On 2012-08-08 19:00, Al Kossow<aek at bitsavers.org> wrote:
> On 8/7/12 11:20 PM, Rod Smallwood wrote:
>> >It's a mystery .. no one seems to know.
>> >
> Quite a few people on this list know, and they have said it several times on this
> list. The rights were bought from Mentec by XX2247, LLC
>
> I think Dave has been busy with other things, though.
Indeed. I know it's been said a few times by now. I'm almost thinking
that some people just don't want to hear that answer...
So, to repeat, the PDP-11 software is still owned, and it is not Mentec
anymore.
Oh, and I saw the other confused discussion about Mentec vs Mentec US.
The Mentec that had the PDP-11 software was not found under mentec.com,
but under mentec-inc.com - how fast people forget...
This is from Jan 6, 2006:
http://web.archive.org/web/20060106160717/http://www.mentec-inc.com/
Johnny
Richard <legalize at xmission.com> wrote ..
<cut>
> "will be available"... I assume that means sometime in the future,
> because I looked at both sites and couldn't find anything.
>
> FYI, dark blue text on a black background is a very illegible color
> scheme.
Here's a direct link: ftp://dragonsweb.org/pub/ti/docs/
jbdigriz
Hi! The XT-IDE V2 PCBs are back! They allow classic PC/XT type computers
to use parallel IDE hard drives and also remote booting over a serial port.
They are very useful boards. The PCBs are $12 each plus $2 shipping in the
US and $5 elsewhere.
Please send a PayPal to LYNCHAJ at YAHOO.COM and I'll send your board(s) right
away! Thanks and have a nice day!
Andrew Lynch
I'm noticing something on my PDP-11/84 that I can't explain. I've
"repaired" the broken power-supply by partially replacing it
(http://flic.kr/p/cKTBn7). The 11/84 runs fine now, except that it
won't boot if I put the Unibus terminator (M9302) in. Without the
terminator, it works fine, and I can access controllers on the Unibus.
According to the manual, however, an M9302 was part of the basic
package. I'm seeing this behavior with two different M9302 modules, as
well as with two different Unibus adapters. Any explanation welcome...
These will be available at my site, dragonsweb.org and ftp.whtech.com, and I've notified bitsavers.org also.
What's done so far:
2262325-9701 "DS990 System Model 1 Site Preparation and Installation"
2262326-9701 "Model 770 Intelligent Data Terminal Upgrade Instructions to DS990 System Model 1"
2262327-9701 "Model 771 Intelligent Data Terminal Upgrade Instructions to DS990 System Model 1"
2262570-9701A "DS990 System Model 1 Field Maintenance Test Operating Procedures"
993023-9701 "Operating Instructions for Model 770 Intelligent Data Terminal"
Scans taken on an Epson Workforce 323 at 600 dpi, 1bit/sample. They need some post-processing,
mostly straightening, but I have such a big pile that I'm focusing on scanning them all in right now,
and will correct later. The .tifs are there if anyone else wants to start on the post-processing. Also pdfs which make the need for straightening glaringly evident :-)
Many, many thanks to Guntis Sprenne for providing these, and my apologies for
the delay in getting to them.
jbdigriz
Hey everyone, I am looking for a original S100 power supply
(transformer, diode and caps) unregulated and 8v/18v/-18v. Looking for
something fairly compact (like the one in an Altair 8800). If you have
one assembled, or ever piece parts, I would be interested in purchasing
it or trading for it.
Hi all,
Does anyone happen to have any IBM 2315 disk packs[1] available? The
National Museum of Computing in the UK are at the point where they're
looking for a few as part of the restoration of their 1130 system.
[1] or functional equivalents to the genuine IBM ones, if any exist; by the
sounds of it packs from various sources may physically fit, but sectoring /
disk surface / other details vary.
thanks,
Jules
We currently house the former WRE 7090 on our farm in South Australia. We
have what appears to be the complete computer system as it was turned off,
with 7090 computer hardware including a 1401 front end and magnetic tape
drives - about 20 large cabinets in all. All computer manuals are included,
with program printouts for system programs and diagnostics, as well as
punched cards for loading and scheduling jobs via the 1401.
We are not looking for more documents or tapes. A couple of our manuals are
somewhat damaged, and some of our punched cards have been dropped, damaged
or lost, but in general there seems to be enough backup documentation in
good condition to recover any lost programs or data.
We are interested to know what other 7090's there are still relatively
intact, and what, if any, work is being put into their systems.
The 7090 would not be a cheap computer to run, as it uses huge amounts of
power and therefore needs considerable air conditioning. In its latter years
after the ESRO space program finished, the WRE 7090 was used amongst other
things for recording mineral exploration data. There is at least one
Australian company using restored 7090 magnetic tape drives with programs
emulating the 7090 magnetic tape drivers to recover this stored data. It is
interesting that the magnetic tapes are still readable after so many years
in the South Australian Department of Mines environmentally controlled
storage.
Susan Freebairn
_____
From: peter at vanpeborgh.eu
To: lawrence at ljw.me.uk; cube1 at charter.net; michaelv at virginiairrigation.net;
henridhosty at hotmail.com; IanK at vulcan.com; cctech at classiccmp.org;
aek at bitsavers.org; wdonzelli at gmail.com; lin.jones at tnmoc.org;
scmobjectenquiries at ScienceMuseum.ac.uk
Subject: Fw: To all with interest in IBM 7090 - follow on
Date: Tue, 7 Aug 2012 11:21:40 +0100
Guys,
Original email attached.
Two new thoughts:
* I do seem to have generated some strong interest for the 7090
documentation, which is good. And some controversy as to who should receive
these bits: US or UK (perhaps Australia?). The 7090 was an American
invention but this one was used in the UK.
Perhaps each of you with a strong interest could make a case to us for
receiving this material. The decision of the deceased owner's family, the
clearing team and myself to be final.
* Something which might influence decisions: the materials are paper,
metal and plastic. The paper is slightly damp, the metal has corroded in
some cases and the plastic has some mould patches. None of which make the
material unusable in any way but I thought I must be clear on this point. I
should have done so in the original email, sorry.
Kind regards,
peter vp
|| | | | | | | | |
Peter Van Peborgh
62 St Mary's Rise
Writhlington Radstock
Somerset BA3 3PD
UK
01761 439 234
|| | | | | | | | |
----- Original Message -----
From: Peter Van Peborgh <mailto:peter at vanpeborgh.eu>
To: cube1 at charter.net ; michaelv at virginiairrigation.net ;
henridhosty at hotmail.com ; IanK at vulcan.com ; cctech at classiccmp.org ;
aek at bitsavers.org ; wdonzelli at gmail.com ; lin.jones at tnmoc.org ;
scmobjectenquiries at ScienceMuseum.ac.uk
Sent: Monday, August 06, 2012 12:21 PM
Subject: To all with interest in IBM 7090
Guys,
I am sending this to all who have registered an interest in the IBM 7090 and
museums. Sorry if I got some people wrong!
This computer started life at AWRE in the UK (nuclear weapons design?!) and
finished in the Medical Computing department at Manchester Uni in 1970,
where it ran for 10-20 years.
It had 4 channels, 32K memory, card reader, card punch, 300 LPM barrel
printer and ?20 mag tapes. It also had an IBM 1401 for printer I/O.
I have now surveyed the stuff available. There is no hardware. It is a lot
of (probably complete) hardware documentation, cicuit diagrams, s/w
documentation (IBSYS, etc) also. Also a lot of mag tapes of mixed content
and some card trays of mixed content.
Are any of you out there interested? It is all quite heavy so transport will
be a challenge, but surmountable!
The stuff will be available in the first week of September. Any sensible
offers will be considered. It might go on eBay but I will wait until you
guys respond first.
Kind regards,
peter vp
|| | | | | | | | |
Peter Van Peborgh
62 St Mary's Rise
Writhlington Radstock
Somerset BA3 3PD
UK
01761 439 234
|| | | | | | | | |
At 12:00 -0500 8/7/12, Fred wrote:
>What IS a "supercomputer"?
>(some people define it in terms of speed!)
...the obvious question, and one we have been over multiple times.
I'm envisioning, but have nothing like the skills to create,
a 3 dimensional plot. X-axis is year of introduction, Y-axis is
available RAM (or equivalent quick-access memory), Z-axis is MFLOPS
or suitable measure of computation throughput [1]. Dots might be
color-coded by relative price, adjusted for inflation, to essentially
encode a 4th dimension, but one normally correlated to Z-axis. Or one
might use color for one of the other possible axes (bit width, I/O
bandwidth, etc.).
I suspect a surface could be constructed in that plot that
would allow one to reasonably define anything above the surface to be
a supercomputer, while anything below it not a supercomputer. I'm
sure exceptions could be made (Distributed.net? The PlayStation 3
array?) but maybe it would cut down some on the inevitable argument.
Does this already exist somewhere? I note
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:PPTMooresLawai.jpg
which is on the way toward what I'm thinking of.
[1] Yeah, that's a whole other discussion on its own. And I have
totally ignored the question of I/O capability, so there could be
lots more axes on the plot. I know, it's not an easy question to
answer, no brickbats please!
--
- 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.
