test-drb January 2011

test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

130 participants
209 discussions

by c.murray.mccullough＠gmail.com

Technology news of two days ago spoke of the Computer History Museum(a past visitor) in Mountainview, CA(Silicon Valley) having a 2000 year timeline and display. I hadn't realized computers have been around for 2000 years! Nevertheless, computer/electronic newsletters such as this should relish in how people/orgaization(s)/institution(s) are attempting to preserve computings past for all, technophiles and technophobes. Maybe this will give encouragement to others who are working diligently, albeit on a smaller scale, on attempts to preserve one little aspect of computing, for example the Computer Museum of Nova Scotia - the Kenbek machine. Compute on! Murray--

13 years, 11 months

IBM 1401 Data Center

by glen.slick＠gmail.com

Short on space, power, and cooling? Not a problem with this IBM 1401 Data Center: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=190490102075 (I have no connection with this seller or listing)

13 years, 11 months

IBM 1401 Data Center model on eBay

by robgarn＠mac.com

Regarding the charming wood/metal scale model of a "1401 Data Center" on eBay, in addition to the 3 1401 Central Processing Units, many of the models are actually for an IBM 7070: main frame cabinets, console (7150), and card reader (7500). As a 1401 system, two of the 1401 CPUs are missing their mainspring! ;-) The IBM 1402, in addition to reading and punching cards, also delivers AC and DC power to the 1401 CPU, 1403 printer, and 729 tape string. Technically, the model system is missing two 1402s. Any large 1401 system would also likely have 1406 extended memory units (12,000 characters). I suspect many 7070s also had RAMAC/disk storage units (7300), as did some 1401 systems (1405, 20 MB). For info and pictures about our two operational tape-based 1401 systems at the Computer History Museum(CHM), restored by a grand team of retired IBM CE's, checkout: http://ibm-1401.info/ - Robert p.s. The CHM just opened to the public its new marvelous Revolution exhibit! p.p.s. For mounting SMS logic boards, the 7000-series main frame cabinets used large "Rolygon" sliding gates, while the 1401 used smaller pivoting gate "Cube" packaging. On Jan 13, 2011, at 10:00 AM, cctech-request at classiccmp.org wrote: > ------------------------------ > > Message: 11 > Date: Wed, 12 Jan 2011 20:05:08 -0800 > From: Brent Hilpert <hilpert at cs.ubc.ca> > Subject: Re: IBM 1401 Data Center > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > Message-ID: <35e182fb8e08dd69eadb310d14d7a288 at cs.ubc.ca> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed > > On 2011 Jan 12, at 7:35 PM, Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > >> Okay, somebody needs to pick that up, either Al for the CHM or Sellam >> or Evan.... put that on display, that is just too damned cool !!! >> > There have been links for sales of sets like this mentioned on the list > previously but I think they were folded cardboard, not the detailed > wood and metal of this set. > > The ebay page linked to this: > http://ibmcollectables.com/360holocaust.html > Great story, Bob. (.. now we know who to blame) > > And speaking therein of 360 front panels: > ebay 150541712482 > IBM 360/50 front panel goes for $5600. > > ------------------------------ > > Message: 12 > Date: Wed, 12 Jan 2011 22:54:12 -0600 > From: Jason T <silent700 at gmail.com> > Subject: Re: IBM 1401 Data Center > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > Message-ID: > <AANLkTikwnRof5-KaoJKDER6+NKnC-ugV84OE703Ny+1_ at mail.gmail.com> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 > >> On 1/12/11 7:10 PM, Glen Slick wrote: >>> >>> Short on space, power, and cooling? ?Not a problem with this IBM 1401 >>> Data Center: >>> >>> http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=190490102075 >>> >>> (I have no connection with this seller or listing) > > Awesome - I saw a set like this many years ago (let's say mid-90s) in > the window of an "antiques" (junk) store in St. Charles, IL. I think > they wanted around $250 for it, and those were the days I was scraping > together $5 for meals, so it wasn't going to happen for me. I always > assumed it was a salesman's kit, for helping to lay our datacenters > (maybe it came with a big sheet of scaled grid paper to represent > floor tiles?) > > Well, I'll be bidding... > > -j > ------------------------------

13 years, 11 months

Xerox 860 IPS system on eBay

by derschjo＠mail.msu.edu

Not my auction, but looks pretty danged neat. Price isn't too bad. eBay Item 220721080577. Looks cool, wish I lived a little closer :). - Josh

13 years, 11 months

On the Beeb, EDSAC to be rebuilt

by cclist＠sydex.com

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-12181153 I don't know how real it is yet, but it's a start. --Chuck

13 years, 11 months

Flakey Multia

by mark.kahrs＠gmail.com

So, I thought it would nice to use a Multia as a wireless machine, after all, it does have PCMCIA ports... My first challenge was that it wouldn't boot. It would startup and get to the cursor and then hang. A new battery was suggested. Rather than use the Rayovac 840, I elected to get a 3 AAA cell holder from Digikey. I replaced it and watched. Sure enough, it started to boot and then put characters on the screen and hung. I powered it off and on and it got further and then hung. Now it won't get that far at all and complains (via 14 LED flashes) that the DRAM is bad. I removed 2 and that didn't work so swapped them and that didn't work. It would make a nice doorstop, but otherwise what are the suggestions?

13 years, 11 months

Single Head HDDs

by bpettitx＠comcast.net

Couldn't find original sender: > Except for a few very odd ones (e.g. hard drives which record analagoue > singals such as analogue video [1]) every hard disk I've worked on has > used both sides of all platters for something. Maybe not user data > storage (for excample, it may contain servo information only), but there > will be a head on it. Because of the enormous pressure to reduce cost, single headed drives are very common. And have been for as long as I've been in the HDD industry. For example, current technology is 667 or 750 GB per platter with 1TB/platter due in next 12 months. Yet there is a demand for 250, 300 or 500 GB drives for ultra low cost drives. Especially in the consumer electronics market - for example, DVRs and security systems. Taking out the cost of one head can save $2.50 to $5.00 of manufacturing cost. That is a big chunk of the $25 manufacturing cost typical of the very low end drives. Servo data has been embedded in the data surface for many many years. Most current drives generate their own servo information. Current drives even have a different tpi for the servo versus the data track, even though they are on the same surface. Billy Pettit

13 years, 11 months

Because it's there: 5 operating systems running on a IIfx (at the same time)

by mtapley＠swri.edu

At 5:24 -0600 1/13/11, Josh wrote: >Could I run these all at the same time in my trusty Macintosh IIfx? > >The answer: Yes. (warning, 1600x1200 image): >http://yahozna.dyndns.org/scratch/random/5OS.png > That is so far beyond cool cool can't even see it any more! I'm totally awe-struck! What a machine! What an idea! How could you *possibly* have anything better to do than that? -- - Mark 210-379-4635 ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Large Asteroids headed toward planets inhabited by beings that don't have technology adequate to stop them: Think of it as Evolution in Fast-Forward.

13 years, 11 months

Video's of inside of Compuserve?

by CCTECH＠beyondthepale.ie

> >Anyway, some doofus managed to string fiber through the cabinet (one >of the 9309 style cabinets, common with older big AS/400s and >RS/6000s). For some reason, the decommissioned machine had to be >removed during the day, but we were forbidden to touch the FDDI >outside a 3 AM maintenance window. Several blades later... > >I'll tell you - IBM uses good steel. > Where did the dust end up? On one memorable occasion, when we requested cable access between two of our adjacent cabs, the data centre tech (without telling anyone) took an angle grinder to the cab walls and showered our running equipment with fine steel dust. Any mystery failures after that were blamed on dust getting sucked in by fans and deposited on pcbs. Regards, Peter Coghlan.

13 years, 11 months

Disc drive READY output -- any standards

by thomas.gardner＠sbcglobal.net

> > Date: Thu, 13 Jan 2011 01:34:00 +0000 > > From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk > > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > > Subject: Disc drive READY output -- any standards? > > > > Hi guys, > > > > Is there a defined standard as to when the READY output on a > > Shugart-type disc drive should go active? <snip> > > Thanks, > > Phil. > > classiccmp at philpem.me.uk > > http://www.philpem.me.uk/ Having worked on a number of those HDDs and FDDs my recollection is the "standard" for asserting READY was, at a minimum, that a disk was loaded and the drive was "at speed." In some higher end HDDs I seem to recall that it was not asserted until the heads were at TRACK 00 but I could be wrong. Speed tolerance was pretty poor with ac motors and I think we just clocked a retrigerable singleshot with index and required two (or more) indexes faster than the timeout before we then asserted READY. There was probably a pot on the singleshot and I suspect it was set to about 90% of nominal RPM for ac motor drives and probably about 2% for dc motor drives. The only real issues with motor speed not in range are writing out of sector/track boundary (high speed) and read data recovery. With today's good channels read data recover should not a problem over a wide speed range but with the early primitive channels (e.g. "two time constant") this could be a problem. Tom

13 years, 11 months

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test-drb January 2011