test-drb December 2016

test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

156 participants
199 discussions

heavy stuff -- was: Anyone want an RK11-C manual?

by henk.gooijen＠hotmail.com

Van: Tony Duell<mailto:ard.p850ug1 at gmail.com> Verzonden: vrijdag 16 december 2016 17:54 Aan: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts<mailto:cctalk at classiccmp.org> Onderwerp: Re: Anyone want an RK11-C manual? On Fri, Dec 16, 2016 at 4:31 PM, Henk Gooijen <henk.gooijen at hotmail.com> wrote: > > But I am not giving up hope ? I recently acquired something I did not think > to be possible to happen ? I ?picked up? an H960 rack with RP11 controller > and *three* RP03 disk drives aand 6 packs. The rack is already moved, the > drives are a separate story. Each drive weighs 415 lbs. ?So what? you might > ask. Well, they are in a cellar and three flights of stairs (10 steps, 6 steps, > and 4 steps) is too much for 3 strong guys to push one drive up the stairs. > We are now looking into another option to get the drives (and a DEC > _line_printer, also very very heavy!) up to the first floor ? Can these units be dismantled without totally losing alignment,etc. At least remove PSUs, spindle motors, etc. I once moved an RA60 (much lighter, but still too heavy for one person to carry easily) downstairs by taking it almost completely apart. Incidentally, it is surprising how much the PCBs in a full cardcage weight, it is often worth pulling them all out. I suspect an RP03 dismantled like that would still be too heavy for one person to move, but with 3 people it might be possible. I hope your upstairs floor is strong enough for them... You do not want them coming back downstairs at 9.81m/s^2 -tony Grin ? I don?t plan to check whether Mother Earth?s acceleration is still working fine. Indeed, the RA60 is heavy. Just like RA81?s, the RA60 is not good for your back, but the RA60 is worse than the RA81. The RA60 is also ?longer? compared to the RA81, and that does not help either when you hav to move an RA60 around. I really do not want to mess with the mechanical construction of the entire RP03 drive. They are too rare. I want to move them ?as is?. The only thing that can be done easily is removing the side panels. However, the ceiling in the cellar has an opening although that is currently welded by a closing lid. The system was installed in the 80ties, and it is not remembered how the system got into the cellar back then. The system has operated in that cellar for almost 20 years (PDP-11/40, RP11, Kennedy 9100 ? 3 H960 rack system). I used wooden planks (shelves) laid on the stairs, and then pushed the racks up. It was heavy, even for 3 strong guys --- OK, 2.5 ? I removed the Kennedy tape drive to make the rack less heavy. The rack with the RP11 controller was also heavy, but I really did not want to pull or dismantle anything of it. We got it out of the cellar. The 11/40 (the 21? version in BA11-F, IIRC) rack had, to my surprise an extra BA11-F with its H742 PSU ? One H742 PSU is already heavy, so two of these beast made the rack way too heavy. I ended up with disconnecting the power harness and move the 11/40 separately. That made it possible to move the rack upstairs (with sweat and some swearing ^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H calling in the help of some gods ? We did try moving one RP03 by pushing it upstairs using the ?planks? trick. Three guys asking ?are we pushing?? Yes, but the drive did not move at all. The RP03 is by far the most heavy item I encountered in 20 years! We are now looking into the option to hoist the drives via the hatch in the Ceiling. Needless to say we take all possible precautions ? for people and for RP03?s. To be continued, * Henk, PA8PDP

7 years, 11 months

Does anyone have docs for a Ventel brand MD212-plus modem?

by ethan.dicks＠gmail.com

Hi, All, A friend of mine just returned a modem he got from me decades ago, a Ventel MD212-plus. It's an early-1980s non-AT-command-set autodialling modem. The settings are adjusted via a pair of 10-pin DIP switches accessible from the back. I've checked the web and bitsavers. So far, all I've found is some old Usenet articles and a couple of pictures, but no manual or jumper guide. One "feature" is that it lacks a modular jack to plug into the phone system. Fortunately, my friend kept the proprietary DA15 cable. I've never seen that choice of connectors on any other modem. Does anyone have any Ventel docs? Thanks, -ethan

7 years, 11 months

PDP-6s at MIT

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Lars Brinkhoff >> They expressed some interest in the old MIT-AI KA-10 that you have in >> storage. Can they have it? > So maybe they got it after all! So perhaps my memory is not so bad after all! :-) Or maybe I was just remembering the discussion of them possibly getting it? The real thing to do is check directly with those guys, rather than examining tea entrails. Howwever, if my memory is accurate, there perhaps might be, in those pictures: http://www.stupi.se/Bilder/pdp-10/ some evidence that they did get it: in the row above the bottom, the picture on the left seems to me like it might be a picture of the HIC-memory for AI. But now that I look close, maybe it's just a CADR? The picture to the right of that one shows what looks like a CADR (they had those giant swing-out monolithic bays on the front which are the CPU - the AI Lab build a cool robot to check the wirewrap when they went into production on the CADRs), and so that may be the front of the same rack as that one before (which would therefore be of the back of that CADR). Noel

7 years, 11 months

Banner Panels

by rodsmallwood52＠btinternet.com

Hi Guys I have had a quick word with the girls down at the silk screen shop. Banner panels 18 1/2 by 3 5/16 silk screened on 1mm Aluminum look to be doable I don't know how many different types there were. Regardless of if you need a replacement and you have not sent me picture a head on shot would really help Rod (Panelman) Smallwood -- PDP-8/e PDP-8/f PDP-8/m PDP-8/i Front Panels ex Stock - Order Now

7 years, 11 months

Stripping an RA80

by ard.p850ug1＠gmail.com

I am probably going to be flamed for this.... My VAX11/730 has an R80 disk drive as you might expect. I dismantled this many years ago to move it and never reassembled it. Over the years (in particular during a house move), the smaller parts (screws, the brackets and clevis pins for the gas struts, and ribbon cables) have got lost. A friend of mine (Philip) was having a clearout and gave me an RA80 (SDI interface, of course). I don't run SDI drives anywhere (I think I have a UDA50 somewhere), but a lot of parts are the same as in the R80. My first thought is to strip this RA80 (that's why I got it!). This will provide me with most of the missing parts (all that I would have to make is the 26 way ribbon to the controller cable -- the 60 way one is still in the R80 chassis). So after stripping I think I would be left with 4 classes of part : 1) Those I need for the R80 -- brackets, screws cables, etc 2) Those that could be useful spares for the R80 : HDA Spindle Motor Belt Belt Tensioner PSU R/W PCB Servo PCB Microprocessor PCB (the ROMs are different, of course, but the the PCB is the same and could be a source of components. I don't swap boards anyway) AC and DC power harnesses Fans Motor capacitor 3) Those that are of no use in the R80, but are not too hard to store Personality board Control panel SDI cabling 4) Those that I don't need and which are a pain to store Cbassis parts. Is there any reason to keep the bare, stripped, chassis, or should I let it go as scrap metal? Does anyone run an RA80 and think any of the bits in list 3 (certainly) or 2 (I may want to keep these, in particular the HDA if it's good) are useful to them? Of course I don't know if the parts are still good. Or should I preserve the RA80 as it is, and just use it as patterns for the missing bits. Try to find a source of the UNC screws, make up the cables, make up brackets, etc. I would only do that if there is a very good reason. -tony

7 years, 11 months

Introduction to DECSYSTEM-20 PDF?

by lists+cctalk＠loomcom.com

I'm looking for a PDF of "Introduction to DECSYSTEM-20 Assembly Language Programming" by Ralph E. Gorin. It used to be hosted on PDPPlanet (xkleten.paulallen.com), but that's been down for a while. Does anyone else have a copy they could send me? Best Wishes, -Seth -- Seth Morabito seth at loomcom.com

7 years, 11 months

Transporting an LGP-30

by blstuart＠bellsouth.net

On Thu, 12/29/16, Noel Chiappa <jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu> wrote: > Interesting factoid about the Bendix G-15: it was designed with the help of > one of the ACE people (Harry Huskey), and is basically a re-packaged ACE with > drum instead of delay lines. There's an interesting article by Huskey himself > in "Alan Turing's ACE" (by Jack Copeland) which discusses the G-15. Indeed. Huskey is probably one of the most influential, least known early pioneers. He was one of the engineers on the ENIAC, having designed the card reader and punch interface units. He spent some time at NPL and was one of the prime pushers behind the idea of building a pilot version of the ACE. When he returned to the US, he designed both the SWAC and the G-15. Later he was on the faculty at UC Berkeley where three of his advisees were Niklaus Wirth, Ken Thompson, and Butler Lampson. And he turned 100 early in 2016. BLS

7 years, 11 months

DEC color standards was: Re: Banner Panels

by chd＠chdickman.com

Rod, On Thu, Dec 29, 2016 at 8:04 PM, Rod Smallwood <rodsmallwood52 at btinternet.com> wrote: > Hi Guys > > I have had a quick word with the girls down at the silk screen > shop. A couple of years ago I tried to translate the DEC color standards to RGB based on the colors in the standards on bitsavers. Here is what I came up with: http://www.chdickman.com/pdp8/DECcolors/ I think I posted this already. How have you been doing your color matching? Have you published a color list for the panels you have made? I am thinking about color matching for switch handles for example that are in the same colors. Some enduring standard translation for the colors would be great to have available in the future. I never imagined how slippery color was until I tried to do the color matching from the DEC standards. I had to meet Munsell, Ostwald and the CHM (Color Harmony Manual, not the Computer History Museum), before I was done. And Pantone seems to be the Microsoft of color. -chuck

7 years, 11 months

Year 2017

by c.murray.mccullough＠gmail.com

2016 is on the way out. For classic computer users let's hope 2017 allows our 'hobby' to continue to flourish. Happy computing for 2017! Murray :)

7 years, 11 months

Stripping an RA80

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Tony Duell > My first thought is to strip this RA80 (that's why I got it!). This > will provide me with most of the missing parts > ... > Is there any reason to keep the bare, stripped, chassis, or should I > let it go as scrap metal? > ... > Or should I preserve the RA80 as it is, and just use it as patterns for > the missing bits. I don't have any problem at all with the concept of stripping the parts you need off one drive to make the other work. After all, you'd be conserving the number of complete drives: start with one complete, and one missing some bits; end with one complete, and one missing some bits. However, I personally would not dispose of any of the bits, though (except things which can be easily found, and will continue to be so, like standard fasteners); once they are gone, they are gone forever. UNC/UNF parts are easy to source on this side of the pond: I imagine they'd be easy to find on eBay, or if there's something you can't locate, let me know, and I can run over to the store and grab it and mail it off. Noel

7 years, 11 months

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test-drb December 2016