test-drb April 2007

test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

257 participants
560 discussions

by legalize＠xmission.com

With my recent dovebid purchase, I got the usual form letter from CTS telling me that I should use them. I responded that based on my past experience with them, I would never use them again and I would never recommend them to anyone else. Then they replied that there were no "comments" on my previous order with them indicating that they had fucked up. My response was: That's capitalism, baby. You lose, someone else wins. Then I got a snarky reply from them telling me to "remember that when they trash your stuff". How could I forget that it was CTS who trashed my stuff, while Craters & Freighters did awesome work? What a bunch of fuckwits. I know y'all like these people, but this kind of attitude is exactly why I had problems with them and will never recommend them or use them again. -- "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/>

17 years, 9 months

Quick survey on equipment

by classiccmp＠memory-alpha.org.uk

Hi, >> BTW Can TRS-80 Model 1's or Memotech's run CP/M (I had an >>"SDX" disc pack.... > > No idea on the MEmotech (I don';t have one yet).... I just did a bit of "Googling"; seems the Memotechs could run CP/M when fitted with the "FDX" expansion "chassis". I never did manage to track one of those units down. They were pretty nifty gizmos which could house 2 floppy drives, a hard drive and Memotech's own "Silicon Discs" (aka ramdiscs) amongst other things. They also came with an internal 80 column video card to make CP/M usable. :-) The really odd thing is that I can find no mention whatsoever of the "SDX" disc unit which I had...? The SDX was a very simple unit, consisting of a single half height FD in a case with PSU and the interface which took the form of a "cartridge" which was the same shape as the computer and plugged in on the right hand side of the machine (you had to have a couple of internal expansion cards fitted to extend the expansion bus out to the edge of the case). This was most definitely a genuine Memotech product, but information on it was thin on the ground even "back in the day". > The problem was that CP/M needs RAM starting at location 0, the >TRS-80 has the BASIC ROMs there and starts RAM at, IIRC, 0x4000. Hmm, same problem as the Model III then (ISTR that had its ROM located at $0000 too, hence the reason for the Model IV). > The first solution was a modifed CP/M _and modified application >programs_ relocated to run in RAM starting at 0x4000.... Ouch....I can see that being somewhat "problematical". ;-) >....The second solution was an add-on circuit board.... Hmm, sounds like these are probably going to be as easy to get hold of now as hen's teeth...? Think I'll just get a Z80 Second Processor for my Beeb instead (far less hassle). TTFN - Pete.

17 years, 9 months

Quick survey on equipment

by doug＠stillhq.com

Some have questioned the number of people on the list who have CP/M systems. Lets do a quick survey - I'll start first! Pulsar Little Big Board - z80 CP/M 2.2 Bondewll 2 - z80 - CP/M 2.2 On the list of non CP/M systems: 3 x Apple II 5.25" disk systems 7 x Apple Mac systems (various) TRS-80 Model 1, 4, 4P 2 x Disk Smith System 80 1 Exidy Sourcerer 1 Energy Control Rockwell 65F11 (forth) system 1 Homebrew 65F12 system Amstrad CPC464 TI99/4A - No disk system though :-( Bucketloads of HP & TI Calculators No DEC Equipment - So can't help there (But I do have a SBC6120 PDP8 emulator.) Doug

17 years, 9 months

ALSPA Cpm box

by Billy.Pettit＠wdc.com

Jules Richardson wrote: jim wrote: [CA floppies] > Any thoughts on the list as to how to archive the data? I know > that Lars H. is going to do his thing, and owns them, but more > ideas would be welcome. Lars said something to me at the weekend about the disks that he has being a bit weird; the first track's laid down using FM density with the rest being MFM - and for some reason Imagedisk wasn't making sense of them even in "full analysis" mode. I'm not sure though if that was *all* CA disks, or just some of the ones he happened to have. ------------ Billy responds: I saw this a lot on the early 8" single sided drives. The transition to double density was FM to MFM. The first track was preserved as FM so older drives could still read the boot track and then check for double density hardware. I thought it had died out when the first double sided units came along, but obviously not. Some of the early LSI could handle this so it was invisible to the end user. All of our 8" test systems at Magnetic Peripherals used this format on the double density disks. Billy

17 years, 9 months

ISO: Amstrad 3" floppy drive

by cclist＠sydex.com

The one in my collection went belly-up (motor has developed a short in the windings). Does anyone stateside have one that I could buy? Thanks, Chuck

17 years, 9 months

Date fun

by drb＠msu.edu

Is the suspense killing you? :) The chopped off line: 31-JUL-31086 02:48:05.47 Sorry, De

17 years, 9 months

Poss OT: TZ875N DLT changer questions

by listmailgoeshere＠gmail.com

Hi list, I'd like to delve into the collective knowledge of those out there, with the following questions: (apologies if the TZ875N isn't quite 15 years old and is as such OT) 1) This changer currently has a 10/20GB (DLT2000) drive in it. Tapes for this (DLT 3) are hard to find on ePay. However, the 15/30GB DLT 3XT tapes are plentiful. What would happen if I tried using those? 2) Can I remove the DLT2000 drive and fit say a DLT4000 and will the changer still work? 2a) ISTR some discussion a while ago about the drives having to be a certain specific type (marked "Changer Only" or somesuch) to be useable in a changer. Is this right, or can I just slap any old DLT4000 I find in there? Sorry this is a bit vague - I haven't taken the thing to bits yet. Looking at its construction, it's going to be quite a challenge to do so. TIA, Ed.

17 years, 9 months

Date fun

by drb＠msu.edu

Found the following in an old usenet post. Seems on-topic. :) De > The Modified Julian Day was adopted by the Smithsonian Astrophysical > Obser- vatory (SAO) in 1957 for satellite tracking. SAO started > tracking satellites with an 8K (non-virtual) 36-bit IBM 704 computer > in 1957, when Sputnik was launched. The Julian day was 2,435,839 on > January 1, 1957. This is 11,225,377 in octal notation, which was too > big to fit into an 18-bit field (half of its standard 36-bit word). > And, with only 8K of memory, no one wanted to waste the 14 bits left > over by keeping the Julian Day in its own 36-bit word. However, they > also needed to track hours and minutes, for which 18 bits gave enough > accuracy. So, they decided to keep the number of days in the left 18 > bits and the hours and minutes in the right 18 bits of a word. > Eighteen bits would allow the Modified Julian Day (the SAO day) to > grow as large as 262,143 ((2 ** 18) - 1). From Nov. 17, 1858, this > allowed for seven centuries. Using only 17 bits, the date could > possibly grow only as large as 131,071, but this still covers 3 > centuries, as well as leaving the possibility of representing > negative time. The year 1858 preceded the oldest star catalog in use > at SAO, which also avoided having to use negative time in any of the > satellite tracking calculations. > This base time of Nov. 17, 1858 has since been used by TOPS-10, > TOPS-20, and VAX/VMS. Given this base date, the 100 nanosecond > granularity implemented within VAX/VMS, and the 63-bit absolute time > representation (the sign bit must be clear), VMS should have no > trouble with time until:

17 years, 9 months

govliq: Rolm on govliquidation...

by erik＠baigar.de

Dear folks, I'd give a lot to get these, but unfortunately it requires dmil for certain reasons I do not know and I am in Germany :-((( There is a Rolm 1602B in Mechanicsburg (2850/3217): http://cgi.govliquidation.com/auction/view?id=1197257&categoryId=1004 Simultaneously there is the ULTRA-RARE operators console for this beast in Richmond (2856/2017): http://cgi.govliquidation.com/auction/view?id=1203684&categoryId=e2856 So these two together would make a very nice rugged nova! I really hope, that these find a good home and maybe meet each other... Regards, Erik.

17 years, 9 months

British Computer Society - 50 year event in July

by julesrichardsonuk＠yahoo.co.uk

(Primarily a bit of advanced warning for those overseas who may be interested!) The BCS is 50 years old this year, and to celebrate the Computer Conservation Society are organising an event at both Bletchley Park and in London, running >from July 12th to the 14th. Lots more details, including booking info, available at: http://www.bcsat50.org cheers, Jules

17 years, 9 months

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test-drb April 2007