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Fix for 4.3BSD-Quasijarus bootstrap on CMD SCSI controllers

by derschjo＠gmail.com

Hi all -- Thought I'd share this fix with you all just in case someone in the future might make use of it. Long story short: Got myself a CMD 710/M UNIBUS SCSI controller with the intent to use it in my VAX-11/750, running 4.3BSD-Quasijarus. Unfortunately it won't boot (it hangs shortly after "loading boot" is printed to the console). VMS boots, NetBSD > 1.6 or so boots, Ultrix boots, but no luck with 4.3BSD. I spent some time adding some debug spew to the bootstrap (on SIMH) and testing (on the 750), and the hang is inside udcmd() in sys/vaxstand/uda.c. I then stumbled on this usenet post: https://groups.google.com/forum/#!msg/alt.sys.pdp11/61LZNTo9Dgg/Q6dI9om_LIEJ Which indicates a similar problem with a Viking controller on a different 4.3BSD variant. The code in Quasijarus is a bit different, but the cause is the same. The fix is: Change line 155 of sys/vaxstand/uda.c from: if(u->uda_ca.ca_rspint ==0) to: if(u->uda_ca.ca_rspdc & MSCP_OWN) Rebuild, and re-run disklabel to replace the bootstrap. Hope that helps someone else someday... - Josh

9 years, 1 month

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

9 years, 1 month

was: National Semi... is Apple ][ collectability (if any)

by COURYHOUSE＠aol.com

In a message dated 1/3/2017 1:09:50 A.M. US Mountain Standard Time, jwsmail at jwsss.com writes: On 1/2/2017 11:26 PM, Brad H wrote: > I brought the RFI thing up with him. No response. There is a legit Rev 1 there too asking $3500. I don't find Apple IIs below Rev 0 that interesting anymore, personally. I think even the legit guy would struggle to get much above $1500. The vintagecomputer museum guy on epay is selling mounted and framed motherboards now for $1500 (might not work noted). I guess someone would care about low ref Apple 2's but I'm not sure why there would be any interest. I've got one I bought with the original packing box, which I have picked and moved twice, which is rare for my collecting, but I don't know what makes any Apple 2 like that collectible. As in why are they collectible with low serials / part numbers. is there any documentation as to when they were made with those numbers that would make them significant? The numbers made as Raymond said would make most of us with Apple 2's millionaires I'd think unless they have some other significance. just curious. thanks Jim Jim the vintagecomputer museum guy wants a crazy price for a roll of teletype punch tape... I do not understand some of his prices. Ed#

9 years, 1 month

National Semiconductor IMP mini

by vintagecomputer＠bettercomputing.net

-------- Original message -------- From: Josh Dersch <derschjo at gmail.com> Date: 2017-01-02 7:37 PM (GMT-08:00) To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Subject: Re: National Semiconductor IMP mini On 1/2/17 7:22 PM, jim stephens wrote: > This system looks pretty interesting, though pricey. I'm thinking it > is going to be a development machine as all the switches and display > would not probably have been on a production machine. > > I don't think National made many minicomputer format machines, in > their history, someone correct me.? That might make this pretty rare > on that front as well. > > thanks > Jim > > Beautiful-1974-NATIONAL-SEMICONDUCTOR-COMPUTER-model-imp-16p/ > http://www.ebay.com/itm/252700755919 > Yeah, it's pretty cool but I don't think the seller has reasonable expectations for actually selling it -- the auction started (I believe) at $1500 (which may have been a reasonable price), then the seller raised it to $2500, now it's at $3500 (which is fairly outrageous, in my >opinion).? I'm not sure what his strategy is. >Bitsavers has manuals (of course...) >- Josh I think he figured toggle switches and lights = $$$$. ?He might be correct, given the obscene money I've seen laid out just for a PDP 8/e faceplate. You never know a) what will motivate a collector and b) when just the right collector for a given item will show up. ?Every day I thank my lucky stars they didn't, for whatever reason, show up for my Mark-8 boards.

9 years, 1 month

National Semiconductor IMP mini

by COURYHOUSE＠aol.com

Bitsavers http://bitsavers.trailing-edge.com/pdf/national/imp/4200021C_IMP16C_App_Jan… is same manual.. the 16 P is the machine in ebay. yea a beauty. Ed# In a message dated 1/2/2017 9:28:59 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time, COURYHOUSE at aol.com writes: SMECC's book is on 16 c talks about adding front panel and display etc... 16 sw and 16 led book dated jan 74 16c seems to designate the card maybe 16 b is inclusive of PS an add on panel and case.. also have a 8C book too. ED# _www.smecc.org_ (http://www.smecc.org/) Odd I was just going though a crate 3 hours ago... what are the odds In a message dated 1/2/2017 9:15:05 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time, couryhouse at aol.com writes: I have manual. Sent from AOL Mobile Mail ____________________________________ On Monday, January 2, 2017 Josh Dersch <derschjo at gmail.com> wrote: On 1/2/17 7:58 PM, Brad H wrote: > > -------- Original message -------- > From: Josh Dersch <derschjo at gmail.com> > Date: 2017-01-02 7:37 PM (GMT-08:00) > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > Subject: Re: National Semiconductor IMP mini > > > On 1/2/17 7:22 PM, jim stephens wrote: >> This system looks pretty interesting, though pricey. I'm thinking it >> is going to be a development machine as all the switches and display >> would not probably have been on a production machine. >> >> I don't think National made many minicomputer format machines, in >> their history, someone correct me. That might make this pretty rare >> on that front as well. >> >> thanks >> Jim >> >> Beautiful-1974-NATIONAL-SEMICONDUCTOR-COMPUTER-model-imp-16p/ >> http://www.ebay.com/itm/252700755919 >> > Yeah, it's pretty cool but I don't think the seller has reasonable > expectations for actually selling it -- the auction started (I believe) > at $1500 (which may have been a reasonable price), then the seller > raised it to $2500, now it's at $3500 (which is fairly outrageous, in my >> opinion). I'm not sure what his strategy is. >> Bitsavers has manuals (of course...) >> - Josh > I think he figured toggle switches and lights = $$$$. He might be correct, given the obscene money I've seen laid out just for a PDP 8/e faceplate. You never know a) what will motivate a collector and b) when just the right collector for a given item will show up. Every day I thank my lucky stars they didn't, for whatever reason, show up for my Mark-8 boards. With the "No shipping cash on pickup" proviso the seller provides, I feel fairly certain no one's biting. But I've been surprised before... - Josh

9 years, 1 month

National Semiconductor IMP mini

by COURYHOUSE＠aol.com

SMECC's book is on 16 c talks about adding front panel and display etc... 16 sw and 16 led book dated jan 74 16c seems to designate the card maybe 16 b is inclusive of PS an add on panel and case.. also have a 8C book too. ED# _www.smecc.org_ (http://www.smecc.org) Odd I was just going though a crate 3 hours ago... what are the odds In a message dated 1/2/2017 9:15:05 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time, couryhouse at aol.com writes: I have manual. Sent from AOL Mobile Mail ____________________________________ On Monday, January 2, 2017 Josh Dersch <derschjo at gmail.com> wrote: On 1/2/17 7:58 PM, Brad H wrote: > > -------- Original message -------- > From: Josh Dersch <derschjo at gmail.com> > Date: 2017-01-02 7:37 PM (GMT-08:00) > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > Subject: Re: National Semiconductor IMP mini > > > On 1/2/17 7:22 PM, jim stephens wrote: >> This system looks pretty interesting, though pricey. I'm thinking it >> is going to be a development machine as all the switches and display >> would not probably have been on a production machine. >> >> I don't think National made many minicomputer format machines, in >> their history, someone correct me. That might make this pretty rare >> on that front as well. >> >> thanks >> Jim >> >> Beautiful-1974-NATIONAL-SEMICONDUCTOR-COMPUTER-model-imp-16p/ >> http://www.ebay.com/itm/252700755919 >> > Yeah, it's pretty cool but I don't think the seller has reasonable > expectations for actually selling it -- the auction started (I believe) > at $1500 (which may have been a reasonable price), then the seller > raised it to $2500, now it's at $3500 (which is fairly outrageous, in my >> opinion). I'm not sure what his strategy is. >> Bitsavers has manuals (of course...) >> - Josh > I think he figured toggle switches and lights = $$$$. He might be correct, given the obscene money I've seen laid out just for a PDP 8/e faceplate. You never know a) what will motivate a collector and b) when just the right collector for a given item will show up. Every day I thank my lucky stars they didn't, for whatever reason, show up for my Mark-8 boards. With the "No shipping cash on pickup" proviso the seller provides, I feel fairly certain no one's biting. But I've been surprised before... - Josh

9 years, 1 month

National Semiconductor IMP mini

by jwsmail＠jwsss.com

This system looks pretty interesting, though pricey. I'm thinking it is going to be a development machine as all the switches and display would not probably have been on a production machine. I don't think National made many minicomputer format machines, in their history, someone correct me. That might make this pretty rare on that front as well. thanks Jim Beautiful-1974-NATIONAL-SEMICONDUCTOR-COMPUTER-model-imp-16p/ http://www.ebay.com/itm/252700755919

9 years, 1 month

DEC color standards was: Re: Banner Panels

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Pete Lancashire > To convert from Muncell to RGB Interesting. For one colour (D.C. Blue), listed on Charles' page as Munsell 5PB 3/10, that page gives it as 'outside sRGB gamut', whereas the page you list gives it as sRGB [0,72,145]. Noel

9 years, 1 month

DEC VT100/220 line wrapping semantics sought

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Antonio Carlini > My scan is ~400MB (and 1090 pages long!) Even at 1K pages, it shouldn't be anything like that big, if scanned using the most space-efficient encoding. For _manuals_, scan at 300 dpi with Black+White encoding (i.e. 1 bit per pixel), then store as TIFFs with CCITT Group 4 (fax) compression. That does a typical page of text in ~45KB or so. So you're about an order of magnitude high.... (For engineering drawings, basically the same, except scan at 600 dpi, to capture all the small characters such as pinouts.) Noel

9 years, 1 month

Viewdata/Teletext

by witchy＠binarydinosaurs.co.uk

Hi folks, Happy new year to all! Is anyone here familiar with the innards of Viewdata? I'm still deep in the bowels of this Executel viewdata phone system and one thing that it should be doing but isn't is puzzling me. The teletext chip is a Plessey MR9735, datasheet here: http://www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk/mr9735.pdf It can work in either 'off hours' or 'on hours' meaning effectively 'day' or 'night' mode when there's no broadcast TV signal at night, this is the 80s remember. The surrounding circuitry forces Off Hours by pulling high all the incoming TV signals apart from Line Flyback which is pulled low. The datasheet says: "When the incoming transmission is turned off, (i.e. Goes 'Off-hours'), this is recognised by the [On Hours Detector] after at least 300ms of missing sync. Pulses. An internally generated Composite Sync signal is then switched to the Composite Sync Out pin." Since Sync In is pulled high there are never any negative sync pulses (I've watched this on a logic analyser) so after 300ms Sync Out should become an internally generated pulse, but this doesn't happen and Sync Out remains a steady 5V meaning the TV picture is unsync'd. I know the MR9735 itself is fine as I have a pair of Tandata viewdata terminals which also use this chip in Off Hours mode and I can swap them around. The chip itself is receiving a steady 6MHz clock to pin 21 and the clock divider outputs at pins 20 and 19 are working. Any clues? -- Adrian/Witchy Binary Dinosaurs creator/curator Www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk - the UK's biggest private home computer collection?

9 years, 1 month

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