very long integrations, but the context of
>the conversation implied hand-held, non-cooled, ordinary, cameras.
>I wasn't slagging CCDs or holding chemical film on high (though
>would that be out of character for this list? :-); just wanted to
>point out things aren't simply linear like that.
Hi
It really depends on the actual CCD. I have one that
I use un-cooled but it is a low noise CCD. I have
used it for 5 min exposures. There is a static drift
that is different on each pixel. I compensate by
subracting the dark current field. This is not noise
but would look like noise when used in an uncompensated
photo. If one can make a dark field time exposure of
the same length of time, one can subtract that and
get a much better image, without cooling.
Dwight
I downloaded this and am using it with a LA100 instead of a teleprinter - the artwork is keeping the kids quiet (at least the bits I'll let them look at). I might even get the old Creed 7B teleprinter out and see if I can get it to run!
Jim.
Please see our website the " Vintage Communication Pages" at WWW.G1JBG.CO.UK
Having received some of these in the mail, what's the best way of
imaging them onto modern media?
I hooked up a 150MB SCSI QIC drive to my Linux PC, and it seems to be
able to pull data off them happily (even though they're only 60MB).
However the tapes contain multiple archives which I'm not too used to
handling, plus the archives aren't in any format known to Linux (so I
guess dd is the tool for the job there)
So, is it just as simple as making sure the tape's rewound, then keeping
on issuing: dd if=/dev/nrst0 of=archive01 (with a different output
filename each time) ? As nrst0 is a non-rewinding device, I assume the
tape will be left at the start of the next archive on the tape after
each dd command?
Or is it more subtle than that and the archives aren't necessarily back-
to-back? Do I need to be issuing some sort of mt command inbetween dd
commands to make sure the tape's positioned at the start of the next
archive each time?
cheers
Jules
>From: "Tom Jennings" <tomj at wps.com>
>
>Unlike film, you can'y simply open the shutter and integrate the
>image over time arbitrarily. CCDs are extremely noisy; silver
>nitrate (etc) it's at atomic scale.
>
>
Hi
Actually, once compensated, CCD's have much more
dynamic range than film. They can be used to integrate
over long periods of time ( usually cooled ). They
have issues but don't confuse poorly compensated
camera's with the ability of a CCD.
Dwight
