test-drb October 2007

test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

228 participants
467 discussions

by paco.linux＠gmail.com

Hi all: I have a HP Apollo 425e and I want to run DOMAIN in it, but for this I need this type of keyboard. Has somebody a spare keyboard? Thanks

18 years, 1 month

Electronics Parts Stores near Seattle

by swtpc6800＠comcast.net

One of the last part stores in the Seattle area, Alphatronics, has move moved a few blocks to 1035 Andover Park East in Tukwila WA. http://www.alphatronics-usa.com/ I when there today to buy parts for a replica of the first MITS product. A Model Rocket Tracking Light from 1969. They had all of the parts on the shelf. I hope to have this built for Vintage Computer Festival in November. I have a copy of the article on DigiBarn http://www.digibarn.com/collections/devices/MITS-Model-Rockets-Tracking-Lig… Thank to Marvin Johnston for giving me some G pattern Vectorbord. Alphatronics had some nice S-100 prototype boards on sale. There is a box of various prototype boards on the floor near the cash register. Michael Holley www.swtpc.com/mholley

18 years, 1 month

That poor system/36

by ballsandy＠msn.com

> > I have been looking at this poor machine for almost two years now and I'm furious that there is no way for me to rescue it. > > Big S/36s are not all that rare. Look, and you will find one on the > West Coast. Do not delay, as I can see them mostly drying up in a few > years. > > > Only one other person openly admits they own one: that guy who runs the corestore, and he never responds to my emails. > > I will admit to having one, but I am not overly proud of it. I think I > can honestly say it is the least liked machine in my collection. > > -- > Will Well it's great to hear of another person who owns one. Why is it the least liked? The design? Well if they are quite common, people out here really don't want to part with them or their first thought is scrap it and then look for people willing to take it. I have been putting out wanted calls for these older mainframe systems for years now and I have never had one reply to any of them. It really make you think your search is hopeless I have always had a strong determination. It took years for me to get my first deskside and I never gave up. _________________________________________________________________ Send a smile, make someone laugh, have some fun! Start now! http://www.freemessengeremoticons.ca/?icid=EMENCA122

18 years, 1 month

TEACO Floppy Drive Tester

by snhirsch＠gmail.com

I picked up this unit today at the NEAR-Fest swap meet in Deerfield, NH. Does anyone know anything about it? It has connectors for 5-1/4" and 8" drives and looks useful. It's a Model 4077, if that helps. Steve --

18 years, 1 month

firmware updates [WAS Vintage computer photogallery - Time Magazine]

by compoobah＠valleyimplants.com

Jules writes: > I suppose real computers have a separate service processor for this > kind of > thing, so it's easy to put things right even if something does go > wrong (plus > of course the update can *only* be done from the service processor - > not from > some rogue code running on the main CPU) Not a service processor, but Alpha has a built in "failsafe loader" that allows you to rewrite the console firmware if something happens. It also has hardware lockdown of the PROM. I don't think I'd consider a separate service processor always a good thing, though - I've just been looking at the docs for the Sun E10k and if you loose the SSP you're pretty much hosed unless you can get Sun to make a new one up that matches your machine. Aren't IBM mainframes and their ThinkPads in roughly the same boat? There, though, I think it's easier to recover if you have a backup - I got the feeling that the E10k's unit was somehow hardware-locked to that machine.

18 years, 1 month

SGI Onyx - Three Phase to Two Phase conversion

by dm561＠torfree.net

-------------Original Message: Date: Wed, 10 Oct 2007 11:13:39 -0600 From: Richard <legalize at xmission.com> Subject: Re: SGI Onyx - Three Phase to Two Phase conversion <snip> Given all the conflicting information and personal anecdotes that people swear by ("turning on a VT100 will destructively read the ROM") that others have not experienced, the conflicting warnings and advice have lead me to the conclusion of just generally ignoring all such warnings and advice from this list. ------------Reply: It's getting harder and harder to find any wheat in the chaff on this list; no doubt in part due to the fact that some of the people who used to contribute good hard info got tired of wasting time scrolling through the irrelevant stuff and left. Even Tony who has so often contributed valuable information seems to be spending more of his time preaching and arguing his various gospels lately... m

18 years, 1 month

Extracting CDOS and CP/M) files

by dm561＠torfree.net

------------Original Message: Date: Fri, 12 Oct 2007 16:43:03 -0400 From: "Roy J. Tellason" <rtellason at verizon.net> Subject: Re: Extracting CDOS and CP/M) files On Friday 12 October 2007 03:23, M H Stein wrote: <snip> > > Want to copy your SDSS 8" disk to a DDDS 5" one? No problem. > Friend or business partner has some data on SDSS 5" disks that you > want on DDDS 8"? Just pop in the disks and copy away; add some > software and you can even copy to/from MS-DOS disks if you must. > Run Z80 CDOS/CP/M Wordstar on your 68000 Cromix+ CS-400? > No sweat (although a different issue). Process your old CDOS data > files with your UNIX software? Not much harder. > > It all just looks different from today's PC-centric perspective. So what sort of hardware does it take to be able to do stuff like that? I know my Bigboard II has both sizes of floppy drive connectors, though I think there's a jumper change involved to deal with different data rates IIRC. And there might be some potential for that board that's in my Cromemco, as well. I'm sure that a lot of my CP/M boxes have controller chips that are much more capable than the pc-centric stuff is, too. And how would the OS have to handle this? Some serious BIOS hacking? ---------Reply: The simple answer for a Cromemco box is a minimum configuration of a DPU, 16/64FDC, 128KB of memory and optionally a hard disk & controller. (You'd need somewhat more to run UNIX). AFAIK, as far as Cromemco systems go (assuming a 16FDC controller or later, and soft-sector disks): CDOS can read/write any one of the 8 (10?)possible CDOS formats and 8"SSSD CP/M (which, essentially being the first floppy "standard", was a more-or-less universal distribution medium for software such as WordStar, SuperCalc etc). Third-party software was available to handle other formats, and there were also custom versions of CP/M configured for a Z80 Cromemco. CDOS itself is a clone of an early 1.x version of CP/M, which Cromemco licenced >from DRI and enhanced somewhat with some additional calls, and it can run most CP/M software (at least early pre-2.x versions). Any version of Cromix (Cromemco's early Z80 and 68000 pseudo-UNIX) can read/write any version of CDOS or Cromix disk (floppies, that is; hard disks are a different story). Third-party software (e.g. CsCopy) can read/write MSDOS disks but requires Cromix+ (and a 680x0 CPU) which was the current Cromix version when the PC became commonplace. Cromix+ and UNIX both read/write UNIX format disks; anything else that Cromix+ could handle was transferred to UNIX via a shared HD partition. Anything else would indeed require some custom programming; the FDC controller cards were reasonably well documented. If the main CPU was a 680x0 instead of a Z80 then Z80 & CP/M software was run either on a dual (Z80/68000) DPU card or, if there was only a 680x0 CPU then it was run on the Z80 on an I/O card such as the IOP I/O processor or the Octart 8-port RS-232 card, if available. Their first hard disks were 11MB 8" IMI drives using a WDI controller; they were superseded by 5 & 20 MB 5" IMI drives requiring a WDI-II. Then came MFM disks using an STDC controller and SMD drives & controller, and finally ESDI and SCSI drives using the ESDC controller. The floppy controller also supported the small tape drives while the larger tapes required the ESDC controller, and there was also a controller and OS support for 9-track mag tape. mike

18 years, 1 month

2816s

by glen.slick＠gmail.com

On 10/12/07, Roy J. Tellason <rtellason at verizon.net> wrote: > > Speaking of which, I have a tube or so of 2816s around, and would appreciate > it if you guys could point me toward any materials on the 'net that'd give me > some ideas as to how you use those things... > > -- Here's a datasheet on how the Atmel AT28C16 works: http://www.atmel.com/dyn/resources/prod_documents/doc0540.pdf

18 years, 1 month

SGI Onyx - Three Phase to Two Phase conversion

by compoobah＠valleyimplants.com

Check the dates on your OLS PSUs - some of the early ones were defective and could catch fire. I would think that Boeing would have had them swapped out, but if it's an older Onyx (R4400 at 200MHz or below probably) it might have been pulled from service before the recall.

18 years, 1 month

Looking for an H3600-SA CPU bulkhead panel for a KA650/KA655 in a BA213

by glen.slick＠gmail.com

Anyone got a spare H3600-SA CPU bulkhead panel for a KA650/KA655 in a BA213? I recently picked up a VAXServer 3600 which has the KA650 board but is missing the H3600-SA CPU bulkhead panel and I would like to acquire one.

18 years, 1 month

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test-drb October 2007