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

reforming capacitor tutorial/walkthrough

by aek＠bitsavers.org

"William Donzelli" <wdonzelli at gmail.com> wrote: > The caps from 1960s seem to be of little concern, and those from past > 1970 are of no concern. If the cap decides to die, its going to die. -- This was not the experience of the PDP-1 team during the restoration of that machine. Detailed records were kept of every cap that was reformed. This process took several months to perform. Blowing up a cap in the machine during restoration was not an option. Lyle, or one of the other hardware folks would know the details. I am disappointed at the 'let it just blow up' attitude that has been expressed on this list so far in the discussion.

18 years, 10 months

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VAX 11/750 rescued, alas...

by RodSmallwood＠mail.ediconsulting.co.uk

The system key can be found on the key rings of many PDP11 enthusiasts. -----Original Message----- From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of J Blaser Sent: 08 October 2007 23:59 To: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Re: VAX 11/750 rescued, alas... Rod Smallwood wrote: > Hi > Fear not all is not lost. There's tons of modules around but not > that many cabs. > Yes, you are absolutely correct! The more I think about it, the more glad I am to have even this empty chassis. Definitely harder to come by than the modules that are missing. A few good souls have already stepped forward offering some help with the boards, so this revival might be less difficult than I anticipated at first. > In the picture of the Qbus board it appears to be sitting on the > module config diagram. > As it is pre printed and not filled in by hand its probably a standard > system. > That will give you a list of the boards. > Yup, I went through that last night. There is another label that was inside one of the front cover plates that does show a list of modules penciled in. So I believe I now know what the original configuration of this system was. I've come up with a minimum list of boards, and a wish-list of the boards that were originally included. Looks like the the mass storage was hung off of a UDA50, and some tape devices on the SI 9700 board (which I still am completely ignorant of). I have a couple of Fuji SuperEagles and an RA81, so I'll be on the lookout for SDI and SMD interfaces for the rebuild. I just hope the Fujis and RA81 are functional when the time comes! > Note of caution do not try to turn it on. The power supplies will need > some work. You need to reform/replace any electrolytics. > > Roger that! I'm a firm believer in a full chassis cleanup, capacitor reform, and separate PS checkout before every hitting the big switch on the front! ;-) Oh, yeah, that reminds me...I've got to locate the 'vending machine' power-switch key for this thing. Anyone know if it is a fairly standard key? > The case will clean up well and you can start off by getting the PSU's > working and getting the list of modules together. Disk drives would > have been in another rack I think. > This looks like it'll be a more lengthy revival than any that I've done up until now, which have been mostly qbus PDPs and uVAXen. A great winter project! - Jared

18 years, 10 months

1
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1541-III group buy?

by dgriffi＠cs.csubak.edu

So, it seems to me that there is a decently sizable demand for 1541-III parts. I asked the creator of this thing if he plans to make PCBs any time soon. He said "no". But he left all the design files, firmware, etc on his website for anyone to use. So, how about a group buy? -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu

18 years, 10 months

8
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TI-990 ...

by bpope＠wordstock.com

I believe it was Chuck who was asking where to find TMS9900 and TMS9995 chips.. The TMS9900 is available from Unicorn Electronics for $34.88 each. See --> http://www.unicornelectronics.com/monthly.html Cheers, Bryan

18 years, 10 months

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VAX 11/750 rescued, alas...

by RodSmallwood＠mail.ediconsulting.co.uk

Its not so much the age of the system more how long it is since it last ran. As minimum isolate the positive terminal and put a meter on ohms range across it. As the capacitor charges the resistance will rise. If it does then good if not or goes up slowly then change the capacitor. I rang our old (now retired) DEC branch field service manager and he said "Turn on a 750 stored for years and with no load on the PSU .. Sure use a pole about twenty feet long!!" Rod -----Original Message----- From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Patrick Finnegan Sent: 08 October 2007 19:29 To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Re: VAX 11/750 rescued, alas... On Sunday 07 October 2007, Rod Smallwood wrote: > That will give you a list of the boards. > Note of caution do not try to turn it on. The power supplies will need > some work. You need to reform/replace any electrolytics. 11/750s aren't that old (early 80s), and shouldn't need reforming. It appears that William Donzelli agrees with me, and I'm sure he has more experience with this than I do. Pat -- Purdue University Research Computing --- http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/ The Computer Refuge --- http://computer-refuge.org

18 years, 10 months

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reforming capacitors, worth it?

by wdonzelli＠gmail.com

> I think > Will's implying that the need to reform caps that new is not necessary, > because there's no data available to say that it actually does any good... One though occurred to me just a few minutes ago. Most failures in capacitors - actually almost all pre-IC components - can be boiled down to impurities getting into the innards of the part thru failing seals. This is documented in military and trade rags, as they found out in the jungles of the Pacific during World War 2. With capacitors, the problems seem to be the dielectric (oil) getting out (see my previous post concerning Vitamin Qs), or moisture getting in. Either way, the dielectric is poisoned near the weakest part of the cap's structure - the edge of the foil, specifically where the leads connect to the foil. I can not see where reforming an electrolytic capacitor will do any good for the seals. If the seals are drying up, cracking, shrinking, expanding, or in some way not meeting spec, the crap is going to get into the innards of the capacitor and lead to a failure. Other than a complete rebuild, I doubt any seals can be repaired. And if you are going to do a complete rebuild, you might as well run the cap until it fails. And unlike an inductors that can be baked to drive off moisture, capacitors do not do well in the oven. -- Will

18 years, 10 months

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RS232 Breakout Boxes

by dkelvey＠hotmail.com

> From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu> > On Sun, 7 Oct 2007, Tony Duell wrote:> > > I can rememebr what 4 are :-)> >> > 1) An old RS23 breakout box. Real slide-switches to open all the wires,> > and 2mm sockets for cross-patching. The main signals are monitored by> > transistor-driven filament lamps, the whole thing is mains-powered,, said> > PSU also prvides +12V and -=12V outputs for forcing handshake signals> > ARRGG!!! You've provoked me into building a banana-jack breakout box!> Of course if you make one, put all the connector combinations on each side. Also put an extra connector on it that can be used to snoop the data in progress between two machines. One can usually put two receivers on a single drive. I've used this method to analyze unusual protocols in the past. It is handy. _________________________________________________________________ Climb to the top of the charts!? Play Star Shuffle:? the word scramble challenge with star power. http://club.live.com/star_shuffle.aspx?icid=starshuffle_wlmailtextlink_oct

18 years, 10 months

2
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Apple again - Disk ]|[ this time...

by julesrichardsonuk＠yahoo.co.uk

Having got the Mitac A2 clone up and running (checked out the 80-column output today and that was fine - only casualty in the whole machine was one cap that had gone high-ESR), I've dug my Apple /// out of storage... Disk ]|[ question - should the ribbon cable to the internal drive be plugged into J2 or J3 on the drive's analog board (does it even matter)? A long time ago I disconnected mine as a precaution; the drive began eating disks, but I didn't have time to get to the bottom of it at the time - I suspect it just needs a good clean. I can't for the life of me find where I made a note of which socket the cable plugs into. Normally I leave myself a note somewhere in the machine for things like this, but for some reason I haven't with this one :-( cheers J.

18 years, 10 months

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Setting up a VAXstation

by lproven＠gmail.com

Well, last night, I went and collected my first ever DEC box. It's a VAXstation 3100/38, bought on eBay for 99p (UK?0.99). It will be a few weeks until I get it home, and currently, it has no hard disks, but I'm hoping to rectify that. I plan to put 2 or 3 old SCSI disks in it - whatever I can find that will fit. I am sure they'll all be well under 1GB, as I believe that is a limitation for boot disks. I think I have a couple of 80MB ones around and maybe a 150MB or so. The two problems I don't currently have answers for are these. [1] I don't have a suitable monitor cable. I have a keyboard, 3 mice, and a DEC 17" mono monitor with a single BNC connector on the back. I also have a monitor cable, but it's an RGB one - one end is 3 colour-coded BNC connectors, the other is a D plug with three large shrouded sockets - like the larger connectors in a YB13 monitor cable but without the standard pins. On the back of the VAX is a monitor out port, but it's a D connector. Alas the machine is currently 15mi away or so, so I can't check, but I think it has about 20 pins. Again, a D connector. What sort of monitors will a VAXstation drive? I have an old Mac 21" monitor with a YB13 connector, which syncs happily enough to both PCs and Macs at around 1024x768, 1280x1024 (at a refresh rate of about twice a minute) and some Mac res in between - 1152x870 or so. Where on earth can I find a VAXstation video cable in 2007? [2] Friends have commented to me that a VAX of this age won't be able to boot from CD-ROM. Somewhere, I have a hobbyist VMS CD, if I can find it. It's been suggested to me that the easiest way to install would be to install VMS onto SIMH on my PC, netboot the VAXstation off the simulated VAX and install from one to the other. This sounds moderately hairy to me. I'm not a VMS virgin but I've not used it in 15y or so and I've never installed a machine from scratch - I just did day-to-day sysop duties. Is this likely to be correct? That a 3100/38 won't be able to boot >from CD? If it can, what sort of CD-ROM drive will I need? Do I need the special 512KB block support that SPARCstations are supposed to need? I have an old external Apple drive (CD300, I think) that I hope will do, if I can come up with the right permutations of SCSI cables to connect it... -- 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: liamproven at aol.com ? MSN/Messenger: lproven at hotmail.com Yahoo: liamproven at yahoo.co.uk ? Skype: liamproven ? ICQ: 73187508

18 years, 10 months

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TI 990 architecture / was Re: TI-99/4A Floppies

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: TI 990 architecture / was Re: TI-99/4A Floppies > From: Dave McGuire <mcguire at neurotica.com> > Date: Wed, 03 Oct 2007 12:48:37 -0400 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" <cctech at classiccmp.org> > >On Oct 2, 2007, at 3:47 PM, Martin Scott Goldberg wrote: >>> There are really three 99/4 home computers, original with chiclet >>> keys, the >>> second and most common with a really nice keyboard and the whie >>> version that >>> is really the same thing with a few board level cost reductions. >> >> Actually, there's one TI-99/4 and two TI-99/4a models. > > What are the differences between them, does anyone know offhand? > > -Dave There are really three 99/4 home computers: original with chiclet keys the 99/4 the second and most common with a really nice keyboard 99/4a the white console version that is really the same thing with a few board level cost reductions. (still 99/4A on the back) Allison

18 years, 10 months

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SGI Onyx Power Boards & System Controller

by jplist2007＠kiwigeek.com

Greetings all; I picked up an SGI Onyx 10000 RE2 rack ("Terminator") last week from surplus and, unfortunately, it appears I'm in the same boat as J Blaser - Boeing used this machine as 'parts' for another. I'm missing the Power Boards (I believe I need three) and the System Controller. Also someone removed the Graphics and Main I/O panels... violently, apparently, as the cable that goes from the DG2 (Display Generator) to the breakout has part of the breakout PCB still attached to the cable! I see a main I/O panel on eBay right now relatively inexpensively, as well as the graphics panel - but the Graphics I/O Panel is for an InfiniteReality, not a RealityEngine2, and is no good to me, alas. Many thanks to all; JP Hindin

18 years, 10 months

2
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reforming capacitor tutorial-walkthrough.htm

by lynchaj＠yahoo.com

>Has anyone got one online? If so, URLs please... [snip] Here is a good one: http://www.s100-manuals.com/Repairs.htm I can't say if it is effective or not but I have followed the directions using a variac several times with some success. At least no exploding/leaking electrolytics in any of my restored machines. I have seen some equipment with burst/leaking electrolytic capacitors and they are very messy. Even if the procedure is marginally effective, it is probably worth something. Preventing even one burst capacitor saves you a *LOT* of time cleaning up. Best of luck! Andrew Lynch

18 years, 10 months

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these RTL or what?

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: these RTL or what? > From: woodelf <bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca> > Date: Mon, 08 Oct 2007 12:11:23 -0600 > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >Allison wrote: > >> RX02 works with PDP-8, WD1793 works with Cmos6120 (PDP-8), VAXen and >> other long word machines are using floppy and other 8bit interfaces. >> VAX 780 microcode was loaded from floppy. > >I grew up in alas in a PC world.I got to play with a 8 but that >is about all. I'd have guessed that. ;) > >> Most of those systems had already dealt with the 8bit/n-bit issue >> and as devices got larger and space less an issue it became less >> an issue. If it were, then PCs would have 32bit wide HDC rather >> than 16bit. > >I like 16 bits for IDE ... You can cut that down to say 12 bits for >your PDP-8. 9 or 12 bits for the cpu depending on what cpu I build.:) True. But since the 386, PCs are 32bit, for that fact since 1978 VAX was 32bit.. You would have thought a wider IDE or data channels would have happend. But it hasn't. IO devices often lagged the CPUs or were designed for the devices convenience or so it seemed. I feel legacy, (not always PCs) played distinct factor as well. Allison

18 years, 10 months

1
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these RTL or what?

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: these RTL or what? > From: woodelf <bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca> > Date: Sun, 07 Oct 2007 08:49:56 -0600 > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >Allison wrote: > >> Does it really makes that much differnce the number of bits for a char? >> Really, Six bits was kinda tight for work where upper or lower case >> was used but it didn't affect calculating Pi to a 100 places. >> Wasn't the basic chunk 9 bits for PDP10 and it happened (DEC >> software) used 6 bit char notation as a carry over from earlier >> life with friden flexowriter and TTYs on earlier machines? > >Floppy disk is 8 bit I/O. That made all the difference when standard >floppy disk controlers came out. Ben. RX02 works with PDP-8, WD1793 works with Cmos6120 (PDP-8), VAXen and other long word machines are using floppy and other 8bit interfaces. VAX 780 microcode was loaded from floppy. Most of those systems had already dealt with the 8bit/n-bit issue and as devices got larger and space less an issue it became less an issue. If it were, then PCs would have 32bit wide HDC rather than 16bit. With that character representation and word size are at best only loosely associated or an OS convention. If anything ASCII was a standard as were a few others like IBMs scheme. Converting >from one coding to another was one of the first apps (code breaking). Going from one character representation to another is generally is not a big task so long and it's not language translaton. We as early users did that often for devices like Seletric printers. Did character convention used affect system choice or OS choice, possibly. It was only a piece of a larger picture of how systems evolved. Allison Allison Allison

18 years, 10 months

2
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these RTL or what?

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: these RTL or what? > From: shoppa_classiccmp at trailing-edge.com (Tim Shoppa) > Date: Sat, 06 Oct 2007 08:40:15 -0400 > To: cctech at classiccmp.org, cctalk at classiccmp.org > >Allison <ajp166 at bellatlantic.net> wrote: >> In the end ECL was a way to speed but always at such a high system cost >> and complexity it was often behind the curve for integration and delivery. > >It depends on what you're doing. > >ECL was perfect for custom-built lab and military hardware. Follow >a few simple rules and even a bozo like me could reliably lay out the >PCB's. Contrast that with 74F technology where you couldn't even figure >out if ground at the center of the board was the same as the ground at >the edge of the board :-). Having used most logic from transistors to ECL100k and some oddballs inbetween I'd agree. ECL was excellent for mixed signal and fast front end stuff. My favorite uses were programable /n for PLLs and frequency counters. ECL was far nicer without ground noise and some of the transmission line difficulties that the faster/fastest TTL (and CMOS) were really nasty driving. Ringing and reflections on a board, bus or interconnect could really ruin your day. That made ECL nice for fast intersystem connects were the cables were for reasons coaxial cables or other shielded schemes. >Above the onesies-twosies level things weren't so clear. There's a big >leap between a back-projector or array-processor made at the onesies-twosies >level and the world where VLSI becomes economical. Gate arrays helped >span this gap but that gap had been pinched to nonexistence by the mid-80's. The magical thing that really impacted logic design indirectly be it discrete transistors or the fastest of the fast was simply size. The faster the logic was the closer all the sourrounding bits had to be to capitalize on it. Otherwise the rule of thumb of 1nS/ft took over never minding load capacitances. Witness the Cray round machine (YMP?). There is a long history of systems compaction, cooling and speed interactions in computers. >Minicomputer makers like DEC who also had their own fabs were in an odd boat... >the process-leading CPU chips couldn't utilize the fabs built to >deal with them because DEC didn't sell enough CPU's. In the end >a vast army of interface and peripheral chips seemed to keep things >churning well enough that they kept their fabs for many many years past >where I was convinced they couldn't be economically viable. Bingo there. While a few chips were economically successful it was only with the help of silicon foundries like WD, SMC and AMD to get needed volumes. In the end the greatest value of silicon hill was in its sale with a few licenses kicked in. Allison

18 years, 10 months

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MFM or ESDI QBUS controller for one PDP-11/23 PLUS

by spedraja＠gmail.com

Hello. As the subject say, I'm searching for one working MFM (not RQDx, better something like the Andromeda UDC) or ESDI QBUS controller plus cables to use with one PDP-11/23 PLUS. The ESDI would be a better choice because I have one 300 Mb HD and one 700 Mb HD, both of full-height (in the terms used with old PeeCee's). I have too a couple of RX33 floppies but no controller for them. I would appreciate to obtain one. Finally, I am thinking in use one old PC enclosure for disks and floppies. Someone has did it ? Results ? Can contact privately with offers. Thanks and Greetings Sergio

18 years, 10 months

1
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reforming capacitor tutorial/walkthrough

by legalize＠xmission.com

Has anyone got one online? If so, URLs please... -- "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/>

18 years, 10 months

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Setting up a VAXstation

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: Setting up a VAXstation > From: shoppa_classiccmp at trailing-edge.com (Tim Shoppa) > Date: Mon, 08 Oct 2007 08:14:33 -0400 > To: cctech at classiccmp.org, cctalk at classiccmp.org > >Tony Duell said: >> I cna understnad why people are interested only in old software, not >> hardware, and want to run it under emulation on a modern machine >> >> My puzzlement is with people who want to run the old hardware (not have >> to run the old hardware becuase it is part of some machine tool or >> something) but don't want to understand what's going on inside. What more >> do you get over running the software under emulation? > >In fact, availability of hardware is a huge factor in succesfully >making an emulator for a machine. All but the simplest processors >are complicated enough that there are little corner cases all over >the place where none of the processor/architecture documentation tells >you what is going to happen. > >And outside the central processors, all peripherals but the very simplest >are filled with complicated and undocumented behavior. > >Schematics could answer many of these questions, but in real life >they end up guiding the search for the answer to the question rather >than being the actual defining source for the answer. > >So in general emulator users and especially developers completely >grok the need to have hardware working. Sometimes I believe that >today's emulator developers know much more about the architectures >than the original architects did :-). (In a couple cases, they are >the orignal architect!) > >Availability of software is also important for making a reliable emulator. >You could spend years reading the books to write an emulator, but you >don't trust anything you've read or done until you've booted the simplest >OS. > >Tim. The best example of this that comes to mind is the Apollo Guidence Computer (AGC). There was one hardy and persistant soul that not only researched it, he built a sim and tracked down samples of software to validate the sim and the later hardware. One great issues was lack of documentation, apparently much was lost/destroyed when that chapter of the space program ended around 30 years ago. The few intact copies of the AGC (Apollo command modules) likely haven't seen power in at least that long if even complete. I doubt any of the CM holders could be convinced to power it up assuming they were even preserved sufficiently to safely do so. So for those interested in machines that are obscure, unusual or very rare even generating a sim has to be a huge challenge only equaled by task of gatherering the needed data to base it on. It is reverse engineering on a very deep level for a faithful sim. Allison

18 years, 10 months

1
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these RTL or what?

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: these RTL or what? > From: "William Donzelli" <wdonzelli at gmail.com> > Date: Sun, 07 Oct 2007 15:55:57 -0400 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >> Yes, but conductors on substrate are slower depending on substrate used. >> They are dense but TCMs still have to talk to other TCMs. > >So you have never seen the innards of a 3081, then? Not enough of one to appreciate. I do know that IBM did some fairly sophisticated stuff to get around the problem. Allison >-- >Will

18 years, 10 months

1
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Setting up a VAXstation

by RodSmallwood＠mail.ediconsulting.co.uk

My view is that if you have spent little or nothing on the computer. Then a few pounds on a cable is a good investment. If you do not have experience in making up cables then don't waste time learning for a small number. Rod -----Original Message----- From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Pete Edwards Sent: 03 October 2007 14:34 To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Re: Setting up a VAXstation > > > here, folks. I'm not going to spend ?20 or ?30 on getting or making > > a cable for a 99p computer! > > Ah, that's right - you're in the UK so the telephone cables won't be > the same. Actually, you _might_ be able to take an Ethernet cable, > file off the clip and file both sides to make it fit. If you can keep > the pins centered properly after filing, it should work. > > -Ian > There's plenty of telephone kit in the UK that does use RJ11, look on answering machines and especially external modems - they nearly always came with an RJ11-BT adaptor cable. A lot of modern laptop internal modems seem to have RJ11 sockets too. -- Pete Edwards "Prediction is very difficult, especially if it's about the future" - Niels Bohr

18 years, 10 months

6
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these RTL or what?

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: these RTL or what? > From: woodelf <bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca> > Date: Sat, 06 Oct 2007 18:10:55 -0600 > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >William Donzelli wrote: > >>> Crunching numbers was a part of the task. The other part was moving >>> and handeling data in mass storage and memory. Most of the DEC hardware >>> moved data pretty fast. What was the demise of PDP-10 was simple, megabytes. >> >> And being six bit machine in an eight bit world... >> >SEVEN bit world. We can blame IBM for all our 8 bit PC ASCII stuff. >Eight bits I think for EBDC was earlier. Having 4 bit sized TTL stuff >does not make for nice octal digits. Ben. Does it really makes that much differnce the number of bits for a char? Really, Six bits was kinda tight for work where upper or lower case was used but it didn't affect calculating Pi to a 100 places. Wasn't the basic chunk 9 bits for PDP10 and it happened (DEC software) used 6 bit char notation as a carry over from earlier life with friden flexowriter and TTYs on earlier machines? While It may have been an issue and part of the picture I don't feel it was as heavy a weight as VAX was easier to promote and potentially could address Gigabyte size memories with 32 bit pointers rather than 256KW with a memory extension to 4MW. I find it easier to see and recognize that bigger machines with bigger memories for big programs crunching huge amounts of data is what had a big part in the 10s demise. Only opinion but hey, it's free. Allison

18 years, 10 months

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these RTL or what?

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: these RTL or what? > From: "William Donzelli" <wdonzelli at gmail.com> > Date: Fri, 05 Oct 2007 13:55:28 -0400 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >> Using ultra-fast ECL doesn't make much sense when you've got nanoseconds >> of delay to the backplane, to the next board, and back to the part that >> needs the signal. > >That depends on how tight everything is. Thermal Conduction Module, anyone? At 1ns/ft even the TCMs were not tight/dense enough. >> The ECL technology used in the VAX9000 was gate arrays with roughly the >> same timing parameters as 100K ECL (0.5 to 1.0 ns propogation delays). > >Yes, but I do not think that was the cutting edge anymore. Considering >the 9000 was supposed to be the machine that finally convinces the >mainframe world to accept DEC, it may have been a poor choice. We >probably will never know. 9000 may have been as big of an >embarrassment as the KC10. > >Even though the 9000s were bombs, they are one of the few VAX machines >I would chase after. ;) the problem is the 9000 by time it got out the door CMOS system on a chip was around the corner. With the ability to put transistors literally next to each other it was easier to achieve overall speed. When you consider that you could put multiple systems in less space than a 9000 well, quantity has it's own special quality. >> Responsiveness of a computer system depends on a lot more than the >> speed of the semiconductors used to build it. Plenty of modern examples >> of how to make fast silicon seem slow are coming out of Redmond I >> notice :-). ;) I was always amazed that a dozen users could be on an 11/34 but one user could bring a 486 to it's knees. > >I am thinking raw horsepower - all the benchmarking stuff. Looking at >the KL10 (or the other DEC ECL machines), it justs seems like they >should have been better number crunchers. Crunching numbers was a part of the task. The other part was moving and handeling data in mass storage and memory. Most of the DEC hardware moved data pretty fast. What was the demise of PDP-10 was simple, megabytes. A PDP-10 could not address the huge volumes of data in one chunk comming >from the more complex models and programs in use. VAX offered a 32bit address, PDP-10 was basicially 18bits with memory extension. If your munching a model or database of millions of elements that is as important as the time to add two word size numbers. It's why PDP-11 was replaced with VAX and why VAX was replaced with Alpha. In the end ECL was a way to speed but always at such a high system cost and complexity it was often behind the curve for integration and delivery. Usually other technologies were close enough behind and had the higher density or ease of integrationin to larger systems needed to offset the per gate speed with sometimes better complex function speeds. Allison >-- >Will

18 years, 10 months

7
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Fw: Software Find at Thrift

by jrkeys＠concentric.net

Second try at sending this to list. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Keys" <jrkeys at concentric.net> To: "cctalk at classiccmp" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Sent: Friday, October 05, 2007 8:51 PM Subject: Software Find at Thrift > While checking out a old hangout I found a copy of IBM's Hollywood > software Version 1.0 (on 3.5 FD), complete in the box for $1.81 plus tax. > There was not much else there like it was in the long ago past. Speaking > of Hollywood, the Hollywood video store near us is closing and I went > dumpster driving the other night and found that they had tossed all the > video game cases that had been on display. Most but not all were empty, I > found PS2 and PS3 DVD's in some of the cases. It got too dark and I had to > stop pulling cases from the dumpster but there was over 150 cases left in > the trash. > > John

18 years, 10 months

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Test Only No Message

by jrkeys＠concentric.net

TESTING

18 years, 10 months

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these RTL or what?

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: these RTL or what? > From: "William Donzelli" <wdonzelli at gmail.com> > Date: Sat, 06 Oct 2007 16:48:07 -0400 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >> >That depends on how tight everything is. Thermal Conduction Module, anyone? >> >> At 1ns/ft even the TCMs were not tight/dense enough. > >Have you ever seen a IBM TCM? Yes, but conductors on substrate are slower depending on substrate used. They are dense but TCMs still have to talk to other TCMs. >> Crunching numbers was a part of the task. The other part was moving >> and handeling data in mass storage and memory. Most of the DEC hardware >> moved data pretty fast. What was the demise of PDP-10 was simple, megabytes. > >And being six bit machine in an eight bit world... ;) minor thing. >-- >Will

18 years, 10 months

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New DSDD 5.25" floppies?

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: New DSDD 5.25" floppies? > From: "Ethan Dicks" <ethan.dicks at gmail.com> > Date: Sat, 06 Oct 2007 17:41:24 +0200 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >On 10/5/07, Zane H. Healy <healyzh at aracnet.com> wrote: >> And you all seem to have missed what I'm referring to. :^) Note the >> "III" portion of 1541-III. :^) >> http://jderogee.tripod.com/project1541.htm > >I've seen that before, and have often contemplated throwing one together. > >> I'm about ready to start collecting the parts needed and to see about >> getting at least a couple circuit boards made. > >Would you mind sharing where you are getting Nokia 3310 phones (or the >Phillips PDC 8544 LCD display)? > >> BTW, I currently have 3-5 1541's, 1 1571, and 1 or 2 Excelerator+Plus >> (minus power-supplies) drives. I tend to use a pair of the 1541's. >> Though the 1571 is at home rather than lost up in storage. :^) I use >> the 1541's as I don't have a spare 1571. I prefer to only use drives >> if I have a spare. > >I've never had a 1571 - I started with 1540 in 1982 (and wish I could >find it - I think it has my Spartan Apple-II interface mounted inside >it), then acquired a number of 1541s in my C-64 days, but never moved >over to the C-128, so froze there in time (except for the 1581 I have >that came from a defunct Commodore dealer - it works, but I haven't >put more than a couple floppies through it). > >I _am_ interested in the 1541-III, but I'd *really* be interested in a >FLASH-storage-based 2031 - i.e., with an IEEE-488 interface. I still >do lots with PETs, and the .D64 support would solve one of the >problems I have with running old programs - Infocom used "random >files" (unstructured raw block access) for their Zmachine. The games >were very much floppy-based, with no obvious way to migrate them to a >hard disk or other non-floppy medium. > >-ethan Something similar to that would be appealing for my Epson PX-8. Allison

18 years, 10 months

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Infant mortality and longevity of DVD media?

by Watzman＠neo.rr.com

First, I don't think that DVD media is subject to "infant mortality" at all, which is not to say that a just burned disc can't be defective. Now a couple of things that look like infant mortality are possible, although the mechanisms are not the same as what we usually call infant mortality. One of these is that data written a burner whose laser power is below spec can "fade" over time, but this is mostly a problem when using "RW" media (which should be avoided for archival and backup uses). Also, a media that is subject to bending can delaminate .... DVDs are a sandwich of two layers of plastic glued together, and the data is stored on a dye layer coating on the inside, at the juncture of the two layers. Delamination is fatal to the data, and normally occurs from the outside in .... Good advice is to only use 80% to 90% of the media capacity, leaving the outside edge (which is where the first damage usually occurs) unused for data anyway. Second, there is no doubt, I don't think, that dual layer media is considerably less reliable than single layer media (knowing how dual layer works, it's hard to believe that it works at all). That said, I have not yet had a problem with any of the dual layer backups that I've made. The subject of optical media longevity is one of considerable debate. All studies by the media makers suggest a life of several decades to centuries, but some skeptics insist on saying less than 10 years. I have optical CD media that is now 12 years old that I can still read just fine. I think that some of your practices are excessively conservative (such as only applying power when the drives are being used), but will do no harm. The biggest risk, I think, is burning with a marginal burner (low laser power and/or bad or just dirty optics). Reading the media with a variety of drives other than the one used for burning is certainly not a bad idea, but for most users is unacceptably time consuming.

18 years, 10 months

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[Fwd: PDP8 im Ebay]

by RodSmallwood＠mail.ediconsulting.co.uk

Wundebar... That's nearly as bad as Vienna. Rod -----Original Message----- From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Paul Heller Sent: 05 October 2007 19:57 To: General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only Subject: Re: [Fwd: PDP8 im Ebay] ---- Original Message ----- From: "Rod Smallwood" <RodSmallwood at mail.ediconsulting.co.uk> > I'm a bit confused as to where it is. The only Penzing I know is in > Austria near Vienna. > If it was northern Germany I'd go and get it. The system unit might be > the basis for building up a PDP 8 system. > Google maps shows it near Munich. Paul

18 years, 10 months

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New DSDD 5.25" floppies?

by ethan.dicks＠gmail.com

On 10/5/07, Zane H. Healy <healyzh at aracnet.com> wrote: > And you all seem to have missed what I'm referring to. :^) Note the > "III" portion of 1541-III. :^) > http://jderogee.tripod.com/project1541.htm I've seen that before, and have often contemplated throwing one together. > I'm about ready to start collecting the parts needed and to see about > getting at least a couple circuit boards made. Would you mind sharing where you are getting Nokia 3310 phones (or the Phillips PDC 8544 LCD display)? > BTW, I currently have 3-5 1541's, 1 1571, and 1 or 2 Excelerator+Plus > (minus power-supplies) drives. I tend to use a pair of the 1541's. > Though the 1571 is at home rather than lost up in storage. :^) I use > the 1541's as I don't have a spare 1571. I prefer to only use drives > if I have a spare. I've never had a 1571 - I started with 1540 in 1982 (and wish I could find it - I think it has my Spartan Apple-II interface mounted inside it), then acquired a number of 1541s in my C-64 days, but never moved over to the C-128, so froze there in time (except for the 1581 I have that came from a defunct Commodore dealer - it works, but I haven't put more than a couple floppies through it). I _am_ interested in the 1541-III, but I'd *really* be interested in a FLASH-storage-based 2031 - i.e., with an IEEE-488 interface. I still do lots with PETs, and the .D64 support would solve one of the problems I have with running old programs - Infocom used "random files" (unstructured raw block access) for their Zmachine. The games were very much floppy-based, with no obvious way to migrate them to a hard disk or other non-floppy medium. -ethan

18 years, 10 months

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Xerox Star floppies (was xerox 820-II boot disk)

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> Hi Dave, I'm also interesting in doing this, but for a Star Imagedisk should work fine. They are double sided, double density disks. Somewhere I have a Unix program that can extract the contents from them. I have at least a hundred 8010 floppies read already with various versions of the Star OS, Interlistp-D, Server software and XDE.

18 years, 11 months

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xerox 820-II boot disk

by dgriffi＠cs.csubak.edu

I've unearthed a Xerox 820-II, the original boot disk to which has gone bad. Is there someone here who can create a copy of the original 8" boot disk and whatever else was shipped with the Xerox 820-II? I have blanks, but no means to write to them. -- 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?

18 years, 11 months

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VAX 11/750 rescued, alas...

by oldcpu2＠rogerwilco.org

The gods smiled upon me, and I was chosen to rescue the DEC VAX 11/750 that Richard alerted us too about a month ago. Yesterday I went up to collect it. I think most of us, during a pickup, are mindful of just getting the load onboard and away, and it was the same way for me with this pickup. Besides, the unit was literally stuffed so tightly into the front corner of their storage that there was no way to examine the innards at that location. A few images can be found at: http://www.rogerwilco.org/VAX11-750 Once back on homebase, I finally got a chance to open up the unit. To my horror (it is October, after all), I find just a single board installed in the CPU backplane, and one loose q-bus board! The first is a System Industries 9700-6301 with the following significant chips: Signetics N8X60N, AMD AM9128 (x2), Motorola MCM93L422PC (x4), TI SN74S181N, and about a dozen TI 82S137s with little numbered stickers on each. Otherwise it's loaded with TTL logic chips. There are no headers or other connectors on board, just the backplane fingers. I have no idea what this board is. I openly admit that I'm a complete {non-uVAX | massbus | unibus} novice. The second board is an MCD MLSI PC-11, which I'm guessing may be some kind of dual parallel interface. I'll have to do a little scouting on Bitsavers and Manx to see if I can turn up anything useful. Anyway, sadly, this box is not much more than an empty carcass, without any brains. It clearly was sacrificed to keep other systems alive. Still, I would dearly love to populate the backplane(s) and light this baby up, but I guessing I'll be hard pressed to find anyone with a whole set of spares that I could somehow convince into letting them go. I don't want to lose an opportunity here, and I'm not saying that I have my eye on the local metal recycler just yet, but what am I going to do with an empty chassis?! Now, I should say that the donor was extremely nice, and offered to pass along anything related that eventually turns up as they dig deeper into their massive pile (12' x 15' x 20', literally boxes/cartons/PCs upon boxes/cartons/PCs), but I'm not sure I should hope for much. Am I foolish to ask? Anyone with a spare set of VAX 11/750 modules? - Jared

18 years, 11 months

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DECnet/E and/or can anyone in Australia image a 1600 BPI tape?

by prd＠bur.st

G'day there, Although I've been watching this list for a few months now, this is my first post to the cctech mailing list so I guess I should start by saying hello from Perth, Western Australia. I've been collecting DEC machines and Commodore 8-bitters for about eight years now, and I've recently started collecting members of the Apple ][ and Macintosh family. (While I'm yet to pick up any big iron PDPs, I do have representatives of DEC's PDP-11, VAX, MIPS and Alpha families.) I've also managed to pick up members of the PA-RISC, SGI MIPS, SUN SPARC and IBM RS/6000 families, though this part of my collection is much less comprehensive. Anyway, on to the topic of my message --- currently up for sale on eBay is a set of RSTS/E and DECnet/E tapes. I've been playing around with RSTS/E, TOPS-20, and earlier versions of VAX/VMS, Ultrix and BSD UNIX in the hopes of setting up a limited ARPAnet-era free public access network, and while I do have some RSTS/E 9.2 boxes running under simh, they're basically standalone. Now, some RSTS/E and DECnet/E tapes have come up for auction on eBay (see http://cgi.ebay.com.au/DEC-Software-Kit-RSTS-E-Tapes-More_W0QQitemZ18016620…) but there are at least two problems: (1) the current set of RSTS/E 9.[257] and DECnet/E 4.1 tapes are listed for AUD 595/795 for Buy It Now, and (2) I don't have any tape drives older than a TK50. So, should this auction lapse, and in the off chance that I can obtain just the DECnet/E tape, I was wondering if anyone here (1) has a 1600 BPI tape drive with which they can image a tape or two, and (2) lives in Australia. Of course, if anyone already has a copy of DECnet/E that they're willing to share, I'd appreciate that even more as the seller doesn't make any guarantees about his tapes' quality or usability. Many thanks in advance, Pete

18 years, 11 months

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Tektronix 4041 System Controller Docs

by Josef.Deuschinger＠web.de

Hi Richard, I just read your email below, when scanning through the net for more 4041 information. You know, I asked you for the missing page A-10 of your '4041 System Controller' manual a while ago. I am looking for more information about how to get user programs as stand alone units into the ROMs. The Utility package names at page 7-1 the programs PRMBLD for building ROMable tape images and RMXFER for transferring them to the ROMs. I am also interested in a description of how to prepare files to be loaded with the command 'Loadroms'. The programs should be part of an optional accessory package. Do you have them? Are they part of the 'systems verification tape'? The following manuals I don't have: * 4041 Option 10 Graphics, plotting, signal processing & utility routines - programmers reference guide 70-5983-00 (I suppose it's a detailed ROM call description), * Getting Stared With Your 4041, * 4041R03 operation manual with ROM call description 070-4559-00, * 4041 service manual 061-2513-00 In turn, I can give you copies of all ROM packs as files. I have them all verified by programmed MCM68766C EPROMs! I also would be interested in an 4041 experience exchange with other users. Thanks in advance for your help. Best regards, Josef Richard legalize at xmission.com Mon Apr 24 12:28:58 CDT 2006 a.. Previous message: anyone have a terminal server? b.. Next message: Tektronix 4041 System Controller Docs c.. Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ] [ subject ] [ author ] -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Since I just acquired one of these new-in-box with all the docs, if someone else out there needs more docs for these let me know and I'll move them to the top of my scanning queue. Of particular interest is the documentation for several of the ROM packs and the complete programmer's reference documentation giving all the details on the BASIC language in the controller. -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline"-- code samples, sample chapter, FAQ: <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/> Pilgrimage: Utah's annual demoparty

18 years, 11 months

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ClarisDraw and ICT1301 (was: Semi-OT: Classic Mac support gone from Leopard (OS X 10.5))

by roger.holmes＠microspot.co.uk

On 6 Oct, 2007, at 02:48, cctalk-request at classiccmp.org wrote: > From: "Zane H. Healy" <healyzh at aracnet.com> > > In all fairness I've already started looking into running > ClarisDraw under > emulation since I can't find a replacement I like, in the long run > it is > likely to run better under emulation. There is a glitch or two > with running > it under Classic on my G5. Besides I want to be able to upgrade to > a Mac > Pro one of these days. > > Or, I might just setup my G4/450 running Mac OS 8.6 (I have the > special G4 > version), and use it as an X-Terminal running my old copy of > eXodus. At > which point I'll be able to run ClarisDraw on there. Though at 8 > years old, > I'm not sure I want to depend on it for an app I *need*. Sorry to take this off topic still further. Please excuse me being nosey, but is it a matter of speed , features, user interface, opening ClarisDraw files, price or what? My company took over 'MacDraft' from IDD many years ago and still supply both MacDraft and the cheaper version MacDraft PE (personal edition) which are both universal binaries on OS-X. We get some people complaining that the UI is not modern enough and others that its too modern. We do not currently have any sort of gradient fills, maybe that's what is missing. We are currently working on version 6.0 so would be interested if you or any others on this list would like to tell me what we need to do to meet your needs, though of course we don't make programs for one users needs alone. To bring back on topic, last month we got the core memory of my ICT1301 back to 100% functionality, all 2000 words of 48 bits (1200lbs weight). We're now working on an interface to write data to a parallel port so we can catch it with a modern machine. We're using TTL working from a -5v supply as Vss and ground as Vcc to match up with the -6.3 volt logic levels (with an implicit inversion). We're also using an IDT 7201 FIFO to buffer the rapid supply of 48 bits >from a word against the 8 bit at a time parallel port, and it may also absorbs some of the difference between rapid data transfer of each mag tape block and no data during the inter-block gap with the constant data rate of the parallel port. Roger Holmes

18 years, 11 months

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Infant mortality and longevity of DVD media?

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: Infant mortality and longevity of DVD media? > From: woodelf <bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca> > Date: Sat, 06 Oct 2007 10:51:30 -0600 > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >Barry Watzman wrote: > Reading the media with a variety of >> drives other than the one used for burning is certainly not a bad idea, but >> for most users is unacceptably time consuming. >Software mortality worries me. Who knows what bugs the next version of >your driver has. Ben. One solution is a few older systems "frozen in time" and not allowed to auto update (if M$). Even if Linux frozen in time is a good idea for backups and archives. This ahs proven successful for me and also give me working systems that are not prone to yet a new set of different bugs or lost capability. Allison

18 years, 11 months

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Decmate I

by James＠jdfogg.com

> I have a reasonable Decmate I / PDP8 with dual RX02's in a > tower and spare parts CRT/Keyboard, spare motherboard. It > boots up nicely, includes serial port board and back cover. > I've enjoyed it for the past year, but now have to get it out > of my workspace. Open to a reasonable offer, especially if > the buyer can pick it up in Southern NH. > > - Gary I don't know what "reasonable" would be, but I am "reasonably" close in Northern New Hampshire (New London). Your space woes could be solved today. I need some fiscal guidance or suggested trades.

18 years, 11 months

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[Fwd: PDP8 im Ebay]

by RodSmallwood＠mail.ediconsulting.co.uk

My German Is not that good but the gist of it is that it's a controller for a CNC drill. The 8/f is an Irish made one from the Galway plant. (Whilst working at DEC I visited Galway on a regular basis). I'm a bit confused as to where it is. The only Penzing I know is in Austria near Vienna. If it was northern Germany I'd go and get it. The system unit might be the basis for building up a PDP 8 system. Oh well one day I'll get a PDP-8 from somewhere. I'm sure that 10,000 + where made. Of those probably 3,000 where UK/European voltage models. Rod Smallwood The DECcollector -----Original Message----- From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Gerold Pauler Sent: 05 October 2007 11:35 To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: [Fwd: PDP8 im Ebay] Got an email today, that you can get a complete pdp8/f on ebay. It is located in Germany. Does not mention how much memory it got but seams to be complete with paper tape reader and an atari 140ST as console. http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=320166292810 I don't have any connection to the seller. And I don't have any more free space for another pdp8 of this era. - Gerold

18 years, 11 months

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Setting up a VAXstation

by cctech＠retro.co.za

Hi all >From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) > >A friend of mine was nearly killed due to this. He tested some wiring for >voltage-to-earth and the meter said it was essentially dead. SO he >started workign, alas the meter was malfuctioning, and he got the full >mains volatege across him. He imediately went and bought an expensive mad >reliable neter. I always short my screwdriver across the line before fitting, say, a light socket or a switch. This would be after turning the mains off and measuring. Even when it's a brand new installation and the main breaker panel isn't connected to the utility yet. Yea, it might cause a helluva flashbang, but it beats walking that tunnel towards the bright light. W

18 years, 11 months

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Semi-OT: Classic Mac support gone from Leopard (OS X 10.5)

by spectre＠floodgap.com

This is semi-OT, but if you use an OS X capable Power Mac to run legacy Mac software, 10.5 apparently no longer supports Classic even on PowerPC machines. http://www.lowendmac.com/mail/mb07/0716.html#2 This is a shame, since a lot of early Mac software will surprisingly still run on my G5 running Tiger. In fact, I use an old System 6-era version of Caere OmniPage for simple OCR tasks since it's so unbelievably fast by comparison. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- In memory of Howard Caine --------------------------------------------------

18 years, 11 months

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Retro-gaming on Mactel/OS 10.4 (was Re: Semi-OT: Classic Mac support gone from Leopard (OS X 10.5))

by ethan.dicks＠gmail.com

On 10/6/07, Zane H. Healy <healyzh at aracnet.com> wrote: > At 9:45 AM +0200 10/6/07, Ethan Dicks wrote: > >X-11 header files on my disk - yes... I _did_ install X)... what I > >would love to do, but don't seem to be able to, is to run some OS 9 > >PPC Mac programs. > > Have you tried? I thought that "carbon" apps should run under > Rosetta. Of course your apps might not be "carbonized" (I think > those are the right terms, it's been years, and it's late). Hmm... I haven't tried screwing with it too much... I tried doing a 'fink' or one of the other distro tools - it fetched the Dosbox source just fine, but the compile stopped when it failed to locate X11.h or something similar. I have it on the system, so it's probably a Makefile assumption as to INCLUDEPATH or something similar. I just haven't had time to dig into it. It's really just to play DOS games ("Master of Orion I", "X-COM", "Colonization", etc.) so I'll probably dig into it in the depths of Winter at Pole, when I'm bored and need a nostalgia fix. It's entirely uncritical for "real" work. > I suspect you are out of luck. Most of us with non-Mac OS X apps are > trying to run stuff so old that they're 68k apps. I've found that > anything I am interested in that had a PPC version now has a Mac OS X > version. As I thought... but I don't think they have released a Mac OS X version of "Starcraft" and "Starcraft: Broodwars" - more unessential retro-gaming. I do have genuine copies of both for Windows, so it's probably easiest to just finish setting up Parallels and run the DOS versions. I was just hoping to stay native where native was possible, but not, apparently, in this case.

18 years, 11 months

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CompacTape

by silent700＠gmail.com

I just received my shipment of items from this auction: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=220149564798 which should have been a load of recyclable TK50 media. Instead of CompacTape, however, they are all CompacTape III. I think these were TK85 2.6gb media. Does anyone know if they will still be writable with the standard format in a TK50? Or do I have a bunch of useless DLT I tapes?

18 years, 11 months

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EPROM Death?

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: EPROM Death? > From: "Zane H. Healy" <healyzh at aracnet.com> > Date: Tue, 02 Oct 2007 17:33:11 -0700 > To: classiccmp at classiccmp.org > >How do you tell an over-erased EPROM? > >I finally have my programmer and eraser, and just tried erasing 6 >EPROM's. Four erased just fine, and two are showing weird patterns >of alternating blocks of 04/06 and 14/16. > > Zane > I've seen that when the quartz window isn't really clean and the UV hasn't quite done the full job. I have found some vendors eproms need a little more time to cook. Ove 26 years I think I've only seen one that really had a stuck bit and that was a blown output pin. Allison

18 years, 11 months

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Experience with Dysan drive tester?

by trixter＠oldskool.org

A friend might have a Dysan Pat-2+ 5.25" floppy drive tester held for me, but we both have no experience with it. Assuming it comes with the alignment disk and manual, and functions, is it a worthwhile piece of equipment to have? I am not a die-hard techie -- I do not own an oscilloscope -- so I might grab it to keep my drives aligned, but not if it's more placebo than functional. If anyone has had experience using this unit or one like it, I'd like to hear your thoughts. -- 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/

18 years, 11 months

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Finally! We have video of Chuck Peddle @ VCF East 4.0

by evan＠snarc.net

Thanks to Dave Haynie and Robert Bernardo. Chuck's talk begins around 15:00 into part 1. Part 4 ends just as he was concluding - and then the Skype PC when blue-screen on us. No video yet of the post-Chuck celebration, which is when the audience got to ask questions of Dave, Bil Herd, and Bob Russell, and when we sang "Happy Birthday to the Pet" with a chocolate chickenhead cake! 1. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBnmJhEOdC8 2. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e1LeMNKHUbs 3. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dm8M5rdrDpA 4. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-_C1j8uSO_I Rumor has it that a DVD may soon be available. - Evan

18 years, 11 months

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Decmate I

by gkaufman＠the-planet.org

I have a reasonable Decmate I / PDP8 with dual RX02's in a tower and spare parts CRT/Keyboard, spare motherboard. It boots up nicely, includes serial port board and back cover. I've enjoyed it for the past year, but now have to get it out of my workspace. Open to a reasonable offer, especially if the buyer can pick it up in Southern NH. - Gary

18 years, 11 months

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Software Find at Thrift

by jrkeys＠concentric.net

While checking out a old hangout I found a copy of IBM's Hollywood software Version 1.0 (on 3.5 FD), complete in the box for $1.81 plus tax. There was not much else there like it was in the long ago past. Speaking of Hollywood, the Hollywood video store near us is closing and I went dumpster driving the other night and found that they had tossed all the video game cases that had been on display. Most but not all were empty, I found PS2 and PS3 DVD's in some of the cases. It got too dark and I had to stop pulling cases from the dumpster but there was over 150 cases left in the trash. John

18 years, 11 months

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SGI Crimson Questions & hardware request...

by derschjo＠msu.edu

Hi all -- Just picked up an SGI Crimson this afternoon, which should prove to be a fun machine to play around with once I get it running... a few questions for those who've dealt with these before... - What kind of power cable does this thing take? I've not yet seen anything like the connector on the back of this thing... can I plug this thing into a regular household outlet (that can supply the massive power requirements) or am I going to have to rewire my house? :) - What version of IRIX do you recommend running? I have a copy of 5.3, and 6.5, but I know that 6.5's too new for this beast. Anyone out there have a keyboard/mouse they're willing to part with (or know where I can find one?). This thing's got a 15-pin D-Sub connector on it and I of course don't have anything compatible... Thanks, as always... - Josh

18 years, 11 months

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Looking for Acorn A5000 keyboard & mouse...

by derschjo＠msu.edu

Man, I seem to be asking for a lot of keyboards lately :). Got a working Acorn A5000 sans keyboard and mouse. Connector looks like PS/2, but of course it's not. Anyone have a spare set? Thanks again, Josh

18 years, 11 months

1
0
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these RTL or what?

by tshoppa＠wmata.com

Will wrote: > I wrote: > > The ECL technology used in the VAX9000 was gate arrays with roughly the > > same timing parameters as 100K ECL (0.5 to 1.0 ns propogation delays). > Yes, but I do not think that was the cutting edge anymore. Considering > the 9000 was supposed to be the machine that finally convinces the > mainframe world to accept DEC, it may have been a poor choice. We > probably will never know. 9000 may have been as big of an > embarrassment as the KC10. The 9000 was obsoleted by the NVAX chip before the 9000 hit the street. "the mainframe world" acceptance of a CPU is the stupidest-ass thing a company could ever ever want. On a.f.c there were some references to emulating Unisys architectures on Intel hardware, and I followed the links to the trade press rags, and the rags were filled with a bunch of useless self-important balloon-filling about CPU technologies with no evidence that anywhere anyone understood what the emulation layer actually did. I came away not knowing what the emulation layer actually did either (classic CPU-technology-on-the-mind poisoning of those who should know better). There are about ten thousand markets that DEC served quite well, and it's a shame they put all that effort and money into neglecting those markets and trying to do a mainframe. > Even though the 9000s were bombs, they are one of the few VAX machines > I would chase after. Stack it up with all those other CPU's without peripherals, huh? :-). >> Responsiveness of a computer system depends on a lot more than the >> speed of the semiconductors used to build it. Plenty of modern examples >> of how to make fast silicon seem slow are coming out of Redmond I >> notice :-). >I am thinking raw horsepower - all the benchmarking stuff. Looking at >the KL10 (or the other DEC ECL machines), it justs seems like they >should have been better number crunchers. Mainframes are really good at some things, sometimes they are decent number crunchers in terms of pure FLOPS but it has been three to four decades since they delivered any punch in terms of FLOPS per dollar. Tim.

18 years, 11 months

3
3
0 0

Apple Profiles...

by julesrichardsonuk＠yahoo.co.uk

Anyone happen to know: a) The correct voltage* for the supply to the HDA (ST506), b) Whether the comms cable is wired straight through? (This for an Apple /// Profile - I'm not sure if the Lisa variant is different in this regard). I'm pretty sure I just used a straight-through cable many years ago, but confirmation would be nice. * I'm getting +16VDC on the one here (with the logic supply given a suitable dummy load so that it produces a regulated +5VDC). I don't particularly want to toast the HDA if that's supposed to be something like 12VDC... possible that the supplies are essentially separate I suppose, and the HDA output needs its own load before it'll regulate properly. I thought there was a service manual for the Profile (Lisa or /// I'm not sure) floating around a decade or so ago - doesn't seem to show up under Google though and it's not on bitsavers :-( cheers Jules

18 years, 11 months

2
1
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Semi-OT: Classic Mac support gone from Leopard (OS X 10.5)

by lproven＠gmail.com

On 05/10/2007, Zane H. Healy <healyzh at aracnet.com> wrote: > At 8:41 PM -0700 10/4/07, Cameron Kaiser wrote: > >This is semi-OT, but if you use an OS X capable Power Mac to run legacy Mac > >software, 10.5 apparently no longer supports Classic even on PowerPC machines. > > > > http://www.lowendmac.com/mail/mb07/0716.html#2 > > > >This is a shame, since a lot of early Mac software will surprisingly still > >run on my G5 running Tiger. In fact, I use an old System 6-era version of > >Caere OmniPage for simple OCR tasks since it's so unbelievably fast by > >comparison. > > <bad word><bad word><bad word><bad word><bad word><bad word><bad > word><bad word><bad word><bad word><bad word><bad word><bad word><bad > word><bad word><bad word><bad word><bad word><bad word><bad word><bad > word> > > OK, that <bad word> STINKS! Just the night before last I had to fire > up ClarisDraw as even though I own copies of more modern drawing > app's, nothing works as well. First in 10.4 they dropped support for > classic AppleTalk breaking things for me, now this. Well, we may > just stay on 10.4.x for the next few years. As a result of the > Appletalk issue I didn't upgrade to 10.4 till earlier this year, even > though I bought it the day it came out. Yep. Although to be fair, I have few Macs so old they can't run MacOS 8.1 and it networks happily with Tiger boxes over TCP/IP. But yes, I entirely agree. OTOH, Apple's market now is x86 boxes and its competition is Windows. A Macintel can dual-boot to Windows or run it in a fairly seamless VM. With the best will in the world, to most people - including, I must reluctantly admit, me - that is (or would be) vastly more use than running MacOS 9 in a VM! I happily run Linux, but if money were no object, I'd be on OS X on a Mac Pro, with Wine for a few legacy Windows apps - or possibly Parallels Desktop, as it's cheap and it runs Windows seamlessly - i.e. Windows apps' windows merged with OS X apps on the same shared desktop. On a quad-core or octo-core machine with 4G of RAM, I could afford a copy of W2K in a VM. I'd never notice the load, I'm sure. The thing that saddens me is that if you do this, you suddenly have to do all that tired old dancing around with legions of MS updates and antivirus and antispyware and so on in Windows on your nice clean safe Mac. -- 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: liamproven at aol.com ? MSN/Messenger: lproven at hotmail.com Yahoo: liamproven at yahoo.co.uk ? Skype: liamproven ? ICQ: 73187508

18 years, 11 months

2
1
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Infant mortality and longevity of DVD media?

by jhfinedp3k＠compsys.to

I have a specific question, but a general concern about how long a backup can still be read. I realize that all of the hardware and software is less than 10 years old, but the software files being backed up are often 30 years old. Environment: Pentium III (running W98SE) or Pentium 4 (running WXP) and using GHOST 7.0 as the backup software with C: hard drive under FAT32 file structure. An image file backup made of the C: drive is eventually written to a DVD and within a time period of between one second to one day, another copy of the DVD file is made back to a spare hard drive thereby proving that the DVD can be read. In addition, the MD5 value of the image file was kept and written to the DVD and compared with the MD5 value of the file copied from the DVD (since it takes less time to produce the MD5 value from a hard disk file than from an identical DVD file). Question: How long a period of time should I wait to be sure that infant mortality of the image file on the DVD is no longer a factor? Is one second sufficient? i.e. at present as soon as the DVD is finished being burned and the DVD is ejected, I copy all of the files back to a vacant partition on the hard drive. Question: I am using Fujifilm DVD-R 16X 4.7 GB blanks with an old Pioneer 105 DVD burner. I have not experienced any problems over the past 5 years and I plug the power into the DVD burner ONLY when it is being used - which is 3 or 4 times a year. Should I be using a second DVD drive which only reads a DVD to check on the files which have been burned to the DVD blank? How often should I be reading the files on the DVD to be sure that the files can still be read? Is 5 years the length of time before I should duplicate the files on an old DVD? Or perhaps sooner or perhaps longer? Since I make and keep a monthly backup image file of the C: drive (3 DVDs a year with 4 monthly backup files of 1 GB each), loosing one backup image file would probably not be critical. Question: The dual layer DVD drives and blanks (which hold more than 8 GB) seem to be more than double the cost. Are they just as reliable at this point as the single layer drives and blanks which hold only 4.7 GB? Sincerely yours, Jerome Fine -- If you attempted to send a reply and the original e-mail address has been discontinued due a high volume of junk e-mail, then the semi-permanent e-mail address can be obtained by replacing the four characters preceding the 'at' with the four digits of the current year.

18 years, 11 months

1
0
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New DSDD 5.25" floppies?

by healyzh＠aracnet.com

18 years, 11 months

10
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MSCP controllers

by bqt＠softjar.se

fre 2007-10-05 klockan 12:00 -0500 skrev "Jerome H. Fine" <jhfinedp3k at compsys.to>: > Johnny, I believe that your comments are very clear and > they address many of the aspects which concern the way > in which MSCP handles read / write requests in both small > systems (single user systems like RT-11 and even TSX-PLUS > since the device driver still handles one request at a time) > and large systems (such as RSX-11 and especially VMS). Thank you. And yes, there might be a big difference between systems like RT-11, and larger ones. I don't know enough of the innards of RT-11 device drivers to tell how it is doing, nor how programs might utlize the driver. > (NOTE that all of the following comments are with respect > to running programs on a 750 MHz Pentium III with 768 MB > of RAM using W98SE as the operating system, ATA 100 disk > drives of 160 GB and Ersatz-11 as the application program > running a mapped RT-11 monitor, RT11XM. While I have very > good reason to believe that the same relative results will > be obtained on a Pentium 4 under WXP, again using Ersatz-11 > running RT-11, I have done almost no testing at this time. > OBVIOUSLY, comparison with real DEC hardware of a PDP-11 > and a VAX can only be done on a relative basis since HD: > exists ONLY under Ersatz-11. In addition, since the speed > of disk I/O on the Pentium III (even more so on a Pentium 4) > is so much faster (more than 100 times) than the transfer > rate on a SCSI Qbus or Unibus, the comparison could be very > misleading since CPU time vs I/O transfer time might become > much more significant. For just one example, when the BINCOM > program that runs on a real DEC PDP-11/73 is used to compare > 2 RT-11 partitions of 32 MB on 2 different ESDI Hitachi hard > drives (under MSCP emulation with an RQD11-EC controller), > it takes about the same time (about 240 seconds) to copy > an RT-11 partition and to compare those same 2 partitions. > Under Ersatz-11, the copy time is about 2 1/4 seconds and the > BINCOM time is about 6 1/2 seconds using MSCP device drivers. > When the HD: device driver is used under Ersatz-11, the times > are about 1 second for the copy and about 6 seconds for the > BINCOM - I have not bothered to figure out why the reduction > is only 1/2 second instead of 1 1/4 seconds.) There is a big problem with using E11 here, since it queues and optimizes disk I/O as well, and so does the underlying OS also in the end. So it is tricky to do much evaluation of the controllers as such. You basically see what is best under E11. > However, I believe that my comments on the efficiency of > using the MSCP device driver under RT-11 vs the efficiency > of using the HD: device driver probably need to be analysed > much more closely. The other aspect of the analysis that > is missing is the efficiency with with Ersatz-11 implements > the MSCP emulation as opposed to the HD: "emulation". It > is unlikely, but possible, that Ersatz-11 has much higher > overhead for MSCP since the interface is so much more > "intelligent" than the HD: interface only needs to transfer > the data to the user buffer based on the IOPAGE register > values. Analysis is always a good thing. And yes, the implementation of the respective emulation in E11 plays a big part. > A bit more information may help. > > (a) The HD: device driver can be used BOTH with and without > interrupts being active after the I/O request is issued. > It makes no difference under W98SE since the I/O request > is ALWAYS complete before even one PDP-11 instruction is > executed. This result also applies to the MSCP device > driver which I could modify to see if it might make a > difference in efficiency. However, when I attempt to > compare the copy of a 32 MB RT-11 partition with HD:, > the time difference between using interrupts and not > using interrupts is so negligible that it is almost > impossible to measure the total time difference to copy > the 32 MB RT-11 partition using the available PDP-11 > clock which measures in 1/60 of a second. Since there > are 60 ticks in a second, the accuracy is better than > 2% over 1 second which seems adequate to determine on > an overall basis if using interrupts vs no interrupts > makes a significant difference. Obviously if there is > no significant time difference at the 2% level (of one > time tick of 1/60 of a second), then avoiding the extra > RT-11 code to handle the interrupt does not play a > major role in the increased efficiency of HD: vs MSCP. > I conclude that would be the same for MSCP as well. An interrupt handler that took anywhere near a fraction of 1/60 of a second is so broken it should be shot. Basically, you cannot measure anything with a clock of that low precision. Also, you need to check for I/O completion before doing the next operation. If you skip that, you will loose. So the question then is: is it acceptable to be in a tight loop waiting for I/O to complete, or do you want the machine to be able to do something else meanwhile? Let us instead look at this from a theoretical point of view. With the HD: driver, you need to somehow make sure that the previous operation have completed before you start the next one. This must all be done in PDP-11 code. You have the choice of either doing it polled, using a tight loop, or having an interrupt when the device is ready. Now, having a tight loop will most likely be better, but then your machine will do nothing else while it is waiting for the previous operation to complete. So most likely you will want to use interrupts. But no matter, we're talking about executing PDP-11 instructions the whole time here. Either to polled loop, followed by setting up the registers for the next I/O request, or having an interrupt handler entry doing the same setup after some sagister saving and so on. As such, they take a damn much longer than doing native instructions on the host CPU. This is important. The host CPU in the HD: case is the machine running the E11 emulator, while for the MSCP case is either the machine running E11, or the local CPU on the controller card. My point here then is: once the previous operation have completed, the HD: controller must run through some PDP-11 code before the next I/O operation can start. With MSCP, the host CPU needs to run though some code before the next I/O operation can start, while the PDP-11 isn't burdened at all in this phase. Obviously, the MSCP case is better. But this is only true, if you queue more than one I/O reuqest to the MSCP controller. If you don't take advantage of this feature in MSCP, then your MSCP controller will be the same as the HD: controller, but with more overhead, since there is more bits to fiddle on the PDP-11 before a new I/O request can start using MSCP. Basically stop and go. Not efficient at all. So it's a question of if the device driver takes advantage of this or not. And this might be something that RT-11 don't do. Oh, and no, disk operations under E11 aren't so fast that no instructions will be executed before the operation completes. However, with disk caching and tricks inside E11, a few operations might appear to go that fast, before reality catches up with you. Disk I/O still takes on the order of milliseconds to complete. Guess how long one PDP-11 instruction in E11 takes? If anything, computer speed have advanced much more that disk speeds, so that even with emulated computers, we now manage to do a *lot* while waiting for disks. And already with the trusty old real hardware, we sat around waiting for disks long times... > (b) The other aspect is the ability of MSCP to order > and internally queue I/O requests based on the most > efficient order for them to be performed, probably > when there are many requests outstanding and the > required head movement can be minimized by choosing > the order in which to execute the requests - which > thereby increases overall I/O throughput. If I can > make a suggestion, I respectfully ask what the interface > between the device driver and the controller (or host > adapter in the case of SCSI for MSCP - note that ESDI > controllers are also MSCP) has to do with efficient > internal queuing of I/O requests. Perhaps my viewpoint > based on RT-11 is distorted (or TSX-PLUS for that matter > which uses almost the identical code as RT-11 as far as > I am aware), but I ask the question. It seems to me > that a simple (dumb and efficient) interface such as > HD: is only the final step in instructing the "controller" > to perform the disk I/O whereas the actual "intelligent" > aspect is probably going to be in the device driver > of the respective operating system such as RT-11, TSX-PLUS, > RSX-11 or VMS. Obviously the "intelligent" portion can > also be in the actual controller or host adapter, but based > on my VERY limited understanding of MSCP implementation > by both DEC and 3rd party MSCP controller and host adapter > manufactures for both the Qbus and Unibus, all of the > "intelligence" of internal queuing of I/O requests for > the above 4 example operating systems is performed in > the device driver, if anywhere. There are obviously several reasons why this needs to be in the controller. If we go back to the first point I discussed above, about MSCP being more efficient if we queue several operations at once, without having to wait for each operation to complete before queueing the next one, then you must also do queue optimization inside the controller, since obviously you cannot easily synconize and reorder operations inside the device driver once you have queued them to the controller. That would require you to withdraw that I/O request, so that you can insert another and then reinsert the revoked one again for you to get the correct ordering. Now, if you don't want the efficiency of being able to queue new operations immediately, but instead only issue them once the previous one is finished, then you can easily also do queue optimizations in the device driver. However, this all also is related to another aspect of MSCP that I mentioned: bad block replacement. Since the controller does this without the involvement of the driver, you cannot from the software really say which ordering of the I/O requests that are optimal. Bad block replacements mean that block that you might think are adjacent might physically be very far apart on the disk. In short, the software haven't a clue to how the physical layout of the disk looks like, and therefore the software can't really do correct I/O queue optimizations. Another aspect is once again efficiency. By letting the controller do the queue optimizations, you unburden the normal CPU from this task, which otherwise takes quite a few CPU cycles to do. The controller can play with this while it's doing a transfer and is just idling anyway, so even if it is a slower CPU, this will end up being faster. So from several points of view, this is both more efficient, and leads to smaller and nimbler device driver, by not having to implement some issues for efficiency because that is moved to the controller instead. > Please confirm if my assumption is correct with regard to > where the "intelligence" is located, i.e. in the device > driver or the controller / host adapter. Based on the > answer, it will then be possible to continue this > discussion. It would be helpful to isolate where the > decreased efficiency of using the DEC concept of MSCP > is introduced and what specifically causes the decrease > in efficiency. For example, on my Pentium III, I have > noted that when I copy large files of 1 GB or larger, > it is almost always useful to to no other disk I/O > during the minute it takes for the copy to complete > unless the additional disk I/O for another job is > trivial in comparison and I can usefully overlap my > time looking a a different screen of information. > Whenever possible, I also arrange to have different > disk files which will be copied back and forth on > different physical disk drives if the files are larger > than about 32 MB since the time to copy any file (or > read a smaller file) is so short in any case. While > I realize that on a large VMS system with hundreds of > users there will be constant disk I/O, I still suggest > that the efficiency of the device driver to controller > interface may play a significant role in overall I/O > throughput rates. Well, as to your thoughts above, I think I've covered that now. As for explanations why you're observing faster operations with the HD: driver in RT-11, my first suspicion would be that the program don't issue multiple reads/writes to the controller, but instead issues one and waits for it to complete before doing the next one. If the program indees tries to be optimal, then my next guess would be the device driver not issuing several operations to the same controller, leading to the same behaviour. While I admittedly don't know enough about RT-11 to say, and obviously don't know how your program does it, I know that in RSX, the device driver do issue the request immediately if possible, and as such you can have several operations outstanding in parallell. If I were to write a na?ve copy program, I might not care enough to try to get the disks working at full speed, which would lead to the same problem you're observing. However, I know how to write such a program in RSX so that I really would keep the controller busy at all times. But that would involve using asynchronous I/O. Another thing: The MSCP driver in RSX is maybe the most complex driver there is (in competition with the TT: driver). There is a reason for this. MSCP is a complex controller. One interesting thing to note is that RSX device drivers can use I/O queue optimization. There is support in the kernel for drivers to do this. And the MSCP driver do have the code for this, but is turned off by default, since it's mostly useless, for the reasons above. Only if very many packets are queued will the driver I/O queue optimization even begin to be used, and then over just the trailing I/O requests that the controller don't have room for. Johnny

18 years, 11 months

1
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these RTL or what?

by tshoppa＠wmata.com

Will wrote: > Someone wrote: >> VAX9000 built of ECL100K, fastest of the fast. The second most common >> use of TTL was in very high speed instrumentation and specifically frequency >> counters and UHF PLLs. > If the 9000 series was till using 100K, DEC must have been sleeping. > By the 9000s development period, ECL was beyond 100K. I am not sure, > but 10E may have been out by then. 10G maybe as well, but using that > leads to insanity. Using ultra-fast ECL doesn't make much sense when you've got nanoseconds of delay to the backplane, to the next board, and back to the part that needs the signal. The ECL technology used in the VAX9000 was gate arrays with roughly the same timing parameters as 100K ECL (0.5 to 1.0 ns propogation delays). > But one thing I notice about DEC's ECL machines (9000, KL10) - for > being ECL, there sure were ssssllloooowwwww. KL10 was 100 series 10K ECL technology, typically 3 to 4 ns propgation delay. A lot easier to build large systems with than say 74F00 stuff but not a whole lot faster. Responsiveness of a computer system depends on a lot more than the speed of the semiconductors used to build it. Plenty of modern examples of how to make fast silicon seem slow are coming out of Redmond I notice :-). Tim.

18 years, 11 months

5
5
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TI 990 architecture / was Re: TI-99/4A Floppies

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: TI 990 architecture / was Re: TI-99/4A Floppies > From: Brent Hilpert <hilpert at cs.ubc.ca> > Date: Wed, 03 Oct 2007 12:56:06 -0700 > To: General at priv-edtnaa06.telusplanet.net, > "Discussion at priv-edtnaa06.telusplanet.net":On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >Chuck Guzis wrote: >> >> On 3 Oct 2007 at 10:13, Peter C. Wallace wrote: >> >> > I think I chose the 9900 based on the Osborne book, it had the shortest >> > benchmark program... > >> This overly-simple benchmark with varying assumptions is one of the >> biggest weaknesses of Volume II of the Osborne books. Perhaps a >> >> But even with its weaknesses, the "Introduction to Microcomputers" >> set was a valuable resource when there was little software and no MPU >> was yet dominant. > >I love that book, for it's overview of lesser known microprocs and being a >period snapshot of the state-of-the-art. I still find it a useful >technical reference for a lot of chips for which data is hard to come by. Same here. I do find that one has to qualify the views of the authors as having some bias. Some of the CPUs commented as being least likely actually had excellent longevity. For example 1802, 6100, 6502 and a few others. It's interesting that at the time of writing the embedded system market was still in it infantcy and would grow considerably to be the primary consumer of microprocessors. But as you say it's at least an overview of many micros to compare or understand at some level. Allison

18 years, 11 months

2
1
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Interesting early all-in-one PC with monitor and printer built-in -- Computer Devices DOT (eBay)

by wmaddox＠pacbell.net

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=120166532727 Computer Devices DOT 14547-03 1983 - (eBay item 120166532727 end time Oct-04-07 19:25:01 PDT) Comes with a carrying case, sort of portable, 8088. I've never seen one of these. Kind of neat for a PC clone. More info here: http://old-computers.com/museum/computer.asp?st=1&c=116 OLD-COMPUTERS.COM Museum ~ Computer Devices Incorporated DOT --Bill

18 years, 11 months

6
7
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MSCP controllers

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: MSCP controllers > From: "Jerome H. Fine" <jhfinedp3k at compsys.to> > Date: Fri, 05 Oct 2007 09:51:38 -0400 > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > > >Johnny Billquist wrote: > >> (Sortof starting a new thread) >> >> There have been a discussion about the ineffectiveness of MSCP >> recently, especially compared to a dumb controller interface. >> >> To make a few comments on this; yes the MSCP controller is much more >> intelligent. But noone have yet talked about what this means. >> >> The overhead for playing with the MSCP controller is way much more >> than for a simple, and stupid controller. However, there is also a big >> speed gain in some situations. >> Jerome Fines observations are correct. Under a single-user system such >> as RT-11 (especially of the software acts in a naive way) much of the >> advantages of MSCP is lost. The fact that it can deal with large disks >> (or disks with different sizes) can hardle be called "intelligent". >> That's really primitive. >> >> Things that the MSCP protocol do handle, however, and where the HD: >> driver will suffer and loose, is when we get into more advanced stuff. >> >> The MSCP controller can have many I/O requests outstanding at the same >> time. Once one operation is completed, it can immediately start the >> next one. You actually have a zero setup time with MSCP. So if you're >> doing several I/O operations in sequence, a good driver, in >> combination with a good program, will be able to get more performance >> out of the MSCP controller than the HD: driver, which each new >> operation can only be programmed once the previous operation is >> completed. >> >> The MSCP controller can also complete several I/O requests with just >> one interrupt. No need for one interrupt for each I/O operation that >> completes. >> >> The MSCP controller can also reorder I/O operations for better >> efficiency. If you have three requests, jumping back and forth over >> the disk, it makes sense to actually do the two operations on one end, >> before doing the operation at the other end. This can be implemented >> in software by the HD: controller, but then we now have more software >> that must run before each I/O request is issued. >> >> The MSCP controller handles bad block replacement without the >> involvement of the software. It always present a disk without bad >> blocks. In real life, all disks have bad blocks, so somewhere this >> always needs to be handled. Now, if you have a simulated PDP-11, the >> disk is actually a file on that OS, so the underlaying OS will handle >> bad blocks for you, so it isn't necceasry for the PDP-11 controller to >> do this anymore, but MSCP was designed for raw disks, not emulated >> systems. Dealing with bad blocks on the HD: driver would cost a lot. >> >> The MSCP controller can do I/O to several disks in parallel. In real >> life, controllers like the HD: driver pretends to talk to exists as >> well. One problem with these are that if you have several disks, you >> can only do I/O to one disk at a time. Some of these controllers could >> allow you to do seeks on other disks while I/O was performed on one >> disk. However, things started getting complicated with this. >> >> The MSCP controller have pretty advanced error detection and handling. >> Including extensive reports to the software on problems. >> >> Now, those things are why it's more intelligent. And more intelligent >> means it also takes more software to talk to it. :-) >> >> MSCP is really like serial SCSI (or serial ATA), only done 20 years >> earlier. > >Jerome Fine replies: > >Johnny, I believe that your comments are very clear and >they address many of the aspects which concern the way >in which MSCP handles read / write requests in both small >systems (single user systems like RT-11 and even TSX-PLUS >since the device driver still handles one request at a time) >and large systems (such as RSX-11 and especially VMS). > >(NOTE that all of the following comments are with respect >to running programs on a 750 MHz Pentium III with 768 MB >of RAM using W98SE as the operating system, ATA 100 disk >drives of 160 GB and Ersatz-11 as the application program >running a mapped RT-11 monitor, RT11XM. While I have very >good reason to believe that the same relative results will >be obtained on a Pentium 4 under WXP, again using Ersatz-11 >running RT-11, I have done almost no testing at this time. >OBVIOUSLY, comparison with real DEC hardware of a PDP-11 >and a VAX can only be done on a relative basis since HD: >exists ONLY under Ersatz-11. In addition, since the speed >of disk I/O on the Pentium III (even more so on a Pentium 4) >is so much faster (more than 100 times) than the transfer >rate on a SCSI Qbus or Unibus, the comparison could be very >misleading since CPU time vs I/O transfer time might become >much more significant. For just one example, when the BINCOM >program that runs on a real DEC PDP-11/73 is used to compare >2 RT-11 partitions of 32 MB on 2 different ESDI Hitachi hard >drives (under MSCP emulation with an RQD11-EC controller), >it takes about the same time (about 240 seconds) to copy >an RT-11 partition and to compare those same 2 partitions. >Under Ersatz-11, the copy time is about 2 1/4 seconds and the >BINCOM time is about 6 1/2 seconds using MSCP device drivers. >When the HD: device driver is used under Ersatz-11, the times >are about 1 second for the copy and about 6 seconds for the >BINCOM - I have not bothered to figure out why the reduction >is only 1/2 second instead of 1 1/4 seconds.) > >However, I believe that my comments on the efficiency of >using the MSCP device driver under RT-11 vs the efficiency >of using the HD: device driver probably need to be analysed >much more closely. The other aspect of the analysis that >is missing is the efficiency with with Ersatz-11 implements >the MSCP emulation as opposed to the HD: "emulation". It >is unlikely, but possible, that Ersatz-11 has much higher >overhead for MSCP since the interface is so much more >"intelligent" than the HD: interface only needs to transfer >the data to the user buffer based on the IOPAGE register >values. > >A bit more information may help. > >(a) The HD: device driver can be used BOTH with and without >interrupts being active after the I/O request is issued. >It makes no difference under W98SE since the I/O request >is ALWAYS complete before even one PDP-11 instruction is >executed. This result also applies to the MSCP device >driver which I could modify to see if it might make a >difference in efficiency. However, when I attempt to >compare the copy of a 32 MB RT-11 partition with HD:, >the time difference between using interrupts and not >using interrupts is so negligible that it is almost >impossible to measure the total time difference to copy >the 32 MB RT-11 partition using the available PDP-11 >clock which measures in 1/60 of a second. Since there >are 60 ticks in a second, the accuracy is better than >2% over 1 second which seems adequate to determine on >an overall basis if using interrupts vs no interrupts >makes a significant difference. Obviously if there is >no significant time difference at the 2% level (of one >time tick of 1/60 of a second), then avoiding the extra >RT-11 code to handle the interrupt does not play a >major role in the increased efficiency of HD: vs MSCP. >I conclude that would be the same for MSCP as well. > >(b) The other aspect is the ability of MSCP to order >and internally queue I/O requests based on the most >efficient order for them to be performed, probably >when there are many requests outstanding and the >required head movement can be minimized by choosing >the order in which to execute the requests - which >thereby increases overall I/O throughput. If I can >make a suggestion, I respectfully ask what the interface >between the device driver and the controller (or host >adapter in the case of SCSI for MSCP - note that ESDI >controllers are also MSCP) has to do with efficient >internal queuing of I/O requests. Perhaps my viewpoint >based on RT-11 is distorted (or TSX-PLUS for that matter >which uses almost the identical code as RT-11 as far as >I am aware), but I ask the question. It seems to me >that a simple (dumb and efficient) interface such as >HD: is only the final step in instructing the "controller" >to perform the disk I/O whereas the actual "intelligent" >aspect is probably going to be in the device driver >of the respective operating system such as RT-11, TSX-PLUS, >RSX-11 or VMS. Obviously the "intelligent" portion can >also be in the actual controller or host adapter, but based >on my VERY limited understanding of MSCP implementation >by both DEC and 3rd party MSCP controller and host adapter >manufactures for both the Qbus and Unibus, all of the >"intelligence" of internal queuing of I/O requests for >the above 4 example operating systems is performed in >the device driver, if anywhere. All of the MSCP devices have some form of CPU RQDXn is PDP-11 (specifically T-11) other us Z80 or 8088/80188. Regardless the CPu engine sued there is considerable "intelligence" for example the RQDX3 carries the T-11, 8KW or ram and 16KW of Eprom as well as hardware support for disk(floppy and hard) IO and bus level DMA. So on one level your expectation is, if you want an intelligent reponse from the HD: you need to have an intelligent conversation. RT-11 however is rather dull in that it's conversation is limited to "do this", and the device does the simple thing and says "here" RT deals at the logical block level and if there is more than one block is a sequential read or write, very plain. RT does not even have the concept of nonsequential file allocation (scatter gather). More souphisticated operating systems do things like "get me this", "write out that" and flush this buffer for multiple users and processes. So the task list is both dynamic and multiple in its activity. TSX is still RT11 under the skin and only does simple operations as a result. >Please confirm if my assumption is correct with regard to >where the "intelligence" is located, i.e. in the device >driver or the controller / host adapter. Based on the >answer, it will then be possible to continue this >discussion. It would be helpful to isolate where the >decreased efficiency of using the DEC concept of MSCP >is introduced and what specifically causes the decrease >in efficiency. For example, on my Pentium III, I have >noted that when I copy large files of 1 GB or larger, >it is almost always useful to to no other disk I/O >during the minute it takes for the copy to complete >unless the additional disk I/O for another job is >trivial in comparison and I can usefully overlap my >time looking a a different screen of information. >Whenever possible, I also arrange to have different >disk files which will be copied back and forth on >different physical disk drives if the files are larger >than about 32 MB since the time to copy any file (or >read a smaller file) is so short in any case. While >I realize that on a large VMS system with hundreds of >users there will be constant disk I/O, I still suggest >that the efficiency of the device driver to controller >interface may play a significant role in overall I/O >throughput rates. The base intelligence must be on the controller to understand and act on IO requests. Othe the other hand there is also a requirement that to use the performance you need to have a high performing driver. RT-11 does not. The VMS DU driver is. The difference is the driver for RT11 is essentally a single task stream, do this, check, do that. The VMS driver will form up a list of tasks required of the storage system and so here's a list go do it and let me know when it's done and what the status for each was. I do believe what you really pointing at is not MSCP but the difference in emulation, simulation and real hardware behavour. I suggest this, emulation/simulation fidelity has multiple dimensions one being behavour of the programs code and another is operational speed. It's my experience with E-11 that program behavour is faithful but speed far exceeds the original device capabbilities to the limit of the host PC. The RQDX is old and depends on T-11 and that CPU is only clocked at 7.5mhz making it rather slow compared to it's hosts. Where as PC emulation (without throttles) may have a huge performance advantage is a far faster CPU. So it makes me ask how would your E-11 simulation look if you could tell it that the MSCP device and connected disks have a more limited speed. It also brings to mind is the MSCP emulated or simple stubbed with PC drivers and devices behind it? I ask that as MSCP is a copyrighted and encumbered (or was) protocal. >I await your reply and wish you a good weekend. I do hope there is s more sophisticated reply as well. I have the advantage of useing the RQDX in both Qbus uVAX and Qbus PDP-11 systems so I've seen how the the VAX (VMS) uses it and how RT-11, and RSX11 use it the performance over less complex disks like RL02. Allison

18 years, 11 months

1
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Lead free solder

by mike＠brickfieldspark.org

> From: "James Rice" <james.rice at gmail.com> > Subject: Re: lead-free solder > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > We have not changed tip or temperature settings in production. Mike. > eventually pickup and pass lead based alloys. One question that I have, > do > you need a special type of iron for lead free soldering or just a > different > tip? I noticed both Hakko and Aoyue shows a different model that is rated > for lead free duty. They show the same temperature range but are fitted > with a larger heating element (70w vs 50w). > > -- > www.blackcube.org - The Texas State Home for Wayward and Orphaned > Computers >

18 years, 11 months

1
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Boeing Surplus Closing... for the better...........

by compoobah＠valleyimplants.com

So it isn't ideal- how's running everything through "a few ebay sellers" and resellers going to improve matters? The Tek terminals will still go to the scrapper, the Grey Walls will still go to the recycle bin (with the binders this time), and nobody else will even have a shot. I work in education, and I provide computer support for a nonprofit, and both groups get stuff at Boeing Surplus (though usually not classic computers- that's my department, and Boeing is a valuable asset, at little cost to Boeing. If you take away the surplus store (providing it covers expenses) you're removing an asset to the community and replacing it with people who are interested in maximizing profits, period. What's the likely change in how they handle 'classic' equipment? Not much.

18 years, 11 months

1
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Kind of vintage - Selling my C-one Computer

by rborsuk＠colourfull.com

Hi All, I've put my C-one computer on eBay if anyones interested. http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=300157914171 I know the computer isn't vintage but the stuff it runs, is. Thanks Rob Rob Borsuk email: rborsuk at colourfull.com Colourfull Creations Web: http://www.colourfull.com

18 years, 11 months

1
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MSCP controllers

by bqt＠softjar.se

(Sortof starting a new thread) There have been a discussion about the ineffectiveness of MSCP recently, especially compared to a dumb controller interface. To make a few comments on this; yes the MSCP controller is much more intelligent. But noone have yet talked about what this means. The overhead for playing with the MSCP controller is way much more than for a simple, and stupid controller. However, there is also a big speed gain in some situations. Jerome Fines observations are correct. Under a single-user system such as RT-11 (especially of the software acts in a naive way) much of the advantages of MSCP is lost. The fact that it can deal with large disks (or disks with different sizes) can hardle be called "intelligent". That's really primitive. Things that the MSCP protocol do handle, however, and where the HD: driver will suffer and loose, is when we get into more advanced stuff. The MSCP controller can have many I/O requests outstanding at the same time. Once one operation is completed, it can immediately start the next one. You actually have a zero setup time with MSCP. So if you're doing several I/O operations in sequence, a good driver, in combination with a good program, will be able to get more performance out of the MSCP controller than the HD: driver, which each new operation can only be programmed once the previous operation is completed. The MSCP controller can also complete several I/O requests with just one interrupt. No need for one interrupt for each I/O operation that completes. The MSCP controller can also reorder I/O operations for better efficiency. If you have three requests, jumping back and forth over the disk, it makes sense to actually do the two operations on one end, before doing the operation at the other end. This can be implemented in software by the HD: controller, but then we now have more software that must run before each I/O request is issued. The MSCP controller handles bad block replacement without the involvement of the software. It always present a disk without bad blocks. In real life, all disks have bad blocks, so somewhere this always needs to be handled. Now, if you have a simulated PDP-11, the disk is actually a file on that OS, so the underlaying OS will handle bad blocks for you, so it isn't necceasry for the PDP-11 controller to do this anymore, but MSCP was designed for raw disks, not emulated systems. Dealing with bad blocks on the HD: driver would cost a lot. The MSCP controller can do I/O to several disks in parallel. In real life, controllers like the HD: driver pretends to talk to exists as well. One problem with these are that if you have several disks, you can only do I/O to one disk at a time. Some of these controllers could allow you to do seeks on other disks while I/O was performed on one disk. However, things started getting complicated with this. The MSCP controller have pretty advanced error detection and handling. Including extensive reports to the software on problems. Now, those things are why it's more intelligent. And more intelligent means it also takes more software to talk to it. :-) MSCP is really like serial SCSI (or serial ATA), only done 20 years earlier. Johnny -- Johnny Billquist || "I'm on a bus || on a psychedelic trip email: bqt at softjar.se || Reading murder books pdp is alive! || tryin' to stay hip" - B. Idol

18 years, 11 months

5
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[Fwd: PDP8 im Ebay]

by gerold.pauler＠gmx.net

Got an email today, that you can get a complete pdp8/f on ebay. It is located in Germany. Does not mention how much memory it got but seams to be complete with paper tape reader and an atari 140ST as console. http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=320166292810 I don't have any connection to the seller. And I don't have any more free space for another pdp8 of this era. - Gerold

18 years, 11 months

1
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Apple ][ (clone) disk booting

by julesrichardsonuk＠yahoo.co.uk

Morning, What's the normal procedure to boot a floppy from an Apple ][? I'm just taking a look at my Mitac [1] clone (with a view to selling it) and got curious as to whether it'd boot a standard Apple DOS system disk. If powered up with a drive connected the spindle motor starts and it'll step the drive head back to track 0 - but nothing more. On the one hand, it's entirely possible that the machine isn't a close enough clone to work with standard Apple DOS (that wouldn't surprise me at all, in fact) - but on the other, maybe I'm just missing some standard key combination to magically boot from the drive... (whilst I've got an Apple ///, I've never used an Apple ][ in my life) I can hit CTRL-reset and the machine will drop to BASIC; is there a normal way of booting (or at least bringing up a dir) a floppy from BASIC on a genuine ][? [1] Quite an impressive machine. Has some flavour of far-east legends on the key fronts, as well as regular ASCII (we had a discussion about it on here once, but there were conflicting opinions on what language it actually was). Built-in disk controller, joystick port, tape, TV modulator, 80-column card. There's a little backplane which can be plugged into the machine's expansion port and gives you five Apple ][ card slots, too. cheers Jules

18 years, 11 months

10
14
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New DSDD 5.25" floppies?

by dm561＠torfree.net

Date: Thu, 4 Oct 2007 12:22:46 -0700 From: "Zane H. Healy" <healyzh at aracnet.com> Subject: Re: New DSDD 5.25" floppies? >At 3:07 PM -0400 10/4/07, Patrick Finnegan wrote: >>But I think that the OP was talking about floppy disks, else they would >>have surely said "floppy drives"... >I was, I know no one is making new C-1541 drives. Though I'm looking >into building a 1541-III drive... > Zane --------------------------------- It just so happens that a member of the local (Toronto) CBM list is getting rid of 6 1541s and he also has several hundred 5 1/4 floppies; I can put you in touch if you're interested (and he still has them and is willing to ship). If he isn't on this list anyway... mike

18 years, 11 months

2
1
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TI 990 architecture

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: TI 990 architecture > From: Cameron Kaiser <spectre at floodgap.com> > Date: Tue, 02 Oct 2007 12:57:08 -0700 (PDT) > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > >> If I remember right, the architecure of the ti chip >> it used a pointer to ram as the internal registers. That would really >> bog down on byte wide bus. > >But then chips like the 9995 do very well on a 8-bit data bus. IMHO the >bigger problems with the 9900 implementation in the 99/4A were the external >scratch pad (made internal for the 9995) and the presence of GROMs, >requiring their own interpretation step and murderously slow serial access. > >Compare this to a system like the Tomy Tutor, which has a 9995 on an 8-bit >bus too, but is significantly faster than the 99/4A despite being clocked >slightly slower (10.7MHz oscillator instead of the 99/4A's 12MHz one). Actually My 99/4a has the 10.7 and the actual CPU is clocked off the slower division of that. The clocks you note were used for the video timing. However, the 9985 was a far nwer chip that the 9900 and was clocked internally faster. Allison

18 years, 11 months

3
2
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these RTL or what?

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: these RTL or what? > From: "Roy J. Tellason" <rtellason at verizon.net> > Date: Tue, 02 Oct 2007 02:01:29 -0400 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >I ran across some data in the pile of what I've been collecting, and there's >some stuff there apparently by Signetics (?) referring to what they're >calling "Utilogic II" -- is this stuff RTL or what? It doesn't say. Dates >are in the late 1960s, and it looks like it, but I figured I'd ask in >here... There are many early families of saturated logic RTL is the oldest, DTL and it's kin "utilogic" where the intermediate sorta TTL like and later TTL( H,LS,S,F,AS,C,HC,HCT flavors). In the middle of all that was ECL (also about three or four generations) a fast non saturating logic. What amazing is when people say "60s" you must do so with care as 1960 was basically germainium transistors but by 1964 silicon transistors are about and ICs were already appearing. Most integrated circuit logic was post '65 and even then from that point speeds went from about 3mhz to 30mhz and RTL was replaced by TTL by 1970. The evoloutionary scale was very steep from the mid 50s to the mid 70s. That 20 years window we went from computers with tubes to microprocessors, delays lines or other serial storage to semiconductor RAM. Allison

18 years, 11 months

3
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Sale of the CoCo lounge

by glenvdb＠hotmail.com

Hello, and good day everyone, Please exscuse the interruption, I am on the Yahoo and Multimedia lists, but It was suggested that I post this information here also. My Name is Glen VanDenBiggelaar, and for the last 3 years, I have run the website www.thecocolounge.com. Due to space and time considerations, I am selling the site, and all the stock and my personal CoCo collection and leaving the hobby. I was close to a deal with anther buyer, but he backed out at the last moment due to shipping problems. I have for sale, my site (domain and all files etc) and 30 boxes of CoCo "stuff" for the on-line store. A lot of the stuff is common hardware (i.e. at least 8 - 10 CoCo 2's etc) but I have some Proto-type experimental stuff also. I don't have a complete list, but I can get a general list off hand. Before you ask, there is only 1 512k CoCo3 and 1 White CoCo 1 and no MPI's or cm8 monitors (sold all of that lot last year) I have at least 5 full high Floppy drives and a lot of "Non-working DD's for parts or repair. I also have the list of box dimensions for shipping on request. I am ask $1000 dollars for all of it (reduced from $5000). The terms are simple : In order to not get accused of shipping gouging, you must make arrangements on your end for shipping. I live up in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada T5M-0K6. The last buyer was an hour out of Buffalo, in Canada, And he was quoted $600 for shipping -which was too much for his budget. The payment will be made through Western Union Money Transfer (as paypal won't actually let me cash Money) and this transaction has to be completed ASAP or I am getting rid of it all at the end of the month. If you have any question, please feel free to e-mail, but I will not tear this lot down, as it is all ready for shipping and the boxes are sealed. You must take it all. _thank you for your time -Glen

18 years, 11 months

1
0
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Setting up a VAXstation

by compoobah＠valleyimplants.com

> On Tue, 02 Oct 2007 16:42:30 -0400 > Sridhar Ayengar <ploopster at gmail.com> wrote: > >> It takes longer than that for my iron to warm up. > Wrong iron. => Metcal. > -- > > > tsch??, > Jochen > So THAT'S why my soldering jobs look so bad. Works great for tinning boards, though :-).

18 years, 11 months

1
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SGI Crimson Questions & hardware request

by compoobah＠valleyimplants.com

The power cable can be either 240V or 110V, but it will need either 15 or 20A depending on config AFAIK. It's only the later Onyx multi-CPU+RealityEngine that requires 240V power. Can't tell you where to get the cable, didn't even see them in Boeing when they were selling off Onyxs. If you have an Indigo/Onyx keyboard (Mini-DIN 6 but not PS/2) it's a simple plug adapter to use it in 4D/Crimson/PI machines - look at the 4D/FAQ (search for "This Old SGI") The Crimson uses the DA-15 connector rather than the early PIs DE-9, but this is the only difference. For IRIX, you'll get the best support for modern applications with IRIX 6.2, but you will need to partition/label the disk in fx on another machine or using the fx that comes with IRIX 4 or IRIX 5, as fx.IP17 is broken on IRIX 6.2, IRIX 5.3 will give you the option of running older ECOFF binaries built for IRIX 4, however, and if your Crimson has GTX graphics rather than PowerVision or RealityEngine you will need to use 5.3. Less than 96MB you'll probably get better performance from 5.3, other than that it's your call - 6.2 has the POSIX pthreads patches available and n32 binary support (and some newer freeware- 2001 was the last 6.2 build on freeware.sgi.com, and there's an offshoot of Nekoware for 6.2 (tgcware, perhaps they have some 5.3 builds available).

18 years, 11 months

1
0
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TI 990 architecture

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

Subject: Re: TI 990 architecture From: Cameron Kaiser <spectre (at) floodgap.com> Message-id: 200710021957.l92Jv8RK013898 (at) floodgap.com Date: 2007-10-02 21:57:08 >> If I remember right, the architecure of the ti chip >> it used a pointer to ram as the internal registers. That would really >> bog down on byte wide bus. > > But then chips like the 9995 do very well on a 8-bit data bus. IMHO the > bigger problems with the 9900 implementation in the 99/4A were the external > scratch pad (made internal for the 9995) and the presence of GROMs, > requiring their own interpretation step and murderously slow serial access. > > Compare this to a system like the Tomy Tutor, which has a 9995 on an 8-bit > bus too, but is significantly faster than the 99/4A despite being clocked > slightly slower (10.7MHz os Rather than rely on sometimes parity afflicted memory I pulled down a spare board (TI99/4A black) and the TI system manuals and prints.. 10.738625mhz is the Video clock (TMS9918) 12.000 is the CPU clock. (4phase 3MHz) The print set indicates FOUR wait states (1.33uS) for every 8bit bus access (to GROM, 9918 and Peripheral expansion). The 16bit bus has 128Words of scratch ram and 4kWords of system rom(GPL interpreter) and no wait states. Since most of the active IO to memory space is to GROM or 9918 on the console that speed cost overhead is both wait states and interpretive language. The TI99/4 series is clearly not representative of TI9900 cpu performance. However the idea of an interpretive system does reoccur in the computing world (JAVA, UCSD PASCAL). Allison

18 years, 11 months

1
0
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FS: Zenrom for HP-41 calculator

by rigdonj＠cfl.rr.com

<http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110177346792>

18 years, 11 months

1
0
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lead-free solder

by mike＠brickfieldspark.org

> Message: 1 > Date: Wed, 3 Oct 2007 18:12:48 +0100 > From: "Antonio Carlini" <arcarlini at iee.org> > Subject: RE: lead-free solder > To: "'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts'" > > When last I looked CPC still had leaded solder for sale. > It is (AFAIK) perfectly OK to purchase and use. Theoretically > there may be some issues if you decide to produce new widgets at > home in order to sell (or even give) them to others, but in practice > I think you'd have to ring the HSE and beg to get them to come round > and prosecute. Leaded solder is still on sale in the UK, but you cannot use it for new production, that has to be lead free. Leaded solder can be used to repair old leaded product which can still be sold if they are spares for old equipment, that is manufactured prior to the lead free cut off date. Some processes, product and organisations are exempt but there are not many. In practice you would have to get somebody annoyed enough for them to want to have your product tested for lead as it can be an expensive process.

18 years, 11 months

1
0
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MMJ connectors

by drb＠msu.edu

Got a note from Digi-Key today saying Tyco/AMP are discontinuing their 6p6c MMJ connectors (AMP #5-555236-2, Digi-Key #A24919-ND). Which leads me to the (somewhat rhetorical) question: are these things starting to vanish from the new market? DK doesn't seem to have any others, based on a quick web search. Mouser carries one brand. De

18 years, 11 months

3
2
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TI 990 architecture / was Re: TI-99/4A Floppies

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: TI 990 architecture / was Re: TI-99/4A Floppies > From: woodelf <bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca> > Date: Wed, 03 Oct 2007 13:04:51 -0600 > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >Peter C. Wallace wrote: > >> The registers-in-memory architecture might be suitable for a FPGA CPU >> where BlockRAM (as system memory) is almost as fast as registers. Why >> not have registers in memory instead of simulatiing it badly (and >> expensively power wise) via caching, that is, why move data if you dont >> have to? There was a late version of 9900 that was done in I think bipolar or some strange combo process that was many times faster than the earlier machine be they NMOS or TTL. TI was not a MOS house for the most part and were ahead by doing like PDP-8 and PDP11 putting their earlier TTL machine on a chip. What they did wrong was to lag severely in marketing and advancing the technology. The 9900 was slow becuase at the time 2102s (fast ones were 400ns) were slow. By 4 years later ram would be down to 45NS (2147 and 2167 as examples). If the 9900 were to ramp up the clock as did the 8085 and Z80 by 1980 it would have gone from 2mhz to around 6-8mhz and that speed increase would have made it from a pure performance standpoint, fast. The speed would ahve been aciveable as the total transistor count on the die was far lower than most (few registers) and the complexity was fairly low. The sad story is they didn't. The TI99/4a was a sad detour that really didn't show off the CPU but did embody some interesing ideas. Grom was one. >Simple registers are expensive. Look at the PDP-5. This is the 1960's >when most architectures where developed. Even the PDP-10 I think Registers were costly when a FlipFlop was an entire board. Then they started to get two in a 16legged chip the cost was way lower and the advantage of having more registers was nowhere near as costly. Also PDP-5 was mid 60s and and we had PDP-10, PDP-11, CDC monsters UNIVAC 1180s and VAX ahead of us at that date. >was designed to use core memory as registers unless you want the >optional module for F/F registers. >Ben. Your thinking pdp6 and earlier. Allison

18 years, 11 months

2
1
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Utilogic II (was these RTL or what?)

by aek＠bitsavers.org

>> I ran across some data in the pile of what I've been collecting, and there's >> some stuff there apparently by Signetics (?) referring to what they're >> calling "Utilogic II" -- is this stuff RTL or what? It doesn't say. Dates >> are in the late 1960s, and it looks like it, but I figured I'd ask in >> here... > > Goggle finds only a few hits for utilogic,and is mostly a odd chip for sale. > I suspect more TTL rather than DTL. Ben. look under http://bitsavers.org/pdf/signetics/_dataBooks/

18 years, 11 months

3
3
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Tribute to Jim Butterfield at the Vintage Computer Festival (VCF X), November 4, 2007

by jack.rubin＠ameritech.net

There will be a session at the upcoming Vintage Computer Festival in Mountainview, California, to honor Jim's memory and the contributions he made to the community of computer hobbyists. Please join us if you can - http://www.vintage.org/2007/main/session.php#53 I hope this will be a chance to get together and share memories and stories - this will be a "gathering" rather than a "presentation". If you have videos, stories, artifacts, or ??? that you would like to share during this time, please let me know. And of course, please pass this information along to anyone who might be interested in joining us, either in person or in thought. Jack jack.rubin at ameritech.net 847.424.7320 days No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.488 / Virus Database: 269.13.39/1045 - Release Date: 10/2/2007 6:43 PM

18 years, 11 months

1
0
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Cromemco Z-2D free to a good home

by matt.valerio＠gmail.com

Hey everybody, I acquired a Cromemco Z-2D for $2 at a garage sale a few years ago thinking "Holy cow that's a sweet rack-mount case". It's been sitting in my basement and I could use the space, so I figured I'd look into donating it to a good home where it would be appreciated (instead of just scrapping the parts fot the case like what I was going to do). Being a grad student right now doesn't give me much spare time to futz around with it, either. If there's anyone out there in the Columbus, OH area that wants it, just let me know! Have a good one, -Matt

18 years, 11 months

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TI 990 architecture / was Re: TI-99/4A Floppies

by kerobaros＠gmail.com

On Oct 3, 2007, at 12:48PM, Dave McGuire wrote: > On Oct 2, 2007, at 3:47 PM, Martin Scott Goldberg wrote: > >> There are really three 99/4 home computers, original with chiclet > >> keys, the > >> second and most common with a really nice keyboard and the whie > >> version that > >> is really the same thing with a few board level cost reductions. > > > > Actually, there's one TI-99/4 and two TI-99/4a models. > > What are the differences between them, does anyone know offhand? > > -Dave Apparently, I'm one of the resident TI-99 experts! The differences are almost exactly as Martin said; the 99/4 is the first computer he described, and the 4As are the second two. The 4's only benefit was the built-in 'Equation Calculator' mode; sure mark of TI's educational division. The 4As had, other than a better keyboard, the ability to use 'lowercase' (just small caps), and not much else. More info can be found at Thierry Nouspikel's pages, which are currently at <http://www.nouspikel.com/ti99/titech.htm>, and at the Mainbyte pages, at <http://www.mainbyte.com/ti99/>. And now I'm out the door! ~Matt

18 years, 11 months

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TI 990 architecture / was Re: TI-99/4A Floppies

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: TI 990 architecture / was Re: TI-99/4A Floppies > From: Brent Hilpert <hilpert at cs.ubc.ca> > Date: Tue, 02 Oct 2007 00:35:01 -0700 > To: General at priv-edtnaa06.telusplanet.net, > "Discussion at priv-edtnaa06.telusplanet.net":On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >Chuck Guzis wrote: >> >> On 2 Oct 2007 at 2:16, Liam Proven wrote: >> >> > They were pretty much the first ever 16-bit home micro, but it was a >> > crippled 16-bit chip - as detailed in another message in this thread. >> > They did have good keyboards, were solidly built and I believe the >> > graphics chip was, for its time, decent and capable. >> >> Tossing all of the other chips and CROMs and other stuff out, how >> compatible was the TMS9900 with the TI 990 mini? The same or >> considerablly different? > >I can't state so categorically but my understanding is that they were very >much the same. >Going back to a conversation of a few weeks ago, when we were >developing/running Verex/Thoth at UBC ca 1980 it was on a 990/10. The next >major step in the project was to develop a distributed kernel for multiple >processors. To this end, 3 bare single board computers based on the 9900 chip >were ordered and received from TI. Something makes me think they were called >"990/5"s. I remember making up a front panel for the 3 of them with reset >buttons and a few status LEDs to go in the rack with the /10. The idea, of >course, was to use the 9900s because we already had the compilers,etc. >generating code for the 990/10. Actually 1980 was mid to late in the life of the TI9900 chip. The first one I worked with was on a Technico Superstarter System, TI9900, 2k ram, 1k prom (monitor ans line by line asm) and a 2708 eprom programmer on one board. I still have it. I purchased it at PCC '78 in in memory serves Philly. Fir the amount of resource on the board it was pretty capable for systems of that day. >(Cheriton left before we actually got into using them at the software level >and the distributed kernel would become the VKernel at Stanford on other hardware). > >Also, the description of the 9900 in Osborne's "An Introduction to >Microcomputers, Vol II" ('76) fits well with my recollections of the 990/10. > >To my knowledge the 9900 chip was not crippled; rather (going from what others >have described) the design and implementation of the 99/4 home computer failed >to make effective use of it. I didn't follow micros too much in the early 80s >but I remember wondering at the time why the 99/4 was doing so poorly when it >had that great processor in it. There are really three 99/4 home computers, original with chiclet keys, the second and most common with a really nice keyboard and the whie version that is really the same thing with a few board level cost reductions. The 9900 chips is not crippled, for 1976 three voltage NMOS its about as fast as the technology of the time could go. The TI99/4 did however do a nasty to it. One is they muxed the bus down to 8bits wide and that does slow the system some. There were 128 words of ram (6810s) that if you execute there the speed is noticeable. The other is the GROM (sort of an interpreted language with a register point to next instruction) is a bottleneck as well. There was a later 9980 and the 9985 which were a 8bit bus interface and were somewhat crippled but I'd never seen one in a TI99/4A. >I quite liked the 990 architecture with the workspace pointer. Yes, there was >the overhead of accessing registers in memory, but there were also savings. >The workspace pointer essentially became the stack/frame pointer. Procedure >calls, interrupts and process switches were quick because there were only 3 >machine registers to save (PC,WSP,PSW). Stack variables and parameters were >referenced in instructions as registers, thus saving on instruction >length/memory accesses to retrieve addresses/offsets, etc. For use with >"modern software design", i.e.: stack-oriented high-level languages, I thought >it was a quite effective architecture. It was a very minicomputer in look and feel and the addressing modes were on par with PDP11 and other CISC machines. Allison

18 years, 11 months

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TI 990 architecture / was Re: TI-99/4A Floppies

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: TI 990 architecture / was Re: TI-99/4A Floppies > From: "Peter C. Wallace" <pcw at mesanet.com> > Date: Wed, 03 Oct 2007 10:13:12 -0700 (PDT) > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >> >> Actually 1980 was mid to late in the life of the TI9900 chip. The first >> one I worked with was on a Technico Superstarter System, TI9900, 2k ram, >> 1k prom (monitor ans line by line asm) and a 2708 eprom programmer on >> one board. I still have it. I purchased it at PCC '78 in in memory >> serves Philly. Fir the amount of resource on the board it was pretty >> capable for systems of that day. > > > >That sure brings back memories. I also had a Technico SuperStarter (Two bytes >are better than one!) Eventually made a wire wrapped 32 KByte RAM card (using I still have mine and it's operational. >TMS4060 non muxed 4K DRAMS), a 256x256 graphic display, A wire wrapped floppy >controller (8 inch with 16 KByte DRAM track buffer). The floppy was a >revelation after waiting for the papertape version of EAL (Editor Assembler >Linker?) to load. Did do all that with mine. Mostly used it for small playing and dumping 2708 eproms. >>> (Cheriton left before we actually got into using them at the software level >>> and the distributed kernel would become the VKernel at Stanford on other hardware). >>> >>> Also, the description of the 9900 in Osborne's "An Introduction to >>> Microcomputers, Vol II" ('76) fits well with my recollections of the 990/10. > >I think I chose the 9900 based on the Osborne book, it had the shortest >benchmark program... Strikingly so. >Interestingly TI's MSP430 has an instruction set reminiscent of the 9900 Instruction sets tend to repeat and reoccur. Allison

18 years, 11 months

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It's only ontopic(ish) towards the end...

by zmerch-cctalk＠30below.com

... and if you're a "Mac fanboi" don't go here... ;-) http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/09/28/bofh_episode_33/ Laterz, Roger "Merch" Merchberger -- Roger "Merch" Merchberger -- SysAdmin, Iceberg Computers zmerch at 30below.com Hi! I am a .signature virus. Copy me into your .signature to join in!

18 years, 11 months

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Looking for OpenMOP for Windows

by Arno_1983＠gmx.de

Sorry for the double post, not wanting to pester anyone, but I figured I'd better write what I need on the subject line because not everybody might be following the VSII thread. So, I'm looking for the OpenMOP daemon for Windows by Fred N. van Kempen in order to get my newly-acquired VAXstation II/GPX started with NetBSD/vax (or whatever). I didn't find anything on the 'net except for Freds announcing the program and looking for test users here, his homepage is currently down, the program is nowhere to be found on the archived snapshots and it's been a long time since I last remember reading from him here. Anybody know if he's okay? TIA, Arno Kletzander -- GMX FreeMail: 1 GB Postfach, 5 E-Mail-Adressen, 10 Free SMS. Alle Infos und kostenlose Anmeldung: http://www.gmx.net/de/go/freemail

18 years, 11 months

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Setting up a VAXstation

by shieldsm＠gmail.com

On 10/2/07, Zane H. Healy <healyzh at aracnet.com> wrote: > > At 4:54 PM +0100 9/30/07, Jules Richardson wrote: > >Jason T wrote: > >>My 3100/30 boots fine off the Hobbyist VMS disc using my > >>boots-anything Apple CD300 (aka Sony) drive. > > > >You got there first :-) Pulls of drives from old Apple systems seem > >like a good bet - I've used a few on various machines which need a > >512 byte block size. I normally use an Apple CD600, but it isn't > >quite perfect - some SGI systems don't like it for some reason > >(others do, as does everything non-SGI I've hooked it up to) > > I've had very good luck with an external Panasonic 4x CD-ROM drive I > purchased new in '95 for my PowerBook 520c. It has worked on > everything I've connected it to. I've used it on both a Mac and PC > laptop, and on numerous DEC, SUN, and Amiga systems. My only SGI > systems have built in CD-ROM's. Another likely source would be old > Sun Hardware. > Maybe I've just been really lucky, but I've been using a Toshiba 40x SCSI cdrom in Sony external case to boot Suns, SGIs, and Macs for quite some time. It also works great on my Amigas and PCs. I read all this about using old drives, but then just gave the Toshiba a shot, and it's worked ever since. As a bonus, being a (somewhat, maybe 5 or 6 years old) recent drive, it reads CD-R copies of discs so I can leave the originals in safekeeping. Guess I just lucked out and it supports 512-byte blocks? Mike

18 years, 11 months

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EPROMS

by pspan＠amerytel.net

Zane, After erasing thousands of eproms, I have not experienced a maximum ttme. You can try to erase them again. I personally have left eproms under an eraser for days, with no ill effects on the eproms. If another tour under the eraser doesn't work, then you have two bad eproms. Over the years, I made a living replacing defective eproms on telecom equipment. If they do erase, mark them, because my experience tells me they will fail when trying to reprogram. Or they would be a good starting point for board failure troubleshooting and repair. phil

18 years, 11 months

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VSII/GPX joy (and minor annoyance)

by Arno_1983＠gmx.de

Antonio Carlini wrote: > Arno Kletzander wrote: > > Hmm. One half of the base board does however have circuitry connected > > to those pads that are just linked by grant continuity traces on the > > second half (and the 4-plane memory boards), so I figured it might > > actually be doing something useful with it. Haven't studied the > > technical description yet... > > The QVSS and QDSS will be passing the grant signals along otherwise > boards further down the bus will have issues. That is the very point I am disputing - in order to just _pass along_ the signals, you only need a _trace_ from the pad where the signal enters the board to the one where it leaves again. This is what the video memory boards do. OTOH, if the pads carrying the grant signals in and out aren't just shorted together but _connected to the electronics_, as they are on the video master board, chances are the board is _actually using_, i.e. monitoring or (more likely in this case) influencing those signals at some time. > Don't let me stop you trading up to a TK70, but FWIW I never had an > issue with TK50s. I prefer TK70s but that's because I can get about > three times as much on them! Getting media might end up being more of a problem in both cases, I assume... ISTR that a TK70 should work in place of a TK50, but I assume I won't get the full capacity without the corresponding controller; coming to think of it, I also have use for a TK50 anyway because I have that TK50-Z SCSI enclosure (minus drive) at home and I found out that a TK70's front bezel won't fit into the panel cut-out. -- Arno Kletzander Stud. Hilfskraft Informatik Sammlung Erlangen www.iser.uni-erlangen.de GMX FreeMail: 1 GB Postfach, 5 E-Mail-Adressen, 10 Free SMS. Alle Infos und kostenlose Anmeldung: http://www.gmx.net/de/go/freemail

18 years, 11 months

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Anyone collect Dec/Compaq Alphaservers or VAXen?

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: RE: Anyone collect Dec/Compaq Alphaservers or VAXen? > From: "Rod Smallwood" <RodSmallwood at mail.ediconsulting.co.uk> > Date: Wed, 03 Oct 2007 07:00:06 +0100 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" <cctech at classiccmp.org> > > >Now there's a story. ... Only part of it. Both MicroVAX-IIs were enabled by DEC but at the time were minimal machines (BA23 had RD53 and BA123 only had RD54). It was post DEC and many finds later they became filled with ram and better disks. the big thig was not the hardware but a set of TK50s with V5.44 and a nontransferable non expiring license for it and all the layered apps. VIDSYS:: is a 5.44 node for that reason with things like Pathworks and VAXnotes. The 11T03 was exactly that, the big find if one was the RL02/RL21 in it. Years later (post DEC) I put in 11/23B, then 11/73, more ram and built the MFM disk shelf supported by RQDX3. >Luckily (or unluckily) I had moved on from DEC by 1985 so I was not a >witness to its sad demise. It was bloody. >Better made products you could not want for. > >Despite having worked with PC's for many years. I could never see how >they became preferred over central unit plus terminals for general >business use. We agree. IN reality they did exactly that. Save for the central system is now called "server" and the terminals are smarter. >My modest collection has beeen accrued of the last couple of years. >Apart from the 11/94's >(Some potato head stole the CPU cards before I got to the machines) the >rest of it is running/will run. I need KDJ 11 processors for the >11/94's. They are expensive and even those intended for 11/84's are >silly prices. Yes even Qbus J-11 cpus are scarce. >I also have three small Sun systems (I can't resist quality engineering) I had suns as well and gave them away to concentrate more on DEC and the CP/M systems. Allison > >Rod > > > > >-----Original Message----- >From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org >[mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Allison >Sent: 02 October 2007 14:46 >To: cctech at classiccmp.org >Subject: RE: Anyone collect Dec/Compaq Alphaservers or VAXen? > >> >>Subject: RE: Anyone collect Dec/Compaq Alphaservers or VAXen? >> From: "Rod Smallwood" <RodSmallwood at mail.ediconsulting.co.uk> >> Date: Tue, 02 Oct 2007 07:08:33 +0100 >> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" >><cctech at classiccmp.org> >> >>Hmmm >> Time for a quick 'We are not worthy' ^00^ > >Consider my leg pulled. :) > >> >>What did you do? >>Raid the Mill with a fleet of trucks? > >No. I did get some small amounts of odd items from DEC salvage before >it was shut down. Mostly things like H751A power controllers, power >supplies and TU58 drives and boards. > >The one uVII (BA123 VIDSYS::) was a parting gift(I paid 100$ for it with >DOCS and licenses) during the days of blood. For those that don't >understand the post 1991 sell off of parts of DEC, that's when the >DIGITAL logo went from blue to burgandy. The other was built from >scrounge. VIDSYS:: is still setup for DECnet area 56.920 (one area in >OGO was 56) and HIPPY:: was area 63.390 (hidden area for DECnet >overflow). > >My 11T03 which is now the 11/73 was a gift from my boss at DEC. I kept >it in the lab area for years for those odd projects but by late 80s it >was obvious it was getting used less and less. He suggested "when are >you going to scrap that thing?" I bring it home (on property pass) which >I did. A year later when it was time to confirm and renew the property >pass his answer was "what 11?". > >The remainder were mostly rescues. The bulk of the uVAX3100s came from >UV Waterloo over 10 years ago on a if you take one you take them all and >I was the only one willing to take a huge pile of uVAX3100s plus cables, >VT320s VS2000s, TK50s, several TLZ04s.. Took two seperate 400mile round >trips with a pickup truck filled to capacity. >A fair number of those got redistributed to others as sixteen uVax3100s >take a bit of space. > >The rest are also rescues from various seperate trips. > >Usually if the system is incomplete I jump on it and clean it up and >restore it to life from spares. The few pending systems are due to my >activities in amateur radio this year and now that I'm done with the >bigger projects it's back to machines. > >I don't do Ubus-11s, big VAX (780s and the like) and unfortunately >PDP-10/20s as most are too large to handle or power here. Also I've >reached the point where excess do get passed on to others as I don't >store any large number of systems either. I try to manage my >collection. Those excess sometimes get cleaned up board added and moved >along so they are operable and don't end up in the trash or worse. I >like to power them up and play and that's incompatable with storage. >There are a few small items like extra VT320s (white, green and amber), >VT100s, H19, DECMate-IIIs I keep in the garage on rotation but I can and >do run them there as well as it's warm enough in the winter and very >dry. I keep those out there mostly to make it easier to move other stuff >around in the room. What seperates me from museum is I use them, >reconfigure and expand them them to suit my wishes or for fun. However, >junking them is out of the questionas even basket cases are salvaged for >any and all usable parts. > >FYI: if anyone needs parts for PDT11/1xx systems I have many CPU, memory >and IO boards I'm not ever going to use. Someone took a bunch apart and >then later gave me the box of boards. (ugly mutter mutter cuss cuss.) > >I mostly do DEC and CP/M based systems (s100, totables, SBCs) but I do >have a few oddballs. For some reason the MIPS based DEC hardware never >got my attention nor have the PC/clone(intel) based systems like Rainbow >and VAXmate. I did have PROs (350s and 380s) but gave those away to >concentrate on Qbus. > > >Allison > >> >>Rod >> >>-----Original Message----- >>From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org >>[mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Allison >>Sent: 01 October 2007 15:47 >>To: cctech at classiccmp.org >>Subject: RE: Anyone collect Dec/Compaq Alphaservers or VAXen? >> >>> >>>Subject: RE: Anyone collect Dec/Compaq Alphaservers or VAXen? >>> From: "Rod Smallwood" <RodSmallwood at mail.ediconsulting.co.uk> >>> Date: Mon, 01 Oct 2007 08:00:44 +0100 >>> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" >>><cctech at classiccmp.org> >>> >>> >>>My list >>> pdp11/94 x 4 R >>> >>> DEC Rainbow 100+ * >>> >>> VAX 300 * >>> VAX 400 * >>> VAX 500 R >>> VAXStation 3100 * >>> >>> DEC 3000 * >>> >>> Multia * >>> >>>* = Working >>>R = Renovation (Mostly missing parts) >>> >>>Rod Smallwood >> >> >>A more detailed list of DEC systems here. :) >> >> >>Collection of operational hardware: >> >>PDP-8 based machines: >>==================== >> PDP-8f, 20k core and 2 serial 8650 and 8652 >>2 Decmate-IIIs OS/278 >> Intersil sampler (6100 chipset) extended to 3k ram >> 6120 based board, homebrew 32kram 8k rom >> >>PDP-11 based machines: >>===================== >>1 LSI-11/03 rx02 >>2 PDP11/23 BA11S boxes, >> 1MB, RQDX2 and RD52 >> 1MB, RQDX2 and RD31, RX50 >>1 pdp11/73 50" RACK SYSTEM (4MB, DLVJ11, DEQNA, RQDX3>> RX02, RD52, >>RX33, RL02). >>1 BA11va with 11/23 +tu58 RT-11 >>1 BA11va with 11/23 +Viking RX02 equivilent RT-11 >> PDT11/130 11/03 with tu58 dectapeII >> OSs in use: RT-11, XXDP-11 and unix V6 >> >>VAX based machines: >>=================== >> Microvax-II (ba23 based) 12mb, RQDX3, RD53, RX33 >> This one lived as HIPSS:: during my days at DEC. >> Microvax-II/GPX (Ba123 based, TK50 and SCSI disks) >> This one was know as VIDSYS:: inside DEC. >>3 Microvax2000 all with 2 RD53, 1 RD54 drive, one with ultrix >>1 Microvax2000 as hard disk formatter and MOP bootable system. >>2 Microvax3100/m76/gpx 32mb 2 each 1gb scsi internal >>3 Microvax3100/server (not M10e) (filled with 400mb and 1gb disks) >>4 BA42 SCSI disk farm for the 3100s populated with RZ56s >> OSs in use VMSv5.4-4,V5.54, V7.2, Ultrix 4.2 >> >>Terminal for the uVAX systems is usually VT1200 via thinnet and the >>PDP-11s the usual terminal is either VT340, VT320 or VT180 in terminal >>mode. >> >>DEC CP/M speaking machines: >>=========================== >>1 Vt180 complete (dual RX180s) >>2 Vt180 CP/M board built up as standalone one modded for 6mhz >>1 Vt185 Thats a Vt125 + Vt180. >> >>In the non operational list: >> >>11/23B uPDP-11 in a BA23 pedestal that while complete with 11/23B, >>M8057 memory, DHV11, RQDX2 and RD52, RX50 it requries cleaning and >>testing. >> >>H11 Backplane complete with LSI-11 CPU, 16k of ram, two serial cards >and >>a parallel card of heath origin. Some day I'll find the case/power >>supply for it. All parts are tested as working. >> >>Small 11/23 system using a H9281-BC (12x2 slots) filled with: >> M8186 1/23 (Overclocked CPU mod) >> 4 M8059 MSV11 ram >> DLV11j, >> RQDX3 with M9058 distribution board. (for RX33 and RD31) >> MRV-11 Eprom card with MSCP boot. >> VK170 with matching LK02 keyboard and a monitor. The VK170 >> is a minimal VT52 on a dual width card for packaged systems >> that communicates via RS232 to system and the bus use is >> power only. >>This is waiting on being packed in a reasonable nonDEC box with a DEC >PS >>and fans. The boards are known working and the backplane is already >>jumpered as Q22. >> >>Generally in my house operational means I can actually turn it on and >>play and it has a permanent spot that is easily accessable. >> >>One project that is in process is a H9800 desk/rack that will replace >>the existing standard steel office desk. the system to be installed >>there will be 11/23B in BA11s with a hand made Disk box for RX33 and >>RD52s. >> >>I have two boxes (Xerox Paper sized) of tested boards enough to build >>another few 11/23s and a few uVAXII as my spares. Failed boards get >>repaird when I feel like it so I have good boards around. >> >>Who was it that has the SIG of >> "DEC had then what you wish you could buy now." ? >> >>Allison >> >> >> >> > > >

18 years, 11 months

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TI 990 architecture / was Re: TI-99/4A Floppies

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: TI 990 architecture / was Re: TI-99/4A Floppies > From: Martin Scott Goldberg <wgungfu at csd.uwm.edu> > Date: Tue, 02 Oct 2007 14:47:46 -0500 (CDT) > To: cctech at classiccmp.org > >>There are really three 99/4 home computers, original with chiclet keys, the >>second and most common with a really nice keyboard and the whie version that >>is really the same thing with a few board level cost reductions. >> > > >Actually, there's one TI-99/4 and two TI-99/4a models. > I know I have them but they are still software compatable and overall similar. Allison

18 years, 11 months

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TI 990 architecture / was Re: TI-99/4A Floppies

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: TI 990 architecture / was Re: TI-99/4A Floppies > From: "Liam Proven" <lproven at gmail.com> > Date: Tue, 02 Oct 2007 20:18:00 +0100 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" <cctech at classiccmp.org> > >On 02/10/2007, Allison <ajp166 at bellatlantic.net> wrote: > >> The 9900 chips is not crippled, for 1976 three voltage NMOS its about as fast >> as the technology of the time could go. The TI99/4 did however do a nasty to >> it. One is they muxed the bus down to 8bits wide and that does slow the system >> some. There were 128 words of ram (6810s) that if you execute there the speed >> is noticeable. The other is the GROM (sort of an interpreted language with a >> register point to next instruction) is a bottleneck as well. There was a >> later 9980 and the 9985 which were a 8bit bus interface and were somewhat >> crippled but I'd never seen one in a TI99/4A. > >That's probably true, but the 99/4a wasn't a 1976 machine. It was >released in 1981 and withdrawn 1983. A bit unfairly for a tweaked 1979 >machine (the 99/a), the 99/4a's competition was mainly 1982 machines >like the Commodore 64 and Sinclair Spectrum, which (based on my >possibly erroneous recollection) outperformed the 99/4a significantly. >The TI99/4 did however do a nasty to >> it. One is they muxed the bus down to 8bits wide and that does slow the system I requote the statement. Why? Because thats what I'd said. The basic 9900 chip was fairly fast the 99/4 computer is _not fast_ and I gave the reasons why. Comparing it to 1980 tech just showed how badly the little console faired. Having a 9900 system without the funky 99/4 hardware I can say the 9900 was still not fast but faired far better against its contemporaries. The reason it did well enough is the archetecture was very good even if 2mhz was somewhat slow. Allison

18 years, 11 months

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Boeing Surplus Closing... for the better...........

by g-wright＠att.net

-------------- Original message from Richard <legalize at xmission.com>: -------------- > IMO, its Boeing's store and they can pack it up and ship it to the > moon if they want to. > > Instead of trying to *stop* the closure of the store, IMO it would be > better to lobby for a one-time fire sale "everything must go!" event > with big discounts. > -- > "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download > > > Legalize Adulthood! I have been going there almost daily, since the early 70's. when you could buy Aircraft fasteners, computer hardware, test gear, and anything in between. PDP 8a's where 25.00 and PDP 11's where 45.00. if it was a large rack system, just name your price. ( I have 3 PDP 11/60's, 5 racks each) The store has been going down hill ever since. Most of the good stuff never makes it to surplus. In the past 5 years, only "Boeing has beens" have worked there. I have heard that the system has 175 employees. Over the years this has just been a monkey on Boeings back and they *never* should have been involve in a retail business. They staff this with people that could only function in a Boeing Mold. These folks should never been involved with the public. The folks that did care and wanted to help where stopped by the turf wars and Boeing policy. I tried over the year to at least slow down the trashing of vintage items. No one cared. You could go in there and see carcass of vintage items. They would only put out what would sell quickly. Lately I found 7 HP suite cases with HP 79xx Alignment tools and packs. They where empty. They could get 25.00 for the suite cases. So they trashed the rest. They love to sell 3 ring binders for .25 each. If you watched closely there where 100's of DEC, HP, Cray, TEK, Sun, Motorola binders from the 70's and 80's. covering both computers and test gear. All empty. As for really good test gear, that was offered up to a local company first and what was left went to the store. I could go further on this but won't. As for the things that this "list" would be interested in. They had what they called pre-sort. if it was newer and/or sold quickly, send it to the store, if not scrap it. They would set out DEC and Data General systems, empty. They could sell the boards by the pound and did not have to worry about anything. I saw some Dumb terminals (VT100) setting in the back this summer and asked to make sure the came out to the store. I was told its was easier to scrap them. No TEK or Dumb terminals would be brought out to the retail store. They have a large amount of old computer boards going trough there each month. all go to scrap. You can go in there on a Saturday morning and see 7 to 10 $60,000.00 a year employees setting around drinking coffee and talking to one another with out any care about the customer. How much surplus do you have to sell to cover one Saturday In the last couple of years they basicly have been watching 10-15 ebay sellers that are at the front door each day and catered to them. Putting everthing out first thing and then sat back and watched the rush when the door opened. The best thing that could happen is for the company to put everything in lot bids so someone, that at least cares a little, has the items. As for the fire sale, everyone is headed for the door. Through the 1st of the year all Boeing employees only have 6 to 8 weeks left to work. So I would just wait for the first lot bids and follow the winner home. Just my .02 cents worth - jerry Jerry wright JLC inc g-wrigtht at att.net

18 years, 11 months

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IMSAI II - still viable OR has anyone else lost their deposit?

by RodSmallwood＠mail.ediconsulting.co.uk

Whilst I am in no way involved (I'm in the UK and would not know an IMSAI from a busted banjo) I am apalled at what this guy did. Is it not time to use the legal system to bring this guy to book? The English and US legal systems parted company in the late 1700's so I'm not sure how it would work. Suffice to say, in the UK at this stage the court bailiffs would have removed anything of value from his premisis and put it up for sale along with his house and car (if he owned them). The proceeds to go to repaying the swindled customers. Rod Smallwood -----Original Message----- From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Robert Stek Sent: 02 October 2007 16:57 To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Subject: RE: IMSAI II - still viable OR has anyone else lost their deposit? I don't think he had any bad intentions in the beginning (some 6 years ago), as I said in a related comp.os.cpm post, "Never assume malice when incompetence will suffice." But his actions over the last two years suggest a lot about his integrity now. I have now heard from four individuals (in 24 hours), two of whom paid in full in advance, with the same basic story: after politely asking for updates, we are ignored despite repeated attempts at communication - no updates, no explanation, no 'good faith' offer of partial shipment (Howard Harte's super I/O board was produced, though apparently by Howard directly), no 'good faith' offer of anything, and certainly no offer of refund. I am sure that the project has been a personal nightmare for him. It is a shame to see someone who contributed so much to the development of the microcomputer industry in its early days end up trying to sweep his recent mistakes (and our money) under the rug while still pretending to offer an IMSAI II (and other items) for sale on his website - it's not only unethical but very probably fraudulent as well. I've screwed up in my life (just ask my ex-wife!). But IMHO it's far better to admit defeat and offer whatever atonement you can, than to continue in the self-delusion that the IMSAI II will ever be built and that a bunch of 'cry-babies' (my projection, not his words) who want their money back are stopping forward progress by reducing working capital. rant := off So, any there any others out there who are willing to admit that they lost their front money? Or anyone who actually received any of his other hardware offerings? Or who received a refund? Bob Stek Saver of Lost Sols >From: Grant Stockly <grant at stockly.com> >Subject: RE: IMSAI II - still viable OR has anyone else lost their > deposit? >To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > <cctalk at classiccmp.org> >Message-ID: <0JP900ENKGIGSQ80 at msgmmp-1.gci.net> >Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed > >I've talked to him several times. Before the Altair kit and >after. Very nice guy. I don't think he has any bad intentions at >all. I will buy one the second they become available. I have no >idea what the situation with them is, but I'd have a hard time >thinking he was trying to defraud people or lie (of course, I have >all my money). He has told me of the money, engineering, and time he >has spent. > >Possibly he just isn't a "business" man. That's not a bad thing at >all, we all have our strengths! Engineers aren't good with making >their own due dates... ; ) The Kenbak kit was supposed to be done >by March. I just shipped the first 8 kits a week ago today. ; ) > >When I started selling kits I decided in the beginning not to collect >money until stuff was ready to ship. I wasn't worried too much about >getting lazy, but it made me look forward to shipping and work >towards that goal. > >Grant

18 years, 11 months

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IMSAI II - still viable OR has anyone else lost their deposit?

by robert.stek＠gmail.com

I was an early fan of the Todd Fischer's IMSAI II project (www.imsai.net) and sent off a deposit several years ago. I even offered to review it in Ciarcia's Circuit Cellar Ink (I'm a friend of Steve's and formerly lived in Hartford). I understand the problems of a task like re-inventing the IMSAI and think that I have been more than patient. His website is still active, he has a copyright date of 2007 on it, and it appears that you can still order not only an IMSAI II but other items as well. Unfortunately I have emailed him several times over the past 12-18 months and haven't had the courtesy of a response. I know he's there - he posts in comp.os.cpm - but from him to me: nada, zip, zilch, nothing. Is there anyone else on the list who was as retrospectively foolish as I as to trust him with a deposit? It doesn't speak much for his ethics if he advertises and takes orders for non-existent products (who was that guy and his company that advertised in Kilobaud, among others, back in the '70's with full page ads for non-existent products? Remember that?). And his customer service skills are non-existent if he just ignores politely worded inqueries re: progress on the product. So, am I the only one still waiting for an IMSAI II? Bob Stek Saver of Lost Sols

18 years, 11 months

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Anyone collect Dec/Compaq Alphaservers or VAXen?

by RodSmallwood＠mail.ediconsulting.co.uk

Now there's a story. ... Luckily (or unluckily) I had moved on from DEC by 1985 so I was not a witness to its sad demise. Better made products you could not want for. Despite having worked with PC's for many years. I could never see how they became preferred over central unit plus terminals for general business use. My modest collection has beeen accrued of the last couple of years. Apart from the 11/94's (Some potato head stole the CPU cards before I got to the machines) the rest of it is running/will run. I need KDJ 11 processors for the 11/94's. They are expensive and even those intended for 11/84's are silly prices. I also have three small Sun systems (I can't resist quality engineering) Rod -----Original Message----- From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Allison Sent: 02 October 2007 14:46 To: cctech at classiccmp.org Subject: RE: Anyone collect Dec/Compaq Alphaservers or VAXen? > >Subject: RE: Anyone collect Dec/Compaq Alphaservers or VAXen? > From: "Rod Smallwood" <RodSmallwood at mail.ediconsulting.co.uk> > Date: Tue, 02 Oct 2007 07:08:33 +0100 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" ><cctech at classiccmp.org> > >Hmmm > Time for a quick 'We are not worthy' ^00^ Consider my leg pulled. :) > >What did you do? >Raid the Mill with a fleet of trucks? No. I did get some small amounts of odd items from DEC salvage before it was shut down. Mostly things like H751A power controllers, power supplies and TU58 drives and boards. The one uVII (BA123 VIDSYS::) was a parting gift(I paid 100$ for it with DOCS and licenses) during the days of blood. For those that don't understand the post 1991 sell off of parts of DEC, that's when the DIGITAL logo went from blue to burgandy. The other was built from scrounge. VIDSYS:: is still setup for DECnet area 56.920 (one area in OGO was 56) and HIPPY:: was area 63.390 (hidden area for DECnet overflow). My 11T03 which is now the 11/73 was a gift from my boss at DEC. I kept it in the lab area for years for those odd projects but by late 80s it was obvious it was getting used less and less. He suggested "when are you going to scrap that thing?" I bring it home (on property pass) which I did. A year later when it was time to confirm and renew the property pass his answer was "what 11?". The remainder were mostly rescues. The bulk of the uVAX3100s came from UV Waterloo over 10 years ago on a if you take one you take them all and I was the only one willing to take a huge pile of uVAX3100s plus cables, VT320s VS2000s, TK50s, several TLZ04s.. Took two seperate 400mile round trips with a pickup truck filled to capacity. A fair number of those got redistributed to others as sixteen uVax3100s take a bit of space. The rest are also rescues from various seperate trips. Usually if the system is incomplete I jump on it and clean it up and restore it to life from spares. The few pending systems are due to my activities in amateur radio this year and now that I'm done with the bigger projects it's back to machines. I don't do Ubus-11s, big VAX (780s and the like) and unfortunately PDP-10/20s as most are too large to handle or power here. Also I've reached the point where excess do get passed on to others as I don't store any large number of systems either. I try to manage my collection. Those excess sometimes get cleaned up board added and moved along so they are operable and don't end up in the trash or worse. I like to power them up and play and that's incompatable with storage. There are a few small items like extra VT320s (white, green and amber), VT100s, H19, DECMate-IIIs I keep in the garage on rotation but I can and do run them there as well as it's warm enough in the winter and very dry. I keep those out there mostly to make it easier to move other stuff around in the room. What seperates me from museum is I use them, reconfigure and expand them them to suit my wishes or for fun. However, junking them is out of the questionas even basket cases are salvaged for any and all usable parts. FYI: if anyone needs parts for PDT11/1xx systems I have many CPU, memory and IO boards I'm not ever going to use. Someone took a bunch apart and then later gave me the box of boards. (ugly mutter mutter cuss cuss.) I mostly do DEC and CP/M based systems (s100, totables, SBCs) but I do have a few oddballs. For some reason the MIPS based DEC hardware never got my attention nor have the PC/clone(intel) based systems like Rainbow and VAXmate. I did have PROs (350s and 380s) but gave those away to concentrate on Qbus. Allison > >Rod > >-----Original Message----- >From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org >[mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Allison >Sent: 01 October 2007 15:47 >To: cctech at classiccmp.org >Subject: RE: Anyone collect Dec/Compaq Alphaservers or VAXen? > >> >>Subject: RE: Anyone collect Dec/Compaq Alphaservers or VAXen? >> From: "Rod Smallwood" <RodSmallwood at mail.ediconsulting.co.uk> >> Date: Mon, 01 Oct 2007 08:00:44 +0100 >> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" >><cctech at classiccmp.org> >> >> >>My list >> pdp11/94 x 4 R >> >> DEC Rainbow 100+ * >> >> VAX 300 * >> VAX 400 * >> VAX 500 R >> VAXStation 3100 * >> >> DEC 3000 * >> >> Multia * >> >>* = Working >>R = Renovation (Mostly missing parts) >> >>Rod Smallwood > > >A more detailed list of DEC systems here. :) > > >Collection of operational hardware: > >PDP-8 based machines: >==================== > PDP-8f, 20k core and 2 serial 8650 and 8652 >2 Decmate-IIIs OS/278 > Intersil sampler (6100 chipset) extended to 3k ram > 6120 based board, homebrew 32kram 8k rom > >PDP-11 based machines: >===================== >1 LSI-11/03 rx02 >2 PDP11/23 BA11S boxes, > 1MB, RQDX2 and RD52 > 1MB, RQDX2 and RD31, RX50 >1 pdp11/73 50" RACK SYSTEM (4MB, DLVJ11, DEQNA, RQDX3>> RX02, RD52, >RX33, RL02). >1 BA11va with 11/23 +tu58 RT-11 >1 BA11va with 11/23 +Viking RX02 equivilent RT-11 > PDT11/130 11/03 with tu58 dectapeII > OSs in use: RT-11, XXDP-11 and unix V6 > >VAX based machines: >=================== > Microvax-II (ba23 based) 12mb, RQDX3, RD53, RX33 > This one lived as HIPSS:: during my days at DEC. > Microvax-II/GPX (Ba123 based, TK50 and SCSI disks) > This one was know as VIDSYS:: inside DEC. >3 Microvax2000 all with 2 RD53, 1 RD54 drive, one with ultrix >1 Microvax2000 as hard disk formatter and MOP bootable system. >2 Microvax3100/m76/gpx 32mb 2 each 1gb scsi internal >3 Microvax3100/server (not M10e) (filled with 400mb and 1gb disks) >4 BA42 SCSI disk farm for the 3100s populated with RZ56s > OSs in use VMSv5.4-4,V5.54, V7.2, Ultrix 4.2 > >Terminal for the uVAX systems is usually VT1200 via thinnet and the >PDP-11s the usual terminal is either VT340, VT320 or VT180 in terminal >mode. > >DEC CP/M speaking machines: >=========================== >1 Vt180 complete (dual RX180s) >2 Vt180 CP/M board built up as standalone one modded for 6mhz >1 Vt185 Thats a Vt125 + Vt180. > >In the non operational list: > >11/23B uPDP-11 in a BA23 pedestal that while complete with 11/23B, >M8057 memory, DHV11, RQDX2 and RD52, RX50 it requries cleaning and >testing. > >H11 Backplane complete with LSI-11 CPU, 16k of ram, two serial cards and >a parallel card of heath origin. Some day I'll find the case/power >supply for it. All parts are tested as working. > >Small 11/23 system using a H9281-BC (12x2 slots) filled with: > M8186 1/23 (Overclocked CPU mod) > 4 M8059 MSV11 ram > DLV11j, > RQDX3 with M9058 distribution board. (for RX33 and RD31) > MRV-11 Eprom card with MSCP boot. > VK170 with matching LK02 keyboard and a monitor. The VK170 > is a minimal VT52 on a dual width card for packaged systems > that communicates via RS232 to system and the bus use is > power only. >This is waiting on being packed in a reasonable nonDEC box with a DEC PS >and fans. The boards are known working and the backplane is already >jumpered as Q22. > >Generally in my house operational means I can actually turn it on and >play and it has a permanent spot that is easily accessable. > >One project that is in process is a H9800 desk/rack that will replace >the existing standard steel office desk. the system to be installed >there will be 11/23B in BA11s with a hand made Disk box for RX33 and >RD52s. > >I have two boxes (Xerox Paper sized) of tested boards enough to build >another few 11/23s and a few uVAXII as my spares. Failed boards get >repaird when I feel like it so I have good boards around. > >Who was it that has the SIG of > "DEC had then what you wish you could buy now." ? > >Allison > > > >

18 years, 11 months

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Burroughs B80 rescued

by dm561＠torfree.net

---------------Original Message: Date: Mon, 1 Oct 2007 05:35:33 -0700 (PDT) From: Mr Ian Primus <ian_primus at yahoo.com> Subject: Burroughs B80 rescued Well, I drove up to Canada yesterday and picked up the Burroughs B80. <snip> I was more concerned with moving the computer than inspecting it, but I don't recall seeing any kind of standard looking interface ports. I believe that the B80 can support extra terminals, but I don't see it. Hopefully, when I get it going, I can connect something external to it and back up the disk packs. I have 11 packs, at least one of which is the operating system, MCP. -------------Reply: Not necessarily; as I recall, things like terminals, line printers, PPT I/O, Datacomm etc. and their interface/controller hardware were all options. The basic machine (which was probably most of them) consisted of the main unit with its dual-forms printer and keyboard and either integrated 8" floppies and/or the external dual 14" drive cabinet which could be 2 removable carts or one fixed/one removable; the self-scan display was also an option, but I don't think there was any I/O as standard equipment on the base model, which was essentially the disk-based replacement for the single-user L series ledger-card accounting/posting machines. mike

18 years, 11 months

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TI-99/4A Floppies

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: TI-99/4A Floppies > From: woodelf <bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca> > Date: Tue, 02 Oct 2007 17:52:04 -0600 > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >Brent Hilpert wrote: > >> I guess home computing got tossed over to the consumer products division at >> TI, which always seemed to have a bottom-of-the-line/low-end approach to >> things, too bad they didn't find some middle ground between that and their >> higher-end commercial/military stuff. > >Well the hand writing was on the wall after 1975 since in hindsight >we know that 16 bit computers with 32kw is just too small for any programs >after about 1975. Look how hard it was to cram advent on a 32K pdp8. >Ben. That doesn't apply to the TI9900. the reason is the PDP-8 is a 4k machine with a minimal instruction set and memory extension. The 990/9900 is a 32KW CISC machine that can support memory extension into the megabyte range. You forget the PDP11 was a 16bit 32kW machine too and that was highly successful. Advent fit on Z80 with 48Kb and PDP11 (LSI-11/03)with 28K of ram. The reason the TI990/9900 was not wide spread is TI was not a computer company and despite having something decent they didn't market it until it was way too late. In 1976-77 the 9900 was about one generation ahead of the 8080 and maybe Z80. Maybe the best code example is the line by line assembler along with a simple monitor all in 1K words. It was capable of very dense code. Actually the 64kB limit was not starting to be problematic until around 1978-9{or later} when applications like DBASE and VISICalc started filling ram. Allison

18 years, 11 months

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Setting up a VAXstation

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: Setting up a VAXstation > From: "Zane H. Healy" <healyzh at aracnet.com> > Date: Tue, 02 Oct 2007 17:54:17 -0700 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org>, > General Discussion: > >At 4:54 PM +0100 9/30/07, Jules Richardson wrote: >>Jason T wrote: >>>My 3100/30 boots fine off the Hobbyist VMS disc using my >>>boots-anything Apple CD300 (aka Sony) drive. >> >>You got there first :-) Pulls of drives from old Apple systems seem >>like a good bet - I've used a few on various machines which need a >>512 byte block size. I normally use an Apple CD600, but it isn't >>quite perfect - some SGI systems don't like it for some reason >>(others do, as does everything non-SGI I've hooked it up to) > >I've had very good luck with an external Panasonic 4x CD-ROM drive I >purchased new in '95 for my PowerBook 520c. It has worked on >everything I've connected it to. I've used it on both a Mac and PC >laptop, and on numerous DEC, SUN, and Amiga systems. My only SGI >systems have built in CD-ROM's. Another likely source would be old >Sun Hardware. > >As I've previously mentioned I'm quite fond of Plextor caddy drives >for my PDP-11's. > >If you're trying to boot an old enough version of VAX/VMS then I >suspect 3rd party drives could cause problems. I know the Hard >Drives will. I'd recommend OpenVMS 7.2 or 7.3 for greatest SCSI >compatibility. I simply only use DEC HD's on VAXen. Even though I >use 3rd party drives on my PDP-11's and Alpha's. > > Zane > I have a few Toshiba 2x SCSI drives that work well for uVAX. The drives are easy to spot as there is a jumper header in the ID select area. Allison

18 years, 11 months

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vcf 10

by jwest＠classiccmp.org

I may be going to VCF10 - and turning it into a mini-vacation with the wife. I'd appreciate it if anyone familiar with area can email me some non-geek things to see and do around Mountain View on non-show days. It'd be nice to have her not think it's ALL geek stuff on the trip :) Jay

18 years, 11 months

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EPROM Death?

by healyzh＠aracnet.com

How do you tell an over-erased EPROM? I finally have my programmer and eraser, and just tried erasing 6 EPROM's. Four erased just fine, and two are showing weird patterns of alternating blocks of 04/06 and 14/16. 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/ |

18 years, 11 months

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TI-99/4A Floppies

by chaosotter76＠gmail.com

On 9/27/07, Zane H. Healy <healyzh at aracnet.com> wrote: > > How well has TI-99/4A software on floppies been preserved? We just > received a very large donation. As part of the donation is what > appears to be a complete TI-99/4A system complete with the expansion > box, and a couple other expansions. There is documentation for at > least some of the hardware and software. Preservation for TI-99/4A software on floppies seems to be pretty poor right now, because of (as Jim mentioned) the rarity of the expansion box and third-party software that used it. There are a few large-ish archives, but they're almost entirely unorganized -- nothing remotely approaching the TOSEC sets available for other systems. If you're able to image a significant number of those floppies, that would be a real service to enthusiasts. You might know this already, but you might look to see whether that expansion box houses a MyArc Geneve 9640, or any of the software is for the Geneve rather than the stock TI-99/4A.

18 years, 11 months

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