test-drb September 2008

test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

220 participants
323 discussions

ENIAC vs. ENIAC-on-a-Chip IC implementation

by wbblair3＠yahoo.com

>From the excellent book, "The First Computers - History and Architectures," an interesting comparison: "The ENIAC contained 17,468 vacuum tubes, 70,000 resistors, 10,000 capacitors, 7,200 crystal diodes, and 6,000 switches, it had a footprint of about 33 m x 1 m, occupied a room of 170 square meters, dissipated about 140-174 kW and weighed 30 tons. In contrast, he chip realization contains 174,569 transistors, measures 7.4 mm x 5.3 mm (the PGA package measures 3.6 cm by 3.6 cm), dissipates a few Watts (depending on how many units run in parallel and the clock speed), and weighs a few grams. Also, in terms of power requirement the comparison is striking. In addition to the AC power for the heaters of the tubes, the card reader and the card punch, the ENIAC required 78 different DC voltage levels to power 10 different types of vacuum tubes. The power equipment was housed in 7 panels which were separate from the ENIAC?s 40 panels. Special ventilating equipment consisted of an elaborate system of fans and blowers to keep the temperature inside the panels below C. In contrast, the chip needs only one power supply of 5 V (or lower). The clock frequency used in the ENIAC was 100 kHz, while the one on the chip can easily run at 50 MHz or higher." http://www.ese.upenn.edu/~jan/eniacproj.html

15 years, 8 months

HP64000 System, Books, Software available

by hpjimbondoris123＠dorisland.net

Steve can you ask the person you gave your 64000 to to contact me to see if he would be willing to help me with my 64000 project. jim

15 years, 8 months

eBay: Vintage HP-2115A Computer and Power Supply

by Tim＠Rikers.org

He wants 4k, which is a lot. That's likely 1$ per word of core. :) I've not seen another listed on eBay ever. Curious to see if anyone snags it. It's likely over when you read this. http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=130249823073 -- Tim Riker - http://Rikers.org/ - TimR at Debian.org Embedded Linux Technologist - http://eLinux.org/ BZFlag maintainer - http://BZFlag.org/ - for fun! ? ? ????????u poo? ??n??u??s ?no? u? 8-??n s? ? ?

15 years, 8 months

PDP-11/40 for sale

by operator＠ocoperations.com

Ashley, Is the PDP 11/40 still for sale. Your internet post was back in February. Richard Van Leer

15 years, 8 months

Uses for OpenVMS

by poghlan+cctech＠vms.eurokom.ie

>I've had a VAXstation 4000/60 in my cabinet for well over a year now (had to >renew the license a few days ago). It is running OpenVMS 7.3. > >I can not think of any use for it, other than learning about OpenVMS, but that >is made difficult when I don't know what to do with it... > >So what can be done with an OpenVMS setup these days? > All sorts of stuff. Here are a few varied examples: Most recently, I hacked together some bits of other peoples C code to take a .au sound file and generate a graph of its frequency spectrum in an XWindow. I put this together on an Alpha where my sound card is but I just tried it on a Vaxstation 3100 and it it worked fine there too, a bit slower though. I have the Hercules IBM mainframe emulator running under VMS on my Alphaserver 1000A. That should annoy the DECheads and IBMmers in equal measure :-) Hercules is a medium sized application targeting linux and windows. I can scan documements using a SCSI attached scanner on my VAX 4000/100A and a port of the SANE scanner software and view and archive pictures from a digital camera using an "interesting" method of attaching a compact flash card to my Alpha. Recent versions of VMS including 7.3 provide a unix like runtime environment which makes it possible to port many of the better written open source unix applications and tools. The windowing system is a port of X-Windows so even if you don't have a display attached to your VAX, you can run X-Windows code on your VAX and display it on a remote X server which could be on a PC or Mac for instance. Lots of X applications and games have been ported to VMS and there are ports and native versions of internet applications such as email and news clients and servers, web servers and even web browsers. Unfortunately, a lot of the more bloaded modern code would have problems building or running on a VAX. VAX hardware is out of production for some years now, having been replaced by Alpha and then Itanium processors and VAX systems tend to be limited in processing power, memory etc compared to their successors and to the expectations of more recent code. Also, some features which were later added to Alpha/VMS (such as kernel threads for example) were never backported to VAX/VMS. I like programming in the native VMS environment. I generally use C, Fortran and VAX assembly but lots of other languages are available under the hobbyist license. VMS System service routines and library functions are available equally >from all languages and are in general very well designed and offer great flexibility. The downside is the learning curve can be a bit steep for someone who is not familiar with the VMS way of doing things, which can be quite different >from other operating systems. There is lots of freeware for VMS at http://mvb.saic.com/ which may stimulate further ideas. Also, check out the comp.os.vms newsgroup where lots of VMS people hang out. Regards, Peter.

15 years, 8 months

Free Linux and OpenOffice - even if your email address doesn't

by tonym＠compusource.net

-----Original Message----- >From: Tony Duell ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk >Sent 8/31/2008 2:07:39 PM >To: cctalk at classiccmp.org >Subject: Re: Free Linux and OpenOffice - even if your email address doesn't > > We run HP, IBM, Sun, Cisco, and Dell hardware, and I > hardly see > ANY of them giving out schematics. > > I doubt Tony has any DELLs, but I'm fairly sure he has some > HP kit ... an HP Laserjet iirc. > >Actually, I have a _lot_ of HP computers, going right back to their first >desktop computer, the Model 30 calculator (HP9830). I have HP calculators >older than that, of course. > >Heck I use an HP handheld calculator all the time. And yes, I have >schematics. Yes, I have the ROM sources. It doesn't bother me that the >latter are often stamped 'NOMAS -- Not Manufacturer Supported -- >Recipient agrees not to contact the manufacturer' I am quite capable of >reading and understanding them on my own. > > > You'll note he said _he_ wouldn't use anything he couldn't > support himself. He's not saying that you should use the > same approach in the office ... that's not where the important > stuff lives! > >_Escatly_.. > >Let's go back to the comment that started this debate. I make no secret >of the fact that I run linux. I considered what was important _to me_ in >an OS : availability of the source code -- not necessarily open-source, a >source license I could afford would be acceptable; the fact that I prefer >a good CLI to a GUI; that it would run the software I need (a C compiler, >TeX/LaTeX, etc) and so on. And I concluded that linux was the best choice >_for me_ so that's what I run. > >Now, I don't think it's the best choice for everyone. Other people have >different requirements and desires, they end up with a different OS that >suits their needs. So? Waht's the problem? > >IT's the same with many other things. I don;'t suppose many people, >buying a new car, would have the same requirement top-of-the-list as my >father did recently. Namely that the official workshop manual had to be >available. But it was important to us. > >-tony The whole debate started, when I simply notified the list, that anyone who ran Windows, and was in school, or knew someone in school, and had an .edu email address, could get an academic copy of Office 2007 Ultimate for $60. After that, all the Linux/Open-Source bigots came out decrying it. OpenOffice was menetioned as being the be-all end-all and being free, and I promptly downloaded it, installed it, and it wouldn't even open 1/3 of the work my wife did last semester. Now, does that mean it sucks? No. Did I say it sucked? No. But the Zealots took it as such, and kept going from there. I never said you couldn't use Linux+OO in school - I am sure MILLIONS already do. I just made the point that it was NOT the right solution for my wife. She is not exactly, um, computer saavy, and has no desire to be, so for my situation, I saw it best to give here Windows+Office, because working 10-12 hours at the office, and then 4 more VPN'd from home, I REALLY didn't want to add to my load... But the bigots INSISTED... I am in TOTAL agreement with what you say - we run many environments at work, and there are MANY instances where Linux is the ideal solution. We currently have about, oh, let's say 12-18 Linux servers at work, (2) of which are hosting semi-large Oracle databases, on the order of about 40GB, and running on HP Proliant DL380 G3's or G4's (depending on age) and either (6) 72GB or 146GB drives in RAID5, again depending on age. They run fine, work fine, kick the SNOT out of equivalent Windows boxes hosting Oracle, and as you pointed out,I have NEVER had a virus/malware/trojan issue to speak of. And we all know that is NOT the case with Windows boxen! As to TCO, well I don't know what you're getting at, as I just pay yearly fees for the M$ True-Up, and the eTrust AV. Comes up to about $785/year for both. Now, workstations are a bit more, and btw, all ours are NOT the same, depending on age, and the property they are at. I still have Compaq Deskpro EN (P3/800-1000) in the enterprise, HP Workstations, multiple versions of Dell SX and GX-series machines, And Dell/IBM Laptops (mostly Dell Latitudes now, D600/D610/D620/D630, as most TPads have been retired). And most times, I don't get a parts-swapping droid when we call HP/IBM/DELL - we usually get overnighted the bad part, so it's back up and running the next day, assuming next day service on that machine, and assuming not the weekend. The only exceptions are the servers, which come with a 3YR warranty, and we pick up the next day, 24x7 support on those. As I said...my first introduction to free *nix was 386BSD in about '94 or so, followed by Linux, although it was still 2 floppies, and then to FreeBSD, which was the next progression of 386BSD - played a little with Minix, but it was a bit closed-in for me - Linux was gathering steam, and developers were getting strongly behind it, which is when I switched over from *BSD to Linux. Things were happening REALLY fast in the Linux world, and were slowing down in *BSD. And then they started the whole *BSD split-offs I figured it was time to switch over for real. Heck, I think I still have quite a few of the older media around, back when Linux was the "In thing" and was being sold retail in Best Buy / Circuit City / etc.. I CLEARLY remember, before affordable WiFi days, the copy of Corel Linux I bought retail, was about the ONLY operating system, that out-of-the-box, would properly run with those RayCom 2MBit wireless cards. Not Windows, and not other Linux distros - I'm talking OOB, here. And I remember loading that on an HP OmniBook of some sort, Pentium 200 or so, as I recall... ps - forgive the formatting, as this is through my Webmail because my work XP laptop is, surprise, running malware / trojan cleaning apps. Tony

15 years, 8 months

Wanted: System V Release 4 (Intel) OS

by pitlog＠gmail.com

Hi, I've been looking for a set of floppies or better yet, a 150MB QIC tape for SVR4 for the 486 platform. Not having much luck to date, which surprises me. I would have thought there would be plenty of these laying around. I need one with SCSI drivers, and I also need the development system. Willing to pay a reasonable amount. Thanks, Tom

15 years, 8 months

HandyMan for Kaypro

by tonym＠compusource.net

>-----Original Message----- >From: Allison ajp166 at bellatlantic.net >Sent 8/31/2008 11:23:55 AM >To: cctech at classiccmp.org >Subject: Re: HandyMan for Kaypro > > >Subject: HandyMan for Kaypro > From: "tonym" tonym at compusource.net > Date: Sun, 31 Aug 2008 06:02:12 +0000 (GMT) > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" cctalk at classiccmp.org > >I asked a while back on comp.os.cpm, and didn't get much response... > >Anyone remember how to use a HandyMan for the kaypro? >This was an add-in board, piggy-backed between the Z80 and socket, and had a TSR-like pop-up >Borland SideKick wanna-be. > >Trying to find some info, as a K10 I acquired came with a handyMan, and Advent 1MB RAMDisk, >and K4 came with an Advent Clock, RamDisk, ProGraphics board, Personality module, and 5mHz turboboard. > > >Tony > > >I ahve the Advent 1mb ramdisk and handyman with RTC plus the personality card for >the disks on my 4/84. Right now I'm up to my eyeballs to dig out the docs but >I do have them. > >To use handyman I think it was a control key sequency that brings it up. > >Allison > When it gets under eyeball level, I'd appreciate it if you could maybe dig something up. Were there different personality modules? This was in a Kaypro 4, which had all the above mentioned items. It currently is NOT working (strange squiggly horizontal line in the center), and the personality module looks rather simple. This machine also had (2) HH floppies, and a third FH in the bottom. Had a toggle switch with a proper label putinto the front panel for the TurboBoard, and an RCA jack on the back for the ProGraphics module. Very interesting - I'd never seen a ProGraphics board before. I'm going to start taking it apart to see what the issue is, but there are so many solder jumpers, and mini-grabber clips, I will have to take careful note of how everything currently is, before I start troubleshooting. Gotta make sure the mainboard has no issues, first and foremost. Tony

15 years, 8 months

Sun Sparc AXi mainboard, Sparc 10 RAM, and other stuff free or cheap

by tonym＠compusource.net

>-----Original Message----- >From: Cameron Kaiser spectre at floodgap.com >Sent 8/31/2008 11:04:42 AM >To: cctalk at classiccmp.org >Subject: Re: Sun Sparc AXi mainboard, Sparc 10 RAM,and other stuff free or cheap > > Tony, > > Apple IIC - pretty clean, minimal yellowing, includes PSU, and an original > DOS 3.3 system master, and I can dig up a > few more original disks to go with it $50+shipping. Does work, but the > monitor IIc I had croaked. > > I have a monitor IIc of my own :) if the IIc is not spoken for, I'll grab it. > Let me know. Shipping would be to zip 91941. > >Perhaps I will actually send an offlist message off list one of these days. > OK - Cameron has spoken up first for the Apple IIc, and Jon Auringer spoke up for the Sun stuff. Jon - I assume you wanted ALL the Sun stuff? Or is it just the AXi stuff? It can all ship together if you're taking it all, which in THAT case, ignore the $10 for the S10 RAM it'll be phree :) Cameron - I'll check Tuesday on the IIc shipping for you. The Heath/Zenith Z-100 manuals+disks claimed by Dan Veeneman, assuming Bill Loguidice passes... Tony

15 years, 8 months

Ring vs BCD counters for decades

by ed＠ed-thelen.org

Message: 5 Date: Sat, 30 Aug 2008 15:57:59 -0800 From: Brent Hilpert <hilpert at cs.ubc.ca> Subject: Re: Ring vs BCD counters for decades To: General at invalid.domain, "Discussion at invalid.domain":On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <48B9DE87.7781F95E at cs.ubc.ca> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii > William Donzelli wrote: > > Ranging. For fire control, very accurate ranging is very important, as > > it is one of the biggest variables in ballistics equations. Getting > > accurate range data out of the radars was thus extremely important, so > > the range circuits were very precise, and often employed dividers and > > flip flops and such to generate cursor information on the scopes for > > the operators. > Interesting, I didn't know they had gotten that complex with the WWII stuff. > Offhand I would have thought they would have used capacitor / pulse-interval > integration techniques for such calculations in that era rather than digital > counters. Not accurate enough perhaps. > (I do have a picture somewhere from WWII of my dad on a Wehrmacht anti-aircraft > gun that he said was automatically ranged and targetted by radar.) I maintained Nike Antiaircraft Missile systems in the mid 1950s. We used a phantastron circuit http://ed-thelen.org/diagrams.html to generate a pulse to compare with the timing of the received radar pulse from the target. http://ed-thelen.org/ifc_track.html The range tracking circuits compared the timing of the two pulses for operator optional automatic range tracking. This was part of the target range tracking system, which had to be as identical as possible with the missile tracking system to provide accurate voltage information to the analog computer for missile steering - http://ed-thelen.org/computer.html To help calibrate both range systems, we used pulses from a 100 KHz crystal controlled oscillator. "worked good ;-))" (remarkably stable!!)

15 years, 8 months

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test-drb September 2008