test-drb January 2016

test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

172 participants
198 discussions

by pontus＠Update.UU.SE

Hi My employer is moving house and need to clear out some old stuff. We have ported to many, many Unix systems over the years and have kept some of the machines. Available is: 1x IBM RS/6000 big and beige 1x Bull DPX/2 1x Concurrent Computer Corporation in rack 1x Sperry unix machine 1x NCR (same as above, other label) Possibly 1 VAX 4000 and possibly one Alphaserver 2000. Pickup only. We will remove hard drives since they contain source code. In a few weeks, this will be gone. A few pictures here: http://www.update.uu.se/~pontus/slask/jobb_vind/ Items are in Uppsala, Sweden. /P

8 years, 10 months

OT: Come watch me install Linux on the IBM z890 Mainframe!

by connork＠connorsdomain.com

Come one come all! Its the day of reckoning. I finally have some storage on loan from a company called Funsoft! Hopefully by the end of the night I will have Linux installed and a portal to the internet to which people can connect and play on it! http://www.twitch.tv/conmega -Connor Krukosky

8 years, 10 months

PDP-11/03, LSI-11 KEV11-C CIS option

by spacewar＠gmail.com

Does anyone have a PDP-11/03 or LSI-11 with the KEV11-C CIS (Commercial Instruction Set) option? It may have also been known as DIS (Dibol Instruction Set). It apparently consists of two microcode ROM chips (MICROMs), 23-004B5 and 23-005B5. Last month I posted here about building a circuit to dump the contents of MICROMs: https://www.flickr.com/photos/22368471 at N04/albums/72157662054690240 I've dumped the base LSI-11 instruction set chips and the EIS/FIS chip. I've partially disassembled the former: https://github.com/brouhaha/lsi11uc and verified that the latter matches the EIS/FIS microcode source code provided with the KUV11 writable control store support software. I'd like to dump the CIS microcode ROMs as well. The resulting dump would be usable by anyone with a KUV11. I'm contemplating developing a MICROM replacement board, which would be useful for those without a KUV11. I've made more progress with the WD9000 Pascal Microengine microcode than the LSI-11 microcode because someone provided a photomicrograph of the CP2161 control chip and I was able to dump the PLAs. I should be getting a photomicrograph of the CP1621 control chip of the LSI-11 soon, and will be able to do the same for it.

8 years, 10 months

Non-baking cure for sticky shed?

by mattislind＠gmail.com

I was trying to archive a bunch of 8 inch floppy disks. Everything was well until I tried an Inmac brand disk. It had severe sticky shed problems. Since it was a non-important disk it wasn't that bad. Baking might solve the problem so before continuing with the rest of the Inmac branded disks with more valuable content I searched internet for knowhow on baking. Then I found this article https://www.questia.com/library/journal/1G1-359998950/the-new-non-baking-cu… on a cure for the sticky shed without baking the tape. I haven't read the article in ARSC since I am not a member. But maybe someone knows what this is about? /Mattis

8 years, 10 months

PDP-11/03, LSI-11 KEV11-C CIS option

by spacewar＠gmail.com

On Sun, Jan 31, 2016 at 12:51 PM, Brian L. Stuart <blstuart at bellsouth.net> wrote: > I'll be glad to loan them to you for the good of the community and history. That would be great, thanks! I'll email you my contact information. Could you please post the markings of the other 40-pin chips as well, and/or a photograph? Best regards, Eric

8 years, 10 months

PDP-11/03, LSI-11 KEV11-C CIS option

by blstuart＠bellsouth.net

On Sat, 1/30/16, Eric Smith <spacewar at gmail.com> wrote: > Does anyone have a PDP-11/03 or LSI-11 with the KEV11-C CIS > (Commercial Instruction Set) option? It may have also been known as > DIS (Dibol Instruction Set).? It apparently consists of two microcode > ROM chips (MICROMs), 23-004B5 and 23-005B5. Eric, It turns out my quad height LSI-11 card has the 23-004B5 and 23-005B5 chips on it. The full markings are: DEC 3025D 23-004B5 8030 B and DEC 3026 D (or maybe B) 23-005B5 8015 C I'll be glad to loan them to you for the good of the community and history. BLS

8 years, 10 months

Can Windows 98SE run on an Intel I7 with SATA hard drives?

by mark＠markesystems.com

From: jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu (Noel Chiappa) > > Win-98 SE ... it would have been nice if it recognized USB storage > > devices natively. > > There is that package you can add (my copy is in a self-extracting > archive, > called "nusb23e.exe") that recognizes USB drives, etc. I run a number of > USB > devices (memory sticks, mice, etc) on my 98SE's and they all work fine. Thanks for the tip - I wish I'd known about that 15 years ago! From: "Jerome H. Fine" <jhfinedp3k at compsys.to> >> >mark at markesystems.com wrote: >> >>> QUESTION: Is it even possible to run Win98SE on a current >>> Intel I7 CPU with SATA hard disk drives? I realize that it might >> >> Almost certainly not, at least practically. Even if you can get it to >> boot and install, it will have no idea how to handle any of the modern > > Then I am really confused. I have two older systems that > are able to run 64-bit Windows 7, an E8400 and a Q9550. > Both take SATA drives which are still available. The mother > > I can also still boot from both system using an old DOS 3.5" > floppy media and run Ghost 7.0 with these old SATA drives, > but as far as I can understand, using the device drivers on the > floppy drive. I believe that Win98 tries to use its own drivers for disk, but if it can't find any that work it just uses the ones built into the BIOS. Performance suffers, because all disk I/O becomes blocking, but it still works. With a modern disk with built-in cache, one probably wouldn't even notice the difference (except for the floppy). > Is it likely that either of these two systems be able to run > Win98SE with the SATA hard drives, in one case 500 GB > each and the other system has 1 TB drives. In that case, it I would expect that you could successfully boot and install Win98, although you couldn't use all the drive in one volume (FAT32 is good for a little over 100 gig); I've never tried partitioning up a terabyte drive and running Win98 on a appropriately-sized partition, but it seems like it might work OK. As above, the BIOS will take care of the fact that Win98 never heard of SATA, and also abstract the USB keyboard and I think the mouse to look like AT-type devices. As I mentioned, though, it won't know about the video adapter, so that will run in VGA 640x480 16-color mode; the sound card won't be available either, nor the network interface. VirtualBox simulates all nice period-style hardware for those things. > As I mentioned, the only two applications I would run would > be the DOS variant of Ersatz-11 and Netscape 7.2 for e-mail > and newsgroups. I suspect that both of those would run on Windows XP, and VirtualBox handles that extremely well. From: Chuck Guzis <cclist at sydex.com> > I didn't mention that I've got 98SE running on an 820 chipset > (RIMM/RDRAM is silly cheap now) with a Tuallie 1.4GHz in a Powerleap > slocket. It doesn't much agree with the Crystal CS4622 audio, but > perhaps that's just a matter of finding the right driver. As I predicted... :-) >> Windows 98 was supposed to support a maximum of 2GB of memory, however >> it has a bug in the Vcache driver which causes problems unless you limit > Exactly what I've done with 440GX system. Using a different XMS driver, > I keep a 1GB RAMdisk there. But it runs quite nicely in just 64 or 128 meg, which was much more typical of a machine of that period. > On faster, more modern systems, I use VirtualBox. Just not worth the > extra trouble finding drivers--but I suspect 98SE will run on P4 systems Yup, that's what seems to work best for me. From: "js at cimmeri.com" <js at cimmeri.com> > The one thing I'm not seeing mentioned > in re VirtualBox is that what if you > have a legacy Win 98SE system with > hardware in it, like a GPIB card or > sound card? Or if you have software > that talks to hardware via serial or > parallel ports eg. eprom burners, Zector > ZVG vector graphic driver for MAME, etc. Yup, that's true. VirtualBox will provide one or two com ports (optionally mapped to the real host ports, or just pipes to other virtual machines), but it doesn't support the parallel port. And as you've pointed out, any specialized hardware won't work at all (because the backplane doesn't really exist). > The other hassle is having to > essentially rebuild an Win98 (or any > other) machine from scratch in order to > try to replicate an existing setup. I Also true... From: Josh Dersch <derschjo at gmail.com> > everything else, you're SOL. I could see it being possible to modify > VirtualBox to support parallel port forwarding or other exotic hardware Wow! I guess it is open source, but that would be quite a bit of work, I expect. If you do it, let me know - I've got an old Needham's PROM programmer that would be nice to have working again. From: John Foust <jfoust at threedee.com> > No one has mentioned the Windows Virtual PC, a Microsoft product, > that lets you run Windows XP apps in a virtual environment under > Windows 7 Pro, letting XP apps run in their natural window on > the 7 desktop, or you can run the virtual XP machine desktop > in its own window. I used an earlier version of Virtual PC on XP, and found that it worked fairly well, although it was very resource intensive. So many applications failed to run correctly on Win7 that Microsoft felt compelled to make a very tightly integrated version for that operating system (Pro or greater only); it was pretty neat how tightly integrated it was. That's how I ran QuickBooks and a couple of other recalcitrant programs, but it wasn't a panacea. In particular, applications that had several programs running simultaneously, especially if they communicated via DDE (DDEML) were still broken, and the tight integration was always a little scary to me. (If I fired up a "stand-alone" XP machine, it would always want to log off or shut down the one that had been running some other application, and because of the Draconian security, I was never sure that I'd be able to get it back...) > It will also run Windows 98, with a few gotchas: This is what I did with the earlier Virtual PC on top of XP, and it worked fairly well. Like VirtualBox, it's free, but I find that VirtualBox tries to do less integration "magic", and therefore feels like a more stable and clearly delineated product. I've seen no mention of Virtual PC on Win8 / 8.1 / 10 - does it still exist, and is that "XP-mode" feature still available? ~~ Mark Moulding

8 years, 10 months

Preferred way of substituting TFT for CRT Monitor?

by Martin.Hepperle＠dlr.de

I have got a HP 9000/217 machine with a standard video card. This card has a monochrome composite output (resolution is as low as about 512x400, but I might replace it with a higher resolution card). A small 9" HP monitor that I used for testing only shows me 2 or 3 bands of the image and cannot capture the signal properly. All I have are modern TFT monitors which usually have VGA and/or DVI inputs, no separate R-G-B or monochrome jacks. What is the preferred way to connect "old" composite video signals to a modern TFT monitor without losing too much sharpness? I understand that interpolation is an unavoidable problem. Searching the internet did not give me a clear answer. Do you have any recommendations? Thank you, Martin

8 years, 10 months

Any hope for CBM VIC-1525 Printers & ribbons?

by drlegendre＠gmail.com

Has anyone found a source for replacement ribbons, or even re-inking supplies, for the Commodore VIC-1525 printer? This printer was manufactured in Japan by Seikosha for CBM, and was also sold in the USA by Radio Shack, re-badged under the Tandy / TRS-80 brand. For reference - The VIC-1525 employs an odd two-cassette ribbon system, that uses a continuous-loop ribbon only about 24" in total length. One cassette contains a spring tensioner mechanism, with the second cassette holding the inking roller and (friction?) gear. The ribbon loop is strung side-to-side between the two cartridges, with the front strand passing in front of the print head, and the rear strand passing through the ribbon advance clutch. Google turns up nothing, except for some homebrew recipes for making new ink.. and one site offering exorbitantly priced NOS ribbons that are just as likely dried up. Thanks for any & all input..

8 years, 10 months

Substituting DSHD for DSDD disks (or DS2D if you prefer)

by echristopherson＠gmail.com

I know Chuck Guzis has written about this, but I don't see that he's done so publicly in the last few years, so I thought I'd ask here about his and others' views on the perennial question of whether (some) 3.5" DSHD disks can be reliably used in DSDD-only drives. The oft-repeated claim is that writing can appear to work just fine, but that even a few months later read errors will occur. On <http://www.retrotechnology.com/herbs_stuff/guzis.html> Chuck was quoted as (actually, correct me if I'm wrong -- it's a little hard to be sure this was Chuck's words) as saying "Usually, they're just fine, with the error rate approximately the same, whether or not 2D or HD media was used." Just before that, he said "I think that the overall quality of DSHD 3.5" media isn't what it used to be, so that might contribute to the general impression that 3.5" HD diskettes used as 2D aren't reliable. I have problems enough finding reliable 3.5" DSHD floppies used as such." Chuck et al., what's your feeling now, both on the overall reliability of HD disks in DD drives, and on whether it depends on how recently the disks were produced? Elsewhere on the page (I don't recall now if it was Herb or Chuck that said it) it was conjectured that HD disks that have never been formatted as HD, -OR- disks that have gone through a good degaussing, will have better luck retaining data. What does everyone think about this? And would an electromagnetic library security system (the kind that's like a tube through which checked-out materials are put; often with a caution not to put tapes or floppies through it) be a suitable degausser? -- Eric Christopherson

8 years, 10 months

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test-drb January 2016