test-drb

test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

101090 discussions

by jws＠jwsss.com

I have a vmware image. I'll see if i can find an installer ISO The comment about being off topic is not true. I don't like Fords, but let people collect them. Also if you need to get a Ford going to do something useful and the topic were relevent to a list about old fords, it should be on topic overall to such a list If you started delving too far into topics about things not related to classic hardware you'd be better to take them to a windows forum. But asking how to get classic hardware running with older devices / hardware and specific topics to that is on target. Reason being. The hardware for the x86 PC progressed from an 8088 thru a 286, 386, 486, and Pentium. The Dos and windows platforms operated in ways that were unique, in this way. Original 8088 in pure 8088 real mode. 286 introduced protected mode but still had to deal with return to real mode and booted and ran as a real mode OS going into protected mode and back. I believe Windows 3.1 used a mode that was somewhat different than win95, but the essential thing for dos, Win3.1 and win95 were all real mode that ran another mode, but basically were real mode OS's. Windows 98 booted almost directly into protected mode and created a dos box to run such software as had required real mode. From there on, the transition was to Windows NT and that is a whole different can of worms. A lot of hardware out there deals only with the various windows platforms, and it is not acceptable to at least be considerate of questions which relate to the topic of windows related to the older custom hardware. Just as an example a lot of the affordable high performance scanners that have created Bitsavers require older windows and then still barely run, and getting help to support such should not be banned. Jim 4

11 years, 5 months

windows 98

by jonas＠otter.se

On Thu, 13 Feb 2014 12:19:35 +0000, Peter Corlett <abuse at cabal.org.uk> wrote: > Do remember that the amount of memory supported in a system depends on the size > of the physical and virtual address spaces. The virtual address space > corresponds to the size of a pointer, and the physical address space > corresponds to the number of pins actually coming out of the CPU package. > Paging hardware allows the physical address space to be larger than virtual. Virtual memory and paging was originally invented to allow the *virtual* address space to be larger than the physical address space. It does work both ways of course, but the original idea was in some old machines of the 1950s to allow extending the address space by using disk storage. The Atlas, for example.

11 years, 5 months

d8tape

by kylevowen＠gmail.com

Greetings, I was trying to download d8tape.tar.gz from pdp12.org. The link seems dead. http://dustyoldcomputers.com/pdp-common/reference/host/index.html Can anyone send me the tar? Thanks! Kyle

11 years, 5 months

ETA-10

by alexeyt＠freeshell.org

I've been reading about the ETA-10 systems, and I have some questions that I hope the folks can clear up for me: The wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ETA10 claims that the designers were expecting a theoretical 4x speedup from cooling the CMOS from room temperature (~300K) to ~90K, but only attained a 2x speedup in practice. None of the sources I can find mention the expected 4x speedup; many mention that a 2x speedup was obtained; some also mention that the originally advertised cycle time was 5ns, and that only 7ns was ever achieved. Is there any basis for the wikipedia claim that a 4x speedup was expected? If so, what's the physics behind that expectation? Why would the theoretical performance not be attainable in practice? The most interesting references I've found so far are: http://www.museumwaalsdorp.nl/computer/en/eta10p.html http://www.ed-thelen.org/comp-hist/super-users-view.html http://yarchive.net/comp/eta_peglar.html There's also an article at ieee that I don't have access to: http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/articleDetails.jsp?arnumber=30952 One last question: are folks aware of any other high performance computing systems that shipped (to customers, plural :-) to with cryogenic cooling? Alexey

11 years, 5 months

DG Nova 1210

by dave＠willomail.co.uk

Hi Folks! Just managed to score a DG Nova 1210 and need a little advise & help. The system is pretty basic having only the CPU board, 8k core memory and another I/O board (Graphic Systems 8400) It does not have any front panel, TTY or top cover. System is coming from the US to the UK. Does anybody have a spare front panel or TTY board? Are the 800/1200/1210/Nova 2 front panels compatible with each other? Are there any schematics availiable for this system? Can the PSU be converted to 240v from 110 or would I need a converter? I'm new to DG hardware and machines of this vintage so is there anything else that I need to be aware of? I'm not after much from this setup. Would just like to toggle in simple programs and add a paper tape reader & terminal / teletype. 8k is enough and not interested in disk storage :) Cheers, Dave

11 years, 5 months

Easiest way to get MAINDEC diags onto a PDP-8 (sans paper tape)

by cramcram＠gmail.com

Hi, I've been bringing up a PDP-8a system over the past few months. It has 2 x TU56 (TC08 controller), 3 x RK05J and a 3rd party RX01 dual floppy. The processor itself is an 8e board set w/EAE and 32K core. As for media I have 7 RK05 packs, one floppy and about 60-75 dectapes. My first attempt at booting was with the RK05. It took a ton of cleaning (and capacitor replacement/reforming) to bring up the 8, followed by cleaning one of the RK05 drives. (BTW, this stuff apparently was in the equvalent of a barn for at least 20 years by what I could see). Anyway I cleaned 2 of the RK05 packs that seemed most likely to be bootable media but no joy. The drive just seeks to cylinder 0 and sits there, although I think a data transfer *might* have occured. I suspect that all of the RK05 packs were for individual user backup. Apparently from the documentation I have this system at one time had a RL01 attached. Next I worked on the better looking of the two TU56's. I've got one drive shuttling okay; the other half has no torque in one direction; I suspect I need to replace yet another AC motor run capacitor. The TC08 checked out okay and I replaced all of the das blinken lights with new bulbs, it looks really cool. Then the big test. I picked out a tape that had a listing with it indicating that it was a system tape of some sort (Focal, editor, etc.) I toggled in the TC08 boot code (since my M8317 has the wrong boot roms for it) and hit run. The tape wound back to the beginning, reversed, seemed to transfer many blocks of data and then just spins in a loop. So the next step would obviously be to run some TC08/TU56 diagnostics but I don't have any way of loading them. If I had an RK05 pack with OS8 + diags on it that would work but I don't see that happening. Perhaps another alternative would be to get the equivalent on RX01 floppies from someone, but I don't even know if the floppy system works yet. So for now I think figuring out how to make a combo terminal emulator/raw data file thingy might be the best way to go. I'm thinking of putting a beagleboard to use for this unless anyone out there has a simpler/quicker solution. Suggestions anyone? Thanks, Marc

11 years, 5 months

OS/8 Disk Server Release

by rick＠rickmurphy.net

At 08:57 PM 2/9/2014, Kyle Owen wrote: >- The OS/8 system handlers use some PDP-8/E and later instructions. If >someone wants to help go back through and track these down, we can see >if a >more compliant version will still fit in the allotted space. I had a quick look at the code and it's not going to be particularly hard to get rid of the BSW instructions. I got distracted trying to remember where the three-instruction BSW subroutine is found. In TSS/8 somewhere IIRC. >- There's definitely an issue present. Running BASIC with a simple test >program halts the computer after 10206. I've not had a chance to further >investigate why. That's not good. How about Fortran? That's another good test as it runs with interrupts enabled. >- The server does its best to check that a disk write will not go outside >the boundaries of the disk. >- The server does its best to verify that a disk read will not overwrite >the system handler OS/8 handlers generally haven't bothered with this. Some of them are pretty horrid. >Also, if an OS/8 guru can help me out, I'd appreciate it. Will a >read/write >from SYS: on an RK05 past block 3248 (decimal) succeed? That is, can a >read >or write carry over from one side of the platter to the other? After >looking at the RK8E system handler, I would say this is a yes. It looks >like a call to SYS: with a block number of 6260 (octal) is the same as a >jump to the second entry point. However, is this behavior desirable or >needed? I would have expected the two sides to be logically separated in >the handler. My server attempts to do just that by essentially >chopping the >.rk05 image in half. If a transfer goes past the end of either half, an >error occurs. However, if this is not what should happen, I can change >that. Yes, if you give the handler a block greater than the size of the disk, it'll overflow into the other half. As above, the OS/8 handlers assume that you know what you're doing. I wouldn't much bother about reproducing that behavior, however. It's remotely possible that something somewhere takes advantage of it, but I'd be really surprised if that was the case. It's not "sides" actually - the blocks alternate sides. You read all 16 sectors on the top, flip to the bottom, read all those, then flip back to the top. There's a CJL (Charles J. Lasner) rant about the fact that the OS/8 system handler does it wrong, causing a full rotation when the side is switched so a full-disk read on OS/8 is far slower than it needs to be. -Rick

11 years, 5 months

Free Tandy DWP230 Printer in southern California

by nf6x＠nf6x.net

I've accumulated way too much cool junk lately, and I need to thin out the pile. I have a Tandy DWP230 daisy wheel printer. It needs a ribbon cartridge; the one that came with it is crusty and doesn't turn properly. I haven't fully tested the printer since I don't have a good ribbon for it. When I turn it on, it homes the carriage and daisy wheel. It's a wide-carriage printer, without a sheet feeder or tractor feed. The printer is free for local pickup either in Riverside (my home, on weekends) or in Irvine (at work, on weekdays). Please only pick it up to use it, not to resell it. -- Mark J. Blair, NF6X <nf6x at nf6x.net> http://www.nf6x.net/

11 years, 5 months

windows 98

by cctech＠beyondthepale.ie

> >>> I for one am glad that the 98 topic came up whether it is on or off >>> topic. >> >> I for one am NOT glad the 98 topic came up. It is off topic for >> this list, and is generating far too much off topic activity. >> >> >> Mike Loewen mloewen at cpumagic.scol.pa.us >> Old Technology http://sturgeon.css.psu.edu/~mloewen/Oldtech/ >> >Seems like a lot of people are interested. > It doesn't seem that way to me. I have seen very little support expressed for making the subject of windows and commodity PCs on-topic. > >I just delete stuff I am not interested in from my email box. > That doesn't work for me. It seems to me that it doesn't work for most people but it can take a while before some come to this conclusion. The method I use is to sign up to mailing lists that discuss topics I am interested in and not to try to change them to discuss something the existing subscribers didn't previously discuss. Regards, Peter Coghlan.

11 years, 5 months

SYKES Floppy Diskette

by michael.99.thompson＠gmail.com

I just bought a PDP-8e that has been sitting in a warehouse for a long time. It came with a SYKES Datatronics diskette subsystem, but without the Omnibus interface board. The I/O board in the SYKES card cage says "8-bit interface". The diskette drives are made by Orbis. Does anyone have information about this SYKES diskette subsystem or the Orbis diskette drives? Some pictures here: http://www.ricomputermuseum.org/Home/equipment/dec-pdp-8e -- Michael Thompson

11 years, 5 months

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