test-drb July 2021

test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

98 participants
64 discussions

Ian Hirschsohn - DISSPLA, Superset Inc. and sad news

by rdawson16＠hotmail.com

As some here know, I collect some dusty deck fortran graphics. We have MOVIE.BYU up and running! (Thanks Douglas Taylor and Emanuel Steibler). Ian built AMD 2901 bit slice hardware to run his graphics, it was called SuperSet, and was very quick for the 1980s. Architecture was 48 bit, A=B op C, similar to DSPs. Compiler processed fortran to this 48 bit 2900 hardware (he wrote the compiler too). Small package, a dormitory size refrigerator with all I/O to drive plotters and graphics terminals. I went to look him up today, as he is not far from me in LA, San Diego, and a fellow R/C flier, and chat about the old Superset days, we did SIGGRAPH many times together. Well, he is dead I find out, killed last year in Mexico is what the news says, buried in a well with his wife. They went often, many times a year. Randy

2 years, 9 months

Reading MT/ST Tapes

by coryheisterkamp＠gmail.com

This is a bit of a long shot, but is anyone aware of a successful method to read IBM Selectric MT/ST tapes? A museum in Australia has a box of them and are interested in the contents. I'm fairly involved in the global Selectric community and while 1 or 2 MT/ST?s exist, they?re non-functional. I know IBM offered a 2495 Tape Reader for the IBM 360, which could be a starting point with modification, but I suspect those are even scarcer than the MT/ST itself. Even the encoding format appears to be a bit of a secret. Recording is character-by-character, tape spacing controlled by sprocket holes along one edge. https://obsoletemedia.org/ibm-mtst/ <https://obsoletemedia.org/ibm-mtst/?fbclid=IwAR28c5ej69AlF0os1PcykpHCh0Q_yz…> Thanks- Cory

2 years, 9 months

LSSM quick update

by mloewen＠cpumagic.scol.pa.us

The A/C is in and running! Tomorrow and Sunday we reassemble the exhibit floor and clean up the mess, just in time for the 60-person group tour on Monday. -- Dave McGuire, AK4HZ New Kensington, PA Thanks to all who contributed to the new A/C!

2 years, 9 months

Reading MT/ST Tapes

by cisin＠xenosoft.com

Yep. And, it was not appreciated when I suggested an interim release between the MT/ST emulator and "Full-ST" to be called "Half Full ST" On Fri, 30 Jul 2021, grif615 at mindspring.com wrote: > Scope Creep.. no telling how many projects died in stalled development. > > On Jul 30, 2021 16:36, Fred Cisin via cctalk <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > wrote: > > On Fri, 30 Jul 2021, Chuck Guzis via cctalk wrote: > > Not really--it's very old technology, (1964), of limited > capacity (about > > 20 KB per tape), was a hideously expensive way to buy a > typewriter > > (about USD$7000 in 1964, or about USD$61,000 today), used > almost > > exclusively in large corporate offices to create form > letters and > > documents. In other words, it was not intended as an > archival medium. > > The effort required in preparing a document was > considerable (one used > > the mini-keypad for various functions). For a memo, it was > easiest to > > use the typewriter as a typewriter. > > There are more interesting things to look at. > > Well, form letters are "important". > But, once microcomputer word processing matured, they could > be done easily > and much better. > > An acquaintance was working on creating an emulation of the > MT/ST, as a > way for those who were familiar with the MT/ST and/or > actually liked it, > to be able to continue unchanged on a microcomputer. > > But, then he started adding features. Besides delaying the > completion > until it was no longer relevant, it was suggested that he > change the name > from "MT/ST" (pronounced "empty ST") to "FULL ST".

2 years, 9 months

Rich Alderson on-list?

by rich.cini＠gmail.com

Is RichA still on-list? If so, could you drop me a note off-list. Thanks! Rich -- Rich Cini http://cini.classiccmp.org http://altair32.classiccmp.org

2 years, 9 months

VCF - west?

by cisin＠xenosoft.com

I heard a rumor that VCF is going to happen again! But, I have seen NO MENTION of that on this mailing list. Is it happening? Will everybody be there? It is now relatively short notice, and between that, not having a station wagon or van, and health issues, I won't be able to pack up and bring a suitable mass of stuff to peddle on consignment. -- Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com

2 years, 9 months

Wanted: Windows Driver for Lexar PC Card Reader

by r_a_feldman＠hotmail.com

Does anyone have the Windows (preferably Windows 10) drivers for the Lexar Media GS-UFD-20SA-TP PC card reader? I found a driver online, lexar_card_34806.zip at admirestore.top, but Malwarebytes gives a warning about the download site, so I am hesitant to download that driver. I want to get my old Lexar PC card reader working again so I can read some cards that I used with my Poqet PQ-181. Bob

2 years, 9 months

Mounting ULTRIX CDROMs on Linux

by a.carlini＠ntlworld.com

I'm running Linux Mint (an ubuntu derivative) and I want to mount ULTRIX CDROM discs to see what I can see. (I'm eventually going to image these, but I presume that will "just work" with dd or ddrescue). They are supposed to be UFS format (according to the net) and that usually means you have to tell mount exactly which option to use (as not all UFS implementations are compatible). I've tried (all the options I can find) and failed: $ sudo mount -t ufs? -o ufstype=44bsd /dev/sr1 /tmp/mount mount: /tmp/mount: wrong fs type, bad option, bad superblock on /dev/sr1, missing codepage or helper program, or other error. The CDROM would appear to be readable 9and I've tried a few anyway): $ sudo file -s /dev/sr1 /dev/sr1: Unix Fast File system [v1] (little-endian), last mounted on /UPS_MOUNT_TAR_SOURCE, last written at Wed Sep 28 16:27:45 1994, clean flag 30, number of blocks 243648, number of data blocks 233295, number of cylinder groups 38, block size 8192, fragment size 1024, minimum percentage of free blocks 10, rotational delay 0ms, disk rotational speed 60rps, TIME optimization A later Digital Unix CDROM behaves the same way with mount and reports this with file: $ sudo file -s /dev/sr1 /dev/sr1: Unix Fast File system [v1] (little-endian), last mounted on /kits/tmp/gendisk17665/mnt, last written at Wed Nov 20 13:38:02 1996, clean flag 3, number of blocks 151168, number of data blocks 150383, number of cylinder groups 24, block size 8192, fragment size 1024, minimum percentage of free blocks 0, rotational delay 0ms, disk rotational speed 60rps, SPACE optimization I also have a few OSF/1 CDROMs, which I assume are also the same format. Any ideas? I can't be the first person to try to do this ... Antonio -- Antonio Carlini antonio at acarlini.com

2 years, 9 months

RP/M2 by Micro Methods Inc

by dave＠661.org

I found a copy of RP/M2 for the IBM PC by Micro Methods Inc. with manual and some floppies, 8" and 5.25". According to the manual, this was a CP/M compatible operating system. Doing a web search doesn't tell me anything more than a couple offhand comments. Does anyone here know anything interesting about this? -- David Griffith dave at 661.org A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail?

2 years, 9 months

Compaq Deskpro boards/hard drives from the late 1990s

by kevin_anderson_dbq＠yahoo.com

For a time I had quite a few Compaq Deskpro towers that had acquired (for free) from my employer after they updated to a newer HP Compaq model. These Compaq Deskpros were the white-boxed variety with Pentium III the like processors that date to the later part of the 1990s and into the 2000s. They interested me because they were able to work with the flavors of Linux that were becoming plentiful and useful at the time (like Mandrake, etc.) Anyway, the desktops themselves are gone, as well as the PC keyboards and the monitors that went with them, with this paragraph just setting the scene.... But at the same time I also acquired (pulled) from these same computers and their siblings a whole bunch of wired Ethernet network cards, one or two video cards, a whole bunch of the IDE/PATA 5.25-inch desktop CD drives, and a whole bunch(!) of 10- and 20-GByte IDE/PATA 5.25-inch desktop hard drives. I believe the vintage makes them all PCI cards for the network and video cards. For some reason I must have had it in my head that I would all need these extra cards (and more) to keep these boxes (and other desktops) going into the future when the apocalypse came <grin> ! Now I have no need for any of these parts. I don't want to chuck them to a recycler either, but it is tempting just to get the stuff out of the house (as I need to seriously downsize prior to retirement). Is there a market for any of this that is worth pursing, or is this all too generic and plentiful to worry about? Giving shipping and that, I am not sure how much of this I'd care to deal with this through resale (eBay or privately) versus just dropping it all at the electronics recycling shop (which fortunately I have locally). Just starting to sort this out...I've been meaning to send this e-mail for awhile now. Your collective thoughts? I know most of this is too new for most of your interests... Kevin Anderson, Dubuque, Iowa

2 years, 9 months

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test-drb July 2021