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

by Billy.Pettit＠wdc.com

Roger Holmes wrote: MOST????? STANDARD????? Rubbish! IBM 7094 - 36 bits. ICT 1301 - 48 bits. CDC 6600/7600 60 (or was it 64?) bits. CDC SC17 (not sure exact era) - 16 bits. Elliott 903/920B/905/920C/920ATC - 18 bits. Many of the BCD machines used 4 bit words I believe. Mid 60s ICL 1900 - 24 bits. What used 40 bits? > What about the MicroData machines with a build your own > instructions on the fly? Tell us more please. Microcoded or 'Extra code' ? > And then there were the ultra-strange like the G-15 - 29 bit word > size, all > instructions were modified moves through arithmetic logic or I/O > devices. > The I/O devices were actually part of the internal logic - no > channels. Actual physical memory, access my DMA from the device or just memory mapped I/O ? ----------------- Billy replies: This was a serial machine using a magnetic drum for memory. So the registers and memory were all bit serial and on the drum. I/O was accomplish by moving data from one line to another. The logic at each end of the line was in peripheral but the bits were on the drum. So it really doesn't fit the standard definition of memory mapped I/O, though that is the closest description. There were no channels per se. Al has just posted most of the G-15 manuals. Have a look. It certainly qualifies for the weirdest machine I ever worked on. ---------------- Roger Holmes: Remember? I am restoring/maintaining an ICT 1301 which has individual Germanium transistors, wire-OR, four and gates to a PCB, one flip- flop one a PCB, a clock derived from the timing track of the last addressed drum store, a core store unit weighing half a ton an stores just 2000 x 48 bit words (plus 2000 x 2 parity bits). Its got Ampex TM4 mag tape drives (not industry standard 7 or 9 track, these are ten track units with hubs the same design as professional audio tapes and the 2 and 3 inch wide video tapes once used by TV broadcasters). [Snip] --------------------- Billy: I salute you. I wish more people on this list had your energy and love of old metal and were restoring it. I enjoy hearing about your efforts. I'm also working on a germanium transistor wired-AND core memory machine. It used TM2's not TM4's. And I've been unable to find any tape units. Did find the original card reader, a modified Burroughs. Still, I consider what you are doing to be the true goal of classic computers. I read, enjoy and participate with the microprocessor based list threads. But my real love is in truly "classic" computers like yours. ---------------- Roger Holmes: > And many of them were wonderfully different and creative. Indeed. And some of them almost make you cry because so much more could have been done with the same amount of electonics. My machine has been modified to implement an index instruction. Previously all indexing and indirection had to be done by program modification, and even now subroutine return is done that way (see my previous e-mail). I have one machine in 'conserved' state, unmolested, unrepaired non- runner, and one with extra tweeks and darn right mass rewiring which runs and I can't stop thinking about how it could be improved, yet somehow manage to stop myself doing so. There are so many gaps in the instruction code and spare bits in the instructions etc. The only modification I am working on plugs into an extension port lashed up by a previous owner. This is to capture the data from the machine onto modern media. May replace with an RS232 interface later to drive a teletype and/or pen plotter, and/or a parallel inteface for a Friden Flexowriter. [sni] Roger Holmes. Classic computer collector, classic car collector, machine tool collector/user (for the prior mentioned hobbies), and for a job, programmer of CAD and graphic software and printer/plotter drivers for Apple computers.

19 years, 2 months

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What are the really unusual or weird computers?

by Billy.Pettit＠wdc.com

Jay West wrote: SortofKindaNotReally MicroData Reality machines were firmware implementations of Pick (Reality), not software implementations. As a result, you couldn't actually microprogram the thing as an end user (normally). There *WAS* an EEPROM board that would replace the firmware board, but I don't believe that was typically released to the field. I used to have two M1600's (the early ones with the wood panels). One of them did have the EEPROM microcode option but I do know that particular unit was sent out from microdata "under the table". I had let these two machines slip through my fingers many years ago, long before I got into collecting. BUT - on the bright side - I found out a year or so ago that those two machines actually did wind up in the hands of another collector who is known to another listmember! I now have an M1600 that is the later metal panel variety, waiting to be restored. Even on the software implementations (which the microdata's weren't), you could create new missionary instructions from native instructions by playing some games in the 5-pass assembly process. However, this wouldn't technically be considered microprogramming as the "native" instructions would be just whatever the underlying cpu was (68000, PDP11, RS6000, x86, etc.). So you could create new virtual instructions, but still not really microprogramming. Jay -------------- I always thought the early MicroData systems were different from the Reality series. Looks like I was wrong. (Where is Jim Stephens when you need him? He has all these systems and the software to go with them.) Billy

19 years, 2 months

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What are the really unusual or weird computers?

by Billy.Pettit＠wdc.com

Chuck Guzis wrote: Quite honestly, I didn't know what the time frame of the original question was--I did mention the Univac SS-80, however--and I did make reference to strange designs of the 50s. But "computer" isn't very specific. How about the hybrid computers of the 60s? How about the "mostly diodes and not a lot of transistor" machines like the PB250? Some parameters for the original question might be helpful. Cheers, Chuck ----------------- Chuck, I agree with you on all your points. And add the Recomp jukebox series to the all diode machines. They had less than 100 flip-flops per system! Billy

19 years, 2 months

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MP3 players

by Billy.Pettit＠wdc.com

Jay West wrote: I find it exceedingly difficult to consider this type of thread on-topic. Jay ---------------------- Jay, I agree with you in principle. But I've spent the last two years working on interfacing hard drives to MP3 players. They aren't old enough for the list, but technically, they employ a lot of computers folks like me. Billy

19 years, 2 months

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Billy Pettit real disappointment

by Billy.Pettit＠wdc.com

Jay West wrote: Billy wrote... >> Come on people: there were computers long before there were >> microcomputers. I seem to remember a recent post complaining that this list was nothing but minicomputer and big-iron talk, no microcomputer discussion. Apparently that was wrong, as now there is a complaint it's just micro talk? ;) Jay ------------ Jay, I wasn't complaining about the list or the subject matter - I'm quite content to see all sorts of ramblings, even some off subject. I was trying to make the point that a computer built around a microprocessor is not particularly weird or unusual - The subject of the thread. Billy

19 years, 2 months

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LISA

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> So, does anyone know what happened to that 90,000+ lines of (Pascal) Source Code for LOS? Last time I saw it, it was on a Lisa in the source control library at Apple > It would sure been neet to be able to look at it. I agree. The Computer History Museum is willing to archive it. All you have to do is ask Steve to release it. I'm sure he has nothing better to do today.

19 years, 2 months

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RX02 parallel port interface (was Re: Linux PCB CAD software?)

by ethan.dicks＠gmail.com

On 6/29/07, Bruce Ray <bkr at wildharecomputers.com> wrote: > Before leaving the RX01 topic, note that Chuck's design was implemented > using the Cadsoft Eagle years ago and is available at: > > http://www.wildharecomputers.com/download/rx0x/rx01-b.zip > > A minor update is at: > > http://www.wildharecomputers.com/download/rx0x/rx01-d.zip Thanks for those. > The idea of putting an SX-28 processor in control of the communications and > using a native USB interface resulted in the (untested) derivative design > at: > > http://www.wildharecomputers.com/download/rx0x/rx-usb.zip I'll have to look at that. I have, in hand, an ATMEGA8 bridging USB to a textual LCD panel for LCDproc / LCD4LINUX, etc. The USB implementation is in software, keeping the project cost quite low ($3.25 for an ATMEGA8 in low quantities, AFAIK). I might have to see if I can take what you have there and see if an ATMEGA8 can do it, too. I hate the fact that the parallel port is vanishing, but since I can't keep it from happening, I might as well attempt to keep classic peripherals working with hardware that's out now and in the near future. -ethan

19 years, 2 months

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Seagate ST1480N termpwr jumpers

by julesrichardsonuk＠yahoo.co.uk

Does anyone happen to have a reference for the termpwr jumpers on a Seagate ST1480N 425MB SCSI disk? The only online reference I've found so far is set out to use the old DOS font with line drawing characters in it, and nothing I've been able to find in Firefox (or elsewhere in Linux) has been able to display it properly :-( I know the termpwr jumpers are 7 and 8 down the left side of the drive, but deciphering the characters used in the corresponding truth table is proving tricky. (I've having another look at the NeXT Cube; I assume that the drive is currently expecting termpwr from the bus, but the NeXT isn't supplying it) ta J.

19 years, 2 months

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Semi-OT: Interesting or unusual PC Compatibles?

by feldman.r＠comcast.net

>Message: 13 >Date: Wed, 27 Jun 2007 08:18:09 -0400 >From: "Jason McBrien" <jbmcb1 at gmail.com> >Subject: Re: Semi-OT: Interesting or unusual PC Compatibles? >To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" >On 6/26/07, Dave McGuire <mcguire at neurotica.com> wrote: >> In the "odd PCs" department, I have to mention the Seequa >> Chameleon. It has an 8088 and a Z80, so it can run DOS, CP/M-80, or >> CP/M-86. >The DEC Rainbow 100 was a similar machine, it had a 8086 and a Z/80, and >could triple (or quad) boot into CPM/80, CPM/86, MS-DOS, or act as a VT-220 >via hardware emulation. It didn't get far as it used wacky 400Kb single >sided quad density floppies that hardly anyone else used. According to >Wikipedia, DEC even ported Windows 1.0 to it. Add the Otrona Attache 8:16 to that list. It used an 8086 daughter card to run MS-DOS 2.11. It had trouble with WordPerfect, though, as the keyboard did not have the PC function keys. It also did PC graphics in software, so a program like Borland's Reflex database redrew the screen _very_ slowly when you scrolled. >A couple more oddities- >The Tandy 2000 was one of the few 80186 based clones, and ran well behaved >MS-DOS apps, though it had somewhat oddball video hardware, keyboard and >serial port setup. It required a custom version of DOS, and MS even ported >Xenix to it. The HP 100LX/200LX palmtops used a custom 80186 and ran most DOS applications, running MS-DOS 5.0 from ROM. There could be problems with the LX's graphics, which was 640x200 CGA with some quirks. >The Atari Portfolio was probably the first palmtop device that ran DOS apps, >though it was such a wacky architecture it's software support was limited. The Poqet came out shortly after the Portfolio, IIRC. Ran quite a few DOS apps under MS-DOS 3.3 -- the Poqet PC website (http://www.bmason.com/PoqetPC/faq/poqetpc.html) calls it "about 99.9% compatible with the original IBM/PC-XT desktop computer." >The HP 100 series were some of the first laptop computers that could run >DOS. It had DOS, Basic, Lotus and a few other productivity apps in ROM, and >used the somewhat odd HP-IL bus to interface with peripherals, among them a >battery powered disk drive.

19 years, 2 months

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HP7202A Schematics questions

by wacarder＠earthlink.net

>>>http://www.woffordwitch.com/HP7202A.asp >>> >>>and click on the link at the bottom of the page. >> >> Can someone help me understand these old HP schematics? > >I can't see them. I get "The page cannot be found". > > Vince Sorry, the first time I mis-typed the URL. Here's the correct one: http://www.woffordwitch.com/HP7202.asp Ashley

19 years, 2 months

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Telephony switches - is there anyone out there collecting these?

by James＠jdfogg.com

> Are there people out there, on the list or otherwise, that > are actively collecting these machines? Admittedly, unlike a > PDP8 you can use (as Dave McGuire does) on a daily basis, a > twelve ton NEAX isn't too 'dramatic' as an attention piece. > But, according to my little book here, they tend to be > multiprocessor, reel-to-reel storage (as they 'reboot' so > infrequently they need a very long-lasting storage medium), > all sorts of good stuff. > And with an average "Mean time between failure of 1 failure > in 40 years"... boy, that just speaks for it. > > So, anyone out there have one of these in their... basement? I'm into telephony, but not on the CO-sized equipment. I've had many PBX's in my houses over the years. Everything from an AT&T 1A2 system (relay based) to an AT&T System 75. Along the way I've had AT&T, Siemens, Nortel, Lucent, Iwatsu, Mitel, NEC and others. At this point I'm using a 32 line, 128 station Iwatsu ZTD. I have many digital (Key) phones for it, operator/programmer consoles, doorphones, analog and digital (Key) station cards, ringer supplies, relay boards and lots of other neet options for them. And I have the all-important documentation to make it run. It's one of these. http://shorterlink.org/2642 (ebay link) The only old CO equipment I know of in private hands is a guy in Pennsylvania that runs a boys camp on a Strowger (relay CO).

19 years, 2 months

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HP7202A Schematics questions

by wacarder＠earthlink.net

>>The interface has a 15 pin male adapter, with >>8 pins on top and 7 on bottom. >> >>I have added a link to the schematics at the bottom of >>the HP7202A Plotter page on my web site. >> >>Go to: >> >>http://www.woffordwitch.com/HP7202A.asp >> >>and click on the link at the bottom of the page. > >Can someone help me understand these old HP schematics? >I see the 15 adapter pins shown at the top right of the >page, and see where one of the pins (# 5) appears to go >to something labeled EIA IN on the "Logic Mother Board" >section. Some pins (3, 4, and 6) appear to not be >connected to anything. Most of the others seem to go >to the Analog Mother Board, but I am not sure how to >follow them from there. What would be nice is if I >could get enough of an understanding from this schematic >to figure out how to construct both a 20mA adapter and >an EIA (RS232) adapter, or an adapter that has the 15 >pin connector on one end, and two connectors on the >other end (one for 20mA and one for EIA). I apologize for posting an incorrect link to the schematics. They can be found at the bottom of the following page: http://www.woffordwitch.com/HP7202.asp Ashley http://www.woffordwitch.com

19 years, 2 months

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Old Modems and Telephony switches

by Arno_1983＠gmx.de

> How about early modems, anyone collect them? Not nearly as intensively as I'd like to (lack of space, for the most part), but I do have one big old (originally Telco-rented) Siemens 1200 baud leased-line modem. The usual couple of paperback-sized "modern" modems (up to 28.8 kbps, I think) - they're one of those items where people always seem to misplace the wall warts and that just as invariably don't state their power requirements on the case. Not oftenly used but kept "just in case". I've got a lead on some four-wire and X.25 ("frame relay"?) stuff from University and just yesterday I got my second ADSL modem. What would it take to set up or "simulate" their counterpart (DSLAM?) at home? Concerning other phone stuff, I do have one relay-based master/slave (or is that boss/secretary?) switch, one or two analog PBXen and one proprietary unit by Telenorma (for which I don't have the displayphones you need at least one of for programming). On the ISDN side, just two phones (one missing its local power supply too - duh), one or two PC cards and an NTBA so far. You can't even make the two phones talk to each other using just the NTBA (as long as you don't have ISDN service) afaik, so I'm looking for an ISDN PBX as well (or some other suggestions how to have some fun with that stuff). So long, -- Arno Kletzander Stud. Hilfskraft Informatik Sammlung Erlangen www.iser.uni-erlangen.de Psssst! Schon vom neuen GMX MultiMessenger geh?rt? Der kanns mit allen: http://www.gmx.net/de/go/multimessenger

19 years, 2 months

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AVAIL: Xerox 630 Memorywriter system disks

by marasco＠insightbb.com

I might be interested in your Xerox 630 Memorywriter system disks. Please email me at davidsharon at insightbb.com with price. Thanks, David This transmission is confidential and intended solely for the person(s) or organization(s) to whom it is addressed. It may contain privileged and/or confidential information. If you are not the intended recipient, you are not authorized to copy, distribute or take any action in reliance on it. If you have received this transmission in error, please notify the sender by reply email and delete this transmission. Thank you for your cooperation.

19 years, 2 months

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Seagate ST1480N termpwr jumpers

by cheri-post＠web.de

Jules, have a look at the biggest database for harddisk drives: www.pc-disk.de All you have to do is to click on "producer", then on the left, you can navigate down to the Seagate drives. For the ST1480N, there is the layout of the PCB and the jumper definitions where the termination power is pointed out as well. Regards, Pierre > > > Does anyone happen to have a reference for the termpwr jumpers on a Seagate > ST1480N 425MB SCSI disk? > > The only online reference I've found so far is set out to use the old DOS font > with line drawing characters in it, and nothing I've been able to find in > Firefox (or elsewhere in Linux) has been able to display it properly :-( > > I know the termpwr jumpers are 7 and 8 down the left side of the drive, but > deciphering the characters used in the corresponding truth table is proving > tricky. > > (I've having another look at the NeXT Cube; I assume that the drive is > currently expecting termpwr from the bus, but the NeXT isn't supplying it) > > > ta > > J. > _______________________________________________________________________ Jetzt neu! Sch?tzen Sie Ihren PC mit McAfee und WEB.DE. 3 Monate kostenlos testen. http://www.pc-sicherheit.web.de/startseite/?mc=022220

19 years, 2 months

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Old Telephony Switches - Available/Free

by billdeg＠degnanco.com

Speaking of old telephony switches...my building seems to have been once a telephone relay substation. If anyone is really interested in having this stuff, let me know privately and I can take pictures, etc. There are a lot of old component cards, wires, wall boxes, etc. "Western Electric" etc. in the basement. I do not know much about this stuff. Looks like it was last upgraded in the mid 70's. Location - Wilmington, Delaware USA Bill

19 years, 2 months

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What are the really unusual or weird computers?

by mike.hatch＠mclennan.co.uk

My experience is SDS9300 - 24bit Elliott 803B - 39bit - one restored and working at Bletchley Park Digital PDP-7 - 18 bit Digital PDP11-45 LEO 326 - ? bits can't remember > Message: 12 > Date: Thu, 28 Jun 2007 12:01:16 +0100 > From: Roger Holmes <roger.holmes at microspot.co.uk> > Its got Ampex > TM4 mag tape drives (not industry standard 7 or 9 track, these are > ten track units with hubs the same design as professional audio tapes > and the 2 and 3 inch wide video tapes once used by TV broadcasters). Our SDS9300 had TM4 drives but I don't remember them being 2 and 3 inch wide, I thought they were 0.5 inch, but then that was 35years ago. The Elliott 803B had 35mm tape drives, sprocket driven, derived from film handlers, tape made by Kodak. Mike Hatch Looking for a PDP-7 (some hope!)

19 years, 2 months

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Billy Pettit real disappointment (Vol46 Iss78 M16)

by mike＠brickfieldspark.org

----- Original Message ----- From: <cctalk-request at classiccmp.org> To: <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > Not enough UK list members, I suspect. I don't know where they all are... > not > on uk.comp.vintage, that's for sure. Maybe there are just more > vendor-specific > mailing lists for the UK scene [1] than there are for the US or something. > Newbie here Uk based. > A big Venn diagram with DEC in the middle? ;-) > I'd go for that Mike Hatch Looking for a PDP-7 (some hope!)

19 years, 2 months

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What are the really unusual or weird computers?

by mike.hatch＠mclennan.co.uk

My experience is SDS9300 - 24bit Elliott 803B - 39bit - one restored and working at Bletchley Park Digital PDP-7 - 18 bit Digital PDP11-45 - LEO 326 - ? bits can't remember > Message: 12 > Date: Thu, 28 Jun 2007 12:01:16 +0100 > From: Roger Holmes <roger.holmes at microspot.co.uk> > Its got Ampex > TM4 mag tape drives (not industry standard 7 or 9 track, these are > ten track units with hubs the same design as professional audio tapes > and the 2 and 3 inch wide video tapes once used by TV broadcasters). Our SDS9300 had TM4 drives but I don't remember them being 2 and 3 inch wide, I thought they were 0.5 inch, but then that was 35years ago. The Elliott 803B had 35mm tape drives, sprocket driven, derived from film handlers, tape made by Kodak. Mike Hatch Looking for a PDP-7 (some hope!)

19 years, 2 months

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Billy Pettit real disappointment

by dm561＠torfree.net

------------------Original Message(s): Date: Thu, 28 Jun 2007 15:52:56 -0700 From: "Chuck Guzis" <cclist at sydex.com> Subject: Re: Billy Pettit real disappointment To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <4683D958.2968.16663E7 at cclist.sydex.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII On 28 Jun 2007 at 14:52, Jules Richardson wrote: > Yet another oddity discovered today: it would seem that the rotating magnetic > fixed-head disk in the Burroughs L-2000/3000/4000/5000 machines wasn't for > secondary storage (as I'd assumed), it was the primary store in place of the > core typically found in systems of the time. I bet there can't be many > machines around which had rotating store as the primary memory. Not at all uncommon during the 1950's. (e.g. LGP-30) In fact, the Univac SS-80 that I mentioned not only has a drum as main memory, but it's synchronized to the card reader. There were two machines in the Univac "Solid State" series; the SS-80 for conventional 80-column Hollerith cards and the SS-90 for Univac 90- column cards. The layout on the drum was different for each. The "solid state" refers not to transistors (which were used mostly to drive indicator lamps), but rather to the magnetic cores used not for memory, but for logical operations; one clock cycle per core. The master clock was driven with 6 4X150 power tetrodes. Very unusual--and very reliable for its day. Cheers, Chuck -----------------Reply: Nevertheless unusual for a machine in the L's size and price point; these were essentially desk-sized accounting computers (posting machines) used in banks and numerous small offices. The sealed fixed-head disks were indeed very reliable; secondary storage (when there was any, other than hard copy ledger cards) was on PPT, EPC and on some models mag stripe cards and up to 4 digital cassette drives. Later models (L6000 onwards) used 2102 RAMs ($800/2K). BTW, the L's predecessor (E series) did use core memory and a device called a core counter, a special core that emitted a pulse for every 10th pulse in. And to link this to another thread, I believe I still have a copy of Lunar Lander for the L series; no display of any kind, just a Selectric type golf ball printer. And speaking of golf balls, there was also a golf game for them, as well as lots of ASCII art. Here's hoping that one of the few people who have one of these (other than Bletchley) will manage to get one going one of these days... mike

19 years, 2 months

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old modems (was Telephony switches)

by silent700＠gmail.com

Not my first modem (that would have been the Vicmodem on the CBM Vic 20,) but probably the oldest one I put to actual use was an Andersen-Jacobson 300 baud model. It has disappeared into the maze of junk in my basement so I don't have the full spec on it. But it was direct connect, had heavy-duty toggles on the front and a classy woodgrain veneer on the top and sides :) Believe it or not I used it from about 1993-1995, in the leaner days when a lot of my gear came from the dumpster at the local community college.

19 years, 2 months

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What are the really unusual or weird computers?

by dm561＠torfree.net

-----------------Original Message: Date: Sat, 23 Jun 2007 13:50:40 -0400 (EDT) From: der Mouse <mouse at Rodents.Montreal.QC.CA> Subject: Re: What are the really unusual or weird computers? > It is too bad Windows and the PC group didn't continue the > OpenFirmware concept. [...] It was a bad move that has cost > millions if not billions of dollars worth of lost productive time. I think having an OS that crashes weekly - daily, or worse, in many cases - and needs a complete ground-up reinstall at least annually has cost their customers far more. /~\ The ASCII der Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents.montreal.qc.ca / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B ------------------Reply: I usually ignore the MS- and WIN-bashing that is apparently a basic requirement for anyone wishing to be taken seriously in the computing field, but just for the record: My main system has been running Win98SE more or less 24/7 since it was released and although the hardware has been upgraded several times it has never had a ground-up reinstall (although I will do one Real Soon Now). Yes, although a BSOD is a very rare event, it does misbehave occasionally but that's not surprising considering all the obscure software that has been installed on it over the years. I have never lost any data (except as a result of my own carelessness) and except for a couple of virus incidents all that's required when it does misbehave is a reboot while I get a cup of coffee. My clients' systems with much more stable software environments are even more reliable and any problems are almost always hardware or operator related; even monthly crashes would not be tolerated for long. If your system crashes daily or even weekly, I'd recommend that you find a qualified computer professional to fix it for you... mike

19 years, 2 months

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What are the really unusual or weird computers?

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: What are the really unusual or weird computers? > From: "Liam Proven" <lproven at gmail.com> > Date: Tue, 26 Jun 2007 16:36:50 +0100 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >On 25/06/07, Chuck Guzis <cclist at sydex.com> wrote: >> On 25 Jun 2007 at 18:14, Liam Proven wrote: >> >> > I am a biker myself - pedal and motorcycles both - and don't know much >> > about cars, but I don't believe I've ever seen a car with a starter >> > button. Maybe in a museum. >> >> Liam, you must not be old enough. Most cars made before 1951 or so >> had one--I clearly recall the one on my aunt's 1950 Hudson. My brother had a '69 baracuda when a few performance mods that the ignition lock was only to "enable" it and the button for the starter was under the dash where a foot could do it. Securtity by obscurity. >But American cars are /weird/ compared to the rest of the world. (I >live in Europe and have travelled extensively there, grew up in Africa >and have visited Asia as well as N America.) Really! I had a Saab that had a three cylinder engine that burnt two cycle mix (oil in gas) like an old outboard. If that wasn't weird enough starting was turn on ignition, set choke and pull cord. Yes it had a pull cord to start it no electric starter. >Automatic transmission seems ubiquitous, which AFAICT is pretty much >unique to N America, /but/ most people still drive these huge, >tank-like petrol-guzzling monsters, whereas the rest of the world >(that can afford new cars at all) prefers smaller, lighter, more >efficient machines which cope better with traffic and produce less >waste and environmental damage - though that's incidental to their >owners for the large part, what matters is that they are cheaper.) I drive a toyota small pickup 2.2liter engine (smallest) and dirt cheap to feed and lots of room for racks! Great for gathering system and all. >It's too fiddly that way, but then, I mainly drive Windows with the >keyboard anyway. And since I prefer and use 20yo IBM Model M >keyboards, I don't have a Windows key, either - so it's Ctrl-Esc, up, >return, return. :?) I do that and people watching are amazed it's possible! Really helpful when the mouse quits or worse isn't recognized for some odd reason. I just wish someone would make a PC keyboard without the numeric keypad at all, just slice it off to the right of the cursor keys and get rid of four inches of wasted space. Allison

19 years, 2 months

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Classic HP forums?? - plotter questions

by wacarder＠earthlink.net

>>Does the service manual contain schematics? If so, it should >>be easy to find out which pins are used. > >I am scanning the schematics right now and will post them >shortly. If somebody can take a look at them and decipher >them for me, that would be GREATLY appreciated! The interface has a 15 pin male adapter, with 8 pins on top and 7 on bottom. I have added a link to the schematics at the bottom of the HP7202A Plotter page on my web site. Go to: http://www.woffordwitch.com/HP7202A.asp and click on the link at the bottom of the page. Ashley http://www.woffordwitch.com

19 years, 2 months

1
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Bos Cobol

by w.bor＠voskuilen.nl

Hi Chuck, Are you still developing with Bos Cobol? Best, Wim

19 years, 2 months

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New Email Address

by cchiesa1＠rochester.rr.com

Hi. My apologies to those of you who already know this; I am going through my address book somewhat indiscriminately. :-) I am sending this message to a melange of my friends, family, and business contacts. I have moved (from Rochester, NY, to Canastota, NY) and very shortly will no longer be at cchiesa1 at rochester.rr.com. My new e-mail address will be cchiesa1 at twcny.rr.com . Please use it henceforth. Thank you! Chris Chiesa

19 years, 2 months

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Classic HP forums?? - plotter questions

by wacarder＠earthlink.net

Jay wrote: >You might try Crisis, see www.crisis.com >They are great folks, I've delt with them a lot. > >You might try some of the comp.sys.hp.XXXX newsgroups, >I know there is an HP hardware one there that used to >have good info (not saying they don't anymore, I just >haven't been there in ages). There was also an HP3000 >newsgroup that had a lot of grizzled veterans from >"back in the day" who may have some info. I just noticed >a csd.machines and csd.machines.hp group that >could be fruitful just based on the name (I'm assuming >csd is Computer Systems Division). I will poke around in these groups and see what I can find. >> I need to construct an interface cable for my >> recently acquired HP7202A flatbed pen plotter. >I messed with a few HP plotters many many years ago. >I seem to recall that their interfaces were bizarrely >"multipurpose". You're going to need a manual I bet. >I seem to recall that there were option selections in the >cable as well as dip switch settings? Whatcha gonna >do with your other 72xx plotter? I have the service manual for the 7200A, which is basically the same plotter. I am still trying to figure out the technical diagrams in the manual. HP does not appear to have as much detail in their engineering diagrams as DEC did. If I can't find a cable, I will figure it out. I just need to find out which 4 pins are used for the 20mA interface and then I should be in business. I plan to keep my other old HP plotter, which is a 7210A model. Right now I need to "borrow" the pen holder from it because the one on the 7202A is broken. The 7210A was a couple years newer than the 7200A/7202A. It used a different command language and a different interface. Ashley http://www.woffordwitch.com

19 years, 2 months

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Classic HP forums?? - plotter questions

by wacarder＠earthlink.net

I got no bites the first time, so I'm trying again. Does anyone know of any good classic HP forums, sites, or parts sources? I need to construct an interface cable for my recently acquired HP7202A flatbed pen plotter. This plotter was manufactured around 1971 and could be interfaced using one of three styles of interface cables (it appears that they all plugged into the same male adapter port on the back of the unit, but must have used different pins). I plan to use the 20mA style of hookup, which I assume will use four of the pins. I just need to determine which of the pins are used for the 20mA send and receive. Other options were for an EIA (RS232) connection, and a third type of connection. The plotter is controlled using ASCII commands to plot points or lines. I am looking for someone who may have had some experience with these plotters in the past. Even better (although not likely) would be that someone would have an interface cable. These are HP part numbers 17251A, 17252A, and 17253A. Last night I repaired the fuse housing, cleaned out the dust, and powered on the plotter. It worked fine in standalone mode. The electrostatic "chart hold" feature held a piece of paper in place on the bed, and the lower left and upper right "pen set" functions worked, as did the "pen up / pen down" button and the controls to move the pen. The plan is to hook this ancient device up to my 11/40 as part of my classic computer center. Ashley Carder http://www.woffordwitch.com

19 years, 2 months

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Billy Pettit real disappointment

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: Billy Pettit real disappointment > From: Gordon JC Pearce <gordon at gjcp.net> > Date: Thu, 28 Jun 2007 15:02:42 +0100 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >On Thursday 28 June 2007 13:58:28 Jay West wrote: >> Billy wrote... >> >> >> Come on people: there were computers long before there were >> >> microcomputers. >> >> I seem to remember a recent post complaining that this list was nothing but >> minicomputer and big-iron talk, no microcomputer discussion. Apparently >> that was wrong, as now there is a complaint it's just micro talk? ;) > >It's never going to be "all things to all men", is it? Everyone has their own >little sphere of interest, and what may seem hugely off-topic to one person >might be massively relevant to another. For instance, I like the DEC >conversations, but I'm not quite so interested in HP (but I keep an eye on >them just the same). I'm surprised there's not more about the UK >microcomputer scene. I'm incredibly surprised that there's no discussion at >all of early computer-based musical equipment; we all know about EMS and the >Putney Studio I'm sure, but what about the Fairlight CMI and the Synclavier? >I'm surprised the latter wasn't mentioned during the "weird computers" >thread... > >And what of the things to keep the big *big* iron running? I'm also >interested in stuff like the power plant and environmental plant around old >kit - but I can easily see how some would see that, and the Fairlight, as >offtopic. > >Maybe we need some sort of map showing what we think is on- and off-topic... > >Gordon Well for on topic and weird Computers or IO... PDP-8 I've never seen anything else that did IO that way save for the CMOS version. TI9900 (and 990) oddball IO but loved the workspace pointer idea. Minuteman Missle guidence computer. Bizzare transistor serial machine where the fixed head disk drive served both program storage and as active registers. I wonder if there are any around and if they are operational or the mountain of manuals needed to figure it out? Allison

19 years, 2 months

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The late, great TRS-80

by classiccmp＠memory-alpha.org.uk

Hi, > The only reason I feel Tony's HP can't be classified as a >microcomputer is because I was taught that a microcomputer >utilized a microprocessor, and I was taught that the definition >of a microprocessor is a processing solution contained entirely >on one chip. Anything larger (more than one chip) and it's a mini.... That's a bit too inflexible a definition. Just off the top of my head, by that logic, the i8080 is a minicomputer....which it clearly is not. Likewise, would you consider a processor made from bit-slice devices to be a mini? TTFN - Pete.

19 years, 2 months

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Linux PCB CAD software?

by gpearce＠curiousgroup.co.uk

Has anyone got any recommendations for PCB CAD software on Linux? I tried Eagle, which I'd heard a lot about, but found it to be utterly useless. Practically everything I tried to do resulted in a big pop-up box saying something to the effect of "This feature is disabled in the Light version", even things like moving pads on the grid. Gordon

19 years, 2 months

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[lisaem] LisaEm 1.0.0-RC2 Available for download

by ray＠arachelian.com

The Lisa Emulator Project, Release Candidate 2 is now ready for download: http://lisaem.sunder.net/downloads.html The biggest change is in the video handling code. The following description on video methods is a bit technical, so skip over it if you find your eyes glaze over. The rawbitmap method: The video updates are now using a hidden API in wxWidgets called rawbmp.h, which allows direct read write access to the pixels. This isn't a secret API by any means, since wxWidgets is open source, however, it is undocumented. To turn this on pass --with-rawbitmap on compiling. This is a lot faster on OS X, but it crashes win32, and shows a black screen on Linux The SetRGB wxImage display method: An alternate method is also available for systems where rawbmp.h doesn't work, such as on win32. Compile using --without-rawbitmap to enable this slightly slower mode. While this mode is also much faster than the original version on OS X, it's slower than rawbmp. The SetRGB method builds a wxImage, and access the pixels via the SetRGB method, then converts the wxImage into a wxBitmap, and blits the result to the display. (On wxWidgets, you can't blit Images, they must be converted to wxBitmaps, and there's no SetRGB method on wxBitmaps.) The original code which built 4x1 blits has been ripped out. In terms of speed, it worked fine on Linux and Windows, but it failed miserably on slower OS X machines. The new code is also a big hack, but at least it's a good hack. :-) The rest of the display mechanism is based on Brian Foley's code, which refreshes only the changed data, and schedules CPU execution via a timer. While Brian's UI code is a lot cleaner, the main LisaEm wx UI code has branched off too far for it to be compatible, so I've adapted the code to do what his code does. Future updates will aim for cleaner C++ code. There may be issues refreshing the display on scrolling, however. Another issue, is that the new code causes a bit of fuzzing in the antialiased modes. This is due to the color levels used by the new code. This will be fixed eventually by trial and error. I suspect that tweaking contrast/brightness levels is what's needed. The Display refresh rate options have been removed as they're no longer needed. The biggest improvement is for G4 OS X machines - the new display code is fast enough to get a 5Mhz on average for a 500Mhz G4 running OS X 10.3.9. It uses about 60M of real memory and about 160M of swap (which includes things like profile disk images, and other mmap'ed data) on the same G4. Other improvements: Dual Parallel ROM cheat - if you have this ROM and are using it, the power on self test is very painfully slow, especially on older systems, the new version bypasses the test routines, so power on time is a lot faster. Should future releases of the emulator support other expansion port cards, this method can be used there as well. NOTE: If you do not enable the ROM cheats when using the Parallel ROM, and set the throttle to anything other than 5MHz, the Parallel ROM tests will not only take a very long time, but fail since they test CPU vs VIA timing. Unlike most standard open source software, LisaEm doesn't use "./configure; make; make install" autoconf/automake method of building. However, Linux distro maintainers have scripts that make use of that, so I've built a fake configure script file that builds a makefile which acts as a wrapper around the build.sh script. libdc42 updates allow access to both macbinaryII wrapped DART and DiskCopy 4.2 images, and detects Disk Copy 6 images. (Since the NDIF/DMG file formats are undocumented, libdc42 cannot support them.) Floppy code can now deserialize tools/install disks and offers the option on disk mounting. Inserting a blank floppy works again. Previously, it either attempted to install an existing floppy, or when inserting a blank disk whilst running Lisa Office System it would cause LOS to hang when initializing. Added raw buffered keyboard mode to compensate for keyboard repeating when throttle >5MHz. The Lisa's COPS Clock is now decoupled from CPU clock, so that the time is accurate regardless of the throttle setting. Remaining known bugs: Screen blurriness with new display. This is a color levels issue. (new) win32 crashes when built --with-rawbitmap (new) Linux shows a black screen when built --with-rawbitmap (new) There's a problem with MacWorks emulation which has existed for a few versions of the emulator - when quitting an application MacWorks gets stuck in a loop refreshing the desktop and reading from the floppy. This prevents the Hard Drive installer from completing as well. I've done a bunch of swap & compile attempts to switch out parts of the source code to isolate the code causing this but haven't been able to locate the bug. Scrollbar arrows overlap in LOS. This has existed since the very first versions.

19 years, 2 months

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Classic HP forums?? - plotter questions

by wacarder＠earthlink.net

>> Hp does not appear to >> have as much detail in their engineering diagrams as DEC >> did. > >Oh, I strongly beg to differ as I'm now intimately familiar with both >documentation sets. However, at the risk of starting a religious war I shall >just saunter off quietly instead :) > >Jay West Nah, don't saunter away. I'll scan the stuff in and maybe you can give me some pointers on deciphering it!! Ashley http://www.woffordwitch.com

19 years, 2 months

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HP 7905/6 disc repair stuff sought

by jwest＠classiccmp.org

Rather urgently needed.... Servo formatting PCA (12995-60114) and the special servo writing head Servo reference cartridge (12995-60031) I was sure that I had the above items, but I just went looking for them and it appears all my "special" cartridges were head alignment carts not servo formatting carts. Also turns out all my disk service boards were head alignment boards, no servo formatting boards. Yikes!! What hurts the most - is someone showed me a link to the above on gov liq a few weeks ago. I didn't bid - and now wish I did. If anyone has the above, I'd be interested in borrowing for a bit... or trading for. Jay West

19 years, 2 months

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Telephony switches - is there anyone out there collecting these?

by classiccmp＠memory-alpha.org.uk

Hi, > How about early modems, anyone collect them? Not exactly early, but at one time I did collect various Hayes SmartModems and assorted other "interesting" modems....still have them, but lost interest in them LONG ago. TTFN - Pete.

19 years, 2 months

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Old phone swittches

by pspan＠amerytel.net

Well, I can assure you that I do not have deep pockets, but I have 3,000 square feet of telephone switching equipment. Two main manufacturer's TRW Vidar and Stromberg Carlson DCO switches. I have been repairing these swithes for 25 years. The interesting thing about the DCO to this list is it was based on the DEC processors, 11/34 and 11//75. The DCO still incorporates the DEC Alpha CPU's, and at one time there were 1500 switches installed in the US. I know of 10 operating companies, including national carriers that are still using them. To the best of my knowedge, there is only one woking Vidar switch still operating in the US. With gov regs and technology pushing towards VoIP all of the companies will soon have the "suitcase" sized switches. Oh, and as you might guess, the MTBF is not engineered in years anymore, it is based on product life cycle.

19 years, 2 months

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What didn't happen in the future

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> I wasn't aware the vinyl record had disappeared. It has for anyone under 30 Get over it.

19 years, 2 months

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Modern external storage emulating RX02 (was Re: Most used toys, was Re: The late, great TRS-80)

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: Modern external storage emulating RX02 (was Re: Most used toys,was Re: The late, great TRS-80) > From: Richard <legalize at xmission.com> > Date: Wed, 27 Jun 2007 12:54:41 -0600 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > > >In article <468295F6.5050801 at nktelco.net>, > C H Dickman <chd_1 at nktelco.net> writes: > >> Ethan Dicks wrote: >> >> > and expansion options. An RX01/RX02-attached device, at least, will >> > work with OMNIBUS machines as well as the VT78 and DECmate I - overall >> > not a bad range to cover. >> >> I did that using a PC as the external storage and a PC parallel port as >> the interface. Lets me run my PDP-8/e and PDP-11/40. DECtape is cool, >> but a little slow. > >Do you have software/interface schematics? I have a DECmate I and no >RX0[12] drives. Easier to find an rx01. Allison >-- >"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/>

19 years, 2 months

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Modern external storage emulating RX02 (was Re: Most used toys, was Re: The late, great TRS-80)

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: Modern external storage emulating RX02 (was Re: Most used toys,was Re: The late, great TRS-80) > From: "Ethan Dicks" <ethan.dicks at gmail.com> > Date: Wed, 27 Jun 2007 16:02:14 -0400 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >On 6/27/07, Allison <ajp166 at bellatlantic.net> wrote: >> Using a Tu58 on an -8 is not a goot match and there are lots of gyrations. > >Agreed. > >> >If all PDP-8s had a spare serial port, it might make sense to have a >> >serially-attached modern mass storage peripheral. >> >> Adding a second serial is trivial as there were many differnt serial >> cards available. To make a TTY card RS232/432 passable is also not hard. > >It's trivial from the OMNIBUS days onward to add another serial port. >Not so trivial for a Straight-8, an -8/S, an -8/L or -8/i. One may >argue that machines that old don't matter so much, but I do happen to >have a BM08 on one --8/L (total of 12K) and would like to be able to >bring up OS/8 on it someday. I'd also like to expand my -8/i to have >8K of core (and perhaps a full 32K eventually) and bring OS/8 up on >that as well. If you have a parallel port or even an interface to read/write one bit with an IOT (less parts than parallelport or tty interface) there are possible interfaces even for 8s. >Changing out 20mA for RS-232 isn't hard at all with the older machines >- Vince Slyngstad made some EIA paddle cards for pre-OMNIBUS boxes. I >have at least two of his cards. Some day, I'll find the time to >assemble them, but for now, I'm fine with hanging a VT220 off of my >-8/L with a 20mA cable. 20ma works too. Though it's not hard to pick up the TTL or logic before 20ma conversion. >> What is possible now is a small micro and a big static ram of 512k are >> which fairly easy to find it's not unreasonable to simulate a RX02 >> using a micro at the end of a serial line (or parallel) and NOT use >> the protocal of TU58. > >Sure. There's no requirement to use the TU58 protocol, it's just >understood, is out there, and happens to work with a real device. If >you are going to write an OS/8 driver anyway, there's no reason to >stick with a protocol that's hard to use. I just dredged up an old >thread in my reading where someone suggested the TU-58 as the >"obvious" device for a diskless PDP-8. I was just heading that debate >off at the pass, since it was extensively investigated over 20 years >ago and determined to be difficult, technically. The need to buffer the tape data is the annoying part as well. >> The cpu/micro used does not have to be very high >> powered or fast as all it's doing is data transfer and PDP-8 PIO is >> usually slower than 30-40K words/sec. > >Certainly not if you are rolling your own interface. If you are >trying to make a plug-compatible RX02 emulator, there might be some >bit-level stuff that's timing critical, but the overall bandwidth is >rather low by modern standards. RX02 interface [RX8E] is fairly simple bit serial with clock. >> In the end what is used is more a matter of convenince than technology. > >Agreed. > >> I happen to be lucky(?) as my 8f has two serial cards but nothing >> else device wise. One of th cards is the usual console TTY but the >> other is a UART based M8652 that were often used for modem >> banks and serial data concentrators/switches made using PDP-8s. > >Nice. What I have is some Q or Ubus quad wide proto cards that could easily be used on Omnibus with a few cuts. Parallel IO is spelled out in the interface handbook. > >In amongst all the other recent PDP-8 discussions, I have to wonder >that if one was going to be spending $$$ on a 1 sq ft. PCB with edge >fingers and whatever line drivers, what would be a good choice of >peripheral options to stack on the same board. For example, the >DKC8AA has several independent devices on one hex-height card. In a DCKAA, have to look that one up. >quad-height form factor, one could easily stuff two RX8Es, and at >least one, if not two KL8Es, which should take care of a lot of >external I/O requirements. The RX8Es would use the standard OS/8 >driver, of course, simplifying that aspect of things, but then one >could attach that to either a real RX02 if you had one, with floppies >to read/write, or to an off-board RX02 emulator as we've been >discussing. Personally, I don't have even one RX8E per OMNIBUS >machine, so alternatives are an interesting direction for me. If the driver were developed for the device it could be anything. For example the device could be two parallel output and one input port. One output port sets the block address (128word block for 512kW) and the second is read/write to ram data with auto increment to the low block counter. That would be PIO, no micro and two 512k byte wide rams (4bits wasted) and 5 74LS161s as the ram address counter (modulus 128). There are existing pdp8 parallel IO cards that can do that. When it cools down and I get a few minutes that might be an easy board to try and build. I imagine patching OS/8 is not hard as the device page is locatable. Though the complete package would need a test program, formatter and a device driver for OS/8. Allison > >-ethan

19 years, 2 months

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nice but OT (HP/Apollo workstation)

by classiccmp＠memory-alpha.org.uk

Hi, >>....I though they'd dropped that after the 400 series? > > No. Yeah, I've just had a rummage around "hpmuseum.net". It seems the "HP-Apollo" name was used up until the end of the 700 series, in fact the 712 (the last of the 700 series) was the first machine to be branded "HP" alone. Learn summat new every day. :-) > http://www.debian.org/ports/hppa/ > > I've installed it on C110 and possibly HP "Apollo 715" systems >a few years ago... Thanks for the info. I did a reasonable amount of "googling" when I picked up this 712, but didn't find that port. Only OpenBSD and NetBSD appeared to have PA-RISC ports. I don't currently have any intention of switching away from HP-UX, but it's nice to have the option.... TTFN - Pete.

19 years, 2 months

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Modern external storage emulating RX02 (was Re: Most used toys, was Re: The late, great TRS-80)

by ethan.dicks＠gmail.com

On 6/26/07, Dave McGuire <mcguire at neurotica.com> wrote: > > Serially connecting would rot though... > > Yeah, kinda. I was just reading some old list threads about PDP-8s and TU58s and emulators - transfer speed aside, the real problem was that most pre-OMNIBUS PDP-8s didn't have a spare serial port (just the console TTY), and that the serial hardware needs to be able to send a Break to the TU-58 to properly initialize and reset the controller in the TU-58, and unmodified PDP-8 hardware can't do that. I did run across a bunch of old 12-bit SIG newsletters from when the TU-58 was new, and all the gyrations folks went through to be able to use them, since at the time, they were about the cheapest mass storage you could get from DEC. One entire aspect of the project was how to mod M706/M707 or KL8E serial interfaces to generate a break. Another aspect was trying to wedge a driver into a couple of pages of code. If all PDP-8s had a spare serial port, it might make sense to have a serially-attached modern mass storage peripheral. Since that's nowhere near universal, it frequently comes down to deciding on which models to support. One of the few disadvantages of the PDP-8 spanning 1965 to 1994 (PDP-8 to DECmate III) is that there's a huge variety of hardware that all runs the same instruction set (give or take a couple instructions), but with an equally huge variety of default peripherals and expansion options. An RX01/RX02-attached device, at least, will work with OMNIBUS machines as well as the VT78 and DECmate I - overall not a bad range to cover. -ethan

19 years, 2 months

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Modern external storage emulating RX02 (was Re: Most used toys, was Re: The late, great TRS-80)

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Modern external storage emulating RX02 (was Re: Most used toys,was Re: The late, great TRS-80) > From: "Ethan Dicks" <ethan.dicks at gmail.com> > Date: Wed, 27 Jun 2007 11:14:19 -0400 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >On 6/26/07, Dave McGuire <mcguire at neurotica.com> wrote: >> > Serially connecting would rot though... >> >> Yeah, kinda. > >I was just reading some old list threads about PDP-8s and TU58s and >emulators - transfer speed aside, the real problem was that most >pre-OMNIBUS PDP-8s didn't have a spare serial port (just the console >TTY), and that the serial hardware needs to be able to send a Break to >the TU-58 to properly initialize and reset the controller in the >TU-58, and unmodified PDP-8 hardware can't do that. I did run across >a bunch of old 12-bit SIG newsletters from when the TU-58 was new, and >all the gyrations folks went through to be able to use them, since at >the time, they were about the cheapest mass storage you could get from >DEC. One entire aspect of the project was how to mod M706/M707 or >KL8E serial interfaces to generate a break. Another aspect was trying >to wedge a driver into a couple of pages of code. Using a Tu58 on an -8 is not a goot match and there are lots of gyrations. > >If all PDP-8s had a spare serial port, it might make sense to have a >serially-attached modern mass storage peripheral. Adding a second serial is trivial as there were many differnt serial cards available. To make a TTY card RS232/432 passable is also not hard. > Since that's >nowhere near universal, it frequently comes down to deciding on which >models to support. One of the few disadvantages of the PDP-8 spanning >1965 to 1994 (PDP-8 to DECmate III) is that there's a huge variety of >hardware that all runs the same instruction set (give or take a couple >instructions), but with an equally huge variety of default peripherals >and expansion options. An RX01/RX02-attached device, at least, will >work with OMNIBUS machines as well as the VT78 and DECmate I - overall >not a bad range to cover. > >-ethan What is possible now is a small micro and a big static ram of 512k are which fairly easy to find it's not unreasonable to simulate a RX02 using a micro at the end of a serial line (or parallel) and NOT use the protocal of TU58. The cpu/micro used does not have to be very high powered or fast as all it's doing is data transfer and PDP-8 PIO is usually slower than 30-40K words/sec. In the end what is used is more a matter of convenince than technology. I happen to be lucky(?) as my 8f has two serial cards but nothing else device wise. One of th cards is the usual console TTY but the other is a UART based M8652 that were often used for modem banks and serial data concentrators/switches made using PDP-8s. Allison

19 years, 2 months

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Emulating an RX02 via parallel port (was Re: Most used toys, was Re: The late, great TRS-80)

by ethan.dicks＠gmail.com

On 6/27/07, Allison <ajp166 at bellatlantic.net> wrote: > For PDP-8 ops, even 10mb is a "large" disk I'm sure so even a 1mb ram > could work well as a "ramdisk". Sure... since OS/8 uses 12-bit block pointers, 10MB works out to 5 "devices". 1MB of RAM for a RAM disk isn't tiny, either. -ethan

19 years, 2 months

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Telephony switches - is there anyone out there collecting these?

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> Are there people out there, on the list or otherwise, that are actively > collecting these machines? Absolutely. There are private collectors with operational CO's. These are serious deep-pockets people who are buying surplussed microwave relay stations and putting museums into them. There are two I know of in San Jose and the central valley in private hands. The telephony collectors have many decades of head start on us computer types.

19 years, 2 months

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Windows DRAM cameras again...

by julesrichardsonuk＠yahoo.co.uk

Another magazine article unearthed on the subject of pulling the lid on a DRAM chip and using it as a camera sensor... This time it was in the May 1984 issue of "Your Robot" magazine, and looks to be intended for use with a Spectrum. Unfortunately the article was a two-parter; only the second part (containing the software) is in this issue and the hardware side was in the previous issue.

19 years, 2 months

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HP-83/85 pocket booklets

by julesrichardsonuk＠yahoo.co.uk

Does anyone else on here have good copies of the following: HP-85 Mass Storage ROM Pocket Guide (00085-90139) HP-85 Plotter/Printer ROM Pocket Guide (00085-90141) HP-85 BASIC Reference Card (00085-90039) HP-85 Pocket Guide (00085-90040) Assembler ROM HP-83/85 Pocket Guide (00085-90445) Advanced Programming ROM Pocket Guide HP-83/85 (00085-90147) I/O ROM and Interface Pocket Guide Series 80 (00087-90122) ... the ones I unearthed today are decaying extremely badly, with chunks of the pages missing, lots of brown discolouration, and the surface of the main HP-85 pocket guide's cover is actually falling off. If I were *very* careful I might just get a scan out of them if I first snip the staples and separate the pages (with staples in place I don't think they'll open up and lay flat without crumbling into dust). If someone else has good copies though already I'll not waste my time... If someone already has high-res colour scans then even better :-) (I have no idea what happened to them to make them like this - whilst I've seen older 'rough' paper discolour and go a little brittle, I've never seen more recent 'glossy' paper like this just start to completely crumble into nothing) cheers Jules

19 years, 2 months

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

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Most used toys, was Re: The late, great TRS-80 > From: Dave McGuire <mcguire at neurotica.com> > Date: Tue, 26 Jun 2007 16:22:36 -0400 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" <cctech at classiccmp.org> > My list is not very esoteric. My older NS* Horizon system with many mods running CP/M as a workhorse system for micros and 8085/z80 coding as it tend to behave better than PCs and also has the Prom Programmer. The system is Z80/10mhz, 256k ram, two 31mb disks, floppies, and a few other goodies. My PX-8 as a data logger and all round Field Day Logging system a database written in of all things BASIC. AmproLB+ small, fast, hard disk and CP/M. PDP-11/73 rack system for those times when I need a break. Nothing like programming in basic or micropower pascal under RT-11. PDP-8f, when I need a handle. I like hand toggleing programs and watching them run. PILOT: my MicroVAX3100/m76 running OpenVMS, for when it really has to be different or when once cpu is not enough (running as nine way LAVC). My portable EElf2000 (embedded elf with Video, PS2 keyboard and CF disk) that runs nicely on a 12V gell cell for a while (>10hours!). If it really has to be Wintel, my 486sx brick system (Modular Solutions). it's about the size of a red brick and runs on 12V nicely. What makes it useful is 800mb hard disk, network, SVGA, serial, parallel and runs whatever I care to. It seems to like DOS6.22 and Linux(slackware). Allison

19 years, 2 months

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Best solvent to remove sticky tape residue.

by chrism3667＠yahoo.com

--- Chris M <chrism3667 at yahoo.com> wrote: > Problem w/WD-40 and other stuff is that it will > dillute the true lubricant, and wherever metal is > coming in contact w/metal, rapid wear will ensue. > Best > to keep that stuff away from machinery or any other > critical moving parts. Paint thinner would work > better > at releasing junk, and at least it evaporates (much > more quickly). As an addendum, I do use Liquid Wrench (or WD-40, or the generic Walmart variety) and a Scotch-Brite (which comes in grades) for rush removal, then usually rinse off w/thinner. Keep in mind that a SB supposedly has imbedded metal particles, so it essentially DOES remove metal. I'm not joking, and in some instances this is critical (high tolerance machine parts, watchmaking equipment, etc.). You may ask how does such stuff get rusty to begin with, but take for instance a 100 year old lathe w/hand scraping marks (indicative of a VERY accurate finish) in areas. The application of a SB and light oil, and...bye bye. Sometimes it's better to start out with real fine steel wool or even a paper towel :) ____________________________________________________________________________________ Boardwalk for $500? In 2007? Ha! Play Monopoly Here and Now (it's updated for today's economy) at Yahoo! Games. http://get.games.yahoo.com/proddesc?gamekey=monopolyherenow

19 years, 2 months

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

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: Most used toys, was Re: The late, great TRS-80 > From: Dave McGuire <mcguire at neurotica.com> > Date: Wed, 27 Jun 2007 03:09:30 -0400 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" <cctech at classiccmp.org> > >On Jun 26, 2007, at 8:01 PM, Chris M wrote: >>> The SBC is currently sitting on the table behind >>> the 8/m, mostly >>> due to laziness on my part. The disk images reside >>> on the SBC's >>> system disk, which is a 1GB CF MicroDrive plugged >>> into the SBC via a >>> daughterboard. The SBC is headless; I access it >>> over the network. >> >> You ought to document this arrangement. > > I would be happy to. Perhaps I'll take some pictures of it tomorrow. If you do a simple block diagram and maybe descriptions of software on both the host (pdp-8) and SBC would be helpful or better yet sources. >> I get the jist of most of it, but yer SBC must have integral ethernet. > > It does. > >> When I see SBC I think Ampro or something LOL. > > It's very similar to an Ampro x86 SBC that I also have in my junk >box. (if I could only turn it into a LittleBoard..) The SBC is a >Teknor VIPer 830. > I suspect any SBC or PC that could run headless and has disk would work given the right code and interface. I've considered a small 8085 powered board with a IDE or CF drive to do that. I have a BCC180 (z180 with 256k ram) and lots of parallel IO that would be a good candidate for that. For PDP-8 ops, even 10mb is a "large" disk I'm sure so even a 1mb ram could work well as a "ramdisk". Allison >> And what sort of daughterboard (PC-104?). > > Not PC/104...The Teknor board has a mezzanine slot (which I think >is proprietary) which takes a small daughterboard that's not much >bigger than a CF card. You plug the CF card into the daughterboard, >then snap that assembly onto the SBC. It's quite a nice arrangement. > >> I have >> a few PMMX SBC's that I believe have ISA slot >> capability (maybe even PCI), and even my Ampro Little >> Board/PC has a header w/ISA signals. > > Yes, this one is similar. It can take PC/104 and PC/104+ boards, >and the SBC itself can plug into a passive 16-bit ISA backplane. I >always found it odd that a board that has PC/104+ (which is PCI on a >different connector) capability would have an ISA card-edge connector >on it instead of PCI. > >> Some earlyish >> SBC's have "flash" storgage capability, RE Robot/Vesta >> OEM-188, but that's something different I take it >> (like eeprom?). > > Is it DiskOnChip(tm)? Many SBCs can take those, both early and >modern. I have a small pile of them somewhere. > > -Dave > >-- >Dave McGuire >Port Charlotte, FL >

19 years, 2 months

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nice but OT (HP/Apollo workstation)

by jba＠sdf.lonestar.org

Patrick Finnegan <pat at computer-refuge.org> wrote: > >On Tuesday 26 June 2007 23:50, Ensor wrote: > > I also question whether the thing will run Linux as he says in the > > auction description....Open/NetBSD certainly, but I've not seen a > > PA-RISC port of Linux. > > http://www.debian.org/ports/hppa/ > >I've installed it on C110 and possibly HP "Apollo 715" systems a few > years ago... The Debian GNU/Linux port to PA-RISC mature and fully supported. I've used it for the last 5 years or so on two boxes. I first installed it on a nice HP 715/100 system and used it as a desktop with KDE. It was slow, but not unusable. My webserver currently is a nearly OT HP Visualize B2000 workstation running at 400MHz (www.approximatrix.com). It runs Apache 2 and Zope/Plone content management system on top of Debian GNU/Linux 3.1 HPPA. The PA-RISC hardware is rock-solid, and Linux is well supported on it, thanks to HP. I've never had a system crash except when an external SCSI disk catastrophically failed (not the HP system's fault). I would suggest trying out Linux on the 700 series systems people have as I pesonally can't stand HP-UX. The NetBSD port to the PA-RISC is, by comparison, completely immature. IIRC, up until last year, they didn't even support booting from CD. Their install procedure was laughable at best (required another NetBSD machine to prep the disks or something...), and it made me wonder what their criteria was for "supporting" an architecture. jba at sdf.lonestar.org SDF Public Access UNIX System - http://sdf.lonestar.org

19 years, 2 months

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Semi-OT: Interesting or unusual PC Compatibles?

by steerex＠mindspring.com

They are pretty machines, most definitely. In the "odd PCs" department, I have to mention the Seequa Chameleon. It has an 8088 and a Z80, so it can run DOS, CP/M-80, or CP/M-86. A friend and mentor had one when I was in my teens (mid-1980s) and I got to use it a fair bit. I really liked it. The display (green) was bright and sharp, and the keyboard had a nice feel. As a "luggable", the mechanical design was similar to that of the Kaypro systems, but if memory serves, it was slightly smaller. A good machine overall. I hope to have one here someday; that will certainly bring back some memories. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL I have one in excellent condition. Wanna make an offer? SteveRob begin 600 WINMAIL.DAT M>)\^(BT*`0:0" `$```````!``$``0>0!@`(````Y 0```````#H``$(@ <` M& ```$E032Y-:6-R;W-O9G0 at 36%I;"Y.;W1E`#$(`0V ! `"`````@`"``$$ MD 8`4 $```$````-`````P``, (````+``\.``````(!_P\!````6P`````` M``"!*Q^DOJ,0&9UN`-T!#U0"`````$=E;F5R86P at 1&ES8W5S<VEO;CH at 3VXM M5&]P:6, at 4&]S=', at 3VYL>0!33510`&-C=&5C:$!C;&%S<VEC8VUP+F]R9P`` M'@`", $````%````4TU44 `````>``,P`0```!8```!C8W1E8VA 8VQA<W-I M8V-M<"YO<F<````#`!4,`0````,`_@\&````'@`!, $````J````)T=E;F5R M86P at 1&ES8W5S<VEO;CH at 3VXM5&]P:6, at 4&]S=', at 3VYL>2<````"`0LP`0`` M`!L```!33510.D-#5$5#2$!#3$%34TE#0TU0+D]21P```P``.0`````+`$ Z M`0````,`<3H``````@'V#P$````$`````````J5#`02 `0`T````4D4Z(%-E M;6DM3U0Z($EN=&5R97-T:6YG(&]R('5N=7-U86P at 4$, at 0V]M<&%T:6)L97,_ M`. at 1`06 `P`.````UP<&`!L`!@`!`"@``P`Q`0$@@ ,`#@```-<'!@`;``8` M```B``,`*@$!"8 !`"$```!&.#4X131%.3DT,C1$0S$Q.3 V-C P-3!"041% M,38T-0`4!P$#D 8`_ 0``!0````+`",```````,`)@``````"P`I```````# M`"X```````,`-@``````0 `Y`" VA2BBN,<!'@!P``$````T````4D4Z(%-E M;6DM3U0Z($EN=&5R97-T:6YG(&]R('5N=7-U86P at 4$, at 0V]M<&%T:6)L97,_ M``(!<0`!````%@````''N*(HA>GD6/XDE!'<D&8`4+K>%D4``!X`'@P!```` M!0```%--5% `````'@`?# $````7````<W1E97)E>$!M:6YD<W!R:6YG+F-O M;0```P`&$%X- at H@#``<0-0(``!X`"! !````90```%1(15E!4D504D545%E- M04-(24Y%4RQ-3U-41$5&24Y)5$5,64E.5$A%(D]$1%!#4R)$15!!4E1-14Y4 M+$E(059%5$]-14Y424].5$A%4T5%455!0TA!345,14].251(05-!3C@````` M`@$)$ $```!2`P``3@,``!$%``!,6D9U<7;VNP,`"@!R8W!G,3(U_C(`_P(& M`J0#Y 7K`H,`4!,#5 (`8V@*P'-E='XR!@`&PP*##E #U (`<(1R<1+B<W1E M;0*#9C,$1A0S,2 (50*#-'<#Q@<3`H!]"H (SPG9.WL8[PXP-0* "H$.<0M@ M;BD.$# S%5!H!;!Z9-1O8P``*A)5( *1'/!>;!TE"OL540OR8P! (.$*BVQI M,S8.L M5%Q+K# $44&\4T&,%0 J%(L$@5&AE>2 *P&4 at VQ10$L!T(S `P6 at + M@ >0:BPC\&\4P" .<0N :;$4T&QY+ at J%(FA)`Z 2=",0("($<&0 at 4-A#<R(D MX0JQ= > `C I)(!)(!* =B-P=&\[(_ H,6D"(";3!F!E<6QU82+ "H5#$H ' M@&SZ90(@+B:1!4 2@ 0(a)`Y%P.# X."OQ)U J,%J;+# D@',I`"5 (&,#D41R M=0. at 1$]3)(!#\% O32TL\@6Q*E<N<_(V*V%!( -0") LDBR1OR at B!;$2@"=0 M`B C<'<C$/L#H"B =RO1"X C\",P%- '"? $(!_&*&UI9"UD,3DL,',I+',H M@&>[(@`HXG42L"U2*C!F"W#=!<!B)4 K8BW 90= )7#Z(""@:PF +5$K82,! M*D?N9 0`"U$C,"@)PS20,G*R8 at 409V@UT2R1<Q*!WG D@"R")N(W<'D&X L1 M5S%S*C #`&,X*&8)X&S/,!(KX2<0"D!G9P&@*R#^(B2 )N('@!)Q/)$'0"3A M_0"09P.@,G(`D#0`"V %P,LH\2;@805 ;V8J1R;B/DLY$"'A+2 4LR1Q8G5O M!4 &D"D1!&!R(S 2L')_*, D<2UA0$, at H#HQ-R%S_P# -Q $D# 3'\8U$ 1P M(_:[+N HP'(W`3:3'&!P*-._**,QPB,0(V$M, > 9#D0_CM!) /P-Q J1SRP M`" +<=\W(3H!&_ V4 #0:TGS0]3-")!S)9].NBU$*+%-[!PM+1_&3[(%T&-' M==LV,$_F4!B1*L)R&( "0/)E)(!&3$WL"H\>^R'7YRB%,<(RL65X/+!&`0(P M7RV `B XP"E2*V!7`'!N/RHP`, W<"OR08 ]8'(__4WL4Q30*, (``PP57PA M[048$0!>`````P`0$ `````#`!$0`````$ `!S!PPA8!HKC'`4 `"#!PPA8! BHKC'`1X`/0`!````!0```%)%.B ``````P`--/TW``#(:KC' ` end

19 years, 2 months

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MFM hard drive data recovery questions/ideas (help needed)

by daviderhart＠oldzonian.com

Hello cctalkers, I'm trying to help someone recover data from an MFM drive in an old Pinnacle 1a system that had MirageOS installed. The system hasn't been booted in years and no longer boots to the hard disk. The drive spins up and sounds okay. We've tried to track down a copy of the MirageOS boot diskettes for the Pinnacle 1a system but haven't found any after looking for months. It's time to come up with a "Plan B". Does anyone have a suggestion about how to read the "raw" data from the MFM hard disk? I was thinking about putting in into an older PC based system with an MFM controller and using some utilities to dump sectors to files that I could convert into something readable/usable. I haven't done this before so I'm hoping someone smarter has a 'cunning plan' of how to do this. I'm a programmer and don't mind write some utilities to pick apart the data after it's off the hard drive. Any ideas are appreciated. Thanks, david. daviderhart at oldzonian.com daviderhart at sageandstride.org http://www.sageandstride.org

19 years, 2 months

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nice but OT (HP/Apollo workstation)

by chrism3667＠yahoo.com

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=180133655171&fromMakeTra… Of course by p/u only. Anyone got anything similar that's surplus to their needs? ____________________________________________________________________________________ Building a website is a piece of cake. Yahoo! Small Business gives you all the tools to get online. http://smallbusiness.yahoo.com/webhosting

19 years, 2 months

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Heh...

by rtellason＠verizon.net

Sounds a little familiar... ---------- Forwarded Message ---------- > How many group members does it take to change a light bulb? > > One to change the light bulb and to post that the light bulb has been > changed. > > Fourteen to share similar experiences of changing light bulbs and how the > light bulb could have been changed differently. > > Seven to caution about the dangers of changing light bulbs. > > Seven more to point out spelling/grammar errors in posts about changing > light bulbs. > > Three to correct spelling/grammar errors. > > Six to argue over whether it's "lightbulb" or "light bulb". > > Another six to condemn those six as stupid. > > Fifteen to claim experience in the lighting industry and give the correct > spelling. > > Nineteen to post that this group is not about light bulbs and to please take > this discussion to a light bulb (or light bulb) forum. > > Eleven to defend the posting to the group saying that we all use light bulbs > and therefore the posts are relevant to this group. > > Thirty-six to debate which method of changing light bulbs is superior, where > to buy the best light bulbs, what brand of light bulbs work best for this > technique, and what brands are faulty. > > Seven to post URLs where one can see examples of different light bulbs. > > Four to post that the URLs were posted incorrectly and then post the > corrected URL. > > Three to post about links they found from the URLs that are relevant to this > group which makes light bulbs relevant to this group. > > Thirteen to link all posts to date, quote them in their entirety > including all headers and signatures, and add "Me too". > > Five to post to the group that they will no longer post because they cannot > handle the light bulb controversy. > > Four to say "Didn't we go through this already a short time ago?" > > Thirteen to say "Do a Google search on light bulbs before posting > questions about light bulbs." > > Three to tell a funny story about their cat and a light bulb. > > - - - AND - - - > > One group lurker to respond to the original post 6 months from now > with something unrelated and start it all over again -- Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and ablest -- form of life in this section of space, ?a critter that can be killed but can't be tamed. ?--Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters" - Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James M Dakin

19 years, 2 months

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Atari collection for sale in Austin

by g＠kurico.com

Someone in Austin has a largish collection of old 8bit Atari stuff for sale. Price seems a bit steep to me, but then again maybe I don't appreciate the Atari like I should :) Local pickup only. http://austin.craigslist.org/sys/359890829.html

19 years, 2 months

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AT & T 7300 in Kansas (eBay)

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> all my disks (except the hard disk) are bad *snifful*. Have you tried imagedisk and a 360K drive? They are 400k (10 sector, 40trk) I have some discs I can try imaging, though I haven't turned up a set of base discs yet.

19 years, 2 months

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

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: Most used toys, was Re: The late, great TRS-80 > From: "Ethan Dicks" <ethan.dicks at gmail.com> > Date: Tue, 26 Jun 2007 16:47:18 -0400 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >On 6/26/07, Dave McGuire <mcguire at neurotica.com> wrote: >> My most >> used classic machine at the moment is a PDP-8/m; I've carved out a >> permanent place for it on my desk. It contains an RX8E which is >> connected to a arallel port adapter based on Chuck Dickman's design, >> which is in turn connected to a small x86 SBC running Linux to give >> the 8/m a disk subsystem. > >Interesting way to do it. How "based on" is it? I know of Chuck's >parallel port adapter, but I'm curious how you've tweaked it. I'm curious too. > >Is the SBC tucked into the /m or is it external? Does the SBC host >your disk images locally, or over a network? > >Given that an RX8E is a PIO device, it makes me think that it wouldn't >be that hard to come up with an OS/8 handler to treat the 12-bit-input >and output ports on a DKC8AA as a disk interface to an external, >modern machine. It doesn't help -8/e/f/m owners much, but the DKC8AA >was a standard peripheral on the -8/a, and normally, unless one is >using the output port as a printer port, unused. I'm sure that will work, many of the OS/8 devices are simple enough and the drivers are small. It would be a great way to get a "disk" on my 8f. Allison >Much to think about there... > >-ethan

19 years, 2 months

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Amstrad Master Scan (Australia)

by chrism3667＠yahoo.com

http://cgi.ebay.com/Amstrad-PCW-8256-8512-master-scan-powerful-graphic-tool… seemingly NIB. ____________________________________________________________________________________ Don't pick lemons. See all the new 2007 cars at Yahoo! Autos. http://autos.yahoo.com/new_cars.html

19 years, 2 months

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[RESULTS] Re: Best solvent to remove sticky tape residue.

by aek＠bitsavers.org

And what are the results? In order of how effective they were at cleaning the crud: 1. Naptha - excellent, all crud removed easily. http://www.biosci.ohio-state.edu/safety/MSDS/GOO-GONE%20STAIN%20REMOVER.htm Ingredients/Identity Information Ingredient: PETROLEUM NAPHTHA Ingredient: CITRUS OIL

19 years, 2 months

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IT Micracle (and I'm still looking for an IBM Displaywriter)

by chrism3667＠yahoo.com

the keyboard to the right reminded me of a displaywriter's: http://cgi.ebay.com/Unique-historic-IBM-Chinese-System-creating-IT-Miracle_… ____________________________________________________________________________________ Park yourself in front of a world of choices in alternative vehicles. Visit the Yahoo! Auto Green Center. http://autos.yahoo.com/green_center/

19 years, 2 months

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AT & T 7300 in Kansas (eBay)

by chrism3667＠yahoo.com

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=290132606044&fromMakeTra… comes with a box labelled *system software 3.n1*. I previously thought mine had everything - a stack of manuals probably 3' tall. Mine don't have that. And all my disks (except the hard disk) are bad *snifful*. I'm still looking for original images. I do have the media. ____________________________________________________________________________________ Pinpoint customers who are looking for what you sell. http://searchmarketing.yahoo.com/

19 years, 2 months

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hat are the really unusual or weird computers?

by roger.holmes＠microspot.co.uk

Just catching up, still about a dozen digests behind! > What are the most bizarre, way-out or just plain *different* machines > that folks have seen? Well how about a machine with a normal instruction set but no program counter? It has a 48 bit word, and most instructions are 24 bits, with a few 48 bit ones. It has three 'Control Registers', and normally at least one has a unconditional absolute jump instruction in it, which jumps to the next word. After a single length instruction is executed, it gets one added to it (in binary coded decimal), and it gets moved from control register (CR) 1 to CR3. At the same time, CR3 goes to CR2 and CR2 goes to CR1 ready for execution. If it is a jump instruction things are a bit different, the original CR2 and CR3 are saved in the 'A' register and the value at the address specified in the jump instruction gets put into CR1 and CR2 instead of the old values of CR2 and CR3. CR1 still gets incremented and put in CR3. Simple enough so far, but what about conditional jumps and procedure calls? On a condition jump where the condition is true, the top 8 bits of the instruction get cleared, which makes it into an unconditional jump. A procedure call (which can be conditional or unconditional) is just a jump instruction. What makes it a procedure call is in the function itself. It stores the A register in memory, usually at the word after the end of the routine. When the program reaches it end, it executes this word. If the procedure call was in the second (bottom) half of the word, then it will execute a jump instruction to the word after the word where the function call was made from. If the procedure call was in the first (top) half of the word, then it will first execute what had been in the second half of the word, which could itself be a procedure call, which actually works out just fine if you think about it. Now I hear your objections - no recursion, no re-entrancy etc. But this machine had no interrupts, and if you really needed recursion then you could implement a stack in software and save the A-register in that stack. Anyway, with a maximum of 2000 (yes 2000 not 2048) words of store and overlays on drum backing store or magnetic tape, programs could not be huge anyway. Other weirdness: pound shillings and pence arithmetic in hardware with a variable ten shillings position register, so than digits to the left were decimal (radix 10), the addressed digit was radix 2, the next digit was decimal, the next was radix 12 and the rest were decimal. This even had a multiply instruction which could multiply a LSD amount by a decimal amount. Division was all in software. The machine was designed in the late 1950s, first delivered 1962 (such a long gestation that it was the only ICT/ICL machine where all the promised applications software/libraries was ready before the first machine shipped). It a collaboration between the British Tabulating Machine company (which had recently given up its rights to use all IBM designs and patents!) and the British General Electric Company, Telephone division based in Coventry. By the time it shipped, BTM had become ICT (International Computers and Tabulators) and went on to be merged with almost all the other British computer companies to become ICL (International Computers Ltd). Somewhere between 155 and 200 of these ICT 1300 series machines were made up to becoming obsolete in 1965. As I understand it, in 1965 there were 950 computers in Britain, so a large proportion were of this type, though of course some were exported. Another weird machine, the CHLL, Compacted High Level Language computer. Executed Coral 66 (a real time variant of Algol 60) in microcode. It was a 24 bit machine but instructions could be any multiple of 3 bits, and could start on any 3 bit boundary. Top 21 bits of program counter were word address and the bottom 3 bits were the 3 bit byte address within the word. The machine was flyable, but otherwise a normal computer which could have a teletype, paper tape reader and punch attached. Only two made (one ground prototype and one flyable).

19 years, 2 months

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WANTED: TRS-80 video/disk interface <-> model 100 cable

by dm561＠torfree.net

-----------------Original Message: Date: Mon, 25 Jun 2007 21:15:11 -0700 (PDT) From: steven stengel <tosteve at yahoo.com> Subject: WANTED: TRS-80 video/disk interface <-> model 100 cable I have the TRS-80 disk/video interface module, but not the cable to connect to my model 100. Does anyone know how to make one? Thanks- Steve. -----------------Reply: It looks simple enough; just take a 40c IDE HD cable and crimp a 40-pin DIP header on the end... But there's a catch: The connectors will not be offset the standard way relative to each other, i.e. you need to swap the even and odd pins somehow. There are two ways of doing that: 1 - Separate all the wires at one end and swap them when you insert them in the connector; put the striped wire in the second slot, the second in the first, the third in the fourth, the fourth in the third, etc. 2 - Crimp the 40-pin DIP header on an IDE cable without swapping; Get a second IDE cable and a set of 40 header pins such as you would find on an old motherboard (make sure they're long enough) and use them to connect the two cables; this will give you the offset and also a way to connect and dis- connect without opening the cover and possibly damaging the delicate 40-pin DIP header. If you make the M100 cable the right length you can fasten the header to the back of the M100 with DS tape and effectively have the same setup as the M102 & 200. If, as usual, I haven't made it very clear, contact me off-list & I'll send you some pictures. BTW, if you're new to the M100 world, check out club100.org and the user group there; lots of folks always willing to help. mike

19 years, 2 months

1
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spectrum hidden menu on reset

by aliensrcooluk＠yahoo.co.uk

hi, i have a spectrum 128K +2 which has been put somewhere "safe" by my parents. When i used it and hit the reset key (by the joystick ports on the left side) i would sometimes end up a secret debug (?) menu. I never altered anything when it came up (a mate did and ruined his spectrum!) and simply pressed reset again. Im just curious to see if anyone knows how to make it appear on reset. What sort of things did it alter? - Andrew B (via mobile phone)

19 years, 2 months

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What are the really unusual or weird computers?

by jfoust＠threedee.com

At 12:14 PM 6/25/2007, Liam Proven wrote: >The real point is that the Windows "start button" is not analagous or >homologous to a mechanical start button on an engine. You may as well >compare a button on Windows to a button on your cardigan. They're both >"buttons" but they have nothing in common. Just to confuse matters, today's hybrid Toyota Prius does not require the "key" in the "ignition" - it will start if it detects the key in your pocket - and the "start" button is up on the dash, a round button perhaps 1 1/2" in size, with the circle-with-a-vertical-line icon on it. But it won't start unless your foot is on the brake. Then you can move the (clearly electronic) gear shift into forward or reverse. There's a separate rectangular "Park" button. And when you pull up to a stop light, you can feel the entire car shut down except for the accessory power. There's a central 4x6" video display, too. Shows a rear-view video when you're in reverse, while you're driving it has all sorts of MPG monitoring graphs and animated graphics. - John

19 years, 2 months

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Inside old games machines, was: Re: Simulated CP/M-68K?

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: Re: Inside old games machines, was: Re: Simulated CP/M-68K? > From: "Ethan Dicks" <ethan.dicks at gmail.com> > Date: Mon, 18 Jun 2007 08:29:55 -0400 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >On 6/18/07, Gordon JC Pearce <gordon at gjcp.net> wrote: >> On Sun, 2007-06-17 at 18:10 -0300, Alexandre Souza wrote: >> >> > In arcade machines, this is already done in MAME. But it would be great >> > for old computers and any kind of gear. >> >> Did any of the CPUs we know and love, like the PDP-11 CPUs, find their >> way into commercial games machines? > >I would be interested to learn if this ever happened. As far as I can >tell (hardly authoritative), the arcade industry bypassed the T-11, >probably primarily due to cost and availability. The Z-80, 6502, and >6809 were favorites in the 8-bit realm, but when they needed something >with a bit more horsepower, I don't know what was common besides the >68000 (as used in "Xenophobe", among others). The T-11 offers PDP-11 archectecture but it's not very fast and not much for availability outside DEC As other than the FALCON card or KXT-11. If any of the pdp-11 machines made it to games I'd expect it would have been a F11 (LSI-11/23) chipsets as they were faster and available before the T-11. >> I know a lot of the Atari vector >> stuff had maths boxes based on AMD bit-slice parts. > >Yep. I helped a friend fix his Battlezone with a couple of 2901s I >desoldered from a dead KA730 board. > >> It seems like the J11 processor would have been a good fit for some of >> the more advanced games. > >Perhaps, but it wasn't a cheap chip. 20 years ago, I could afford >used F-11-based gear (11/23, 11/24) because it ran around $300 for a >barebones or lightly-loaded system (disks and controller extra, etc). >I couldn't touch J-11 stuff because it was still in use commercially. > >In the mid-1980s, the 68000, then 68020 was just too cheap compared to >the J-11, I'd estimate. Same for the 6502/6581x series and they were fast enough for the price. Games for the most part were judging from their construction a very price sensitive product. Did the RISC CPUs (arm, strongarm, and friends) make it in games? Allison

19 years, 2 months

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Yahoo "Web Beacons"

by healyzh＠aracnet.com

It looks like Yahoo has found a new way of tracking people online, I'd recommend going to the page for details on their "Web Beacons" and to find a link to opt out. You apparently need to do this for each browser you use. http://info.yahoo.com/privacy/us/yahoo/webbeacons/details.html 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/ |

19 years, 2 months

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WANTED: TRS-80 video/disk interface <-> model 100 cable

by tosteve＠yahoo.com

I have the TRS-80 disk/video interface module, but not the cable to connect to my model 100. Does anyone know how to make one? Thanks- Steve. --------------------------------- Be a PS3 game guru. Get your game face on with the latest PS3 news and previews at Yahoo! Games.

19 years, 2 months

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Here's some VCF East audio recording

by evan＠snarc.net

http://www.armchairarcade.com/neo/node/1359

19 years, 2 months

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Apple ][ with Alpha Syntauri

by joachim.thiemann＠gmail.com

A while ago someone asked about early synthesizer-computer stuff. I just saw this on Montreals Craigslist: "Synth?tiseur ALHA SYNTAURI SYNTHESISER - $400" http://montreal.craigslist.org/msg/359808712.html I am not in any way affiliated with whoever this is. I'd buy it myself if I had money, space and time (all in perpetual sparse supply...) but i figured some here might be up for it. Joe.

19 years, 2 months

2
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What didn't happen in the future

by wacarder＠earthlink.net

>I'm not a DJ, but I do play music and have collected it since I was a kid (many years ago). > >My 78rpm records (that I grew up listening to) are on mp3s on my laptop. >My 33 1/3 rpm vinyl albums are on mp3s on my laptop. >My 45 rpm records are on mp3s on my laptop. >My cassette tapes are on mp3s on my laptop. >My 8 track tapes are on mp3s on my laptop. >My CDs are on mp3s on my laptop. >and the mp3s that I downloaded from eMusic, WalMart, Apple, etc. are on my laptop. I forgot to mention that some of my stuff is on YouTube too. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qtWyNQDgtcA Loaded from the same laptop that has my PDP-11 on it. ... and now I'm done with this topic since it's not really on topic. Ashley http://www.woffordwitch.com http://www.highlonesomeband.com

19 years, 2 months

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What didn't happen in the future

by wacarder＠earthlink.net

>Vinyl is dead. CDs are dying. Did anyone notice that the DJ at the >wedding party next to the unofficial VCFeast Friday dinner was >spinning mp3s? He was not ahead of his time. He is in it. > >I am not going to waste anymore time with this religious fight. > >-- >Will, the other radio DJ on this list. I'm not a DJ, but I do play music and have collected it since I was a kid (many years ago). My 78rpm records (that I grew up listening to) are on mp3s on my laptop. My 33 1/3 rpm vinyl albums are on mp3s on my laptop. My 45 rpm records are on mp3s on my laptop. My cassette tapes are on mp3s on my laptop. My 8 track tapes are on mp3s on my laptop. My CDs are on mp3s on my laptop. and the mp3s that I downloaded from eMusic, WalMart, Apple, etc. are on my laptop. They are all also on my desktop system and my iPod. And yes, those 78s do sound much better after you clean the noise up and turn them into mp3s. My PDP-11 is also on my laptop, my desktop, and my web server, running in simh. I had to throw that last line in there just to keep this thread on-topic. :-) Ashley http://www.woffordwitch.com

19 years, 2 months

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What didn't happen in the future

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> Vinyl is dead. CDs are dying. Did anyone notice that the DJ at the > wedding party next to the unofficial VCFeast Friday dinner was > spinning mp3s? He was not ahead of his time. He is in it. Exactly. Record companies are more than happy to sell you a $30 piece of plastic that can't be copied. There are niches, but this ain't mainstream music distribution. "disappearance" wasn't the right word, "irrelevance" was, going the way of 8-track tape and Selectavision. > I am not going to waste anymore time with this religious fight. Neither am I

19 years, 2 months

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What didn't happen in the future

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> The only thing *never* predicted > was a small computer. and the disappearance of the vinyl record. record store scene in "A Clockwork Orange" for example.

19 years, 2 months

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(another) Floppy disc reader status update and RFC

by classiccmp＠philpem.me.uk

Hi guys, Progress is going a little slower than I'd hoped.. I've been roped into working most of the past few weeks, so all I've got done is the final block diagram and part of the schematic. What I have got is a box containing ?200 worth of CPLDs, Molex connectors, and other parts I had to order from Digikey. What this basically means is that after I've got the schematic and PCB done, I can get a prototype built up within a day or so of finishing the PCB. Assuming, that is, I manage to etch the PCB without any bridged/broken tracks (especially on the CPLD and PIC, which are both QFP parts). So here's the final spec as I see it: - USB interface -- USB2.0 Full Speed (12Mbit/sec) - 40-pin disc interface connector. All outputs are open-collector -- the first 34 pins are wired exactly as the standard PC floppy connector is. The remaining 6 pins are all open-collector outputs with internal 680R pull-ups to +5V. The state of these pins can also be read back in, assuming they're set to 'output high' mode. - Replaceable bus drivers. 74LS07 O/C buffers are used - these are not generally ESD sensitive, and are rated to 20V over the outputs. All the buffers will be socketed and can be replaced easily in the field (as long as you have spares, that is). - Flexible triggering options: - Start of capture: - MFM sync word detection, with programmable sync word (*) - Rising or falling edge of index pulse - Hard-sector track mark detection - "Wait for N start events before triggering" option - Termination of capture: - MFM sync word detection, with programmable sync word (*) - Rising or falling edge of index pulse - Hard-sector track mark detection - "Wait for N start events before triggering" option (*): The capture CPLD only has one MFM sync detector, which is shared between the Start and Stop events. Note that the acquisition clock divider must be set correctly in order for the sync word detector to function. [ A future version of the CPLD may offer the option of independent clock generators for the sync detector and acquisition system - currently Facq is locked at 32 times the disc's bit-rate, e.g. 500kbit * 32 = 16MHz for 3.5-inch HD. This is a fairly simple mod, so I might do it before release, but 32*Fdata should be enough to get a usable scan ] - 128 kilobytes onboard high-speed SRAM buffer with end-of-capture-address storage. - Disc writes controlled by a simple microsequencer - commands are: - Wait N cycles and strobe WR_DATA - Stop writing - Open/close Write Gate - Wait for hard-sector track mark - Wait for N index pulses (where 1 <= N <= 31) - Onboard flash upgrading feature for both the main microcontroller and CPLD, with failed-flash recovery and forced-reflash options for both devices (as long as the bootloader is still intact). The boot block will also be protected against overwriting, to reduce the possibility of irrecoverable 'bricking'. - Multi-platform (Linux and Windows initially, OSX if someone ports it) programming library to handle disc read/write operations, including full source code and example 'dartutil' application. - Open-source hardware design, but with hardware available for purchase either fully-assembled or as a complete or partial kit (optionally with SMD parts soldered down). - Power supply: USB bus power or external 7-12V power supply unit. Can anyone think of anything else before I start drawing up the schematics? I'm also thinking about an extension to the ImageDisk file format to allow storage of raw MFM data, though I'm not sure how to go about doing this... creating a whole new format may be a better idea. So to recap, this is done: - Block diagram and outline design - CPLD code (all major functional units tested and working) And this needs doing: - Schematics - PCB layout - Prototyping I'm currently toying with the idea of moving the half-done schematic from OrCAD/SDT to KiCAD [<www.kicad-eda.org>] (on the basis that KiCAD is open-source, newer, and can do just about everything OrCAD can do), though I've not decided yet. Other suggestions (please don't suggest EAGLE...) will be given due consideration :) -- Phil. | (\_/) This is Bunny. Copy and paste Bunny classiccmp at philpem.me.uk | (='.'=) into your signature to help him gain http://www.philpem.me.uk/ | (")_(") world domination.

19 years, 2 months

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AMD2901s (was e: Inside old games machines,was: Re: Simulated CP/M-68K?)

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

> >Subject: RE: AMD2901s (was e: Inside old games machines,was: Re: Simulated CP/M-68K?) > From: "Antonio Carlini" <arcarlini at iee.org> > Date: Mon, 25 Jun 2007 21:58:01 +0100 > To: "'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts'" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > >der Mouse wrote: >> Ah. Then "undocumented (as far as I can tell)" here really means "I >> haven't found the right manual yet". >> >> I'll keep your message around and go digging for the scans you refer >> to some time when I have the leisure. Thanks for the pointer! > >Before I forget I should say that slipping "78032" into Manx gets >you the CPU Chip guide and the KA630-AA User's Guide (which is >equivalent to what was later usually called the CPU Technical >Manual). > >Antonio Then again there are odball hardware like the DEC ADVICE a MVII(78032) on a board for in curcuit testing and development. I'm still hunting for manual for that board or even a schematic. Allison

19 years, 2 months

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Bitmap images

by aliensrcooluk＠yahoo.co.uk

Hi, i was reading up on bitmap (mainly .bmp, with some .wbmp) images last night and was wondering why everything is stored backwards (e.g. BGR instead of RGB and the bottom of the image first, instead of the top)? Also would i need to pay a license if i wrote a program to create .bmp files? My main aim is to write a .bmp to (amiga) .iff format, but would love to add full .bmp support to an art program i wrote for the amiga and then stick it online (on Aminet.com ) for other people to use if they wish. - Andrew B (via mobile phone) --- cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org <RodSmallwood at mail.ediconsulting.co.uk> wrote: > Yes definitly existed.. > Same case as a VT52. > Difference may have been > > a) 12 x 80 > b) Uppercase only > c) 20mA only. > > Rod Smallwood > DEC Terminals Product Line 1973 > > -----Original Message----- > From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org > [mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Ashley Carder > Sent: 12 June 2007 18:28 > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Subject: Re: Strange VT50 Decscope > > >> Are there any former DEC employees (or anyone else) here who have > ever seen or heard of anything like this? > > Richard said: > >I saw one of these for sale on ebay recently, advertised as a VT52. > > > This is the one that was on ebay. It was listed as a VT50. It also > came with the VT50 engineering prints and a VT50 manual. > > Ashley > > >

19 years, 2 months

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AMD2901s (was e: Inside old games machines, was: Re: Simulated CP/M-68K?)

by ethan.dicks＠gmail.com

On 6/19/07, woodelf <bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca> wrote: > Providing the word length is a multiable of 4 bits that is. It sure would be "fun" to debug microcode issues with nine of those puppies chained together. -ethan

19 years, 2 months

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VCF/Rocky Mountains?

by legalize＠xmission.com

Any interest? -- "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/>

19 years, 2 months

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VCF/Midwest 3.0 - July 14/15

by pat＠computer-refuge.org

It's just 3 weeks until the third annual Vintage Computer Festival, Midwest edition. We've got a few interesting speakers lined up, and more to be added shortly. So come all ye collectors, see the speakers, and even exhibit your favorite items from your collection! We still have plenty of space to fill up with exhibitors. If you're interested in being an exhibitor, please sign up before Sunday, July 8th. Don't wait until the last minute, or there may not be space left! VCF/Midwest 3.0 will be July 14-15, at Purdue University's Stewart center. Speakers will run from 11a to 2p each day, and exhibits and the marketplace will be open from 2p to 6p. Admission is $5 per day for access to the whole event, and kids 17 and under get in for free. For more details, and to sign up as an exhbitor or vendor, please see the official VCF/Midwest 3.0 website at: http://www.vintage.org/2007/midwest/index.php If you have any questions, feel free to send me a message at: vcfmw at computer-refuge.org. Pat -- Purdue University Research Computing --- http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/ The Computer Refuge --- http://computer-refuge.org

19 years, 2 months

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What are the really unusual or weird computers?

by tshoppa＠wmata.com

My taste for the last several years is to play around with 1: dedicated industrial logic (e.g. elevator and machine controllers) 2: Analog computers 3: Electromechanical stuff, especially if somewhat programmable Now, none of the above are things with video screens and keyboards, and in most cases they don't even have readily recognized "instruction sets", but they all do computing in a pre-Von-Neumann sense. I heavily, heavily try to stay away from stuff with keyboards and video screens and, even worse, anything with an "operating system" of any sort! I don't want to have anything to do with installing software. I want to solder tube sockets, read meters, turn knobs, and watch scope traces. Tim.

19 years, 2 months

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removing epoxy potting, etc.

by rtellason＠verizon.net

Just wondering, do any of you guys know of something that'll remove epoxy potting compounds? Only suggestion I've seen so far is some pretty nasty acid that I really don't want to mess with.... -- Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and ablest -- form of life in this section of space, ?a critter that can be killed but can't be tamed. ?--Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters" - Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James M Dakin

19 years, 2 months

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Best solvent to remove sticky tape residue.

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> a citrus based liquid (orange juice I reckon) read the material safety data sheet for 'goo gone' the active ingredient isn't the citrus

19 years, 2 months

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My sale or swap list (Update)

by RodSmallwood＠mail.ediconsulting.co.uk

Well if you if you will pardon the expression, "Its heading in the right direction" I agree, the charges build up is a bit of an unknown. > 'has 1 cubic meter of volume and the first 1000 kilos' That seems to be a lot of weight in a small space. Port to port is less of a problem for me as the UK is that much smaller than the US. I can get to most of the UK ports in an hour or two. Thers a good chance that there's a service from US east coast ports to UK west/south ports. So... Boston to Liverpool or Southampton New York to Liverpool or Southampton. Etc. Rod -----Original Message----- From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Mike Ford Sent: 11 June 2007 19:05 To: On-Topic Posts Only Subject: Re: My sale or swap list (Update) Rod Smallwood wrote: > Hi > I am curently investigating shipping costs between the UK and US. > As collectors we don't need next day delivery but we do need full > cover insurance. > > Don't go away. The cost is not that bad. > > Rod I'm looking at LCL oceanic shipping, its Less than Container Load, basically a rectangular box that fits about 20 to a container, has 1 cubic meter of volume and the first 1000 kilos is part of the base shipping cost of about $150. As usual lots of quicksand around the treasure, port fees, brokerage, customs, and its a port to port service, not terminal to terminal or door to door without adding a local ground shipper to the mix. Also its targeted to business, not private goods, so some places don't seem to want to even talk to a one time shipper. Complete and accurate paperwork seems essential. It does tend to be SLOW, as in couple weeks transit, with a month or more of sitting on a dock at either end.

19 years, 2 months

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removing epoxy potting, etc.

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> Just wondering, do any of you guys know of something that'll remove epoxy > potting compounds? Hot air gun and a knife. Depending on how much clay is in the potting compound it may need to be hot enough to melt solder. It obviously will melt anything made of soft plastic that was potted, including the outside of electrolytics.

19 years, 2 months

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8" SCSI interface hard drives

by cheri-post＠web.de

Hello Ian, yes, 8 inch harddisk drives do exist with SCSI interface. Seagate produced the Sabre drives with SCSI interfaces with 360MB, 500MB, 1GB and 2GB. I suppose that they were made in the CDC/Imprimis facility, Seagate bought at the end of the 80's. These drives had sometimes a small console attached at the front, including an LCD-display! Apart from that, Fujitsu built interfaces in order to attach their ESMD drives to SCSI-interfaces. The drives then obtained the letters "KS" instead of "K" which stood for ESMD. I'm lucky to own such an interface, but I haven't had the time bring it back to life, as some electronic parts such as capacitors and resistors have been ripped off the PCB due to an excessive shock apparently. Does anybody knows, if other SCSI-drives with form factors greater than 5,25" had been built ? Regards, Pierre > > >From what I have heard, they did make 8" SCSI > interface hard drives (possibly a Seagate Sabre?), but > I was thinking about it the other day, and now I'm not > so sure. I have never seen one, nor have I heard of > one "in captivity". > > So - do they exist? > > -Ian > __________________________________________________________________________ Erweitern Sie FreeMail zu einem noch leistungsst?rkeren E-Mail-Postfach! Mehr Infos unter http://produkte.web.de/club/?mc=021131

19 years, 2 months

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8" SCSI interface hard drives

by ian_primus＠yahoo.com

>From what I have heard, they did make 8" SCSI interface hard drives (possibly a Seagate Sabre?), but I was thinking about it the other day, and now I'm not so sure. I have never seen one, nor have I heard of one "in captivity". So - do they exist? -Ian

19 years, 2 months

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Ancient HP resources

by wacarder＠earthlink.net

My classic computer interests primarily center around early-to-mid 1970s DEC Unibus systems and peripherals. In my computer center I have a couple 1970-72 vintage Hewlett Packard X-Y plotters, an HP7202A and an HP7210A. In college back in the 70s we had an HP7200A, which is pretty much identical to the HP7202A except that the 7202A will support 100, 150, and 300 baud, while the 7200A only supports 100 baud. I am going to hook up the 7202A plotter to my PDP-11/40. It appears to support both 20mA and EIA (RS232) connections. I'd like to connect it to my M7814 20mA DZ11. Currently the only device connected to my 20mA DZ11 is an ASR-33 teletype. All other terminals (DecScopes, DecWriters, VT05, VT100, etc) are connected to the M7819 EIA DZ11. Does anyone here know of anyone who has worked with these kinds of plotters, connecting them to either a PDP-11 or an HP minicomputer? They were made to work in-line with an ASR-33, or they could be used somewhat like a printer, where you could send simple ASCII commands like PLTL for "Plot Line" or PLTP for "Plot Points", and then you would send it X,Y coordinates like "0001,0500". Back in the old days, we used programs like HPPLOT.BAS to do the plotting, and we had a program called CHGEN.BAS to generate characters so we could label our plots. I have these programs loaded on my PDP-11/40. Are there forums for classic HP hardware such as this, where I could get in touch with others who may have experience connecting these devices to my ancient minicomputer? I have Googled and there is not much info out on the web that I can find. Some info is on http://www.hpmuseum.net, but not much elsewhere. I have the User Manual and the Service Manual, as well as several pieces of marketing material on these plotters. Pictures of the plotter can be found at: http://www.woffordwitch.com/HP7202.asp Thanks in advance for any info or advice that anyone might be able to offer. Ashley Carder http://www.woffordwitch.com

19 years, 2 months

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Q-Bus core memory

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> For the Q-bus, I don't even know if any core memories exist. There was a 4k quad board for the original 11/03, but that was long dead by the time the T11 came out.

19 years, 2 months

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What are the really unusual or weird computers?

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> I thought I had seen your name in the output of the > "kudos" word on my G5. I should be in the hidden credits (ie. the 'cat in the hat' picture) >from the first PCI PowerMacs until Apple abandoned PPC in 2005.

19 years, 2 months

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House cleaning -- (mostly) free hardware available in the Seattle area...

by derschjo＠msu.edu

Moved into a new house and in the process realized I have a ton of computer stuff that I haven?t so much as looked at in the past several years. Figured you guys might get more use out of it than I have been. This stuff is free unless otherwise noted. Local pickup in the Seattle area ONLY. Anything leftover will be put on Craigslist in a week or so. Computers: - IBM POWERServer 560. Large MCA-based RS/6000 machine. From memory, it?s got a 50Mhz POWER Cpu, 128mb of RAM. No hard drive. I have an IBM-branded internal SCSI CD-ROM to go with it but no mounting rails. 10/100 ethernet, thicknet ethernet and some sort of FDDI card. Runs AIX 5.1 better than I thought it would. - IBM POWERServer 350. Small (ha) MCA-based RS/6000 machine, desktop sized. 64MB ram, no drive. Thicknet ethernet. - AT&T 3B2 1000/60. 16mb ram, 60MB tape, 350MB SCSI drive. Works, but has been scavenged for parts (missing most EPORTS cards, no dummy plates to replace them). - TRS-80 Data Terminal. Have not tested. A dumb terminal that looks like a Model III :). - HP 9000/236 w/Monitor. Missing ?S? key. Works but reports a floppy controller error on startup. I?d like $25 for this. - Sparcstation 10, dual 40Mhz SuperSparc, 64mb ram. - SGI Personal Iris 4D/35, for parts only ? has no ram or drives, I have no idea if what's in there works. A little bit of rust on the chassis. Ugh. - PowerMac 6100/60 and PowerMac 6100/66. Work, but ugly and probably the worst PowerMacs ever made. What a ringing endorsement! - Commodore Pet 8032. I?d like to get $50 for this, or an interesting trade. Someone did a nasty job replacing a RAM chip which involved seriously burning the PCB and replacing several traces with bits of wire. Amazingly it seems to work fine. Obviously no guarantees :). Laptops: - Tandy 1400HD and Tandy1400LT. No idea if they work, no AC adapter. - ?Leadman? 386, I seem to recall this had 4mb ram and an 80mb drive. AC adapter. - 2x Toshiba Tecra 750CDT, parts only ? both have odd keyboard failures, may be repairable. - 2x AST Ascentia 800n. 50Mhz 486, 8mb ram. Only 1 AC adapter. - 2x Zenith Data Systems SuperSport. 8088, 640k ram, 20mb hard disk, 720k floppy. These worked the last time I used them but I can?t for the life of me find the AC adapters. Monitors: - Apple III monochrome monitor (green phosphor). Decent shape, but has ?GRJC? spraypainted on the top (it was from Grand Rapids Junior College). Small scratch in the glare-proof coating. Works. - Commodore 1702 monitor. Works great, missing fold-out cover over the adjustment knobs in front. - Moniterm Viking 22? B&W monitor, with Mac NuBus adapter to drive it. If I recall it does 1280x1024 at 60Hz. It may be possible to hook a Sun mono framebuffer to it if it?ll do the right refresh rate. Worked last time I used it, but the picture was a bit jumpy from time to time. If you need more details on any of these, don?t hesitate to contact me. Thanks! - Josh

19 years, 2 months

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flexowriter patent

by aek＠bitsavers.org

stumbled upon this looking for something else at uspto.gov http://bitsavers.org/frieden/flexowriter/Patent_2700446_Jan55.pdf

19 years, 2 months

1
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Multithreaded hardware (LispMs)

by aijones2＠bsu.edu

> > Message: 29 > Date: Sun, 24 Jun 2007 07:38:46 -0400 > From: Brad Parker <brad at heeltoe.com> > Subject: Re: Multithreaded hardware > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > Message-ID: <200706241138.l5OBckR7029888 at mwave.heeltoe.com> > > I believe the Symbolics 3600 has support for multiple tasks in hardware > at the microcode level. Unfortunately internals of the 3600 are hard to > come by, but I keep digging. > > (I found someone the other day who worked on a "lisp risc machine" FPGA at > Symbolics. He says he may have some tapes... :-) > > -brad > Symbolics last hardware products used a sort of lisp-machine-on-a-chip developed for use inside ATM networking gear (AT&T, maybe?). I think that may be what the "Zora" was. Google's not being very helpful on this one. My memory's not that good, and whatever I originally read was apocryphal at best. I could be wrong, but I think the NXP1000 (the final, headless workstation) used a similar chipset after the other project fizzled. The only relevant link I can find is http://www.sts.tu-harburg.de/~r.f.moeller/symbolics-info/zora/zora.html If you find out anything interesting from your acquaintance with the tapes, you had better post it.

19 years, 2 months

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Massbus simulation

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> Something tells me a MASSBUS-interfaced peripheral would be of > somewhat limited appeal. ;) Every DEC10 owner I know would want one. Guy started on a design, but I think he got tied up with other projects. Mike Ross bought bits of a commercial unit, but I don't think he ever found the software.

19 years, 2 months

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What are the really unusual or weird computers?

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> I assume that along with this go the usual virtual-memory features as > well as address-space protection. I couldn't imagine this being done > in unprotected non-paged non-virtual memory hardware Systems in a single address space have been implemented using a strongly-typed language. Mesa, for example, on the Xerox Star, which had many active 'threads' in a single address space with protection enforced by the language. Obviously, these languages don't support unchecked memory access though pointers.

19 years, 2 months

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Multithreaded hardware

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> The CDC 6000 series used a 10 way multithreaded architecture > virtualized as 10 independent 12-bit processors for I/O. No > interrupts necessary there either. But then, back in 1964, I don't > know if the word "multithreaded" had been invented yet. This also apparently appears in the Honeywell 1800. Need to dig out info on that. I knew the TX-2 and Xerox Alto implemented multiple hardware contexts. I'm pretty sure Mark Smotherman covers this on his site, which Brad mentioned a day or two ago.

19 years, 2 months

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Andromeda ESDC Q-Bus ESDI controller manual, anyone have one?

by glen.slick＠gmail.com

Does anyone have the manual for the Andromeda ESDC Q-Bus ESDI controller? I have a controller which is not currently installed and there are enough jumpers on it that it would take a while to try to figure out exactly what they all do. A pinout for the serial port would be good to have also, although I could probably trace back to the MAX232 to figure out that pinout. Thanks, Glen

19 years, 2 months

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The late, great TRS-80 - 1st Z-80 appliance computer.

by billdeg＠degnanco.com

> > > The First Off-the-Shelf Microcomputer > >On Sat, 23 Jun 2007, Lance Lyon wrote: > > Errrr.... wasn't that the PET 20001 ? > >Possibly. I have recently done research into this topic. In Kilobaud and Byte magazines of 1977, there is general consensus that the Apple II, PET 2001, and TRS 80 were the first of a new class of "appliance" microcomputers. This is their term, not mine. There are numerous references to the "appliance computer class" in articles and comparisons to kit computers, etc. The appliance computer is defined as a computer ready to be used, out-of-the-box directly from the manufacturer. No component assembly required. Although you could get a KIM or Altair pre-assembled (there are ads in 1976 for this kind of service), ready to use with software, a middle-man would do the assembly/configuration/testing, not the manufacturer. Interestingly, this term appliance computer kind of fell off. The last reference I could find was a short 1978 article describing the Attache as an appliance computer. Other mag references? Using the Kilobaud and Byte mag definitions, I think it's safe to say that the TRS 80 was the first Z80-based appliance computer. According to these sources the Apple II started shipping earlier in 1977 than the PET 2001 or the TRS 80, so the Apple II the first appliance computer. The PET is the 2nd 6502 appliance computer, the first with a built-in monitor. The TRS 80 is definitely NOT the first microcomputer. Bill D

19 years, 2 months

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IBM Series/1

by jplist2007＠kiwigeek.com

Hey all; I have an IBM Series/1 that I picked up a few years ago. I've just pulled manuals from BitSavers (Whee! Way to go!) and clearly have an awful, awful lot of reading to do. Unfortunately my S/1 was pillaged by some cretin before I picked it up - the logic section appears to be complete, although some wires have been cut (Hopefully they were leading to external devices). Unfortunately everything behind the operators panel is missing - I'm not even sure what went there, I'm guessing the units power supply. Is there anyone out there on the list that has one of these that can help me get an idea what I'm missing and, in the best case, maybe even has a little software for the unit? Thanks all; JP (knee deep in PDFs)

19 years, 2 months

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What are the really unusual or weird computers?

by aek＠bitsavers.org

> Also, don't forget that every PCI-based Power Macintosh could be forced into > OpenFirmware. And you can thank me and Ron Hochsprung for that. When we were developing the second generation PPC Macs, Ron and I decided that OF would be the best solution for boot support of PCI devices, since Sun had forced OF into the PCI spec for boot firmware and neither of us thought Apple should reinvent some one-off boot protocol. But thanks to all the world being x86, it really didn't matter anyway since very few vendors ever supported OF on their cards.

19 years, 2 months

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