test-drb October 2007

test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

228 participants
467 discussions

SGI Sirius Video Breakout Box -- do you need the i/f board?

by legalize＠xmission.com

There's one on ebay right now (item 230183969927) complete with the cabling and connectors to the chassis. No cables connecting the board to the breakout box, though. -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html> Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>

16 years, 5 months

Tandy Logix-Kosmos (was: Re: Ferranti Logical Computor (1951) )

by blstuart＠bellsouth.net

> > http://oldcomputermuseum.com/logix_kosmos.html > > That was the first one I had - the overlays inside were, IIRC, printed > tissue paper. Me too. I still remember how I would forget that they were not symmetric, so if you put them in backwards the separators between the output values and the plastic separators between the lights don't line up. > > Mine died of corrosion on the contacts, and was (regrettably) > > trashed, I'm pretty sure. > > I remember the contacts weren't great on the best of days. I think my > step-mother threw mine out when she decided my room was too messy. > :-( Yeah. The contacts were my biggest source of frustration. I probably would have done a lot more with it, if I hadn't had to wiggle wires and adjust the contacts for every "program" on it. Believe it or not, I still have mine. I even have it upstairs where I can find it. Not that I've used it any time recently. > My only real complaint with it as a teaching tool was that even though > I did all the projects, there was no abstraction of the underlying > concepts presented. I agree. They also didn't do a good job of clarifying that the device only implemented combinatorial logic. As I recall, I got it before the idea of a stored program really clicked with me. Unless I missed it, they didn't have a discussion in the manual that said, this "computer" does this, but real computers also have memory that stores not only data, but instructions too. BLS

16 years, 5 months

PERQ Emulator Progress (of sorts)!

by derschjo＠msu.edu

Sorry, I just had to share this with someone, and I thought some of you guys might appreciate it... I've been working on a Three Rivers PERQ emulator since last year in my spare time, though I've had basically no time the past eight months or so. Last I left the code, it managed to boot POS about halfway before the boot process would hang. Well, I managed to fix (or at least, work around) the bug causing the hang, which brought me to this: http://yahozna.dyndns.org/projects/PERQemu/PERQ-3.png Ok, it doesn't look like _much_, but compare it with the photo here: http://yahozna.dyndns.org/computers/perq/photos/pos-boot.jpg (Hint: They're the same thing, only one's really scrambled up :P) The boot process is still erroring out, but it's about 99% there (at DDS 951). Of course, I obviously still have a ways to go. As evidenced by the completely garbled text, I have yet to get the PERQ's unique (and extremely complicated) RasterOp hardware emulated to any significant degree. And after that I have a ton of hardware details to work out. But this is a major milestone, and I'm so excited that I just had to share my excitement with someone... I never thought I'd get anywhere near this far with the emulation, given how complicated the PERQ is. And if I've seen so far, it's because I've been standing on the shoulders of giants. Or one giant, at least -- our own Tony Duell who's been ever-so-patient with my questioning and who probably knows more about the PERQ hardware than the original designers did... Thanks for taking a look, and sorry for tooting my own horn... Josh

16 years, 5 months

top2049 programmer as 74xxx chip tester

by lynchaj＠yahoo.com

Hi, Does anyone have any experience with using a TOP2049 as a TTL 74xxx chip tester? How did it work for you? Do you recommend it as a worthwhile piece of test equipment? Thanks! Andrew Lynch

16 years, 5 months

SGI Onyx - Three Phase to Two Phase conversion

by jplist2007＠kiwigeek.com

Greetings all; I'm reading up on the Onyx (rackmount, original Onyx) and the manual says that units with three power supplies (OLS') are configured for three phase, and units with two OLS' are configured for two phase. While my machine does have the optional lower VME card cage and also the second SCSI box (thus necessitating the 3 OLS'), I won't be likely to use either of them. 220v I can do (handy-dandy nearby 40A circuit for a stove) - 3 phase would require wiring changes in the building. Is anyone aware if there was an established procedure to go from 3 phase back to 3 phase on these units? Could I be lucky enough to have someone here who has done it? Thanks! JP Hindin

16 years, 5 months

SGI workstation sequence

by jvdg＠sparcpark.net

Sridhar Ayengar wrote: > David Griffith wrote: >>> I think it goes like this, someone please correct me if I'm wrong: >>> >>> 1984 IRIS (terminal/workstation) >>> 1988? Personal Iris >>> 1990 Indigo >>> 1992 Indigo^2 >>> 1993 Indy >>> 1996 O2 >>> 1999 Octane >>> 2000 Octane2 >>> 2002 Fuel >>> 2003 Tezro >> >> I seem to recall the O2 coming out in 1999, roughly at the same time as >> the Octane. > > Didn't the O2, O20 (Octane), O200 and O2000 come out at roughly the same > time? More or less. Besides that, the Indigo2 and Indy represent a split in the low-end line, both being offspring of the Indigo, with O2 being Indy's successor and Octane being Indigo2's successor. The O200 was the offspring of the Challenge S (and M) low-end server offering. The Fuel and Tezro are also pretty much complementary machines. Also, since Octane sported the Cube logo, I seriously doubt that 1999 introduction date. The logo was changed in 1997/1998 and debuted on the Octane2/O2+ in the IRIS workstation line. Here's the family tree, then: /-> Indigo2 -> Octane -> Octane2 -> Tezro Personal Iris -> Indigo -< \-> Indy -> O2 -> O2+ -> Fuel ,xtG tsooJ

16 years, 5 months

An old dream come true: Iris Indigo!

by robinson＠shlrc.mq.edu.au

Hi gang, > > > Can I use a PC mouse/keyboard with that? > > > > You cannot. You need to use a SGI keyboard and mouse. > I have plugged a PC kybd/mouse into a SGI Crimson and an Octane and they seemed to work OK. > > > Are the monitor frequencies suitable for a modern PC monitor? > > > > They aren't. It's sync-on-green, so you either need a good monitor and > > you definitively need an adaptor. > Needed a special cable so I used a Sun cable on the SGI monitor. Worked OK. Have not tried any other monitors. Regards Ray vk2ilv

16 years, 5 months

Quadram Quadboard

by geoffr＠zipcon.net

Does anyone have docs for this beastie? it's an apple-II on a card that goes into an XT... or does anyone have any interest in it? it's been sitting on my shelf for ~ 12 years now...

16 years, 5 months

Alternative Hardware Design for Floppy Interface

by lynchaj＠yahoo.com

At 01:42 PM 10/19/2007, you wrote: >Grant Stockly wrote: >>What do you guys think? The thing has a peripheral expansion header. >>We could hook a modern floppy chip to that, connectors for >>different drives, and off we go... > >What's the cost like? Is the board made up of separate components >(CPU, ROM, RAM, USB chip, buffers for I/O, Ethernet chip etc.)? > >I'd find Ethernet more useful than USB, and in an ideal world I'd >prefer a board where the functional areas are segregated (rather >than some complex and expensive single chip, where if disaster >strikes the thing basically needs throwing out and replacing as a >complete unit) The base eZ80SBC from howard is $250. Add $100 for the disk board... -----REPLY----- Hi, By the time you add in all the costs of the CPU board with IO, case, power supply, cables, documentation, plus the specialized disk controller, AND write most if not all of the software this project is quickly going to become uneconomical for all but the most patient and financially well off. You could use a throw away old 486 or Pentium II computer with ISA and/or PCI slots to provide any interface you'd like (ethernet, SCSI, ST506, USB, whatever) for a whole lot less time and effort. A double sided 48tpi floppy drive will read practically any format given the right controller. The same can be done for whatever sort of drive you'd like to test. I have made and am using a few bench stations for testing floppy drives, ST506/ST412 hard drives, SCSI, etc for a small fraction of what the cost you are proposing. I am sure many others here are doing the same thing as well. In addition, reusing old PCs effectively removes them from the waste stream which is not only economical it is environmentally friendly as well. Get a small enough PC and they are portable assuming you choose standard interface for peripherals like VGA, PS/2 keyboards & mice, etc. On top of the above, as an added bonus much of the software is already written. You can use ImageDisk for soft sector floppy disks, SpinRite II for ST506/ST412 hard disks, etc. Respectfully, it seems like the proposals being discussed are reinventing the wheel by developing and/or repurposing a new CPU and IO board rather than reusing proven and cost effective solutions which already exist. It is just my $0.02. Best of luck with your project. Thanks! Andrew Lynch

16 years, 5 months

Atari SIO bus connectors found

by mcguire＠neurotica.com

Hey folks...I don't know if there are any Atari hackers around here; I may be alone...but I wanted to let any interested parties know that I've located a source for the proprietary connectors that Atari used for their "SIO" bus, which is used to connect nearly all of their peripherals in a daisy-chain configuration. http://www.connectworld.net/cgi-bin/iec/fullpic?AZndUfrS;AT13F;6 I've purchased a connector from the page referenced above, and it is indeed the right thing. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL Farewell Ophelia, 9/22/1991 - 7/25/2007

16 years, 6 months

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test-drb October 2007