test-drb September 2006

test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

200 participants
374 discussions

by jrkeys＠concentric.net

Hello All I'm still looking for help with the second rescue attempt in Georgia and need either 182 donors of $10 each or 1820 at $1 each. I would like to get to these items before winter really gets here, so please if you can spare a $1 (one buck) send it to the Houston Computer Museum, 15827 Thistledew Drive, Houston, TX 77082-1432. Cash or a check will do. Again the first trip was a great success and many thanks to all donors for that rescue. www.housoncomputermuseum.org Thanks in advance to all, John Keys

18 years, 3 months

Needed: Tandy 2000 manuals

by rcini＠optonline.net

All: I'm doing research for another potential emulation project. Does anyone have a pointer to an electronic copy of the Tandy Model 2000 Programmer's Reference Manual (260-5403) and the Hardware Reference Manual (260-5404)? Alternatively, if someone has hard copies that I can make a copy of, that'd work. Thanks a lot. Rich Rich Cini Collector of classic computers Lead engineer, Altair32 Emulator Web site: <http://highgate.comm.sfu.ca/~rcini/classiccmp/> http://highgate.comm.sfu.ca/~rcini/classiccmp/ Web site: http://www.altair32.com/ /***************************************************/

18 years, 3 months

RX02 Problem solved...

by gkaufman＠the-planet.org

Tony and others - The head load pad looks visually fine. The head load spring tension appears pretty normal , and the solenoid pulls in nicely. The drive consistently reads the first 10 or so tracks, then tosses various number of errors as it goes further out. I've cleaned the head, and cleaned/lubed the spindle. The track 0 sensor appears fine. It is indeed possible that the alignment is off - that would probably explain the poor performance as it steps out. I guess a worn out head would have the same symptoms. I the 70's I had a neat Dysan digital alignment disk that I used to realign a few SA901 and SA801 drives. Unfortunately I no longer have it. I suppose I could mark the position of the stepper and slightly rotate it in each direction to see if it improves things. If someone can point me to an actual alignment procedure I'm game - I have reasonable scopes etc here. I'm not anxious to replace the entire drive, but I would love to get this up and running! Any help/suggestions greatly appreciated. - Gary Other faults that I've had were a mis-aligned track 0 sensor (causing it to step out beyond the outermost formatted track on the disk), and a low-tension head load pad spring. In the latter case, taking the thing a aper and bending the torsion spring by hand got it going again. The only problem was reassembling it, I found it necessary to make a dummy pin to hold the spring inside the load arm that was then pushed out when the real pin was inserted through the head mouting. In any case, before replacing something as large as a drive unit, I'd want to know which of the various parts was the problem. Do you know, for example, that the head load solenoid works and pulls in correctly? That you can get a signal from the track 0 sensor? That the spindle is turning? and so on... -tony

18 years, 3 months

group buy for homebrew CPUs?

by dgriffi＠cs.csubak.edu

I was wondering if there's anyone else out there interested in someday building a Magic-1 and/or D16 homebrewed CPU computers. If so, I'd like to organize a group buy for some of the harder to source parts. Specifically, the 74F382 and probably 74F381. My favorite chip broker has a $50 minimum order. -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail?

18 years, 3 months

need docs for intel 80c186/80c188 evaluation board

by chrism3667＠yahoo.com

moochiss grassyass amigos __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com

18 years, 3 months

Anyone interested in this job lot (West Yorkshire, UK)?

by listmailgoeshere＠gmail.com

Due to an urgent need for more space, I'd like to know if anyone would be interested in taking ALL of the following off my hands. Doesn't have to be one person - feel free to club together with whoever you feel like if you can arrange it fairly quickly. I just don't want to ship individual bits of this or that to the four corners of the globe - I don't have time :( Here goes: HP 85 - 5 machines (one or two may be missing a few keys). I posted about these (and the 86Bs) on this list a while ago. HP 86B - 3 machines. All work, for varying degrees of "work". One seems totally OK, one seems to work but various characters of the screen are stuck as "M" right from switch on, so I'm guessing video RAM trouble. One has an unresponsive keyboard - a couple of the keys work but that's it. This one also has keys missing, so is probably best used as spares for the other two. There are RAM cartridges and ROM drawers on offer with these as well, also 5 off 9121 dual single-sided 3.5" HPIB drive and 1 off 9122 dual double-sided 3.5" HPIB drive, also 3 brand new rolls of paper and 6 tape cartridges Sun Ultra 2 300(ish)MHz - 384(ish)MB RAM Sun Ultra 1 140MHz, not sure how much memory is in it Sun SPARCstation 4, 110MHz, 96MB RAM, 1GB (I think) disk Sun SPARCstation 5, 90MHz, there's some memory in it but not sure how much Sun SPARCstation 2, 2 off, there's memory and disks in both Sun SPARCstation IPX, 2 off, both have memory and disks I think Sun SPARCclassic, faulty Sun SPARCstation SLC, has memory Sun SPARCstation ELC, has memory Sun SPARCstation ELC (faulty) - not sure if this one has memory Box of the system board and socket board combos from died-of-video-problems SPARCstation ELCs. There are about 8 or so of these, all have memory IIRC. Sun EXP-2 disk pack (the 386i style one) - 4 (one is for spares only). All have disks and/or tape drives in Sun type 411 disk enclosure, DAT tape drive fitted Sun type 411 disk enclosure, 4.3GB IBM harddisk fitted Sun type 611 UniPack disk enclosure, 7 off, all closed-face type. Most, if not all, have various low-ish size harddisks fitted Sun type 711 MultiPack disk enclosure, takes 12 SCA harddisks in SPUD brackets, complete with keys Sun "SBUS Expansion" with card and cable Sun GDM-17E10 17" monitor. Last known working, can't guarantee it still is Sun CPD-1790 17" monitor, works Sun GDM-20D10 20" monitor, 2 off. Both have different faults. One works fine once it's warmed up, but while it does the size of the screen "bounces" alarmingly all over the place. One has (as is written on the casing in biro) "LINE JITTER PROBLEM". These are stunning looking monitors - one even has its IR remote control. Make one good one out of the pair SGI 14" monitor. Yes, I didn't realise that any 13w3 monitors were ever made this small, but here it is. Don't know the model number offhand, sorry Huge box full of SBUS and UPA cards. Along with loads of CG3 and 501-2015s and stuff, there are some rarities in here (Vigra VGA cards, 4 off; others as well) Box full of Sun accessories - audio output breakouts, serial adaptors, drive mounting sleds, all kinds of stuff Huge box* full of SCSI cables of all varieties, from Sun DD50 right up to VHDCI Huge box* full of serial cables and RS232/MMJ-related adaptors Huge box* full of IEC 320 power leads Boxes of mice (Sun SDB, PS2 and serial) About 10 PC keyboards About 10 Sun Type 4 keyboards One or two Sun Type 5 keyboards One Sun Type 6 USB keyboard DEC MicroVAX 3100-30 - not sure if these have memory, they don't have disks DEC LA38 teletype DEC VT510 dumb terminal - 2 off DEC BA356 disk array - full of 4.3GB and 9.1GB drives. Has a personality module fitted, but I couldn't tell you what kind it is Other dumb terminals - there are about 20 of various kinds, including a Lear-Siegler ADM-11 which is retro-tastic Box of old SCSI and IDE harddisks 19" rack mount 10baseT network hub - 24 ports I think Drawer full of motherboards, 486 to Pentium era Various old media (including some hard-sectored 8" floppes which I think belong to something Tektronix) 3.5" floppy disk boxes - 3 of the "square" style (2 disks wide) and one of the "narrow" style (1 disk wide) Mac Plus 1Mb. Also an Apple 20SC harddisk to go with this - don't have the cable, though. Few miscellaneous external SCSI disk enclosures of various sizes Some x86 machines - few 486s, couple of Pentia (~120MHz) and two more interesting machines: - One DEC which has the CPU on a removable daughterboard (I have 3 of said boards - two are a single 486 and one is two Socket 5 Pentia. I can even give you the matched pair of P133 CPUs I bought to put in this). This machine has onboard Adaptec Wide SCSI. One Full Tower AT - will take (IIRC) 5 3.5" drives in a nifty swing-out cage, and 5 half-height drives (CDROMs etc). Currently fitted with a P200 with 64MB RAM and an Adaptec 2940W SCSI card. APC UPS system (don't know the model number offhand, but a smallish one) - batteries are duff, but I bought a slightly bigger battery (which has to go outside the case) and all the necessary big wires and connectors to be able to wire it in for use Entire shelf full of CDROM drives, including 4 Nakamichi 5-disc changers (two SCSI and two IDE) 7 off 3.5" HD floppy drives Several large bags full of various cables and x86 accessories (floppy, IDE, ...) Few boxes of various ISA/VLB/PCI cards - mainly graphics and network Probably a bit more stuff that I haven't listed, as well The catch: you must take it ALL. Currently, it's filling a room (and overspilling a bit from that) and I want it gone. I'd say this is going to fill at least 2 estate cars, so you'd probably want a van. I can help you pack and carry it out. How much? Make me an offer. The offer can be from "free but I can have it gone REAL SOON" upwards. I really wouldn't say no to some cash ;) This stuff is teetering ever closer to getting landfilled; I'd hate to see it be lost to the community but I honestly can't keep it any longer. I hope someone/some group out there can give it a good home(s). Ed. * where these are concerned, you can take the *contents* of the box but not the boxes themselves - they were quite expensive. I have many flat-pack cardboard boxes and can make some up for you to take stuff away in.

18 years, 3 months

WANG micro? found

by jwest＠classiccmp.org

Surplus dealer saved an odd looking box for me. It's a WANG, slightly larger than a typical PC with monitor and keyboard. Comes with a case of floppy disks, most of which are original WANG labels. I couldn't make out much from them other than some of it was some productivity type software. The front dimensions were square (Width = Height) and the depth was unusually deep (maybe 2.5 to 3 feet). In the front was a power switch, 5.25 floppy drive, and visibly the front of some small hard drive (looked like the old IBM PC drives). The thing that piqued my interest is that it supposedly had 10 terminals hanging off the back of it before it was brought in. I'm going back tomorrow to pull it out and get more info about it. Jay

18 years, 3 months

Resetting connectors (Was: Personal Iris IRIX issues..)

by mtapley＠swri.edu

At 19:30 -0500 9/17/06, Jochen Kunz wrote: >Sometimes it helps this old hardware to be "kreidlered". I.e. >disassemble the whole machine, reaseat all PCBs and connectors and try >again. (Sometimes connectors get a litle bit of corrosion etc. that is >cleand out by un- and repluging the connector.) Thirded (1). I have a Mac Plus with Brainstorm accelerator (16 MHz 68000, plus SCSI chip upgrade). It has been giving me fits with intermittent operation for years. Tuning the 5V setting on the analog board *right up* against (but not over) the crowbar seemed to help, but it'd still reset periodically. Best diagnostic I have is (unfortunately) still a Radio Shack Archerkit analog VOM, which does not show momentary Voltage transients. Finally, this month, I was doing battle with it again, got the 5V setting tweaked up and the machine running face down, but then it failed when I set it back up on its feet. At long last, during the post-failure examination, I took loose and re-seated the power cable >from the analog to digital board at the *analog board* end. I'd done this dozens of times at the *digital board* end - that's a lot less likely to take out the end of the CRT when my hand slips - but not at the analog board end. Machine has been running without problems since then. Wife is re-addicted to Dark Castle (and I have to put in a good word for Delta Tao on that score, they just sold me, at a discount, the original software! (2) ), kids getting addicted to Concertware + MIDI. Next project may be to find a MIDI interface for the thing and start learning more about digital music. (1) I'm curious about the etymology - where does the expression "kreidlered" come from? (2) Not affiliated, but if I had to choose one company in the field to hold up as wonderful, Delta Tao would be it. -- Mark Tapley, Dwarf Engineer (I haven't cleared my neighborhood) 210-379-4635

18 years, 3 months

Anyone interested in this job lot (West Yorkshire, UK)?

by listmailgoeshere＠gmail.com

Hi Simon, On 9/20/06, Simon Fryer <fryers at gmail.com> wrote: > I'll find out of the computer museum at Bletchley Park would like any > of the items. Jules Richardson, who works at the Bletchley museum, has already posted in this thread with what they'd like :) Jules Richardson wrote: > [snip] it's perhaps worth rescuing the Tek > hard-sectored disks for the museum; that's assuming that nobody has a more > pressing need for them (and their contents!), of course - I just wouldn't want > to see them go to landfill. > Small hard disks (particularly SCSI rather than IDE) are also worth rescuing > if nobody else wants them. > Oh, I believe we're short a few Sun type 4 keyboards for all of our Sun kit > (assuming the ten that were listed don't belong with the machines that were > also listed :-) > The UPS would be darn handy for the couple of new servers that have been put > into action recently... Austin, who's stated that he wants all the Sun kit (though it seems to be in high demand ;) has let me know that he's happy for all but a couple of the keyboards to go to Bletchley. I've had no requests so far for the UPS, box of small harddisks, or the Tek 8" floppies other than Jules's one (though several people have pointed out that said floppies should be saved - don't worry, I'm not going to landfill those even if some of the hardware does go. They will go to somewhere where they'll be preserved), so I'm guessing that lot goes to Bletchley (if it can find transport there) unless anyone else wants? There are most likely enough Sun keyboards that some go to Bletchley, anyone who wants just one machine can take one, and then some can go with Austin. I want to be as fair as possible about this :) I'll do a proper count of them over the next few days and post back here. John Shadbolt wrote: > Thanks Ed for offering this grand collection. No probs. Having been on this list for years, it was my first port of call for sure :) > I am particularly interested in the HP-85s and 86Bs, If you're not thinking of keeping all of these machines, would you be able to keep in touch with Vassilis, and this list, to find good homes for the others? I did have some interest when I initially advertised them shortly after I rescued them, but being unable to get onto testing them I wasn't able to do anything further about it. I would like any ROMs that Vassilis doesn't already have archived in the www.series80.org collection to go to him first for the use of the community. Actually, it's not going to take particularly long to pull the ROM drawers and inventory what I have here - I'll get onto that within a few days and post back here. > but could take other stuff too if it helps (eg Sun). I think some of this Sun kit has found homes several times over by now ;) There's a stack of MicroVAXen you're quite welcome to take on, though! Ed.

18 years, 3 months

toner transfer circuit board etching

by chrism3667＠yahoo.com

by any chance does anyone use this method, and would be willing to small *even* number of sheets? The one place I know of that sells it has a $50 minimum order (Halted). Or maybe someone knows of a place with fewer restrictions. __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com

18 years, 3 months

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test-drb September 2006