Hey, all, especially those in Seattle with old Apple gear:
Seattle Repertory Theatre is producing "The Agony And Ecstacy Of Steve
Jobs", a show by Mike Daisey about Apple's and Jobs' various trials and
tribulations over the years. They're hoping to put together a lobby
display of several of Apple's old hardware. To that end, they're looking
for gear to borrow between mid-April and late May; and to show their
appreciation they're offering free tickets for the production and "your
picture hanging proudly next to your relic" (assuming you're interested
in that, o'course).
Their wish list includes:
-an Apple II, IIe and/or IIc;
-an Apple III;
-a Lisa;
-a Mac Classic, Mac SE/30, or similar;
-Macintosh Portable (1989 vintage);
-an early PowerBook, preferably 100 series;
-a Quadra;
-Newton MessagePad;
-QuickTake, an early Apple digital camera;
-20th Anniversary iMac, circa 1997;
-iMac G3;
-an early Apple flat panel display, circa 1998-2001-ish;
-Power Mac G4 cube;
-G4 Powerbook; and
-a NeXT workstation (though I think a NeXTcube would work too).
Though they didn't list it, I have to think that an Apple I would also be
extremely welcome. In fact, I think the only reason they didn't put it on
their list is because actually _finding_ one seems so unlikely. :)
...Anyway, if you're in or near Seattle and have some of this gear and
want to support the arts and/or get your gear displayed publicly and/or
want free theatre tickets, or if you have further questions, feel free to
e-mail the Rep at <info at seattlerep.org>.
Feel free to forward or repost.
-O.-
Well I certainly can't say this evening wasn't entertaining.
Got the HP 16500B out of the cupboard. Powered on to a screen of random
lines. Turns out the "base" (Bank0) RAM SIMM had slipped out of the
mounting. Power off, all the blades out, push it back in, power on.
SYSTEM SELF TEST FAILED: SEE SERVICE MANUAL
System board: FAILED
Touch screen: IMPAIRED
Base RAM: FAILED
Oh joy. Cleaning the (rather dusty) touchscreen surround sorted the
touch screen. Reseating the other SIMM sorted the Sysboard failure, but
the memory test kept failing. Swapped both SIMMs for a 64MB set I had
kicking around -- thus giving me a 64MB HP 16500B. Powered back up,
"SELF TEST PASSED, LOADING SYSTEM SOFTWARE." Now we're getting somewhere.
Or not.
"Corrupted LAN Board! LAN Not Functional!"
So evidently the 28C16 parallel EEPROM on the 16500L LAN card has
developed a case of amnesia (that's if the Random Lines Event didn't
nuke it). I got to the System screen, but the 16555D isn't triggering,
and trying to configure the Ethernet adapter hard-crashes the analyser.
Does anyone happen to have a dump of the 28C16 EEPROM on a 16500L LAN
card, or even a spare 16500H or 16500L card?
Or an E2479A 16500A/B --> 16500C upgrade kit... or the bits of a 16500C
needed to upgrade a 16500B... I think I'll stop there :P
Apparently you need HP-specific Factory Test software to reprogram the
EEPROM, which was AIUI never released outside of HP. I figure it should
be possible to reprogram the chip with a couple of wires, some solder,
and a 28pin turned-pin DIP socket, but I need a known-good image first.
So anyway, I figured I'd try and soldier on and figure out what was
wrong with the 386 motherboard. In with the POST card... yep, still
dying at checkpoint code 06, which basically means the BIOS couldn't
read the shutdown register in the RTC. Off with the old RTC socket, a
quick clean up with Flux-off, and under the microscope it goes.
I started tracing the under-chip tracks out, following them with the tip
of a mechanical pencil. Until, that is, one of them crumbled... Hmm.
Copper isn't supposed to do that. Out with the Xacto. Scrape off the
solder resist... hmm, black fuzz, but no copper?! Apparently the battery
did more damage than I thought!
Eventually I found a total of three broken or damaged tracks, all on the
data bus. I bridged them with Roadrunner wire (really thin enamelled
copper wire, like transformer wire). In goes the new socket and....
0d : 0c
Hmm, still no go. So I pulled the RTC chip, put it dead-bug style on the
desk, and started looking at the tracks again. And then I saw it, out of
the corner of my eye...
The VCC pin had broken off the RTC chip. So what did I do? I fixed it.
I took a fresh turned-pin IC socket, and inserted a piece of 22SWG
tinned copper wire into the top-right corner socket (i.e. VCC). Clipped
it back to ~5mm, then put the socket to one side. Next, I used a
triangular needle file to cut a notch into the plastic of the chip,
right above the VCC pin stub. A bit of scratching with the Xacto got me
enough Vcc pin stub to solder a wire to. Lightly tinned the VCC stub,
just for good measure.
RTC chip goes into the socket, and the stub was soldered to the 5mm VCC
wire. Into the motherboard it goes. POST card in, speaker (on POST card)
connected, power on.
0201... 0605... 0d0c... 1F1E... lots of hex numbers... 403F...
*BEEP BEEP* dit-dit-dit-dit-dit-dit-dit-dit
So it's just passed the chipset and base hardware tests, proven that the
mainboard and chipset are alive... and emitted two beeps for a fatal
error, and eight error ID beeps. Quick look up... that's a Video RAM R/W
Test error, which makes sense because there kinda-sorta isn't a video
card plugged in... or anything besides the POST card for that matter.
It's at about this point I shouted "King of the lab!". My mother poked
her head around the door and gave me a very strange look....
So yeah, the 386 board is basically fixed. I need to hunt down a case
for it (the K6 board is inhabiting the 386's old case). I might chuck
the thing in the dishwasher to clean off the last bits of dirt and
fluff, but at this point it's working and I'm happy. Or I would be if Ye
Olde HP Boat Anchor hadn't picked tonight to turn its toes up... Guess
you can't win all the time :(
And if you question why I call it a boat-anchor, you've obviously never
tried to move a 16500B... :)
Thanks,
--
Phil.
classiccmp at philpem.me.uk
http://www.philpem.me.uk/
This group seems strangely quiet. I hope nothing bad has happened!
BTW, I realize that none of my posts are all that important. However, I
do find it curious that I usually see my own posts only if someone else
comments on something I said. Does anyone else have this problem and/or
does anyone know of a setting I need to change to correct this?
Thanks,
Charlie C.
I rescued one of these ancient Bernoulli boxes today. It uses the large
(8") cartridges at 20MB each, and it has two slots for the cartridges.
Other than for hearing some of the folklore about the drives, I don't
know much about it. I'd like to see it run and be usable, but I need
some help.
- Is it SCSI? If so, what's the pinout on the back? It has a 37 pin
female connector that I'm not familiar with if it is SCSI.
- Where is the head mechanism? Is it fairly robust and protected if
there are no cartridges inserted? This one has no major dents, but it
has not been babied either. I don't want to waste time on it if it's
just going to be a heartache. (I have enough of that already.)
- Cartridges look like they are on eBay. They are cheap enough for me
to experiment with.
- Is there anything I should know about these beasts before I attempt
powering on and working with it?
Thanks,
Mike
>
> Now for the speakers ...
> http://www.decware.com/newsite/homepage.html
> If you need details on 1KW speakers, just email them for advice.
> Ben.
> PS. Remember 500 watts or more will kill small rodents.
>
Nice!
I think I will have to stay well below 1 kW though, tempting though it may
be. I live in an apartment and using that kind of gear would probably a)
kill the cat b) get me tarred and feathered and run out of town ;-)
Jonas
I cleared out most of my MAC/APPLE Stuff awhile ago but I just found
this on the Shelf
MCD 800K 3.5 floppy drive for MAC. I've seen some discussions on 3.5
Floppy drives.
Is this any use to anyone
Bob in Wisconsin
?
Thanks to all who have shown an interest, the Alpha has already been claimed.
?
Dale
--- On Fri, 2/18/11, Alan Perry <alanp at snowmoose.com> wrote:
From: Alan Perry <alanp at snowmoose.com>
Subject: Re: AlphaServer 1000A
To: indiviniti at yahoo.com
Date: Friday, February 18, 2011, 12:06 AM
Where is it?
On 2/17/11 8:02 PM, cctech-request at classiccmp.org wrote:
> Subject: AlphaServer 1000A
> To:cctalk at classiccmp.org,chiclassiccomp at yahoogroups.com
> Message-ID:<637473.29307.qm at web38208.mail.mud.yahoo.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1
>
> DEC AlphaServer 1000A?pedestal server, in good shape, working state unknown,
> but likely does.? Alpha VMS or Tru64 UNIX CD's with apps likely available as well.
> Let me know asap if anyone is interested.? Ths is being cleared out of an old DEC
> logistics site early this week.
> Roger Ivie [rivie at ridgenet.net] wrote:
>
>> During development of VAXBI, we were told (by the folks
>> working on it) that it was A) not going to be VAX-specific
>> (DEC was moving MIPSward at the time) and B) would be open.
>>
>> We were a bit startled when it was announced as "VAXBI".
>
> It was never open (in the way that UNIBUS was) but it wasn't VAX-only
> as the DECsystem 5800 (iirc) used it too.
>
> Antonio
If I remember correctly there was $250,000 license fee for the "BI
Corner" if you wanted to design your own BI board.
That doessn't sound open to me.
--
Michael Thompson
