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

by glen.slick＠gmail.com

I was going to do some VAX VMS tinkering today and my hobbyist licenses have expired. I thought this is where I got the licenses last time around but now the domain name appears to have expired: http://www.openvmshobbyist.com Anyone know anything about that? Is there somewhere else to get licenses now?

15 years, 6 months

7
6
0 0

Micropolis1355 to 1325 (RD53) conversion

by useddec＠gmail.com

I have a few Micropolis 1355 drives I am looking into converting into 1325 drives. Has anyone know how, tried to, or ever done this? Is the HDA the same? Can the logic board be modified, or does it have to be replaced? Any info would be greatly appreciated. Thanks, Paul

15 years, 6 months

3
2
0 0

OT: american vs european 220 (Tony Duell)

by jonas＠otter.se

> > But it is online here. > > http://www.r-type.org/static/mull-cir.htm > > Is it? > > Firstly, I could find several links to download bits of the book, but no > link to download the whole thing and I don't think all sections are > available to download separately. I couldn't find the series-heater-chain > AC/DC mains amplidier or the tape amplifier for example. > > Secondly, this is not the book we are talkign about. This is the second > one that the OP already has. For the <nth> time, there is an earlier > book, with only 2 main amplifiers (5-10 and 5-20), their preamps and an > FM tuner/. No tape amplifier, no 3-3, etc. And the FM tuner was removed > from the later book which is why the OP wants to find the older one I > believe. Indeed. Sadly the link points to pages containing bits of the book I already have. It's the older one I am interested in, for the FM tuner. Jonas

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

Tektronix 4010/4014 terminal printer project

by bqt＠softjar.se

On 02/10/11 21:38, Brent Hilpert<hilpert at cs.ubc.ca> wrote: > On 2011 Feb 9, at 2:17 AM, Christian Corti wrote: >> > On Tue, 8 Feb 2011, Brent Hilpert wrote: >>>>> >>>> For that matter, how big are the pixels? >>>> >>> There aren't any pixels. >>> >> >>> >> I know what you mean here, so not to argue your point about the >>> >> analog process in the system under discussion, but I would like to >>> >> add an historical footnote: even analog raster-scan systems were >>> >> characterised in terms of "picture elements" going back to the very >>> >> early days of TV. >> > >> > That's exactly the point: those Tektronix terminals/computers are not >> > raster-scan systems, you draw a line from here to there. The only >> > "limitation" is the addressing range for the start and end point >> > (either 10 or 12 bits). Speaking of the printer, AFAIK it's the >> > printer that determines the scanning speed and the resolution of the >> > rasterization process. > (And ultimately that 10 or 12 bits does place a maximum on the V*H > resolution of the drawn image.) I hope you understand that a line drawn from one point to another point does not form discrete points. It will be a straight line, not a series of discrete pixels along that straight line. You will not the the "traditional" moiree pattern if you were to draw lines in a spread from a certain point, as you would on a pixel based display. The 12 bit resolution sets a limit to where you can place the beam, but on a line between points, it can be at coordinates that cannot be expressed in 12 bit coordinates. Johnny

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

Phantom of the Floppera

by jfoust＠threedee.com

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dmoDLyiQYKw - John

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

C64-C128 CP-M Cartridge Interest

by lynchaj＠yahoo.com

________________________________ On 12/24/10 5:40 PM, Gene Buckle wrote: >>> I wouldn't mind a CP/M standalone if it was cheap. Most of the CP/M >>> machines of the era are either recycled or need some repairs by now. >> >> N8VEM is a really nice machine.. >> > Unfortunately, nobody is kitting them. They're dead easy to assemble. The only "problem" components are the unreasonably large EPROM and SRAM chips, and even they aren't too tough to find. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL -----REPLY----- Hi! Due to numerous builder requests, we fixed the RAM/ROM size issue with SBC V2. SBC V2 accepts 28 and 32 pin ROMs (EPROM, PROM, EEPROM, or Flash) which is pretty much anything from a 27256 to a 29C040 or 27C080. You could probably go smaller if you want although I haven't tested it myself. Also the RAM accepts 512KB or 128KB SRAMs. All set with config jumpers. There are several other improvements which fixed several bugs from SBC V1. Maybe what is needed for the C64 CP/M cart is a expansion port to ECB interface board. Then plug in an N8VEM SBC, SBC-188, or whatever and use the ECB peripheral boards along with your C64. We have a 6809/6802/6502 to ECB bridge board that might be a basis. Make the C64 appear as an IO port on the ECB and as a memory mapped IO on the C64. Plug in SBC V2 for your CP/M-80 cartridge or SBC-188 V1 for the CP/M-86. Just an idea. Back in the day, I used to have a C64 with a CP/M cartridge. It was great -- Nevada FORTRAN rocks! Thanks and have a nice day! Andrew Lynch

15 years, 6 months

20
91
0 0

Onyx2 cube

by legalize＠xmission.com

Picked up an Onyx 2 cube from university surplus today for a lowball bid of $50. Yay! -- "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, 6 months

20
41
0 0

Jay needs a ZFS expert

by aek＠bitsavers.org

Jay called me a couple of hours ago looking for some help with ZFS. The classiccmp file system is acting up, which of course effects bitsavers and the other hosted sites. I didn't know the mailing list was still working, or I would have posted sooner.

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

Good new about Turbodos

by aek＠bitsavers.org

From comp.os.cpm The search is on for sources, time to start turning over rocks... -- From: Per Frejvall <turbodos at frejvall.se> Newsgroups: comp.os.cpm Subject: TurboDOS is now free! Date: Thu, 10 Feb 2011 14:14:52 +0100 Bearer of good news, it is good to be! Message from Mike Busch, co-founder of Software 2000 and creator of TurboDOS: "Per, Software 2000, Inc. Is no longer enforcing its copyright on TurboDOS. Have fun with it, and thanks for asking. Mike" Unfortunately, they don't have any copies of the sources. We'll have to disassemble if we want to hack it. I will, in a short while, prepare a complete download package and send it to Gaby and Peter Schorn. /per

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

PSU for MicroVAX 3400 Not Faulty But Not Working

by robert.jarratt＠ntlworld.com

A while back I mentioned that I have a MicroVAX 3400 with one of the H7868 PSUs not wanting to work (green light fails to come on). I have just tried the "faulty" PSU in a MicroVAX 3500 and it works just fine. I took a PSU >from the 3500 and put it in the 3400 and it does not work in the 3400 either, only in the 3500. So clearly there is something else that is causing the problem and I am looking for suggestions, especially as the machine is in an awkward location and hard to dismantle speculatively. As a reminder this machine was working fine and I had not done anything at all to it prior to its failure, I had not moved it, changed any components or anything. Regards Rob

15 years, 6 months

5
11
0 0

Apple Lisa 2/10 - Progress

by terry＠webweavers.co.nz

More progress, I was kindly donated a IWM chip for the Lisa 2/10 by the original seller of these Lisas I have. He extacted it from a Mac 128 board he had lying around. I'm happy to report the machine now boots up. I'm not sure how much further I'm going to be able to take it though. The widget AND the floppy drive both have issues. I feel I might be able to fix the floppy. The widget seems a pretty complicated piece of machinery, info is sparse and I think might be beyond my limited skills. Here is a description of the problem with the widget. The certainly spins and I can hear a definte clack when the break comes off. I can hear drive seeking noises and the light flashes. I then get an "Error 82". From what I can read this is a fairly generic error which just means the internal drive is not working properly. I've tried to install the Lisa Office Suite and Macworks XL 3.0 from floppy. In the former case I'm told there is no suitable hard disk to install on, and the latter throws up an error 96. I've reseated all socketed chips to no avail. It could be a case of just requiring a low-level format, but I can't find anything on the web that suggests anyone actually knows how to do this. The 400k floppy drive has a weird problem. The stepper moves a little on a disk access call but the motor to rotate the disk doesn't go? The disk ejects ok. Things have been cleaned and lubed and I am using DD disks this time. I suspect it might be a sensor problem because once I was examining the drive when the machine was accessing it and tilted the embedded disk up slightly at the front. Suddenly it whirred into life and loaded the disk and the next disk I put in. Then it stopped working again after that. It could be a sensor maybe? Interestingly my other (spare) 400k shows exactly the same problem? However, the drive from my recently fixed Lisa 2 is fine and it was that drive I used to attempt to re-install software on the widget. I'm going to persist with trying to fix the floppy drives. Given that at least one of the drives did work for a short amount of time is hopeful. If nothing comes to light on the widget, I'll either just abandon trying to fix it and be happy with just a working Lisa 2, and/or perhaps simply look at getting one of these: http://cgi.ebay.com/Profile-Widget-Emulator-Board-Apple-Lisa-Apple-III-/140… .It's quite expensive though and I do like to have things original. I'll have to mull on it. Terry ----- Original Message ----- From: "Terry Stewart" <terry at webweavers.co.nz> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Sent: Thursday, January 27, 2011 9:10 PM Subject: Apple Lisa 2/10 - Progress > Ok, for those that have been following this project of mine there has been > progress. > > I had a friend visit today who owns a Lisa 2/10. He bought some of his > Lisa ICs with him for swap-out diagnostic purposes. > > The cause of the Lisa 2/10 failing its diagnostic test was indeed one of > the two ICs under suspicion on the I/O board . It was the IWM Apple > 344-0041 (Integrated WOZ machine controller). The other suspect., the > ROM, appears OK (even though it seems a highly unusual version..I should > learn to use my new (unused) ROM burner and take a copy of the ROM for > posterity). > > However, the widget drive itself throws up an error. First things first > though. I'll source a replacement IWM chip first, then worry about the > widget drive. It might just need some exercise. > > My friend also had an IDEFile ProFile drive emulator which we hooked up to > my working Lisa 2. Whoo hoo, it was great to see the Lisa Office Suite > boot into action. It looked very cool and in 1983 it would have looked > even cooler! > > Tez

15 years, 6 months

4
20
0 0

Using whiteboard cleaner on floppies

by aek＠bitsavers.org

I thought this was an interesting discovery if you're willing to sacrifice the media to recover some data. I've been trying to read some nasty old 360k 5" floppies circa early 80's, the kind that squeek and strip the oxide off in nice little rings. These were probably made from the same nasty stuff they made early 80's magtapes out of. Thinking this might be a dirt/lubrication issue, I tried applying whiteboard cleaner to the disk while still in its sleeve using a lint-free cloth across the slot on both sides, rotate, repeat around the whole disk, and after a few head cleanings was able to recover the data (and the squeeking stops). Weber Costello Markerboard Cleaner (from the label, after water) octylphenoxy polyethoxyethanol trisodium phosphate ethylene glycol monobutyl ether it's probably the glycol acting as a lubricant

15 years, 6 months

4
3
0 0

Gould electrostatic printer/plotter

by wmaddox＠pacbell.net

The weekend before last, I picked up a Gould 5010 electrostatic printer/plotter along with some PDP8 gear. The technology is interesting. It writes an electrostatic charge directly on the paper, and develops with a liquid toner "fountain" as the paper exits the machine. Mechanically, it's quite simple, with just a single stepper motor to advance the paper and a pump to recirculate the toner. According to some patents I found on the web which appear to match the configuration of the write head, the pins are activated by a clever coincident-current addressing scheme that avoids the need to dedicate a driver to each pin. The product line was eventually bought by Calcomp, which continued to manufacture electrostatic plotters into the 90's. A successor company still provides paper and toner for some models, but the 5010 is not mentioned on the website, and I have no idea whether supplies made for the newer models will work in the 5010. The printer looks reasonably good on the outside. Internally, there are a few rusted places that could use cleaning and repainting, but it doesn't look like it's structurally or functionally compromised in that respect. The vinyl tubing for the toner circulation, on the other hand, has turned brittle and most of it is missing, and it looks like there has been some toner leakage/spillage at some time in the past. Most distressingly, the electrostatic write head is gunked up and/or corroded, and I suspect it is no good. The printer is a free-standing unit, but not particularly heavy. Two guys lifted it into the back of a minivan without difficulty. Before I strip this thing for parts (it has a couple of nice power supplies, among others), is there any interest in it? Does anyone else have such a printer and need parts? --Bill

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

Debugging a 386 motherboard...

by classiccmp＠philpem.me.uk

Here's one for the PC gurus (I know there are a few of you here!) I've got the 386 motherboard on the bench. It's got four 1MB 32pin SIMMs installed (it can take eight), no graphics card and my POST code display card (which arrived in the post this morning). I've set the jumpers per the manual: http://stason.org/TULARC/pc/motherboards/I/INFORMTECH-INTERNATIONAL-INC-486… The CPU on this thing is an AMD Am386DX-40. The math-coprocessor (Intel 80387DX-33) has been pulled for now. BIOS is an AMI (American Megatrends) BIOS, label on the chip says Copyright 1992. This is the BIOS which has the atrocious magenta-and-cyan setup screen. The POST card is reporting stable power, RESET inactive, and a valid I/O clock. After powering up, I get the following sequence of POST codes cur prev -- -- holds for a second (or so) 02 01 holds for ~15 seconds 06 05 holds for a second 0d 0c holds for a few minutes 00 0d holds forever The POST card has two displays: CUR and PREV, for Current and Previous code. CUR is the code most recently written to the debug port, PREV is the one before that. Now, according to http://www.postcodemaster.com/AMI91.shtml , 0D is "CMOS Shutdown Register Test to be Done Next", and 00 is "Going to Give Control to INT 19H Boot Loader". Does anyone have any clue what these error codes actually mean? Complete guess here, but it looks like the BIOS is having trouble talking to the CMOS RAM chip. Going by the Dallas datasheet, the most likely candidate is that it's writing 01X (i.e. 0,1,something) to the enable bits in CR1, then reading it back to make sure the control register was set up correctly. The readback failed (repeatedly), so it got stuck in a loop. Obviously without a disassembly of the BIOS, it's pretty hard to say for definite that this is the problem... but does what I'm saying sound at least reasonably plausible? I'm thinking my next step should be to plug a couple of Harwin pin headers into the turned-pin socket and probe it with the logic analyser... Does anyone have any other ideas? -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

15 years, 6 months

3
4
0 0

seeking gutta-percha

by dgriffi＠cs.csubak.edu

I was wondering if someone out there knows how to acquire smallish quantities of gutta-percha for antique-ish fiddling around with. I'm looking for sheets, blocks, or bars of the stuff; not the tiny needles sold by dental suppliers. -- 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, 6 months

3
2
0 0

3B1 Unix PC emulator -- keyboard driver (half) done

by classiccmp＠philpem.me.uk

Hi guys, I've just finished adding a rudimentary keyboard handler to my 3B1 emulator (http://www.philpem.me.uk/code/3b1emu). Problem is... it doesn't quite work. I can get into the test software, and if I hit a key it'll drop into the main menu. Problem is, when I get to the main menu, it doesn't seem to recognise the commands I'm entering. That is, I can enter a menu item number (e.g. 6 <CR> for Goto Subsystem Menu), it echoes to screen correctly, but then the screen clears and I'm thrown unceremoniously back to the main menu, instead of getting passed along to the subsystem menu... This happens with all the possible menu selections, and the "expert mode" command ("s4test"). Is anyone aware of any quirks with the test software which might cause this type of behaviour? Does anyone happen to have a 3B1 and an RS232 protocol analyser (or a logic analyser with RS232 decoding)? It'd be really handy to have some dumps of the data sent and received by the 6850 ACIA (the keyboard comms controller chip) when the keyboard is initialised, and when various keys are pressed... (If I had a 3B1 of my own, it'd be on the table downstairs with a keyboard sniffer cable and my HP logic analyser mainframe plugged in...) Thanks, -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

15 years, 6 months

2
2
0 0

cctalk Digest, Vol 90, Issue 19 [Subject: Seeking: IBM Coding Forms]

by vintagecoder＠aol.com

Hi Jeff, I have found several on bitsavers.org and maybe one other place. There may be some overlap with what you found but I would be willing to email them to you if you're interested. They're whoppers, about 1M a piece. I guess that is nothing today, but this is my first post and I don't want to start sending attachments to the list. It usually takes right about a week for me to become persona non-grata and I don't want to give anybody an excuse to change the timetable. I don't like change. So the best thing is for you to get them now before I get thrown out of here. I have about 6 different coding forms that I can find at the moment. I could swear I had an RPG coding form but I cannot find it and anyway I've been trying to cut down. I have 3 assembler forms including one in German or Swiss (both Greek to me) and one for System/3. The others are for COBOL and FORTRAN and a weird print layout form for a 150 character width page. I don't know who came up with that abomination since where I come from everybody knows anything past 132 columns isn't worth reading. I am constantly trying to find a way to deal with the huge quantity of archival stuff I have and haven't succeeded until now. There may be more hidden somewhere. I would like to say "Hello" to the list members and thank the list owner for providing the list and the website owner for providing the web site. My background is large IBM systems but I am interested in just about anything that lights up, hums, smokes, or goes bang when you get the wires twisted the wrong way. I am interested in programming languages, usually the older the better although IBM (mainframe) assembler will always be my favorite. At the moment I'm on a retro computing spree trying to learn how to code in DOS assembler. I am having a hard time finding books for that online.

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

Any recent posts?

by jhfinedp3k＠compsys.to

Is the list active? There were no posts this morning? Please disregard if you see this post. Jerome Fine

15 years, 6 months

3
2
0 0

New Corvus Mac Disk images...

by curt＠atarimuseum.com

Hi, Okay, well I was told that my original images zipped up on the PC side lost the resource forks and other nuances of the Mac Disks with which they were written to originally... So, I went back to the Powermac, it creaked and moaned a bit due to some battery issues and corrupted HD, after a reinstall of OS 8.1 (7.5.3 just didn't want to cooperate today, though I did finally did take all of the 19 damned disk images and make an Install CD image of it all finally) I got the Mac back up and running... I know, I know... Mac's after OS 7.6 can't read 400K diskettes... WRONG! They can, but with a little help from a wonderful utility I found on macgarden.org called Diskdup + 2.9.2 (the earlier 1.3.2 does NOT work)... Read all of the disks in perfectly, even allows you to save them in its diskdup format or in Apple diskcopy format... So I saved them in both, plus I made SEA images as well just for good measure. Its late, I'm tired, and I need to catch up with some CPLD design work I'm doing, so this wonderful side project was a great diversion for a couple of days, but back to work... I will revisit my Corvus website in a week or so, make the needed clean up and link changes, plus add in some great photo's of a killer Concept setup sent to my by a former Corvus engineer... so I'll be working on the Corvus site more in a week or so... in the meantime: http://www.corvusmuseum.com/software/mac/corvus_mac_disks.sitx Curt

15 years, 6 months

2
2
0 0

Seeking: IBM Coding Forms

by silent700＠gmail.com

What started out as a novelty search for an old IBM COBOL coding sheet has turned into a serious-ish quest: I am now looking for any original IBM (and other) coding forms so that I might build a collection on our documents site. As for IBM, Google has helped me uncover the part/form # GX28-1464 for the COBOL form, GX09-0011 for FORTRAN and GX21-9279 for Assembler. More useful would be part # GX21-9818, which is listed as "Coding Forms Masters" and may contain these and other forms. If anyone has these and can a) scan them with high quality or b) lend/send them to me for scanning, I'd much appreciate it. Of course, if my Google-fu has failed and they're already out there, pointers to the downloads will do, too. -- jht

15 years, 6 months

17
35
0 0

Anyone want an IBM/Hitachi 5.25in 2.4MB floppy drive?

by classiccmp＠philpem.me.uk

Hi guys, I'm toying with the idea of importing a couple of Hitachi HFD532EIU 5.25in 2.4MB floppy drives from the USA. Thing is, the postage on these is rather steep -- they won't quite fit into a USPS Small flat-rate box, and the next size up is the $47.50 Medium International flat-rate box (or $65 via Priority Mail in the seller's own box... yeah, right). So here's the question. Given that each drive costs $15, plus $47.50 shipping for all three, would anyone be interested in taking one or two of these drives off my hands for the cost of the drive, plus a contribution towards the original postage fee (the $48)? (I'm also open to offers along the lines of "I have a spare you can have for less money!" -- I only need one drive, and maybe a spare) Thanks, -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

Historical Computer Society

by david＠classiccomputing.com

On Feb 7, 2011, at 3:46 AM, cctalk-request at classiccmp.org wrote: >> This is a group to become a lot like MARCH (http://www.marchclub.org/) > > We prefer http://www.midatlanticretro.org. OK, sorry, I'll start referencing that URL. >> for the greater Atlanta / southeast US region. A few of us had our first meeting in a restaurant yesterday, so I think that is a good start. > > David, you're probably sick of hearing me repeat this, but I strongly > suggest that you follow MARCH's lead and put something about Atlanta or > at least "Southeast" in your new group name. That would help * local * > people find you, rather than people thinking, "Looks like an interesting > group .... oh wait they're only in some place far away from me." No, I actually agree, and we discussed this in our first meeting on Saturday. One of the names to consider is SEARCH (pretty cool) - S = south E = east A = area R = retro C = computing H = hobbyists That's a lot like MARCH, so you guys don't mind? Best, David Greelish, Computer Historian Classic Computing The Home of Computer History Nostalgia http://www.classiccomputing.com Classic Computing Blog Classic Computing Show video podcast "Stan Veit's History of the Personal Computer" audiobook podcast Retro Computing Roundtable podcast Historical Computer Society Classic Computing Expo 1.0 - planning for sometime late 2011!

15 years, 6 months

3
2
0 0

RFC: DiscFerret configuration files

by classiccmp＠philpem.me.uk

Hi guys, I'm working on the configuration file format for the DiscFerret. As I might have mentioned earlier, this is based on the Lua programming language -- in fact it *is* Lua. To load the config, the DiscFerret tools fire up a Lua virtual machine, compile the config file into bytecode, then run it and pick the config values out of the VM's global state. What this gives you is an absolute ton of flexibility: you can do things like use a FOR loop to generate repeated Drive or Format specs. Something like this: for kv in { "pc35a", "pc35b" } do drivetypes[kv] = {} drivetypes[kv]['friendlyname'] = kv drivetypes[kv]['crossed_cable'] = true end In the DiscFerret implementation, you have two config files: - DriveSpec: these tell the software how to talk to a given drive. Basically, what to do with the I/O lines. - DiscSpec: these tell the software what the parameters of a given disc are. Minimum/maximum track numbers, double stepping required (or not), hard/soft sectored, and so on. ( There are also DecodeSpec files, which MagDAS uses to decode transition data into disc images -- and which I'll document when I've actually designed them! ) Here's an example DriveSpec file: --------------------8<-----------8<---------------------------- --[[ ####################### # DiscFerret Disc Drive Specification File # # PC 3.5in Drives A and B, twisted cable or CBL-01A cable kit ####################### ]] -- DriveSpec version flags drivespec_version = 1.0 -- Drive types recognised by this drivespec drivespec = { pc35a = { -- Passed to Drivespec functions drivetype = "pc35a" -- Shown to user friendlyname = "PC 3.5\", twisted cable (CBL-01A), drive A" -- Default step rate in milliseconds steprate = 3.0 -- Spin-up time in milliseconds spinup = 1000 } pc35b = { drivetype = "pc35b" friendlyname = "PC 3.5\", twisted cable (CBL-01A), drive B" steprate = 3.0 spinup = 1000 } } --[[ Given the drive type, track, head and sector, return a list of output pins which need to be set. Called once per sector on hard-sectored media, once per track on soft-sectored media --]] function getDriveOutputs(drivetype, track, head, sector) pins = 0 -- 3.5in FDD settings are really easy to set up. First start with drive selects. if drivetype == "pc35a" then -- Shugart DS0 = motor enable A, DS2 = drive select A pins = pins or PIN_DS0 or PIN_DS2 else if drivetype == "pc35b" then -- Shugart DS1 = drive select B, MOTEN = motor enable B pins = pins or PIN_DS1 or PIN_MOTEN else error("Unrecognised drive type '" .. drivetype .. "'.") end -- Handle side selection if head == 0 then -- do nothing, Head 0 is PIN_SIDESEL (p32) inactive/floating high else if head == 1 then pins = pins or PIN_SIDESEL else error("Head number " .. head .. " out of range.") end -- That's pretty much it, unless we need to provide TG46 on the DENSITY pin. return pins end --[[ Given the current drive status flags, identify whether the drive is ready for use. ]] function isDriveReady(drivetype, status) -- 3.5in drives don't generally have a working READY output, and we don't give a damn about DISK CHANGE. -- If this were a Winchester drive, we'd be checking READY and SEEK COMPLETE. return true end --------------------8<-----------8<---------------------------- So in about 70 lines of code (a fair few of which are comments), we've added full control support for two 3.5in PC floppy drives connected via a crossed cable. With a few more LOCs we could add support for 8-inch and 5.25-inch drives which require a 'TG46' signal on pin 2, or an 'IN USE' signal to mount the heads or switch on the LED. FormatSpecs are even simpler: --------------------8<-----------8<---------------------------- --[[ ############################# # DiscFerret Format Specification File # # 40/80 track generic, soft sectored ############################# ]] formatspec_version = 1.0 formatspec = { gen40ds = { -- format name friendlyname = "40 track, double-sided, soft-sectored, generic" -- minimum track number mintrack = 0 -- maximum track number maxtrack = 39 -- track stepping -- 1=singlestep, 2=doublestep trackstep = 1 -- minimum head number minhead = 0 -- maximum head number maxhead = 1 -- sectoring; 0=soft-sectored, or number of sectors if hard-sectored sectors = 0 } gen40ds = { -- format name friendlyname = "40 track double-stepped, double-sided, soft-sectored, generic" -- minimum track number mintrack = 0 -- maximum track number maxtrack = 39 -- track stepping -- 1=singlestep, 2=doublestep trackstep = 2 -- minimum head number minhead = 0 -- maximum head number maxhead = 1 -- sectoring; 0=soft-sectored, or number of sectors if hard-sectored sectors = 0 } gen80ds = { -- format name name = "80 track, double-sided, soft-sectored, generic" -- minimum track number mintrack = 0 -- maximum track number maxtrack = 79 -- track stepping -- 1=singlestep, 2=doublestep trackstep = 1 -- minimum head number minhead = 0 -- maximum head number maxhead = 1 -- sectoring; 0=soft-sectored sectors = 0 } } --------------------8<-----------8<---------------------------- In about 60 lines of code, again mostly comments, we've added support for three types of disc. Not bad. You could even go as far as generating all of these in code when the script loads. So on to the point of my message: does anyone have any comments to make on this type of config file format? Is there anything you'd like to see added, or done differently? Thanks, -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

15 years, 6 months

6
7
0 0

VS8000

by tshoppa＠wmata.com

Pontus writes: > On Sun, Feb 06, 2011 at 09:43:42PM -0800, Roger Ivie wrote: >> Nice little boxes. >Does CHM have one? Wouldn't it be better for CHM to concentrate on the truly innovative boxes that re-invented computation as we know it or defined the industry for extended periods, rather than the oddball historical footnotes? I mean as a DEC fan I understand the sweetness of a VS8000 as the odd man out (a personal workstation with BI!), but it hardly seems important in painting the broad strokes of the industry. Heck, BI in itself is nothing more than an oddball historical footnote looking backwards, I mean, there was very little third-party stuff Made for BI (present company excepted). You wouldn't know it by the front page of the Digital Review at the time! Oh Charlie Matco loved the leaks. Tim.

15 years, 6 months

5
4
0 0

OT: high powered amps (ben)

by jonas＠otter.se

> > Try here for the on line version. > http://www.tubebooks.org/ > > > Jonas > > > Ben. > PS. A GM-70 ( $90 ) might substitute for V1505. > Thanks! You just saved my weekend ;-) Jonas

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

VS8000 (was Re: Big PDP-11 pile on Ebay)

by michael.99.thompson＠gmail.com

>A previous employer had two "MicroVAX 8000s"; we got them without the >graphics hardware. > >One was supplied to us by DEC, for whom we did some VAXBI work. We also >had a couple of 3rd party interfaces we designed. > >The other we bought from E&S when they were getting out of the business. > >Nice little boxes. >-- >roger ivie >rivie at ridgenet.net I have one without the graphics that was used for VAXELN develpment. I am looking for a KDB50 cable assembly that plugs onto the backplane so I can install a RA71 disk. I could also use a T1031 KFBTA RD disk controller and cables. -- Michael Thompson

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

OT: american vs european 220 (Tony Duell)

by jonas＠otter.se

> Some good PDF doc's from that era. Happy digging. > http://www.pmillett.com/index.html > Ben. Thanks! Jonas

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

OT: american vs european 220 (Tony Duell)

by jonas＠otter.se

> >Hmmm... All I will say is that I maintained my father's Citroen car for >13 years. I therefore have a great love of (some) French engineering. > >IIRC the Pascaline was French.... > >-tony And just in case anybody misunderstands, I hold French engineering in great esteem. They are brilliant in many ways, but do tend to be rather careless about personal safety. I really love France. Including their railways. And Cavaill?-Coll organs. Jonas

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

OT: american vs european 220 (Tony Duell)

by jonas＠otter.se

> >Hmmm... All I will say is that I maintained my father's Citroen car for >13 years. I therefore have a great love of (some) French engineering. > >IIRC the Pascaline was French.... > >-tony > Ah, but there is French engineering and French domestic wiring (and French bricoleurs...) I agree that Citroens are wonderful, I had the opportunity of test driving a DS19 (or Pallas 21 or something probably) when I was 19 or thereabouts, on a French gravel road full of potholes. Absolutely fantastic suspension... French domestic wiring, on the other hand... :-O I remember getting a shock from a light switch, in my French godmother's house in a village in Charente-Maritime (same place I drove the Citroen). There was a fuseholder in the switch and the cover was broken and I happened to touch the bare metal. And I also had a look at the wiring in her Paris apartment. The previous tenant had "improved" it, using lots of "sparadrap" (sticking-plaster) to connect the extra wires... A wonder the place hadn't burst into flames. French domestic wiring is more like doll's house wiring. Flimsy 2-pin plugs where you connect the wires by jamming the bared ends under the pins, which screw into the plastic body of the plug. And so on. A Swedish inspector would probably have a heart attack merely from looking at it. Jonas

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

OT: american vs european 220 (Tony Duell)

by jonas＠otter.se

>I must get round to buildign a secodn Williamson. A friend of mine had >one and wanted to get a stereo pair but he never found a second one. He >gave it to me in exachnage for repairs to his guitar amp. He also gave be >some boxes of 'junk' which incuded a pair of new KT66s, other valves, >valvholders, etc _and the Williamson mains and output transformers. In >other words he'd got the hard to find bits to make his pair... His loss.... > >-tony > I am seriously jealous... No not really, I'm glad for you. How terrific! What are you waiting for? ;-) Jonas

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

Ken Olsen

by evan＠snarc.net

http://news.cnet.com/8301-30684_3-20030941-265.html RIP.

15 years, 6 months

5
4
0 0

OT: american vs european 220 (Tony Duell)

by jonas＠otter.se

> > I will have to find mine... From what I remember, it's a yellow cover and > titled 'High Quality Sound Reprodcution'. It includes (I think it this > order) the 5-20 (EF86, ECC83, 2*EL34, GZ32), preamp for the 5-20 > (3*EF86), FM tuner (I can't remember the full line-up, I am pretty sure > the IF amplifiers are EF41s, the detector an EB91 with an EM80 tuning > indicator), the pre-amps for the 5-10 (EF86) and the 5-10 itself (EF86, > ECC83, 2*EL84, EZ81), > If you could find it and give me details of it, I can start looking. That would be much appreciated. > There were of coruse other FM tuners for the home constructor at one > time, Some easier to align than others... > > I also have the GEC book on audio amplifiers. The _low power_ one is the > Williamson (15W, 2*KT66 in the output stage). I think the highest power > amplifier schematic in that book gives 1.1kW RMS into the speakers... > *Drool* Another book I shall have to try and find... Someday I must get round to building a valve amplifier. Jonas

15 years, 6 months

4
7
0 0

DC Power Was: OT: american vs european 220

by fryers＠gmail.com

All, This is starting to get further off topic as this is more a few years into the future. I was reading the IEEE Spectrum for Feb and they have a couple of pages about a move to 380V DC distribution for data centres with a view to make it suitable for domestic use. Simon -- ------------------------------------------------------------------------ "Well, an engineer is not concerned with the truth; that is left to philosophers and theologians: the prime concern of an engineer is the utility of the final product." Lectures on the Electrical Properties of Materials, L.Solymar, D.Walsh

15 years, 6 months

4
3
0 0

minor improvements to bitsavers RSS feed

by legalize＠xmission.com

I updated the bitsavers RSS feed with the following improvements: - filenames with special characters (#, %, &) are now properly encoded in their URLs - HTTP HEAD used to obtain last MIME content type, file size and last modification date for the RSS items. This means that the published date on the RSS item matches the last modification date on bitsavers and not the time the cron job generated the RSS feed. - files mentioned in Whatsnew.txt that don't exist on the server are not published in the RSS feed Due to the change in the pubDate for each item, you may need to unsubscribe and then resubscribe to the RSS feed for your RSS reader to make sense of it. <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/vintage/bitsavers-pdf.xml> <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/vintage/bitsavers-bits.xml> -- "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, 6 months

1
0
0 0

Acorn floppy interface question

by afra＠aurigae.demon.co.uk

Hi all, This is going to seem like a weird question...... Does anyone know why on almost all of the Acorn machines with disk interfaces (including at least one non-Acord designed one), they gate the drive select signals with the motor on signal. e.g. drive select is inactive unless the moror is also on ? This seems to be a peculiarity of Acorn as none of the other machines I am familliar with do this (Dragon, CoCo etc), even when they use the WDxa7xx type controlers. Though I guess cirtainly with the Atom / BBC A/B it may be a requirement of the 8271, it seems odd that it was carried over to the machines that only ever had 177x controlers. Cheers. Phill. -- Phill Harvey-Smith, Programmer, Hardware hacker, and general eccentric ! "You can twist perceptions, but reality won't budge" -- Rush.

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

OT: american vs european 220

by brianlanning＠gmail.com

In the US, two separate 110 legs are delivered to the house. When we need 220, the magic of constructive interference is applied, and we get 220. The 220 is delivered to the appliance as two separate 110 wires, a neutral wire, and sometimes a separate ground wire for safety. Because of this arrangement, sometimes appliances (I believe, maybe I'm wrong) will pull 110 from one of the legs to power electronics in the appliance. But I think european 220 doesn't work this way. Is one 220 leg delivered to the house? And the electronics work off that 220 leg? Or are two 110 lines delivered and every outlet gets the sum of those two 110 lines? If it's not two separate legs, I'm thinking that it will be impossible to wire an american 220 appliance to work with european 220. Is this right? brian

15 years, 6 months

24
109
0 0

OT: american vs european 220 (Tony Duell)

by jonas＠otter.se

> > Depends on the 'take over' :-) It certianly says 'Made in Sweden' on th > front and on the rating plate, > Asko took over Cylinda from ASEA or ABB, don't remember if it was before or after the ASEA-Brown Boveri merger. Maybe they drop the Cylinda part overseas for marketing reasons or something. > > I have always thought that the UK system was much more sensible. Not > only > > are all plugs and sockets earthed, fused and switched, but they are also > > I am not sure what sockets are still permitted over here, but the > standard one is the 13A plug to BS1363, which is indeed earthed, > polaraised, and cotnains a cartridge fuse. > I wouldn't know, but I certainly remember that my Uncle's house in Sleaford had the old 3-pin round pin polarised and earthed sockets in the late 60s or early 70s, all of them switched IIRC, and IIRC there were no two-pin sockets at all. And the electrical installation must have been quite a few years old then. > Do socket outlets have to be switched? I would never fit one that isn't, > but I thoguth unswitched ones were still available. No switched sockets at all here, unfortunately, possibly with the exception of sockets for electric irons in communal laundries in blocks of flats etc. And coffee makers in workplaces etc are always connected through a timer, since there have been fires caused by coffee makers boiling dry and the protection device having failed closed-circuit. It is probably illegal to run a coffee maker without a timer in a workplace. > > > polarised so it is impossible to switch live and neutral (provided the > > electrician who installed them knew what he was doing). The Swedish > plugs > > Sensible people check to make sure ;-). There are plenty of so-called > 'electricians' who get this wrong. > I can well believe so. Many years ago I witnessed a very experienced electrician getting the hair dryer treatment from his boss because he had used a green/yellow piece of wire for a phase connection in an industrial installation. Here unfortunately there is no way of knowing which wire is live on the appliance, since the plug can be connected either way round. > I > beleive that some countries (Germnany?) oftn have a pair of 16A socket > outlets protected by a single 32A breaker. And you could plug a small > appliance in to osme of those sockets with no other protecive devices in > the circuit, even if the flexible cable to the devive is rated at 3A, > say. No thanks! > [...] Sockets and lighting circuits here are usually protected by a 10A fuse in the switchboard. Modern switchboards have miniature breakers for each circuit, the kind with both a magnetic and a thermal trip. Older installations only have a fuse. If you connect a shaver or something to the socket and the shaver shorts out, I suppose it is possible that the insulation on the shaver cable might melt before the fuse blew (shavers usually have a 0.5 mm2 cable). > > But more seriosuly, I feel I might well die from electrocution. After all > I work on mains-powered stuff most days and something could go wrong. > But > this doens;t mean I am not going to be sensible about it and use RCDs etc > if I think they could help. > Actually it might not be a bad way to go provided the voltage and current were high enough. > > I don't intend to bring it about by electrocution in the bathroom. And of > > course the RCD goes on the end of the lead outside the bathroom. I would > > want one even in a dedicated darkroom. > > I have a dedicated darkroom (it's a little hard treating a DeVere 504 > enlarger as a temporary device :-)), but I still have (and want) an RCD > on the incoming mains to it. > Sadly I only have a 35mm enlarger, I am hoping to modify it to take 6x6 negatives. But I also have quite a few old 6x9 negatives which would be nice to print. Happily for me, enlargers are cheap second-hand nowadays :-) (as is old audio gear, Revox A77s or B77s can be had for very reasonable prices for example. I have a very nice Marantz amplifier which I got cheap, and a Technics FM tuner which probably weighs nearly as much as the BC-312 shortwave receiver I used to have). Jonas

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

OT: american vs european 220 (Tony Duell)

by jonas＠otter.se

> > I am not that surprised given that at some time (in the past 20 years?) ES > > lampholders appear to have become legal in the UK (I'm sure they never > used > > Weren't they? I am pretty sure I've seen reference to them in quite old > (1950s) electrical engineering books over here. Maybe not used on > domestic installations, thohhg > > > to be) and they have a large _easily_touched_ metal part that could > randomly > > be connected to live or neutral (I suspect that if Tony found himself having Not easily touched with the bulb in place, I hope? Over here (Sweden) all bulbs are ES and all holders have an insulating exterior. If you remove the bulb and poke your finger inside with the holder live, you may well get a shock, since mains sockets aren't polarised here. Most people don't usually do that however, not even the cognitively challenged. The bulbs don't wobble about in an ES holder, IIRC they do in a bayonet holder. The French use bayonet holders and that IMO says a lot about that type of holder. Jonas

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

OT: american vs european 220

by CCTECH＠beyondthepale.ie

> >> SPX graphics adapter which was plugged into a very nice VR297 monitor (Sony >> Trinitron). I plugged out the monitor cable from the back of the Vaxstation >> for some reason. When I plugged it back in I felt a zap. On investigating, >> the earth pin in the IEC plug going into the monitor didn't seem to be >> making proper contact for some reason. The monitor didn't mind a bit but one > >I've neve seen that happen. Normally it's due to a wire having fallen off >in one of the connectors. Of course tend to prefer the rewirable IEC >sockets so I can check the wiring and make sure the contacts aren't bent >open/ > After unplugging and reinserting the plug (line socket?) once, I couldn't get it to fail to make contact again. The connector was moulded but it was possible to squeeze the contacts by inserting a small flat screwdriver between the contact and the body. I decided it was better to discard the lead and use another. (I fitted a rewirable IEC connector on the vacuum cleaners lead after the cable failed near the original moulded connector. The new connectors body is too flexible and the rubber strain rellef sleeve regularly works free from it...) > >> I traced the connections on the graphics card and found the RGB outputs came >> directly out of a large, probably expensive, difficult to replace and rare >> looking BT459 RAMDAC :-( > >I asuem that's a Brooktree part from the number. They are not mormally >custom chiups, you even find them (although probably not the right one) >on old VGA cards. > Yes, it's a Brooktree part. I don't come across that many old VGA cards and any that I have come across don't use it. If anybody has an old card with a BT459 that they are willing to give/sell me, I would have a go at changing it. A quick tally shows it to have 132 pins but it looks like they are 0.1in spaced so I should have a realistic chance of dealing with it. Maybe I should put this in another posting as the people with large stashes of BT459s and think this is an off-topic discussion about mains voltages might not realise we have drifted back on topic again :-) > >There is a locking assembly avaialble, but few manufacturers seem to use >it. And it doesn;t work with moulded scokets (see above ;-)). > I've seen a simple wire retaining mechanism (on Cisco 1U high kit I think) which seems to do the job and works with almost any leads, moulded or not. However, I'd prefer something that just felt a bit more secure without needing this extra mechanism. > >What mains connector do you prefer? > Given that almost all the kit I use has IEC connectors, I don't really have any I prefer, just ones I don't like that much :-) I once bought variable bench power supply at a ham rally for a very small price. The obvious snag was that it didn't have a mains lead and the mains input connector was an oblong thing a little flatter than an IEC chassis mounted connector. I removed the original connector, made the hole a little larger and fitted a new IEC connector. There's no shortage of IEC leads and I don't want to end up needing a selection of different power leads for different items. Sometimes it's easier to put up with something I'm not than keen on. Even if they don't feel that secure, I can't argue with the sheer numbers in use and the small number of reported problems with them. Regards, Peter Coghlan.

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

GONE: FREE in Minneapolis: RL02 drive for repair or parts

by bub7734＠yahoo.com

The RL02 drive has been claimed. Cheers, -scott

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

VS8000 (was Re: Big PDP-11 pile on Ebay)

by ethan.dicks＠gmail.com

On Sun, Feb 6, 2011 at 10:17 PM, Richard <legalize at xmission.com> wrote: > About 10 VS8000s sold sounds about right. I saw a couple at DECUS Symposia in the late 1980s - they were fun to play with, even if they didn't have good price/performance numbers. -ethan

15 years, 6 months

3
3
0 0

OT: american vs european 220 (Tony Duell)

by jonas＠otter.se

> >I don;'t dispute that for an instant. What I do disagree with is that all >pre-1970 power tools in all countries wire not earthed nad wired to >non-polarised plugs. This is an international list after all. > >-tony > They most certainly weren't. There were power tools here that had a metal casing, were earthed and wired to a non-polarised plug. That was well before 1970. And in Sweden. Jonas

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

CP/M based Digitech network analyzer available

by shawn.t.rutledge＠gmail.com

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=260733084635

15 years, 6 months

9
12
0 0

Historical Computer Society

by david＠classiccomputing.com

After a poor turnout at my place of work, I canceled trying to hold meetings there. Instead, I created a discussion group for the Historical Computer Society. There are a few of us there now, and we are building a grassroots organization that way. This is a group to become a lot like MARCH (http://www.marchclub.org/) for the greater Atlanta / southeast US region. A few of us had our first meeting in a restaurant yesterday, so I think that is a good start. More information is here - http://www.classiccomputing.com/CC/Meetings.html Anyone in this area, please consider becoming a part. Best, David Greelish, Computer Historian Classic Computing The Home of Computer History Nostalgia http://www.classiccomputing.com Classic Computing Blog Classic Computing Show video podcast "Stan Veit's History of the Personal Computer" audiobook podcast Retro Computing Roundtable podcast Historical Computer Society Classic Computing Expo 1.0 - planning for sometime late 2011!

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

Big PDP-11 pile on Ebay

by wdonzelli＠gmail.com

There is currently a pretty big PDP-11/44 collection on Ebay (just search for PDP-11/44). It is located in Milwaukee. Will anyone here be bidding on the pile? If so, and you win, I would be interested in one or both of the RK07 drives, but nothing else. Reply off list...we could come to terms... -- Will

15 years, 6 months

4
8
0 0

John Boffemmyer IV wants to stay in touch on LinkedIn

by newyork.techie＠gmail.com

LinkedIn ------------ I'd like to add you to my professional network on LinkedIn. - John Boffemmyer IV John Boffemmyer IV Technical Systems "Ironman" Solution - put me in the environment and I'll make it work Greater Philadelphia Area Confirm that you know John Boffemmyer IV https://www.linkedin.com/e/-silvj6-gjqabyyk-50/isd/2266969373/aJNbndpt/ -- (c) 2011, LinkedIn Corporation

15 years, 6 months

7
7
0 0

Vintage TTL computer

by PETER＠beyondthepale.ie

Hi again, Christian > >PS: Using the shorter URL >http://lh4.ggpht.com/_lkddKjPsPFU/TUswHtRykbI/AAAAAAAAB6k/1ne8IFziAUU >gives you the full sized picture. > On further investigation, I find that if I open the full URL first, and then shorten it down to the above, I then get the full sized picture with no problems. However, if I go straight to the short URL above, it fails with the "Not found" error I mentioned in my previous mail. Google must be doing something really strange. Regards, Peter.

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

LP37 on epay

by mark.kahrs＠gmail.com

http://cgi.ebay.com/Digital-DEC-LP37-1200-LPM-Lines-Per-Minute-Line-Printer… Virginia ...

15 years, 6 months

3
2
0 0

Tektronix 4010/4014 terminal printer project

by legalize＠xmission.com

OK, I've been studying the circuit diagrams and service manuals for the Tektronix 4014 printer interface: <http://bitsavers.org/pdf/tektronix/401x/070-2303-00_4014_4015_Service_Mar79…> <http://bitsavers.org/pdf/tektronix/463x/070-1831-02_4631_Service_Nov79.pdf> I'm starting a project to create a modern printer interface for the terminal. This involves creating the optional target signal amplifier board for the 4010/4014 and creating a microcontroller based board that will drive the terminal like a 4631 printer and scan out the image from the storage tube for digitizing as a digital image. The amplifier board is what distinguishes a 4010/4014 from a 4010/4014-1 and provides the signals for the printer. The original 4631 printer is a completely analog device that scans out the storage tube and transfers the electrical signal to a dry silver paper for printing. This design will treat the analog signal supplied to the printer as a signal for digitizing into a raster image. I plan on housing mine inside a 4632 video hardcopy shell with a modern printer inside driven by the controller. Who knows, this project might make those 4631/4632 printers useful again, considering that noone is going to be getting a new supply of dry silver paper anytime soon. I'm looking for other people that have hardware design experience to join me on this project. All resulting EDA files will be made available under a suitable open source style license. Please reply to me off-list if you are interested in collaborating with me on this project. -- "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, 6 months

3
4
0 0

FREE in Minneapolis: RL02 drive for repair or parts

by bub7734＠yahoo.com

I've an RL02 drive that I need to dispose of. It mostly works, but has occasional read errors--possibly dirty heads or adjustments are needed. It is missing the two cable connectors on the back (I needed those), and the rack rails (never had those). The drive is free to anyone for pick-up in Minneapolis. And while on the RL02 subject, I'm looking for two cabinet kits for RL02 controllers. e.g. CK-RLV12 type bulkhead connectors. Does anyone have these for sale or trade? Cheers, -scott

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

Tandem clx cyclone -r Seattle area

by g-wright＠att.net

Any interest in this before it gets scrapped. Missing the drives and Drive holders. rest looks Good. Full Model number T-16 7168 Name CLX cyclone-R vintage 1991 or so - Jerry

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

OT: american vs european 220 (Tony Duell)

by jonas＠otter.se

> > It's in the second version of the book that I have. The book also > includes the 5-10, 5-20, 3-3, several preamplifers and tape > recording/playback amplifiers. It doesn't include an FM tuner design. The > older book ('High Quality Sound Reproduction') includes the 5-10, 5-20, > their preamps and an FM tuner. The latter was removed from the later book > because apparently few home constructors could align it properly. > > -tony > That's the one I have. Published 1959. Seven-watt DC/AC Amplifier, pages 59-66, UF86, 2xUCL82, UY85. I had no idea there was another version with an FM tuner in. I wonder how I could get hold of one? Jonas

15 years, 6 months

3
2
0 0

CP/M based Digitech network analyzer available

by allanh-cctalk2＠kallisti.com

Jason T wrote: > While I am by no means Mr. CP/M, I have never seen a CP/M machine with > a 3.5" floppy before. > > Who can name any others? BNW System 1. Okay, there was only one of those so it's not surprising you haven't seen one. It was dual processor, Z80 and 68000; it ran CP/M 3 on the Z80 and both CP/M and UCSD p-system on the 68K. It used the high RPM Sony 3.5" drives (600RPM?); those used the same data rate as a standard 8" floppy, so the controller could run both 8" and 3.5" without having to switch any clocking. allan -- Allan N. Hessenflow allanh at kallisti.com

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

trs 80 model I "i/o bus interface adapter"

by billdeg＠degnanco.com

Does anyone have a TRS 80 Model 1 with Expansion Interface and external hard drive? According to a 3rd party hard drive manufacturer (VRDATA Hard Disk III) there is a small device called the trs 80 model I "i/o bus interface adapter" that goes between the EI and the hard drive. Any clues about this? Bill

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

HP 7240A plotter paper substitute?

by derschjo＠mail.msu.edu

I seem to have a plotter-based theme going here today... Snagged an HP 7240A (this is the RS-232 version of the 7245A) plotter today, it's in working condition. A really cool design -- a combination plotter/printer using a thermal print head. My understanding is that the special tractor-feed thermal paper for this thing is basically impossible to find. Anyone out there found a reasonable substitute? Mine came with maybe 1/4 of a roll left in it, and I guess after that's gone I'll probably never get to use it again :). Thanks, Josh

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

OT: american vs european 220 (Tony Duell)

by jonas＠otter.se

> >That might explain the 'optional' conactor and multi-phase wiring on our >wanhing machine wiring diagram. Did I metion it's a Swedish machine... > If it's a Cylinda, it might actually be made in Sweden. If it's an Electrolux, it could be made just about anywhere. Electrolux own 50 brands or thereabouts, and I believe they make appliances in several countries in Eastern Europe as well as in Italy (Zanussi is Electrolux since ages, as well as the AEG appliances division). On the subject of power sockets in bathrooms, in Sweden sockets may be fitted in bathrooms provided they are either earthed and protected by a Ground Fault Interrupter (there is probably a requirement that the GFI be located outside the bathroom), or have an isolating step-down transfomer internally, 220/110 and about 20 VA or so. Houses built after 1994 may not have non-earthed sockets anywhere. My bathroom has a small laundry section which I am intending to use as a darkroom. My flat is from 1963 so there is no socket in there, I have bought a portable GFI and intend to run an earthed extension lead from the kitchen via the GFI into the bathroom whenever I want to use it as a darkroom. Probably illegal but it should protect me (I hope...). Jonas

15 years, 6 months

5
7
0 0

OT: american vs european 220 (Tony Duell)

by jonas＠otter.se

> No, it;s an Asko, from the time before they were taken over. > That would be Finnish then IIRC. Cylinda is Asko Cylinda since a number of years. We used to pass the Cylinda factory every time we went to see my ex-parents-in-law. It's in a little village called Jung, in the South-west of Sweden. Cylinda used to be known for being particularly high quality since the washer drums were made of stainless steel where everyone else used mild steel. Asko Cylinda was bought by Gorenje of Slovenia last year. > > On the subject of power sockets in bathrooms, in Sweden sockets may be > > fitted in bathrooms provided they are either earthed and protected by a > > Ground Fault Interrupter (there is probably a requirement that the GFI > > be located outside the bathroom), or have an isolating step-down > > transfomer internally, 220/110 and about 20 VA or so. Houses built after > > The latter sounds like hte 'shaver sockets' we get in the UK. As I > mentioned, I bought a few in a pound shop and extractd the transformers > form them -- 110-0-110V at 20VA will power some small valve projects and > I've yet to find any other new HT transformers for a pound each :-) > They are meant for shavers and usually marked as such. The advantage of having earthed sockets nowadays is of course that you can run hair dryers in the bathroom (or even use the bathroom as a darkroom, which is presumably not what those who wrote the rules had in mind). > > 1994 may not have non-earthed sockets anywhere. > > I have no idea what the regualtions ontaht are over here. Virtually every > new installation (since about 1948) uses the 'ring main' with 3 pin > (earthed) sockets and plugs with intenral cartridge fuses. > > I think the only non-earthed sockets you would find now are isolated > shaver sockets. > I have always thought that the UK system was much more sensible. Not only are all plugs and sockets earthed, fused and switched, but they are also polarised so it is impossible to switch live and neutral (provided the electrician who installed them knew what he was doing). The Swedish plugs sockets are the same as the German ones, which are symmetrical and neither switched nor fused. > > > > My bathroom has a small laundry section which I am intending to use as a > > darkroom. My flat is from 1963 so there is no socket in there, I have > > bought a portable GFI and intend to run an earthed extension lead from > > the kitchen via the GFI into the bathroom whenever I want to use it as a > > darkroom. Probably illegal but it should protect me (I hope...). > > I would have to check the rgualtions, but in a darkroom you are working > in poor light with electricla stuff and water. No way would I want to do > without n RCD. > Precisely why i bought the RCD/GFI. I know for a fact I am going to die but I don't intend to bring it about by electrocution in the bathroom. And of course the RCD goes on the end of the lead outside the bathroom. I would want one even in a dedicated darkroom. Jonas

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

OT: american vs european 220

by CCTECH＠beyondthepale.ie

> >> On electronic (i.e. personal computer) gear, I wonder if the role of >> the ever-present ground wire isn't more for RF noise than actual >> safety protection. > >Possibly. Althoguh a lot of computer equipment is metal-cased and >certainly wouldn't meet the requirements for double insulation. One >consern would be the mains filter. With no ground wire the casing would >flaot at half mains voltage due to a capacitive voltage divider formed >from the capacitors from the power-carrying wires to the case. Yes, the >source impedance would be quite high, but enough to give you a tingle. >Worse than that, if you connect the machine ta an earthed device and if >the logic ground wire is defective you are most likely to end up zapping >driver and receiver ICs. This was, I am told, a problem with some Acorn >Econet installations... > It's happened to me :-( I have a Vaxstation 3100 which was equipped with an SPX graphics adapter which was plugged into a very nice VR297 monitor (Sony Trinitron). I plugged out the monitor cable from the back of the Vaxstation for some reason. When I plugged it back in I felt a zap. On investigating, the earth pin in the IEC plug going into the monitor didn't seem to be making proper contact for some reason. The monitor didn't mind a bit but one of the primary colour outputs from the SPX adapter went away (red I think). I traced the connections on the graphics card and found the RGB outputs came directly out of a large, probably expensive, difficult to replace and rare looking BT459 RAMDAC :-( That was the only serious problem I ever had with them but I never liked IEC plugs and sockets much. Even when they are correctly mated, they often seem loose. I suppose on the plus side, they are more likely to pull free than cause damage when I trip over a mains lead... Regards, Peter Coghlan.

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

VT330 Flyback Transformer Repair - advice please

by mark＠wickensonline.co.uk

Hi guys, I've received a replacement flyback transformer for the VT330. I'd like some advice about what other components it would be worth replacing at the same time. The transformer suffered from arcing but there doesn't appear to be any physical damage to any other components. I've got a replacement output transistor on the list, could anyone advise as to what else would be worth replacing - I'd like to get the terminal back to working condition with the best chance of a few years more use? My gut feeling is to also look at diodes and high voltage capacitors on the output side of the transformer, as well as the two large electrolytics on the input side of the power supply. I'm presuming that resistors don't normally need replacing. I have to weigh up the benefit of replacing components with the possibility that I don't get an exact replacement and balls something up. There are several high voltage (1000V+) capacitors are polypropylene. Do these typically stay stable over time? I have a circuit diagram and could put together an exact schematic if that is useful in helping. Thanks for the advice, Mark.

15 years, 6 months

3
4
0 0

Mac 400K issue solved!

by curt＠atarimuseum.com

Hi, Okay, found a treasure trove of files buried deep on Apple's website: http://download.info.apple.com/Apple_Support_Area/Apple_Software_Updates/En… Found Diskcopy 4.2 from 1991... I installed it, it took 3 passes to read in the Corvus User Disk, but finally I got a good copy and then put in a fresh diskette, make the copy and it promptly mounting on the Mac desktop and I was able to open it and all of the files were right there, so that worked like a charm. So to review: Powermac 5260/100 Mac OS 7.5.3 Diskcopy 4.2 This all worked well in finally reading the older 84-85 Mac MFS diskettes... So I just updated the Macintosh Archive section with the added Mac User Client for Corvus Omninet networks (this will not work with Appletalk or Ethernet, you need a special Corvus Interface Adapter that plugs into the Localtalk Port and then to Corvus Omninet cabling...) http://www.corvusmuseum.com/software/mac/ Curt

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

Free (in Seattle): HP 7550A Plotter

by derschjo＠mail.msu.edu

This is an 8-pen 8.5"x11" autofeed plotter with Serial and HP-IB interfaces. It's in good shape, and seems to be almost working, but something's gone awry with the autofeed mechanism -- it's not picking up paper from the tray. Some of the pens still have wet ink in them :). A friend of mine was tossing this out and I couldn't let that happen, but since I already *have* a working 7550A I probably don't need another. Anyone interested? This is in Seattle, drop me a line... - Josh

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

Need RL02 Controller for PDP-11/44 Restoration

by michael.99.thompson＠gmail.com

> So I'm *almost* sure that you can run one without the OCP. Mind you, it > might have been an RA71 or RA72 rather than an RA70. > > Right now I cannot put my finger on a suitable manual ... > > There are, I'm sure, some jumpers or switches that set the unit number. There is a DIP switch on the back next to the Fault and Ready LEDs that is labeled Unit Number Select. Next to the DIP switch is a pushbutton labeled Unit Number Accept. I have all of the DIP switches off, I suspect for Unit Number 0. I tried pushing the Unit Number Select push button both after the drive was powered up and while it was being powered up. It does not spinup. > Antonio > arcarlini at iee.org -- Michael Thompson

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

Kinda off topic: searching for a PC server power supply

by jrasite＠eoni.com

You folks are the best people I know for scaring up obsolete hardware. <smile> My employer needs a power supply for an Acer Altos G510 server. He has contacted all his sources and come up empty. He says, "I really need one." Specifically, we need: STANDARD POWER SUPPLY 450W DELTA/ DPS-450DBM). Acer Part Numbers PY.45005.002 Any leads would be really appreciated. Google gets exactly four hits. <sigh> Please reply p-mail. Thanks, Jim Arnott Support Services Eastern Oregon Net, Inc. La Grande, OR

15 years, 6 months

3
4
0 0

Tektronix 4010/4014 terminal printer project

by tshoppa＠wmata.com

>> For the vector purists (e.g. me) making SVG or Postscript or PDF or some >> True vector format, would be a desirable goal. But with endpoint resolution >> Only 1024x768 probably overkill. I still hate seeing what I know are >> True vector lines, get rasterized. > Actually, IIRC, the 4631 is raster, not a vector device, It scans an > electro beam across the storage target in the (vecotr display) CRT and > reads out what's stored. And IIRC it does it a scan line at a time and > prints the image using a strange, flat, 1-axis CRT onto photosensitive > paper with the other axis being achieved by the paper movement. I was using a 4631 as late as 1990 to do "real work". (OK, it was academic, but real.) Somebody in office supplies knew somebody in procurement who could get me as much of The silver paper as I wanted. Anyway, even though the 4631 was a raster device in scanning, it still managed To avoid the jaggies that most pixellated devices suffer from. I note that the Decent PDF and SVG viewers manage to smooth over much of the jagginess. Tim.

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

Need RL02 Controller for PDP-11/44 Restoration

by michael.99.thompson＠gmail.com

>> Anyone have a manual for this drive or know how to get it work without >> connecting an OCP? > > How complex is the OCP? Is it possible to fake it? > > -tony It is actually fairly simple. It has a bunch of LEDs and START/STOP and WRITE PROTECT switches. It also has a connection to the processor for the RUN LED and the HALT switch. I tried just the OCP without connecting the cable to the processor and the drive will not spin up. There must be just a little logic on the board. I suspect that just adding a START jumper to the OCP connector on the drive will get it to spin up. I just need to figure out which pins. > Browsing the link you attached reminds me of one problem I came across > some time ago... > The drive seems to complain about the missing speed signal. > How is the speed signal generated? > Is there still an opto coupler under the drive assembly detecting the > sector impulses from a crown like mechanic coupled with the spindle? > > It is perhaps worth to check the LED / photo transistor for dust. > When done verify that a proper signal is generated and transmitted to > the disk controller assembly. > > Hope it will help, please keep us updated about your progress. > > Bernhard Wulf I will pull the HDA and look at the encoder next weekend. >> I pulled two RA70 disks from a pair of VAX-3500s that I have. By some >> miracle both drives spin up and go ready when the Operator Control >> Panel is connected. I was thinking that one of these drives would work >> nicely with the UDA50 disk controller in the 11/44 until I can get the >> RA81s sorted out. >> >> These drives are supposed to work with the Operator Control Panel. >> There is a button on the back of the drive that says Unit Number >> Accept. I pushed the button both before and after power up, but the >> RA70 does not spin up. >> >> Anyone have a manual for this drive or know how to get it work without >> connecting an OCP? > > I have used RA7x drives with a KDA50 (M7164 / M7165) without an OCP > attached to the drives. ?It has been a while now. ?I don't remember > there being anything tricky about getting it to work. ?I was probably > using either an RA72 or RA73. ?I'll have to look and see if I have an > RA70 to try. > > I don't remember if I ever found any RA7x drive manuals other than > this one on the net, which doesn't have all that much useful > information: > RA7x/SA7x Pocket Reference Guide, Order Number EK-RSA7X-PG-002 > > -Glen I have Googled for the User's Manual, but have not found anything yet. Thanks for all of the suggestions! UPS delivered the RL02 controller today. We have LOTS of RL01 and RL02 drives to try. We have XXDP on an RL01 that might make diagnosing the RA81s a little easier. -- Michael Thompson

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

OT: american vs european 220 (Tony Duell)

by jonas＠otter.se

> >Yes, exactly. The domestic mains is nomianlly 230V now. We get a single >phase wire and a neurtal, the latter being close to ground. Everything is >designed to run off that 230V supply. There is no 'centre tap'. So our >cookers, say, have 230V elements and a timer that runs off 230V mains. > >Actually, the European mains is 3 phase. The final transformer secondary >is start (wye?) connected with the star point being th eneautral. Houses >get a single phase supply consisting of that neurral wire and one of the >phase wires -- to balance the load, neighbouring hosues in a road get >different phases [1]. Of coruse industral places get the full 2 phase >mains to run larger motors, etc. It's very difficult to convince the >electricity companies to run 3 phase mains into a normal house, though, >which is a problem for people who ant to run large disk drives ;-) > >[1] In the cases of blocks of flats, student halls of residence, etc, >it's not unheard-of for each floor to be wired to wired to a different >phase. This has led to studend running extension leads to the rooms above >and below theres so as to get a 3 phase supply... > That's sad. In Sweden houses (almost?) always have 3-phase mains (230/400V), and flats get single phase. A very large proportion of Swedish houses have electric heating, run off 3-phase. A house will have at least 16A, sometimes 25A meter fuses; Sweden is quite cold in winter. Running 3 phase into a normal house is standard. The water heater will be 3 phase, usually the kitchen stove as well, and washing machines and tumble dryers can be connected either single phase or 2, sometimes 3 phase. The lighting and power points will be distributed evenly between the three phases (obviously). Although my flat does seem to have 3 phase. I shall have to check, I only moved in 3 months ago... Jonas

15 years, 6 months

5
5
0 0

OT: american vs european 220 (Tony Duell)

by jonas＠otter.se

>> Weren't there also some European countries (or parts thereof) that >> used various DC voltages for lighting and small appliances? (Belgium >> or Italy?). > >We had DC mains in England into the 1950s in some areas. A lot of radios Gothenburg, Sweden had 127 VDC in some parts of the town in the late 60s/early 70s, even though almost all of Sweden had 220/380 3-phase since ages. >and TVs weew 'AC/DC',not just to save the cost of the mains transformer. >I rememebr working on TVs (long after the 1950s, of coruse) with >different voltage selector settings for AC and DC mains (possibly due to >fact that the smoothing capacitor would charge to the peak and not the >RMS votlage of AC mains). One of the Mullard books of audio amplfiier >cirucits (including things like the 5-10 and 5-20) includes a circuit >for an amplifier (4 valves, something like UF86, 2 * UCL82, UY85) for >AC/DC mains. Of coruse it was hot-chassis which is a right pain... > Hmm, I shall have to have a look at my Mullard book. I seem to remember that one. Jonas

15 years, 6 months

3
2
0 0

OT: step down voltage converters

by brianlanning＠gmail.com

Can anyone recommend a good step-down voltage converter? I'd like to be able to plug 110 power tools into 220 european style outlets. Some of the power tools are 1.5hp induction motors, while others have the typical universal motors. I'll need a high-wattage unit. At least 2000watts I think, whatever is the maximum for a 20amp 110 outlet. Amazon has one for something like $85. But I'd happily pay twice that or more for one built like a tank with high quality components. Can anyone suggest one? brian

15 years, 6 months

5
7
0 0

Vintage TTL computer

by tshoppa＠wmata.com

Nick writes: > Anyone have any interest in purchasing this minicomputer (believe it is > a Texas Instrument from 1972 used in manufacturing). It is missing the > core memory box however. I have a friend who is thinking of selling it, > I had no interest as it was missing the core memory, but maybe someone > here will want it? > http://lh4.ggpht.com/_lkddKjPsPFU/TUswHtRykbI/AAAAAAAAB6k/1ne8IFziAUU/s640/… Wow... where does this machine fall relative to say the TI-960A or 960B? I'm guessing that each of those little cards is one or maybe two bits of ALU/register slice. The TI-960's I've seen (maybe they were "A"'s and "B"'s and not the earlier pre-A) were working at a slightly higher level of integration with moderately bigger PCB's. Tim.

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

Vintage TTL computer

by nick.allen＠comcast.net

Anyone have any interest in purchasing this minicomputer (believe it is a Texas Instrument from 1972 used in manufacturing). It is missing the core memory box however. I have a friend who is thinking of selling it, I had no interest as it was missing the core memory, but maybe someone here will want it? http://lh4.ggpht.com/_lkddKjPsPFU/TUswHtRykbI/AAAAAAAAB6k/1ne8IFziAUU/s640/…

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

OT: PC Virtualization Software

by feldman.r＠comcast.net

Some months ago there was a thread about setting up virtual machines on an Intel PC, where people recommended different software. I cannot locate that thread in the list archives, so I am asking once more for recommendations on virtualization software that people have found to be good. What I want to do is run multiple virtual Windows XP or Windows 7 (64-bit preferred) machines on a single Intel-based PC. TIA, Bob Feldman

15 years, 6 months

7
9
0 0

Visual 1050 systems for sale in Orange, CA

by d_cymbal＠hotmail.com

Disclaimer: Not my listing and I don't know the seller.? I was a little skeptical (10 systems?) and the asking price is not realistic. http://www.pennysaverusa.com/classifieds/merchandise/computers-printers/com…

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

AVL road Runner computer

by stevenm＠optonline.net

Joe, Do you still want to know about the Road Runner? I came across your slightly old post today. Steve AVL road Runner computer Joe rigdonj at cfl.rr.com Tue Nov 4 15:22:13 CST 2003 a.. Previous message: Kaypro 2X starts up with silly display b.. Next message: Anybody know what this HP test board is for? c.. Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ] [ subject ] [ author ] -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Last week I found an interesting looking computer in a scrap place. It was called a Road Runner and was made by AVL. I wasn't familar with it so I posted a question here on the CC list about it and no one knew exactly what it was but a number of people contacted me about it and wanted to see some pictures of it. Yesterday I went back and and bought it. I brought home and today I cleaned it up and took some photos. First, the system was made by Audio Visual Labs of Atlantic Highlands, NJ. Second, I ended up with TWO monitors, TWO floppy drives and a detachable keyboard even though the unit has a built in keyboard. After I bought the thing but before I left, I was looking around and found a bigger computer marked AVL Eagle (I THINK Eagle was the name on it). I opened it up and it looked like an S-100 chassis. It had 9 slots with 8 boards in it. Two boards had 8080 CPUs, three boards had Intersil 6204s (communications boards? and three boards had 2114 memory ICs on them. All the boards including the backplane were made by AVL. I'd already paid for my stuff and I didn't think this one was all that interesting so I left it behind. But my point is that I think I ened up with the keyboard, monitor and floppy drive from the second AVL system as well as those for the AVL Road Runner. Anyway here's the links to the pictures. The Road Runner computer <http://www.classiccmp.org/hp/avl3/avl-rr.jpg> and the back of it; <http://www.classiccmp.org/hp/avl3/avlrr-b.jpg>. Note the connector on the left that connects to the expansion box. Picture of the expansion box, front and rear; <http://www.classiccmp.org/hp/avl3/avlexp-b.jpg> and <http://www.classiccmp.org/hp/avl3/avl-exp.jpg>. Note the the floppy drive attachs to the expansion box and it appears that only one floppy drive can be used on the compter. Small VM-5 (5 inch?) monitor, front and back; <http://www.classiccmp.org/hp/avl2/vm5.jpg> and <http://www.classiccmp.org/hp/avl2/vm5-b.jpg>. Large VM-9 (9 inch?) monitor, front and back; <http://www.classiccmp.org/hp/avl3/avl-vm9.jpg> and <http://www.classiccmp.org/hp/avl3/mon-b.jpg>. The external keyboard; <http://www.classiccmp.org/hp/avl3/avl-kb.jpg>. The two floppy drives; <http://www.classiccmp.org/hp/avl2/fd1.jpg> and <http://www.classiccmp.org/hp/avl2/fd1-b.jpg>. I don't know which drive goes with which system but I don't thinkit matters since the drives appear to be very similar despite the cables coming out at different points in the box and the drives being painted different colors. Both drives are marked FD-1. It's not made by AVL but this patch panel was in the box with the AVL stuff.<http://www.classiccmp.org/hp/avl1/patch.jpg>. From the markings on it, I'd say that it was used with the Road Runner. OK that's it. Can anyone tell me any more about it? Joe -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- a.. Previous message: Kaypro 2X starts up with silly display b.. Next message: Anybody know what this HP test board is for? c.. Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ] [ subject ] [ author ] -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- More information about the cctech mailing list

15 years, 6 months

4
3
0 0

ADM3A Screen Rot

by trebor77＠execpc.com

I Have Three ADM3A's that sat in my Barn for Years. The Field mice made there home in two of them. One of those has a bad motherboard that might not be salvagable [Mouse Crap all over it] though I might soak it in warm water come Spring then blow dry and treat with 90% Isoprpyl alcohol but there is bound to be some Corrosion. One is still in the Barn but I plan on bringing it in when it gets WARM and see if I can SWAP the Top W/the CRT onto the one Unit that has a partially working M/B. It lights up my Breakout Box but Shows no Cursor but the tube Dies down to a Spot in the Middle when Turned off. I tried the one from the Bad M/B and it just Buzzed. If anyone is interested in the CRT's let me Know. If I can't get one working I can get something for the Aluminum Casings. But Maybe someone can use the CRT's. They look OK to me but I'm not familiar with SCREEN ROT. Shipping the whole Unit would be just to expensive. Maybe the One M/B is still useable???? Bob in Wisconsin

15 years, 6 months

5
5
0 0

Computer test equipment... Boardwalker 101/103

by pinball＠telus.net

Does anyone here use electronic test gear for repairing these old machines? I am trying to hunt down information (manuals, schematics, ROM images) on a device made by Micro Circuits called Boardwalker - models 101 or 103. The group of techs I keep up with have tracked down a few sets of ROM images (up to V2.50, Library V1.60), but no one has found a manual - so far. The device is handy in that it can test TTL and Eproms (up to 24 pin devices) in circuit by comparison to the built in library and it appears that you can add to the library too... Thanks! John :-#)# PS - if anyone is interested in electronic service tools I've included the link to the tech tools mail list & FTP site below -- How to subscribe or unsubscribe from TTL: http://seven.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/techtoolslist FTP site is: ftp://ftp.flippers.com/TTL/TestEquipment Archive: http://www.vectorlist.org/

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

ENIAC ....

by evan＠snarc.net

Hi all -- Obviously no one here "collects" the ENIAC, but it's certainly old enough to be on-topic. :) Having said that, here is a new site devoted to ENIAC -- www.the-eniac.com -- the six orange links up top are packed solid with useful information. Disclosure: it's NOT my site, but I was involved in its creation.

15 years, 6 months

27
132
0 0

OT: american vs european 220

by john_finigan＠yahoo.com

Chuck Guzis wrote: > Another artifact of earlier days in US industrial applications is > 55/110/220/440V 25 Hz distribution. The power transformers are huge > and the "hum" is more of a "rattle". Here in New Orleans, I am pretty sure that we still have 25 Hz drainage pumps in service, generated by a dedicated natural gas plant. Some of them may have been destroyed in Katrina, but searching around, I found some post-2005 news articles referencing the system. Apparently it relies on 60 Hz power for natural gas pumps, so it's still dependent on the local utility. The pumps seem to date back to 1920 or so. I don't know if the NYC subway system still uses any 25 Hz power or not. According to the book "New York's Forgotten Substations" they still had a few 25 Hz to DC synchronous rotary converters in operation as late as 1999! It would be unsurprising if they kept some of the 25 Hz system in place, feeding solid state rectifiers, but I don't know if they did. The power plant in Mechanicville, NY apparently still uses motor generator sets to convert its 40 Hz power to 60 Hz power they can sell. The plant is mentioned in a couple of IEEE articles, just search Mechanicville 40 Hz. Personally I think this is more amazing than our 25 Hz pumps. John Finigan

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

Because it's there: 5 operating systems running on a IIfx (at the same time)

by derschjo＠mail.msu.edu

A random thought popped into my head this evening, and having nothing better to do (well, ok, I have quite a few things better to do to be honest) I decided to go with the impulse. The idea? I have a number of nubus Mac coprocessors and accelerators, amongst them: - An Orange386 PC coprocessor (16Mhz 80386, 4MB ram, CGA graphics) - A Radius Rocket Stage II (Basically a Quadra on a 12" nubus card, complete with 40Mhz CPU and 32mb of RAM) - A Symbolics MacIvory III (The coolest coprocessor ever -- a lisp machine on a card!) Could I run these all at the same time in my trusty Macintosh IIfx? The answer: Yes. (warning, 1600x1200 image): http://yahozna.dyndns.org/scratch/random/5OS.png That's a 40Mhz 68030 IIfx running System 7.6.1, the Radius Rocket running System 7.1, the Orange386 running DOS 5.0, the MacIvory running Genera 8.3, and just for good measure the IIfx is also running Tenon's MachTEN (BSD 4.3 running as a Mac OS process). I didn't leave it running like that for very long, as it's probably more than a bit stressful on the poor IIfx's power supply. But I just had to try it, thought you guys might get a kick out of it... - Josh

15 years, 6 months

5
7
0 0

XT-IDE PCBs have arrived

by lynchaj＠yahoo.com

Hi! The next batch of XT-IDE PCBs have arrived! If you were waiting please contact me at LYNCHAJ at YAHOO.COM http://wiki.vintage-computer.com/index.php/XTIDE_project Thanks and have a nice day! Andrew Lynch

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

OT: american vs european 220

by dm561＠torfree.net

> Date: Tue, 1 Feb 2011 12:22:11 +0100 (CET) > From: Christian Corti <cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de> > Subject: Re: OT: american vs european 220 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > Message-ID: <alpine.DEB.2.00.1102011217160.10259 at linuxserv.home> > Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed > > On Mon, 31 Jan 2011, Tony Duell wrote: >> Taht wouldn't work in Europe (since the 2 sides of the 230V mains are not >> balanced about ground), and anyway AFAIK making the protecive ground wire >> carry any current under normal conditions is totally forbidden. > > In new installations, maybe. But many older houses have just that, they > use the neutral wire as protective ground (called "klassische Nullung" or > TN-C system as opposed to a TN-C-S system, see > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earthing_system) > > Christian ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- And in some places they still have the single wire distribution systems where the 'real' earth/ground is the return: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single-wire_earth_return

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

CDC/MPI Wren II HH (94205-51) drive manual

by dm561＠torfree.net

---------------Original Message: Date: Mon, 24 Jan 2011 11:39:41 -0800 From: "Chuck Guzis" <cclist at sydex.com> Subject: Re: CDC/MPI Wren II HH (94205-51) drive manual To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <4D3D64FD.13298.6DC0FC at cclist.sydex.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII On 24 Jan 2011 at 10:09, Chuck Guzis wrote: > I have a Wren II manual, but not sure about the interface. I'll check > later today. I'll be darned--I found it. 77738035, Rev. H, April 1986. "This OEM Manual 77738035 provides the basic information and instructions for installing and operating Control Data WREN II Disk Drives; Models 94151, 94155 and 94156. It also provides information to aid in servicing those parts of the drive external to the sealed enclosure." Do you want me to scan and forward the whole thing to you? It's not terribly long, only about 40 pages. Or was there something specific that you were interested in? --Chuck -------------------Reply: I've got the Product Specification Manual (77715909-C, May/85, 61pp) for that CDC506 (ST506) 94155 series (and an opened drive as a piece of "art" beside my desk), but those are FH drives so I don't know how relevant it'd be.

15 years, 6 months

6
24
0 0

VT240A vs. VT240B

by legalize＠xmission.com

What's the difference? -- "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, 6 months

10
17
0 0

ADM3a screen rot again...

by jdr_use＠bluewin.ch

Had another ADM3a come in, again with severe screen rot. Unlike the first time i now have successfully separated the faceplate from the CRT. Question is of course how to get it back on again. Anybody successfully done this ? I know screenrot has come up often here, but I do not believe someone presented a working solution yet. Jos Dreesen

15 years, 6 months

9
11
0 0

Kryoflux folks need help

by silent700＠gmail.com

Seems they are willing to implement software support for hard-sectored 5.25" disk formats if someone can provide them with some known-good examples to work with. Preferably in the UK: http://forum.kryoflux.com/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=117 -- jht

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

Any error correction gurus in the audience?

by classiccmp＠philpem.me.uk

Hi guys, As the subject says: are there any EDC/ECC code experts hanging around on the list? I'm working on implementing the 4-byte (32-bit) ECC code Western Digital used on the WD2010 Winchester HDD Controller IC. This appears to be an implementation of the ECC scheme explained in section 7.6 of National Semiconductor's "Disk Interface Design Guide and User's Manual" (appnote AN-413). It looks like the ECC scheme is based on running a CRC forwards over the data to produce a 32-bit CRC, which is used to validate the data in the same way the 16-bit CRC validates the IDAM. Error correction apparently operates by running the CRC in reverse using an "inverse polynomial". I can't see how this could work -- isn't a CRC by its very nature a one-way operation? The application note calls this a "Glover 140A0443" code, but doesn't bother to reference any papers, books or similar on the subject. There's an example on how to program NSC's controller chips to use the code, but nothing on the mathematical background behind it. For instance: how does it work, and why is the maximum correctable error burst 5 bits long? Does anyone recognise this polynomial? x^32 + x^28 + x^26 + x^19 + x^17 + x^10 + x^6 + x^2 + 1 aka. x^32 + x^28 + x^26 + x^19 + x^17 + x^10 + x^6 + x^2 + x^0 or: 0x140A0443 It's not a standard CRC32 polynomial (according to Das Wiki), and I don't *think* it's a Fire code... though I've been looking for the original paper on those (P. Fire, "A class of multiple-error-correcting binary codes for non-independent errors". Sylvania Reports RSL-E-2, Sylvania Reconnaissance Systems, Mountain View, California, 1959) and haven't had any success -- a few hits on Citeseer, but it appears all copies of the paper have vanished into thin air. What I'd really like to find out is more about how this algorithm works... a model implementation (e.g. in C, Python or similar) would be extremely useful, but at this point even a basic worked example ("here's a chunk of data, now watch what happens if we flip some bits, and here's how we fix it") would be extremely useful... Thanks, -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

15 years, 6 months

3
3
0 0

High-Speed Computing Devices in 1950

by swtpc6800＠comcast.net

"High-Speed Computing Devices" is a report on the state of computing machines in the US that was published in 1950. I have first edition copy but it is also available on the Internet Archive. http://www.archive.org/details/HighSpeedComputingDevices My favorite part is "Table 10-1, Large-Scale Digital Computing-Machine Projects in the United States." It lists all nine operational machines with eleven more under construction. (Pages 214 and 215, the DJVU file is offset 14 pages so this starts on page 228.) The description of the ENIAC starts on page 194. The book describes the computing circuitry in detail. You can build your own accumulator with a handful of vacuum tubes. Michael Holley

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

need Num Lock keycap for IBM Model M

by rescue＠hawkmountain.net

Anyone have a dead model M or some keycaps around. I rescued this one from a recycle pile and it works fine.... a few key caps were off it and I found them, but missed the fact the num lock cap was missing, and now the pile has been hauled off.... so no looking for it now. Let me know if you have a Num Lock key cap. -- Curt

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

ANN: DiscFerret speaks ST506!

by classiccmp＠philpem.me.uk

Hi guys... I've just this second got my DiscFerret talking to an ST506 hard drive. Specifically, a Control Data / Magnetic Peripherals 94205-51 "Wren IIHH", apparently also known as the Seagate ST253. 989 cylinders, 5 heads, 17 sectors. It also seems to bear an uncanny shape-and-weight resemblance to a breezeblock... But anyway, I digress. First, the pretty pictures: Linear histogram: http://www.discferret.com/temp/st506/dat.lin_histogram.png Logarithmic histogram: http://www.discferret.com/temp/st506/dat.log_histogram.png Scatter graph: http://www.discferret.com/temp/st506/dat.scatter.png The log-histogram shows a very distinctive MFM timing pattern (three peaks at 1T, 1.5T and 2T), and the scatter-graph shows that the timing data is split into 17 distinctive segments: the sectors. So what's the catch? 1) The DiscFerret PSU doesn't have enough grunt to run a Winchester drive (or at least a 5.25 half-height like the Wren) and a 3.5in floppy drive at the same time. This is an academic point, because you need an adapter board to hook the 'Ferret up to the ST506 drive, and you can't have both a floppy drive and the adapter plugged in at the same time. 2) I haven't got the software decoder working. Yet. I need to play with the sync-word scanner -- the WD2010 controller chip does strange things to the IDENT flag byte. Adding a few don't-care bits to the mask and implementing a 16bit CRC should sort this out. The data looks good, but I can't prove it until I make MagScan read it. I've made a few modifications to the Microcode too: - The acquisition and RAM Write clocks have been increased to 100MHz. This provides a bit more timing resolution, and makes it a little easier to convert from a timing count to an absolute time (especially if you're reading a timing histogram and don't have a calculator). - The data separator has been partly re-implemented. I've ditched the shift-register counter in the DPLL and replaced it with a parameterised binary counter. Now the sync-word detector can run from almost any reasonable input clock rate. I've got it running at 40MHz at the moment (it used to run at 32MHz). - A FIFO has been added between the data sources (acquisition module and parallel port) and the memory write controller. I did this because there was a risk that a timing value could be lost if a transition occurred within 5 or 6 clocks of a RAM write (the previous transition, or a counter overflow). Still to do: - Make the current acquisition abort if the FIFO overflows - Decouple the acquisition and memory-write clocks. The RAM has a 10ns access time (i.e. 100MHz), and I'd like to see if the acquisition engine can be made to go faster. This should work as long as it doesn't get hit with more than 256 fast transitions in a burst... The DPLL change came about because the FPGA I'm using only allows the on-chip PLLs to be driven from a global clock input, and only one PLL can use the GCK. So for each PLL you want to use, you have to provide a separate GCK... This is a fairly easy board tweak (you bridge two pins on the FPGA with wire or solder), but it'll break backwards compatibility... :( So a good day was had by all, it seems :) The new Microcode is in the usual place (the Mercurial repository). I'll push a compiled version into the Firmware repository in the next couple of minutes. Thanks, -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/

15 years, 6 months

4
4
0 0

RA70 use with the OCP / Operator Control Panel

by glen.slick＠gmail.com

On Sat, Jan 29, 2011 at 12:45 PM, Michael Thompson <michael.99.thompson at gmail.com> wrote: > I pulled two RA70 disks from a pair of VAX-3500s that I have. By some > miracle both drives spin up and go ready when the Operator Control > Panel is connected. I was thinking that one of these drives would work > nicely with the UDA50 disk controller in the 11/44 until I can get the > RA81s sorted out. > > These drives are supposed to work with the Operator Control Panel. > There is a button on the back of the drive that says Unit Number > Accept. I pushed the button both before and after power up, but the > RA70 does not spin up. > > Anyone have a manual for this drive or know how to get it work without > connecting an OCP? I have used RA7x drives with a KDA50 (M7164 / M7165) without an OCP attached to the drives. It has been a while now. I don't remember there being anything tricky about getting it to work. I was probably using either an RA72 or RA73. I'll have to look and see if I have an RA70 to try. I don't remember if I ever found any RA7x drive manuals other than this one on the net, which doesn't have all that much useful information: RA7x/SA7x Pocket Reference Guide, Order Number EK-RSA7X-PG-002 -Glen

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

RA81 Disks Will Not Spin up at the RICM.

by michael.99.thompson＠gmail.com

So far we have tried 5 RA81 and 1 RA80 disk at the RICM. They all have the same symptom, when you push the RUN button. The drive starts to spin up for just a few seconds, then stops and lights the FAULT light. We ran diags on one of the drives. The details are here: https://sites.google.com/site/ricmwarehouse/Home/equipment/dec-pdp-1144/pdp… We made sure that the heads were unlocked and the drive belt was engauged. Debug suggestions would be appreciated. -- Michael Thompson

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

Need RL02 Controller for PDP-11/44 Restoration

by michael.99.thompson＠gmail.com

I pulled two RA70 disks from a pair of VAX-3500s that I have. By some miracle both drives spin up and go ready when the Operator Control Panel is connected. I was thinking that one of these drives would work nicely with the UDA50 disk controller in the 11/44 until I can get the RA81s sorted out. These drives are supposed to work with the Operator Control Panel. There is a button on the back of the drive that says Unit Number Accept. I pushed the button both before and after power up, but the RA70 does not spin up. Anyone have a manual for this drive or know how to get it work without connecting an OCP? -- Michael Thompson

15 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

Most used toys, was Re: The late, great TRS-80

by thollowell＠designdata.com

Hey Peter, Do you still have your MV7800? If so, do you want to sell it? Thanks, Tom

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

Need RL02 Controller for PDP-11/44 Restoration

by michael.99.thompson＠gmail.com

I am reassembling a PDP-11/44 from parts for the Rhode Island Computer Museum. I would like to try an RL01 or RL02 drive on the system, but we don't have another RL02 controller. Do any of you have a M7762 RL11 disk controller board that you could donate or sell inexpensively for this project? The RA81s won't spin up, so I suspect that I need to replace the starting capacitors. Do any of you know where to get replacement starting capacitors for the RA80 or RA81 drives? Details on the project are here: https://sites.google.com/site/ricmwarehouse/Home/equipment/dec-pdp-1144 -- Michael Thompson

15 years, 6 months

7
7
0 0

Usenet

by jhfinedp3k＠compsys.to

I assume that a few of the list members still follow specific Usenet sites. A few days ago, I became aware of an additional free server for many TEXT ONLY sites. I don't want to flood them with subscriptions, so if you are a list member send me a post privately. At present, I subscribe to 2 such servers. At least one, probably both, accept posts via the Netscape browser under W98 SE which is what I use. I can't vouch for anything else, but likely IE is also acceptable. Jerome Fine

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

FS: 1200 baud external modem

by charlesmorris800＠centurytel.net

FS: one "BSR 1207" external modem. New in the (very old) box. I assume it's 1200 baud. Runs on 120 vac. Can send pic to interested parties. $4.99 plus shipping (probably around $3-4, it's light) >from US zip 65775. There's one on that auction place right now 220714815493 for the same price, but he wants $16 shipping! thanks Charles

15 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

OT: step down voltage converters (part deux)

by brianlanning＠gmail.com

Can some of you EE types talk about the (in)efficiency of stepdown transformers? Like say a 2000 watt 220 to 110 transformer. How bad are they? brian

15 years, 6 months

5
4
0 0

MC14500 / was Re: ENIAC ....

by shoppa＠trailing-edge.com

Brent asks: > Are there any known examples of real-world products or equipment that > used the 14500 ? > (Leaving aside evaluation boards & such.) I've seen it used in railway interlocking control panels and HVAC applications from the early 80's... places where PDP-14's had previously been used and it's pretty obvious the design was done from ladder logic principles. Interestingly, a certain generation of GRS interlocking control panels used PC boards and backplanes exactly matching the format of quad-height DEC modules. I never traced out the backplane wiring but at first glance it was nothing like Q-bus or Omnibus. > I had the impression of it as a bit of a stillborn product, like the > Fairchild CMOS Macrologic series (34700/4700 ICs), of limited > cost-effectiveness or benefit by the time it was introduced. There were many bitslice families out there that never saw wide use or maybe only existed in databooks. After the 2901 everyone tried to jump in. The MC14500B at least was obviously not a 2901 clone :-) Tim.

15 years, 7 months

3
2
0 0

Data I/O Unipak 2B ?

by scanning.cc＠gmail.com

I just bought a Data I/O 29B with an Unipak 2B from Epay. Everything seems okay BUT the pinout cartridge ( the little module that plugs in the end of the 2B ) is missing. I suspect that all it has is some kind of simple interlock like two pins tied together to tell the Data I/O the cartridge is there ( probably so you can't run the unit with that HAZARDOUS 20 volts on the open connector. Anybody know how to get around this or fake it ? The unit won't do squat without it.... Have not been able to find a schematic of the 2B or the pinout cartridge. Thanks. Best regards, Steven

15 years, 7 months

53
215
0 0

The Ultimate Computer

by trebor77＠execpc.com

Imaging an Alien Being totally non-Physical but infinite in Nature capable of Computing. Aren't our Brains Computers of a sort.??? They take in Inputs from all the Parts of our bodies. Process that information and act on it. Producing Output to our Optical Part of our "BRAIN" in response to sensory Input from our Optical Sensors ;"EYES",? If we see Food we eat it if we are "HUNGRY". The same can be said for all of Nature. It reacts to Sensory Input and outputs a Response. Birds can sense the Magnetic Field of the Earth and Guide themselves accordingly They also can sense the Position of the Stars and Navigate from them. The Monarch Butterfly must have a Built in Programmable ROM as when One generation flies South to Mexico in the Fall the same Individual does not make the Return trip but instead Produces Offspring along the way but those Offspring find there way back to there "HOME" Port unfailingly as does the Fingerling Salmon who traveled down the Columbia River. In Essence every thing that "MAN" has Discovered or Invented already existed in the Natural World in some Form or the Other "Food For Thought" Now theres a handy "Thought" And in closing "All Computers Need a Programmer" even a light switch. Pair up 3 and you have a "3-Way Circuit" which when activated turns on the Appropriate light. I even had a Four Way installed in my Basement. I Just added an "X" Crossover in the Circuit at the bottom of the Stairs. Works great. Turn it ON at the Top of the Stairs and you can either Turn it OFF at the Bottom or Turn it OFF over by the Sink in the Laundry Room then turn it back ON from the Bottom of the stairs for the return trip. If one used Motion Sensing Switches then One would not have to even Streach out his Hand to flip the switch. Start with 256 Switches and a Diode Matrix and you have the Makings for a Home Brew Computer. Just add circuits to each Output of the Matrix and you can control up to 255 Devices. CRUDE but effective. Replace the Devices with Logic Circuits and before you know it your Computing. Now that's Computing.

15 years, 7 months

2
1
0 0

How many ICs does it take to put a man on the moon

by shoppa＠trailing-edge.com

Brent mentions Atwood saying: > The question about the moon landing is why haven?t we been back. > And it was done in an age where computers were as big as a couple of rooms. > If you even look at the Space Odyssey 2001 HAL the computer, and I think > that movie came out in the late 60s, HAL the computer is huge. > We didn?t yet have microchips. So I just wonder, how did they do that? > Why they haven?t done it again if it was so easy? My day job is a computer that has a $10 Billion (1980's dollars) peripheral. In other words the computer isn't the end goal :-). To think that the computer is the peripheral, sometimes trips up even the senior execs. Really the computer only exists to help the peripheral :-). Getting back to Atwood's babbling, I don't remember JFK promising to land a computer on the moon by the end of the decade. And BTW, we have sent computers to the moon, and landed them on Mars, many times since then, all in the goal of space science, not in the goal of sending computers there :-) Tim.

15 years, 7 months

1
0
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