- test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org - classiccmp.org

by wayne.sudol＠hotmail.com

Is anyone from this list bidding on this. If so i?ll back out. Just don?t want it to be ?recycled ? and i have room for it. https://www.ebay.com/itm/Digital-DEC-BA23-Lot-Micro-PDP-11-73-VAXstation-32… Sent from my iPhone

4 years, 9 months

11
17
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digital group's Richard Bemis

by unclefalter＠yahoo.ca

Hi there, I am working on a 30 minute historical video about the digital group. For source material there isn't a ton of stuff out there unfortunately and much of the account of what happened to the company comes from the late Dr. Robert Suding. In his account, Suding sort of points fingers at Richard "Dick" Bemis for mismanagement of the company. I am wondering if anyone knows what became of Mr. Bemis after his stint running dg. Apart from a couple of (slightly snarky) letters to Dr. Dobb's Journal when dg was still operational, there's literally no trace of him on the internet. If he's still around I'd love to get his side of the story to balance things out, or at least find out what he did afterwards. Thought I'd write here in case anyone knew. Brad

4 years, 9 months

5
6
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PIC programmers? More generic programmer? Port?

by compoobah＠gmail.com

Looking for suggestions on hobbyist PIC setup. So far I have just used Arduino type direct-connect microcontrollers (back in the day programmers for general devices were expensive), but the currently existing SGI proprietary system to PS/2 keyboard adapter is PIC (and I have a couple different systems that all use my single SGI proprietary keyboard). Any gotchas with the PICKit-3 clones out there? I have the feeling that sticking with PIC would be better than trying to port to Arduino, and imagine that as things continue to age there will be more applications for interfaces. Any better but still cheapish alternatives for programming?

4 years, 9 months

4
8
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TSS/8 & dectape

by djg＠pdp8online.com

I'm having trouble using DECtapes with TSS/8 under SIMH. I tried with both the RF image and LCM RK05 image and no mater what I do it hangs if I try to access a DECtape. I am trying to use COPY command from account 2. I attach a dectape in simh then assign it in TSS and then try to get a directory or zero the tape with copy. Both hang. Anybody with more TSS knowledge know how to get this to work. Images from bitsavers http://www.pdp8online.com/ftp/images/bitsavers/unknown/ 7196, 7211, 7242, and 7280 have text where TSS/8 was mentioned. These are the ones I wanted to use TSS to see if I can get a directory. 7241, 7253, 7264, 7265, 7275, 7278, 7291, 7292 have contents but nothing I can identify. There are also some LINCtapes that had read issues so unable to determine what the are. What I have decoded http://www.pdp8online.com/images/index.shtml See last 3.

4 years, 9 months

2
1
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FS: Large Collection of HP LX Palmtop Items in Germany

by r_a_feldman＠hotmail.com

I am posting, with permission from Daniel, the following "For Sale" message from the HPLX Mailing List for a large collection of HP LX Palmtop hardware, software and books. Daniel Hertrich has been a major contributor to the HPLX List, creating a backlight mod, and doing HPLX repairs. His web site, www.hermocom.com, has been an important repository of information about the HP Palmtops. He can be reached at daniel at hertrich.photo and is located in Bavaria, Germany. I have no interest in the sale, etc. Regards, Bob <Begin Forwarded Message> Hi friends :) In short (longer text below): You can see my collection in detail here: https://360bayern.de/pano/daniels_palmtop_collection/index.html (zoom in with zoom gesture or scroll wheel) 2,000 ? total for the entire collection. Shipping or delivery from Bavaria, Germany. You can hover over each item and get a description tooltip (except for items that are self-explanatory, such as the books), some are even clickable, and the click leads to a website describing the item. Most clicks lead you to my own website www.hermocom.com, because I documented a lot of the stuff that I worked on back then. :) If you like to provide more link targets for the items, please do so. then I'll gladly add them. Note that for the high-resolution image (300 Megapixel) I used panorama software to stitch 10 individual images, so you can zoom in and see a lot of details of the single items. But given the unusual "panorama" setup for capturing the collection, there are stitching errors in the image, so some items look as if they might be broken, but they are not. ;) You can always switch to the lower-resolution standard image (40 Megapixel) to check that there is really no crack in the item. The descriptions and (obviously) the high details when zooming, however, are only available in the high-resolution image. So here comes the longer text: :) No, I won't say goodbye to you! I'll stay here with you. And I'll keep a few items from my collection for myself. But the rest of my collection has to go. The Palmtop hobby was a really great one for me, probably the most important one, until I began with photography. I learned so much during all these years since 1997, when I bought my first 200LX. Until 2005 the 200LX even was my main computer (i.e.: the one I used most). I started so many hardware and software projects to support my own work and also the community, and I got a lot of support from you, the community, as well. Thank you so much for that, and for all these years of fun! :) I have (even until now!) never been part of a community that I gave to and got from that much support and heart-warming talks, even if the topic was most of the times a very unemotional one: Computers! I've even built my own small business around all that ("hermocom - hertrich mobile computing"). The business was never really "successful" in the sense of earning money, but that was not important to me. Important was, that I could take the money earned from it and invest it into new research, new projects, new hardware, to keep it all going and constantly improve. I think, the most important success (again, not in the monetary sense) was the development of a feasible and relatively affordable backlight solution for the 200LX, made possible by the great help of Hal Goldstein and his team at Thaddeus Computing by handing me over their material they got from their own research in this field. I will keep two used 200LXs and one 1000CX, as well as a few important accessories (an LED light, one 200LX has a backlight, some PCMCIA cards etc.) and spare parts, but all the remaining parts and devices, even two like-new(!) 200LXs just take up space here and only once a year or so they give me nostalgic feelings and a smile. Given that I am currently in a financial emergency situation with my photography business, that's heavily damaged due to the Corona situation, I clearly need the money more than the nostalgic feelings. :) For each item in the collection (except for almost all the books and a few trivial items, which I will add for free), I estimated a value, then summed up these values and resulted in a total value of 2,300 ?. I would prefer to sell the collection in its entirety, and would offer the entire collection for 2,000 ?. That price does not include shipping costs. In case nobody wants to buy the entire collection for a couple of weeks, I'll probably slice the collection into smaller chunks or offer items one by one. If you are interested in a particular set of items (collection chunk), let me know. I may consider that. The collection fits into a standard-sized moving box, with not much padding. For shipping, I'd like to add much more padding, so that it would probably take 2 moving boxes for shipping. Within Germany, I would deliver the collection in my area for free (85077 Manching, near Ingolstadt + 100km). I'd also consider delivering it within a wider distance against a refund of my driving costs. That would maybe be cheaper than parcel shipping for two heavy moving boxes and it would allow for a beer and a good talk :) Okay, so now have fun exploring my collection. :) If you are interested or have questions, you may contact me at daniel at hertrich.photo. ....This is quite an emotional step for me... Oh boy. Daniel

4 years, 9 months

1
0
0 0

RSTS processor identification

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Paul Koning > Here is an outline (not all the details) of the hardware scan flow: > ... > 2. Make sure the MMU exist; if not, halt. > ... > If it has FIS, it can only be an 11/40. You probably know this already, but the KEV1-A floating point chip for the LSI-11 also implemenred FIS. (Of course, the LSI-11 would fail step 2, so it's not really a factor here.) Noel

4 years, 9 months

1
0
0 0

Pdp10 and TOPS 10 stuff

by hachti＠hachti.de

Hi, I habe some pdp10 related docs which need to go away. Anybody interested? Or should I dump it (and reuse the white folders foro pdp8 stuff)? https://www.icloud.com/sharedalbum/#B0r5oqs3qGclUOi Kind regards Philipp -- Dipl.-Inf. (FH) Philipp Hachtmann Buchdruck, Bleisatz, Spezialit?ten Klus 16 31073 Delligsen Mobil: 0171/2632239 UStdID DE 202668329

4 years, 9 months

4
6
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pdp11, pdp8 prototyping boards

by emu＠e-bbes.com

Don't know if you guys know about them, I just tripped over them... https://www.tindie.com/products/glitchwrks/gw-dec-1-prototyping-board-for-p… Cheers

4 years, 9 months

1
0
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[TUHS] A stack of PDP-11 field maintenance print sets

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: John Floren > Can anyone on the list point me to either an existing archive where > these exist The canonical repository for historic documentation online is BitSavers. It has an almost-complete set of DEC stuff (both manuals and prints. QBUS devices are at: http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/qbus/ QBUS CPU's will be in the relevant model directory, e.g.: http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/pdp11/1123/ and disk drives are in: http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/disc/ I haven't checked your list, but I suspect most of them are there; I think the ADV11-A prints are missing, though. You can either send the originals to Al Kossow, or scan them for him; but check with him first, to make sure he doen't already have them, just hasn't got around to posting them yet. There's another site which indexes DEC online documentation: https://manx-docs.org/ There are a very few things which aren't in Bitsavers, and can be found there. > KFD11-A cpu I assume that's a typo for 'KDF11-A'? Noel

4 years, 9 months

1
0
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Fwd: [TUHS] A stack of PDP-11 field maintenance print sets

by jfoust＠threedee.com

> >From: John Floren <john at jfloren.net> >Date: Fri, 5 Mar 2021 14:51:40 -0800 >To: The Eunuchs Hysterical Society <tuhs at tuhs.org> >Subject: [TUHS] A stack of PDP-11 field maintenance print sets > >I've been hauling around a pile of DEC Field Maintenance Print Sets >for PDP-11 components for over a decade now, intending to see if >they're worth having scanned or if there are digital versions out >there already. Can anyone on the list point me to either an existing >archive where these exist, or an archivist who would be interested in >scanning them? They're full of exploded diagrams, schematics, and >assembly listings. > >Here's the list of what I have: > >Field Maintenance Print Set (17" wide, 11" high): >RLV11 disk controller >RL01-AK disk drive >ADV-11A (??) > >Field Maintenance Print Set (14" wide, 8.5" high): >RL01 disk drive >DLV11-J serial line controller >RLV11 disk controller >KFD11-A cpu >KEF11-A floating point processor >PDP11/23 >PDP11/03-L > >Absolutely not tossing them, just wondering if there are already >scanned copies available somewhere, if I should send them off to be >scanned and put online, or if I should just check in with computer >museums (I'm near the CHM, for instance) > >John Floren

4 years, 9 months

1
0
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PDP 8/a for sale UK (Devon)

by gordon+cctalk＠drogon.net

I'm moving soon and need to down-size a little, so selling off my PDP-8/a. It has 16KW core and is in full working order. It has the serial IO board which I think was standard in the 8/a anyway. It's a 3-card system plus the 2 x 8KW core boards. Also included is a Vincent Slyngstad memory/rtc expansion board - not built up, so full kit form that I've not been able to assemble yet. ?1000 ono. https://unicorn.drogon.net/IMG_20210305_150415.jpg boards: https://unicorn.drogon.net/IMG_20180126_181135.jpg https://unicorn.drogon.net/IMG_20180126_181115.jpg https://unicorn.drogon.net/IMG_20180126_171659.jpg I'm based in Devon. Buyer collect (if you want to see it working) else I can make a short video and may be able to take it a little way up or down the A38/M5. Thanks, Gordon

4 years, 9 months

1
0
0 0

Looking for the numeric pad "1" key on VT-100 vintage keyboard

by cramcram＠gmail.com

Does anyone out there have a "1" key (the one in the numeric keypad, not the 1 / ! key) that they are willing to sell: me? I saw a couple of partial keyboards go fairly cheap on ePay a couple of months ago but didn't see it until it was sold. Thanks, Marc Howard

4 years, 9 months

2
1
0 0

Intellec MCS-8 8008 monitor program ROM files

by roelof_klaas＠yahoo.com

Hello everyone, Does anyone have the?Intellec MCS-8 8008 system monitor ROM files? According to the Intellec MCS-8 manual the System Monitor is contained in five 1702A PROMs.My ROMs have a disk loader, but the disks system is long gone... Any papertape software is also welcome for this machine! Thanks in advance!Regards, Roland Huisman

4 years, 9 months

4
3
0 0

SPARCengine CP1200

by rp＠servium.ch

I just acquired a Sun SPARCengine CP1200. To my knowledge the CP1200 is the only 32bit SPARC with a PCI bus, which makes it pretty cool. It was also extremely unpopular, because who wants a 100MHz MicroSPARC IIep when you can have a SPARCengine CP1500 with a 270MHz UltraSPARC IIi (they were released at the same time, and I suspect the cost difference wasn't all that much). Would anyone know where I can find a Sun PROM image? mine has a VxWorks ROM, but I'd rather run Solaris on it. I've searched everywhere, and couldn't find anything. Most "usual" places (e.g. the FE handbook) barely acknowledge its existence if at all. AFAIK this predates field upgradeable flash PROMs, so it's not hidden in a patch somewhere. thanks Rico

4 years, 9 months

1
0
0 0

Searching for Elevated socket

by brain＠jbrain.com

IN my continuing Digitalker saga, I did find a couple not horribly priced Digitalker ICs online and purchased them.? As one arrived, I found that my original IC was actually OK, but the cable from the computer to the device has issues. I've traced it to what looks like a heavy duty 16 pin IC socket on the board that plugs into the computer, and into which a 16 pin 2x8 .3" DIP IDC header plugs into (with the IDC cable going to another such header, which plugs into a similar socket on the main synthesizer PCB). The socket has the same basic footprint as a normal 2x8 16 pin .3" IC socket, but it's much heavier duty.? I could replace with a simple leaf socket, but would prefer to find a direct replacement. Though I am sure other manufacturers sold similar, I find that Aries sells that I need.? It's an Aries 16-8430-10 <http://www.beckwithelectronics.com/ARIES/16-8430-10.htm> (or could be an Aries 16-8480-10 <http://www.beckwithelectronics.com/ARIES/16-8480-10.htm>) elevated IC socket.? The link below shows the units: http://www.beckwithelectronics.com/ARIES/8xxx.htm Digikey has the 14 pin version in stock, but no 16 pin ones, and neither does Mouser.? I'll keep searching, but they are very expensive and I'm not sure I need 40 of them (minimum Digikey order). Thus, I am wondering if someone on list has 1 or 2 they might be interested in selling for the cause. The good news is that I was able to get the connection to work, and now the unit operates as designed. Still, I do not trust the socket. Jim -- Jim Brain brain at jbrain.com www.jbrain.com

4 years, 9 months

2
1
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Massbus - was: Re: VAX 11/750

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Paul Koning > There's a good reason why the big disks on many DEC machines were Massbus > devices until MSCP arrived. It's quite clear on Unibus PDP-11s, which > needed Massbus both for speed and for a cleaner answer to more-than-18 > bit addressing. I follow the first sentence, but I'm confused by the second, especially "a cleaner answer to more-than-18 bit addressing". The UNIBUS MASSBUS controller/adapter, the RH11, only has 18-bit addressing on the main memory side. It does have more than 18-bit addressing on the device side, but so does the RP11 (sort of). Are you thinking of the RH70? That does have access to more than 2^18 bytes of main memory, but that's because it connects to the -11/70 memory bus (as well as the UNIBUS, which is only used for control, not data). Similar questions about the speed point; passing data through an RH11 doesn't increase the speed of the UNIBUS? Yes, the RH70 is faster, but that's because of its connection to the -11/70 memory bus. Noel

4 years, 9 months

12
18
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PDP-8/I vs 8/E EAE

by kylevowen＠gmail.com

Has anyone noticed a difference in DVI overflow behavior on the PDP-8/I EAE versus the PDP-8/E EAE? The 8/E EAE claims to be 8/I compatible in Mode A, and I think I agree, for the most part. At least, it's compatible for the parts that matter. When a DVI instruction results in overflow, the EAE immediately returns with the link set. The results in AC and MQ seem to have no relevance, but they appear to differ between the 8/E and 8/I. For instance, running the 8/I MUY/DVI diagnostics under SimH fails due to the following: sim> lo maindec/maindec-8i-d0ba-pb.bin sim> d sr 40 sim> g 201 DIVERR L C(AC) C(MQ) C(MB) PROB 0 000000000000 000000000000 000000000000 GOOD 1 111111111111 000000000000 000000000000 BAD 1 000000000000 000000000001 000000000000 SCA 000000000000 HALT instruction, PC: 01512 (JMP I 1506) The link is set, but obviously MQ and AC do not match. Running the same diagnostic on an 8/I works fine. I can't imagine a scenario outside of diagnostics where this behavior would impact the software, but it does seem curious nevertheless that the DVI approach to handling overflow differs slightly between EAEs on the 8/I and 8/E. Kyle

4 years, 9 months

2
1
0 0

DS20 Alpha System

by jwsmail＠jwsss.com

I've got rights to a fairly nice system located in St. Louis.? It has working streaming tapes as well as half inch, all working. It is on till this coming weekend. The full system is a single bay, I've been told is 7' tall on casters.? I won't let it be scrapped if possible, but I'd like it to go off the floor directly to someone interested and not have to use favors to get help having it moved out. It will be skinned of an addin UPS but otherwise disconnected and put to one side till it can be picked up. Told the location has dock high, but no word on how that is accessible or what type it is.? Might be able to move dock high to dock high anyway. Let me know if there's interest.? I will have to have possession of the drives, but will make sure the hardware that goes with them is kept.? I hope I can zero them and pass it along. Cabling will be boxed as appropriate and will be included. Let me know if you are interested, and pass it along.? I know it's a dual processor, but don't have other info right handy here. thanks Jim

4 years, 9 months

5
4
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Any interest in a Floating Point Systems AP-120 array processor?

by boris＠summitclinic.com

That appears to be an earlier model of a similar system we had at UBC which could crunch arrays of FP numbers at 10 Mflops. Had it connected to an 11/44 and just recall doing some frantic programming mainly involving using minimal code as had to use memory management to allocate memory pages to get data into array processor and then fetch results. Realized at that time that a 56 Kb memory space was a bit limited for this type of work. Did FFT far faster than 11/23 (which took 1 second for 1024 points using DEC's code that shipped with MINC) but still had to do overnight runs to analyze a lot of our data. Likely have bad memories of that part of my programming career as we were under some rather tight deadlines to analyze data to get a few papers published and I much preferred writing in PDP11 assembler as very rarely had to deal with running out of memory issues with data acquisition code. Out of curiousity, decided to benchmark one of my old, really cheap PC laptops that got in 2010 and it managed 30 Mflops using double precision arithmetic. 10 Mflop performance no longer as impressive as it used to be. >I picked this up a number of years ago for reasons that entirely escape >me. It's certainly neat, but I don't see myself ever actually using it and >it's large and heavy. > >Documented here: >http://bitsavers.trailing-edge.com/pdf/fps/7259-02_AP-120B_procHbk.pdf > >Mine appears to have a DEC-style interface but I'm unsure what it talks to >on the DEC side of things. > >I can take pictures if there's interest, but it's fairly nondescript, just >a large white box with rack-mount ears and a small panel with some switches >on it. > >It's in the Seattle area if anyone wants it, and it's free! Shipping is... >not something I really want to think about right now. > >- Josh

4 years, 9 months

3
3
0 0

Any interest in RLX blade servers

by julf＠julf.com

RLX Technologies pioneered the blade server concept between 1999 and 2005 (when they got acquired by HP). I have two of their early RLX 24 blade enclosures, one fully populated with 24 transmeta-based processor blades, and the other with 19 blades. Julf

4 years, 9 months

4
9
0 0

ISO: Stabilization feet for DEC H960 rack

by derschjo＠gmail.com

I realize these are uncommon; curious if anyone has a spare pair somewhere (hey, that rhymes.) I'd like to be able to pull out the CPU on my 11/70 without worrying about the whole thing tipping over and crushing people I care about. It's the little things, really... Thanks! - Josh

4 years, 9 months

9
8
0 0

Any interest in a Floating Point Systems AP-120 array processor?

by derschjo＠gmail.com

I picked this up a number of years ago for reasons that entirely escape me. It's certainly neat, but I don't see myself ever actually using it and it's large and heavy. Documented here: http://bitsavers.trailing-edge.com/pdf/fps/7259-02_AP-120B_procHbk.pdf Mine appears to have a DEC-style interface but I'm unsure what it talks to on the DEC side of things. I can take pictures if there's interest, but it's fairly nondescript, just a large white box with rack-mount ears and a small panel with some switches on it. It's in the Seattle area if anyone wants it, and it's free! Shipping is... not something I really want to think about right now. - Josh

4 years, 9 months

3
2
0 0

ISO: Stabilization feet for DEC H960 rack

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Steven Malikoff > I have yet to machine the bolt head tapers to the originals but lost > the photo of one that was posted here some time ago. By "bolt head tapers", do you mean the special bolts with countersunk heads, or the countersunk holes in the extension feet? Whichever it was, I can provide photos and/or measurements, as needed. Noel

4 years, 9 months

1
0
0 0

DOS/Batch 10 source disks

by aek＠bitsavers.org

Did someone on the list buy the pair of source RK05's on eBay? https://www.ebay.com/itm/PDP-11-Program-Monitor-V10-02-CUSP-and-Device-Driv… I bought the fortran source disk that was listed at the same time, but didn't go after these because of the cost and I may already have it in the archived DECtapes on bitsavers.

4 years, 9 months

1
0
0 0

Electronics Plus

by jwest＠classiccmp.org

In case this link only made it to discord, I'm (re-?)posting here. Cindy has been extremely helpful and generous and giving of her time to all in this hobby. It is a very worthy cause. https://www.gofundme.com/f/electronics-plus Not too much more to hit their goal. Lets see if we can put them over, I'm pretty sure most of us have benefited from her efforts. Cindy, a few things have changed on my end with retirement, but I may be able to get that website back online for you. Please reach out to me directly and I'll check. Best, J

4 years, 9 months

6
5
0 0

List your old computer

by trash80＠internode.on.net

Hi folks - there used to be a web site where you could register and list your "classic/old computer(s)". I'm not looking to do that but am trying to find something from years gone by that I think was on that site. I thought it was https://www.old-computers.com/ or http://oldcomputers.net/ but it's neither of those. My googlefoo has been unable to track it down assuming it still exists. I know at one stage the owner was thinking of closing it down because of hacks or spamming of forms or something like that. Does this ring a bell with anyone? Thank you!! Kevin Parker <https://t.sidekickopen08.com/s2t/o/5/f18dQhb0S7n28cFFdQW752kH81jkhdLW1_k-L- 1qZM43W3s0v_y2M0f8BF4c2NfHml5Hf6Bq4h603?si=8000000004908274&pi=997afdd6-85ea -4056-b2dd-7a9b54226840>

4 years, 9 months

9
11
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Pinging Jay West

by jwsmail＠jwsss.com

Sent out a request via multiple channels to you WRT a local STL system.? can you give me a call or ping back. sent to your emails, discord and other channels. thanks Jim

4 years, 9 months

3
2
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Funky electronics chain Fry?s is no more (Seattle Times)

by sieler＠allegro.com

Gavin Scott wrote: > We all had a love/hate relationship with Fry's, but they were an > institution and will be missed. Sometime after his story, Gavin moved to the Bay Area to work for my company. One day, I started to buy something at Fry's and they asked for my phone number. So, I gave the the office number. The salesman entered it, and said "thank you, Mr. Scott". I was still "Gavin Scott" to them 15 years later :) Oh, the "seal of quality". Not only did it scream "do not buy this item", but it was a very useful thing ... although not for reasons Fry's expected. Many times, I'd be looking at some newer tech item (e.g., a 4-bay RAID enclosure), and see that over half of them had the "seal of quality". I quickly developed a rule: two more seals meant: stay away from this product! Stan

4 years, 9 months

1
0
0 0

ISO IBM flex cables made by Chabin

by aek＠bitsavers.org

I'm making some replacement cables and paddle cards so I'm on the lookout for these connectors on cable assemblies. http://bitsavers.org/pdf/ibm/dasd/21ED/chabin_4.jpg You'd think there would be piles of them around since they were used as the interplanar connecting cables in lots of IBM products.

4 years, 9 months

2
3
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Original Intel 8085 training briefcase with tapes

by rdawson16＠hotmail.com

Just on a chance, would anybody have the paper workbook that goes with this kit? It is a 8085 SDK board in a briefcase, power supply and tape player that was probably part of a class they presented. Mine works fine, including the Sony Walkman in the case, I am listening to the 10 or more training tapes. The whole kit is pristine, but no paper - the workbook from the kit. Anybody help me on this, or want it? I revisit things now and then, and this is one of them. It may need a new home. Randy

4 years, 9 months

1
0
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archive of DEC Notes

by spacewar＠gmail.com

Does anyone have contact information for the proprietor of this site: http://www.activityclub.org/decnotes/ The site has an index of messages archived from DEC's internal "Notes" (kind of their equivalent of UseNet). It appears from the "Download this site" page that at one time it was possible to download an archive of the actual content, but the hosting used for that only provides one week of free hosting, which has expired. I don't need the entire archive (though I'd like to get it), but I'd especially like to get messages from milkwy::23class_semiconductor and ricks::decschips.

4 years, 9 months

6
5
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Massbus - was: Re: VAX 11/750

by michael.99.thompson＠gmail.com

The PDP-10 KL10 at the RCS/RI was used to control a real-time flight simulator at Sikorski. It had one of the RH20 Massbus controllers connected to a DTR01 cabinet holding a DR01 chassis. The DR01 was, I think, connected to a DR11 chassis that had A/D and D/A converters boards inside. You could use the same DTR01 subsystem to connect two PDP-10s together with Massbus, or connect a PDP-10 to a PDP-11 with Massbus. -- Michael Thompson

4 years, 9 months

1
0
0 0

FW: List your old computer

by erik＠baigar.de

Hm, just adding that my venerable SUN SPARC UII runs WEB server, ssh, web proxy, sub-version, and is my "cloud" via rsync and of course serves email. Over the last 7 years it got rebooted only twice, because the provider needed to relocate it in the server farm and during one of these reboots we replaced a failed disc in the array. I am pretty sure it would have ran without reboot the full 7 years with one good disc left...

4 years, 9 months

1
0
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VAX 11/750

by jbglaw＠lug-owl.de

Hi! Just stumbled over https://www.ebay.de/itm/265064917329 . Is it a system somebody of you is offering? Given that it would need to be shipped through Europe and is in unknown condition, I'd probably bid a few Euros on it. MfG, JBG --

4 years, 9 months

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FW: List your old computer

by cclist＠sydex.com

On 2/25/21 2:05 AM, Peter Coghlan wrote: > Chuck Guzis wrote: > I don't think so. My Raspberry Pi running Linux becomes choked by memory leaks > when I leave it running more than a few months. No amount of killing processes > or other fiddling with the operating system tools available allows it to > recover and the only alternative I can find is to reboot it. My VAX/ALPHA > machines/clusters just keep on trucking until the next power failure. I suppose it depends on what's being done. I've got an OrangePi PC running headless that's nothing more than an email relay and an Internet radio server. Until we had power cuts because of the summer wildfires, it ran more than a year. It's been running since power returned. I've got a OPi Zero hooked to a stereo system (headless again) running nothing more than mplayer. Various modems/routers and other appliances have been running BusyBox as an embedded OS. They pretty much escape notice. --Chuck

4 years, 9 months

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Funky electronics chain Fry’s is no more (Seattle Times)

by decguy＠songdog.eskimo.com

https://www.seattletimes.com/business/funky-electronics-chain-frys-is-no-mo… So sad to see them go. There was a Fry's store close enough for me to visit occasionally. What will I do now when I actually want to examine the merchandise before I pay for it?

4 years, 9 months

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Massbus - was: Re: VAX 11/750

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Chris Zach > technically the MASSBUS cable is just an extension of the Unibus No. For one thing, the MASSBUS has no lines for carrying memory addresses. So there is no way to even build a box that 'translates' MASSBUS to UNIBUS; the semantics ('the things you can say', basically) of the two busses are so very different. (The MASSBUS is actually two separate busses; a control bus, and a data bus. The former has 5 lines for 'register address', but that's all. While the control bus is asynchronous, the data bus is synchronous.) Noel

4 years, 9 months

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SaturnCalc, Graph, and WP disks uploaded

by mark＠matlockfamily.com

Hi all! Spent some serious time this evening with the RX02 drives: I managed to download the images of the SaturnCalc 3.0, Saturn Graph, and Saturn WP software to RX02 images. I think it's set right, can someone take a look at the images and see if they are good? Should be RT11 format, RX02 (of course), I recorded from both sides of the disks (they're double sided, hole punched by the vendor) and are at https://www.crystel.com/bob You should see the disks and the meta files. Let me know if they work, I need to get to bed. Either burn them on real RX02's or read them with a SIMH image. C Chris, I am very interested in Saturn Calc for PDP-11s specifically for RSX. I downloaded your floppies and will take a look at them soon. You mention that they are in RT-11 format. Do you know which PDP-11 OS the Saturn software was for. They had versions also for RT-11, TSX and RSTS. Later they had native VMS and MSDOS versions. There are images of RX50s for RSX Saturn Calc, Graph and WPS at Malcolm?s web site. https://avitech.com.au/?page_id=2570 <https://avitech.com.au/?page_id=2570> He also gave me some documentation that I have scanned and put up at http://www.rsx11m.com/SaturnInstall.pdf <http://www.rsx11m.com/SaturnInstall.pdf> http://www.rsx11m.com/SaturnCalc.pdf <http://www.rsx11m.com/SaturnCalc.pdf> http://www.rsx11m.com/SaturnCalcRef.pdf <http://www.rsx11m.com/SaturnCalcRef.pdf> Saturn products on the PDP-11 and VMS used their own license key systems. I do have valid licenses for Calc and Graph for VMS and have them running on a MV3100-80. It would be great to get the RSX version running. I used it extensively back in the day and it would be wonderful to preserve it. Best, Mark Matlock

4 years, 9 months

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PDP11 (Qbus) boards available

by boris＠summitclinic.com

Have been told by my wife that PDP-11 stuff not coming along with us when we're moving and so time to get it off to a good home. All of it is QBus and material in first batch is what I've got at home and will try to get pictures of another 2 systems in storage locker this week. Locker contains 2 QBus systems, one is a small system with about 64 Kb of RAM and other is larger, also a Qbus system. I powered them up when I got them but that was close to 30 years ago so power supplies will need to be checked out first. Also have a small 4 slot Qbus card cage H9281 which has a DRV11 board in it (photo not shown). Pictures, in order, are 4 channel 12 bit D/A converter, unknown QBus board, programmable real time clock, what I thought was manual for DataTranslation A/D converter but not, A/D converter, have no idea what Dilog board is, box of DEC cables, a few manuals, MINC manuals, 11/23 together with I suspect is a DRV11, not sure what board with bus extensions on top is, bus extender, blank 2 slot board and another board which was part of a parallel interface between MINC and 11/34. Would preferably like to get rid of everything at once. Haven't looked at cost of shipping out of Canada. Alternatively, send me an email off list is you want to pick it up in person. I live in Kamloops, BC. Photographs can be found at: http://drgimbarzevsky.com/Photo2020/PDP11/20210223_photos/PDP11_index.html Boris Gimbarzevsky

4 years, 9 months

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SaturnCalc, Graph, and WP disks uploaded

by cz＠alembic.crystel.com

Hi all! Spent some serious time this evening with the RX02 drives: I managed to download the images of the SaturnCalc 3.0, Saturn Graph, and Saturn WP software to RX02 images. I think it's set right, can someone take a look at the images and see if they are good? Should be RT11 format, RX02 (of course), I recorded from both sides of the disks (they're double sided, hole punched by the vendor) and are at https://www.crystel.com/bob You should see the disks and the meta files. Let me know if they work, I need to get to bed. Either burn them on real RX02's or read them with a SIMH image. C

4 years, 9 months

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Keys for startech 25U server rack

by cctalk＠gtaylor.tnetconsulting.net

On 2/23/21 7:43 AM, Joshua Rice wrote: > Deviant Ollam on Youtube does some fantastic lectures/videos on physical > security, and makes it horrifyingly clear how pointless locks and > physical security often is. Locks, of any type, only keep honest people honest. Actually stopping would be bad actors is an entirely different problem. To whit, many locks / enclosures are simply tamper evidence tags. -- Grant. . . . unix || die

4 years, 9 months

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: Re: MSI 6800 EPROM Software

by frank＠tuccio.net

Message: 5 Date: Mon, 22 Feb 2021 21:45:24 -0600 From: Jon Elson <elson at pico-systems.com> To: Brad H <unclefalter at yahoo.ca>, General at ezwind.net, Discussion at ezwind.net:On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Subject: Re: MSI 6800 EPROM Software Message-ID: <60347A54.5070803 at pico-systems.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed On 02/22/2021 01:31 PM, Brad H via cctalk wrote: > Hi there, > > A longshot I'm sure - but I am wondering if anyone familiar with MSI (Midwest Scentific - SS50 bus system) would happen to have a copy of the software for their 1702A EPROM burner, I think the model is PR-1. I just picked one up and am eager to see if I can use it to read/burn 1702As, something that has been an issue for me for a while now. > > Reading them is pretty easy. BURNING them is crazy. They need an 80 V power supply, and I think you XOR the address or something as you apply the programming voltage. Jon Actually, programming a 1702 only requires a -48 volt pulse for each address. Here's the datasheet: https://www.jmargolin.com/patents/1702a.pdf

4 years, 9 months

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Intel Developers' Insight CD-ROM collection archived anywhere?

by glen.slick＠gmail.com

Does anyone have a collection of Intel Developers' Insight CD-ROMs in physical form or as images? The only physical CD-ROMs I have are a two disk set from February 1998. I don't know what time period these were available. Maybe mid or late 1990s to early 2000s? They have a variety of information on them such as datasheets and manuals that might not always be easy to find online anywhere anymore. As one example of something that I was recently unable to find online anywhere is a copy of either of these, which might have been available on some of the Intel Developers' Insight CD-ROMs: 297372 16-Mbit Flash Product Family User?s Manual 297508 FLASHBuilder Design Resource Tool Those are mentioned in various Intel flash memory datasheets and databooks from around the 1995 timeframe. The February 1998 CD-ROMs contain a copy of the Intel Flash SOFTWAREBuilder, which appears to be related to but different from the FLASHBuilder tool.

4 years, 9 months

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Keys for startech 25U server rack

by cclist＠sydex.com

I dropped by the local e-waste recycler and picked up a Startech 25U server rack for $100. (This one: https://cdn.cnetcontent.com/75/26/75261816-2cf3-43e9-a0b3-1e63752d781e.pdf). Heavy bugger, complete with glass door. I was as surprised as the guy who helped me load it to find that it barely fit in a Gen2 Prius (I left the truck at home). It came with an HP EO4500 PDU, with all 4 power strips (I have no use for this, so if you do, drop me a line. Maybe we can work out something). They also tossed in all of the bags of unused parts. But--no keys! Do all Startech Duraracks use the same key? Anyone know? --Chuck

4 years, 9 months

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MSI 6800 EPROM Software

by unclefalter＠yahoo.ca

Hi there, A longshot I'm sure - but I am wondering if anyone familiar with MSI (Midwest Scentific - SS50 bus system) would happen to have a copy of the software for their 1702A EPROM burner, I think the model is PR-1. I just picked one up and am eager to see if I can use it to read/burn 1702As, something that has been an issue for me for a while now. Many thanks, Brad

4 years, 9 months

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TI 960

by aek＠bitsavers.org

I'm assuming these are 960s Not very often you see paper tape software for them Price is absurd for the mixed bag that is there https://www.ebay.com/itm/Texas-Instruments-Mainframe-Computers-With-Parts-a…

4 years, 9 months

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PDP-11/70 progress (and a cry for help)

by derschjo＠gmail.com

Hi all -- Thought you all might be interested in an update, and I'm also looking for advice in debugging the current issue I'm hitting. After replacing the clock crystal on the TIG, the system started showing signs of life, but the Load Address switch would stop working after being powered on for 10-30 seconds, but would work fine single-stepping via the KM11. Brought the DAP board out onto the extender for debugging and the problem went away. Reinstalled the board after cleaning the slot (again) and the problem hasn't recurred since. First bad backplane connection, I'm sure it won't be the last. After this, addresses could be loaded, data could be toggled into memory. But instructions wouldn't execute; Tracing through the microcode with the KM11 indicated that the microcode flow was aborting early and returning to the main console loop (via BRK.90) before the instruction fetch at FET.00; this was due to the TMCB BRQ TRUE H signal being stuck high. Probing of the TMC board revealed a bad 74H30 at E70, which had its output stuck at 1.65V or so, just high enough to confuse things. Now instructions would execute but the PC would contain garbage after execution of an instruction, after tracing the microcode and staring at the flow diagrams all signs pointed to the PCB register (twin to the PCA register that is used for storing PC data) having trouble. Garbage in the PC after execution was always in bits 6-11, everything else was fine, which pointed to a 74S174 at H47 on the DAP board. Replaced and now instructions execute! Mostly. They seem to execute properly when single-stepping instructions, or running off the RC clock at a clock rate of about 16-20Mhz, any faster than that and things stop working correctly. This is what I'm currently banging my head against -- if anyone has any experience with the 11/70 or wants to stare at the manuals for a bit (and who doesn't?), I'd appreciate any extra input. There are a number of different issues, I'm currently focusing on two-operand instructions that take an immediate argument (MOV #10, R0, or ADD #42, R5) for example. The behavior here is a bit befuddling and I can't quite figure out how it ends up happening, given the microcode. I'll use ADD as a representative example. An ADD #10, R0 instruction (followed by HALT) poked in at address 1000 executes properly -- R0 gets 10 -- but afterwards the PC is corrupted: it contains 2, rather than 1004. In the general case, "ADD #X, R0" ends with PC containing 2 + <original value of R0>. (MOV shows the exact same behavior, except that there's no addition, obviously.) This value of PC is shown in the Address lights, as well as when examining the register from the front panel (at 17777707). When single-instruction-stepping the processor this instruction executes perfectly: R0 gets R0+10, PC is 1004 afterwards (both in the Address lights and when examining from the front panel). I have verified with my logic analyzer that when running normally (i.e. not single-stepping) the microcode executes the proper sequence of instructions -- which is the same as executed when single-stepping except at the very end: In FLOWS 4, after the D00.90 instruction executes, a branch is taken to BRK.90, which exits back to the console loop. I don't believe there should be any other differences in execution between the two paths -- other than the branch at the end there are no conditional branches or conditional operations based on whether the CPU is single-stepping or not. There's a signal somewhere in there that has just gone a little bit slow... the trick is finding it. For reference, the microcode sequence (starting at FET.03, see pg. 5 of http://bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/pdp11/1170/MP0KB11-C0_1170engDrw_Nov75.pdf) is: 334 (FET.03) 260 (FET.10) 343 (IRD.00) 022 (S13.01) 027 (S13.10) 205 (D00.90) 260 (FET.10) 343 (IRD.00) 010 (HLT.00) 316 (HLT.10) 164 (FET.04) 240 (BRK.90) 352 (BRK.00) 170 (CON.00) You can see it fetching and executing the ADD instruction, then returning back to FET.10 and executing the next instruction, which is a HALT instruction (because all other memory contains 0 at this point). I believe this is what causes the "+2" portion of the final (incorrect) PC value. (What's extra odd -- literally -- here is that if you start with a "1" in R0, the final PC is 3... seemingly indicating a fetch/execution of an instruction at an odd address, which you'd think would cause a trap instead...) I've been staring at this awhile and I'm puzzled; everything seems to execute properly, the instruction is fetched and decoded, and the immediate value is fetched, the ALU does the right thing and the result is properly stored in R0. And then the PC gets screwed up, and I'm not quite sure how that's possible from looking at the microcode, so I'm not quite sure where to start looking. I sort of suspect the PCB register again, as this is related to the difference in behavior between single-stepping and normal execution: the branch back to the console loop *doesn't* update PCA from PCB, whereas the branch back to the fetch / decode loop does. Anyone have any bright ideas as far as what to poke at? Thanks as always, - Josh

4 years, 9 months

3
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Systems Concepts SC-4 computer

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Lars Brinkhoff > Anyone ever heard of the Systems Concepts SC-4 computer? Given the SF address, and Peter Samson's signature, this is the _the_ Systems Concepts. Never heard of the SC-4, though. One oddity: the cover letter is dated 1972, but it talks of "the main G.E. computer". GE's computer business was sold to Honeywell in 1970, though? Noel

4 years, 10 months

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IndiZone collections

by compoobah＠gmail.com

Curious if anyone on here knows if the contents of any of the earlier IndiZone CDs from SGI are posted? A copy of IndiZone3 came with my copy of IRIX 6.2 a number of years ago, and while the games aren't the sort that would impress a modern XBox user I thought they were kind of neat and showed off the equipment and thoughts of the 1995-era, but I also have some earlier SGIs that would be IndiZone 1/2 era. I found a couple lists of the contest winners (but the CDs have more), and an occasional download link, but nothing complete for either. Anyone have links or lists of what was on them?

4 years, 10 months

3
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Systems Concepts SC-4 computer

by lars＠nocrew.org

Anyone ever heard of the Systems Concepts SC-4 computer? "This is an two's-complement 18-bit machine, with 16 general registers and a 16 level priority interrupt system. Its programming ascpects are explained in great detail in the SC-4 Reference Manual, of which a draft is enclosed. Below are times for some typical instructions. Add word on stack (not top word) to general register 1.5 us Multiply general register by memory word 6.2 us Jump 750 ns Push and Jump 1.5 us Compare Immediate 750 ns" >From page 6 here: http://people.csail.mit.edu/saltzer/Multics/MHP-Saltzer-060508/filedrawers/…

4 years, 10 months

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Deciphering an odd floppy disk format.

by mattislind＠gmail.com

I have a few 8 inch floppy disks coming from a Q1 Lite computer. I tried reading them on a PC with a Adaptec 1522A floppy controller but it failed completely. Then I tried my Catweasel and dumped the raw flux data. The format differs >from what I have seen before. I did a quick histogram of the flux lengths and it appears that there are four groups of sample lengths evenly spaced. Peaks at 30, 48, 66 och 84 samples flux lengths. The longest flux lengths are interspersed in between more normal flux lengths in the actual data and I get the same type of result regardless of reads of the same track and between different tracks. But the relative frequency is much much lower for the longer flux lengths than the shorter ones. An RX02 (MFM ish) had 26, 41, 55 samples as the peaks in the histogram. As far as I understand cw2dmk software uses 14 MHz setting in the catweasel so each sample length is around 70ns. Anyone that has seen this kind of format before? Or is it just a reading error? I have the same result from several discs though and they look to be in quite good shape physically. Link contains histogram files and a raw track flux file. https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1URC5i8AsRyP08d_ZhWRovbDp2TMgdj4B?us…

4 years, 10 months

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TK70 maintenance--swapping capstans

by cz＠alembic.crystel.com

Well my little TK70 here has been squeaking and it looks like the capstans are frozen/bad. They don't move up and down and they don't spin well. Fortunately I have a dead TK70 with good capstans so I figured I would swap them. Unfortunately I don't have a maintenance manual (does anyone have one?) so I had to figure out alignment myself. Capstan alignment seems to be critical, if they are off the unit don't work... Anyway here is my procedure so far to get the unit to load and unload tapes on the bench. Not perfect, but a start.... Pulling the capstans requires you to remove the two lock nuts on top first. I recommend you count the turns from all the way tight if possible as alignment is critical, and the front and rear ones can be at different relative heights. Anyway if you didn't do this you need to adjust the rear height to trip the optical sensors and the front one to handle tape slew. Note: All the below is done with the unit on a bench, with a PC power supply. The first step is to adjust the rear capstan so the leader tape's wide hole for the end of tape-stop marker allows light from both LEDs/sensors to pass through. You do this by tightening the bolt down till snug, then back off 1/2 turn. Turn on unit, see if it unlatches. It probably will try to turn the tape 4 times then error out. Fine. Power down, back off the bolt 1/4 turn and try again. At some point it will open the latch. Note the # of turns of the bolt then keep going 1/4 turn at a time till it doesn't work again (too high). The proper value for your unit in turns is halfway between too low and too high. Reset the bolt and verify it works several times. For my unit the right height was about 1.5 turns out. Then you need to adjust the front capstan. The problem is if the front is higher or lower than the back you have tape slew errors. Start at the level of the rear one based on the # of turns minus a bit (1/2 turn). Then load a tape. It will load, but when you try to unload things will go bad, the tape will just move forward onto the take up reel 4 times, and the unit will error out. The reason is it has to read the tape as it turns to know a tape is loaded (as opposed to the leader where it looks for the end of leader light). If the capstans are not holding the tape level against the head it can't read. Each time it moves forward a bit, try bringing the front up 1/8 turn at a time. Eventually it will speed up, that means it can read the tape on one of those moves. It should then unload. Now you have the front basically set. It will unload the tape, cycle it a few times to make sure it's working. That's where I am now. Next step is to see if it will read the tape in the computer. I'll work on that tomorrow. Note if you ever shine an led flashlight into a running TK50 or 70 all hell will break loose as the system will see the light on the tape sensor and think it has hit BOT. Even worse is if both LED sensors trigger, then it thinks it is at end of leader and it will throw tape everywhere. Ask me how I know....

4 years, 10 months

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WTB: HP 9000-340 memory (HP 98268A), AUI (HP 98235A), SCSI (HP 98658A)

by cmhanson＠eschatologist.net

I've acquired an HP 9000-340C+ and I'd like to kit it out with the maximum RAM, SCSI, and AUI rather than thin Ethernet. Desired: - RAM boards: HP 98268A RAM board (three of them to get to 16MB, I'd probably buy extra just to be safe) - AUI LAN board: 98571-66534, aka HP 98235A AUI LAN Upgrade - SCSI board: HP 98658A SCSI Interface Card Anyone have any of this stuff that they might be interested in parting with? I'm also always on the lookout for an HP 98556A 2D/integer graphics accelerator in case anyone happens to have one that needs a home. That's the integer accelerator with a 68020 and some RAM, which piggybacks atop the 98550A (1280x1024 8-bit color card) via its extra Eurocard connector. -- Chris

4 years, 10 months

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Systems Concepts SC-4 computer

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Lars Brinkhoff > I suppose that main computer could be the GE-645 on which Multics was > developed? And they would still refer to it as G.E. Oh, it was clearly referring to the Multics machine. I assumed that with the GE sale being 1970, by '72 it was not a GE machine anymore. But the MIT Multics site page: https://multicians.org/site-mit.html says the H-6180 was installed in November, 1972; shortly after the letter. Noel

4 years, 10 months

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found it: first speech synthesizer (at least, for S-100 systems)

by couryhouse＠aol.com

Have one filed in somewhere with all the s-100 boards... now I have a reason to dig it out! Yes... memories of Wirt's projects! Ed#?? smecc On Wednesday, December 16, 2020 Bill Degnan via cctalk <billdegnan at gmail.com; cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote: Very interesting Stan. Thank you for sharing this info Bill Degnan On Wed, Dec 16, 2020 at 2:43 AM Stan Sieler via cctalk < cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote: > Hi, > > Some years back, I was asking if anyone had information about the speech > synthesizer > developed for the Altair 8080 by Wirt Atmar of AICS (in New Mexico). > No "hits". > > Most places on the web claimed the Computalker was first, given the date as > 1976 or 1977. > > (Earlier speech synthesizes existed, but they were external boxes that one > interfaced to, > or were standalone (often with a large/weird keyboard).) > > Today, I stumbled over a fairly bad OCR of Byte magazine from August, 1976 > at > > https://archive.org/stream/byte-magazine-1976-08/1976_08_BYTE_00-12_Speech_… > > It has two articles about speech synthesizers for S-100 bus systems. > > The first is by the Computalker people, who say: > > At the time this article > goes to press, a synthesizer > module incorporating several > detail refinements and im- > provements over the circuits > of this article is being de- > veloped by the author and > associates. > > and > > A detailed user's > guide will be supplied with the > Computalker module > > > Note the future tense! > > The second is by Wirt Atmar, whose product *was already shipping*. > > Near the end of his Byte article, Wirt lists currently available products: > > At the present time, two speech synthesizers > are both commercially available and affordable by > the hobbyist. > > One is the Votrax produced by: > > Vocal Interface Division > > Federal Screw Works > > 500 Stephenson Dr > > Troy Ml 48084 > > Price, approximately $2,000 > > Interfacing: Parallel or Serial (RS-232) > > > The second is the Model 1000 manufactured by: > > Ai Cybernetic Systems > > PO Box 4691 > > University Park NM 88003 > > Price, $425 > > > Wirt had told me (twenty years ago or so) that he thought his was the first > for microcomputers (e.g., a user installed card, not an external box). > Now, I'm sure ... but it was realllly close! > > Wirt demonstrated his product at the earlier MITS World Altair Computer > Conven- > tion, where it won first prize. > > He advertised it poorly/infrequently, since it was mostly a side business. > And, that shows, since history doesn't remember it. > > Stan >

4 years, 10 months

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Plessey/Dilog DCV54

by nw.johnson＠ieee.org

Has anybody got a DCV54 that they are using? I am trying to get one working with David Gasswein's mfm board and having no luck. The controller is working fine with a standard floppy as an RX33, even boots the MicroVAX from it.? But on-board diagnostics cannot format or even recognise the mfm board as a winchester. Just got the scope out today and found that the drive select lines are being terminated OK on the mfm board, bit the controller is not even dropping drive select. (Yes I have tried new cables) Problem is I don't have anything old enough to test the mfm boards with other than the Plessey controlelr! I'm thinking there must be some on-board config that I am missing on the controller. - It has never had a real mfm drive connected to it. Any help appreciated, Nigel -- Nigel Johnson, MSc., MIEEE, MCSE VE3ID/G4AJQ/VA3MCU Amateur Radio, the origin of the open-source concept! Skype: TILBURY2591 nw.johnson at ieee.org

4 years, 10 months

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Digitalker 54104 IC

by couryhouse＠aol.com

Bill...this just? struck a memory I think I have a Radioshack Digitalker in a packaging? but recall it being just one large chip...? Ed #??? SMECC On Saturday, February 13, 2021 Bill Gunshannon via cctalk <bill.gunshannon at hotmail.com; cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote: On 2/12/21 6:09 PM, Ethan Dicks via cctalk wrote: > On Fri, Feb 12, 2021 at 6:01 PM Jim Brain via cctalk > <cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote: >> But, I'm sad because no one either has one nor can help me test this >> one.? So, I cannot enjoy the thrill of making it say inappropriate stuff :-( > > I have several vintage speech ICs, but not that one. > I do as well.? I have the Radio Shack "Voice Synthesizer IC Set" sitting on the desk in front of me right now. bill

4 years, 10 months

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Wanted: Info on Optisys/Optidisk WORM file system

by cclist＠sydex.com

I have a bunch of Panasonic/Matsushita 470/940 MB phase-change WORM discs here--and the appropriate drive (Panasonic LF-5010 SCSI-2) to read them. Unlike CD-R media, however, the format of these discs is not anything standard--they were essentially treated as hard disks. So, adding a file involves copying the directory and then adding the file information to the copy. The same applies, of course, for file deletion. If the drive tries to read a (1,024 byte) sector that hasn't been written to, it will get an error after a number of retries. I should emphasize that this drive is *not* fast--throughput seems to be on the order of a floppy disk. I can probably (with a bit of head-scratching) figure out the methodology behind this system, but I'm giving a shout-out to see if this rings any bells. Phase-change WORM did not enjoy a long life in the world, being superseded by rewritable media (both CD-RW and MO). As a point of reference, here's the data from sector 1 of a sample disc (Sector 0 is not used): > 00000400 04 0d 04 16 00 0f 0a fe 02 00 20 03 00 03 48 47 |.......... ...HG| > 00000410 49 42 32 2e 31 31 2d 30 33 2e 30 30 43 72 65 61 |IB2.11-03.00Crea| > 00000420 74 65 64 3a 20 54 68 72 20 32 32 20 41 70 72 20 |ted: Thr 22 Apr | > 00000430 31 39 39 33 20 20 20 20 20 31 35 3a 20 32 2e 32 |1993 15: 2.2| > 00000440 38 3a 35 31 20 20 20 20 4f 70 74 69 73 79 73 20 |8:51 Optisys | > 00000450 4f 70 74 69 44 69 73 6b 20 28 43 29 20 43 6f 70 |OptiDisk (C) Cop| > 00000460 79 72 69 67 68 74 20 31 39 38 37 20 2d 20 31 39 |yright 1987 - 19| > 00000470 39 31 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 |91 | > 00000480 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 | | If nothing turns up in the community, I'll work out the format and make details available (as I understand them). TIA --Chuck

4 years, 10 months

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Digitalker 54104 IC

by couryhouse＠aol.com

Most challanging was to figure out to make it say naughty things... and once you did? how it almost caused havoc in AZ On Tuesday, February 9, 2021 Jim Brain via cctalk <brain at jbrain.com; cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote: I suspect the answer to question #1 is no, but thought I would ask. 1) Anyone happen to have a known working Digitalker 54104 IC they are looking to trade for some cash that does not involve me selling an arm or a leg :-)? 2) Barring that, anyone have a known working Digitalker-based unit that might be able to pop in a suspected non working Digitalker IC and test? I have a Jameco (yep, the parts firm) manufactured Digitalker unit here called the JE-520 that is my original unit.? It suffered some ROM bit rot long ago and was not working, but I acquired the ROMs a while back to repair the unit. Now, though, as I pull it out for another project, it seems to be misbehaving.? It's like "address bit 1" on the input commands is acting up.? For instance, word 48 is "zero", and 49 is "one", but zero will be followed by "three" and then "zero" and then "three" as one sends values 48,49,50,51 to the unit.? I'm working to confirm the bit 1 on the cable to the PC is not bad, but initial efforts point to it being the IC. Jim -- Jim Brain brain at jbrain.com www.jbrain.com

4 years, 10 months

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Mystery (unusual) 1973 terminal

by jules.richardson99＠gmail.com

Hi all, Hopefully the following link works, but someone over on one of the Facebook vintage groups has this oddball terminal from 1973 that they've been looking for any information on: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1-2uEFbi3OKBYr06y6yHnygDiLMtw2Qkj ... it's somewhat unconventional in that half the CRT is hidden from view within the machine, i.e. it only actually displays the top half of the display to the user - I've no idea if that's because it had a specific application where space was limited, or if it was simply that memory at the time was horribly expensive and so it was designed to only use a few lines (I know some vendors did that, although I think they typically presented the whole CRT and at least had the option of RAM upgrade to more lines). The blower assembly seems a little on the homebrew side, but on the other hand the PCBs and case construction make it seem like a professional product. The owner says the only label anywhere on the thing is the one on the CRT saying "Mfd in Japan for Conrac", but that's presumably just the CRT itself and not the entire machine. I don't believe there's anything resembling a microprocessor in the system, it's all just TTL logic (the large white ceramic IC is an ACIA). Oh, I believe the owner's in Canada, so it may be it was made there and never exported to other parts of the world. cheers Jules

4 years, 10 months

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Mystery DEC cartridge tape drive

by aek＠bitsavers.org

This is a mystery. What DEC system used a CDC Sentinel DC300 cartridge tape drive? https://www.ebay.com/itm/Vintage-Computer-DEC-BY5A5-E-Tape-Drive-77-014320/…

4 years, 10 months

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One more thing to fix... HP9000/380 power supply

by ce.murillosanchez＠gmail.com

This decade seems to have increased the number of failing things in such a way that the "to be repaired" backlog is growing much faster than I can get to diminish it. Argh.? A month ago my trusty HP9000/380 ran just fine and I booted the different OS's in the SCSI and HPIB drives connected to it (this particular machine is interesting because the 9000/300 port of NetBSD was partly developed in it: it was Mike Wolfson's). Yesterday, it failed to turn on; the power supply is dead.? So I unracked the pile of drives and the computer, checked for obvious things (the fuse is fine, and nothing in the power supply is swelled up or leaking, or browned by heat; visually, it looks new; the HV caps seem to hold a charge).? I need the schematics for the power supply (at least the output connector; I can work my way back from that)? and also those for the backplane in this hp9000/380.? A preliminary search at bitsavers and elsewhere did not help.? Does anybody have these? In the meantime, I finally improved the mainboard (had the parts for a long while) from a 380 to a 385 by changing the clock generator, and replacing the 68040RC25 with an RC33. I ran this machine as a web server continuously for ten years in the 2000's, totally exposed.? Many tried to hack it... and failed. Another personal connection to this architecture is that I used Apollos and hp9000/300 at UW-Madison back in 1989-91.? Boy, did I crunch numbers... carlos.

4 years, 10 months

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Reading ESDI disks

by mattislind＠gmail.com

What is the best way of dumping the contents of an ESDI disk? I have an original IBM Enhanced ESDI ISA controller board. Could that be used under Linux? Or NetBSD/FreeNSD? I googled but didn't find much. Is there any other way of dumping the disk contents? In theory it should be just a matter of clocking the raw data and finding the marks and extracting the data. Has anyone done something similar? /Mattis

4 years, 10 months

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APL\360

by boris＠summitclinic.com

Counting in binary on ones fingers was something I first ran into at age 11 when found a book on Military Electronics in a surplus store. Everything simplified, but in computer section found binary system explained with using fingers to represent bits. That was something that I used immediately as used to count steps to various places but after 1000+ steps would often forget where I was so would increment my binary digital counter every 100 steps. At that age 1 mile was probably about 2500 steps so I my counter would have overflowed at about 40.9 miles. Also LSB was my left small finger which seems weird now but suspect that's what illustration in book showed of how to count in binary on your fingers. Found manual method easier to use than a pedometer. >I too count sheep with my fingers, but I never get past zero due to the >lack of sheep. :-) > >Tom Hunter > >On Mon, Feb 1, 2021 at 5:34 PM Tor Arntsen via cctalk <cctalk at classiccmp.org> >wrote: > > > On Sat, 30 Jan 2021 at 03:27, dwight via cctalk <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > > wrote: > > > If we'd thought about it we could count to 1023 on our fingers. > > > Dwight > > > > Some sheep herders in (IIRC) the Caucasus do, or did at least. I > > learned about that some decades ago. Counting sheep on their fingers. > > I use the system sometimes. > > > > -Tor > >

4 years, 10 months

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Al Lasher's electronics closing.

by korpela＠ssl.berkeley.edu

One fewer place to obtain old stock components in the NorCal East Bay. https://www.berkeleyside.com/2020/12/03/lashers-electronics-berkeley-busine… -- Eric Korpela korpela at ssl.berkeley.edu AST:7731^29u18e3

4 years, 10 months

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IBM AS/400 and HP scope for sale in the UK

by alsilisk＠icloud.com

Dear all, I have been looking to downsize a bit in recent times and am looking to get rid of an IBM AS/400 9404 F10 and an HP 175a oscilloscope. As these things are large they are pickup only in the Petersfield area. I cannot guarantee either work. Although the scope comes with spares and does show some signs of life. It is not my area of expertise and it is probably going to need a full rework, it being from the 60s. The AS/400 is a similar story although will probably be a much simpler task. Send me an email if you are interested in either one of them or want pictures or have questions. I also realise it is lockdown, but if you send me a line now I can hold them for you rather than them being scrapped. Thanks, Al

4 years, 10 months

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ENIAC 75th Anniversary Celebration

by blstuart＠bellsouth.net

This evening begins a series of events celebrating the 75th anniversary of the unveiling of the ENIAC at the University of Pennsylvania.? On the 11th and 18th, the Philadelphia Venture Cafe will be hosting virtual round tables with a number of us who have some connection to the ENIAC and Philadelphia technology.? Included among the people present will be: - Bill Mauchly and Chris Eckert, sons of the ENIAC creators - Bill Mensch, part of the 6502 engineering team - Kathy Kleiman, producer of the ENIAC programmers documentary (And yes, I'll be there for anyone who wants to get nerdy and talk about the technical aspects of the machine and its programming.) Monday, the 15th is the day of the anniversary, and there will be a full day of webcasting.? Starting at 10:30 EST, UPenn will be holding a mini-symposium in recognition of the ENIAC.? Then at 3:30 EST, Unisys will be webcasting an ENIAC celebration video that includes a number of panel discussions, as well as clips from early newsreels, and happy birthday wishes >from the various locations housing ENIAC artifacts. More details and links to all the events can be found here: http://www.eniacday.org/events/ BLS

4 years, 10 months

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RX02 DMK image to raw tool?

by david4602＠gmail.com

On 2/8/21 1:00 PM, Mattis Lind wrote: > This is highly annoying. Back in 2015 I did exactly this and now I have > forgotten how. > > I dumped a set of RX02 disks with catweasel into .DMK and now I want a raw > sector image to be able to test them with SimH. > > What is a good tool to use? I have some faint memory of glancing through > hexdumps of .dmk files. Perhaps I did something myself using dmklib by Eric > Smith? Don't really remember, unfortunately. > > But surely someone else has already done this, right? > > /Mattis I wrote my own, not knowing where another one lived. I happen to think in Java, so that's what it's implemented in. Description is here: https://github.com/RetroFloppy/transformenator/wiki/Utility-Functions#dmk2r… Code is here: https://github.com/RetroFloppy/transformenator/blob/master/src/org/transfor… The only thing of interest is the cw2dmk tool would read RX01 disks and "double" the data - so my tool will make an attempt to detect that and halve the data back out the other end. - David

4 years, 10 months

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New pinion gears for plotters...

by geneb＠deltasoft.com

For those of you with the Atari & Commodore pen plotters that have broken pinion gears, there's now a guy making new ones in brass: https://www.soigeneris.com/alps-printer-plotter-mechanism-pinion-gears g. -- Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007 http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind. http://www.diy-cockpits.org/coll - Go Collimated or Go Home. Some people collect things for a hobby. Geeks collect hobbies. ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes. http://scarlet.deltasoft.com - Get it _today_!

4 years, 10 months

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Mystery NCR disk pack

by p.gebhardt＠ymail.com

Hello list, there is an NCR-labelled disk pack offered in the bay with a geometry that I've never come across before: https://www.ebay.com/itm/353379280282 It seems to be a 14" pack with three platter and six recordable surfaces. The platters themselves are quite thick and the distance between the platters is quite wide compared to the IBM 1316 and 2316 type standards. Does anybody know if this is really an NCR development or if it is a rebadged pack from another manufacturer? Any hints to solve this mystery is much appreciated :) Best regards, Pierre PS: I wonder if the seller describing the party dog is describing himself, but partying seemed to be an important part of his life ;) ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://www.digitalheritage.de

4 years, 10 months

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resistor packs for terminating SCSI bus inside Exabyte 8020

by nw.johnson＠ieee.org

Hi all, I wonder if anybody has one with the terminators installed that can read off the p/n for these SIPs The manual says they are 8-pin 7 resistor 220/330 ones, but that is not possible! To put 7 resistor pairs to 220 and 330 you need a 9-pin, unless you have one resistor SIP for 220 and another for 330!? But there are 2 so that leaves an odd number! The sockets are 9-pin.? I have yet to find any 9-pin ones on digikey cheers, Nigel -- Nigel Johnson, MSc., MIEEE, MCSE VE3ID/G4AJQ/VA3MCU Amateur Radio, the origin of the open-source concept! Skype: TILBURY2591 nw.johnson at ieee.org

4 years, 10 months

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Apple ][+ ic

by david4602＠gmail.com

On 2/10/21 1:00 PM, John Many Jars<john at yoyodyne-propulsion.net> wrote: > So, I have an Apple ][+. It is missing an IC at location a3 on the > motherboard. > > I don't know why. it used to work... I think my mind is going. I have no > memory or removing it. Anyway, I need another one. The board is marked > 74166. > > Can I put any shift register IC with a similar part no, like this one: > > 74166PC | FAIRCHILD | IC DIP-16 Shift Register (icompplus.com) > <https://www.icompplus.com/en/integrated-circuits/24400/74166PC> > > in there, or ? > > Thanks, > > mark aka john I have a mobo that has that very part (Fairchild 74166PC), so it's a good bet it'll work. - David

4 years, 10 months

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Part# request: TK70 eject switch

by cz＠alembic.crystel.com

Working on fixing a pair of TK70's here to speed up my backups. The TK50 is fine on a TQK70 controller (it streams perfectly) but I am coming close to filling a tape. I've managed to assemble a working TK70 out of two unhappy ones, but to fix the other I need to replace the eject button switch. The plastic/rubber on it has turned to the usual goo. Does anyone know the part number for that switch? Taller than a usual SMD button switch, so a stock one won't work. I could take it apart but that would be a kludge. Thanks!

4 years, 10 months

2
1
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APL\360

by paulkoning＠comcast.net

I was just poking around the computerhistory.org website, searching for Knuth stuff. The second or third hit when I search for "Knuth" is this one: https://computerhistory.org/blog/the-apl-programming-language-source-code/ . It's not just about APL, it actually has a downloadable copy of the source code. And it points to an executable version, apparently a packaged up Hercules running that code. Nice. I'll have to give it a try. paul

4 years, 10 months

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Digitalker 54104 IC

by brain＠jbrain.com

I suspect the answer to question #1 is no, but thought I would ask. 1) Anyone happen to have a known working Digitalker 54104 IC they are looking to trade for some cash that does not involve me selling an arm or a leg :-)? 2) Barring that, anyone have a known working Digitalker-based unit that might be able to pop in a suspected non working Digitalker IC and test? I have a Jameco (yep, the parts firm) manufactured Digitalker unit here called the JE-520 that is my original unit.? It suffered some ROM bit rot long ago and was not working, but I acquired the ROMs a while back to repair the unit. Now, though, as I pull it out for another project, it seems to be misbehaving.? It's like "address bit 1" on the input commands is acting up.? For instance, word 48 is "zero", and 49 is "one", but zero will be followed by "three" and then "zero" and then "three" as one sends values 48,49,50,51 to the unit.? I'm working to confirm the bit 1 on the cable to the PC is not bad, but initial efforts point to it being the IC. Jim -- Jim Brain brain at jbrain.com www.jbrain.com

4 years, 10 months

1
0
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DEC RK11-C Disk Controller - on ebay...or is it?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Fritz Mueller > In at least one case of attempting to recover a pac BTW, your neat hack to do that only works on the RK11-C, and not the RK11-D: the latter doesn't implement 'Read/Write-All'. Noel

4 years, 10 months

2
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DEC RK11-C Disk Controller - on ebay...or is it?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> the Unix V6 RK pack formatter ... sets _both_ 'Format' and > 'Read/Write-All Oooops; my bad; I mis-read the register description. It's setting 'Inhibit Bus Address Increment' and 'Format', not 'Format' and 'Read/Write-All'. So ignore my speculation about 'Read/Write-All' not getting the sector header word from memory. My bad! Noel

4 years, 10 months

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DEC RK11-C Disk Controller - on ebay...or is it?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> Fron: Jon Elson > The write all function is likely how you format a blank pack. No, 'Format' is a separate bit in the CSR from 'Read/Write-All', and they do different things. The RK11 always re-writes the header word of each sector when it writes a sector in normal operation; when 'Format' is set on a Write operation, it merely supresses the 'read header word and check/compare' function (which normally precedes any disk operation, to make sure the head's at the right place). Format/Write then goes ahead and writes the header word of the sector, just as in normal operation. (It is possible to set 'Format' on a Read operation; that just reads in the sector header words into memory.) Although in theory one could use 'Read/Write-All/Write' to format packs, the Unix V6 RK pack formatter: https://minnie.tuhs.org/cgi-bin/utree.pl?file=V6/usr/source/mdec/rkf.s sets _both_ 'Format' and 'Read/Write-All', and _doesn't_ set up the sector header words in the memory buffer, arguing that even with 'Read/Write-All' on, the hardware is still generating the sector header word contents. (I'm too lazy to check the RK11-C and RK11-D engineering drawings to confirm that.) Noel

4 years, 10 months

2
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DEC RK11-C Disk Controller - on ebay...or is it?

by billdegnan＠gmail.com

If you search ebay for "DEC RK11-C Disk Controller", you'll find a listing of a backplane of flipchip cards, but it's not like any RK11-C I have ever seen. Am I right, this is a mis-labeled auction? Bill

4 years, 10 months

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DEC RK11-C Disk Controller - on ebay...or is it?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Ethan Dicks > I do have a replica KM-11 set that I need to construct. You'll need the RK11-C overlays (shown on pg 6-2 of the RK11-c Manual). (My set of overlays from Guy with his KM11 replica included them; thanks Guy :-). > From: Fritz Mueller > The cables are actually in the correct slots -- they connect A30 and > B30 to the pass-through connectors to support plugging in a pair of > KM11s from the outside of the rack for debug. Ah. The Double-Buffered RK11-C doesn't have those; the slots used (looks like C08 and D08) are used for logic. Noel

4 years, 10 months

1
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classic Mac GUSI compiler issue

by spectre＠floodgap.com

I think we have some old Mac programmers here. I've dusted off some code that allegedly compiles with CodeWarrior Pro 2, and it needs CWGUSI, so I installed 1.8.0 (which was on the CW Pro2 Tools CD). A bit of hacking and everything compiles, but it won't link; it's missing a symbol _Stdout that CWGUSI apparently requires (I traced it back to a couple fflush(stdout); calls). I've got SIOUX, the Metrowerks Standard Library and everything else I can think of, and while everything else builds, I can't seem to find the lib with this mysterious _Stdout symbol. Any guesses? Does this sound familiar? -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- Do I look like I just fell off the turnip truck?! -- Ryoga, "Ranma 1/2" ----

4 years, 10 months

1
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Request: Octave for VAX

by ce.murillosanchez＠gmail.com

Hello, everyone... I may have asked here many years ago about this:? Does anybody? have a binary distribution of Octave for VAX/VMS?? The sources for some early versions were distributed in the SIG tapes, but I never managed to complete a VMS build using them.? I tried tracking old octave archives with binary builds, but they're all gone (it used to be at ftp.chem.wisc.edu).? I even tried to contact John Eaton about this but got no response. Regards, Carlos.

4 years, 10 months

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Fwd: [GreenKeys] Teletype 33 KSR free in Knoxville, TN, USA

by jfoust＠threedee.com

The guy posted today, saying they're still available... - John >From: <highpwr at bellsouth.net> >To: <greenkeys at mailman.qth.net> >Date: Sun, 27 Dec 2020 18:23:31 -0500 >Subject: [GreenKeys] Equipment Available > >I have the following available for pickup in the Knoxville TN area, it from >the estate of an old ham buddy that's now in the nursing home with >Alzheimer's. All was salvaged from his property which was sold to help >defer his nursing home expenses, and was going to go in the dumpster. >Really just wanted to save this stuff from the dumpster, and its free to a >good home, BUT if it works for you (whomever comes and get this stuff) a >donation that I could forward to his Nephew to help cover his nursing home >costs would be greatly appreciated. > >There are two Teletype Model 35 KSRs and at least one 33 KSR. Also there is >an model 14 Printing Reperf FRXD (very similar to frxd-1311-04.jpg (800?600) >(navy-radio.com) <http://navy-radio.com/tty/reperf/frxd-1311-04.jpg> on >Nick England's site. There may be some other in the future and possibly >some 11/16 paper tape, but this may be spoken for. > >All was stored in a dry outbuilding, but was in the building for well over >twenty years. It took the best part of a day to dig it out, salvage and >carry it out of said storage building. > > > > >I can provide additional more detailed photos if required, but please don't >ask unless your really interested and serious. The empty brass nor the gun >they were fired in are no longer available I'm keeping it.....Ha Ha. > >PS this stuff will not be available indefinitely, I don't have the space to >store it for another twenty years, it will probably go onto the dump or be >dismantle for parts before the end of February. > >Steve >KM4V

4 years, 10 months

1
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looking for egcs for PowerPC BeOS R4

by spectre＠floodgap.com

I know it exists, or existed, as there are references all over to it from the skeletal remains of various BeWare mirrors. However, the package itself has disappeared. The Intel version is marginally easier to find but if anyone knows where the *PowerPC* one is (I'll take R3 or R4) please advise. I guess, since I've got mwcc on it, I could try to reconstruct it, but I don't know if I would have all the BeOS-specific changes. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- My opinions may have changed, but not the fact that I'm still right. -------

4 years, 10 months

2
1
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RX02 DMK image to raw tool?

by mattislind＠gmail.com

This is highly annoying. Back in 2015 I did exactly this and now I have forgotten how. I dumped a set of RX02 disks with catweasel into .DMK and now I want a raw sector image to be able to test them with SimH. What is a good tool to use? I have some faint memory of glancing through hexdumps of .dmk files. Perhaps I did something myself using dmklib by Eric Smith? Don't really remember, unfortunately. But surely someone else has already done this, right? /Mattis

4 years, 10 months

1
0
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PDP-11/70 debugging advice

by derschjo＠gmail.com

Hi all -- Making some progress with the "fire sale" PDP-11/70. Over the past month I've rebuilt the power supplies and burned them in on the bench, and I've gotten things cleaned up and reassembled. I'm still waiting on some new chassis fans but my curiosity overwhelmed my caution and I decided to power it up for a short time (like 30 seconds) just to see what happens. Good news: no smoke or fire. Voltages look good (need a tiny bit of adjustment yet) and AC LO and DC LO looked good everywhere I tested them. Bad news: processor is almost entirely unresponsive; comes up with the RUN and MASTER lights on, toggling Halt, and hitting Start causes the RUN light to go out, but that's the only response I get from the console. I got out the KM11 boardset and with that installed I can step through microinstructions and it's definitely executing them, and seems to be following the flow diagrams in the engineering drawings. Left to its own devices, however, the processor doesn't seem to be executing microinstructions at all, it's stuck at uAddress 200. In the troubleshooting section of the 11/70 service docs (diagram on p. 5-16) it states: IF LOAD ADRS DOES NOT WORK AND: - RUN, MASTER & ALL DATA INDICATORS ARE ON - uADRS = 200 (ZAP) THEN MEMORY HAS LOST POWER Which seems to adequately describe the symptoms I'm seeing, but as far as I can tell the AC and DC LO signals are all fine. (This system has a Setasi PEP70/Hypercache installed, so there's no separate memory chassis to worry about.) I'm going to go back and re-check everything, but I was curious if anyone knows whether loss of AC or DC would prevent the processor from executing microcode -- from everything I understand it should cause a trap, and I don't see anything in the docs about inhibiting microcode execution. But perhaps if this happens at power-up things behave differently? And the fact that the troubleshooting flowchart calls out these exact symptoms would seem to indicate that this is expected. But I'm curious why the KM11 can step the processor, in this case. I'm going to wait until the new fans arrive (hopefully tomorrow or tuesday) before I poke at this again, just looking for advice here on the off chance anyone's seen this behavior before. Thanks as always! - Josh

4 years, 10 months

3
16
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UDS EIA module for ASR33

by shumaker＠att.net

Recently acquired an ASR33 with an old EIA (RS-232) Interface convertor module. ? It came with a two page spec and cable pinout sheet that is more hole than it is paper. Manufacturer is United Data Services (UDS) in Phoenix.? Model seems to be 312 A 0568? (might be 0563)? Google hasn't been much help and Bitsavers is silent as well..? Herb Johnson of Retrocomputing.com has 312 A 0567 which appears similar but not close enough to be useful. Anyone familiar with this unit who could share docs??? (willing to scan and share if desired) Steve

4 years, 10 months

1
0
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RD51 reduced write current signal?

by paulkoning＠comcast.net

Looking at the DEC Pro documentation there's some ambiguity I'm trying to figure out. The hard drive documentation talks about the "reduced write current" signal. In one place it's explicitly described as relevant to the RD50 only. But later on in the RD50/RD51 chapter the signal is described generally, without any indication that RD51 ignores it. Does anyone know which is correct? If RD51 also uses it, how does the right value get set? What IS the right value, anyway? paul

4 years, 10 months

18
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HP Journal back issues

by couryhouse＠aol.com

Thanks!?? The radio site aside? from? using low bit rate scan also I think compresses the pdf files. Ed# On Wednesday, February 3, 2021 J. David Bryan via cctech <jdbryan at acm.org; cctech at classiccmp.org> wrote: On Wednesday, February 3, 2021 at 9:25, ED SHARPE via cctech wrote: > Indeed this site is great for reference but alas are too lo-res for good > museum display images. They appear to be scanned at 150 dpi. The ones here are scanned at 300 dpi: ? http://hparchive.com/hp_journals ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? -- Dave

4 years, 10 months

1
0
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Flip-Chip selloff (Al Kossow)

by michael.99.thompson＠gmail.com

> > > Date: Tue, 2 Feb 2021 09:19:08 -0800 > From: Al Kossow <aek at bitsavers.org> > Subject: Flip-Chip selloff > > I don't have any equipment that uses them any more, so I'll be ebaying off > my > A-W series flip chips over the next few days. The W's and PT08 boards are > up now > > https://www.ebay.com/itm/184647476832 > https://www.ebay.com/itm/184647420812 > I am still maintaining a PDP-8/I & TC01, PDP-8/L, PDP-8/S, PDP-9 & TC02, and PDP-12 for the Rhode Island Computer Museum. The RICM would happily accept any donated FlipChips, especially the go-fast B versions and anything else for the PDP-9. You can even get a charitable tax deduction for the donation. -- Michael Thompson

4 years, 10 months

8
8
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Greaseweazle

by jfoust＠threedee.com

At 08:32 AM 2/2/2021, geneb via cctalk wrote: >On Mon, 1 Feb 2021, Al Kossow via cctalk wrote: >>and it is the software and the knowledge of what you need to do when >>recovering media in volume these guys have no clue about > >How about helping out instead of bitching from the sidelines? I was quite eager to hear Kossow's insights. Any engineer or programmer (or both) worth their salt eagerly seeks and accepts the "but it would be really handy if it did X, Y and Z" insights, especially if they're coming from someone with decades of experience in the field in question. How else will products improve? - John

4 years, 10 months

14
40
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HP Journal back issues

by couryhouse＠aol.com

Indeed this site is great for reference but alas are too lo-res for good museum display images. I do use this as a reference source? but need paper copies sometimes? to hi res scan some times! Ed# On Tuesday, February 2, 2021 Richard Milward via cctalk <rsmilward at frontier.com; cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote: You can find HP Journal issues at https://worldradiohistory.com/HP-Journal.htm <https://worldradiohistory.com/HP-Journal.htm> The World Radio History site is a fantastic resource in general, I use it regularly. **Richard

4 years, 10 months

2
1
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VAXstation 3100

by rlloken＠telus.net

Adam, I have a VAXstation sitting about three metres from me. As is usually the case, "it worked when I turned it off 20 years ago" I don't remember how many years ago I turned it off. I think it is a model 30 but casually looking at the box does not show me what model it is. I pulled out the nicad battery pack many years ago and it is sitting by my left hand and it does not leak. I have the system box, the expansion box with its little SCSI disk drive, the RRD40 and its wierd disc caddies, and the VR--- monochrome monitor, and probably the keyboard and mouse and documentation if I look around for half an hour. I have no idea where you are but I can send it to you for the price of shipping which would be astronomical I expect. I hesitate to ship the monitor - that would be had work - but the other components can be managed. -- Richard Loken VE6BSV : "...underneath those tuques we wear, Athabasca, Alberta Canada : our heads are naked!" ** rlloken at telus.net ** : - Arthur Black

4 years, 10 months

1
0
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cctalk Digest, Vol 77, Issue 3

by athornton＠gmail.com

As long as we?re talking about divesting: if anyone has a VaxStation that they?d sell me for substantially less than eBay prices, I?d be interested. I have a 3100M38, but it doesn?t POST; indeed, a replacement mainboard would be a place I could start. (I did try burning new ROMs and replacing them, but that wasn?t the problem). I?d even consider swapping an 11/730 in unknown condition (this is from the Kaur collection) for a working VaxStation, on two conditions: you have to pick it up, and you have to take an RM80 drive with it and dump it far enough away from my house that no one thinks it was me what done it. Adam

4 years, 10 months

2
1
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QIC 3M "Magnus 1.2" carts

by cclist＠sydex.com

I have received a few of the above-mentioned DC300-sized QIC carts for recovery. The usual stuff about tension bands applies, but I'm a bit stymied. The official specs for these tapes say that they're SLR 3. I've tried Tandberg SLR 3, 4 and 5 drives (any of which should be able to read these) with no luck. I've even tried an SLR2 QIC525, though why someone would pay for more tape than they need is a mystery. These would be ca. 1990 and most likely on a Mac, although the latter is pure conjecture. Before I unspool some of this tape and have a look with developer, am I missing something? --Chuck

4 years, 10 months

1
0
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Flip-Chip selloff

by aek＠bitsavers.org

I don't have any equipment that uses them any more, so I'll be ebaying off my A-W series flip chips over the next few days. The W's and PT08 boards are up now https://www.ebay.com/itm/184647476832 https://www.ebay.com/itm/184647420812

4 years, 10 months

10
14
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DEC backplane power connectors

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> I'm too burned out to look at the engineering drawings and get the part > number to confirm; I'll do that 'soon'. The BA11-K FMPS gives the male shell part numbers as 12-09350-06 and -15; the DD11-C lists the female shell numbers as 12-09351-06 and -15. Those look like they are DEC numbers: https://gunkies.org/wiki/DEC_part_numbers So I'm not sure those are much use. (I'm not going to bother trying to look up what they translate too; we already have the AMP numbers needed to order them; so not much to be gained.) > I took a picture of the male shells, and added it to the CHWiki page > (I'll add the females tomorrow). Done. Noel

4 years, 10 months

1
0
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NOT "Re: APL\360"

by sieler＠allegro.com

TL;DR: getting tired of separating the wheat from the chaff I have an odd but potentially useful idea for the list server ... Until we have an AI that can properly read a message and re-write the subject line, perhaps the list server would *auto generate* a new subject line after, say, the 29th reply with the same "Re:". After 29 "Re: APL\360", the next such msg would have subject line rewritten to "New topic 1", and the next (up to) 28 "Re: APL\360" would be similarly re-written (the '28' is decremented for every "Re: APL\360" and every "Re: New topic 1"). At that point, the next "Re: APL\360" or next "Re: New topic 1" gets rewritten as "New topic 2". (After a reuse counter for a subject has been 0 for two weeks, it could be reset to 20, to allow much later legitimate replies.) Yeah, tired of getting hopeful seeing "Re: APL\360" and seeing instead a discussion of pints, or endianness (big rules, for a number of reasons ... *even the creator of Intels's memory chip admitted that*), or bit numbering, or counting sheep! :) (And I'm not even complaining about the needless copying of the entire prior post :)

4 years, 10 months

1
0
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HP Journal back issues

by rsmilward＠frontier.com

You can find HP Journal issues at https://worldradiohistory.com/HP-Journal.htm <https://worldradiohistory.com/HP-Journal.htm> The World Radio History site is a fantastic resource in general, I use it regularly. **Richard

4 years, 10 months

1
0
0 0

Greaseweazle

by jfoust＠threedee.com

At 04:58 PM 2/1/2021, geneb wrote: >I've got one (F7+ Lightning version) and I've used it with 5.25" and 8" disks. I've got plans to use it with 8" disks, but I've not done it yet. You'll need to get the FDADAP from here: http://www.dbit.com/fdadap.html in order to use it with the GW. Already have one of those. Did you say you have it working with eight inch? - John

4 years, 10 months

2
1
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