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

by dgriffi＠cs.csubak.edu

Given that old Soviet knockoffs of pdp11 cpus can be found on ebay, I was wondering if anyone else has thought of making S100 boards containing said processors. -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail?

15 years, 3 months

16
23
0 0

Stan Viet passed away

by evan＠snarc.net

http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/floridatoday/obituary.aspx?n=stanley-veit&… Very sad.

15 years, 3 months

6
6
0 0

pdp11 CPU on S100 board

by mtapley＠swri.edu

At 12:00 -0500 5/13/11, Andrew wrote: >The only remaining practical options IMO are to either write/port a >free/open source operating system to PDP-11 (an enormous task) fig-FORTH? I'm pretty sure there was at least one (buggy?) version for PDP-11; I think maybe it ran on top of RSX-11M because I remember trying to type it in on UTCSR's RSX-11M system. I would expect drivers might be relatively easy to write in FORTH, but I don't know what other OS services might pose a challenge. -- - Mark 210-379-4635 ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Large Asteroids headed toward planets inhabited by beings that don't have technology adequate to stop them: Think of it as Evolution in Fast-Forward.

15 years, 3 months

6
11
0 0

latin stuff

by aliensrcooluk＠yahoo.co.uk

My latin isn't that good. I only know a handful of short well-known phrases/sayings: Canem canem edit Carp? deum Carp? noctum et cetera mea culpa Lame I know. Does anyone know of any good books for learning latin? Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk ----- Original Message ----- From: "David Griffith" <dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu> To: <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Sent: Tuesday, May 10, 2011 6:51 AM Subject: latin stuff > > Si des purgamentum purgamentum accipietis > > Noli turbare cuium simia virgas tonitrui > > Si duo sunt in una camera turpis vento facit, qui sciunt et feci > > > -- > David Griffith > dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu > > A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. > Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? > A: Top-posting. > Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail?

15 years, 3 months

14
28
0 0

[rescue] ACM Publications, circa 1970, in Atlanta GA

by legalize＠xmission.com

If there's anyone in Atlanta that can rescue the SIGGRAPH, SIGCHI and Journal of Computing History portions of it, I'll cover shipping costs to me and give them some money for their time. In article <BANLkTimSRdNWh-xyFojJ9JEADOfpCXd2uQ at mail.gmail.com>, Sparr <sparr0 at gmail.com> writes: > I apologize for the poor timing of this. Had I known there was > interest, and that they were being discarded, earlier I would have > made better arrangements. > > They are at 675 Metropolitan Pkwy, Atlanta GA 30310. The gate code to > enter the complex is 9171* and they are stacked near the dumpsters at > the middle of the complex. > > They include publications from every SIG, including SIGGRAPH and > SIGPLAN and SIGCHI and ... > > The stack has suffered a few minutes of rain damage. I would say that > 10% of them got wet, although they are in a relatively dense stack on > a pallet so the ones on the bottom and in the middle are still fine. > > On Mon, May 16, 2011 at 9:45 AM, Sparr <sparr0 at gmail.com> wrote: > > A local geek organization is discarding a few thousand ACM > > publications from around 1968-1982. It includes complete years of > > Transactions, Journals, conference programs, various periodicals, etc. > > It's about one pallet load of boxes, so it would be expensive and > > complicated to ship. If anyone is willing and able to rescue them > > before they get recycled, let me know. > _______________________________________________ > rescue list - http://www.sunhelp.org/mailman/listinfo/rescue > -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download <http://legalizeadulthood.wordpress.com/the-direct3d-graphics-pipeline/> Legalize Adulthood! <http://legalizeadulthood.wordpress.com>

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

Looking for regional collectors

by tosteve＠yahoo.com

Hi, I run the website http://oldcomputers.net Almost every day I get offers from people wanting to get rid of their old computers, sometimes for free. Most of the time, though, the systems aren't worth the money to ship across the country to me in California. Therefore I am looking for other collectors across the country (or world) who wouldn't mind being recipients of mid or low value computers. Send me you name, location, email, and what you collect and I'll see if I can send some stuff your way. Do not REPLY, instead send to tosteve at yahoo.com Thank- Steven Stengel http://oldcomputers.net

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

Looking for regional collectors

by tosteve＠yahoo.com

Hi, I run the website http://oldcomputers.net Almost every day I get offers from people wanting to get rid of their old computers, sometimes for free. Most of the time, though, the systems aren't worth the money to ship across the country to me in California. Therefore I am looking for other collectors across the country (or world) who wouldn't mind being recipients of mid or low value computers. Send me you name, location, email, and what you collect and I'll see if I can send some stuff your way. Do not REPLY, instead send to tosteve at yahoo.com Thank- Steven Stengel http://oldcomputers.net

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

PR1ME Computer SE50M

by michael.99.thompson＠gmail.com

The Rhode Island Computer Museum has a PR1ME Computer that says it is a model SE50M on the back of the CPU cabinet. I can't find any reference to that model number. Any idea how to identify this system? https://sites.google.com/site/ricmwarehouse/Home/equipment/prime-computer-s… -- Michael Thompson

15 years, 3 months

4
3
0 0

Variac and reforming caps...

by michael.99.thompson＠gmail.com

>From: Michael Kerpan <madcrow.maxwell at gmail.com> > One thing that puzzles me is that all these things seem to imply > powering the system's own power supply with a Variac rather than > bypassing it. Wouldn't it be possible to have connect a linear > transformer with the proper output voltages to a backplane and then > power that with the Variac to reform the caps only switching back to > the stock supply once the caps have been reformed? > > Mike The Variac transformer works because the voltage is AC. The crew at the CHM used a programmable DC power supply to reform the capacitors, after they disconnected them from the system.. -- Michael Thompson

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

Variac and reforming caps...

by michael.99.thompson＠gmail.com

> From:?Geoffrey Reed <geoffr at zipcon.net> > For general use on old personal computer systems, S100, Kaypro, etc.... > Would a 5A variac be sufficient? > > And is there any write ups anywhere on how to use the variac when powering > up a system that hasn?t been powered up in > 10 years? There is lots of information available on reforming capactors. Some of it is useful. This is good introduction: http://www.nmr.mgh.harvard.edu/~reese/electrolytics/ A Variac can be used to reform caps in a linear power supply. Linear power supplies were common in older computers. The RICM recently used a Variac to reform capacitors during the resurection of a PDP-8/S. The power supplies in the 8/S were linear ferroresonant design, common in DEC equipment. With these power supplies the voltage on the capacitors will slowly increase in relation to the Variac output until you reach about 45 VAC. At that point the ferroresonant circuit kicks in and the output goes to full voltage. The big electrolytic filter caps survived this, but eventually the AC capacitors in the ferroresonant circuit failed. Replacements for those are easy to find. Newer systems, like the Kaypro, probably have a switching power supply. Switching power supplies usually will not have any outout until the Variac reaches the minimum acceptable input voltage for the power supply, usually something like 85-90 VAC. At that point the power supply turns on and tries to make the full output voltage. That can be really tough on old electrolytic capacitors. Eric Smith, as part of the PDP-1 restoration project at the CHM, developed software to control an Agilent power supply and very carefully reform capacitors. This is probably the best solution. http://www.brouhaha.com/~eric/software/wrec/ -- Michael Thompson

15 years, 3 months

2
1
0 0

Cray-Cyber Down for the Count?

by mjkerpan＠kerpan.com

A while ago, cray-cyber.org, which used to provide online access to various classic CDC and Cray supercomputers went down so that the owners could move the collection to a new home, with a note that access to the supercomputers would become available again in late 2010 or early 2011. Now we're almost halfway through 2011 and things are still down AND there's no word on what's up? Does anybody know what's going on here? Is the only public access classic supercomputer cluster in the world down for good? Mike

15 years, 3 months

7
6
0 0

latin stuff

by ken＠seefried.com

On 5/16/11 8:21 PM, Fred Cisin <cisin at xenosoft.com> wrote: > I used to have a copy of McCracken in Spanish. I have a Chinese language (Mandrin) Fortran textbook. Several, actually. Didn't help a bit. KJ

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

Decwriter iii's for rescue in Astoria Oregon

by innfoclassics＠gmail.com

I just uncovered a couple of Decwriter IIIs that need to go. They have been stored outside but dry (plastic, foam, plastic and tarp). I got them from the basement of an automobile dealership auction about 4 years ago. Free if picked up soon. I don't want to take them apart. I could deliver from Seattle to Eugene (I-5) for gas. Otherwise they will be scrapped. Parts could be available including the print heads. Paxton -- Paxton Hoag Astoria, OR USA

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

IBM 3741 available for rescue

by jfoust＠threedee.com

Thank you for finding me! Although I don't have a personal interest in that particular computer, I will forward your email to the Classic Computer Collector mailing list, and someone else may contact you directly. - John Like: http://musi.fwtunesco.org/wolz/index.html Location: http://goo.gl/cvD1E At 03:27 PM 5/16/2011, you wrote: >John: > >I?m not sure if you are interested, but I have a working IBM 3741. It has one 8? floppy and does appear to be loading tax software of some type. The monitor, keyboard, etc. all seems to work. It is in pretty clean condition with everything present. It even has an old parallel computer cable and plug. > >I hate to haul it to the dump and would love to give it to someone who will appreciate it for what it is ? the first commercial computer to move from punch cards to floppy. > >Please let me know if you are interested or if you know someone else who may be interested. > >I am located in New London, WI. > >Thanks, > >Henry >HenryM at inwia.org > >Notice of Confidentiality: This email, and any attachments, is intended only for the use of the addressee(s) and may contain privileged, private, or confidential information. Any distribution, reading, copying or use of this communication and any attachments by anyone other than the addressee is strictly prohibited and may be unlawful. If you have received this email in error, please immediately notify me by email (by replying to this message) or by phone ( 920-982-3244) and permanently destroy or delete the original and any copy or printout of this email and any attachments. >

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

HP 9830 status..

by hp-fix＠xs4all.nl

I'm not making a lot of progress, was using my time to fix the Citroen DS replacing thegearbox in it and overhauling the steering cylinder and fixing a lot of little items which you encounter when working on a 44 year old car. It's a little like classic computing, if you don't touch it everything keeps working, but if ....etc. Citroen used a rubber based wire insulation for the DS and Pallas models between 1965 and 1968. This kind of insulation hardens over time and corrodes the copper wires, in the Safari I have, this wiring isn't used for the main wiring harness (lucky me:-) but they used it for smaller components like the wiper engine wiring and ignition resistor wiring etc.. Real fun and lots of fuses ;-) To come back to the HP 9830 I did find some time to connect the LA to the datapath board and look at the Carry and ALU signals The carry doesn't change while the processor is running it's test cycle, the QC and AC lines seems to be consistent to the processor state. So I think I have to look at the timing of U12B and at the BCD mode X2. I'll get it running .. some day -Rik > -----Oorspronkelijk bericht----- > Van: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] > Namens Tony Duell > Verzonden: zondag 15 mei 2011 18:57 > Aan: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Onderwerp: Re: Bad ebay experiance with ebay seller : sammyslave1 > > > At last I recieved my items after they were held in customs .. > > And of cause I payed them.. > > Excellent! > > IIRC one of the devices was an HP59405 HPIB interface for the 9820/9830. > You'll ahve fun with that (I speak from experience!), all you need to do is fix the > 9830. How are you getting on with that BTW? > > -tony

15 years, 3 months

2
1
0 0

What is the status of Mentec? was: Re: pdp11 CPU on S100 board?

by chd＠chdickman.com

This thread begs the perennial question: What is the status of Mentec Inc? Who owns rights to the PDP-11 and the Digital Equipment operating system for that architecture? Some on the list have acknowledged PDP-11 related contact with Mentec in the recent past. If I was a licensed user of RT-11 and I wanted to change the terms of the license, how would I do that? I have no direct knowledge of Mentec so I did some online searching, below are my results. -chuck ------------------------ Some Googling shows: Mentec Inc. 13 Hampshire Drive Hudson, NH?03051 United States Phone: 603-883-7711 Fax: 603-883-7799 www.mentec.com Phone is disconnected. Link goes back to Mentec International in Ireland which I think was the parent of Mentec Inc. ------------------------ A search of corporations in New Hampshire finds this record: Date: 5/11/2011 Filed Documents (Annual Report History, View Images, etc.) Business Name History Name Name Type MENTEC, INC. Legal MENTEC, INC. Home State Corporation - Foreign - Information Business ID: 277927 Status: Admin. Suspension Entity Creation Date: 10/9/1997 Dissolve Date: 11/30/1998 State of Business.: DE Principal Office Address: % WINIFRED S GILL 20 INDUSTRIAL PK DR NASHUA NH 03062 Principal Mailing Address: No Address Last Annual Report Filed Date: Last Annual Report Filed: 0 Registered Agent Agent Name: Gill, Winifred Office Address: 20 INDUSTRIAL PK DR NASHUA NH 03062 Mailing Address: ------------------------ The two addresses are about 3 miles apart. ------------------------ Another entity at: DAYBREAK SOFTWARE INC 20 INDUSTRIAL PK DR NASHUA NH 03062 Which seems to still exist: http://www.daybreak-sw.com/ ------------------------ The building at: 13 Hampshire Drive Hudson, NH 03051 It is half occupied and the rest is available for rent. At least part of the address is a printing company.

15 years, 3 months

3
4
0 0

Fan Fole Paper

by jhfinedp3k＠compsys.to

I have about a dozen boxes of fan fold paper. Most are 9 1/2" by 11". The sides with the holes for the sprockets tear off leaving a clean sheet of 8 1/2" by 11". I an in Toronto. Is there any interest these days in fan fold paper. I suspect that the cost of shipping is more than the paper is worth, so local pickup only. If there is no interest, I will dispose of the paper in June. Jerome Fine

15 years, 3 months

3
3
0 0

TRS80 PT210 printing terminal serial board

by dgriffi＠cs.csubak.edu

I recently completed a PCB layout for a serial board for the TRS-80 PT210 printing terminal. The primary intended means of connecting to a host to this is an accoustic coupling modem. If you want to use RS232 serial, you need an optional board. These boards have since become very hard to find, so I used the info I found in the service manual to make my own. See http://batchpcb.com/index.php/Products/59707 to get your own made. -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail?

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

Variac and reforming caps...

by geoffr＠zipcon.net

For general use on old personal computer systems, S100, Kaypro, etc.... Would a 5A variac be sufficient? And is there any write ups anywhere on how to use the variac when powering up a system that hasn?t been powered up in > 10 years?

15 years, 3 months

2
1
0 0

Bad ebay experiance with ebay seller : sammyslave1

by hp-fix＠xs4all.nl

I have had a very bad experience with sammyslave1, I bought two items an extended mass storage rom for the HP9845 and a HP-IB interface for my HP 9830A. I always pay instantly with paypal, when I contacted the seller about my items after a week or three I didn't get an answer, I waited another week and another email no answer. After I opened a dispute he answered and promised to ship the items and some extra's for the inconvenience. And yes his wife made a shipping label for USPS, but they never took the package to the post office, eventually I upgraded to a claim and got my money back, but what a waste of time this guy is. It took me 8 weeks to get nothing, so my advice don't buy from sammyslave1 (aka Larry L.) -Rik

15 years, 3 months

8
14
0 0

FFS: Tandon TM-100-4 floppy drive

by dgriffi＠cs.csubak.edu

I have a Tandon TM-100-4 floppy drive that needs some work on the drive door. Free for shipping from California. -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail?

15 years, 3 months

2
2
0 0

HP LJIIp and LJIIIp printers - get them working or dump them?

by chd＠chdickman.com

I have 1 LaserJet IIp and 3 LaserJet IIIp printers. None of them are really usable because the toner cartridges are either out of toner or the images have streaks and blotches. I think all of them are functional electrically and the paper feeding is still OK. It has been 3 years since I last tried one. I could always use an extra printer, so I have to decide if I should get them working or just dump them and get something new when I really need it. Is there a source for GOOD toner cartridges? Google finds a bunch of cartridges, but how many are junk refills? I am willing to pay for good cartridges, but I can't tell good from bad. Are feeding parts available if they start to pull multiple sheets, etc? Are there reputable sources? I know these have a good reputation generally, and I used one for a long time in the '90s. -chuck

15 years, 3 months

10
16
0 0

Infections (was Re: DEC, IBM, sex, drugs, rock 'n' roll)

by dm561＠torfree.net

----- Original Message ----- > > Message: 17 > Date: Fri, 13 May 2011 23:26:14 -0400 > From: "Teo Zenios" <teoz at neo.rr.com> > Subject: Re: DEC, IBM, sex, drugs, rock 'n' roll > > You would need to step outside of the house into a wooded area and wait > for an infected tick to bite you to get Lyme disease, something few tech > geeks have to worry about. Yes, this is just a joke. ----- Reply: Apparently we're fortunate up here in Canada; although there are thousands of cases in the bordering US states, according to many doctors the ticks don't cross the border: "...most Canadian doctors are woefully uneducated about Lyme Disease, erroneously believing that it does not occur in Canada." This is *not* a joke! http://www.canadatrails.ca/outdoors/lyme.html

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

Unibus extender cards

by RichA＠vulcan.com

Does anyone have hex-height Unibus extender cards they would be willing to part with, or loan? We have created a printer interface card (based one the last rev of the M8571 plus all relevant ECOs) for an LP20 in the front end of our Tops-10 system (a DECSYSTEM-2065). It turns out that the other cards in the LP20 are not entirely defect free, so we need to hook up a logic analyzer to see where things are going wrong. We have no Unibus extenders, so we can't do things like cool suspect delay pots. We'd really prefer not to have to try building these. :-) Rich Alderson Vintage Computing Sr. Server Engineer Vulcan, Inc. 505 5th Avenue S, Suite 900 Seattle, WA 98104 mailto:RichA at vulcan.com mailto:RichA at LivingComputerMuseum.org http://www.LivingComputerMuseum.org/

15 years, 3 months

10
14
0 0

DEC, IBM, sex, drugs, rock 'n' roll

by evan＠snarc.net

VCF East this weekend has at least three of those five things. Come visit to see which ones! :) http://www.vintage.org/2011/east Kids get in free.

15 years, 3 months

9
11
0 0

pdp11 CPU on S100 board

by lynchaj＠yahoo.com

pdp11 CPU on S100 board? Given that old Soviet knockoffs of pdp11 cpus can be found on ebay, I was wondering if anyone else has thought of making S100 boards containing said processors. -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu <http://www.classiccmp.org/mailman/listinfo/cctalk> A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? -----reply----- Hi Dave, I've been monitoring the S-100 PDP-11 CPU board thread and have a couple of observations. I did not know the Russian clone PDP-11 CPU chips lacked datasheets. This is a major problem but maybe surmountable with prototyping. Also, I was very surprised to learn there are no free/open source operating systems for the PDP-11 which would be required to adapt for existing S-100 peripherals. Apparently not even NetBSD is available which is stunning as it runs on practically every CPU in some form AFAIK. The lack of free/open source operating systems is a major problem since it then requires all the PDP-11 peripherals to be hardware compatible. As a result, either the entire PDP-11 CPU with all peripherals fit on a single S-100 board or a suite of dedicated boards would be needed. Neither scenario is realistic IMO. The only remaining practical options IMO are to either write/port a free/open source operating system to PDP-11 (an enormous task) or design an S-100 board with FPGAs and blow in the whole PDP-11 design (CPU with peripherals). The latter option rather defeats the purpose of using an S-100 bus since you can't easily share other boards and it may be easier to just make a PDP-11 SBC. Sorry the S-100 PDP-11 CPU board project does not seem practical at this time. However if anyone has ideas on how to resolve these issues and launch a community project I would be glad to support as best I can. Thanks and have a nice day! Andrew Lynch

15 years, 3 months

3
2
0 0

core memory project

by peter.turnbull＠york.ac.uk

Has anyone seen this? http://www.corememoryshield.com/ -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York

15 years, 3 months

4
3
0 0

Available S-100 board PCBs

by lynchaj＠yahoo.com

Hi! I've been ordering new and respin S-100 PCBs for the S100computers.com and N8VEM builders. There are several boards left over and available if anyone on CCTALK would like to get some I've noticed recently that some people do not want to "join" the project and prefer to buy the PCBs on eBay. This is a bit of a surprise but if their preference it is OK with me. You can see the available boards here with links for more information. http://shop.ebay.com/lynchkl/m.html Thanks and have a nice day! Andrew Lynch

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

HP 36" Pen plotter In CA

by shumaker＠att.net

ISTR someone looking for a vintage HP penplotter recently... FYI: There is an HP DraftMaster II 36" pen plotter listed on CL (San Francisco Bay Area) for $325. steve

15 years, 3 months

2
1
0 0

FF: Kennedy tape drives, and QBUS PDP 11's

by silvercreekvalley＠yahoo.com

More free stuff for collection in West Yorkshire, UK if anyone is interested. 1) I have two Kennedy tape drives, not sure of the model number, but these are the front loading 19" rack mount type. These are spooled tape drives. Look to be in good condition, but I've never powered them on, so not sure if they still work. Having two is useful (one for spares). 2) I have a couple of rack mount case style PDP 11 QBUS machines. These are complete except for the disk drives(s) and the push on front plastic surround (not sure what its called). They do have the control panel and PSU though and a compliment of QBUS cards. email me of list if interested in any of these. Thanks. Ian.

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

Weird spam

by vintagecoder＠aol.com

I just received two weird spam emails froom the list this morning. One was a bounce from cctalk to my email address, obviously a cheap attempt at forging headers that failed. The second is just weird. Did anybody get it and figure out what's going on?

15 years, 3 months

2
3
0 0

FFS: NSC800 Microprocessor Family Databook (1985)

by dgriffi＠cs.csubak.edu

I have a databook from National Semiconductor for the NSC800 family of microprocessor stuff dated 1985. Free for shipping from California. -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail?

15 years, 3 months

1
1
0 0

core memory project

by pete＠dunnington.plus.com

Has anyone seen this? http://www.corememoryshield.com/ -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York

15 years, 3 months

2
1
0 0

The results of your email commands

by cctech-bounces＠classiccmp.org

The results of your email command are provided below. Attached is your original message. - Unprocessed: Ring anytime 1-801-461-5094 We provide a concept that will allow anyone with sufficient work experience to obtain a fully verifiable University Degree. Bachelors, Masters or even a Doctorate. Think of it, within four to six weeks, you too could be a college graduate. Many people share the same frustration, they are doing the work of the person that has the degree and the person that has the degree is getting all the money. Don't you think that it is time you were paid fair compensation for the level of work you are already doing? This is your chance to finally make the right move and receive your due benefits. If you are more than qualified with your experience, but are lacking that prestigious piece of paper known as a diploma that is often the passport to success. CALL US TODAY AND GIVE YOUR WORK EXPERIENCE THE CHANCE TO EARN YOU THE HIGHER COMPENSATION YOU DESERVE! Ring anytime 1-801-461-5094 - Done.

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

new here

by tdk.knight＠gmail.com

hi i'm 23 have a love for the history of computers and recently got a pdp8a with a nice collection of stuff http://img687.imageshack.us/img687/8493/pdpe.jpg curently scanning these http://img861.imageshack.us/img861/216/tapes3.jpg http://img41.imageshack.us/img41/4800/tapes2i.jpg http://img545.imageshack.us/img545/2889/tapes1.jpg the cpu test scaned if anyones interested https://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0Bwfh3w-st3iPOTljY2YxODQtNmE0MS00MzJiLTkwZW… dkca-aa option test #1 https://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0Bwfh3w-st3iPMGM5ZmVlNjktOTkwOC00ZGE4LTgyYz… yet to figure out how to make them into a pdf also got these software specific to the spectromitor the pdp8a came from http://img859.imageshack.us/img859/8412/tapes4.jpg has the fallowing cards M8315 ? KK8A PDP-8/A CPU board (hex wide) M8317 ? KM8AA PDP-8/A bootstrap, powerfail (hex wide) M8316 ? DKC8AA PDP-8/A I/O serial/parallel/clock (hex wide) G649 ? MM8AA 8K Core stack. H219A ? MM8AA 8K Core memory control. and then these http://img811.imageshack.us/img811/5155/card3u.jpg http://img21.imageshack.us/img21/4624/card2q.jpg http://img808.imageshack.us/img808/9238/adc120z.jpg and 2 teletype asr33's with hook up for the pdp8a i also have a heath h89 thats curently waitin for parts from a member at sebhc a h11 (ls1-11) with a nice collection of cubus cards h10 reader Geworkwaster 1 in need of parts and bunch of other GE faunic related stuff such as software some plc's controller cards for hooking into computers ect... a sick ibm p70 think it needs a floppy as i can't get it to read disks ibm model 50 bunch of industrial software a sick osborn 1

15 years, 3 months

25
126
0 0

pdp11 CPU on S100 board?

by tshoppa＠wmata.com

> Can anybody explain how the Mentec boards fit into all of this. > My understanding was they were the next generation of PDP11. The early Mentec boards had real DEC J-11's and onboard memory And serial ports (not too conceptually different than 11/53's or 11/93's). This spans the M70 through M100. Toward the end Of this era a big crimp was that J-11's were becoming unavailable (even via Clever routes like removal from old HSC's). Later Mentec boards (after J-11's dried up completely) went to high density TI bitslices and then custom ASICs. This is the M11 and M1. Mentec was all Q-bus. (AFAICT). As the Q-bus peripheral market dried up in The late 90's I remember some talk amongst the Mentec guys of making a M11 or M1 with onboard MSCP-compatible controller for ATA or SCSI drives but I don't think this ever got off the ground. Others made J11 CPU boards too for Q-bus, Unibus, ISA bus, etc. And there were others who sold DEC-compatible CPU's using bitslice and other higher integration techniques (e.g. QED/Quickware). The Mentec and others' main selling points, were cheaper prices and higher Levels of integration on the CPU board (thus reducing total system price). Tim.

15 years, 3 months

2
1
0 0

Hello Son, I think you will find this

by cctalk-owner＠classiccmp.org

WHAT A GREAT IDEA! Ring anytime 1-801-461-5094 We provide a concept that will allow anyone with sufficient work experience to obtain a fully verifiable University Degree. Bachelors, Masters or even a Doctorate. Think of it, within four to six weeks, you too could be a college graduate. Many people share the same frustration, they are doing the work of the person that has the degree and the person that has the degree is getting all the money. Don't you think that it is time you were paid fair compensation for the level of work you are already doing? This is your chance to finally make the right move and receive your due benefits. If you are more than qualified with your experience, but are lacking that prestigious piece of paper known as a diploma that is often the passport to success. CALL US TODAY AND GIVE YOUR WORK EXPERIENCE THE CHANCE TO EARN YOU THE HIGHER COMPENSATION YOU DESERVE! Ring anytime 1-801-461-5094

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

Seeking Teletype KSR-35 for Internet Heritage Site and Archive

by sellam＠vintagetech.com

The Internet Heritage Site and Archive is seeking a Teletype model KSR-35 for their restoration project. They are re-creating the ARPA lab at 3420 Boelter Hall at UCLA from where the first internet message ("lo") was sent. Please see additional information below, and visit the website for more information about this excellent project: http://internethistory.ucla.edu/ Reply-to: Brad Fidler <fidler at internethistory.ucla.edu> -- Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org [ Old computing resources for business || Buy/Sell/Trade Vintage Computers ] [ and academia at www.VintageTech.com || at http://marketplace.vintage.org ] ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Wed, 11 May 2011 12:14:11 -0700 From: Brad Fidler <fidler at internethistory.ucla.edu> To: Sellam Ismail <info at vintagetech.com> Subject: Reaching out to the collector community Hi Sellam, Thank you again for all your help with this. Below is a blurb that you could post. All best, Brad --- There is a project underway to recreate the UCLA ARPANET lab as it stood when it first connected with SRI in 1969. We are interested in borrowing or purchasing a *Teletype KSR-35*, to display in the original space of the ARPANET lab at 3420 Boelter Hall. I invite you to read more about our project at http://internethistory.ucla.edu/p/mission.html . Please get in touch with me at fidler at internethistory.ucla.edu if you can help us in any way. Sincerely, Brad Fidler

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

AW: cctalk Digest, Vol 93, Issue 17 -- Unibus Extender Cards

by gerhard.kreuzer＠liftoff.at

Hi, Somebody told us, that this company didn't reponse to eMails, and so I try out. I get this answer within 24 h: Hi Gerhard, Yes, you can order DEC handles and cards through me. The handles only come in white. They are .55 each. Let me know the part numbers you are interested in, and I will give you current pricing and availability. Best Regards, Claire Eichner ________________________________ Claire Eichner, Office Manager Douglas Electronics, Inc. Tel: +1 (510) 483-8770 x20 Fax: +1 (510) 483-6453 E-mail: claire.eichner at douglas.com Problem solved? With best regards Gerhard -----Urspr?ngliche Nachricht----- Von: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] Im Auftrag von cctalk-request at classiccmp.org Gesendet: Mittwoch, 11. Mai 2011 19:00 An: cctalk at classiccmp.org Betreff: cctalk Digest, Vol 93, Issue 17 Send cctalk mailing list submissions to cctalk at classiccmp.org To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit http://www.classiccmp.org/mailman/listinfo/cctalk or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to cctalk-request at classiccmp.org You can reach the person managing the list at cctalk-owner at classiccmp.org When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific than "Re: Contents of cctalk digest..." Today's Topics: 1. Re: Unibus extender cards (Dave McGuire) 2. And then there were three.. (Michael Thompson) 3. Re: Unibus extender cards (Paul Popelka) 4. Re: And then there were three.. (Adrian Stoness) 5. RE: Unibus extender cards (Ian King) 6. RE: pdp11 CPU on S100 board? (Rod Smallwood) 7. Re: pdp11 CPU on S100 board? (Shoppa, Tim) 8. Re: Unibus extender cards (Dave McGuire) 9. Re: Unibus extender cards (Chris Elmquist) 10. Google Lisa List (Steven Hirsch) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Message: 1 Date: Tue, 10 May 2011 22:47:51 -0400 From: Dave McGuire <mcguire at neurotica.com> Subject: Re: Unibus extender cards To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <4DC9F8D7.5080307 at neurotica.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed On 5/10/11 9:59 PM, Chris Elmquist wrote: >> Look at: >> http://www.douglas.com/hardware/pcbs/breadboards/digital.html at >> the bottom of the page (for hex). >> They will still build them for you, at $100 a pop as long as you >> order 10 or more. > > Are they still in business? If so, perhaps they do not do it by email? > Numerous email to them from here have gone unanswered. > > I'm another guy needing Unibus extender board(s) so if a group buy or > something similar comes together, add me to the list. I'm in, but not for a couple of months. It'll probably take that long to get one together. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL ------------------------------ Message: 2 Date: Tue, 10 May 2011 20:48:15 -0400 From: Michael Thompson <michael.99.thompson at gmail.com> Subject: And then there were three.. To: cctech at classiccmp.org Message-ID: <BANLkTimHoinw2xcuUHV-KMRcO9izB9V9Fw at mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Through a generous donation the Rhode Island Computer Museum now has three PDP-8/S systems. The first PDP-8/S is a rack mount, S/N 517, and was donated earlier this year. It is operational, but still needs some more testing to insure that everything works OK. It does run FOCAL and Fortran, so I suspect that everything is OK. The second PDP-8/S is a desktop, S/N 857. The third PDP-8/S is a rack mount, S/N 537. Both were donated today. Both of these systems will need extensive cleaning and restoration. The rack mount system came with an OMD8S memory/data-break expansion chassis, S/N 96. The OMD8/S only has a single 4 KW core plane installed. During the week I will post pictures and an inventory of the two recent dontations on the RICM Warehouse WWW page. -- Michael Thompson ------------------------------ Message: 3 Date: Tue, 10 May 2011 19:18:59 -0700 From: "Paul Popelka" <trenchdweller at att.net> Subject: Re: Unibus extender cards To: <cctech at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <002f01cc0f81$ca28c890$6563a8c0 at geek> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Douglas Electronics lists these as available. Look here: http://www.douglas.com/hardware/pcbs/breadboards/digital.html near the bottom of the page. But, ..... you need to buy 10. Maybe you could by a double and a quad and use them together. You only need to buy 1 of each of those. Paul ------------------------------ Message: 4 Date: Wed, 11 May 2011 00:46:33 -0500 From: Adrian Stoness <tdk.knight at gmail.com> Subject: Re: And then there were three.. To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <BANLkTik4XghO0zSJae_fTR7LwgGt6p3Psg at mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 nice On Tue, May 10, 2011 at 7:48 PM, Michael Thompson < michael.99.thompson at gmail.com> wrote: > Through a generous donation the Rhode Island Computer Museum now has > three PDP-8/S systems. > > The first PDP-8/S is a rack mount, S/N 517, and was donated earlier > this year. It is operational, but still needs some more testing to > insure that everything works OK. It does run FOCAL and Fortran, so I > suspect that everything is OK. > > The second PDP-8/S is a desktop, S/N 857. The third PDP-8/S is a rack > mount, S/N 537. Both were donated today. Both of these systems will > need extensive cleaning and restoration. The rack mount system came > with an OMD8S memory/data-break expansion chassis, S/N 96. The OMD8/S > only has a single 4 KW core plane installed. > > During the week I will post pictures and an inventory of the two > recent dontations on the RICM Warehouse WWW page. > > -- > Michael Thompson > ------------------------------ Message: 5 Date: Tue, 10 May 2011 23:04:15 -0700 From: Ian King <IanK at vulcan.com> Subject: RE: Unibus extender cards To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org>, "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" <cctech at classiccmp.org> Cc: Rich Alderson <RichA at vulcan.com> Message-ID: <FF6AB92D97A23A409701CDBF66F03FCD03E0F38DB9 at 505fuji> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I didn't get response to email either, so I called them, and they were very nice folks. I think they have a weird email distribution protocol. -- Ian ________________________________________ From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Chris Elmquist [chrise at pobox.com] Sent: Tuesday, May 10, 2011 6:59 PM To: General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only Cc: Rich Alderson Subject: Re: Unibus extender cards On Tuesday (05/10/2011 at 02:44PM -0700), Don North wrote: > > Look at: > http://www.douglas.com/hardware/pcbs/breadboards/digital.html at > the bottom of the page (for hex). > They will still build them for you, at $100 a pop as long as you > order 10 or more. Are they still in business? If so, perhaps they do not do it by email? Numerous email to them from here have gone unanswered. I'm another guy needing Unibus extender board(s) so if a group buy or something similar comes together, add me to the list. Chris > > On 5/10/2011 11:23 AM, Zane H. Healy wrote: > >One has to wonder what a production run of cards might cost, and > >how many people would be interested in them. I don't have any. > >:-( I'd be more interested in dual and quad height. Hex height > >could be used in a PDP-8 as well, couldn't they? > > > >Zane > > > > > > > >At 10:58 AM -0700 5/10/11, Rich Alderson wrote: > >>Does anyone have hex-height Unibus extender cards they would be willing > >>to part with, or loan? > >> > >>We have created a printer interface card (based one the last rev of the > >>M8571 plus all relevant ECOs) for an LP20 in the front end of > >>our Tops-10 > >>system (a DECSYSTEM-2065). It turns out that the other cards in > >>the LP20 > >>are not entirely defect free, so we need to hook up a logic analyzer to > >>see where things are going wrong. We have no Unibus extenders, > >>so we can't > >>do things like cool suspect delay pots. > >> > >>We'd really prefer not to have to try building these. :-) > > > > > -- Chris Elmquist ------------------------------ Message: 6 Date: Wed, 11 May 2011 07:20:35 +0100 From: "Rod Smallwood" <rodsmallwood at btconnect.com> Subject: RE: pdp11 CPU on S100 board? To: "'General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only'" <cctech at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <36BDE41E23F84F71AF957429CEA72C93 at RODSDEVSYSTEM> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Can anybody explain how the Mentec boards fit into all of this. My understanding was they were the next generation of PDP11. There still seems to be a mystery around what happened to the rights to PDP11 they held. I have seen a recent reference to them having been sold to an unnamed American company who would quote 'Make them available'. Can anybody solve the mystery of what actually happened? ? Rod Smallwood -----Original Message----- From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Bob Armstrong Sent: 10 May 2011 14:49 To: 'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts' Cc: 'Allison' Subject: RE: pdp11 CPU on S100 board? >I have done that and it runs RT out of the box on a T11. Did you build a T-11 system? Can you post more information ? >Forget RT11FB, RSTS or RSX as they will not do well in 24KW. FWIW, RSX-11S will run on an unmapped system. Of course RSX-11S was intended for "embedded" applications and it's not very useful as a general purpose OS. And in theory you can build RSX-11S systems on an RSX=11M or M+ system, but I'm not sure all the stuff you need is part of the standard M/M+ distribution so it might be hard to come up with the necessary files. Didn't at least some DSSI drives, like the RX7x, have embedded T11s that ran RSX-11S? Bob ------------------------------ Message: 7 Date: Wed, 11 May 2011 09:23:59 -0400 From: "Shoppa, Tim" <tshoppa at wmata.com> Subject: Re: pdp11 CPU on S100 board? To: "cctalk at classiccmp.org" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <B136EDE3DF5EC441B6F08E0A7AB872450D71E3BA11 at EX2K7-CMS-1.wmata.local> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > Can anybody explain how the Mentec boards fit into all of this. > My understanding was they were the next generation of PDP11. The early Mentec boards had real DEC J-11's and onboard memory And serial ports (not too conceptually different than 11/53's or 11/93's). This spans the M70 through M100. Toward the end Of this era a big crimp was that J-11's were becoming unavailable (even via Clever routes like removal from old HSC's). Later Mentec boards (after J-11's dried up completely) went to high density TI bitslices and then custom ASICs. This is the M11 and M1. Mentec was all Q-bus. (AFAICT). As the Q-bus peripheral market dried up in The late 90's I remember some talk amongst the Mentec guys of making a M11 or M1 with onboard MSCP-compatible controller for ATA or SCSI drives but I don't think this ever got off the ground. Others made J11 CPU boards too for Q-bus, Unibus, ISA bus, etc. And there were others who sold DEC-compatible CPU's using bitslice and other higher integration techniques (e.g. QED/Quickware). The Mentec and others' main selling points, were cheaper prices and higher Levels of integration on the CPU board (thus reducing total system price). Tim. ------------------------------ Message: 8 Date: Wed, 11 May 2011 10:04:23 -0400 From: Dave McGuire <mcguire at neurotica.com> Subject: Re: Unibus extender cards To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <4DCA9767.8070707 at neurotica.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed On 5/10/11 10:18 PM, Paul Popelka wrote: > Douglas Electronics lists these as available. Look here: > > http://www.douglas.com/hardware/pcbs/breadboards/digital.html > > near the bottom of the page. > > But, ..... you need to buy 10. > > Maybe you could by a double and a quad and use them together. You only need > to buy 1 of each of those. I see no reason why that wouldn't work. I've used two duals side-by-side as a quad. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL ------------------------------ Message: 9 Date: Wed, 11 May 2011 09:06:49 -0500 From: Chris Elmquist <chrise at pobox.com> Subject: Re: Unibus extender cards To: "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" <cctech at classiccmp.org> Cc: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org>, Rich Alderson <RichA at vulcan.com> Message-ID: <20110511140649.GA21661 at n0jcf.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii On Tuesday (05/10/2011 at 11:04PM -0700), Ian King wrote: > I didn't get response to email either, so I called them, and they were very nice folks. I think they have a weird email distribution protocol. -- Ian OK. Roger that. I was hoping to get them to offer some pictures of their various prototype boards too as I am interested in those as well but find it hard to visualize what the hole patterns and other routing really are on them. Chris > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Chris Elmquist [chrise at pobox.com] > Sent: Tuesday, May 10, 2011 6:59 PM > To: General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only > Cc: Rich Alderson > Subject: Re: Unibus extender cards > > On Tuesday (05/10/2011 at 02:44PM -0700), Don North wrote: > > > > Look at: > > http://www.douglas.com/hardware/pcbs/breadboards/digital.html at > > the bottom of the page (for hex). > > They will still build them for you, at $100 a pop as long as you > > order 10 or more. > > Are they still in business? If so, perhaps they do not do it by email? > Numerous email to them from here have gone unanswered. > > I'm another guy needing Unibus extender board(s) so if a group buy or > something similar comes together, add me to the list. > > Chris > > > > > On 5/10/2011 11:23 AM, Zane H. Healy wrote: > > >One has to wonder what a production run of cards might cost, and > > >how many people would be interested in them. I don't have any. > > >:-( I'd be more interested in dual and quad height. Hex height > > >could be used in a PDP-8 as well, couldn't they? > > > > > >Zane > > > > > > > > > > > >At 10:58 AM -0700 5/10/11, Rich Alderson wrote: > > >>Does anyone have hex-height Unibus extender cards they would be willing > > >>to part with, or loan? > > >> > > >>We have created a printer interface card (based one the last rev of the > > >>M8571 plus all relevant ECOs) for an LP20 in the front end of > > >>our Tops-10 > > >>system (a DECSYSTEM-2065). It turns out that the other cards in > > >>the LP20 > > >>are not entirely defect free, so we need to hook up a logic analyzer to > > >>see where things are going wrong. We have no Unibus extenders, > > >>so we can't > > >>do things like cool suspect delay pots. > > >> > > >>We'd really prefer not to have to try building these. :-) -- Chris Elmquist ------------------------------ Message: 10 Date: Wed, 11 May 2011 11:16:05 -0400 (EDT) From: Steven Hirsch <snhirsch at gmail.com> Subject: Google Lisa List To: Classic Computers Mailing List <cctech at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <alpine.DEB.2.00.1105111107160.6127 at duo> Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; format=flowed; charset=US-ASCII Does anyone know who owns this list and how to get in touch with them? I joined last month, made about three totally innocuous postings and found myself banned at the next attempt to sign in. Google, in their infinite wisdom, gives you no means to find out if it's a mistake, appeal to the owner, or even get an explanation for why it's occurred! I sent a message to the posting address with no response. I had been given the name of "lowenddan at gmail.com" as list owner, but cannot get any response from that address either. Is there something I should know about becoming worthy of Lisa List membership? Perhaps a secret handshake I've overlooked? I contacted a couple of members privately, and both were utterly baffled as to what the motivation may have been. I'm still operating on the assumption that this is a software glitch or mistake. If I've been thrown off as a deliberate action, then I think it's common courtesy for the list owner to at least explain why this occurred. Steve -- End of cctalk Digest, Vol 93, Issue 17 **************************************

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

Unibus extender cards

by trenchdweller＠att.net

Douglas Electronics lists these as available. Look here: http://www.douglas.com/hardware/pcbs/breadboards/digital.html near the bottom of the page. But, ..... you need to buy 10. Maybe you could by a double and a quad and use them together. You only need to buy 1 of each of those. Paul

15 years, 3 months

2
1
0 0

And then there were three..

by michael.99.thompson＠gmail.com

Through a generous donation the Rhode Island Computer Museum now has three PDP-8/S systems. The first PDP-8/S is a rack mount, S/N 517, and was donated earlier this year. It is operational, but still needs some more testing to insure that everything works OK. It does run FOCAL and Fortran, so I suspect that everything is OK. The second PDP-8/S is a desktop, S/N 857. The third PDP-8/S is a rack mount, S/N 537. Both were donated today. Both of these systems will need extensive cleaning and restoration. The rack mount system came with an OMD8S memory/data-break expansion chassis, S/N 96. The OMD8/S only has a single 4 KW core plane installed. During the week I will post pictures and an inventory of the two recent dontations on the RICM Warehouse WWW page. -- Michael Thompson

15 years, 3 months

2
1
0 0

Terak notebooks

by jfoust＠threedee.com

Among the items from the William Mayberry estate, I've scanned four notebooks into a series of TIFF files. Bill kept engineering notebooks to carefully document his thoughts in designing the Terak, as well as meeting notes with other principals. I'll make these available when I'm finished. Each page filename is 000.TIF, 001.TIF, etc. What's the best tool for converting these to a sensible PDF? LibTiff tiffcp to multipage, then tiff2pdf? I have Windows, Mac and Linux. - John

15 years, 3 months

4
4
0 0

"Original" IBM PC

by jws＠jwsss.com

I'll take half what they are asking for all of my Pee Cees 250814364633 and it comes with 6" floppy drives. Phil? Disk Ferret material? Jim

15 years, 3 months

14
24
0 0

Desoldering a chopper transistor

by trag＠io.com

> Date: Mon, 09 May 2011 10:57:34 -0700 > From: "Chuck Guzis" <cclist at sydex.com> > On 9 May 2011 at 12:59, Shoppa, Tim wrote: > >> ChemWick (which is indeed better than the other brands but this >> applies to the Other brands too) will "dry out" and become much less >> useful If not stored properly. > > That's "Chem-Wik" (tm) and "Soder-Wick" (tm) by Chemtronics. > >> If it does get dried out, dipping it in one of the fancy-pants fluxes >> will Pep it up considerably :-) > > I find that a brief dip of the braid in denatured alcohol helps > considerably (at least with "Soder Wik".) Thank you, Chuck and Tim. I did not know that. When I get home this evening I will put the plastic cover back on my spools of braid and perhaps store them in a ziplock bag as well. Jeff Walther

15 years, 3 months

2
1
0 0

OT: ham radio licenses

by mcguire＠neurotica.com

I had a ham license (coded Tech class, KA2UZK) from 1984 to 1994, and was quite active on VHF FM and HF CW during that time. I've missed it quite a bit over the years and have always intended to relicense, but the piles of rules changes gave me pause, as rote memorization isn't really my strong suit. Well, the recent discussion of ham radio licensing motivated me to finally get off my butt and do it. I studied off-and-on for a few days to assimilate the new rules & regs, and registered for the VE test given at the hamfest in Hagerstown, MD on April 31st. I sat for all three exams...Element 2 (Technician class), Element 3 (General class) and Element 4 (Extra class). I am very proud to report that I passed them all the first time through! And, I don't mind saying, the Extra exam made my head hurt. The FCC processed my paperwork very quickly, and on May 5th I was granted an Extra-class license and assigned call sign AK4HZ. Of I'm still in West Virginia handling family business, while all of my ham gear is in Florida, but my mother (who is house-sitting for me in Florida) was able to ship two of my HTs up here so I'd have something at least. When I have access to my HF gear (Yaesu FT-ONE and FT-920, Heath HW-7, HW-8, and HW-9 QRP rigs, and Heath SB-101) I hope to try out some of the neat new(ish) stuff like PSK31 that came up while I was away. High-tech stuff aside, I'm sure to do some plain old SSB and CW on the HF bands. Anyway, enough of my blather, I'm just proud to have accomplished that and wanted to tell everyone. I'm hoping to catch some of you on the air! -Dave 73's DE AK4HZ -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL

15 years, 3 months

8
11
0 0

HP LJIIp and LJIIIp printers

by mtapley＠swri.edu

At 12:00 -0500 5/10/11, Charles wrote: >Is there a source for GOOD toner cartridges? Google finds a bunch of >cartridges, but how many are junk refills? I am willing to pay for good >cartridges, but I can't tell good from bad. Are feeding parts available if >they start to pull multiple sheets, etc? Are there reputable sources? > >I know these have a good reputation generally, and I used one for a long >time in the '90s. I've had reasonable success (with my LaserJet4M+, a later model) with: http://www2.printerworks.com/ No connection, just satisfied customer. YMMV. -- - Mark 210-379-4635 ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Large Asteroids headed toward planets inhabited by beings that don't have technology adequate to stop them: Think of it as Evolution in Fast-Forward.

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

Subject: Re: Desoldering a chopper transistor

by kandres＠epssecurity.com

As far as the "broken track", with difficult to remove components, and the lack of an octopus with scope, an exacto knife slice of track can be used to meter suspect components without removal. A solder bridge then repairs the "service trick". As Tony suggested, watch for modifications that may have altered the track on purpose! Kevin Andres Senior Technician Engineered Protection Systems Inc Nicet # 90660 Fire Alarm Systems Level II 616 459 0281 kandres at epssecurity.com epssecurity.com -----Original Message----- From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of cctech-request at classiccmp.org Sent: Sunday, May 08, 2011 6:46 PM To: cctech at classiccmp.org Subject: cctech Digest, Vol 93, Issue 10 Send cctech mailing list submissions to cctech at classiccmp.org To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit http://www.classiccmp.org/mailman/listinfo/cctech or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to cctech-request at classiccmp.org You can reach the person managing the list at cctech-owner at classiccmp.org When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific than "Re: Contents of cctech digest..." Today's Topics: 1. Re: "Original" IBM PC (Tony Duell) 2. Re: Desoldering a chopper transistor (Tony Duell) 3. Re: rack mounting vintage gear (Al Kossow) 4. Re: ebay: VAXstations (Salt Lake City; I can pick up for you) (Wolfgang Eichberger) 5. RE: Desoldering a chopper transistor (dwight elvey) 6. Re: Desoldering a chopper transistor (Dave Caroline) 7. Re: Desoldering a chopper transistor (Chuck Guzis) 8. Re: Desoldering a chopper transistor (John Robertson) 9. Re: Desoldering a chopper transistor (Brent Hilpert) 10. RE: Desoldering a chopper transistor (Rob Jarratt) 11. RE: Desoldering a chopper transistor (arcarlini at iee.org) 12. IBM 3480 help (Patrick Finnegan) 13. Re: IBM 3480 help (vintagecoder at aol.com) 14. Re: IBM 3480 help (Al Kossow) 15. Re: Desoldering a chopper transistor (Geoffrey Reed) 16. Re: Desoldering a chopper transistor (Pete Turnbull) 17. Enormous lot of vintage microcomputer stuff for sale (Bloomington, IN) (Mark Meiss) 18. Re: Enormous lot of vintage microcomputer stuff for sale (Bloomington, IN) (Richard) 19. Re: Enormous lot of vintage microcomputer stuff for sale (Bloomington, IN) (Mark Meiss) 20. RE: Desoldering a chopper transistor (arcarlini at iee.org) 21. RE: Desoldering a chopper transistor (Rob Jarratt) 22. S-100 EPROM boards are here! (Andrew Lynch) 23. RE: Desoldering a chopper transistor (Chuck Guzis) 24. pdp11 CPU on S100 board? (David Griffith) 25. Re: pdp11 CPU on S100 board? (Roger Ivie) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Message: 1 Date: Sun, 8 May 2011 18:46:59 +0100 (BST) From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Subject: Re: "Original" IBM PC To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Message-ID: <m1QJ84S-000J3yC at p850ug1> Content-Type: text/plain > > HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! > > "...or 5.25" as they are sometimes called." You mean, by everyone else on = Indeed... I did wonder if the 5.25" refered to the diameter of the magneitc disk and that the square envelope was larger. However, I have just measured a 5.25" floppy disk with a ruler and the enveleope is 5.25" in each direction... So what 6" refers to is beyond me. (OK, you can call me cluelrdd for not knowing the size of the minifloppy disk, but at least I measurted it rather than making some silly comment...) > the planet, even in metric-based countries? "This computer has been in my = > family for generations. I inherited the computer from my grandfather and my= > uncle originally purchased it...." Generations? The machine was introduc= > ed in 1981....=20 > > Whatever this guy's smoking, it's pretty serious stuff. Maybe *that's* wor= > th $65K, for viable cuttings - not that I would know anything about that so= > rt of thing, really -- Ian =20 Not that I am going to bid on it, but I wonder just how 'original' this is... To me an origianl IBM PC implies a 16K-64K motherboard. And a 63W power supply I would also claim that the expansio cards were origianl IBM ones. I wouldn't object to _ectras_ being third-party, but there should be enough IBM boards, of the types produced when the machine was made, to have a working system (that is, video card and floppy controller at least). But if, for exmaple, an MDA card has been rpelaced at some point by a Hercules card and the originial IBM MDA card is not included with the machine then that is not 'original'. -tony ------------------------------ Message: 2 Date: Sun, 8 May 2011 19:01:19 +0100 (BST) From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Subject: Re: Desoldering a chopper transistor To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Message-ID: <m1QJ8II-000J49C at p850ug1> Content-Type: text/plain > And just for the record, I have not actually lifted a track. The track Oh you will :-). I'll admit ot having lifted my fair share of tracks too. And damaged the odd bit of through-plating. > damage is strange and I am not entirely convinced it was me because it is a > little distance from the pin, perhaps 5mm away and it is a break in the > track. It looks like I could have let the iron slip across it, but I don't You won;t normally break a track by just letting the iron rub across it. Are you sure this track break is not deliberate? Have you checked the components connected to each side of it and made sure they should be connected accordign to the schematics? -tony ------------------------------ Message: 3 Date: Fri, 06 May 2011 17:13:26 -0700 From: Al Kossow <aek at bitsavers.org> Subject: Re: rack mounting vintage gear To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Message-ID: <4DC48EA6.1040902 at bitsavers.org> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed On 5/5/11 11:21 PM, David Griffith wrote: > My story is that I scored a couple IMSAIs and Altairs with the catch that I had to take most of the contents of the shed. I'm still selling off that stuff. > And a good lot of stuff you got there, too. It would be nice to see if Morrow MICRONIX is in there somewhere. re. Fujitsu tape drive If someone wants one in the Bay Area, I have a complete unit I'm about to scrap. ------------------------------ Message: 4 Date: Sat, 7 May 2011 13:53:23 +0200 From: Wolfgang Eichberger <oe5ewl at gmail.com> Subject: Re: ebay: VAXstations (Salt Lake City; I can pick up for you) To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <BANLkTi=A171jPbG25ieck_NNJpTT4pg1JQ at mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 same here for austria. regards, wolfgang ps: can pick up and store too, if someone needs this. -- Wolfgang Eichberger - OE5EWL Operating System Collector Blog: 5ewl.blogspot.com Homepage: www.eichberger.org 2011/5/6 Pontus <pontus at update.uu.se>: > 2011-05-06 18:24, Dave McGuire skrev: >> >> ?In any event, that one (he says he has two) is in the BA123 "World Box", >> which have dried up significantly on the market in the past couple of years >> and are becoming much harder to find than they had been. >> > > It is definitely on the want list :) If anyone local to me (sweden that is) > has anything in a BA123 I wouldn't mind driving a bit and pay a bit for it. > > I've seen two in Sweden, on with GPX > > Regards, > Pontus. > > ------------------------------ Message: 5 Date: Sat, 7 May 2011 06:26:01 -0700 From: dwight elvey <dkelvey at hotmail.com> Subject: RE: Desoldering a chopper transistor To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <SNT129-W426FD9C62B93280592E265A3820 at phx.gbl> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" > Date: Sat, 7 May 2011 10:40:55 +0100 > From: pete at dunnington.plus.com > To: > Subject: Re: Desoldering a chopper transistor > > > On 07/05/2011 10:04, Rob Jarratt wrote: > > I need to desolder a chopper transistor from a PCB in the PSU of my PDP11 so > > that I can test it and if necessary replace it. The trouble is that I am not > > experienced with soldering and desoldering and I am having a lot of trouble > > desoldering it. I have made several attempts, damaging one of the PCB tracks > > in the process (should be repairable by adding a wire). I have a cheap > > Weller 40W soldering iron and I have been using some narrow tips. I have one > > of those pumps for sucking out the molten solder. I also have 2mm solder > > wick (braid?). > > You don't normally desolder more than one pin at a time but you do need > a good iron and a good pump. On DEC PSUs particularly, I've found the > holes are, um, less than generous -- the component pins tend to be a > close fit and there's not much room around the pin even when you get all > the solder out. > > I normally use a 100W Weller soldering gun for things like those > trannies (I have a 50W Weller temperature-controlled iron for anything > else). The trick is to get the solder hot enough to flow, and to do so > quickly. If you can't do that, you're unlike to succeed, and the longer > you leave the heat on the pad, the more likely you are to damage > something. Then use a large pump to suck it off. Sometimes adding > fresh solder and trying a second time helps -- the first attempt removes > most of the oxidised stuff and the flux from the fresh solder helps > remove the last of it. Then push the pin from side to side to break the > last whisker of solder that bridges from the pad across the gap to the > pin -- if you can! Hi I thought I'd mention that you always need to refill with solder if it misses getting it all out. Try heating both sides with two irons( tough with only two hands but I've gotten good with holding the pump and iron at one side with just the one hand. You need something to clamp the board. Also, when first melting the solder, make sure the pin is free and centered in the hole. I push the lead around with the iron and solder melted until it feels right( it is a feel thing ). It seems that no matter how well it is cleared, some small bridge seems to be there. Often this can be easily broken loose with a little pressure >from a small screwdriver. If that doesn't work, I put the iron on the lead with sideways pressure. Just as the lead pops, I remove the iron. The idea is to heat it just enough to make the solder start to soften but not so much as to melt it all and attach the lead someplace else. If this fails, I refill the hole with solder and try to adjust the lead again, while hot, to center it in the hole. As a last resort, I go to a friend house that manufactures burn-in boards. He has a solder pot. It is full and I just set the board on the brim of solder. I then just pull the part out. Do remember through all this, do not put pressure on the traces with the iron. Use a clean iron well tinned iron. You can't clear a partially cleared hole, you need to refill it and try again. Use bottled flux if you can get some, it helps to keep the solder surfaces fresh. Also, although many like solder wick, I'd done more damage with it then I'd like. I now only use the pump( not the small one with the yellow lever on the side. It is junk.The larger the better ). Dwight > > I'd suggest getting a bigger iron if you can, and don't use a narrow tip > for large components. I wouldn't waste any time on solder braid, either > -- fine for small stuff but probably not for this. > > -- > Pete Peter Turnbull > Network Manager > University of York ------------------------------ Message: 6 Date: Sat, 7 May 2011 14:40:12 +0100 From: Dave Caroline <dave.thearchivist at gmail.com> Subject: Re: Desoldering a chopper transistor To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <BANLkTik391Az42pGyL5Ef1FGwC2UDpSm6w at mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 A few points 1. If the device is dead, or cheap, just cut it off above the board, the board is rare/delicate the device commodity and replaceable, then each leg can be got out above board, even the solder sucking process can do this for you. least board heating 2. after sucking all three, I try to jiggle each lead to check its free/break any small amount of solder left, hole has to be reasonable clear 3. with a large iron add solder to get a blob on all three, pull device out and then suck holes after 4. similar to above but rapid sliding of iron over the pins to get all melted, then pull device 5. back in the old days there were iron tips around for multi pin melting, I never found them to be too good braid never worked that well for me Dave Caroline ------------------------------ Message: 7 Date: Sat, 07 May 2011 08:33:01 -0700 From: "Chuck Guzis" <cclist at sydex.com> Subject: Re: Desoldering a chopper transistor To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <4DC503BD.29324.2A3F5E at cclist.sydex.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII On 7 May 2011 at 10:04, Rob Jarratt wrote: > The thing I really don't understand is how you desolder more than one > pin at the same time. There is always bound to be just a little solder > left holding each pin in place no matter how much you remove with the > pump or wick. So it seems to me that you would need to have the > solder in all 3 pin holes molten, all at the same time, to be able to > lift the component. > > What is the trick? Or is it just that my soldering iron is not good > (powerful) enough? If you're going to do much repair of PCBs, a temperature-controlled iron is pretty important. I use my venerable Weller TCP iron--a time- proven design that's still in production after, what, a half-century? However, there are less-expensive imported options. A clean and well-tinned iron is vital to this kind of work. If your iron isn't tinned, the molten solder can't conduct heat to the joint and you end up spending too much time trying to get a joint to melt. If you're using a solder pump, make sure it's the big one; the little ones don't seem to be worth much. It often helps to add solder to a joint before you use the pump to suck the solder out. Once you've sucked the solder out of a joint (you should be able to see daylight through the joint), wiggle the component gently to break the bond between the lead and the PCB trace formed by any remaining solder film and it should pop right out. Others have suggested cutting the component body off the leads to reduce heat conduction away from the joint being worked on--and that's a very good suggestion. If you still don't trust yourself, you may want to look into a low- temperature solution, such as Chip-Quick, which is basically a low- temperature fusible alloy that takes solder into solution. It's quite valuable duing SMT rework (I have yet to damage a PCB using it to replace surface mount ICs), but it might also work with traditional through-hole devices. http://www.chipquikinc.com/index.htm I've got lots of desoldering braid, but I tend to use it for soldering SMT packages, rather than desoldering them. --Chuck ------------------------------ Message: 8 Date: Sat, 07 May 2011 09:14:25 -0700 From: John Robertson <pinball at telus.net> Subject: Re: Desoldering a chopper transistor To: General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only <cctech at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <4DC56FE1.8010300 at telus.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Pete Turnbull wrote: > > On 07/05/2011 10:04, Rob Jarratt wrote: >> I need to desolder a chopper transistor from a PCB in the PSU of my >> PDP11 so >> that I can test it and if necessary replace it. The trouble is that I >> am not >> experienced with soldering and desoldering and I am having a lot of >> trouble >> desoldering it. I have made several attempts, damaging one of the PCB >> tracks >> in the process (should be repairable by adding a wire). I have a cheap >> Weller 40W soldering iron and I have been using some narrow tips. I >> have one >> of those pumps for sucking out the molten solder. I also have 2mm solder >> wick (braid?). > > You don't normally desolder more than one pin at a time but you do > need a good iron and a good pump. On DEC PSUs particularly, I've > found the holes are, um, less than generous -- the component pins tend > to be a close fit and there's not much room around the pin even when > you get all the solder out. > > I normally use a 100W Weller soldering gun for things like those > trannies (I have a 50W Weller temperature-controlled iron for anything > else). The trick is to get the solder hot enough to flow, and to do > so quickly. If you can't do that, you're unlike to succeed, and the > longer you leave the heat on the pad, the more likely you are to > damage something. Then use a large pump to suck it off. Sometimes > adding fresh solder and trying a second time helps -- the first > attempt removes most of the oxidised stuff and the flux from the fresh > solder helps remove the last of it. Then push the pin from side to > side to break the last whisker of solder that bridges from the pad > across the gap to the pin -- if you can! > > I'd suggest getting a bigger iron if you can, and don't use a narrow > tip for large components. I wouldn't waste any time on solder braid, > either -- fine for small stuff but probably not for this. > Also, once you have most of the solder removed from the feed through hole then you can push on the leg of the device with a small screwdriver (or the like) to try to release it from the side of the hole. Most device legs go in the hole on an angle, thus there is a tiny film of solder holding the leg to the side of the hole - sometimes on both the top and the bottom of the hole. You will feel or hear a tiny 'click' as the leg releases. Looks like this (somewhat crappy ASCII sketch) \ |\ | <--- Top of feed through hole | \ | | \ | | \| <--- Bottom of feed through hole \ <--- Leg of device So you are trying to break the top and bottom points by pushing the leg away from the side of the hole it is soldered to. If done correctly the device will then be easy to remove with only finger force - no prying with the screwdriver! Hope that makes sense! John :-#)# -- John's Jukes Ltd. 2343 Main St., Vancouver, BC, Canada V5T 3C9 Call (604)872-5757 or Fax 872-2010 (Pinballs, Jukes, VideoGames) www.flippers.com "Old pinballers never die, they just flip out" ------------------------------ Message: 9 Date: Sat, 7 May 2011 10:01:54 -0700 From: Brent Hilpert <hilpert at cs.ubc.ca> Subject: Re: Desoldering a chopper transistor To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <0aa498f92dc635573a396ff7494972f1 at cs.ubc.ca> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed > I need to desolder a chopper transistor from a PCB in the PSU of my > PDP11 so > that I can test it and if necessary replace it. As you are just trying to isolate the device for testing, sometimes it is easier to open the circuits elsewhere to achieve the isolation. For example, if the collector goes to an offboard transformer through a connector, then that lead is easily isolated; the base is probably fed by a resistor and lifting one lead of the resistor will isolate the base. With 2 of the 3 connections to the transistor open, it is isolated for testing purposes. TO-220 packages (3 leads with tab) can be very difficult to remove in one piece when - as Pete was mentioning - the holes are to small. Some manufacturers fail to increase the drill size for the wider TO-220 pins, they can be very tight with no room to wiggle the lead to break the final solder bridge. Sometimes slightly twisting the lead might do it. Sometimes you have to rock the device up and out of the holes with several heating cycles. ------------------------------ Message: 10 Date: Sat, 7 May 2011 18:58:36 +0100 From: "Rob Jarratt" <robert.jarratt at ntlworld.com> Subject: RE: Desoldering a chopper transistor To: "'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts'" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <039201cc0ce0$651033b0$2f309b10$(a)ntlworld.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Brent Hilpert > Sent: 07 May 2011 18:02 > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Subject: Re: Desoldering a chopper transistor > > > I need to desolder a chopper transistor from a PCB in the PSU of my > > PDP11 so > > that I can test it and if necessary replace it. > > As you are just trying to isolate the device for testing, sometimes it is easier to > open the circuits elsewhere to achieve the isolation. For example, if the > collector goes to an offboard transformer through a connector, then that lead > is easily isolated; the base is probably fed by a resistor and lifting one lead of > the resistor will isolate the base. With 2 of the 3 connections to the transistor > open, it is isolated for testing purposes. > > TO-220 packages (3 leads with tab) can be very difficult to remove in one > piece when - as Pete was mentioning - the holes are to small. Some > manufacturers fail to increase the drill size for the wider TO-220 pins, they > can be very tight with no room to wiggle the lead to break the final solder > bridge. Sometimes slightly twisting the lead might do it. Sometimes you have > to rock the device up and out of the holes with several heating cycles. It is indeed a TO220 and I do need to test it. After sending my request I had an idea and took the board to a local jeweller, he was able to remove it for me by using a very fine drill to drill out the just the pins themselves. The contacts look to be intact and even if they are not I will be able to use wires to reconnect the transistor pins. Thanks Rob ------------------------------ Message: 11 Date: Sat, 7 May 2011 19:44:02 +0100 From: <arcarlini at iee.org> Subject: RE: Desoldering a chopper transistor To: "'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts'" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <8730C5A328D94EE69B0E446A537D6F12 at ANTONIOPC> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I'd be tempted to suggest that you pick up some scrap boards from somewhere (old TV/computer from the tip) and practise. You want to non-destructively remove this component and you've already lifted a track. I'd stop now and practise on something that doesn't matter. Removing something like a 4 pin molex power connector from a dead (recent:-)) hard drive or similar is probably the sort of difficulty you want? Antonio arcarlini at iee.org ------------------------------ Message: 12 Date: Sat, 7 May 2011 16:59:36 -0400 From: Patrick Finnegan <pat at computer-refuge.org> Subject: IBM 3480 help To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <201105071659.37382.pat at computer-refuge.org> Content-Type: Text/Plain; charset="us-ascii" I'm attempting to figure out an error code on my IBM 3480-B22 drive, and was wondering if anyone had access to a manual listing error codes for the drives. I seem to have a "logic" manual, but that's not particularly helpful yet. The code the drive displays, immediately after start-up is "CHK 38". Pat -- Patrick Finnegan ------------------------------ Message: 13 Date: Sat, 7 May 2011 21:51:31 +0000 From: vintagecoder at aol.com Subject: Re: IBM 3480 help To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Message-ID: <201105072151.p47LpZOo009529 at imr-ma01.mx.aol.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII > I'm attempting to figure out an error code on my IBM 3480-B22 drive, and > was wondering if anyone had access to a manual listing error codes for > the drives. I seem to have a "logic" manual, but that's not particularly > helpful yet. > > The code the drive displays, immediately after start-up is "CHK 38". > > Pat That's out of my area but a quick check of the 3490 manuals I could find (couldn't find any relevant 3480 doc) does not look good. It says this is a "call your service rep" type of error- the CHK XX codes are apparently undocumented, at least for 3490s. If you can't find a 3480 guide on bitsavers (I just checked and couldn't find one) then this may or may not be worthwhile: http://www.fujitsu.com/downloads/COMP/fcpa/tapes/m2488ce_prod-guide.pdf The only reason I suggest it is Fujitsu has some history of ripping off IBM (they did it with several OS versions and paid over 800 million USD in a settlement) and compatible-hardware manufacturers often try to keep the same error codes to make pubs easier (also by ripping off IBM), so maybe just maybe they are using the same codes as the 3480/90 tape subsystem. See appendix E. for the code listings. Nice piece of hardware btw. IBM's marketing materials say "The A22 control unit is priced at $65,430, and the B22 tape unit, which contains two tape drives, sells for $43,120." Good luck and post back if you find anything. If you don't get any answers >from the list or elsewhere (some good places to ask are on IBM-MAIN (you will need to subscribe or nobody will see your posts) and the yahoo hercules groups) email me offline and I'll see if I can find anything. -- +------------------------------------------------------------------------+ | Vintage Coder America Online Com ivagntrpbqre at nby.pbz <ROT13> | | | | Collecting: DOS assemblers, compilers, books, and related doc, | | software and doc for IBM S/360 through OS/390. | | | | Wanted: Ada 95 compilers for MVS/ESA and Solaris (Sparc). | | | |---------------------------------------+--------------------------------| | Powered by Slackware 64 & Solaris 10 | Powered by Hercules | |=======================================+================================| | PGP Key 4096R 0x1CB84BEFC73ACB32 Encrypted email preferred | | PGP Fingerprint 5C1C 3AEB A7B2 E6F7 34A0 2870 1CB8 4BEF C73A CB32 | +------------------------------------------------------------------------+ ------------------------------ Message: 14 Date: Sat, 07 May 2011 15:10:13 -0700 From: Al Kossow <aek at bitsavers.org> Subject: Re: IBM 3480 help To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <4DC5C345.2090008 at bitsavers.org> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed On 5/7/11 1:59 PM, Patrick Finnegan wrote: > I'm attempting to figure out an error code on my IBM 3480-B22 drive, and > was wondering if anyone had access to a manual listing error codes for > the drives. I seem to have a "logic" manual, but that's not > particularly helpful yet. > There are about 8 books in the maint set, I'll see about getting them on line. It was also sold as the DEC TA90/E. I have a couple of volumes up under dec/magtape/ta90 ------------------------------ Message: 15 Date: Sat, 07 May 2011 15:27:13 -0700 From: Geoffrey Reed <geoffr at zipcon.net> Subject: Re: Desoldering a chopper transistor To: cctalk <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <C9EB1551.42C11%geoffr at zipcon.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" On 5/7/11 11:44 AM, "arcarlini at iee.org" <arcarlini at iee.org> wrote: > I'd be tempted to suggest that you pick up some scrap boards from > somewhere (old TV/computer from the tip) and practise. > > You want to non-destructively remove this component and you've already > lifted a track. > > I'd stop now and practise on something that doesn't matter. Removing > something like > a 4 pin molex power connector from a dead (recent:-)) hard drive or > similar is > probably the sort of difficulty you want? > > Antonio > arcarlini at iee.org I'd second that.. And use a good de-soldering tool. I use a Hakko 808 desoldering gun. My hot air rework station has an option for a desoldering attachment but the gun is serving me well. Just change the flux filter regularly and clean it out well. ------------------------------ Message: 16 Date: Sun, 08 May 2011 00:55:54 +0100 From: Pete Turnbull <pete at dunnington.plus.com> Subject: Re: Desoldering a chopper transistor To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <4DC5DC0A.9020207 at dunnington.plus.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed On 07/05/2011 18:58, Rob Jarratt wrote: > It is indeed a TO220 and I do need to test it. Ah, that ought to be doable with a 40W iron. When I described using my 100W Weller, I was thinking of bigger stuff with metal cans! > After sending my request I > had an idea and took the board to a local jeweller, he was able to remove it > for me by using a very fine drill to drill out the just the pins themselves. I hope those holes weren't plated-through ;-) -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York ------------------------------ Message: 17 Date: Sat, 7 May 2011 18:09:05 -0700 From: Mark Meiss <chaosotter76 at gmail.com> Subject: Enormous lot of vintage microcomputer stuff for sale (Bloomington, IN) To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <BANLkTimPW3gPjqQPYcx52XiV1sfPdPDaSg at mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=windows-1252 Hello to the cctalk list after a long absence! My wife and I own a small business specializing in vintage computers and electronics, especially 1980s microcomputers and game consoles. We?re in the process of moving from Bloomington, Indiana, out to California, and as part of that move, all of our inventory has to go! Because we are anxious to complete our move quickly, we need to sell everything as a single bulk lot. If you?re a fan of the technology or looking to start your own related business, this is a chance to acquire a mother lode of great old stuff. There are some real treasures included -- we hope that you?ll be able to give these computers a good home. Included are almost 100 systems (Apple, Atari, Commodore, TI, Sinclair, and more); thousands of disks, tapes, and cartridges; over a thousand books and magazines; electronics test equipment; and more. The complete list of stuff is available at http://bit.ly/izaYpw ( https://docs.google.com/document/pub?id=1JS2fRLSfeOoI27Otf-Zhkl1f84WNZQHwM-… ) I can be contacted by email at squunkin at gmail.com, or leave a message on our Google Voice number at (408) 676-6467<https://www.google.com/voice/b/2?pli=1#phones>and I?ll get back to you. (Serious offers only, please -- and feel free to pass the word along to any interested friends!) The sale will go to the best offer from the most reasonable person as quickly as we can manage it. Here are the basic terms and conditions: - We must sell as a single lot and cannot split off individual items. This is not negotiable -- I?m in California, and the inventory is stored in Indiana. (Obviously, we can?t handle returns either.) - This is a LOT of stuff; you will certainly need a U-Haul track or the like. (I?m not a pro at this, but I?d estimate a 20? truck.) - Once the sale has been arranged, I?ll make a trip back to Indiana to help you load up your truck: you?re not on your own. This makes it very important to me to establish a firm pick-up date. I can be flexible about the day of the week. - We cannot guarantee the condition of individual items and must sell as-is: most of this stuff is at least 20 years old. We have always tried to test new equipment as it arrives, and most of the media have been kept in a controlled environment. - Southern Indiana is humid and subject to flooding, and there is a chance that some items may have some moisture damage. If we discover in the process of loading that any items of particular interest to you are damaged, we can adjust the final sale price accordingly. Please let us know about those items in advance! - The list of items we?ve compiled is not exhaustive, but represents a large sample from our inventory database. There?s more. - We currently have around 3-4 dozen WYSE and Falco terminals available, most of which power on. Please let us know ASAP if you want them included -- otherwise, they?ll be heading to recycling on May 14th. - If you have any questions, please ask! I will try to respond to every enquiry with 24 hours. ------------------------------ Message: 18 Date: Sat, 07 May 2011 22:06:52 -0600 From: Richard <legalize at xmission.com> Subject: Re: Enormous lot of vintage microcomputer stuff for sale (Bloomington, IN) To: cctalk <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <E1QIvGe-0007Iu-6j at shell.xmission.com> In article <BANLkTimPW3gPjqQPYcx52XiV1sfPdPDaSg at mail.gmail.com>, Mark Meiss <chaosotter76 at gmail.com> writes: > Because we are anxious to complete our move quickly, we need to sell > everything as a single bulk lot. Good luck with that. Pretty much everything listed there is obtainable incrementally and few people are interested in buying huge lots of things when they could obtain them incrementally. I understand its what's easiest for you, but given the economy its probably better to cater to the buyer. -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download <http://legalizeadulthood.wordpress.com/the-direct3d-graphics-pipeline/> Legalize Adulthood! <http://legalizeadulthood.wordpress.com> ------------------------------ Message: 19 Date: Sat, 7 May 2011 23:51:17 -0700 From: Mark Meiss <chaosotter76 at gmail.com> Subject: Re: Enormous lot of vintage microcomputer stuff for sale (Bloomington, IN) To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <BANLkTik=WNawSCVKv_FD5t3ybq2tVa6RXg at mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Well, yes, I imagine that few people are, but we're hoping for exactly one, and here seems likelier a place than most. (Not to mention that Bloomington isn't so far from Dayton, and the Hamvention is coming right up in a few weeks.) We're not looking for top dollar (the move is a good move), but a chance to try to transfer these things en masse to somebody with an understanding of what they are -- hence the desire to avoid eBay if possible. On Sat, May 7, 2011 at 9:06 PM, Richard <legalize at xmission.com> wrote: > > In article <BANLkTimPW3gPjqQPYcx52XiV1sfPdPDaSg at mail.gmail.com>, > Mark Meiss <chaosotter76 at gmail.com> writes: > > > Because we are anxious to complete our move quickly, we need to sell > > everything as a single bulk lot. > > Good luck with that. > > Pretty much everything listed there is obtainable incrementally and > few people are interested in buying huge lots of things when they > could obtain them incrementally. > > I understand its what's easiest for you, but given the economy its > probably better to cater to the buyer. > -- > "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download > <http://legalizeadulthood.wordpress.com/the-direct3d-graphics-pipeline/> > > Legalize Adulthood! <http://legalizeadulthood.wordpress.com> > ------------------------------ Message: 20 Date: Sun, 8 May 2011 10:47:47 +0100 From: <arcarlini at iee.org> Subject: RE: Desoldering a chopper transistor To: "'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts'" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <865E15B734024AA98E807E829C8F7704 at ANTONIOPC> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Tony Duell [ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk] wrote: > Don't tell me that you've never lifted a track. If you do I will have > to conclude that you've never worked on a PCB :-) I've lifted my fair share of tracks (possibly more, just natural greed I guess). Once or twice I've had to put down wire to make up for my clumsiness, although mostly I've lifted tracks on scrap that I don't care about (I just wanted whatever component it might have been). Antonio arcarlini at iee.org ------------------------------ Message: 21 Date: Sun, 8 May 2011 10:57:39 +0100 From: "Rob Jarratt" <robert.jarratt at ntlworld.com> Subject: RE: Desoldering a chopper transistor To: "'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts'" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <03ed01cc0d66$5f623a40$1e26aec0$(a)ntlworld.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of arcarlini at iee.org > Sent: 08 May 2011 10:48 > To: 'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts' > Subject: RE: Desoldering a chopper transistor > > Tony Duell [ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk] wrote: > > Don't tell me that you've never lifted a track. If you do I will have > > to conclude that you've never worked on a PCB :-) > > I've lifted my fair share of tracks (possibly more, just natural greed I guess). > > Once or twice I've had to put down wire to make up for my clumsiness, > although mostly I've lifted tracks on scrap that I don't care about (I just wanted > whatever component it might have been). > > Antonio > arcarlini at iee.org And just for the record, I have not actually lifted a track. The track damage is strange and I am not entirely convinced it was me because it is a little distance from the pin, perhaps 5mm away and it is a break in the track. It looks like I could have let the iron slip across it, but I don't recall that happening, and the break seems too wide for the size of bit I was using. Is it possible there might have been a latent track defect that the heat from the iron revealed? Regards Rob ------------------------------ Message: 22 Date: Sun, 8 May 2011 08:05:54 -0400 From: "Andrew Lynch" <lynchaj at yahoo.com> Subject: S-100 EPROM boards are here! To: <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <6B4661ED29914CC8B690BC223940C2F3 at andrewdesktop> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Hi! The S-100 EPROM PCBs have arrived! These are updated respins of the S-100 EPROM board from last summer with minor corrections and improvements. The S-100 EPROM board supports a wide variety of EPROMs, EEPROMs, FLASH memories, and Static RAMs in 8 or 16 bit modes. It supports many common 28 pin and 32 pin chips. More information is available at John's S100computers.com website here: http://s100computers.com/My%20System%20Pages/PROM%20Board/PROM%20Board.htm The board is $20 plus $3 shipping in the US and $6 elsewhere. Please send a PayPal to LYNCHAJ at YAHOO.COM and I will send your boards right away! There are plenty of PCBs so even if you weren't on the waiting list there should be plenty to go around. Thanks and have a nice day! Andrew Lynch PS, I have some S-100 4MB SRAM boards, S-100 parallel ASCII keyboard interface boards, and S-100 Serial IO boards left too in case you'd like to get some of those and save on shipping. ------------------------------ Message: 23 Date: Sun, 08 May 2011 09:37:15 -0700 From: "Chuck Guzis" <cclist at sydex.com> Subject: RE: Desoldering a chopper transistor To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <4DC6644B.215.F1880 at cclist.sydex.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII On 8 May 2011 at 10:57, Rob Jarratt wrote: > And just for the record, I have not actually lifted a track. The track > damage is strange and I am not entirely convinced it was me because it > is a little distance from the pin, perhaps 5mm away and it is a break > in the track. It looks like I could have let the iron slip across it, > but I don't recall that happening, and the break seems too wide for > the size of bit I was using. Is it possible there might have been a > latent track defect that the heat from the iron revealed? Take a close look at the gap. It's not unusual to see board revisions done this way--just a bit of tape on the master negatives to do a cut in a trace. If the edges of the break look smooth and straight under magnification, you most likely have your answer. Do not attempt to bridge gaps such as this! --Chuck ------------------------------ Message: 24 Date: Sun, 8 May 2011 12:43:59 -0700 (PDT) From: David Griffith <dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu> Subject: pdp11 CPU on S100 board? To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Message-ID: <alpine.DEB.1.10.1105081242480.23678 at sleipnir.cs.csubak.edu> Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; format=flowed; charset=US-ASCII Given that old Soviet knockoffs of pdp11 cpus can be found on ebay, I was wondering if anyone else has thought of making S100 boards containing said processors. -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? ------------------------------ Message: 25 Date: Sun, 8 May 2011 13:02:24 -0700 (PDT) From: Roger Ivie <rivie at ridgenet.net> Subject: Re: pdp11 CPU on S100 board? To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <Pine.NEB.4.63.1105081301490.1826 at stench.no.domain> Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed On Sun, 8 May 2011, David Griffith wrote: > > Given that old Soviet knockoffs of pdp11 cpus can be found on ebay, I was > wondering if anyone else has thought of making S100 boards containing said > processors. I'm pretty certain there used to be one. Osprey, IIRC, built around a J-11. -- roger ivie rivie at ridgenet.net End of cctech Digest, Vol 93, Issue 10 **************************************

15 years, 3 months

2
1
0 0

latin stuff

by dgriffi＠cs.csubak.edu

Si des purgamentum purgamentum accipietis Noli turbare cuium simia virgas tonitrui Si duo sunt in una camera turpis vento facit, qui sciunt et feci -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail?

15 years, 3 months

2
2
0 0

MARCH computer history library

by evan＠snarc.net

MARCH (Mid-Atlantic Retro Computing Hobbyists) will debut part of its vast library of computer history at the VCF East this weekend. The collection includes full runs of the first few years of Byte, Compute, Creative Computing, Dr. Dobb's Journal, SCCS Interface, Interface Age, Kilobaud, and more. We also have the early years of the People's Computer Company newsletter, anthologies of the early years of the West Coast Computer Faire, a variety of machine-specific publications, and early issues of various user group newsletters (some on CD). Not to mention * hundreds * of computer books (and related topics) from the 1940s-1980s and zillions of manuals / user guides. Our full library will be organized later this year. It will be a reading / research library, not a lending library, except by special permission.

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

Final reminder -- VCF East 7.0

by evan＠snarc.net

One last reminder .... only five days until the Vintage Computer Festival East 7.0 ..... bring your kids, they get in for free! http://www.vintage.org/2011/east http://www.facebook.com/vcfeast7

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

Thinning the Herd (part2)

by ittybittybytes＠gmail.com

Thanks everybody for the heartwarming responses,,,and the corresponding requests for "first dibs" on much of the collectibles I will be parting with. :-) I really did not fathom, just how much stuff I have. When you get around to trying to inventory it, a project I started and abandoned several times over the lat few years. It seems a bit overwhelming. Add to the fact that much of the stuff that I thought was "here" or "there" was not in the spot I remember it being. This was no doubt to my dad moving stuff around, forgetting he did, and not telling anybody where he put it. Fortunately, I do not think he threw any hardware away, but I'm afraid some documentation may be lost, or put in an area where it was exposed and damaged by the elements, but It will take a lot more "digging" through literally piles of equipment to find stuff. Something I am not looking forward to in the HOT arizona summers. I have decided to tackle this effort by dealing with Items by brand name and since I have a lot of DEC stuff, it will go first, then move on to HP, then IBM, then the odd stuff. So far I have counted close to 200-250 various DEC qbus boards, some VAX, some PDP. More importantly I have about a dozen BA11/BA22 chassis, a few BA123 , a few other BA4xx chassis. Some stuff I will be selling on Ebay, but I would prefer to sell some of my pdp stuff through the list, and to cut down the amount of shipping I would have to do, I would like to sell a few "complete" pdps in the smaller chassis, I have more than a few lsi-11/2, 11/23 and 11/73 with enough peripheral boards and memory for at least 4-5 units, maybe more. On some of the chasis, like a BA11-M they would be sans any actual disk, others would have a rd OR rx50 drive. If no drive they would at least have the qbus board. Whatever boards and odd things I would have left over would go to anyone who will throw a few dollars my way. Almost all the pdp's can be shipped via UPS, except the BA123. My UniBUS machine, the 11/04 is mounted in the standard dec pdp full-height rack with a 3rd party RX02 floppy and a unique TS07 upright reel-to-reel. The 11/04 works, the RX02 gave a lot of read errors (dirt or dust most likely) and the TV07 is a "project" ,not working, but is complete, the whole system, I'm afraid it would need to be freighted, as I would like, if possible, sell it in one piece. I will also be selling a ISI PDP-MAC, that's a M68K processor on a Qbus quad height board. I think this one has the 10Mhz and about 1MB of memory on board (although I'm not real sure as the cards contained between 128k to 1MB on board) expandable to 4mb) with on board MACSBUG 1.0 firmware, two serial ports and a parallel port, I will use most any qbus peripheral card made for the pdp/vax. I was trying to find a Unix prom that would allow it to run 4.2 BSD and maybe even Netbsd (looking through the M68k source code, the qbus hooks are there!) I do not know what OS will run using the MACSBUG firmware. So would there be interest in doing this? I am not going to set a firm price but more of a "make offer" type of deal (be generous as it goes to the widow and orphan fun...mom) but may set a reserve on some things. For someone who doesn't have a pdp, but was looking for one, or wants to get started with a small one, here's your chance. Be prepared to make your own cables, though, as I cannot find the boxes of DEC cables I once had, and you will need to configure it yourself. Some cards may require you to move a few dip switches or set a few jumpers. I know more than a few have asked for certain things and I'm on it, but it may take time to dig through and find stuff. Cheers Tom P

15 years, 3 months

2
3
0 0

pdp11 CPU on S100 board?

by vintagecoder＠aol.com

>On Mon May 9 14:57:10 2011 bob at jfcl.com wrote >> Jerome Fine (jhfinedp3k at compsys.to) wrote: >>How would device drivers designed for a Qbus or Unibus do disk I/O? >> How would serial ports to a terminal operate? > You could, if you had the right bits and knew enough about RT11, just > write new device drivers for RT11 and port it to S100 hardware. I'm sure > there are people with enough knowledge to do that, but RT11 is _not free_. > What hobbyists do in their garage is one thing, but any commercial > endeavor would have to be careful about putting their name on that. Wouldn't it be possible to sell a kit containing the complete board and enclosure, power supply etc. and device drivers, but *not* the OS? I think most hobbyists wouldn't have a problem getting RT11/RSX whatever on their own using the hobbyist license and installing it themselves. The hardware part (and the device drivers) is what most people can't do. I think a complete kit less the OS is viable and fair to all parties. I would like to see more (any!) choices in that area, new retro hardware ready for vintage but readily available OS.

15 years, 3 months

3
2
0 0

Desoldering a chopper transistor

by robert.jarratt＠ntlworld.com

I need to desolder a chopper transistor from a PCB in the PSU of my PDP11 so that I can test it and if necessary replace it. The trouble is that I am not experienced with soldering and desoldering and I am having a lot of trouble desoldering it. I have made several attempts, damaging one of the PCB tracks in the process (should be repairable by adding a wire). I have a cheap Weller 40W soldering iron and I have been using some narrow tips. I have one of those pumps for sucking out the molten solder. I also have 2mm solder wick (braid?). I seem to have removed most of the solder from two of the pins, mostly with the pump, the solder wick just does not seem to pick up any solder not matter what I do. One of the pins, however, goes onto a track that is more like a large area of metal and the iron does not even seem to melt the solder there. The thing I really don't understand is how you desolder more than one pin at the same time. There is always bound to be just a little solder left holding each pin in place no matter how much you remove with the pump or wick. So it seems to me that you would need to have the solder in all 3 pin holes molten, all at the same time, to be able to lift the component. What is the trick? Or is it just that my soldering iron is not good (powerful) enough? Thanks Rob

15 years, 3 months

10
19
0 0

Vintage Computer Festival East: InfoAge Science Center, Wall Township, New Jersey

by vintagecoder＠aol.com

I saw this online and figure it's ok to cross-post here since it's public information. I have no knowledge or involvement in this but thought it might be relevant for the group. If this kind of post is unwelcome, please let me know. ---------------- WHO: You! WHAT: VCF East 7.0 WHERE: InfoAge Science Center, Wall Township, New Jersey WHEN: May 14-15 WHY: Vintage computers! The Vintage Computer Festival East returns on May 14-15 at the InfoAge Science Center, 2201 Marconi Rd., Wall Township, New Jersey, 07719. ? This year's event, VCF East 7.0, is expected to be our largest ever on the east coast. There will be more than 20 hands-on exhibits, six lectures, and two hands-on classes. ?Also planned are a book sale, consignment sale, food, live restoration of an IBM mainframe from 1965, museum tours, prizes, and even a reading of epic technology poetry. The hours are Saturday 10am-7pm and Sunday 10am-5pm. ?Lectures and classes are scheduled for the mornings and the exhibit hall is scheduled for the afternoons. ?Tickets are just $10/day, $15/weekend, and free for ages 17 and younger. ?Parking is free. Our classes are limited to just 10 people each. ?A few spots are still available for a $40 pre-registration. Full details are posted at http://www.vintage.org/2011/east and http://www.facebook.com/vcfeast7 or contact VCF East producer Evan Koblentz at evan at snarc.net or (646) 546-9999. Tickets are sold at the gate. ?Class registration is at http://www.vintage.org/2011/east/workshop.php. VCF East 7.0 is sponsored by: - MARCH (Mid-Atlantic Retro Computing Hobbyists) -- http://www.midatlanticretro.org - VintageTech -- http://www.vintagetech.com - InfoAge Science Center -- http://www.infoage.org

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

Subject: Re: Desoldering a chopper transistor

by kandres＠epssecurity.com

Desoldering a component is a learned skill. I have been in component level repair since the early to mid 1960's. I was trained for depot repair level by the USN. On normal track devices, DIPs, transistors, diodes, etc I rarely go above 650*. If the component has a large back plane of tracking on either side of the board, I will dial up to 750*. As Phil mentioned, a first attack to remove what oxidation and junk is present, is appropriate. Then I will apply some new solder, and watch closely for the "drop" of the new solder which means it has heated thru the hole to the far side. Both the internal plating of the through hole and the pin help convey the heat. Very inexpensive boards with no thru plating will be your enemy. I would not expect to find that in a PDP. An immediate application of a good vacuum to remove the solder is then warranted. If your vacuum device will not pull a vacuum against the area of skin on the outside of your hand between your thumb and forefinger, get another, it is NOT good enough. Follow that with a dental probe to manipulate the desoldered pin if possible, examining both sides of the board. You may hear or feel a "click" as the last solder whisker lets go. I have never used "braid", I have never liked it, you must heat both the braid and the track/pin to melt temperature, difficult at best. A product called, I believe "Solda-Quik", used in surface mount work, can be used as a catalyst to lower the melt temperature of some solders to around 350* and aid in the more rapid removal of the existing solder. I have done surface mount repair with this product. A lifted track can be repaired with some 30 gauge wire wrap wire stripped clean, bridging gaps, or thru holes to solid track on both sides. I have also socketed any DIP I have ever removed, if at all possible, with a good 2 side wipe socket suck as AMP. Kevin Andres Senior Technician Engineered Protection Systems Inc Nicet # 90660 Fire Alarm Systems Level II 616 459 0281 kandres at epssecurity.com epssecurity.com -----Original Message----- From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of cctech-request at classiccmp.org Sent: Saturday, May 07, 2011 1:00 PM To: cctech at classiccmp.org Subject: cctech Digest, Vol 93, Issue 8 Send cctech mailing list submissions to cctech at classiccmp.org To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit http://www.classiccmp.org/mailman/listinfo/cctech or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to cctech-request at classiccmp.org You can reach the person managing the list at cctech-owner at classiccmp.org When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific than "Re: Contents of cctech digest..." Today's Topics: 1. Re: ebay: VAXstations (Salt Lake City; I can pick up for you) (Zane H. Healy) 2. Re: ebay: VAXstations (Salt Lake City; I can pick up for you) (Fran Smith) 3. Re: rack mounting vintage gear (Jonas Otter) 4. Re: ebay: VAXstations (Salt Lake City; I can pick up for you) (Pontus) 5. Desoldering a chopper transistor (Rob Jarratt) 6. Re: Desoldering a chopper transistor (Pete Turnbull) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Message: 1 Date: Fri, 6 May 2011 12:38:59 -0700 From: "Zane H. Healy" <healyzh at aracnet.com> Subject: Re: ebay: VAXstations (Salt Lake City; I can pick up for you) To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org>, General Discussion: Message-ID: <p0624085bc9e9fe44266a(a)[192.168.1.157]> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ; format="flowed" At 12:24 PM -0400 5/6/11, Dave McGuire wrote: >On 5/6/11 12:16 PM, Richard wrote: >>See item # 170637016956 >> >>Described as a "VAXstation 3", but I don't think that's the proper >>designation. > > That could very well be a VAXstation-3. If it was sold as a >VAXstation-II and upgraded with a KA650 CPU and MS650 memory >module(s), that'd be an appropriate designation. > > In any event, that one (he says he has two) is in the BA123 "World >Box", which have dried up significantly on the market in the past >couple of years and are becoming much harder to find than they had >been. I have a MicroVAX III, nice system. What might be interesting to know is what it has for a disk subsystem. If they upgraded the CPU's and RAM, did the also upgrade the hard drives to something other than MFM? In any case I'd say $250 for a KA650 system in a BA123 is well worth the cost, at least it is if you're local. I wouldn't want to have to pay shipping on it! Zane -- | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator | | healyzh at aracnet.com | OpenVMS Enthusiast | | | Photographer | +----------------------------------+----------------------------+ | My flickr Photostream | | http://www.flickr.com/photos/33848088 at N03/ | ------------------------------ Message: 2 Date: Fri, 06 May 2011 13:11:26 -0400 From: Fran Smith <fsmith at ladylinux.com> Subject: Re: ebay: VAXstations (Salt Lake City; I can pick up for you) To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Message-ID: <4DC42BBE.8080003 at ladylinux.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Hiya, > That could very well be a VAXstation-3. If it was sold as a > VAXstation-II and upgraded with a KA650 CPU and MS650 memory module(s), > that'd be an appropriate designation. I had one just like this back in the day with full graphics , mouse etc that I used as a workstation. I upgraded it from MV-11 to MV-III in box with the above kit. Nice versatile units and I hope they go somewhere they can be used. Fran ------------------------------ Message: 3 Date: Fri, 06 May 2011 20:09:02 +0200 From: Jonas Otter <jonas at otter.se> Subject: Re: rack mounting vintage gear To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Message-ID: <4DC4393E.3010304 at otter.se> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed > > What exaclty is an "anti-tip feature"? > Most racks have a pull out stabilizer of some kind, or even jutting out little "feet" to prevent them> from tipping over forwards while you pull heavy things out on the rails. So, in order to pull out a > device, first you pull out the anti-tip bar at the bottom, then pull out the device. The DEC H960 > racks don't have that pull-out bar, instead they have two feet that stick out the front of the > cabinet a foot or so, and serve to trip people walking too close to the computer... > > -Ian You can see an anti-tip bar here:http://www.flickr.com/photos/textfiles/3789164168/ If you look at the bottom of the rightmost TU80 you can see a silvery T-shaped thing with a foot on it. That is the anti-tip bar. /Jonas ------------------------------ Message: 4 Date: Fri, 06 May 2011 22:34:20 +0200 From: Pontus <pontus at update.uu.se> Subject: Re: ebay: VAXstations (Salt Lake City; I can pick up for you) To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <4DC45B4C.6070803 at update.uu.se> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed 2011-05-06 18:24, Dave McGuire skrev: > > In any event, that one (he says he has two) is in the BA123 "World > Box", which have dried up significantly on the market in the past > couple of years and are becoming much harder to find than they had been. > It is definitely on the want list :) If anyone local to me (sweden that is) has anything in a BA123 I wouldn't mind driving a bit and pay a bit for it. I've seen two in Sweden, on with GPX Regards, Pontus. ------------------------------ Message: 5 Date: Sat, 7 May 2011 10:04:40 +0100 From: "Rob Jarratt" <robert.jarratt at ntlworld.com> Subject: Desoldering a chopper transistor To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <037a01cc0c95$ce2121c0$6a636540$(a)ntlworld.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" I need to desolder a chopper transistor from a PCB in the PSU of my PDP11 so that I can test it and if necessary replace it. The trouble is that I am not experienced with soldering and desoldering and I am having a lot of trouble desoldering it. I have made several attempts, damaging one of the PCB tracks in the process (should be repairable by adding a wire). I have a cheap Weller 40W soldering iron and I have been using some narrow tips. I have one of those pumps for sucking out the molten solder. I also have 2mm solder wick (braid?). I seem to have removed most of the solder from two of the pins, mostly with the pump, the solder wick just does not seem to pick up any solder not matter what I do. One of the pins, however, goes onto a track that is more like a large area of metal and the iron does not even seem to melt the solder there. The thing I really don't understand is how you desolder more than one pin at the same time. There is always bound to be just a little solder left holding each pin in place no matter how much you remove with the pump or wick. So it seems to me that you would need to have the solder in all 3 pin holes molten, all at the same time, to be able to lift the component. What is the trick? Or is it just that my soldering iron is not good (powerful) enough? Thanks Rob ------------------------------ Message: 6 Date: Sat, 07 May 2011 10:40:55 +0100 From: Pete Turnbull <pete at dunnington.plus.com> Subject: Re: Desoldering a chopper transistor To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <4DC513A7.3000405 at dunnington.plus.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed On 07/05/2011 10:04, Rob Jarratt wrote: > I need to desolder a chopper transistor from a PCB in the PSU of my PDP11 so > that I can test it and if necessary replace it. The trouble is that I am not > experienced with soldering and desoldering and I am having a lot of trouble > desoldering it. I have made several attempts, damaging one of the PCB tracks > in the process (should be repairable by adding a wire). I have a cheap > Weller 40W soldering iron and I have been using some narrow tips. I have one > of those pumps for sucking out the molten solder. I also have 2mm solder > wick (braid?). You don't normally desolder more than one pin at a time but you do need a good iron and a good pump. On DEC PSUs particularly, I've found the holes are, um, less than generous -- the component pins tend to be a close fit and there's not much room around the pin even when you get all the solder out. I normally use a 100W Weller soldering gun for things like those trannies (I have a 50W Weller temperature-controlled iron for anything else). The trick is to get the solder hot enough to flow, and to do so quickly. If you can't do that, you're unlike to succeed, and the longer you leave the heat on the pad, the more likely you are to damage something. Then use a large pump to suck it off. Sometimes adding fresh solder and trying a second time helps -- the first attempt removes most of the oxidised stuff and the flux from the fresh solder helps remove the last of it. Then push the pin from side to side to break the last whisker of solder that bridges from the pad across the gap to the pin -- if you can! I'd suggest getting a bigger iron if you can, and don't use a narrow tip for large components. I wouldn't waste any time on solder braid, either -- fine for small stuff but probably not for this. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York End of cctech Digest, Vol 93, Issue 8 *************************************

15 years, 3 months

3
2
0 0

Desoldering a chopper transistor

by trag＠io.com

> Date: Sat, 7 May 2011 19:43:10 +0100 (BST) > From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) >> of those pumps for sucking out the molten solder. I also have 2mm solder >> wick (braid?). >> >> I seem to have removed most of the solder from two of the pins, mostly >> with the pump, the solder wick just does not seem to pick up any >> solder not > > Thats what I tend to find too. I much prefer the solder sucker (pump). I have had similar experiences with several brands of desolder braid/wick but I have also found that the Chemtronics brand always works well for me. Unfortunately, I have not been able to find it anywhere local and always must order it from Digi-Key. I suspect it is simply a matter of being impregnated with flux, but I'm not certain. Jeff Walther

15 years, 3 months

3
2
0 0

Desoldering a chopper transistor

by tshoppa＠wmata.com

> I have had similar experiences with several brands of desolder braid/wick > but I have also found that the Chemtronics brand always works well for me. > Unfortunately, I have not been able to find it anywhere local and always > must order it from Digi-Key. > I suspect it is simply a matter of being impregnated with flux, but I'm > not certain. ChemWick (which is indeed better than the other brands but this applies to the Other brands too) will "dry out" and become much less useful If not stored properly. I suspect Digikey etc. move it a lot faster and store it more consistently than the local shops or many lesser mail order houses. If it does get dried out, dipping it in one of the fancy-pants fluxes will Pep it up considerably :-) Many of the higher-tech solder pastes and fluxes have to be stored at Even more tightly controlled temperature/humidity.

15 years, 3 months

2
1
0 0

More on telehack

by geneb＠deltasoft.com

http://telehack.com/telehack.html Documentation plus history about what it is and what it can do. Fun stuff! g. -- Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007 http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind. http://www.simpits.org/geneb - The Me-109F/X Project ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes. http://www.scarletdme.org - Get it _today_! Political correctness is a doctrine, fostered by a delusional, illogical minority, and rabidly promoted by an unscrupulous mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a turd by the clean end.

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

pdp11 CPU on S100 board?

by tshoppa＠wmata.com

Closest I have personal experience with, is the Alpha Micro AM100 S-100 processor that used the WD-16 aka MCP1600 chipset (LSI-11 chipset but different microcode). It is not a PDP-11 but lemme tell you, every time I see the WD chips on an AM100 CPU board it screams out "coulda been a LSI-11" to me. Working at the problem the other way: I remember a very early IMSAI product, was some sort of Unibus-to-S-100-interface. Never saw one in the flesh but it was in the IMSAI price lists. I think it was some sort of shared memory but maybe it was more than that (DMA? Doubt it but it would be nice.) Are the early IMSAI marketing docs up on the net anywhere? I think a lot of the mini-oriented stuff they listed early on (e.g. 14" SMD drive systems, 9-track systems) were vaporware but I could be proven wrong. Right now I can't even find the price lists on the net. Tim.

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

ebay: VAXstations (Salt Lake City; I can pick up for you)

by legalize＠xmission.com

See item # 170637016956 Described as a "VAXstation 3", but I don't think that's the proper designation. Asking ~$250 I am in Salt Lake City and can pick these up for you if you want. I have no affiliation with the seller. -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download <http://legalizeadulthood.wordpress.com/the-direct3d-graphics-pipeline/> Legalize Adulthood! <http://legalizeadulthood.wordpress.com>

15 years, 3 months

7
7
0 0

pdp11 CPU on S100 board

by lynchaj＠yahoo.com

pdp11 CPU on S100 board? Given that old Soviet knockoffs of pdp11 cpus can be found on ebay, I was wondering if anyone else has thought of making S100 boards containing said processors. -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu <http://www.classiccmp.org/mailman/listinfo/cctalk> A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? -----reply----- Hi Dave, In theory, I don't see anything preventing an S-100 PDP11 CPU board. The only practical concern is there would not be enough demand for the boards to make even small batches of manufactured PCBs economical. This has proven to be the limiting factor the hobbyist projects I've seen. At N8VEM and S100computers.com, we already have about 15 or so boards including an S-100 Z80 CPU board, with a second prototype board of an S-100 68K CPU board on the way, a third prototype board of an S-100 8086 CPU board imminent, and a first prototype board for an S-100 6502 CPU board soon. So certainly there are many CPUs which can be implemented on S-100 boards as bus masters. However, these are all fairly popular mainstream CPUs and are likely to have enough hobbyist interest to warrant at least a small run of manufactured PCBs. I doubt anyone knows for certain how much demand there would be for an exotic S-100 PDP11 CPU board however I'd be willing to support a community project along the lines of the vintage-computers.com XT-IDE, AT2XTKBD, SCSI to IDE/CF, and FM Synth efforts. My role is mostly the schematic capture, PCB layout, and getting the prototype boards made. I am assuming you or someone else would have the knowledge to make the schematic and perform the initial build and test debugging. I don't know much about PDP11 since it is outside my interest area. Using the S-100 bus has some advantages in that we already have a fairly complete suite of peripheral boards already such as RAM, ROM, floppy disk, hard disk, video, serial IO, RTC/PIC, etc. The project could focus solely on making the S-100 PDP11 CPU board a bus master much like the S-100 68K CPU board already in development and just reuse the rest of the boards "as is". This has made initial build and test of our S-100 8086 CPU board *dramatically* easier. By using the S-100 EPROM board, S-100 4MB SRAM board, S-100 Serial IO board, etc the S-100 8086 CPU board booted CP/M-86 almost right away. Very nice! A community project would start with a schematic and PCB layout which should be fairly straight forward to do. Next would be getting some prototype boards which would be typically $30 each if we went the www.33each.com route $150 for 5 PCBs. If a lot of builders wanted to participate we could get a batch of 10 from PCBcart.com for probably around $250 for 10 PCBs. However, as you probably know already the track record for community projects, especially at CCTALK, is pretty poor. Probably the best bet would be to take it elsewhere to improve the "signal to noise" ratio. I am aware of another S-100 hobbyist project that is working to make a multiple board custom 32 bit RISC CPU system. It is quite impressive in scope but well beyond my skill set. Thanks and have a nice day! Andrew Lynch

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

S-100 EPROM boards are here!

by lynchaj＠yahoo.com

Hi! The S-100 EPROM PCBs have arrived! These are updated respins of the S-100 EPROM board from last summer with minor corrections and improvements. The S-100 EPROM board supports a wide variety of EPROMs, EEPROMs, FLASH memories, and Static RAMs in 8 or 16 bit modes. It supports many common 28 pin and 32 pin chips. More information is available at John's S100computers.com website here: http://s100computers.com/My%20System%20Pages/PROM%20Board/PROM%20Board.htm The board is $20 plus $3 shipping in the US and $6 elsewhere. Please send a PayPal to LYNCHAJ at YAHOO.COM and I will send your boards right away! There are plenty of PCBs so even if you weren't on the waiting list there should be plenty to go around. Thanks and have a nice day! Andrew Lynch PS, I have some S-100 4MB SRAM boards, S-100 parallel ASCII keyboard interface boards, and S-100 Serial IO boards left too in case you'd like to get some of those and save on shipping.

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

Enormous lot of vintage microcomputer stuff for sale (Bloomington, IN)

by chaosotter76＠gmail.com

Hello to the cctalk list after a long absence! My wife and I own a small business specializing in vintage computers and electronics, especially 1980s microcomputers and game consoles. We?re in the process of moving from Bloomington, Indiana, out to California, and as part of that move, all of our inventory has to go! Because we are anxious to complete our move quickly, we need to sell everything as a single bulk lot. If you?re a fan of the technology or looking to start your own related business, this is a chance to acquire a mother lode of great old stuff. There are some real treasures included -- we hope that you?ll be able to give these computers a good home. Included are almost 100 systems (Apple, Atari, Commodore, TI, Sinclair, and more); thousands of disks, tapes, and cartridges; over a thousand books and magazines; electronics test equipment; and more. The complete list of stuff is available at http://bit.ly/izaYpw ( https://docs.google.com/document/pub?id=1JS2fRLSfeOoI27Otf-Zhkl1f84WNZQHwM-… ) I can be contacted by email at squunkin at gmail.com, or leave a message on our Google Voice number at (408) 676-6467<https://www.google.com/voice/b/2?pli=1#phones>and I?ll get back to you. (Serious offers only, please -- and feel free to pass the word along to any interested friends!) The sale will go to the best offer from the most reasonable person as quickly as we can manage it. Here are the basic terms and conditions: - We must sell as a single lot and cannot split off individual items. This is not negotiable -- I?m in California, and the inventory is stored in Indiana. (Obviously, we can?t handle returns either.) - This is a LOT of stuff; you will certainly need a U-Haul track or the like. (I?m not a pro at this, but I?d estimate a 20? truck.) - Once the sale has been arranged, I?ll make a trip back to Indiana to help you load up your truck: you?re not on your own. This makes it very important to me to establish a firm pick-up date. I can be flexible about the day of the week. - We cannot guarantee the condition of individual items and must sell as-is: most of this stuff is at least 20 years old. We have always tried to test new equipment as it arrives, and most of the media have been kept in a controlled environment. - Southern Indiana is humid and subject to flooding, and there is a chance that some items may have some moisture damage. If we discover in the process of loading that any items of particular interest to you are damaged, we can adjust the final sale price accordingly. Please let us know about those items in advance! - The list of items we?ve compiled is not exhaustive, but represents a large sample from our inventory database. There?s more. - We currently have around 3-4 dozen WYSE and Falco terminals available, most of which power on. Please let us know ASAP if you want them included -- otherwise, they?ll be heading to recycling on May 14th. - If you have any questions, please ask! I will try to respond to every enquiry with 24 hours.

15 years, 3 months

2
2
0 0

IBM 3480 help

by pat＠computer-refuge.org

I'm attempting to figure out an error code on my IBM 3480-B22 drive, and was wondering if anyone had access to a manual listing error codes for the drives. I seem to have a "logic" manual, but that's not particularly helpful yet. The code the drive displays, immediately after start-up is "CHK 38". Pat -- Patrick Finnegan

15 years, 3 months

2
1
0 0

IBM 3480 help

by vintagecoder＠aol.com

> I'm attempting to figure out an error code on my IBM 3480-B22 drive, and > was wondering if anyone had access to a manual listing error codes for > the drives. I seem to have a "logic" manual, but that's not particularly > helpful yet. > > The code the drive displays, immediately after start-up is "CHK 38". > > Pat That's out of my area but a quick check of the 3490 manuals I could find (couldn't find any relevant 3480 doc) does not look good. It says this is a "call your service rep" type of error- the CHK XX codes are apparently undocumented, at least for 3490s. If you can't find a 3480 guide on bitsavers (I just checked and couldn't find one) then this may or may not be worthwhile: http://www.fujitsu.com/downloads/COMP/fcpa/tapes/m2488ce_prod-guide.pdf The only reason I suggest it is Fujitsu has some history of ripping off IBM (they did it with several OS versions and paid over 800 million USD in a settlement) and compatible-hardware manufacturers often try to keep the same error codes to make pubs easier (also by ripping off IBM), so maybe just maybe they are using the same codes as the 3480/90 tape subsystem. See appendix E. for the code listings. Nice piece of hardware btw. IBM's marketing materials say "The A22 control unit is priced at $65,430, and the B22 tape unit, which contains two tape drives, sells for $43,120." Good luck and post back if you find anything. If you don't get any answers >from the list or elsewhere (some good places to ask are on IBM-MAIN (you will need to subscribe or nobody will see your posts) and the yahoo hercules groups) email me offline and I'll see if I can find anything. -- +------------------------------------------------------------------------+ | Vintage Coder America Online Com ivagntrpbqre at nby.pbz <ROT13> | | | | Collecting: DOS assemblers, compilers, books, and related doc, | | software and doc for IBM S/360 through OS/390. | | | | Wanted: Ada 95 compilers for MVS/ESA and Solaris (Sparc). | | | |---------------------------------------+--------------------------------| | Powered by Slackware 64 & Solaris 10 | Powered by Hercules | |=======================================+================================| | PGP Key 4096R 0x1CB84BEFC73ACB32 Encrypted email preferred | | PGP Fingerprint 5C1C 3AEB A7B2 E6F7 34A0 2870 1CB8 4BEF C73A CB32 | +------------------------------------------------------------------------+

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

rack mounting vintage gear

by legalize＠xmission.com

OK, so someone gave me a nice 40U equipment rack. I was planning on using it for my Nuclear Data ND812, which has rackmount plates for everything. I first experimented with the empty dual 8" floppy rack unit and a couple things came up. For reference take a look at these photos to see the ND812 rack units: <http://picasaweb.google.com/legalize.slc/NuclearDataND812#> First, I'd like to minimize the potential for scratching the paint on the rack mount plates. Should I use a plastic or teflon washer between the plate and the mounting screw? Like most rackmount equipment, the only support is from that front panel, so it has to be mounted pretty tight to support the weight. The maintenance manual doesn't say anything specific about mounting the equipment in a rack. Is it typical for things to be supported only by that front mounting panel, or do people add some kind of additional support in the rear? -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download <http://legalizeadulthood.wordpress.com/the-direct3d-graphics-pipeline/> Legalize Adulthood! <http://legalizeadulthood.wordpress.com>

15 years, 3 months

14
27
0 0

rack mounting vintage gear

by jonas＠otter.se

> > What exaclty is an "anti-tip feature"? > Most racks have a pull out stabilizer of some kind, or even jutting out little "feet" to prevent them> from tipping over forwards while you pull heavy things out on the rails. So, in order to pull out a > device, first you pull out the anti-tip bar at the bottom, then pull out the device. The DEC H960 > racks don't have that pull-out bar, instead they have two feet that stick out the front of the > cabinet a foot or so, and serve to trip people walking too close to the computer... > > -Ian You can see an anti-tip bar here:http://www.flickr.com/photos/textfiles/3789164168/ If you look at the bottom of the rightmost TU80 you can see a silvery T-shaped thing with a foot on it. That is the anti-tip bar. /Jonas

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

ebay: VAXstations (Salt Lake City; I can pick up for you)

by fsmith＠ladylinux.com

Hiya, > That could very well be a VAXstation-3. If it was sold as a > VAXstation-II and upgraded with a KA650 CPU and MS650 memory module(s), > that'd be an appropriate designation. I had one just like this back in the day with full graphics , mouse etc that I used as a workstation. I upgraded it from MV-11 to MV-III in box with the above kit. Nice versatile units and I hope they go somewhere they can be used. Fran

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

UTZOO Usenet archive - need file 124f1

by tshoppa＠wmata.com

I can't help you specifically but I note that that tape would've held some posts from mid-1990 and want to wonder out loud: Wonder if the same posts were on the "Usenet CD-ROM's" that were sold (or maybe just discussed) in the early 90's. "Sterling Software" is one name associated with that but I also remember a Vancouver BC based company doing similarly. Likely I just replaced an unreadable tape with an unfindable CD. I have no idea if the "sell-usenet-on-CD's" ever actually sold any. Tim.

15 years, 3 months

9
16
0 0

Tektronix photos updated

by legalize＠xmission.com

With the addition of two more Tektronix 4015-1 terminals, I've rearranged my Tektronix storage tube terminals in the warehouse and uploaded some updated pictures of "Tektronix storage tube row". (The 4015-1 is essentially a 4014 with APL and printer interface options.) Neither of the 4015's are reported to be in working condition from the seller, but at least all the keycaps with APL glyphs are present. The 4010 and 4014 are relatively simple terminals, so I should be able to restore them to working order. They have no microprocessor, firmware code or custom ASICs, so repairing them should be a matter of replacing capacitors or replacing TTL or analog parts. <https://picasaweb.google.com/legalize.slc/Tektronix#> -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download <http://legalizeadulthood.wordpress.com/the-direct3d-graphics-pipeline/> Legalize Adulthood! <http://legalizeadulthood.wordpress.com>

15 years, 3 months

7
9
0 0

Thinning the herd.

by ittybittybytes＠gmail.com

Hunter S. Thompson once said; ".... but once you get into a serious drug collection, the tendency is to push it as far as you can..." My drug, of course was classic computers. I shared this "hobby" with my father, whom was retired USAF and retired TWA aircraft mechanic. We would tinker with all sorts of stuff we collected and finally when we had no more room, built a small storage shed.Then a few more, until we had about 2-3. When I had to downsize because of the economy and moved, I stored my collection inside the various sheds we built on his large parcel of land in the Sonoran dessert, Putting them away when we finished or stored them to await further restoration. I don't know how many pdp's or HP we restored or fix to working condition, then gave away to students in the area. I was the bigger collector though. I was most interested in all the DEC stuff we got at auction for next to nothing; alphas, vax;s the occasional pdp's. But I also collected anything that was "pre-80's' Well, my father passed away last month. We had already stopped working on stuff when he was diagnosed with Alzheimers. I would always be back at the shed picking through stuff for my projects. Unfortunately, much of the stuff that was well-ordered and nicely on racks, etc was taken doen when my dad would be searching for stuff and couldn't remember what he was looking for.A lot of the stuff was "reordered" and some "lost" or stored in one of the sheds that lost it's roof in a fierce storm and was all waterlogged. But a lot is still OK. It took me only a few days recently, to realize, that I should be thinning this heard down. My mother may decide to move as she gets older and I cannot move all this stuff to storage. Much of it is commodity stuff. By that I mean it was part of the "lots" we would buy at the university auctions. For one item we wanted, we had to but the whole lot. Much was discarded, but some of it still remains. Sun and SGI stuff, older HP stuff. The stuff I valued, DEc stuff and my pre-80's stuff too need to be taken care of. I have decided to "sell" a bunch of the stuff. Those that will still fetch a decent price on Ebay. Most of the money will go to my mom as her income has been greatly diminished by my fathers death. And besides, she put up with us for all those years. Other stuff, I'll sell to anyone interested in throwing a few buck my way. A lot of stuff is just to be given away. So I"ll be doing triage at first. It is getting "warm" here in SE arizona, on it way to HOT and I'll be doing triage slowly, in the morning and it will take months. There is a lot of stuff I'll give away to anybody that wants it, some is in great condition, some terrible, I'll let you know which. I have lots of odd cabling and lots of odd stuff. If you are looking for something. let me know. I also have lots of documentation and some of it I know Al Kossow was interested in. I soon as I find a cheap/fee web space. I'll start posting what is available, rather than cluttering this mailing list. But here are a few things: A complete IBM RT system (romp processor) with most/all the software and documentation. A couple of AT&T systems, a "lot" of qbus pdp and vax stuff. An 11/04 unibus system with third part floppy's and an TV07 tape drive ( tape drive complete but not functioning) along with the "PDP" rack it's in. A Tektronix 4051 computer, a OSI superboard, a few HP 9000/300 systems. Lots of tabletop vaxes and alphas. a lot of vt 520 terminals, as well as some ADM-3A, VT100's, Vt 220. Vt 320''s and other odd terminals. A few of the Qbus Mac cards. If you are near Tucson Arizona or are coming to the area this summer, you may be able to pick it up in person, or maybe pick through all the stuff. This is not a fire sale! I have decided to let it go slowly as the day may come where I would have to get rid of it fast, but not now. But I'm ready to deal and while most of this stuff isn't really rare and expensive, it;s still worth a few sheckles to collectors. and the money's going to a good cause. Cheers Tom P.

15 years, 3 months

2
1
0 0

Latest DiscFerret beta software

by classiccmp＠philpem.me.uk

Hi guys, Here's a screenshot of the analysis side of the current DiscFerret software build: http://i162.photobucket.com/albums/t242/philpem/Screenshot-1.png At the moment, I've got it reading IMG files (the format of some disc images Chuck Guzis sent me a while back). CWI files are next on the hit list (another one of Chuck's file formats) and then DFI files (the DiscFerret native raw image format). The GUI was built with wxWidgets, and in theory the code is completely cross-platform compatible. I'm aware of wxWidgets backends for GTK, Mac Cocoa/Carbon and Windows, so that covers all the major *nixes, OS X and Windows. As long as you have a half-way decent C++ compiler, that is (*cough* GCC). However: I will openly admit that the code has only been tested on Linux. It slows down to an absolute crawl (~60 seconds refresh time) if you turn anti-aliasing on... though I suppose that's to be expected when you ask it to plot 30-odd thousand data points on a scatter chart... The raw-reader app is working too -- I can specify the various parameters of a disc drive, and do a full track-by-track read of an entire disc, and dump the data into a file. Next on the 'add list' is DFI support (so the analyser can read it, of course!) then disc-format script support. Effectively, I want a tool which can be told what type of drive is in use, what disc format, and will automatically figure out whether double-stepping is needed, and what read parameters to use. Even to the point where it'll warn you if you specify a 100tpi format and a 96 or 48tpi drive... Built in sanity checking :) Which now brings us onto naming -- the reader app currently calls itself "discferret-read", and the analyser "Merlin". Can anyone think of better names for these, or should I be lazy leave them as-is? (Suggestions on an email to the usual address please!) At this point the reader app is close to releasable (involving maybe a few more weeks of work assuming I find a ready supply of Round Tuits), but the analyser needs a lot more work. Mainly because I seem to be spending a lot of time chasing mismatched-free bugs in the algorithms. Thank $DEITY for Valgrind (and a great big sarcastic "gee, *thanks guys*" to the GTK developers who have obviously never heard of it, much less used it on their own code...) Cheers, -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

15 years, 3 months

6
14
0 0

new here

by michael.99.thompson＠gmail.com

> On 4/24/11 10:04 AM, Tony Duell wrote: >> >> There are quite a few PDP8 owners/enthiasts here. I've got an 8/e with >> 32K words of core, ?RX01, TU56 and PC04 on my desk. I've also got an 8/a >> upstairs somewhere, but it's got the 8/e CPU board set in it, not the >> hex-height 8/a CPU board. I am told that was a stnadard variant. We (RICM) have an 8/I with 5x TU55 drives, a pair of bare 8/L, and a very functional 8/S that now runs FOCAL. I can give plenty of advice on ferroresonant power supply capacitors. Advice is easy to supply. -- Michael Thompson

15 years, 3 months

2
1
0 0

Thinning the herd.

by vintagecoder＠aol.com

Tom, I'm very sorry to hear your dad passed away. That's a hard lesson for us all that the real classics are people, and they can't be replaced. I would love to see all the machines and parts you have collected over the years but I am a million miles away and had a recent personal "economic downturn" that leaves me happy to have a roof and a piece of bread. Good luck to you and your mom and I hope whatever else you have to part with won't hurt nearly as much. -- +---------------------------------------+--------------------------------+ | Vintage Coder America Online Com | Collecting software and doc | | ivagntrpbqre at nby.pbz <ROT13> | for S/360 through OS/390 | |---------------------------------------+--------------------------------| | Powered by Slackware 64 & Solaris 10 | Powered by Hercules | |=======================================+================================| | PGP Key 4096R 0x1CB84BEFC73ACB32 Encrypted email preferred | | PGP Fingerprint 5C1C 3AEB A7B2 E6F7 34A0 2870 1CB8 4BEF C73A CB32 | +------------------------------------------------------------------------+

15 years, 3 months

2
1
0 0

Drive Type International Memories, Inc. (IMI) 5012H

by thomas.gardner＠sbcglobal.net

> Date: Wed, 4 May 2011 21:36:32 EDT > From: JHMcCarthy at aol.com > Subject: Re: Drive Type International Memories, Inc. (IMI) 5012H > To: cctech at classiccmp.org > Message-ID: <c892a.3319ecda.3af35920 at aol.com> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" > > Just a historical question. I have a 10 MB IMI drive that was going to > be > used in the IBM PC-XT back in 1983. Is IMI still in existence? Was it > located in Oregon in 1983? --- Jud > > Justin (Jud) McCarthy > 251 SW 9th Ave > Boca Raton, FL 33486 > Home (561)391-1422 Cell: (561)504-7048 > jhmccarthy at aol.com The IMI 10 MB was never used in the IBM PC/XT; IBM's suppliers were Seagate, MiniScribe and CMI. The IMI drive was likely used in clones. CMI is most famous for its exclusive contract to supply the PC/AT drives which then almost sunk the AT due to their high apparent failure rate. If anyone has a copy of the Core International advertisement offering to build a breakwater at Boca with trade-ins I'd love a copy. Only Seagate survived. Tom

15 years, 3 months

2
1
0 0

Drive Type International Memories, Inc. (IMI) 5012H

by JHMcCarthy＠aol.com

Just a historical question. I have a 10 MB IMI drive that was going to be used in the IBM PC-XT back in 1983. Is IMI still in existence? Was it located in Oregon in 1983? --- Jud Justin (Jud) McCarthy 251 SW 9th Ave Boca Raton, FL 33486 Home (561)391-1422 Cell: (561)504-7048 jhmccarthy at aol.com

15 years, 3 months

3
3
0 0

8/L core memories ( long, with pic's, hopefully of interest )

by jdr_use＠bluewin.ch

Having been given, some time ago, 2 8/L core memory stacks to test and then sell, I set about and fired up my 8/L. This 8/L was bought some years ago for around 500 USD, in known working condition. Try this today.... The memory tests revelead that one stack was nearly OK, the other was seriously sick. The nearly OK one was 99.9% OK, but bit 0 @ address 0 was stuck. I intended to live with that, until it was pointed out on classiccmp that address 0 is very essential indeed.... I decided to take the plunge and tried to repair the memories. The sick module was checked out first. Result : around 20 of the select diodes were either shorted, or open ciruit. Further tests show that the coremats themselves were also sick : resistence of sense and inhibit wires varied widely ( normal values are around 19 ohms vor inhibit, 24 ohms for sense wires ). Select wires were all OK. So the stack, made by Dataram, was opened by cutting through 128 wires and separating the upper diode board from the stack. Then the microscope was fired up and I produced some pictures : An overview of the coremat : ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/coremat.jpg Strange to find was a whole bunch of very small cupper wire remains, which where below some lacquer, which means they must have been there since the beginning : ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/wire_remains.jpg A whole bunch of repairs, covered by some gunk was found. These also were made during production. They were present only on the sense and inhibit wires : ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/old_repair.jpg Wait a minute : only on the sense and inhibit wires? which where also the wires with the variables resistance ? So I took out the smallest tip SMD iron I could find and started resoldering these old repairs. See ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/new_repair.jpg ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/new_repair2.jpg ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/new_repair_3.jpg And yes, with each repair one more sense or inhibit wire was OK. Yes ! Good ! Until, with one of the last repairs, the inhibit wire broke, some few mm inside the coremat... ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/broken_inhibit.jpg In this picture you can seen the green select wire in the middle, which no longer has an accompaning inhibit wire. The other core lines still have the inhibit wire, in parallel with the select line. Major bugger, since the inhibit line is the lowest of the four wires in each core.... I attempted repair by trying to pull out the whole inihibit wire from that line of cores, only to have it break in several more places.... Endgame for this particular stack..... ... and some weeks later i did open the other stack, made by Fabritek. First impression was much better than the Dataram stack, no loose copper wire segments, the pic shows it all : ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/coremat_ft.jpg Also far fewer repairs on this one, and much better organized : instead of just soldering the wire-ends together, the wires are soldered together in some spare PCB holes that are sprinkled about the area for that purpose. ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/wire_hole.jpg ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/wire_hole2.jpg The reason of the stack failure was soon apparant, see : ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/core_broken_ov_ft.jpg In even greater detail the broken core can be seen here : ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/core_broken_ft.jpg ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/core_broken2_ft.jpg I strongly suspect mechanical stresses are biggest in the corner, which I assume is why this particulare core was broken. But since this core is situated in the coremat corner, surely a repair must be possible ? I started with cleaning out the remains of the wires that connect the coremat-pcb with the diodeboard. And yes it had to happen : a small shift of the soldering iron, and one select line was broken... ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/omg.jpg ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/omg2.jpg Luckily it was outside the stack, so the wire could be repaired ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/omg_repaired.jpg Then I took some individual cores from the Dataram mat, here they are, with a small piece of flatcable for size comparison : ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/cores.jpg ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/cores2.jpg ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/cores3.jpg This is the overal location of the broken core repair, the mat edge, with x/y select and sense/inhibit wires. ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/pcb_edge.jpg ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/pcb_edge_2.jpg ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/pcb_edge_3_ft.jpg So first the X select line was opened, a core was inserted, and the select line soldered in again. See : ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/inhibit2.jpg Next line was the inhibit line, the picture also clearly shows the old, broken, core ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/inhinit_mounted.jpg And the sense and Y select wires were routed through : ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/repair_full.jpg ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Cores/repair_full_close.jpg Select, sense and inhibit wires where then measured and found to be OK. I was astonished to find that the Cu-wires on this stack were considerably less brittle than the ones of the Dataram stack, although visually they are the same. Pending a company move, the whole setup was now set away for a few weeks. In the new lab I set about reassembling the stack. Which is when disaster struck ... The new magnifying glass setup was unstable and landed where it could cause maximal damage : the coremat itself, with around 40 cores broken........ Major major bummer, and really only myself to blame. Not only was the stack now lost, but I also now cannot produce evidence that the core repair worked. So in conclusion : can core memory stacks be repaired ? Potentially yes, but it is every bit as difficult as you would expect, and only certains failure modes are repairable. In the 8L stack an additional difficulty is the way the stack is build up with 128 wires to be snipped, 128 holes to be cleaned and to be rewired, all without damaging the cores. So i now have 2 stacks, one Fabritek, one Dataram, both opened. Mechanical differences prevent building one good stack from the two damaged ones. The Fabritek has two known good coremat-pcb's, the Dataram has two potentially good coremat PCB's. I have spent rather too much time on this, and am open to offers on these stacks, in the condition described above. If someone wants to sell their known-defective 8L / 8I Dataram/Fabritek corestacks, I would also be interested. Jos Dreesen

15 years, 3 months

7
7
0 0

Free AS4100 parts

by alexeyt＠freeshell.org

Sorry if this system is still off topic... I have a full set of guts for the 2-CPU version of the Digital AlphaServer 4100. No CPUs, no memory, no expansion boards, no fans, no PSUs, no disks, but all the other parts that could be removed, down to the little metal clips that make an electrical connection between the case and the cover. http://alexeyt.freeshell.org/AS4100_parts.jpg Here's what happened: I got 2 of incomplete systems in the early 2000s, and put them away to play with 'later'. Then I had to move, so I decided I could keep just one. I took out everything in the less complete system that could be removed, and boxed it up. The more complete one went in the basement of the new house. Fast forward 2 years or so: there's a flood in the basement, and the 'good' AS4100 dies under a foot of water :-( By the time the basement dried out enough to get to it, it was so rusted I was unable to open the case. It did, however, save the lives of a half-dozen other machines that were stacked on top of it. For some reason I kept hanging on to the box of spare parts... I have no way of using these, so I figure I sould give them to someone who can. They're yours for the cost of shipping from 27606; it's about 5-6 pounds all told (I'm guessing, I don't have a scale). Alexey

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

Various interesting stuff FS in Creswell (Eugene) OR

by cclist＠sydex.com

>From Myles Swift: "Please do post it on the Classic list. I have some other items to sell as well - 8 inch external floppy drive, 2 Kaypro 10s, one is #49 >from the first run that I pre-ordered. I also have an original IBM PC with a Tall Trees card and a 5 MB CDC hard drive with the lock bar. I have an ATR-8000. That ATR was the first unit with a programmable floppy controller so you could burn floppies for different systems. I think it was designed as an Atari add-on device. That business died when Kaypro included Uniform to perform that function. I also have a Compaq 386, the one that really put Compaq into high gear. I figured I would try offering the heavy stuff locally first before going to ebay. You can forward this list of items to see if anyone on the Classic list is interested. " He also has a Cipher F880 1/2" drive with Cipher S100 controller card. He also says that he's looking for a Pertec Interface Q-bus card. Contact Myles at mswift "at" computerassistance.com. Cheers, Chuck

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

Older PDP-8 repair (was Re: new here)

by ethan.dicks＠gmail.com

On Tue, Apr 26, 2011 at 7:34 PM, Michael Thompson <michael.99.thompson at gmail.com> wrote: > We (RICM) have an 8/I with 5x TU55 drives, a pair of bare 8/L, and a > very functional 8/S that now runs FOCAL. Did you have to do any work on that -8/S? I have one that needs a lot of replacement bulbs and some sleuthing in the "lock" circuit (the switch is fine, but the machine behaves as if it's always in "lock" mode). I've done lots of work on M-series machines like the -8/L and -8/i (it's where I got my start with 12 bits), but virtually no debugging of the older logic. I built a simple M-series FLIP-CHIP tester with a DEC backplane socket and an 6821 PIA, but it was straightforward to abstract different arrangements of inputs and outputs for different modules. I haven't done the homework to see how many types of R/S-series modules are used in a Straight-8 or -8/S, so I'm not even sure how difficult it would be to make a comparable logic tester. I'd like to automate the testing to the point where I could at least plug in a suspect module and either flip some switches or type some commands to exercise the inputs and monitor the outputs - yes, one can debug pre-TTL machines with a lot of clip leads and an oscilloscope, but I'd like to abstract that one level to see what boards need detailed attention. Has anyone ever considered building an automated or semi-automated R/S-Series module tester? Did it get further than musings and drawings? -ethan

15 years, 3 months

3
3
0 0

H7140 PDP11 PSU

by ard＠p850ug1.demon.co.uk

> > If I am not mistaken, the chopper transistor you are referring to is Q1 > (p88). I checked the resistance with the component still soldered onto the Correct. > board. Looking at it from the front (with a plate behind connected to what > looks like a diode), the resistance between the middle and the left pin was > 170Kohm (or 1Mohm, the multimeter scaling confuses me somewhat, I get > different numbers depending on whether I put the dial on 200K or 2M, either Well, it's not totally shorted, then, which is the common failure mode of chopper transistors. Does your meter have a 'diode check' range? If so, use that, and check the base-emitter and base-collector junctions with the probes both ways round. This will at least tell you if the junctions are good. You really need to remove the transistor from the PCB to test it, though. But perhaps before that we should check a few more things. The chopper circuit is driven by E2 (p88), a good ol' 555 timer wired as an astable. For this to work, it needs to be gettign power. This power comes from one of two places : When the supply is running, it comes from T1 on the PSU motherboard, via pins 7 and H of the connector and diode D7 (p88). At start-up it comes from the mid-point of the mains smoothing capacitors via pins 2 and B and Q6 (p88). The base of Q6 is driven from the network R2 and D2 (p82). You should check the power resistors on the motherboard, actually, R1, R2 and R3 (p82). Now obviously the first can't be doing anything since the supply is not running. But the second source should be there. You should measure the supply voltage at pin 8 of E2 _with respect to pin 1 of E2_. That is, the black meter probe is connected to pin 1 of E2, the red one to pin 8 of the same IC. Be warned that this circuitry is directly connected to the mains, and will have _lethal_ voltages on it with repect to ground. So connect the wires, make sure they can't touch anything, then plug the machine in and see what voltage you get. Unplug the mains and wait for things to discharge before touching anything. -tony -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://link.mail2web.com/mail2web

15 years, 3 months

6
11
0 0

Laserjet 5SI boards and software

by shumaker＠att.net

I've seen several mentions on here of folks using LJ5 printers... I recently acquired as part of a govt auction, a C3768A Lj5 SI paper handler board and a Token Ring Jetdirect card with Lj5SI drivers for several O/Ss. Status is unknown although they *look* unused in original boxes. Anyone interested can have them for postage from 95006 (I suspect they would fit a medium flat rate box). Steve

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

8/L core memories ( long, with pic's, hopefully of interest )

by tshoppa＠wmata.com

>> Is it really the knowledge that's fading away or the technique? >> >> I mean, seriously, there is nothing complicated about core planes. >> Its a bunch of toroids with wires strung through them. > > Tricks of the trade that make the job easier. > > One of the better known tricks it to pull apart a wire to be strung > though a line of cores, rather than cutting it normally, so you get a > little bit of a needle like tapered end on the wire. One odd thing about these attitudes we have, is that we're almost all male and the folks who did and understood the work and improved the techniques were almost exclusively female. It's sort of like the boatanchor radio groups where we have men lecturing other men as to how to lace cables or properly wrap a wire around a lug before soldering. The women who actually did the work would laugh at all of us :-). I know they laughed at me and other male techies (anywhere from undergrads to professional machinists to full professors!) who sometimes attempted these sorts of tasks! Tim.

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

Help needed in Berkeley Calif. area

by evan＠snarc.net

A friend of mine (who's been trying to join this list!) needs help rescuing something from the Berkeley California area. Contact him privately at ark72axow at msn.com.

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

Rick Hanson

by evan＠snarc.net

I hate to keep posting sad news .... but there is more .... Rick Hanson, the owner of Club100.org, died of of cancer this weekend. Rick was an incredible asset and friend to the Model 100/102/200 community.

15 years, 3 months

2
1
0 0

8/L core memories ( long, with pic's, hopefully of interest )

by dm561＠torfree.net

----- Original Message ----- > Date: Mon, 02 May 2011 21:31:01 +0200 > From: Jos Dreesen <jdr_use at bluewin.ch> > Subject: 8/L core memories ( long, with pic's, hopefully of interest ) > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > Message-ID: <4DBF0675.9000301 at bluewin.ch> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed > <snip> > Pending a company move, the whole setup was now set away for a few weeks. > In the new lab I set about reassembling the stack. > > Which is when disaster struck ... The new magnifying glass setup was > unstable and landed where it could cause maximal damage : the coremat > itself, with around 40 cores broken........ > > Major major bummer, and really only myself to blame. Not only was the > stack now lost, but I also now cannot produce evidence that the core > repair worked. > I feel your pain; all that tedious work and then... (a few similar T-shirts in my wardrobe ;-) ) > The Fabritek has two known good coremat-pcb's, the Dataram has two > potentially good coremat PCB's. > I have spent rather too much time on this, and am open to offers on these > stacks, in the condition described above. > > If someone wants to sell their known-defective 8L / 8I Dataram/Fabritek > corestacks, I would also be interested. > > > Jos Dreesen No idea if they're useful or compatible, but I have a damaged MDS core board and a jar of new loose cores in two sizes somewhere, in case you or anyone else is insane enough to consider repairing those boards. mike

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

Epson SMD-400 drive

by jonas＠otter.se

> Dies tguis just miove the head up and down, or does it also move it from > side to side. I am wondering if it's there to adjust the depth of > engagement between the rack and pinion. It moves the heads in an arc around the rack and pinion as a pivot point. The engagement of the pinion does not seem to be adjustable. The motor can be rotated but not shifted radially as far as I can see. Also the track 0 sensor is adjustable. /Jonas

15 years, 3 months

2
1
0 0

Looking for Sol-20 program DISKT

by bdamer＠digitalspace.com

CC folks, I have a friend who is looking for a copy of Processor Technology's DISKT, their program for exercising the Helios disk drive, anyone have that out there? bruce damer

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

8/L core memories ( long, with pic's, hopefully of interest )

by mtapley＠swri.edu

At 12:00 -0500 5/3/11, Jos wrote: >Major major bummer, and really only myself to blame. Not only was >the stack now lost, but I also now cannot produce evidence that the >core repair worked. Jos, you must have felt terrible. I'm really sorry that happened, but I'm awe-struck at the work you put in investigating and repairing that far, to say nothing of photo-documenting the whole way as you went. That was a great job, and I very much appreciate the post. Thank you most kindly! You deserved a much better outcome. On the broken cores, hm ... do the same places that glue logic also glue cores? :-) -- - Mark 210-379-4635 ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Large Asteroids headed toward planets inhabited by beings that don't have technology adequate to stop them: Think of it as Evolution in Fast-Forward.

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

Fwd: [alt.folklore.compute...] PDP11GUI: Home page has moved

by legalize＠xmission.com

This message has been forwarded from Usenet. To reply to the original author, use the email address from the forwarded message. Date: Sun, 17 Apr 2011 11:35:24 +0200 Groups: alt.folklore.computers,de.alt.folklore.computer,alt.sys.pdp11 From: =?ISO-8859-15?Q?J=F6rg_Hoppe?= <j_hoppe at t-online.de> Org: albasani.net Subject: PDP11GUI: Home page has moved Id: <ioec8s$gro$1 at news.albasani.net> ======== Home page and online doc of PDP11GUI have moved to www.retrocmp.com/tools/pdp11gui The download is an attachement now. The old page is still alive, but will disappear without further notice. Enjoy! Joerg Hoppe

15 years, 3 months

2
1
0 0

IBM 9000 / 9221 Mini Main Frame on eBay

by wmaddox＠pacbell.net

Any fans of 90's-vintage IBM gear to save this machine from the gold scrappers? http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=170628677445

15 years, 3 months

5
6
0 0

UTZOO Usenet archive - need file 124f1

by classiccmp＠philpem.me.uk

Hi guys, Does anyone happen to have a working version of news124f1.tgz from the UTZOO Usenet / NetNews archive set? Part of it is currently available from <http://www.skrenta.com/rt/utzoo-usenet/>, but the above file is damaged, and all the .toc files are missing... here's what you get if you try and decompress the file: tar: Unexpected EOF in archive tar: Unexpected EOF in archive tar: Error is not recoverable: exiting now 'Nuff said really... if anyone knows of an alternative source for these files (ideally one which has the complete 124F1 file), please let me know! Thanks, -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

New DiscFerret tool released: Merlin

by classiccmp＠philpem.me.uk

Hi guys, I'm going to stick my neck out a bit, and assume you all saw the screenshots I posted this week. If you didn't, well... you missed a treat :) I've just committed the current "development alpha" of the DiscFerret software to the DiscFerret Mercurial repository. You can access the files at the following address: http://hg.discferret.com/software/merlin/ Hit the "zip," "gz" or "bz2" link on the top toolbar and you can download a ZIP, tar-gzip or tar-bzip2 file containing all the current source files. At the moment, I've only tested Merlin on Linux (specifically, Ubuntu 10.10 "Maverick Meerkat"), although *in theory* it should also build on the various BSDs and Mac OS X, as long as you have a working copy of the GCC C++ compiler, and the wxWidgets libraries for your system (note that 'wx-config' must be on the PATH). At the moment, it'll only read "Catweasel IMG" files. These are basically dumps of the Catweasel data buffer, sampled at 28MHz, in the following format: File := 1 or more "Track" blocks Track := uchar cylinder // physical cylinder (track) uchar head // physical head (side) uint32le payload_length uchar[] payload // length specified by payload_length uchar = unsigned char, an 8 bit unsigned value uint32le = unsigned integer, 32 bit, little endian. Data is exactly as extracted from the Catweasel memory; 28MHz clock rate, index in the MSbit, bits 6..0 contain the timing value. Please feel free to post your comments on-list, or email me in private if you prefer. Thanks, -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

15 years, 3 months

3
2
0 0

Dummy loads (was: Re: new here)

by mtapley＠swri.edu

At 19:06 -0500 4/29/11, cctalk-request at classiccmp.org wrote: >...The other side to this is that unless you show kids how do fun things, >they will have a go on their own. Possibly with things that are a lot >more dangereous than a car battery and lead. Oh yes! My kids have done archery, rock climbing, sailing (with *lots* of wind), bicycling (on public roads), snorkeling in the ocean, model rocketry, etc. etc. etc. with my encouragement and supervision. Lots of warnings, but (hopefully) lots of fun, too. At 19:06 -0500 4/29/11, ard wrote: >...I think I've expressed this view before... Everything has some risks >associated with it, even getting out of bed in the morning. So I could >either spend my life lying in bed and die of boredom or I can get on with >what I enjoy, even though there are some dangers in doing so. I'll take >sensible precaustions (not drinking the electrolyte as it may contain >heavy metal ions, not eating solder, making sure high voltage devices are >isolated and discharged before I work on them, etc). My life will >probably be shorter doing that, but it will be a lot more enjoyable which >would seem to be the important thing. I agree almost completely with this. My one provisio is that I'm much more likely to take risks when I (think I) understand them and know how to minimize or control them. There's a lot of chemistry and biochemistry that's not in that category for me, so I'm more cowardly there. At 5:03 -0500 4/29/11, Grumpy Ol' Fred wrote: >It has a radio that can be used while working, While my '68 Plymouth 12V bench supply appreciates the compliment, it's not warranted. The AM radio came out in the '80s, and was replaced by an AM-FM-Cassette which subsequently failed. Wish I'd kept the AM radio... But Fred left off one of the most important auxiliary functions! It can also function as a dolly for moving computer cabinets around the workshop at speeds up to ~100 mph (well, OSHA-type regulations notwithstanding...)! -- - Mark 210-379-4635 ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Large Asteroids headed toward planets inhabited by beings that don't have technology adequate to stop them: Think of it as Evolution in Fast-Forward.

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

Data General Nova and Eclipse items for rescue on Vancouver Island

by dancohoe＠oxford.net

Hello everyone, Looks like Canadian Government Surplus has a large pile of old radar items including a DG Eclipse S/230 system and some version of a Nova. In the picture you can see these items along with a number of large disks and a lot of documentation. Auction closes a couple of days from now and I'm in Canada but 3000 miles away from it. The pile is in Ucluelet BC. Heres a link: If you can't get right to the item, just use the search term "radar". http://crownassets.pwgsc.gc.ca/mn-eng.cfm?snc=wfsav&sc=enc-bid&scn=69424&lcn =213328&lct=L&srchtype=&so=ASC&sf=ferm-clos&lci=&str=1&ltnf=1&test=1

15 years, 3 months

3
2
0 0

IBM manuals

by cc＠informatik.uni-stuttgart.de

Hi, I'm restoring an IBM 3340-A2 winchester disk drive that is part of our new IBM 4331 system[1]; so far so good. It still needs some cleaning and visual inspection; it was incredibly dirty (I've even found a mouse trap inside on top of the air filter housing!) but looks fine otherwise. We also have almost all manuals for the system, except one for the 3340: the first of six volumes, i.e. volume R01 that contains the sections INDEX, MLX, LGND, START, FSI, MSG, SENSE, OLT and OPER. All other manuals will be scanned bit by bit and put on our FTP server. Question: does anybody have that manual? I'd be interested in a scan; i can then put it online if desired. Christian [1] The system consists of a 4331-2, four 3278 terminals including console, a 3287 matrix printer, a 3262 steel band printer, a 8809 tape drive, and a string of one 3340-A2 and one 3344-B2 drive. There were also several 3370 drives that went to the nearby IBM museum.

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

command line "museum"

by CCTECH＠beyondthepale.ie

> >By necessity: any retelling of 80's era networking will have so much >source information available from UUCP mapping projects and Usenet >and mailing lists, than any other more closed sections of the network. >(BITNET and later NSFNet are also up there in terms of preserved >message/map volume but by no means as huge). > Where are the preserved BITNET maps to be found? I went looking for BITNET topography related material a few months ago and found only a few examples. One of the people I contacted recently came back to me with a stash of files previously thought to be lost but I would be pleasantly surprised to know if there is more material out there. Regards, Peter Coghlan.

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

command line "museum"

by CCTECH＠beyondthepale.ie

> >What OS is it supposed to be >running (the starting host seems to be a sort of hybrid of TOPS-10, >Unix and VM/CMS)? > What bit is like VM/CMS? - I've never come across anything else that reminds me of VM/CMS to any degree :-) Regards, Peter Coghlan.

15 years, 3 months

1
0
0 0

Since there is no irc talk...

by vintagecoder＠aol.com

> BTW, anyone looking for a good sunday talk? > > Incredible I have no one from this list on MSN. If you're looking for > some chatting, add webmaster at pinball-taito.com.br to your MSN and lets > have a bit of talking :D > > Boring day... > > Greetings from Brazil > Alexandre Souza, PU1BZZ Maybe somebody should set up an irc channel on freenode if there isn't one already...that sounds like a good idea to me!

15 years, 3 months

5
9
0 0

H7140 PDP11 PSU

by ard＠p850ug1.demon.co.uk

> > I will add some diagnostic wires to the board as you suggest, I don't > remember a lot about TTL chips, is there a convention about which are the > power pins? > > In the meantime someone else told me that the click I would hear when > connecting to the mains (before switching it on with the key) was some kind > of relay. I don't hear that anymore, would that help to isolate the problem > at all? OK, I am looking at the schemaitcs... I will take the referenes from this manual on bitsavers, since I guess we all have access to it. http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/pdp11/1124/MP01018_1124schem_Aug80.pdf This is a complex PSU, and it is not obvious at first sight what is going on, but I will try... I will put page references (to that PDF) in brackets. The relay is K1 (p70). It shorts out a soft-start resistor in series with the input to the mains bridge rectifier. This produces 350V across C1/C2 in series. Now much of the PSU circuitry runs off a little SMPSU. The chopper transformer is T1 (p82). It provides about 12V across C3 (p82). Now we need to look at the 'Bias and Interface Board'. The relay is driven by E4 (p86). It's essentially a 'mains OK' circuit, the relay is energised when the votlage across the mains smoothing capacitors is high enough to trigger E3a. E3a is on the mains side of the isolation barrier, of course. But the relay driver (E4) is powered from a signal called '+5V'. This is not the +5V that you're expecting. It comes from the 7805 regulator E1 (p87). The input to that comes from that little SMPSU I've been talking about. This is isolated >from the mains. The control circuitry for that is on page 88. Be warned that this circuitry is NOT isolated from the mains. It's a relatively conventional SMPSU with the control circuitry powered straight from the mains. Q1 (p88) is the chopper transistor. So, if everything's working right, this SMPSU starts up when you apply mains to the machine, the 'mains OK' circuit triggers and the relay pulls in. I would start by checking that '5V' supply, remember it's not the one to the backplane. Check it at the output of E1, for example. If it's missing, as I think it will be, you need to sort out the SMPSU I've been talking about. But let's find out if you need to do that. -tony Regards Rob -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web.com ? What can On Demand Business Solutions do for you? http://link.mail2web.com/Business/SharePoint

15 years, 3 months

2
7
0 0

2026

2025

2024

2023

2022

2021

2020

2019

2018

2017

2016

2015

2014

2013

2012

2011

2010

2009

2008

2007

2006

2005

2004

2003

2002

2001

2000

1999

1998

1997

test-drb