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

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: Halted > From: Fred Cisin <cisin at xenosoft.com> > Date: Fri, 27 Feb 2009 15:21:58 -0800 (PST) > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >> > They died a really long time ago, probably by 1983. I grew up in >> > Wakefield, MA and remember them well. I used to raid their dumpster and >> > those around them. > >On Fri, 27 Feb 2009, Chuck Guzis wrote: >> Poly Paks actually had something left after sending their stuff out >> to put in a dumpster? The mind boggles! :) > >What would Poly Paks reject? Only totally nonfunctional parts without any metals value. Allison

17 years, 6 months

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UNIX for the VAXstation or AlphaStation

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: UNIX for the VAXstation or AlphaStation > From: "Zane H. Healy" <healyzh at aracnet.com> > Date: Fri, 27 Feb 2009 20:47:24 -0800 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >At 10:54 PM -0500 2/27/09, John Floren wrote: >>So, I've got both a VAXstation 4000-60 and an AlphaStation 250 here >>and after playing with it for a bit I've decided I don't really care >>for VMS so much that I want it on both of them. I'd like to find an >>interesting, preferably AT&T-style UNIX to run on one of them, so I'm >>hoping some of you can help me figure out my options. So far, I know I >>can run: >>-NetBSD >>-Probably some DEC/HP UNIXes (Tru64 on the Alpha?). >> >>I'd really appreciate perspectives on these different systems, >>user/admin experience, etc. I'm not looking to accomplish anything in >>particular here, I just want something to play around with on my DEC >>hardware while I wait for the PDP-11 :) > >UNIX is a waste of good DEC hardware! :-) DEC never sold a UNIX >variant that would run on a VAXstation 4000/60. I think NetBSD and >OpenBSD will both run on it. I'll confess that OpenBSD at least used >to rock on Alpha and can handle a machine with less RAM than OpenVMS >expects. Your choice of OS's are a lot wider for the Alpha. DEC sold Ultrix32 (unix BSD flavor) and it was installable on most VAXen. I have 4.2 running on a UVAX2000. >As for a PDP-11, I recommend RT-11, RSTS/E, or RSX-11M+, not UNIX. For low end PDP11 Unix up to V7 runs. If you have one of the I&D machines (11/44, or any of the J-11 cpus) then BSD2.11 is interesting. >For UNIX get a Sun or SGI system, in other words cool hardware that >only runs UNIX. I did buy a nice DECstation 5000/133 (a MIPS box) >years ago to run NetBSD. I wonder what happened to that machine... > All the DEC mips machines run unix (ultrix). Or find an Alpha and run true64. Allison >Zane > > >-- >| Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator | >| healyzh at aracnet.com (primary) | OpenVMS Enthusiast | >| MONK::HEALYZH (DECnet) | Classic Computer Collector | >+----------------------------------+----------------------------+ >| Empire of the Petal Throne and Traveller Role Playing, | >| PDP-10 Emulation and Zane's Computer Museum. | >| http://www.aracnet.com/~healyzh/ |

17 years, 6 months

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Another classic-computer 'test'

by ard＠p850ug1.demon.co.uk

This one did the rounds of a system I was on aout 20 years ago. Some of the questions are certainly classic-cmputer related... Enjoy.. -tony ---------------------------- ARD's Hacker Test. To remove the somewhat IBM and UNIX bias from the original Hackers test, here is one which is either non-biased, or DEC biased. Computer Usage -------------- 000000) Have you ever used a _dedicated_ computerised control system? (e.g. the syscon processor in a VCR, so having used a video would count here ) 000001) Have you ever used a computer (general-purpose programmable) 000002) ... For more than 30(8) Hours continuously 000003) Have you ever programmed a computer 000004) ...In assembler 000005) ...In machine code (binary/octal/decimal/hex/whatever) 000006) Has you use of computers ever caused you to miss an important event 000007) Do you work the hours 9-5? 000010) Are they the ones at night? Hardware -------- 000011) Have you ever built a computer 000012) Have you ever designed a computer 000013) ... 16 bit or more 000014) ... 32 bit (or more) 000015) Have you ever repaired a microcomputer 000016) Have you ever repaired a minicomputer 000017) Have you ever debugged an item of computer hardware with minimal test equipment (e.g. LED and resistor, Battery tester) 000020) Did that item contain >100 ic's, and have a logic fault 000021) Have you ever repaired a printer 000022) .... A laser printer 000023) .... A hard disk (demountable or winchester) 000024) .... A floppy disk 000025) .... A paper-tape punch/reader 000026) .... A card punch/reader Can you use : 000027) A logic probe 000030) A logic pulser 000031) A protocol analyser 000032) A manufacturer's maintenance unit (KM11 or whatever) 000033) Have you ever wire-wrapped a board or backplane 000034) .... Did it work first time? 000035) Ever found an undocumented feature in a piece of hardware? 000036) ... Did you exploit it? 000037) Did you complain when later versions/clones didn't have it? 000040) Ever written microcode? 000041) Ever reverse-engineered microcode? 000042) .... Did you find any undocumented features? 000043) .... Did you find any bugs? 000044) Ever linked 2 devices that were claimed to be incompatible 000045) ....Did it work? 000046) Have you ever voided the warranty on a piece of hardware 000047) ...Ever not (owned a piece of hardware for >30mins without voiding the warranty?) 000050) Can you wire an RS232 cable? 000051) ... And get it right first time? Operating systems ----------------- Which of the following OS's have you used: 000052) RT-11 000053) RSX (MCR) 000054) RSX (DCL) 000055) RSTS-E 000056) OS-8 000057) OS-9 000060) MS-DOS 000061) LDOS 000062) UCSD P-system 000063) Unix (Any version) 000064) VM/CMS 000065) MVS or TSO 000066) VMS 000067) TRS-DOS (any version <6.0. versions 6.0 and higher are LDOS!) 000070) CP/M 80 000071) CP/M 86 000072) CP/M 68 000073) Tripos 000074) XtalDOS 000075) XXDP+ 000076) Have you ever sysgened a Operating System (Note, the CPM sysgen program doesn't count, writing/hacking the CBIOS does) 000077) have you ever written a device driver? 000100) ... For a piece of you own-design hardware? 000101) Have you ever found an undocumented feature in an Operating system? 000102) ... Did you use it? 000103) ... Did you abuse it? Micros ------ Which of the following assemblers/machine codes do you know? 000104) 6502 000105) Z80 000106) Z8 000107) Saturn 000110) 6800 000111) 6809 000112) 8080 000113) 8085 000114) 680x0 000115) 80x86 000116) 1802 000117) SC/MP 000120) 32016 (or similar nat/semi processor) 000121) LSI-11 000122) Have you ever cracked a copy-protection scheme? 000123) .... Or created one? 000124) Have you ever created your own disk format? 000125) Have you ever read a disk for one machine on an incompatible machine 000126) ... with your own program? Calculators ------------ 000127) Do you own a programmable calculator? 000130) ... Is it RPN 000131) .....Is it RPL? 000132) Have you ever programmed a calculator in machine code? 000133) Have you ever found an undocumented command on a calculator? 000134) Have you ever logged on to a larger machine from your calculator 000135) Have you ever logged on to your calculator from a larger machine 000136) Have you ever written a significant application program for a pocket calculator 000137) Do you own a desktop calculator 000140) ... Is it mechanical (Monroematic etc)? 000141) ... Does it use core memory? 000142) Can you divide on a monroe, or similar machine? 000143) Have you ever built a peripheral device for a pocket calculator? 000144) Have you ever reverse-engineered the ROMs of a calculator? 000145) Have you ever met the designer of your calculator? Minicomputers ------------- 000146) Have you ever installed a minicomputer 000147) Have you ever upgraded/expanded a minicomputer using ready-made modules or peripherals? 000150) Have you ever annoyed the manufacturer of a minicomputer by making it out-perform the next model up in the range? 000151) Have you ever toggled in the bootstrap code for a minicomputer? 000152) ... For more than 1 type of machine? 000153) Have you ever toggled in a program for a minicomputer other than the bootstrap loader? 000154) Have you ever used a minicomputer other than one made by DEC or IBM? 000155) Have you ever mounted a disk pack? 000156) Or a magtape? 000157) Have you ever used paper tape 000160) Have you ever edited paper tape 000161) Can you read paper tape by eye? 000162) Have you ever used punched cards? 000163) Can you read punched cards by eye? 000164) Have you ever used a hand-punch (one of those with 12 keys - one for each row)? 000165) Have you ever seen/heard a disk crash? 000166) Have you ever rebuilt a crashed drive? 000167) Have you ever watched the flashing lights on a front-panel? 000170) ...for more than 1 hour? D.E.C. ------ 000171) Can you name and describe at least 4 models of PDP11? Can you identify the following (assume someone gave you a board. Could you work out what it is)? 000172) An SPC board 000173) A dual-height UNIBUS peripheral 000174) A MUD board 000175) A Q-Bus peripheral (Dual Height) 000176) A Q-bus peripheral using CD interconnect 000177) A Quad-Height Q-BUS board 000200) Can you tell an RL01 pack from an RL02 pack? 000201) ... At 20 feet? Can you expand these acronyms? 000202) SPC 000203) ODT 000204) RSX 000205) PDP 000206) PDT 000207) VAX What sort of device would your data be on if it's name was : (Ignore logical devices!) 000210) DX0: 000211) PP: 000212) DL0: 000213) DM0: 000214) CR: 000215) DD: 000216) PD: Can you identify these DEC boards? 000217) M7821 000220) M8100 000221) M7800 Can you find DCL equivalents for : 000222) PIP DM1:[*,*]*.MAC;*/LI 000223) SET /cli=tt3:dcl Can you find MCR equivalents for 000224) DEL DL3:[1,4]TEMP.TXT 000225) show queue Languages/Application software ------------------------------ Which of the following languages do you know? 000226) PL/M 000227) Lisp 000230) RPL 000231) FORTH 000232) APL 000233) ... Have you ever used an APL terminal? 000234) PL/Z 000235) Occam 000236) Postscript Which of the following have you written? 000237) Language Compiler 000240) Language Interpreter 000241) Assembler 000242) Disassembler 000243) Monitor (Rom preferably) 000244) Editor/Text processor 000245) Spreadsheet 000246) Database 000247) Data Aquisition system 000250) Real-time control system 000251) Have you ever found a bug in a commercial program? 000252) Do you never comment code? 000253) Do you prefer to find commands by disassembling the program, rather than reading the manual? 000254) Do you edit your programs by patching the Binary? 000255) Is TECO your favourite editor? General ------- There now follow a mixed lot of questions to test your knowledge of some of the obscure bits of computing and to see just how mad you are. 000256) Have you ever sent e-mail 000257) ... Internationally 000260) ... Between 2 sites in the same country, but going through a second country 000261) Do you read USEnet News? 000262) Do you post to USEnet News? 000263) Have you ever had a program of yours distributed by a mail-server? 000264) Do you prefer meeting computers to meeting people? 000265) Do you count on your fingers in Binary? 000266) Do you own a talking door? 000267) Have you ever logged on to a talking door? 000270) Do you know the ASCII code table? 000271) ... In Octal? 000272) Do you use 8" disks? 000273) ... Do you carry them in your pocket? 000274) Do you own a computer? 000275) ...more than 4? 000276) ...more than 10(8)? 000277) ...more than 40(8)? 000300) Have you ever eaten a floppy disk? 000301) ...paper tape? 000302) ...Punched cards? 000303) Do you carry a computer (or advanced pocket calculator) around with you? 000304) Do/Did you take your lecture notes on a computer? 000305) Do you know more computer phone numbers than people's phone numbers? 000306) Do you use VMS phone, Broadcast or similar to communicate with the chap sitting next to you? 000307) Have you ever transmitted software on an IR beam? 000310) Are you a member of a User Group? 000311) ...Have you founded a user group? 000312) Is your first question on meeting a person 'What computer do you use?'? 000313) Do you think that a mouse is 'a filthy creature that squeaks and spreads disease'? 000314) Do you wish your brain had an RS232 port? 000315) Do you wish that 'Caps lock' keys were remote controllable? 000316) Can you expand the expression 'FUBAR'? 000317) ...SNAFU? 000320) ...RYFM? 000321) Do you have a collection of old bits of computer? 000322) Do you have core memory? 000323) ... Delay line memory? 000324) ... Demountable hard disk? 000325) ... High-speed paper tape? 000326) Does your brain ever crash? 000327) ... Get interrupt-bound? 000330) ... Loose context? 000331) Have you ever repaired a teletype? 000332) Have you ever removed that screw in the ASR33 that causes various bits to become airborne? 000333) ...Did you get them back together again? 000334) Do you type random commands 'just to see what happens'? 000335) ... In TECO? 000336) Have you ever cut a computer in half? 000337) Did it work afterwards? 000340) Have you ever aligned a floppy disk head? 000341) ...A hard disk head? 000342) ...A print head? 000343) Do you have any line printer pictures (TTYpics)? 000344) Do you draw circuit diagrams as TTYpics? 000345) ... Do you then submit them to USEnet News? 000346) Do you know any computer jokes? 000347) Do you have to explain them to people? 000350) Do you know about (DEC) flip-chip? 000351) Have you ever used flip-chip? 000352) On what machine is 207F the opcode for HALT? 000353) Where would you use synthetic programming? 000354) Do you own the circuit diagrams of your computer? 000355) ...The Microcode source? 000356) ...The OS source? 000357) ...The diagnostic source? 000360) Have you ever found bugs in any of the above? 000361) Have you ever punched dot-matrix characters on paper tape (or cards)? 000362) ... Have you projected the image with an OHP? 000363) Have you used/do you own a vector graphics unit? 000364) If asked 'Do you want <A> or <B>?' do you often reply 'Yes'? 000365) Can you write a (mathematical) routine quicker than it takes to find the documentation, and understand it, for the one in the standard library? 000366) Have you ever named your computer? 000367) In what number system does: 1+1=110 and 110+110=100? 000370) Do you ever build hardware just to get round the need of writing a program? 000371) Do you write 'Do Not fold,spindle or mutilate' on items to be sent by snail-mail 000372) Do you wish to be buried 'Face down, nine edge first'? 000373) Do you ever 'push buttons, just to see what happens'? 000374) Have you ever filled a printer with water? 000375) ... Did it work better at the end? 000376) Have you ever run a multi-user machine? 000377) Do you have a collection of computer trivia (e.g. Nutworks). Scoring. ------- Count 1 point for each yes, or question answered correctly. If your score is between: You are: 000000 and 000010 Naive User 000011 and 000040 User 000041 and 000100 Hacker 000101 and 000200 Sage 000201 and 000300 Guru 000301 and 000377 Wizard

17 years, 6 months

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DEC AXP 3000/800 Parts Available (UK)

by mark＠wickensonline.co.uk

Hi List, I have a DEC 3000/800 AXP that I've not been able to get working fully, so I'm providing the opportunity for parts before the rest goes for recycling. The box was complete, and has the following items of note: Motherboard Processor I/O board Power supply (good output rails) 3.3V VRM Module All wiring Harnesses Audio IO support board with diagnostics seven segment displays. Memory carriers (I'm keeping the memory as it's compatible with the 3000/600 I have) Fans It was complete, so anything that you might expect can be supplied. All I'm asking is the cost of postage, paid via paypal or cheque. Clearly there is an issue with the box as it stands that I've not been able to isolate, which would point to either the I/O board or the motherboard, but you might get lucky with either. Please contact me off list. Regards, Mark.

17 years, 6 months

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5.25" drives free for shipping from austin, tx

by frustum＠pacbell.net

I found a box of drives that I had been given years ago and had forgotten about. All are used and pulled from working systems (TRS-80s mostly). All have black face plates. half height: TEAC FD-55FV-35-U (80 track, 720KB) Matsushita SA455 (40 trk, ds) yes I know sa455 is a shugart designation, but that is what the label says Toshiba (40 track, ds) (part of the label is missing) ... 02 REV A Mitsubishi M4854 double sided; web search says "1.2MB" Mitsubishi M4854 double sided; web search says "1.2MB" Shugart SA465 "720K 5.25 Double Sided, Quad Density" written in pencil: "OK 4-90" full height: tandon, relabeled "texas perhipherals" type unknown, but probably 40 track, ss tandon tm100-1A (ss, 40 trk, 180K), bezel says "MTI 140 / MOD III PLUS" MPI Model 52 This might be crap; there is a hand written note on the side, written in sharpie, saying "Head #1 read only" Request one, any combination, or all. Local pickup gets priority. Otherwise, if there are multiple requests for the same drive, the random number generator of a Wang 2200 will decide the winner. I reserve the right to skew the results to minimize the number of boxes I need to ship. None of these drives have protective cardboard inserts. The drives will be bubble wrapped for shipment.

17 years, 6 months

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(Montreal) DEC and Sun junk, Dell workstation, personal request

by alexandre.laguejacques＠gmail.com

Hello all, Five items for local pickup that may interest the members of the list. The first three items are basically junk and will be thrown out because I'm moving. The parts may be useful to someone. Everything is free except the last item. 1. DEC AlphaServer 1000A Fans turn but no boot. Had already asked here for advice but can't seem to fix it. May be a power supply issue but can't find a replacement at a reasonable price. Includes memory (appears good), PCI ethernet card, video card. 2. Sun GDM-1604-15 Fixed frequency colour monitor, 4xBNC input. Missing pedestal. Works but there is no vertical control and the image is slightly strechted beyond the top and bottom borders of the screen. Was given to me by a generous list member and has served me well when I need a console on a Sun. 3. DEC LK461-A2 Looks like an English (UK?) layout with a PS/2 connector. Verified PC compatible, but with a VMS layout. Missing both feet at the back. Had bought the French Canadian version on eBay and they sent this instead. Go figure. 4. Linksys EtherFast PC Card PCM100-CA No dongle! Good for old laptops (16 bit PCMCIA). 5. Dell Precision 220 - 100$ Pentium III 733 MHz (single but dual possible), 512 MB (2x256 MB) RDRAM, Matrox dual display card, 9.2 GB Ultra3 60 pin SCSI hard drive, recent Netgear wireless card with Atheros chipset (WG311T), PCI ethernet card. Worked great as a server running FreeBSD. IMHO worth the price alone for the RDRAM and the wireless card. I'll probably post more messages between now and the month of June as I sort through my stuff. ***REQUEST *** If anyone knows a source for a cheap but more modern (and working) Alpha, please drop me a line. I'd also love a VMS compatible Integrity but I'm dreaming. Or some cheap SGI kit. Thanks! - Alex

17 years, 6 months

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FS: DEC H3104 (36-Pin to 8 MMJ ports) -- New, never opened

by eric940＠gmail.com

For USA folks only, sorry... I have 3 of these: DEC H3104 (36-Pin to 8 MMJ ports) They are all new, in factory sealed bubble wrap, never opened (not even for the pictures). All include mounting screws. PHOTOS: http://www.flickr.com/photos/35806042 at N03/ $10 each (includes shipping - will provide tracking number) Please reply off list if interested. -Eric

17 years, 6 months

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Free: IBM 3151 31/41 DEC/IBM terminal emulation cartridge

by eric940＠gmail.com

(USA folks only, please.) IBM 3151 31/41 Cartridge Part number: 94X4114 PICTURE: http://www.flickr.com/photos/35806042 at N03/sets/72157614533585520/ Never used it myself, but apparently emulates IBM & DEC terminals. Found it at my last job. I'm guessing it plugs into an IBM terminal? Doesn't seem to have a standard PCMCIA edge connector. Out of curiosity, I wouldn't mind knowing a bit more about it. Contact me off list, and it's yours free. -Eric

17 years, 6 months

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Antikythera fans

by rdawson16＠hotmail.com

wondering if you guys love this as much as I do. I would like to make a user group/club for it if there is enough interest For myself, I am fully equipped here with machine capability and stage one is to make the model (2005) as currently known. Stage 2 is heck make these in volume, its a marvelous thing and may be profitable. You cannot find a better classic computer than this. Randy Dawson _________________________________________________________________ Access your email online and on the go with Windows Live Hotmail. http://windowslive.com/online/hotmail?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_HM_AE_Access_022009

17 years, 6 months

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SGI 4D/220s

by ball.of.john＠gmail.com

>Just scored a couple SGI 4D/220s from a government auction site. >Anyone have any familiarity with these? Anything I should look out >for besides what's > >Crappy auction pics: <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/vintage/images/4D-220-1.jpg> <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/vintage/images/4D-220-2.jpg> So you bought those twin tower systems. We were all crying over them. Those are Twin Tower 4D systems as you can already see and they are not the most powerful things out there as they are pretty old. They should be able to run Irix 4.0.5 but that is it and I don't know much about Irix software older than version 5.3 so you better hope that there are some GL demos installed. In all honesty I recommend you go talk to the folks over at http://www.nekochan.net as they are the last people on the net really to tame these old beasts. I also recommend http://www.martnet.com/~bobd/sgi/4dfaq.html as it contains a nice FAQ and tells you how to make a serial terminal cable adapter which is essential for any SGI system. John.

17 years, 6 months

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Powering up a 20-year old MicroVAX II

by robert.jarratt＠ntlworld.com

Thanks for all the replies over the last few days. I am sorry I have not replied to them, I have been away for work all week (and will be away again over the next few weeks). I thought I would gather up my various responses into one email, so here goes. To the person who asked about the enclosure. This is a BA23 and has only one PSU, so without that PSU I cannot try to get the machine running again. The harness I have is not the same as either of the two that someone sent me pictures of. It is not a ribbon cable, it has discrete wires, of different lengths, its part number is 70-20450-01, rev C1 and there is a date of 9th Dec 1985 on it. The actual connectors though look like the connectors on the bad ribbon cable harness, I think they are MTA-156. Some have suggested it blew because I had insufficient load. I had a TK50 and an RD53 attached, would that no be sufficient. Furthermore I did not actually switch the PSU on, just connected it to the mains, would the load connected to the PSU matter when the PSU is not actually switched on? There was also a suggestion that the PSU would have needed switching separately for 50Hz operation as well. The hardware manual I have for the machine tells me how to switch between 110 and 240, but does not say anything about switching it for frequency, so I suspect this was not an issue here. >From the various responses I think it would be unwise for me to attempt a repair. Is there anyone on this list who is in the UK who would be willing and able to fix this PSU, or who knows someone who might be? Thanks Rob

17 years, 6 months

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free for shipping things on ebay

by dgriffi＠cs.csubak.edu

I will be continually adding listings on Ebay that will run at fixed prices until sold. For those of you reading cctalk, if you make me an offer for zero and reference cctalk, the item is yours for shipping. Check my stuff out at http://myworld.ebay.com/frotz661. If you're not on speaking terms with Ebay, take a look anyway and email me if you like something you see. -- 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?

17 years, 6 months

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Paging Ethan Dicks

by dgriffi＠cs.csubak.edu

Ethan Dicks said he wanted the copy of Zaks' "CP/M Handbook" I offered up in October. We both forgot about it. I tried emailing him at his usap.gov address just now and that came back as invalid. Ethan, if you're reading this, please email me! -- 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?

17 years, 6 months

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Xerox 8010 system software diskettes

by dgriffi＠cs.csubak.edu

Spread across several ziplock bags I found a bunch of system diskettes for the venerable Xerox 8010. The disks are in excellent condition and there are lots of duplicates. Is there a museum in need of some of these? Also, would someone please point me to a list of diskettes originally shipped with the machine? -- 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?

17 years, 6 months

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UNIX for the VAXstation or AlphaStation

by slawmaster＠gmail.com

On Sat, Feb 28, 2009 at 12:11 AM, Zane H. Healy <healyzh at aracnet.com> wrote: > At 12:03 AM -0500 2/28/09, John Floren wrote: >> >> It's not so much what I have as what I will be soon inheriting from >> the good folks over at the Laboratory for Laser Energetics; I'm not >> sure of the exact model but it's a MicroPDP-11 of some type. Comes >> with an RX02. More details when it actually gets decommissioned and I >> pick it up. > > Sounds like you might be getting a MINC-11. > > Zane > Cool as a MINC-11 would be, I've seen the system and it's in a standard BA23, not the MINC box. John -- "I've tried programming Ruby on Rails, following TechCrunch in my RSS reader, and drinking absinthe. It doesn't work. I'm going back to C, Hunter S. Thompson, and cheap whiskey." -- Ted Dziuba

17 years, 6 months

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UNIX for the VAXstation or AlphaStation

by slawmaster＠gmail.com

On Fri, Feb 27, 2009 at 11:58 PM, Zane H. Healy <healyzh at aracnet.com> wrote: > At 11:54 PM -0500 2/27/09, John Floren wrote: >> >> The PDP-11 has RT-11 loaded already, so I look forward to playing with >> that; when I get it home and can check exactly what the >> processor/memory/disk values are, then do some research into whether >> or not it would be possible to try RSTS/E or RSX-11M+ on it too. > > I really like RT-11. ?I don't follow the list like I used to (no time), what > kind of a PDP-11 do you have? > > Zane > It's not so much what I have as what I will be soon inheriting from the good folks over at the Laboratory for Laser Energetics; I'm not sure of the exact model but it's a MicroPDP-11 of some type. Comes with an RX02. More details when it actually gets decommissioned and I pick it up. John -- "I've tried programming Ruby on Rails, following TechCrunch in my RSS reader, and drinking absinthe. It doesn't work. I'm going back to C, Hunter S. Thompson, and cheap whiskey." -- Ted Dziuba

17 years, 6 months

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UNIX for the VAXstation or AlphaStation

by slawmaster＠gmail.com

On Fri, Feb 27, 2009 at 11:47 PM, Zane H. Healy <healyzh at aracnet.com> wrote: > At 10:54 PM -0500 2/27/09, John Floren wrote: >> >> So, I've got both a VAXstation 4000-60 and an AlphaStation 250 here >> and after playing with it for a bit I've decided I don't really care >> for VMS so much that I want it on both of them. I'd like to find an >> interesting, preferably AT&T-style UNIX to run on one of them, so I'm >> hoping some of you can help me figure out my options. So far, I know I >> can run: >> -NetBSD >> -Probably some DEC/HP UNIXes (Tru64 on the Alpha?). >> >> I'd really appreciate perspectives on these different systems, >> user/admin experience, etc. I'm not looking to accomplish anything in >> particular here, I just want something to play around with on my DEC >> hardware while I wait for the PDP-11 :) > > UNIX is a waste of good DEC hardware! :-) ?DEC never sold a UNIX variant > that would run on a VAXstation 4000/60. ?I think NetBSD and OpenBSD will > both run on it. ?I'll confess that OpenBSD at least used to rock on Alpha > and can handle a machine with less RAM than OpenVMS expects. ?Your choice of > OS's are a lot wider for the Alpha. > > As for a PDP-11, I recommend RT-11, RSTS/E, or RSX-11M+, not UNIX. > > For UNIX get a Sun or SGI system, in other words cool hardware that only > runs UNIX. ?I did buy a nice DECstation 5000/133 (a MIPS box) years ago to > run NetBSD. ?I wonder what happened to that machine... > > Zane > The PDP-11 has RT-11 loaded already, so I look forward to playing with that; when I get it home and can check exactly what the processor/memory/disk values are, then do some research into whether or not it would be possible to try RSTS/E or RSX-11M+ on it too. John -- "I've tried programming Ruby on Rails, following TechCrunch in my RSS reader, and drinking absinthe. It doesn't work. I'm going back to C, Hunter S. Thompson, and cheap whiskey." -- Ted Dziuba

17 years, 6 months

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SGI 4D/220s

by legalize＠xmission.com

Just scored a couple SGI 4D/220s from a government auction site. Anyone have any familiarity with these? Anything I should look out for besides what's Crappy auction pics: <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/vintage/images/4D-220-1.jpg> <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/vintage/images/4D-220-2.jpg> -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html> Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>

17 years, 6 months

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Not sure this is classic enough...

by lproven＠gmail.com

Would anyone be interested in an original, complete copy of Windows 3.1 on 1.2MB 5?" floppies? Just uncovered during a clearout... -- Liam Proven ? Profile: http://www.linkedin.com/in/liamproven Email: lproven at cix.co.uk ? GMail/GoogleTalk/Orkut: lproven at gmail.com Tel: +44 20-8685-0498 ? Cell: +44 7939-087884 ? Fax: + 44 870-9151419 AOL/AIM/iChat, Yahoo & Skype: liamproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508

17 years, 6 months

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Recommendations for AIM-65 power supply?

by derschjo＠mail.msu.edu

Title basically says it all -- anyone have any recommendations for a decent power supply for an AIM-65? I have it running right now on just 5V, but I need something that puts out 24V so I can run the little printer, too :). It'd be nice nice to something small enough to fit inside the enclosure this thing came in but I'm not that picky. My searches on the 'net reveal a lot of choices, so I'm looking for advice on what to look out for. For those playing along at home, the AIM-65 wants 5V at ~2A, and 24V at ~2.5A. Thanks! Josh

17 years, 6 months

3
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Overland Data 9-track drive

by IanK＠vulcan.com

In one of my fortunately few poor deals on eBay, I bought an Overland Data 9-track drive, identified on its tag as an OD 3601 GCR. It's an interesting unit, a bit bigger than a briefcase and standing "on end" with the drive reels facing out. It has both a Pertec-style interface and a PC serial interface. It looks pretty cool. There are only two problems. One is a broken door hinge - not a big deal. The other is that the drive does not respond to any control input - a big deal. After asking about, someone told me that the flashing LEDs on its face mean that its main electronics have failed. I'm guessing that one or more of the many EPROMs in it have lost their minds. It's a really nice looking unit, but it doesn't work. So I have an offer or two I'd like to make. If you perhaps have one of these drives, and it has a bad mechanism but good electronics, I'd be glad to give this to you for the actual cost of shipping. On the other hand, if you have those good electronics but don't want/need the drive, I'd be glad to talk about obtaining the innards from you for a nominal cost (shipping and some beer money, perhaps). Anyone interested? Thanks -- Ian PS: this is a piece in my personal collection. I'm just using this email account because this is where I read the list.

17 years, 6 months

2
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Copying simh images onto real disks

by toby＠coreware.co.uk

I've been trying to get BSD 2.11 running on my uPDP-11/73. Rather than going the vtserver route, I thought I'd try to speed things along by making a disk image under simh and then copying it onto a SCSI disk for use on the PDP-11. I successfully built a 300MB disk image under simh from the BSD 2.11 tape and then copied this onto the SCSI disk with: dd if=bsd211.dsk of=/dev/sda However, when I put the disk onto the -11 and try to boot DU0, it just hangs. Anyone know where I am going wrong? Many thanks, Toby -- This message has been scanned for viruses and dangerous content by MailScanner, and is believed to be clean.

17 years, 6 months

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Apple Laserwriter 16/600PS, parts/repair, free

by mcguire＠neurotica.com

I have an Apple Laserwriter 16/600PS available for free, just pay shipping. (continental US only, please) It functions, but it jams 30-50% of the time. It is just wearing out. I've babied it for many years and it is in pretty good shape otherwise. If you want to (probably) replace the pickup rollers and give it a good cleaning, you'll have an absolutely wonderful 16PPM, 600DPI, TCP/IP-capable Ethernet-connected PostScript laser printer that works well in the Mac, Windows, and UNIX/Linux worlds. It comes with a paper tray, but no toner cartridge. (same cartridge as HPLJ 4/4M/etc, Canon EX engine if memory serves) Continental US shipping should be $40 or so. PayPal me that and it's yours. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL

17 years, 6 months

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DEC Equipment - Tucson, AZ

by technobug＠comcast.net

I was wandering around my local scrapper and found four PDP11/23+ chassis (without cards) and three RL02 on a pallet in purgatory (prior to triage). If there is any interest, drop him a line @ "<keith at swliquidators.com >. He promised to hold them for a week or so prior to making a decision to scrap. CRC

17 years, 6 months

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More Info RE: Emulex SCSI Controllers available...

by lbickley＠bickleywest.com

I've received a number of responses from folks - and a few questions. Here's answers to the most common questions: 1) Is there a warranty? Yes the boards are guaranteed by the dealer to not be DOA. I just re-checked - and he's agreeable to a 15 day warranty. My guess is that if you went a few more days, he'd cover it - but he would like whoever gets the boards to check them out right away. ALL boards will be pre-tested by the dealer on a QBUS system using RT before shipping. All will have the latest EPROMS. 2) Is it standard QBUS (i.e., not "S") Yes. 3) Is the SCSI port standard 50-pin? Yes. Lyle ---------- Forwarded Message ---------- Subject: Emulex SCSI Controllers available... Date: Thursday 26 February 2009 From: Lyle Bickley <lbickley at bickleywest.com> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> I was chatting with a DEC broker recently regarding SCSI controllers for DEC gear - when he mentioned that he had a quantity of Emulex UC07's available. UC07's are QBUS cards which have a single SCSI port and support either MSCP or TMSCP (in RT land, that would be either DU or MU devices). The manual states that the UC07 is compatible with RT, RSX, RSTS/E and Ultrix versions which support MSCP or TMSCP. The dealers initial price was high (as expected). However, he then added - "I'd be willing to do better for hobbyists - as long as they commit that the boards will only be used for hobby purposes - and not for commercial use". So here's the "deal": $235 per UC07 plus shipping from Mountain View, CA (FedEx Ground). I've paid MUCH more for SCSI interfaces for my DEC QBUS and UNIBUS systems - so IMHO, this is a great deal. The broker said he did not want to deal "individually with a bunch of hobbyists" - so he asked if I would be willing to consolodate a single order of UC07's to him. I reluctantly said "yes", as this is not my business and I'm not interested in making money on this deal - only covering costs. To get a sense of interest, please reply to me privately if you'd like one or more if these "critters". The manual for the UC07 is available on bitsavers. A link to a bitsavers mirror is below: http://bitsavers.vt100.net/pdf/emulex/UC0751001-F_UC07_Feb90.pdf Regards, Lyle -- Lyle Bickley Bickley Consulting West Inc. http://bickleywest.com "Black holes are where God is dividing by zero" ------------------------------------------------------- -- Lyle Bickley Bickley Consulting West Inc. http://bickleywest.com "Black holes are where God is dividing by zero"

17 years, 6 months

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Archiving 8" RT-11 floppies to CD-ROM?

by dbetz＠xlisper.com

I have a friend who has a number (10-20) of 8" RT-11 floppies he wants to archive to CD-ROM or some other modern media. Is there anyone in the Boston area (he lives in Medway) who could help with this? I believe these are RX01 media since I think they were created on a PDT-11/150 that I gave away to someone a few years ago. Can anyone here help? What would the fee be for such a service? Thanks! David Betz dbetz at xlisper.com

17 years, 6 months

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visiting Seattle next week -- get together?

by legalize＠xmission.com

I'll be visiting Seattle next week for the Microsoft MVP Summit. The Summit wraps up on Wednesday around 5pm in downtown Seattle. I'd love to get together with other collectors for a beer, say at the Elephant and Castle? I'll be returning home on the weekend, so I have some time on Thursday during the day, Friday and Saturday. Last time I got to check out bear's collection (r.stricklin) and I'd love to see anyone's collection that's willing to share :-) Email me off-list and let's trade contact info and I'll give you a hollar! -- Richard -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html> Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>

17 years, 6 months

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truck trip, space available

by mcguire＠neurotica.com

Hey folks. It looks like I'll be making a road trip from Port Charlotte, FL (just south of Tampa, Gulf coast) all the way up to Boston, and then back down, sometime next week. I'll be in a 24' truck with a lift gate. The southbound trip will be full, but the northbound trip will be at least half empty, so I may be able to move big and/or heavy stuff along that route. The requirements are that it be not too far off of Route 95, and that any stops not take too much time. I will need a few bucks for this. Be aware that the scheduling and other details of this trip are not yet set in stone. Any thoughts? I'll need to hear back soon. Please CC me on any replies, or email directly, as I'm only on cctech. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL

17 years, 6 months

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43 "classic" articles about our hobby

by evan＠snarc.net

>From the better-late-than-never department .... Tonight I posted 43 articles from the former Computer Collector Newsletter / Technology Rewind. Many of you will recall that I published this a a weekly e-newsletter from Jan. 2004 to March 2006, with the help of Sellam Ismail, Christine Finn, Erik Klein, Bill Loguidice, Michael Nadeau, and many others. The newsletter ran for 2 years and 3 months. Now it's been 2 years and 11 months since the end. So, I finally got "a round tuit". Read them at http://www.snarc.net/tr/newsletter.htm. - Evan

17 years, 6 months

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Archiving 8" RT-11 floppies to CD-ROM?

by fjkraan＠xs4all.nl

Jan-Benedict Glaw <jbglaw at lug-owl.de> wrote: > On Tue, 2009-02-24 13:14:06 -0500, David Betz <dbetz at xlisper.com> wrote: > >> > I have a friend who has a number (10-20) of 8" RT-11 floppies he wants >> > to archive to CD-ROM or some other modern media. Is there anyone in >> > the Boston area (he lives in Medway) who could help with this? I >> > believe these are RX01 media since I think they were created on a >> > PDT-11/150 that I gave away to someone a few years ago. Can anyone >> > here help? What would the fee be for such a service? >> > > I obviously cannot help, but it would be nice if, once it is done, > describe the procedure for others. > Just recently I was able to read my MiniMINC (a PDT-150) floppies with an 8" drive connected to an AHA1542B (capable of single density) with Dave Dunfields ImageDisk. I didn't write them back yet (inverted write protect logic, but assume it will be no problem... Fred Jan Kraan

17 years, 6 months

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sun HD 'sledges'

by silvercreekvalley＠yahoo.com

I'm looking for a sledge for the SPARCstation 1, I have a couple of loose HD at the moment and its not great :) Ian.

17 years, 6 months

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Halted

by evan＠snarc.net

Roy said: >>> I've taken notice of them and have intentions of stopping in there one of these times I make a trip to The City... Consider making your trip in the second or third week of September. Then you combine it with a visit to VCF East in New Jersey!

17 years, 6 months

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washing floppies

by legalize＠xmission.com

An interesting blog post... <http://www.classic-computers.org.nz/blog/2009-02-21-retrieving-data-using-s…> -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html> Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>

17 years, 6 months

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1" paper tape buy ?

by henk.gooijen＠hotmail.com

Hi all, I was searching for a company that sells 1" unoiled paper tape, here in The Netherlands. No luck. After googling and many pages, I found a company in the USA: http://www.wncsupply.com/paper-tape-rolls.html I would like to buy one or two rolls of 1000 ft, order# 0400A, R-V-PU471 Unoiled / Printed Top Arrow yellowish color, but it comes in either a package of 28 rolls (1) and weighs 40 lbs, or in a quart package, 7 rolls, still a weight of 10 lbs. The 7 rolls package costs $80. That OK, but the shipping costs would make it quite expensive. My question is simple. Are there people on this list who also want to buy some rolls of 1" nice looking yellow paper tape? I would take 2 (or 3) rolls. Hint: Get a paper tape reader from an old CNC machine from eBay. (I bought one for $30 and another for $79 two weeks ago). You can interface such a reader to a computer, in my case the SBC6120 ! Think of it ... booting the SBC6120 from a paper tape. Is that cool? The site also sells nice reels (http://www.wncsupply.com/reels.html). I wanted to buy the 4" blue ones, but again shipping costs, aarggghh. However, a nice lady from the company emailed me that she is looking into the shipping costs, as the costs quoted on their site is a bit high. I hope to hear from one or two people also looking for a few paper tape rolls ... Please contact me off list. Links to other companies that sell 1" paper tape are also welcome! Thanks, - Henk, PA8PDP

17 years, 6 months

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Fwd: Alpha in San Leandro, CA

by slawmaster＠gmail.com

If anyone is interested in this, send Rich an email. I already have too many VMS boxes; I'd hate to see this get tossed. John ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Rich Asvitt <rasvitt at comcast.net> Date: Tue, Feb 24, 2009 at 6:13 PM Subject: Re: Alpha or VAX machine wanted (dublin / pleasanton / livermore) To: John Floren <slawmaster at gmail.com> John, I know it's been a while but are you still interested in getting a VMS machine? My wife has been asking me what I'm going to DO with my workstation. As I haven't cranked it up in over a year, I suppose it's time I find it a good home. ?So if you're still interested, let me know and we can work something out. What we have is a Alpha 3000 with an internal disk there is also an external disk drive. ?There is also a CD drive and a cartridge tape drive. ?I just cranked it up today and deleted all my junk on the disks, So it's running fine. ? So....... Lemme know Rich

17 years, 6 months

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Halted

by christian_liendo＠yahoo.com

Yea... I remember that place...I was over at Silicon Graphics back in I think 97 and I would stop by there. In fact every time I was in Silicon Vally I stopped by there. There were other places as well, I guess they are all gone now I'm glad they are still around. --- On Wed, 2/25/09, Tom Uban <uban at ubanproductions.com> wrote: From: Tom Uban <uban at ubanproductions.com> Subject: Halted To: "On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Date: Wednesday, February 25, 2009, 9:13 AM Sorry if this has already gone around, but I only saw it yesterday after a friend sent me the link: http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2009/02/05/technology/personaltech/20090… It reminded me of ELI in Cambridge Massachusetts, which was a similar type of place back when I lived in the Boston area, but which is now gone. I can only imagine that Halted will not be around too much longer and I definitely want to stop there the next time I'm in the area... --tom

17 years, 6 months

3
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8088 vs. 80c88

by les＠frii.com

>In emulation mode (V20) BP = (8080) SP. But I don't follow your >logic on how to avoid it. Why JRT chose to code things that way, >I'll never know, but it worked on 8080, 8085 and Z80 and not on V20, >so it's a bug. And a bug in commercial (i.e. you paid money for it) >software. The code snippet you showed seemed to indicate that either you couldn't preform a call to the same address contained in the stack pointer, or that you couldn't preform a call as the next instruction after a lxi sp instruction. Its not really clear which the problem is. I am assuming the problem relates to following a lxi sp instruction immediatly with a call instruction, I can see how pipelining instructions could cause this failure. I cant immagine how calling the address which happens to match the sp would be an issue. My thought was that most cp/m programs either left the sp alone, and used the stack provided by cp/m, or set up a local stack early on in the program. In either case this bug could be completly avoided. Am I wrong here? Is the bug related to calling the address which happens to be in the sp? >The instruction prefetch queue issue was well documented in the 386, >as was the use of an unconditional jump to void the queue. Although >it's lousy practice to use self-modifying code, I don't blame >MicroPro for it--they wrote their code to an earlier processor. >But claiming backward compatibility is a different game. Unless >something is 100% backward-compatible with the original, you'd best >not advertise it as being backward-compatible at all, unless you like >answering support calls. So as I understand your opinion, if NEC had stated in the V20 documentation, that you should not follow a lxi sp instuction immediatly with a stack operation, this would not have been a bug. In the case of the 386, they documented issues with the 386 queue, issues which crashed commercial software, but which are not a bug. In this case, it was just code written for an older processor. Les

17 years, 6 months

2
1
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Plessy Core Stack Indentification

by fsmith＠ladylinux.com

Hi All, I am cleaning out my basement and came across a mystery Plessy core stack. Its 16k by 16 and is a full height Unibus slot card. Its one of those sandwiched controller/core stack type of card. Looks to be able to only take up one slot which is nice. Part number is PM 1116B I suspect its a compatible 11/05 or 11/10 memory card but I am not sure. I could plug it into one of my 11/05's but really don't want to do the old see if it smokes test as I think this lil baby is kinda hard to find and desirable to the right person/machine. -- Kindest Regards, "No Problems Only Solutions" L.B. Network Consultants LLC. Baltimore, Maryland

17 years, 6 months

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DEC Computer Lab workbook

by mcguire＠neurotica.com

There's one on eBay right now, auction number 230326916375. (not affiliated with seller, etc etc) Too rich for my blood right now, but I'd love to hear that someone here grabs it and gets it scanned. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL

17 years, 6 months

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Nicolet 660

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> It continued to do this for > several reboots, but after running unattended for a few hours the hard > disk was again unreachable They took this opportunity to completely back up the contents of the disk, right?

17 years, 6 months

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TS-11 tapedrive controller cards available

by quapla＠xs4all.nl

Hello All, I have available a set of controller cards from the internal backplane of a Dec TS-11 tapedrive. Contact me off list if interested. Ed --

17 years, 6 months

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contact at cray-cyber.org or cyber1.org?

by legalize＠xmission.com

I've sent requests to join their mailing lists, which never get approved. I've tried to contact the owners directly, but never get a response. I suspect my email is being dumped into a spam folder. (I've been on the net so long and my email address has been so prominent, that spammers have often used my email address as the forged From address on their spam; as a result I've been placed on a bunch of filters and its hopeless to try and get removed from them, since they don't notify you that you've been put on a filter list.) Does anyone have any successful contact with these sites? <http://www.cray-cyber.org/general/start.php> <http://www.cyber1.org/> I've been trying to get in touch with them to get my PLATO terminals up and running. Thanks! -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html> Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>

17 years, 6 months

2
1
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Sun 3/80 colour card?

by silvercreekvalley＠yahoo.com

Looking for a colour card for a Sun 3/80 if anyone has one spare? Will pay or trade. Part numbers are 501-1443 or 501-1505 Thanks Ian.

17 years, 6 months

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washing floppies

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> On a related subject, have there ever been any non-contact (i.e. > flying head) tape drives brought to market? It looks like IBM filed a bunch of patents in the 70's on flying head helical tape http://www.google.com/patents?id=BZ4vAAAAEBAJ

17 years, 6 months

1
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Archiving 8" RT-11 floppies to CD-ROM?

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

Read the headers, It's 8" floppies and likely RX02. For that you must have a PDP11 (maybe uVAX) and RX02. David, I have an 11 with RX02. I can copy them to RX50 or RX33 that can be read on PCs. Allison > >Subject: RE: Archiving 8" RT-11 floppies to CD-ROM? > From: Ian King <IanK at vulcan.com> > Date: Tue, 24 Feb 2009 11:57:30 -0800 > To: "'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts'" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >I've developed a procedure for this. It's a bit roundabout but it uses easily available tools. > >Tools needed: >- PDP-11 running RT-11, with an extra serial line (SLUx) >- DOS PC with a serial port >- PUTR program from John Wilson >- TU58 emulator, which I found through Will Kranz' website > >At a high level the process looks like this: > >Install TU58 per its README file. Copy the contents of the floppy onto the emulated TU58 using the COPY/DEVICE command in RT-11. Some versions will gripe at you about the fact that the floppy may be bigger than the tape. RT-11 v4 seems perfectly happy with that, and the TU58 program doesn't care. :-) IIRC there are prompts from RT-11 v5, but you can provide answers that will direct it to do the full copy anyway. > >Use PUTR to copy from that tape image onto... whatever you want! PUTR will let you manipulate the individual files and copy them into DOS directories if you so choose. By using COPY/DEVICE, you can preserve "bootability" of bootable disks, as well. > >I've used the reverse of this process to create physical floppies from disk images as well as to restore floppies after disk failures. Of course, if you want to burn either the images or the individual files onto a CDROM, you'll have to have the files on a machine that supports that device, has burner software, etc. But at that point, they're just files in a DOS filesystem. > >Cheers -- Ian > >> -----Original Message----- >> From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- >> bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Jan-Benedict Glaw >> Sent: Tuesday, February 24, 2009 11:37 AM >> To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts >> Subject: Re: Archiving 8" RT-11 floppies to CD-ROM? >> >> On Tue, 2009-02-24 13:14:06 -0500, David Betz <dbetz at xlisper.com> >> wrote: >> > I have a friend who has a number (10-20) of 8" RT-11 floppies he >> wants >> > to archive to CD-ROM or some other modern media. Is there anyone in >> > the Boston area (he lives in Medway) who could help with this? I >> > believe these are RX01 media since I think they were created on a >> > PDT-11/150 that I gave away to someone a few years ago. Can anyone >> > here help? What would the fee be for such a service? >> >> I obviously cannot help, but it would be nice if, once it is done, >> describe the procedure for others. >> >> Backup is one thing, restoring the image another. A third thing would >> be to use that image on some simulator... >> >> MfG, JBG >> >> -- >> Jan-Benedict Glaw jbglaw at lug-owl.de +49-172- >> 7608481 >> Signature of: >> http://perl.plover.com/Questions.html >> the second : >

17 years, 6 months

1
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Why do the OOP Seller's use RFQ?

by shoppa＠trailing-edge.com

On Tuesday 24 February 2009, Jeff Walther wrote: > And how is it more profitable to them to let this stuff sit in > (costly) storage somewhere, rather than selling fifty pieces to > someone who could use them? IMHO: They do not have them sitting in storage. What they have is a small hand-run chip-labeling machine and a bunch of random chips. They grind off the original part numbers and label them to whatever you wanted to buy. And they have a website with a bunch of part numbers culled from various databases. Google "counterfeit chips" and "counterfeit transistors". Tim.

17 years, 6 months

2
1
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Powering up a 20-year old MicroVAX II (BA23/123 cables)

by tiggerlasv＠aim.com

On Monday, February 23rd, Charles H Dickman wrote: >> Robert Jarratt wrote: >> The harness in my system does not seem to match any of the descriptions I >> have seen so far. The wires are not equal in length, but it is not a ribbon >> cable with IDC connectors either. The connectors are black rather than >> white. The harness wires do not seem discoloured, but I believe that this >> particular system may have only had light use in its day. I have a picture >> of the harness but I am not sure if the rules of this list allow >> attachments. >> > The key point of your description is that the wires are not equal in > length. This COULD be a bad thing. On the BA23, the backplane and power supply connectors are at right-angles to each other, so the 5-volt (red) wires are shorter than the 12-volt (yellow) wires, as well as most of the grounds (black). The same is true on the BA123. As you can see in the ASCII art below, the 12v interconnect wires end up being longer than the 5V wires. This is normal. I have a side-by-side photo of the old style cables, as well as the FCO, however I don't have a convenient place to post it. If anyone wants it for reference, let me know. | 1 | 2 | V | | G | n | d | | 5 | V 5 V G n d 1 2 V _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ T

17 years, 6 months

2
1
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Nicolet 660

by slawmaster＠gmail.com

Hi everyone A kind list member in my area has offered me a Nicolet 660 computer free if I can haul it off, so I'm hoping to see if anyone else has any information about it. Luckily all the documentation seems to still be there so it's not a total mystery machine, but Google doesn't really offer any info on it. The Nicolet is a hip-high (3'?) cabinet that acts like a mini rack (units slide in and out on rails). The disk unit sits on top and has two SCSI 3.5" floppy drives and an SMD hard disk. Under that is the CPU unit, which has (as I recall) a start/stop button, a program1 button, a program2 button, and a power switch. There is a VGA monitor and an AT keyboard to go with it, both Nicolet branded. The OS is called NICOS and apparently is FORTH-based. It also includes floppies for FORTRAN, PASCAL, and BASIC. There is also a lot of software for data collection and processing, as this was once hooked up to lab equipment. Apparently the hard drive has died. Is it easy to get replacement SMD disks, or are there adapters that would let me plug in a SCSI drive or something more common? This seems to be a very unique piece of equipment that I would like to try to get working. Thanks! John Floren -- "I've tried programming Ruby on Rails, following TechCrunch in my RSS reader, and drinking absinthe. It doesn't work. I'm going back to C, Hunter S. Thompson, and cheap whiskey." -- Ted Dziuba

17 years, 6 months

13
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8088 vs. 80c88

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: 8088 vs. 80c88 > From: "Chuck Guzis" <cclist at sydex.com> > Date: Sun, 22 Feb 2009 23:58:23 -0800 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >On 22 Feb 2009 at 22:17, Allison wrote: > >> Your kidding tight? ;) >> >> JRT pascal was fairly buggy itself and it was till arond V3 that it stopped being >> noticalbly so. > >Buggy or not, the V20 wouldn't run it. Rich Naro verified the bug >and published a MicroNote on it. And JRT was comparatively popular >for the time. It boils down to the V20 not being able to run a >commercially available 8080 product because of a fault in the CPU. That may be true, bought it too but found it buggy on both 8085 and Z80 too. Why did I buy it, $29.95 and I even got a copy, some didn't! However using a buggy suite to prove a bug is weak even if it got lucky. That it had bugs, can't argue that. They could have just as easily given it the base uCOM78 instruction set instead. But how many V20s were bought to run 8080 rather than as a faster varient of the 8088? >Suppose a customer used an application written and deployed with JRT >Pascal. What do we tell him? "JRT Pascal--ho, ho, ha, you must be >kidding...." > >Nope, serious business. Who knows what other product could have used >the same coding technique? That's a regression testing issue. Generally getting functional code out of it was at best luck till later versions. >In a way, this was deja vu of a much earlier problem with the NEC >version of the 8080, where NEC left the carry bit unaffected after a >boolean operation, where Intel reset it. Considering that many 8080 >programs cleared the carry bit with something like "ORA A", do you >think that CP/M would have run with the old NEC chip? Yep, I as working for NEC then. What's also forgotton is Intel changed the spec to match there part as it was deemed fine that way. Since NEC was ground up from spec, oops. They also fixed it and copied many other subtle timing bugs as well. Sometimes you get it wrong and other times you don't. In the industry the number of second source flubs are legion.. remember the 8251,2651, and friends. FYI at the time CP/M did run with the old chip. Allison > >--Chuck

17 years, 6 months

3
2
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Powering up a 20-year old MicroVAX II

by RodSmallwood＠mail.ediconsulting.co.uk

Hi Sounds like capacitors. Alhough it's a switcher any high voltage/high value capacitors in the PSU might well need reforming. Quite often you will see caps with a pair if incised lines on top. This makes them go pop instead of bang. You would not want to see a PSU where they have gone bang. Rod Smallwood The DEC Collector -----Original Message----- From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Robert Jarratt Sent: 21 February 2009 19:17 To: 'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts' Subject: RE: Powering up a 20-year old MicroVAX II > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Robert Jarratt > Sent: 20 February 2009 22:45 > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: Powering up a 20-year old MicroVAX II > > I have just collected a MicroVAX II which has been in storage and has > not been powered on for 20 years. This is my first machine of such an > age, unfortunately I am not particularly knowledgeable at the > electronics level (I studied circuits academically 25+ years ago and > can solder a bit, but that is as far as it goes). I know I will need > to treat it carefully in order to get it working again. I plan to open > it up and make sure I clear out any debris etc, but beyond that I need > advice from those with the experience and knowledge that I lack on how > to go about powering it up carefully. > > > > Thanks > > > > Rob After removing all the boards and leaving just the disk and tape drive for load I impetuously decided to try powering it up. I knew the PSU (model H7864) was set for 110V and made the switch to 240V (I am in the UK). When I connected the power cord, after a few moments there was a loud pop, followed by another before I could pull out the power cord, smoke rose from the PSU. This sounded just like when I had once accidentally made a 110/240 mix-up. The question is, could it be that I had not made the switch to 240 correctly, or could this just be down to the age of the PSU? Regards Rob

17 years, 6 months

14
18
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sun HD 'sledges'

by silvercreekvalley＠yahoo.com

Hi - does anyone have any spare Sun 'sledges' for the older pizza-box style Sparcstations? These are used to mount the hard-drives in the box. Thanks. Ian.

17 years, 6 months

3
2
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Powering up a 20-year old MicroVAX II

by doc＠mdrconsult.com

Robert Jarratt wrote: > After removing all the boards and leaving just the disk and tape drive for > load I impetuously decided to try powering it up. I knew the PSU (model > H7864) was set for 110V and made the switch to 240V (I am in the UK). When I > connected the power cord, after a few moments there was a loud pop, followed > by another before I could pull out the power cord, smoke rose from the PSU. > This sounded just like when I had once accidentally made a 110/240 mix-up. > > The question is, could it be that I had not made the switch to 240 > correctly, or could this just be down to the age of the PSU? I haven't been into a BA23 PSU, so this is a question, not a suggestion - does that PSU have a separate "jumper" plug for 50Hz/60Hz switch? I toasted an RA60 once by just flipping the visible switch from 240V to 110V, not knowing there was a separate physical setting to switch it >from 50Hz to 60Hz. The behavior as it burnt up was just like this. Doc

17 years, 6 months

3
3
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Electrolytics

by tshoppa＠wmata.com

Will writes: > So even though I was one of the first people on this list > to suggest reforming old capacitors, I have basically > completely reversed my view > on the issue. Now, if the machine is not super old, I will > just pretty much plug in the machine and let it power up. > Even if something does fail, most of the machines I > deal with have enough built in protection > that they will just shut down safely. Some of us do the opposite of using a variac to reform caps - we use a variac to stress-test the components at above the rated voltage. If they blow up now, that's better than them blowing up later. We always called this "margining". I suppose it depends on attitude. To some people a KA630 in a BA123 is a holy shrine to be babied all the way back to restoration. Which I find odd, because there isn't that much that's actually restorable. I mean, 20 years ago I was fixing rubber bumpers in RD53, but who today wants to go through that much work for 70 Mbytes of really slow storage? Maybe I just hate all those stupid MFM drives too much. Tim.

17 years, 6 months

4
4
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Electrolytics

by jgessling＠yahoo.com

> We always called this "margining". Years ago, I had read a book about the Whirlwind computer developed at MIT. In that book was the claim that margining had been invented during that project, the idea being to increase the voltage and make the weak tubes fail so that overall reliability would be improved after they were replaced. I've wondered if that's really true or was the technique in common practice and it just became formallized at that time and entered into historical lore. Of course Whirlwind was also important for other developments like core memory and employing a young grad student by the name of Ken Olson. BTW, I think the book was: Project Whirlwind: History of a Pioneer Computer by Kent C. Redmond, Thomas M. Smith Digital Press, 1980. Definitely a good read, alas, my copy is miles away. Regards, Jim

17 years, 6 months

2
1
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AAARRGGGHHHH ... people still stealing my work

by evan＠snarc.net

This was an issue a couple of years ago. Now it's back: the 10,000-word article that I published on my personal web site in 2005 (and since took down) is reprint IN FULL at http://www.iranianpda.com/iPDADB/FAQs/PDAHistory/ThehistoryofPDAs.htm, obviously without my permission. Whatever moron did this even included my disclaimer saying not to steal my work!!! Here are two other examples: Big yellow chart 1/3 down the page: http://um_pxgt_6103.seedwiki.com/wiki/um_pxgt_6103/pda_-_discuss?wikiPageId= 237424 Timeline 1/4 down the page: http://pdaforum.ladoshki.com/viewtopic.php?t=20027 <http://pdaforum.ladoshki.com/viewtopic.php?t=20027&postdays=0&postorder=asc &start=5&sid=772e87081af243f1c20a6cc14bb989ce> &postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=5&sid=772e87081af243f1c20a6cc14bb989ce Can anyone help?

17 years, 6 months

9
14
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Why Do the OOP Seller's Use RFQ?;Was: Source for bipolar PROMs?

by trag＠io.com

> Date: Mon, 23 Feb 2009 21:03:22 -0500 (EST) > From: Steven Hirsch <snhirsch at gmail.com> > The 571 seems to be pure unobtanium, unless you > count 50 hits of *&ssholes who want you to submit an RFQ and won't deal > under $250 a shot. Does anyone know why those businesses operate that way? Why not just post a price list? A line item on their RFQs is always "Target Price". Well, honestly, my target price is 0, of course. I know I won't hit it, but that's what I'd like. I'm certainly not interested in telling them there is a floor to the price they can offer me. And how is it more profitable to them to let this stuff sit in (costly) storage somewhere, rather than selling fifty pieces to someone who could use them? I've been hunting WD92C32 for a long while and they all seem to be in the hands of *those* people. About once a year I do another search, and the quantity available listings never change. There's plenty of them out there, doing nothing, but try getting your hands on any for less than $5 each. The total value of the thing I want to build is probably $15 so spending $5 on one component is ridiculous. Jeff Walther

17 years, 6 months

7
6
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RL02's And RL01 Offered Baltimore Maryland

by fsmith＠ladylinux.com

Hi, I have two nice RL02's and a RL01 I am offering either for trade or whatever to whom ever wants to stop by and pick these up. They were part of a E-Pay lot I bought over a year ago and were working when deinstalled. I am looking for a later BA23 case with skins (Hopefully) so I can build my frankenpdp with or anything else including good beer you want to offer. I had to haul them here and store them so something must be offered but I am not asking for much. No shipping as they just are too big. More stuff is coming to be offered up as I have discovered a old love with vintage audio equipment and some of my Dec "Projects" have to be put into the hands of people who will actually use them. -- Kindest Regards, "No Problems Only Solutions" L.B. Network Consultants LLC. Baltimore, Maryland

17 years, 6 months

1
0
0 0

VCF's this year

by rborsuk＠colourfull.com

Hi All, Has there been any dates for VCF's this year? Rob Rob Borsuk email: rborsuk at colourfull.com Colourfull Creations Web: http://www.colourfull.com

17 years, 6 months

7
6
0 0

Central Point Option Boards available

by trixter＠oldskool.org

I've seen a smattering of interest around Option Boards in this list every few months, so I thought I'd mention that my last two option boards are now up for auction, an older CopyIIPC Option Board and a Deluxe Option Board: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110355365098 http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110355371748 I set the starting prices at about half what I've seen them go for in the past (and that was for loose boards). -- Jim Leonard (trixter at oldskool.org) http://www.oldskool.org/ Help our electronic games project: http://www.mobygames.com/ Or check out some trippy MindCandy at http://www.mindcandydvd.com/ A child borne of the home computer wars: http://trixter.wordpress.com/

17 years, 6 months

4
4
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8088 vs. 80c88

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: 8088 vs. 80c88 > From: "Chuck Guzis" <cclist at sydex.com> > Date: Tue, 24 Feb 2009 03:29:14 -0800 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >On 23 Feb 2009 at 18:36, Allison wrote: > >> That it had bugs, can't argue that. They could have just as easily given >> it the base uCOM78 instruction set instead. But how many V20s were bought >> to run 8080 rather than as a faster varient of the 8088? > >To be certain, almost all of the publications that I saw touting the >V-series chip emphasized the performace aspect. Few even mentioned >the 8080 emulation mode. I was surprised to see emulation extend to >the V40 and V50 uPs. > >And almost none mentioned that the V20 implemented many of the 80186 >and some of the 80286 instructions. > There was that too. >I've heard reports where the V20 doesn't work as a drop-in >replacement for an 8080. Must be just enough timing difference that >one works and the other doesn't. > True also. the original IBM PC didn't run it, as well as any cpu other than intel. Seems there was a minor timing issue that the intel part tolerent of but no one elses would work.. rumor was it was deliberate. But most of the 8088 designs were not well cooked and werern't so reliable. Allison >Cheers, >Chuck

17 years, 6 months

1
0
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8088 vs. 80c88

by les＠frii.com

1) I can attest that the V20 runs cp/m80 (2.2), wordstar, word master, asm, mac, load, ddt, collasal cave adventure, logicalc. I just verified these things yesterday. 2) Here's the one with JRT Pascal (IIRC): LXI SP,LABELX CALL LABELX LABELX: ... Does the 8080 decrement the sp before it pushes the return address, or after. If its after, that code would of course not work. I can't remember which order that happens in, although I suspect that it decrements before pushing. Another possibility (seems more likely) is that the loading of the stack pointer is not finished before the next instruction is executed. I am trying to remember which register was used for the sp in the emulation mode. (I think it may be BP????) In this case, as long as some instruction gets executed between lxi sp,xxxx and the first push/pop/call, it may not show up. In any case, this seems like a rare issue, as most programs (thats a big undefensable statement) would set the sp when they start, and then leave it alone. Related, I found a bug in Spellstar for DOS. It worked fine on an 8088 or 80286, but crashed on a 386 (it could have been a 486). Here is what the code did: 100 mov dx, address of routine to jump to 103 mov [121],dx .. .. .. .. .. 120 jmp 0000 This little piece of self modifying code worked great until the instruction queue in the cpu became large enough that the jump instruction was already in the pipeline before it was modified with the desired address. I was able to fix this with a jmp dx instruction, but compilers do generate odd code sometimes. The question becomes, did the 386 have a bug, or is this just a software issue? Les

17 years, 6 months

2
1
0 0

VAX cables for the cost of postage

by pcoghlan+cctech＠vms.eurokom.ie

> >> A weird DEC cable, DB25 male on one end, and what I think is QBus >> female on the other (3 rows of pins, 17/16/17 - DB50?). I'm guessing >> this will be a huge score to someone, just not sure what it goes >> with. :) > >I'm not sure how fair it is to call a DD50 "Qbus", since Qbus is a >card-edge connector bus. > The Qbus sockets on the back of my Vax 4000-100A are DD50 so I guess DD50 connectors are used on Qbus cables for at least some applications? > >>But this might be a SCSI cable; I've seen both DB25 and DD50 used for >>SCSI (D-shell SCSI in my experience always uses male connectors on the >>cables, but my experience with DD50 SCSI is pretty much limited to >>Suns). It might be useful to buzz it out.... >> > It sounds to me like a V.24 adapter cable for something like a DEMSA X.25 router and various other DEC synchronous serial items. This would seem to be a BC19D-02 from what I can find. Is there a part number stamped on it? See http://www.islandco.com/cables.html#bc19d Regards, Peter.

17 years, 6 months

5
4
0 0

Dumping MCM6832 PROMs

by derschjo＠mail.msu.edu

Anyone out there have the capability to dump Motorola 6832 PROMs? I'd like to dump the rom sets from my Tek 4051 (and expansion packs) for some reverse-engineering but I don't currently have any means to do it. (Can't use the Tek to do it since the system software is BASIC only and has no low-level memory access functionality.) Ultimately I'd like to be able to build a custom expansion ROM pack with my own code on it, and eventually write a 4051 emulation. (And of course if anyone out there's already dumped this stuff, I'd love to get a copy...) Thanks, Josh

17 years, 6 months

3
2
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Powering up a 20-year old MicroVAX II

by RodSmallwood＠mail.ediconsulting.co.uk

They can often go down internally without the top going. Some have vents that end up next to the PCB. I did four years in a high voltage test lab. And..... Yes they do pop and they can explode! Rod Smallwood -----Original Message----- From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Gordon JC Pearce Sent: 23 February 2009 10:25 To: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Re: Powering up a 20-year old MicroVAX II Rod Smallwood wrote: > Hi > Sounds like capacitors. > Alhough it's a switcher any high voltage/high value capacitors in the > PSU might well need reforming. > Quite often you will see caps with a pair if incised lines on top. > This makes them go pop instead of bang. > You would not want to see a PSU where they have gone bang. This is the only popped electrolytic I have ever seen, in damn near 30 years of fiddling with electronic stuff: http://www.gjcp.net/~gordonjcp/blowncap.jpg Gordon

17 years, 6 months

1
0
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Can someone help me identify this IBM machine?

by mwichary＠gmail.com

I spent 20 minutes on Google without much luck: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mwichary/3300685689/ It seems like a calculator. Thanks in advance! -- Marcin Wichary Sr. user experience designer, Google Graphical User Interface gallery >> www.guidebookgallery.org

17 years, 6 months

3
3
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Electrolytics

by tshoppa＠wmata.com

>>> I have to say, for all the talk of failing caps in power supplies >>> I've only ever seen one electrolytic cap fail *ever*, and that was >>> last week in a one-year-old graphics card that has hardly ever been >>> powered off... >> >> > Gordon, you don't mention how many caps you've looked at or tested, or > how you've done so, but I encounter them constantly. Not so much in > the 1980's vintage DEC equipment YET, but it's no myth that AEC's are > electrochemical vats that have a lifespan. The lifespan varies widely > depending on many factors, heat being the big one. My gut feeling is that electrolytics got a lot lot better in the 70's compared to earlier generations. It's not just that they're 20 years newer than the ones from the 50's, they really were better quality to begin with. I work on old radios and it's pretty much a given that any set has electrolytics in need of replacement. If the set was used for a while, in fact some lytics were probably already replaced in the 50's or 60's, and maybe the replacement needs replacement today. "Failed" is a relative term... it's easy to find electrolytics leaky enough that they no longer meet their original spec, or leaky enough that they get warm. But the set still works. Other times they literally explode, or they cause other components in the circle to fail catastrophically... my experience is that switching supplies are far more sensitive to out of spec ESR's in electrolytics than any old radio ever was. Tim.

17 years, 6 months

8
12
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servicing terminals/monitors

by slawmaster＠gmail.com

I've got a quick question about power safety here. My ADM-3A has needed fiddling for a while, since what I believe is the flyback is making a very high-pitched whine that gives me a splitting headache and makes it hard to see straight after 5 minutes. I want to take a poke around, make sure everything is connected firmly, make sure none of the components are visibly bad, that kind of thing. How long does it take an unplugged CRT to discharge? This hasn't been plugged in for over a month, so I figure it's probably safe right now, but if I test it and then want to check something else, how long do I need to leave it sit? Is there a safe way to discharge a CRT when you're working on it in the living room? I'm a little leery of just shorting connections with a screwdriver randomly, although that's almost exactly what I did the first time I worked with a CRT :) (it was 5th grade, and I had just had it on, unplugged it, opened it, and started poking around with wires. BIG SNAP) Thanks John -- "I've tried programming Ruby on Rails, following TechCrunch in my RSS reader, and drinking absinthe. It doesn't work. I'm going back to C, Hunter S. Thompson, and cheap whiskey." -- Ted Dziuba

17 years, 6 months

6
6
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Powering up a 20-year old MicroVAX II

by js＠cimmeri.com

-----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Robert Jarratt > Sent: 20 February 2009 22:45 > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: Powering up a 20-year old MicroVAX II > > I have just collected a MicroVAX II which has been in storage and has > not > been powered on for 20 years. This is my first machine of such an age, > unfortunately I am not particularly knowledgeable at the electronics > level > (I studied circuits academically 25+ years ago and can solder a bit, > but > that is as far as it goes). I know I will need to treat it carefully in > order to get it working again. I plan to open it up and make sure I > clear > out any debris etc, but beyond that I need advice from those with the > experience and knowledge that I lack on how to go about powering it up > carefully. > Thanks Rob > After removing all the boards and leaving just the disk and tape drive for load I impetuously decided to try powering it up. I knew the PSU (model H7864) was set for 110V and made the switch to 240V (I am in the UK). When I connected the power cord, after a few moments there was a loud pop, followed by another before I could pull out the power cord, smoke rose from the PSU. This sounded just like when I had once accidentally made a 110/240 mix-up. The question is, could it be that I had not made the switch to 240 correctly, or could this just be down to the age of the PSU? ---- *Rob, possibly you made the 110/240 switch wrong, but also possible is that the PSU just wasn't ready to be turned on like that. Electrolytic Capacitors (of which there are many in that PSU) tend towards non-functionality the longer they sit unused. Without those caps working right, the PSU will do pops, smokes, and other alarming things. Then good luck fixing it. What I do with an old PSU like that is test each cap prior to it ever being powered up.. both for capacitance and ESR. Usually, some or all of the caps need reforming or even replacement. Only after the caps are back to health, do I then give the PSU power... at first with the smallest load I can get away with. If it's a switcher PSU (as that one is), I'll bring it up quickly to about 90V using a variac... then in 5V increments every 1/2 hr after that to 130V, then back down to 120V. This in the USA. jS *

17 years, 6 months

6
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TransEra documentation

by aek＠bitsavers.org

Going through my Tek 405x stuff, I realized I hadn't uploaded anything >from TransEra, who was a third party supplier of firmware. http://bitsavers.org/pdf/transEra

17 years, 6 months

1
0
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Powering up a 20-year old MicroVAX II

by chd_1＠nktelco.net

Robert Jarratt wrote: > The harness in my system does not seem to match any of the descriptions I > have seen so far. The wires are not equal in length, but it is not a ribbon > cable with IDC connectors either. The connectors are black rather than > white. The harness wires do not seem discoloured, but I believe that this > particular system may have only had light use in its day. I have a picture > of the harness but I am not sure if the rules of this list allow > attachments. > The key point of your description is that the wires are not equal in length. This COULD be a bad thing. I have a BA23 chassis that had a melted power supply connector. The connectors were AMP MTA .156 IDC connectors with individual wires. The connector housings were Yellow. The failure point was the connection between the harness and the power supply pin. As Allison describes, the problem is that there was an unequal distribution of current between shared pins. I replaced the harness with one that I made myself using high current box connection pins... with equal length wires. There is a field service notice that describes the problem and even mentions the color of the connectors. I remember reading it and saying to myself that was my chassis. I just can't remember where... -chuck

17 years, 6 months

1
0
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AAARRGGGHHHH ... people still stealing my work

by evan＠snarc.net

>>> Else something more wordy and crafted in legalese, rather than a plea. I hate legalese. I was trying to be nice. :)

17 years, 6 months

6
5
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Advice for Tek 4051 vector-drawing issue?

by derschjo＠mail.msu.edu

Inherited a Tektronix 4051 this afternoon (really, really cool old machine - 6800 CPU, vector storage-tube display) and after cleaning it out and reseating the socketed chips it appears to work almost correctly. (Even the tape drive works after cleaning the head... amazed that the pinch roller hasn't turned to goo.) The one issue is that "long" vectors do not get drawn as straight lines -- they end up curving in the direction of the destination. I've taken a photo to demonstrate: http://yahozna.dyndns.org/computers/tek4051/unvector.jpg The above is _supposed_ to be drawing a line from 0,0 to 100,100 and back, but as you can see, it's not really doing a very good job. Short vectors seem to draw OK, as do perfectly vertical and horizontal ones. Text gets drawn fine. I have the schematics but I've never dealt with a vector-based display before (only other vector display I have is in my Vectrex, and I haven't had to tweak that one yet.) Any ideas where to start? I figure the D/A converters on the CPU board are working correctly since text positioning works, and the endpoints of the vectors seem to be correct. Bitsavers has the schematics at: http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/tektronix/405x/070-2286-00_4051_Service_Vol2_M…, (see page 92 for the start of the display schematics.) And a higher-level overview of the functionality at: http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/tektronix/405x/070-2065-00_4051_Service_Vol1_M… (See page 147 for the start of the display overview.) Thanks! Josh

17 years, 6 months

10
29
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Powering up a 20-year old MicroVAX II

by ard＠p850ug1.demon.co.uk

> > > *Rob, possibly you made the 110/240 switch wrong, but also possible is > > that the PSU just wasn't ready to be turned on like that. > > Electrolytic > > Capacitors (of which there are many in that PSU) tend towards > > non-functionality the longer they sit unused. Without those caps > > working right, the PSU will do pops, smokes, and other alarming things. > > Then good luck fixing it. > > Do you mean that it will be difficult to fix, even if I can find someone who > really knows what they are doing? It might be. It depends on just what's failed. In SMPSUs (Switch Mode Power SUpply Units), one component failure can wreck other components too (ecven to the extent of multing PCB tracks) and if you don't find _all_ the failed partsm, but juet replace some of them and turn it on again the same thing can happen again. > > > > > What I do with an old PSU like that is test each cap prior to it ever > > being powered up.. both for capacitance and ESR. Usually, some or all > > of the caps need reforming or even replacement. Only after the caps > > are back to health, do I then give the PSU power... at first with the > > smallest load I can get away with. > > I only have a basic multimeter so I don't know if I would have had the > necessary equipment to do this, do you have any advice on the minimum > equipment needed? Now that there has been some damage is it sensible to You need a multimeter, certainly. An ESR meter is very useful too (this measured the effective series resistance of a capacitor, basically the higher the value the worse the capacitor is). A good 'scope is handy, and if you want to owrk on the primary side of the PSU when it's running, or examine waveforms there, you need a mains isolating transformer. And the 'series light ulb' (a mains-rated lightbulf, or 2 in series, conencted in series with the DC supply to the chopper circuit to limit the current in the event of a catastrophic failure) will save your nerves and possibly some expensive components [1]. But very important is a _brain_ :-) [1] THe fact that mains-rated light bulbs are getting hard to get thanks to the governemnt does not help here! > replace the blown capacitors and any other ones that don't measure well? > > > > > If it's a switcher PSU (as that one is), I'll bring it up quickly to > > about 90V using a variac... then in 5V increments every 1/2 hr after > > that to 130V, then back down to 120V. This in the USA. > > I looked up variacs but there seem to be an awful lot of different ones, > again any recommendation as to the minimum I would need? I would recomend against using a Variac on an SMPSU unless yoy really know what tyou are doing. An SMPSU is a fairly good aproximation to a contant _power_ load, in other word the input current increases as the input voltage decreases. Some SMPSUs can actually be damaged by running them at too low an input voltage, while plenty of other types do strange things. > By the way, I am aware that PSUs can be very dangerous to meddle with when > you have limited knowledge. How long should I leave the PSU between any Indeed. Mains, and the rectified mains you find in SMPSUs, is probably the most danagerous voltage you're going to come across. > tests to allow the capacitors to discharge? The label on the PSU says to > leave it 5 minutes, I suspect it should be longer. It's impossible to say. A good electrolytic capacitor with nothing connected to it will hold the charge for quite a time. Of course when the supply is working, the chopper circuit tends to discharge the mains smoothing capacitors, so the charge won't remain for very long. And many supplies have bleeder resistors (resistors connected in parallel with the mains smoothing capacitors) to discharge them. But of course those could fail too. What I do is open up the supply carefully and then measure the voltage across the mains smoothing capacitors (sometiems, as in the case of the HP9845 and DEC PDP11/44 supplies there are clear testpoints to do this). If it's more htan a few volts, I carefully connect a suitable resistor (a few 10's of kilohms) across the capacitors to discharge them. -tony

17 years, 6 months

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Advice for Tek 4051 vector-drawing issue?

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> I'm looking into whether if it's possible to adapt one of the "backpack" > expansions to take EPROMs instead of MCM6832 ROMs. Later modules used EPROMs. I've put everything I had dumped up under http://bitsavers.org/bits/Tektronix/405x along with scans of the binary loader and real time clock pcbs.

17 years, 6 months

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GPIB cards [WAS: Re: Advice for Tek 4051 vector-drawing issue?]

by devonstopps＠gmail.com

Speaking of GPIB cards, if anyone needs an ISA GPIB interface card, let me know. They're usually NI AT-GPIB/TNT+ cards. We usually toss a few every couple of months. For the cost of shipping (about $15CAD to almost anywhere). Also have Sun Ultra10 and Ultra5 free for pickup in Kingston, ON. On Sun, 22 Feb 2009, Josh Dersch wrote: > > Richard wrote: >> >> I guess the best way to get data transferred from these systems is to >> >> use the GPIB interface and transfer the programs out of the system and >> >> into the internet. I wonder if the easiest would be to use a >> >> Commodore GPIB compatable floppy drive or something.

17 years, 6 months

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Can someone help me identify this IBM machine?

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> So the other pictures in that bunch implies that most (all?) of the > stuff formerly at the museum is now at the offsite warehouse? The space which was formerly large and small storage in Mountain View has been packed and moved offsite to make room for an exhibit which is in development that will take up much of the first floor. This also helped the efforts to get the collection cataloged. Exhibits in the front of house are still there.

17 years, 6 months

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Randy Cook, TRSDOS, and Datapoint

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> Can anybody here compare the two and find threads of similarity? Gordon P. seems like the guy to ask..

17 years, 6 months

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8088 vs. 80c88

by les＠frii.com

I just thought of another intersting example. The version of adventure I used to play (550 point Geotz B01) behaved differently on a Z80 and a 8080. Something happened at the beginning of the game on a Z80 (It asked for your name, or have a version message, or something) which did not happen on an 8080/85. With that exception, it worked fine on either processor. That allways struck me as odd, and became my test for what processor was in a system. Les

17 years, 6 months

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Can someone help me identify this IBM machine?

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> Where is this thing? Do you know if there is any more of it left? At CHM. Apparently one of our volunteers went into storage while the artifacts were still in Mtn View and got creative with his camera. The 610 console was all that was donated.

17 years, 6 months

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AAARRGGGHHHH ... people still stealing my work

by evan＠snarc.net

>>> I only questioned the expectation of licensing and control given the original distribution medium and terms As far as the owner and creator am concerned, the original terms were: "This is cost-free to read and to quote for fair use, and I reserve the right to change these terms by making an announcement." "Fair use" doesn't mean "make available wholesale to the world" ... that's one of the (few!) things I think the courts got right about file sharing, for example. Later, I removed it from my site and announced about it.

17 years, 6 months

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Powering up a 20-year old MicroVAX II

by js＠cimmeri.com

Message: 20 Date: Sun, 22 Feb 2009 17:58:50 -0000 From: "Robert Jarratt" <robert.jarratt at ntlworld.com> Subject: RE: Powering up a 20-year old MicroVAX II <<Do you mean that it will be difficult to fix, even if I can find someone who really knows what they are doing?>> *Yes, it'll be difficult (but not impossible) to fix. You're probably better off finding another working one. Or trying to find an electronics buff.* <<I only have a basic multimeter so I don't know if I would have had the necessary equipment to do this, do you have any advice on the minimum equipment needed?>> *You don't have the necessary equip. And, No, I don't, because teaching you how to be an electronics technician is a whole other subject and beyond my means. * << Now that there has been some damage is it sensible to replace the blown capacitors and any other ones that don't measure well?>> *Not for you to replace them, no. It needs knowledgeable attention at this point.* << I looked up variacs but there seem to be an awful lot of different ones, again any recommendation as to the minimum I would need?>> *You choose them according to your voltage and amperage needs. I use a 5 amp one for small electronics and computers, 10 amp for larger computers (like my own Microvax). Again, though, unless you already know what you're doing with one, please take the time to learn prior to blowing stuff up. * <<By the way, I am aware that PSUs can be very dangerous to meddle with when you have limited knowledge.>> * Yep! They remain dangerous even when you have knowledge. * << How long should I leave the PSU between any tests to allow the capacitors to discharge? The label on the PSU says to leave it 5 minutes, I suspect it should be longer.>> *Honestly? Don't use time as a safetly measure. Assume the caps are always fully charged. Then test them and discharge them if needed. Again, because you don't know this, you need to get the knowledge or let someone else handle it before meddling with the PSU. Proceed carefully.* On Feb 22, 2009, at 3:33 PM, Gordon JC Pearce wrote: > >> I have to say, for all the talk of failing caps in power supplies >> I've only ever seen one electrolytic cap fail *ever*, and that was >> last week in a one-year-old graphics card that has hardly ever been >> powered off... > > Gordon, you don't mention how many caps you've looked at or tested, or how you've done so, but I encounter them constantly. Not so much in the 1980's vintage DEC equipment YET, but it's no myth that AEC's are electrochemical vats that have a lifespan. The lifespan varies widely depending on many factors, heat being the big one. jS

17 years, 6 months

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AAARRGGGHHHH ... people still stealing my work

by tshoppa＠wmata.com

Jim writes: > If this were a commercial work then I would obviously see it > differently. Not evaluating it from a commercial sense, but from an academic sense, Evan's work (not just the web page but all the effort and research and deep context behind it) puts it at the top 1% of anything I've ever seen done in the "history of technology" realm. It's far more than a picture of a bunch of old stuff, and it's far more than just scans of old documents. It's truly original work of top-notch caliber. I believe that in a world that is dominated so heavily by the current winners in brand-names that having a deep look at the outfits that may not be current commercial players (but whose ideas did eventually win) is very important. How such deep looks might become commercial ventures of their own... harder for me to say. There's clearly lawsuits flying back and forth about technology where examples of prior art or experts in prior art have value. And there's clearly coffee table books. But there are probably ways to succeed that I've never thought of. Tim.

17 years, 6 months

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