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

by ard.p850ug1＠gmail.com

I am not sure if anyone is interested, but I've scanned the manual for the Trend HSR500 and HSR500P optical paper tape readers. If I've got the permissions right, then you can get it from my google drive on : https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B5uNCTLB4VsqRU9TWDIzWnZYaU0 It's a large file, I don't think the scanner software has heard of compression!. If anyone can make it a more reasonable size, feel free... This is a proper manual with schematics, parts lists, adjustment info, etc. I've also scanned the circuit diagrams for the Trend Paper Tape Station, here https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B5uNCTLB4VsqemRFMnVNb0l5WU0 The Paper Tape Station is a rack unit containing an HSR500 reader, power supply, GNT34 punch and a driver card for the punch. Those diagrams are for the punch driver and power supply, you need the HSR500 manual as well. Let me know if it all works... -tony

9 years

2
1
0 0

8085 RAM testing program

by witchy＠binarydinosaurs.co.uk

Hi folks, I'm at the point of troubleshooting this 8085 board where I need to test all the RAM. The code loops at an IN looking for....something. Based on other assembly programs I've looked at the code is very similar to eg a disk controller looking for a READY signal from a drive. Trouble is I have no idea what's expected to be at I/O port 0xE3. If it was one of the peripheral chips I'd expect a chip select line to go low. The 74LS139 that does chip select is OK - I've tested it off-board and all traces going to it buzz out OK. The code uses upper RAM as a scratch pad so what I'd like to do is replace the $0000 ROM with an EPROM containing RAM test code. I've found incomplete examples that need to be tailored so before I go reinventing the wheel has anyone got a working example I can use? Warnings of things I should and shouldn't do? RAM is at $8000-$FFFF, and at least some of it is ok since the stack pointer is up at 0xF0B3 and I can trace the code by watching which addresses it's reading. Cheers! -- Adrian/Witchy Binary Dinosaurs creator/curator Www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk - the UK's biggest private home computer collection?

9 years

3
2
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Information Request: unidentified HP 9825T instructions

by cruff＠ruffspot.net

I am working on the disassembly and commenting of the 98228A disk ROM for the 9825T, and my disassembler flagged two instructions as invalid. They are used inside a routine that copies blocks of words from various banks of the ROM into low RAM. The first, bit pattern 070113, is used immediately after a dir (disable interrupt) instruction. The second, bit pattern 070117, is used immediately before an eir (enable interrupt) instruction. The ?invalid? instructions do not match any instructions described in the 9825A patent, nor are present in the 9835 or 9845 assemblers instruction descriptions. From the surrounding code, it doesn?t appear that these instructions reference any of the user visible CPU registers, but are used in some way that enhances the effect of dir/eir and ensures the block copy is not interfered with. Anyone have any ideas? Possibly a DMA request ignore/resume pair?

9 years

2
1
0 0

Disassembly of a DG One?

by isking＠uw.edu

Hey all, Is anyone out there familiar with disassembly of the Data General DG One portable? I have one of the EL models - it looks so cool! - and the hard drive is stuck. I want pull it out and repair it, but I've reached an impasse. I have the machine disassembled and the HD case is accessible, but there is no obvious way to remove it. I don't like to just force things, for obvious reasons. Thanks to anyone with some advice. -- Ian -- Ian S. King, MSIS, MSCS, Ph.D. Candidate The Information School <http://ischool.uw.edu> Dissertation: "Why the Conversation Mattered: Constructing a Sociotechnical Narrative Through a Design Lens Archivist, Voices From the Rwanda Tribunal <http://tribunalvoices.org> Value Sensitive Design Research Lab <http://vsdesign.org> University of Washington There is an old Vulcan saying: "Only Nixon could go to China."

9 years

2
1
0 0

tu58fs - oversized TU58 tapes under XXDP and RT-11

by j_hoppe＠t-online.de

Friends, tu58fs 1.1 now supports oversized TU58 tape images, with capacity up to 32MB instead of 256KB. This was easy to made for XXDP. Under RT-11 the DD.SYS driver must be patched and reinstalled, tu58fs now handles this automatically. The GITHUB release at https://github.com/j-hoppe/tu58fs/releases contains 2 new demos: "demo_xxdp_oversize" packs the whole XXDP25 RL02 disk content onto an emulated tu58 "demo_rt11_oversize" boots a full RT-11 installation from TU58, and mounts a 2nd tape full of games. Docs at http://retrocmp.com/tools/tu58fs were updated. And I feel pretty empty now ... hope you love it! Joerg

9 years

2
1
0 0

LMI Lambda?

by dseagrav＠lunar-tokyo.net

If there is anyone out there who has access to or knows someone who has access to an LMI Lambda in any condition or configuration, please contact me.

9 years

14
40
0 0

16MB memory module for a PC110

by brain＠jbrain.com

I know it's a "newer" PC compatible machine, but I was wondering if anyone had a 20MB PC110 Palmtop and could tell me (or send me pics) of the 16MB RAM upgrade. I have a non working unit here I can liberate the 4MB module from, and I believe I can replace the RAM ICs with larger ones. The DRAMs on the board are HM51W16160ATT7, which are 70nS FP DRAM 1Mbx16 I assume there are similar 4Mbx16 DRAMs I could solder in (A0-A11 Row/Col) Jim -- Jim Brain brain at jbrain.com www.jbrain.com

9 years

4
5
0 0

SunOS 3.5 and SMD disks

by dennis.grevenstein＠gmail.com

Hi, I recently acquired an old Sun3 with a Fujitsu Eagle disk. This disk has SunOS 3.5 on it. Parts of the installation were missing, though. I wanted to build a new kernel with SCSI support and extracted the sys stuff >from a 3.5EXPORT release tape. My machine however runs plain 3.5. I can build a new kernel, but some things won?t worked like allowing logins when a password is set. Is there anyone out there who could provide me with a tar of /usr/sys >from a complete working SunOS 3.5 running on sun3? As a second question: The SunOS boot disk is a Fujitsu Eagle that often reports errors. I have a second Eagle that I might use as a backup, but I would have to reformat the second disks. How can I do that with SunOS 3.5? There is no ?format? command apparently. thanks, Dennis -- Don't suffer from insanity... Enjoy every minute of it.

9 years

2
1
0 0

RSTS V7 magtape images on bitsavers

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Paul Koning >> When did V7 come out, BTW? > The files on the SYSGEN tape have a timestamp of 26-Sep-79, so "Fall > 1979" sounds right. Ow. I was looking for something a lot earlier than that. I used RSTS-11 in the '72-'74 timeframe, so it's a version from that era I'd like to have. Any idea what version that would be - and if it's still extant? > I've used the V4A kit (DECtapes) to build that ... (There's a V4A > sysgen manual on Bitsavers too ...) When was that one? >> It would be really nice to have sources - are they gone forever? > Some still exist. I know someone who has a RSTS source kit, not sure > which version. I have pieces of source. OK, better than nothing. > A complication with all of this is the question of licensing. There's a > hobbyist license for RSTS to build and run it, but whether that carries > over to making sources available is an interesting question. I'm not > sure who to ask these days, either. Hmm. I guess technically HP owns it now? Noel

9 years

5
6
0 0

LMI Lambda?

by john.h.blake＠gmail.com

> > > Apple is slightly different -- the licence for Mac OS X stipulates > > > that you're only allowed to run it on Apple-branded hardware. This is > > > somewhere between rare and unique, though, and it has recently been > > > relaxed slightly to permit use of hypervisors. > > > > EULAs have the same value as toilet paper and should be used for the same > > purpose. > > > > Legally, they can and have been enforced. So their value is not nil > > when it comes to screwing up someone. I was always under the impression that EULAs existed, at this point, solely to scare corporate/commercial users into license compliance in order to avoid lengthy and draining court expenses, since they've been shown to be entirely unenforceable on individuals since the 90s. That's why Adobe stopped trying to prevent piracy of Photoshop on a single-user basis long ago, as an example. License compliance is irrelevant for individual users and particularly so for long obsolete software, i.e. anything that might reasonably be emulated. Even emulating a more recent video game system such as the Wii would be impossible to prevent given that the courts have decided that it is acceptable to create backups of software that you own and the original creator cannot prevent you from using that backup on a different platform than originally intended (recent example being ripping a CD you own and listening to it on an mp3 player, or more distant example, creating mixtapes for your personal use). Not that it would prevent you from having to deal with a court case, but in virtually every case I'm aware of over the last decade or so it's usually just been a cease and desist letter to show the company still intends to maintain copyright, but actually taking someone to court for emulation would be catastrophic for any corporation's public image and virtually guaranteed to be thrown out.

9 years

1
0
0 0

RSTS V7 magtape images on bitsavers

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Paul Koning > I wrote a simple program to strip off those two bytes everywhere, and > the result was a set of V7 kit tapes that work nicely. Any chance you could provide those 'ready to run' tape images back to BitSavers, so other people don't have to replicate what you did? > Trying to remember how to do a V7 installation with no docs was > interesting... Any chance you could write up some notes covering what your rememaber/did, for anyone else who'd like to try running RSTS-11? (I'd upload them to the Computer History wiki, if you like - I've, alas, not had any luck getting in touch with the Webmaster there about getting other people accounts...) When did V7 come out, BTW? And in looking around BitSavers a couple of days ago for RSTS-11 stuff, I didn't think I found much in the way of sources, just the binaries. Did I miss any? It would be really nice to have sources - are they gone forever? Noel

9 years

2
1
0 0

RSTS V7 magtape images on bitsavers

by paulkoning＠comcast.net

Gents, I'm looking at a set of RSTS V7 magtape images (a release kit) which have an odd format that gives SIMH fits. In the container formats I'm used to, each tape block image is preceded and followed by the data length as a 4-byte value. In SIMH that's rounded up to even, in E11 format it's not, but apart from that this is how things work. The V7 tape images don't match that format. It looks like each block contains not just the data but also 2 more bytes, and the data length value represents that extra 2 bytes. So the tape label is 16 bytes, not 14, and the data blocks are 514 bytes, not 512. Does this ring any bells? Where do those extra bytes come from? Can SIMH be told to deal with this or does it require a repair program to fix the format? paul

9 years

4
6
0 0

Wanted: AT&T 3B2 systems & software

by lists＠loomcom.com

(n.b.: Sorry for the "wanted" spam from me. I think this is the last one for a while!) I have access to a friend's AT&T 3B2 Model 400 for exploratory and reverse-engineering work, but I would really like to get a system of my own. To that end, if you have an AT&T 3B2 you'd like to part with, please drop me a line. Happy to pay fair market prices, or consider some trades if you prefer that (I have a lot of DEC Qbus stuff) I'm also still looking for more documentation. I especially wish I had schematics, and any docs related to writing drivers. Anything that would be useful in documenting the 3B2 internals would be lovely. Thanks! -Seth

9 years

3
3
0 0

More of the collection for sale: Franklin ACE 100, LNW-80, Commodore PET 8032

by sellam.ismail＠gmail.com

I am presenting two more items from my collection to sell: Franklin ACE 100 (Apple ][ clone) http://www.vcfed.org/forum/showthread.php?56187-Franklin-ACE-100 LNW Research LNW-80 (TRS-80 clone) http://www.vcfed.org/forum/showthread.php?56189-LNW-Research-LNW-80-w-Syste… I also have this nice Commodore PET 8032 (like new in box): http://www.vcfed.org/forum/showthread.php?55679-Commodore-PET-8032-Brand-Ne… Although you can contact me on the VCForums, I would much prefer you contact me directly through e-mail if you're interested in any of these fine systems. Thanks! Sellam

9 years

2
1
0 0

PDP8/e power controller connections

by ard.p850ug1＠gmail.com

I am currently rack-mounting my PDP8/e and its peripherals. And of course I want to have the peripherals power up when I turn on the CPU. I have an 861 power controller in the rack, but you can't just link that to the power control sockets on the CPU, DEC changed the wiring at some point... Let me explain. The 3 pin power control sockets on the 861 and just about every other power controller and all my PDP11s carry the following 3 signals : Ground, On/ (ground to turn the unit on) and Off/ (ground to force the unit off, e.g. for an overheat shutdown). The 3 pin sockets on the PDP8/e CPU are not wired quite in parallel. One pin is ground. Another pin is On/ (as above). But the middle pins are linked via the frontpanel switch and overheat thermostat. The normal thing to do is to put a jumper in each socket so that one side of the switch is grounded, the other goes to On/. If you have more overheat thermostats in peripheral boxes, they can be linked into the chain. There is a mains output on the PDP8/e PSU that was (according to the printset) used to operate a contactor directly to power up the peripherals. A moment's thought made me realise you could use a normal power controller with the PDP8/e. The only disadvantage is that the overheat switch in the power controller would not shut down the CPU. Since I don't run my machines unattended that is no great loss. What I did was to cut a normal DEC power control cable (with the 3 pin plug one each end) in half. Call the 2 halves 'CPU' and 'Pwr' Then wire as follows : CPU/Green (Gnd) - Pwr/Green (Gnd) CPU/Red (On/) --->|--- CPU/Black (Switch) Pwr/Red (On/) --->|--- CPU/Black (Switch) Pwr/Black (Off/) : Not connected Now plug the ends into the power controller and one of the CPU power control sockets (make sure you have them the right way round). In the other CPU power control socket fit the jumper plug that links the middle pin to ground. The idea is that when the CPU switch turns on, both the CPU On/ line and the power controller On/ line are pulled to ground via the diodes. The diodes prevent the voltage from one power switching circuit ending up in the other. The diodes can be just about anything that will carry the power relay coil current. I used 1N4007's as I happen to have them to hand. I built it in a spare telephone junction box with 6 pairs of terminals. One set of terminals carries the cables. The other set carries the diodes and a wire between the 2 ground wires. Needless to say construction is not critical. It's very low speed, it's about 24V (and isolated from the mains) at < 1A. -tony

9 years

2
1
0 0

FOR SALE: SWTPC 6800

by sellam.ismail＠gmail.com

I have a nice SWTPC 6800 with a color video board and custom sound board for sale. The ad is on the VCF forums: http://www.vcfed.org/forum/showthread.php?56190-SouthWest-Technical-Product… Please inquire directly to me via e-mail if you have any questions. Thanks! Sellam

9 years

1
0
0 0

SWTPC 6800 for sale

by sellam.ismail＠gmail.com

I have a very nice SWTPC 6800 for sale. Please see the ad on the VCF forums for complete information. If you have inquiries, please do send them directly to me via e-mail. Thanks! Sellam

9 years

1
0
0 0

need (physical) key for Sun SPARCserver 1000e

by Richard.Sheppard＠telus.com

Apparently the part number is 330-1651 http://docs.smoe.org/sun/feh/docs/wcd00015/wcd015cd.htm Richard Sheppard

9 years

2
1
0 0

LMI Lambda?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Alfred M. Szmidt > System 46 for the MIT CADR is licensed under a 3-clause BSD license -- > start hacking. ;-) You even have an emulator for the MIT CADR. Everyone seems to have blown right past this, but it might be important. Does anyone know if the Lambda matches the CADR? Or did they make changes ('improvements')? I always had the impression that it was basically a CADR clone. A CADR emulator, running the MIT code, would certainly be OK. Noel

9 years

2
1
0 0

Odd-looking scope trace on an address line

by witchy＠binarydinosaurs.co.uk

Hi folks, Clear one problem and hit another is just what I expect to happen with this Executel :) After last weekend's little breakthrough my little machine is now hitting a loop that LOOKS like it's waiting for an RST6.5 interrupt*, but at the same time the A9 line is doing this: http://www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk/STCExecutelOddTraceA9.jpg (scale doubled for ease of viewing) That doesn't look normal to me, but all 8 chips that touch A9 check out OK and there's nothing odd resistance wise. Before I start chasing my tail again I thought I'd ask first... (*for anyone interested RST6.5 is triggered by the TS1/TS2 status lines from the MR9735 teletext decoder and should be constantly active while video is being output. At one point Tony suggested this chip needs to be initialised and there is indeed a control word that can be passed to it to turn it on and off which makes me wonder if there's another memory bit stuck somewhere) Cheers! -- Adrian/Witchy Binary Dinosaurs creator/curator Www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk - the UK's biggest private home computer collection?

9 years

4
4
0 0

Unidentified (CDC?) panel

by cc＠informatik.uni-stuttgart.de

Hello, amongst other panels and things (CDC 6600 dead start panel, PDP-15 frontpanel) I got this one: http://up.picr.de/28257957bg.jpg I *guess* it also comes from the CDC 6600 but I'm not sure. Can anyone identify it? Christian

9 years

8
8
0 0

11/44, parts, 11/24, DZ11

by useddec＠gmail.com

I have at least one 11/44 for sale, at least one 11/24 for sale. I can configure them as needed within reason. They can be packed and shipped as freight carrier of your choice or pickup in IL. or IN. Please contact me off list. Also the following parts: M7090 M7094 M7095 M7096 M7097 M7098 $300/SET (several available) 70-15672 backplane $70 M7093 FP11-A make offer M7819 DZ11 board only $50 Any quantity boards ship for $10 within US. Thanks, Paul

9 years

2
3
0 0

The Biggin Hill Omnibus

by ard.p850ug1＠gmail.com

No, not Transport For London routes 246, 320, 464, R2 or R8 :-) Some of you might like the photos here ... https://www.flickr.com/photos/tony_duell/albums/72157677925921112 -tony

9 years

7
11
0 0

tu58fs - PDP-11 file sharing with TU58 tape emulator, now RT-11

by j_hoppe＠t-online.de

Next milestone reached: tu58fs 1.0 now supports the RT-11 file system, additional to DOS11/XXDP (phew!) And its easier to use: I also precompiled binaries f?r Linux x64, Win32 Cygwin, ARM Beaglebone Black and RPi. Also some batch files show typical usage, XXDP/RT-11 tape and disk images are included. Docs on http://retrocmp.com/tools/tu58fs Precompiled releases at https://github.com/j-hoppe/tu58fs/releases The RT-11 filesystem has the special features of "extended directory entries" and "file prefixes". These are fully supported by tu58fs, but I never heard of real-life usage. Anybody can talk about it, or has RT-11 images with dir extension and/or file prefixes? best, Joerg

9 years

1
0
0 0

RL02 version of UNIX6?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Mark Matlock > I also tried an 11/40 but the SET CPU NOEIS in Simh gave me an error In Ersatz-11, an -11/40 without EIS works properly (i.e. it doesn't :-): that's how I recognized his booting error! ;-) > From: John Forecast > Depending on the state of your EIS board you may want to stay with the > original un-mapped system - I suspect that the baseline mapped system > will always try to use the "sob" instruction. No matter; SOB is part of the baseline instruction set in the -11/40. The EIS board adds only MUL, DIV, ASH and ASHC. Noel

9 years

3
12
0 0

Updated Spacewar for the PDP-8/I, 8/E, etc....

by anders＠abc80.net

I used Lyle's updated version to show Spacewar on my PDP-8/a during this weekends retro event "RetroGathering" in Sweden. It works great! I did two modifications to the code: 1. Use digital IO instead of the switch register so I could use hand controls to let the audience play the game. 2. Fixed a bug so that timer interrupts is turned on if the DK8-EP programmable real time clock is used. /Anders > >I just updated D.E. Wrege's Spacewar as follows: > >1. Correctly supports slow monitors attached to a VC8/E interface by >correcting mistakes made in the VC8/E driver code. The code now follows >DEC's recommended method of waiting on the VC8/E. > >2. Starts up with spaceships (as opposed to UFO's) per the original >Spacewar! by Steve Russell. > >3. Now supports the DK8-EC Crystal Clock > >Items 1 & 2 were released by me previously - but support for the >DK8-EC is brand new. > >The new source and listing can be picked up via anonymous FTP to >bickleywest.com and the pdp8_spcwar directory. >

9 years

1
0
0 0

RL02 version of UNIX6?

by mark＠matlockfamily.com

>> Bill, Paul, >> I have been tinkering with old versions of RSX11M (back to V2) on >> non-mapped CPUs, primarily PDP-11/05 as I hope to get mine running soon. On >> Simh >> with the CPU set as a PDP-11/05 which does not have EIS (I also tried an >> 11/40 but the SET CPU NOEIS in Simh gave me an error so I couldn't be sure >> if it was disabled) I was able to boot the baseline distribution for RSX11M >> V4.0 on a RL02 distribution. See details below on the config I tested. >> RSX11M is a pretty capable multitasking, multiuser system and would be good >> fit for the PDP-11/40. > > RL02 or RL01? I have only RL02 drives (2). Are you saying you can Bill, My first PDP-11 system was a PDP-11/24 (256KB) with 2 RL02s. It ran RSX11M V4.0 and collected RS232 data from lab instruments and provided a programming environment and handled 3 or 4 users ok. Later we added a KT24 and went to 512KB. With 2 RL02s one was a system disk and one was a user/data disk. The utility BRU allowed you to make a copy of the system disk, but to backup the data disk, one has to boot BRUSYS.SYS which is a memory resident only RSX11S system that RSX11M includes so you can remove the system disk and make a disk to disk copy of the non-bootable user disk. Actually, BRUSYS.SYS is small and you can have the user disk boot block point to it for convenience. > 1) Use simH to set up the environment RSX11M especially in small memory systems should be customized to your hardware. If you have extra DL or DZ terminal ports or other hardware you will need to do this. You can use the RL02 disk emulation, but have 4 of them for convenience so you don't to swap disk images during the process. Once you have SYSGENed an RSX11M system you are happy with then the RL02 disk image file needs to be transferred to an RL02 pack. > 2) Port to RL02 image disk This is the tricky part. RSX11M+ can run a TCP/IP stack and the disk image could be FTPed to it from the Linux or Windows system running Simh. M+ could mount the disk image file and BRU the image to a physical disk (if the M+ system had an RL02 Drive). I don't have RL02s and don't know anyone who does. Also, you might find a Baseline RSX11M disk someone has which can be copied and booted. > 3) Take image put on actual RL02? Since we are unlikely to find a SYSTEM to do that then, the other way would be with PDPGUI from Jorge Hoppe. His PDPGUI program can load via ODT a small driver to write to an RL02 and then transfer a disk image over the console port. It would take quite a while but it can be done. http://retrocmp.com/pdp-11/pdp11gui/disk-images-readwrite This assumes you have ODT and I don't know if an 11/40 does. The !1/05 doesn't either but Jorge found that a M9312 bootstrap card with ODT ROMs will enable ODT on an 11/05 so it should work on an 11/40? http://retrocmp.com/how-tos/interfacing-to-a-pdp-1105/194-interfacing-with-… > I agree that it would run on the PDP 11/40 without EIS, but so far I have > not been able to get it onto an image that will write to actual RL02 > disks. I was playing around with this yesterday. > > I was also working on getting Fortran onto a RT11 disk and in general > building a dual drive system that has a programming environment with enough > space to save program and a dataset. RT11 would work very well on two RL02s as well. In fact, one can get by with two RX02s. It is a much simpler operating system. > I have a lot of RSX11/M manuals and docs here, compared with RT11 I'd love > to use RSX. Are tools made for RSX compatible with RT-11, I am reading up > to see how these compare, what levels they're on...is RT11 like DOS and RSX > like "Windows" that sits on top of it, etc. I know RSX is not a GUI, just > making an analogy. I am researching all of this, up to this point I had > only dabbled in RT11. RT-11 and RSX11M are quite different internally. RT-11 is a single user monitor that was extended to multiuser with some later version and via the TSX operating system. TSX is more like your Windows analogy. The RSX11M executive was written from the ground up with conditional assembly code that can be customized for your hardware so any code for hardware not needed can be left out. When you do a SYSGEN you actually compile the assembly source for much of the operating system and then link (TasK Build, TKB) it. Utilities come in object libraries and can be modified a bit when linking. Also, many of the features of the OS can be left out if you don't need them. It was designed to have executive calls that were compatible with RSX11M and IAS which ran only on large systems. Much of the same languages can be run on RSX and RT11 (Fortran, Basic, Macro, APL) and RSX can read RT-11 tapes and disks with the utility FLX. Good Luck, Mark > > Thanks > > Bill

9 years

1
0
0 0

PDP-8/e M8310 Help

by w2hx＠w2hx.com

Hello folks, I have a PDP-8/e where I've tested all the boards in a friend's PDP-8/e and they are all generally ok with the exception of the M8310 which did not work in his machine. I started to do some very rudimentary analysis of the what isn't working. I did the following. 7100 CLA clear AC 7040 CMA (complement the AC) 7040 CMA 7040 CMA 7040 CMA The complementing worked fine. I set the switch to AC and single stepped through the little program and watched the all 12 lights alternate on and then off. So far so good. I then did this: 7100 CLA 7001 IAC (increment AC) 7001 IAC 7001 IAC 7001 IAC And nothing happened, no incrementing of AC took place. So I may be onto something here. I then looked at the link bit which I believe is viewed by setting the switch to STATUS and looking at bit 0 "LINK" I did the following program: 7100 CLA (Clear Link) 7020 CML (complement Link) 7020 CML 7020 CML And I found that the link was not alternating. The lamp was lit at all time unlike the same test with the CMA. I then read in the Maintenance Manual Volume 1 on page 4-7, Item 11 which gives the following symptom "CPMA, MB, PC, or AC do not increment" And the likely cause of "CAR IN L is always high to the adder. It should be generated for ..." and presents a series of events that should cause the CAR IN L to assert. Now two questions. 1) It appears that CPMA, MB and PC all do increment but the AC does not. Does this help me to narrow down which of the events a. through f. listed might be my problem? 2) Is the link bits inability to complement help narrow down the issue? 3) Might anyone know what the fault is? 4) Are there any other steps you might suggest I take to further narrow down the fault? Thanks Eugene

9 years

1
0
0 0

RL02 version of UNIX6?

by mark＠matlockfamily.com

>> On Feb 2, 2017, at 11:19 PM, william degnan <billdegnan at gmail.com> wrote: >> ... >> I am curious to see what OS's run on an 11/40 without the EIS card other >> than RT-11. I am researching this. I have always wanted to learn more >> about batch-11. > > You mean DOS/BATCH? Yes, that would run on that machine, it's an 11/20 OS. So would the pre-Batch version of DOS-11 (V4). > > Another OS that would run on your machine (as well as an 11/20) would be RSTS-11 (V4, or I suppose V3 if you can find that), the predecessor of RSTS/E that didn't use the MMU. > > It may be that some flavors of RSX-11/M or /S can be built with no EIS, since it's supposed to be possible to build a non-MMU version at least of /S. But I don't know the specifics (no RSX experience). > > paul Bill, Paul, I have been tinkering with old versions of RSX11M (back to V2) on non-mapped CPUs, primarily PDP-11/05 as I hope to get mine running soon. On Simh with the CPU set as a PDP-11/05 which does not have EIS (I also tried an 11/40 but the SET CPU NOEIS in Simh gave me an error so I couldn't be sure if it was disabled) I was able to boot the baseline distribution for RSX11M V4.0 on a RL02 distribution. See details below on the config I tested. RSX11M is a pretty capable multitasking, multiuser system and would be good fit for the PDP-11/40. Best, Mark sim> sho cpu CPU 11/05, idle enabled, autoconfiguration enabled 64KB sim> sh rl RL RL11, address=17774400-17774411, vector=160, 4 units RL0 2621KW, attached to rsxm32.rl01, on line write enabled, RL01 RL1 2621KW, attached to excprv.rl01, on line write enabled, RL01 RL2 2621KW, attached to mcrsrc.rl01, on line write enabled, RL01 RL3 2621KW, attached to rlutil.rl01, on line write enabled, RL01 sim> b rl RSX-11M V4.0 BL32 28.K (BASELINE) >RED DL:=SY: >RED DL:=LB: >MOU DL:RSXM32 >@DL:[1,2]STARTUP >* PLEASE ENTER TIME AND DATE (HR:MN DD-MMM-YY) [S]: 17:52 04-FEB-80 >TIM 17:52 04-FEB-80 >* ENTER LINE WIDTH OF THIS TERMINAL [D D:132.]: 80. >SET /BUF=TI:80. >@ <EOF> >dev DL0: Mounted Loaded Type=RL01 DL1: Loaded Type=RL01 TT0: NL0: TI0: CO0: TT0: CL0: TT0: LB0: DL0: SY0: DL0: >ins $pip >pip /li Directory DL0:[200,200] 4-FEB-80 17:52 BLDLAINIT.CMD;1 14. 22-JAN-82 10:19 SGNBLDDRV.CMD;1 19. 22-JAN-82 10:19 SGNKLAB.CMD;1 70. 22-JAN-82 10:19 SGNSTAND.CMD;1 4. 22-JAN-82 10:19 SYSGEN.CMD;1 85. 22-JAN-82 10:19 SYSGEN2.CMD;1 79. 22-JAN-82 10:19 SYSGEN3.CMD;1 52. 22-JAN-82 10:19 Total of 323./323. blocks in 7. files

9 years

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Cromemco disk question

by rich.cini＠verizon.net

All ? ??????????????? I?m trying to test a Cromemco 16FDC controller?long story but it?s part of a QDOS project. I?m looking for recommendations on a 5.25? disk image I could use for testing. The system is simple ? 16FDC, CompuPro RAM17 (with $C0 block disabled), and a Z80 card. The 16FDC RDOS ROM works, so I can issue commands but I need to test the disk interface part. ??????????????? Any recommendations would be appreciated. Thanks! Rich -- Rich Cini http://www.classiccmp.org/cini http://www.classiccmp.org/altair32

9 years

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Need to borrow Amiga 2000/3000 keyboard near Oakland, CA...

by COURYHOUSE＠aol.com

where do you get a thing like that to convert IBM keyboard for the Amiga's use? we have a Amiga with toaster we need a keyboard for, Prefer the real Amiga one but.... In a message dated 2/4/2017 7:21:14 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time, ian.finder at gmail.com writes: I ordered a PS/2 -> amiga adapter for the fine folks at the MADE in oakland: https://www.yelp.com/biz/the-museum-of-art-and-digital-entertainment-oakland But I fear it may not arrive in time for their 2/27 show. Is there anyone local who could loan these good folks an Amiga 2K or 3K keyboard? I'm remote and cannot do so. -- Ian Finder (206) 395-MIPS ian.finder at gmail.com

9 years

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Need to borrow Amiga 2000/3000 keyboard near Oakland, CA...

by ian.finder＠gmail.com

I ordered a PS/2 -> amiga adapter for the fine folks at the MADE in oakland: https://www.yelp.com/biz/the-museum-of-art-and-digital-entertainment-oakland But I fear it may not arrive in time for their 2/27 show. Is there anyone local who could loan these good folks an Amiga 2K or 3K keyboard? I'm remote and cannot do so. -- Ian Finder (206) 395-MIPS ian.finder at gmail.com

9 years

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Macintosh Floppy

by bill.gunshannon＠hotmail.com

Anybody interested in a Sony MP-F75W-21G? I have one to dispose of as I got rid of all my Mac stuff a long time ago. Make an offer. bill

9 years

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Logic Analysers

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Jon Elson > Any time you see really narrow glitches, especially when they are one > LA sample wide, you have no idea what they actually look like. The LA > detects that the pulse was there at the instant it sampled it, but you > don't know whether it was 5 ns wide, or 70 ns wide ... You also don't > know whether they were full-amplitude pulses or runts that just barely > crossed the logic threshold of the analyzer. Which is why I always prefer to work with an LA _and_ a 'scope: the 'scope lets me see what the signals look like, how much noise/etc there is, etc, etc, while the LA can do other things - better triggering, capture longer time periods, etc. (Now they have those fancy new digitial 'scope with capture capability, and you can get the best of both worlds with one box, but I guess they are still kind of pricy.) But you can probably pick up an old 'scope for not much money on eBait. I can't imagine working on anything without one. Noel

9 years

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Logic Analysers

by witchy＠binarydinosaurs.co.uk

Evening folks, I have two so-called Logic Analysers, both cheap Chinese clones of other more expensive units that hook up to the host via USB2 and stream readings direct to software, in one case the open source Sigrok and in the other genuine Saleae Logic. I'm getting different and inconsistent readings out of both of them whilst sampling at 25MHz which should be more than enough for this 6MHz Executel I'm working on. Both of them are good for spotting dead or stuck outputs but I still can't get a good set of readings from eg all points on a single address line. Tonight I replaced all four ROM sockets and ROM chips, tested each individual line for resistance (0.5 ohms on all apart from an occasional 0.4 and 0.6) but still get ghost readings. Is it me or the cheap clones? Whilst looking for better quality units I came across a couple of 'proper' HP/Agilent analysers, a 1663A 34 channel and 1661A 102 channel which seem complete apart from the chip leg grabbers. Am I right to assume some of you might have experience of these beasts? Forums seem to mostly think the streaming USB units aren't worth anything for more than a few channels but I'm still a relative beginner to all of this. I really need to watch all 16 lines of an address bus and externally clock it as Tony has suggested. Any insights appreciated! -- Adrian/Witchy Binary Dinosaurs creator/curator Www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk - the UK's biggest private home computer collection?

9 years

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One more VCF East tech class/teacher needed

by cctalk＠snarc.net

We have one last 60-minute spot to fill for the Friday (March 31) tech classes at VCF East. Any topic is fair game if it has wide appeal and makes people into better vintage computing hobbyists. The topics thus far are here: http://vcfed.org/wp/classes/. Email me ** off-list ** if you'd like to volunteer. (Please avoid "someone should teach XYZ" messages -- we know what * should * be taught, we need people to DO it. :) ________________________________ Evan Koblentz, director Vintage Computer Federation a 501(c)3 educational non-profit evan at vcfed.org (646) 546-9999 www.vcfed.org facebook.com/vcfederation twitter.com/vcfederation

9 years

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RL02 version of UNIX6?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Paul Koning > Another OS that would run on your machine (as well as an 11/20) would > be RSTS-11 (V4, or I suppose V3 if you can find that) I'd love to have an old RSTS-11, is there any variant around? > didn't use the MMU Huh? He's got an MMU (I think): it's the EIS he's currently struggling with. Noel

9 years

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[cctalk-request@classiccmp.org: confirm 38290c8a992491eda604beff5a06ff20cd7e85f5]

by ams＠gnu.org

Can someone please fix the mailing list software? This has been reported every once in a while by a bunch of people for over ten years. These are a just the last bounces I got: 20-Jan cctalk-request at classiccmp [78] confirm fd5d1f938a6c920c61c094802694d0194e87f1a4 25-Jan cctalk-request at classiccmp [78] confirm e01809296377d0fd3033b4ab27394ca7dc0fae71 31-Jan cctalk-request at classiccmp [78] confirm 38290c8a992491eda604beff5a06ff20cd7e85f5

9 years

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RL02 version of UNIX6?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: William Degnan > I was able to get the extended three cables Excellent! > I can put the M7238 EIS card on a riser so I can probe for faults I'm all agog to hear what you find out! > and maybe if I am lucky boot XXDP+. With the EIN installed I can't boot I thought the machine basically just totally froze if you tried inserting the KE11-E, and removing the jumper to enable it? Oh well, that severe a fault should be fairly easy (sic) to track down. > From: Paul Koning > DEC's PDP11 architecture handbook doesn't appear to confirm that. > Either that or the model differences table is sloppy. The next page (B-4) says "The KE11-E .. provides MUL <etc>" and has an "x" under "35/40". Noel

9 years

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RL02 version of UNIX6?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Allison > for laughs I wandered over to: > http://ftp.math.utah.edu/pub/mirrors/minnie.tuhs.org/PDP-11/Boot_Images/ > To see if the copy of V6 on RL02 is still there.... yep it is. and it > runs on a 11/23 just fine Yes, that's another copy of the Shoppa disk. So, I looked at that system, to see how it dealt with the clock issue on an 11/23 (in /sys/ken/main.c, if anyone else is interested). While looking, I noticed something that made it extremely unlikely that it would boot on an 11/40. Sure enough, attempting to boot the /unix on it on a (simulated) -11/40 blows out. There are a couple of other unix loads on that pack image (oldunix, unix.tmp, etc), but all the ones I looked at had the same issue (only tried booting the 'unix' one, though); they're probably all for the same machine, so have the same configuration issue. V6 Unix was pretty persnickety about the hardware configuration it ran on; while it was possible to create builds that would run on almost any configuration, on 'vanilla' V6 that really only applies to the /40/45/70 era. And even then you still had to re-build the system to match your actual hardware configuration, almost all the time. The advent of the /23 (with no CSW, and no KW11-L/P), made things more complicated. (The clock is pretty key - Unix needs one - several things, e.g. parts of the teletype drivers, require real-time delays provided by the clock. I've never tried to run Unix without a working clock, I'm not sure if it would run without slowly grinding to a halt as stuff waited for clocks delays that never happened.( With a little work, a suite of 'universal boot' versions (one for each type of disk controller - RK05/RL02/RX02 etc) could have been created that would boot and run on any pretty much CPU/etc configuration - at least, well enough to build one that did exactly match the hardware configuration at hand. (The one on the Shoppa disk is close, from what I could see.) I don't think anyone ever bothered, though (in part because it was much more of a PITA to test them all, BITD, with only real hardware). Noel

9 years

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RL02 version of UNIX6?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: William Degnan > my focus has been on just getting an 11/40 hardware working Rightly and properly so... > I suppose I should be happy with RT-11 given my circumstances. Unix really is a significant improvement, we really need to make sure you can run it. Don't worry about the OS image issue, I can crank them out like sausages, and we already have all the bits we need (V6 RL driver, bootstrap, etc). > It's not possible with the 3 over the back cables to put the 7238 on a > riser card to probe signals as easily. Really? DEC specified BC08R-01 cables, which _should_ be long enough to allow it to be put on an extender. Does your machine have the -01's, or have they been replaced with little shorty ones? If the latter, if you can't find any -01's, it should be possible to locate some generic 40-pin cables, which should work (old IDE cables should work, but not the new ones, which have a key that will prevent the connectors from going in, in this application). Also, it should not to be too hard to whip up some: the connectors and the flat cable are pretty easy to find - although not the ground-plane backed kind - do anyone know of a source for that? Anyway, the regular kind of flat cable ought to work well enough for debugging. Noel

9 years

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HP Integral PC Accessories?

by Martin.Hepperle＠dlr.de

Hi, I am looking to swap or buy the following HP-Integral IPC (portable HP-UX box) interface boards: - HP-IL interface - 1 MB memory board Does anybody have a manual for the HP-IL interface board? Could offer HP 9000 interface or memory boards. Martin

9 years

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Please identify this circuit board

by ilcohn3＠gmail.com

Hi, Can someone identify this circuit board? It's some sort of magnetic core memory. I've had this for ages and I've always wondered what it is and where it comes from. http://lookpic.com/O/i2/366/iAFq4mLF.jpeg Best regards

9 years

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RL02 version of UNIX6?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Allison > for laughs I wandered over to: > To see if the copy of V6 on RL02 is still there.... yep it is. There are actually plenty of builds out there that run on RL11s, e.g.: http://www.tuhs.org/Archive/PDP-11/Distributions/other/Tim_Shoppa_v6/ includes "A V6 RL02 bootable on a 11/23. Kernel is built for a 11/23, 2 RL02's, and 2 RX02's"; and my V6, running under Ersatz-11, is also an RL-based system. The real issue with mixing and matching kernels and disks is that since the RL was not a standard device (as far as 'mkconf' went), the RL's can have different major device numbers on different systems. This does not stop the system from _booting_, since internally there will be consistency, but consistency between the OS and file system is another matter: e.g. trying to mount another drive (or any other use of /dev/rl? or /dev/rrl?) may not work, since the device inodes for /dev/rl? might have the wrong major device numbers in them. > and it runs on a 11/23 just fine Must be a slightly modified V6 - totally stock V6 will panic when it can't find a clock (unless there's a BDV11), or NXM when it tries to touch the switch register. And for machines with no BDV11, I had to turn the clock off while booting; the first time I tried to boot on a simulated 11/23, my totaly stock vanilla V6 apparently took a timer interrupt during the boot process and went wayyyy South, totally smashing the file system in the process. Not sure how the one above dealt with this... Noel

9 years

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RL02 version of UNIX6?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Phil Blundell > I suspect it would probably not be all that hard to write some > sort of preprocessor to convert such code Really? Check out: http://minnie.tuhs.org/cgi-bin/utree.pl?file=V6/usr/sys/ken/pipe.c (Needless to say, none of the 'int *' things are actually pointers to integers!) In particular, what will lines like this: sleep(ip+2, PPIPE); do, depending on what 'ip' is declared as? Noel

9 years

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VCF East online ticketing is open

by cctalk＠snarc.net

Get your tickets now. Save time at the show. http://vcfed.org/wp/festivals/vintage-computer-festival-east/tickets/ ________________________________ Evan Koblentz, director Vintage Computer Federation a 501(c)3 educational non-profit evan at vcfed.org (646) 546-9999 www.vcfed.org facebook.com/vcfederation twitter.com/vcfederation

9 years

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RL02 version of UNIX6?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> Jim Stephens > The listings I've read of early unix have ... mixed c + assembly Not V6 (the subject of the current discussion); the C compiler of that era couldn't inline assembler. _ALL_ of the assembler in V6 is in one of _two_ files: l.s - per system, hardware configuration dependent m40.s - Startup, and machine language support for all low-level OS or functions such as stack switching, etc; the latter option m45.s supported both the -11/45 and -11/70 Noel

9 years

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RL02 version of UNIX6?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: William Degnan > was there ever UNIX made for the PDP 11/40 and RL02, or was it only run > on RK05? Wouldn't all of the C and wake calls, etc issues have been > solved then? You're mixing up two _TOTALLY_ different things. Unix V6 will happily run on _ANY_ block device, all you need to do is write a driver for it. The rest of Unix V6 doesn't know ^%$^%$ about the device, all it know is that there's this thing that can store, and read back, blocks 0-N. The _only_ interface between the rest of Unix, and the driver, is through a file called c.c which just contains entries for functions to read and write blocks, etc. (You can even run Unix - painfully - on a DECTape drive.) Adding support for RL drives to Unix V6 involves i) writing an RL driver, and ii) editing that file c.c to add _one line in a table_ to hook the driver into the rest of the OS. (And there's a edit to something called l.s which holds interrupt vectors, to all the RL vector.) THAT'S IT. Editing c.c and l.s was No Big Deal. To customize Unix to one's particular hardware configuration, you _had_ to change those two files, and every V6 site in the known universe tweaked those files. _WITHOUT EXCEPTION_. Unix V6 doesn't give a *&^*&^* what disk drives its using. As long as there's a driver for the controller. The stuff about wake() calls is a totally different subject, it's all about how the code in V6 Unix cuts a lot of 'C' corners (e.g. using an 'int *' as a pointer to a struct - something that would horrify modern compilers) because it's in very early C. Noel

9 years

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RL02 version of UNIX6?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Paul Koning > Yes, GCC should do that correctly. ... Dealing with the output might be > a nuisance ... You may need some post-processing to cast the output > into the syntax that V6 "as" expects. Actually, dealing with the _input_ is going to be a PITA (so my suggestion was, in retrospect, not really a plausible one). The problem is that V6 is written in an early dialect of C, one which I am sure would cause GCC would toss its cookies, if fed to it. Some things, like "a =+ b;" would be easy to fix; likewise "int a 1;" instead of "int a = 1;". But the Unix kernel is shot through with places where are int is used as a structure pointer, etc, without benefit of a cast (casts weren't invented until later). And a lot of stuff like that. Noel

9 years

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RL02 version of UNIX6?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: William Degnan > if possible can you help me to link in m40.o instead of m45.o? Sure; tomorrow, though, not tonight. Just to check, you have 128KB of memory, and 2 RL02 drives, right? That will make it all really easy, if so. Like I said, I'll make you a mini-disk that will be quick to load with GUI11, with only the only files on it the few you need to be able to boot: the Unix system, /etc/init, /bin/sh, etc. Once it has booted, you can 'mount' your existing RL pack, and copy the Unix system over to that one, then you should be able to boot off that one. Noel PS: I was thinking of fixing 'mkconf' (it currently doesn't properly handle the /dev/tty device, etc), but whoever wrote it was really lazy! 'nswap' and 'swplo' aren't even parameterized, let alone being things you can override with inputs. So the dude who did the RL disk just changed the numbers for the RL - so his mkconf now doesn't work properly for RK drives! Might as well just edit c.c and l.s directly - that's what I always did! ;-) Anyway, I might fix it at some point, but... not for tomorrow.

9 years

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RL02 version of UNIX6?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: William Degnan > Tried my M7838 EIS this morning. It is bad or there is a config/jumper > issue to investigate. When installing the KE11-E, you have to remove a jumper on the CPU's M7233 module. See pg. 2-1 on the KE11-E/KE11-F User's Manual (EK-KE11E-OP-001), available online. Did yours come with the three flat cable jumpers? If it's still not working, the KE11-E/KE11-F Technical Manual (EK-KE11E-TM-002), also available online, will undoubtly prove useful. Noel

9 years

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Free to a good home: Honeywell/Bull DPS-6 workstation / server (Seattle, WA)

by julian.metcalf＠liketechnologies.co.uk

Hi Josh, I saw your posting on the 23rd Jan 16 regarding Bull DPS 6. We are based in the UK and actually run 4 working DPS6 systems in the UK. Any system (in its entirety or parts) we may be interested in if compatible with our existing system. Do you still have it? Many thanks, Julian Julian Metcalf Finance Director Like Technologies Ltd 0845 519 2244 Ext 111 This email and any attachments to it may be confidential and are intended solely for the use of the individual to whom it is addressed. Any views or opinions expressed are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of Like Technologies Ltd. If you are not the intended recipient of this email, you must neither take any action based upon its contents, nor copy or show it to anyone. Please contact the sender if you believe you have received this email in error.

9 years

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RL02 version of UNIX6?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: William Degnan > I do not have an EIS installed. I have one however, I can try it. I am > unsure if it's good or not, but I guess I am going to find out. Oh yeah, without that, you're totally hosed, Unix-wise. The V6 C compiler puts out MUL etc all over the place (e.g. for structure pointer math), so there's absolutely no way to run vanilla V6 Unix without it. (The GCC compiler claims to be able to compile C to machines without the EIS; it might be an interesting hack to see if that could be used to get V6 running on a machine without the EIS. The machine language startups would still need work, though. And the bootstrap. :-) > Josh Dersch > As I mentioned above Right, but if his bootstrap isn't working, gotta debug that first.. :-) > you'll also need to recompile the kernel Actually, I don't think you need to re-compile anything, just link in m40.o instead of m45.o; I think all the C code checks for 'cputyp == 40' or whatever, as the case may be. Noel

9 years

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RL02 version of UNIX6?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> William Degnan > It "boots" to the ! prompt at least there's that. Yeah, but not much has to be working for that to happen! :-) > I am unsure if one can put an M7891 into a slot that has no NPG jumper > installed Yes, you can - but having a slot with no NPG jumper, and either i) no board in in it at all, or ii) a non-DMA-speaking board in it, will prevent any DMA device _further down the bus_ from working. > I would have to check, or whether I can put this card into a DD11-B No. It needs a MUD slot (UNIBUS in connectors A-B, essentially; more here: http://gunkies.org/wiki/Modified_UNIBUS_Device although other places have info about this too). (I'm not exactly sure how the A/B connectors on DD11-B slots 2 and 3 are wired, it's something wierd, look at the DD11-B prints for more.) > or a slot without the NPG installed. The NPG jumper is IRRELEVANT to everything except DMA devices (in that slot, and downstream). > Typing *anything* kills the system. Well, technically speaking, that's not entirely accurate - clearly, from the below typing "r" doesn't crash the machine. I gather you meant 'typing "{anything}<CR>" crashes the machine'. Hmm. > When I type say rlunix or foobar or whatever and hit enter, the prompt > returns to the next line and the CPU stops. The system crashes, > unresponsive, requiring restart from the front panel. That sounds like the bootstrap isn't running properly. Oh, I remember an issue I had with the boostrap when first trying to bring up Unix in Ersatz-11 - does your -11/40 have the EIS board? Is the EIS working? If not, the bootstrap won't run - it uses the MUL instruction. (MUL is not in the base set on an -11/40, it's an option.) If that's not it, we'll have to debug the bootstrap... Should't be too hard, test versions can be loaded directly into memory with GUI-11, we don't have to write them to disk. You've got a (hopefully good) disk to have the bootstrap ponder over... Noel

9 years

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RL02 version of UNIX6?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: William Degnan > 64K. That's 64KB, right? DEC used to talk of PDP-11 memory in words, back in the day, so it's never quite clear unless the 'B' or 'W' is specified. Anyway, 64KB out to be enough to run most things. I have't looked to see how big a system with just RL and DL drivers, and a minimum number of disk buffers (that's probably the easiest way to get the size down almost as far as it will go) is, but it's probably in the region of 30-35KB (20KB text, and 10-15 KB data). That leaves plenty for user processes (not max sized, of course). > I'd like to get another M7891, mine is only 1/2 populated. Oh, so that must have been 64KW - 128KB. That will give you plenty of room for a decent-sized kernel, and user processes. Wonder why it won't boot, then? Anyway, those are pretty rare. I have a couple of spare M7847's; they're only 32KB, but they'd help. You've got a couple of spare hex MUD slots now in the DD11-C, right? Speaking of which, where is the M7891 plugged in? It couldn't go in the DD11-B, or in the CPU backplane? > typing anything kills the CPU and I have to restart the system.. Sorry, need exact details: after the '!' prompt, anything you type kills the system on the first character? Or only "rlunix<CR>" does? How about "foobar<CR>"? I'd have to look at the bootstrap source, but I think typing a non-existing file name should take you back to the top-level prompt. Noel

9 years

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RL02 version of UNIX6?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: William Degnan > doesn't hurt to try I suppose Absolutely. > My fear is that it will not have enough RAM on top of whatever other > issues are present. Oooh, good point - I hadn't thought of that. I couldn't quickly find a 'minimum memory required' in the release notes for V6; the 'Unix Summary' says it needs "48K to 124K words". I think that might be a bit excessive; I seem to recall our -11/40 had, to start with, only 48KB. Anyway, try it, and let us know what happens. How much memory does the system have on it now? If it doesn't work, I can do some experiments and see what's the least amount of memory one needs. There are a whole bunch of parameters which will reduce the size of the resident OS; if necessary, I can turn them all down to the minimum, and see what we get - although just reducing the number of disk buffer may do it. As for the applications, it does swap, so there's no requirement for more than one process to be resident at a time, so whatever the largest is - probably the C compiler - there only needs to be enough memory left over after the OS is loaded, for that one. It looks like the shell is about 10KB, for example. If it won't boot, don't trash the disk: if we send you another bootable disk, we can make it tiny (only Unix, and enough files to get it running: /etc/init, /bin/sh, etc), and if/once it books, you can mount the disk you just wrote and move the bootable Unix system image over, and then reboot on the current disk, to get to the rest of the stuff. Do you have two working RL drives on the machine? Noel

9 years

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RL02 version of UNIX6?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: William Degnan > Can one be made using simH to dump and set up for RL02 that can then be > ported as a RL02 disk image to actual RL02 drive? I see someone has already provided a pointer to someone who ha done this; I'm not sure if that system will boot on a hardware 11/40, or if it was built with m45.s, or some simlar issue. It would be pretty easy for anyone with a working V6 UNIX (either on hardware, or emulated) to do this, _iff_ they have a V6 RL driver. ('Vanilla' V6 does not include one.) My 'Bringing up V6 under Ersatz-11' page describes one: http://www.chiappa.net/~jnc/tech/V6Unix.html#rl You might want to get familiar with building V6 kernels, _any_ hardware variations you wish to support (e.g. more than one DL11 seria line) will involve re-building the kernel. Not to worry, it's a pretty simple process, it only takes a few commands, and a few moments (more on a real machine, of course :-). That page include almost all the directions on how to do so, but note that one must also edit 'rootdev' in c.c if the root file system is to be on an RL (no, mkconf as distributed with 'vanilla' V6 won't do any of the legwork for you, it does not know about RL drives). Note that running 'vanilla' V6 Unix i) has some bugs/issue (e.g. you can't set the date to this century; the user interface is _strictly_ for printing terminals, etc, etc, etc), some of which are handled here: http://www.chiappa.net/~jnc/tech/V6Unix.html#Issues so I would advise checking it out. (You can skip all the Ersatz-11-specific stuff, like the 'DOS Device' to allow Unix to read files from the host file-system - a very useful capability in an emulated Unix!) > From: Angelo Papenhoff > http://www.tom-yam.or.jp/2238/rl/ Note that his page says "bootblock is rluboot from v6_rl02_unknown, which lacks the source code"; I disassembled and commented the code, see above links. Noel

9 years

2
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RL02 version of UNIX6?

by billdegnan＠gmail.com

I thought this question was answered recently but I can't find the answer. I have the RK disk version of UNIX6 for PDP 11/40 but I could not find an RL02 version. does this exist? Can one be made using simH to dump and set up for RL02 that can then be ported as a RL02 disk image to actual RL02 drive? I can get an image onto the drive, should the image exist. My PDP 11/40 is not compatible with Unix 7, but I would be happy with 5 or 7 if it'll run on a 64K system. Thanks Bill

9 years, 1 month

2
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RT-11 Basic source available

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> Here: > http://ana-3.lcs.mit.edu/~jnc/tech/pdp11/macro.tar > is a tar file with the whole works, along with the MACRO-11 source. BASIC is not ready yet, and won't be for a few days. The problem is that I can't get it to assemble into a working version, which I would like to do, before sending it out. I _think_ that what happened is we made some change in the toolchain, to support other things we were doing, and one of them 'broke' re-building BASIC - except that since nobody was actually _doing_ anything with BASIC, we had no reason to re-build it - and so nobody noticed we had 'broken' it. If someone's desperate to get their hands on this, let me know, and I can go ahead and send out what I have, with the proviso that you can't build a working version from the MACRO-11 source at this point. > If the first person to try MACRO could send me feedback, to see if the > whole process works, I'd be grateful. Did anyone grab the MACRO-11 TAR and try it yet? Noel

9 years, 1 month

1
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Looking for Eyring PDOS for TMS-9900

by schubert＠microsys.de

Hi Camiel Vanderhoeven I nearly got all about PDOS and the TM990 system......however only on 8" floopy disks. I also have the complete documentation and a TM990/100M system with a DRAM and a Floppy-Controller board. best regards Walter Schubert -- MicroSys Electronics GmbH, M?hlweg 1, D-82054 Sauerlach Tel.: +49 8104 801-0, Fax: +49 8104 801-110 Sitz der Gesellschaft: Sauerlach, HRB M?nchen 48340, Ust.ID No: DE129296566 Gesch?ftsf?hrer: Dipl.-Ing. Richard Loeffl, Dipl.-Ing. Dieter Pfeiffer http://www.microsys.de

9 years, 1 month

1
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[cctalk-request@classiccmp.org: confirm 38290c8a992491eda604beff5a06ff20cd7e85f5]

by blstuart＠bellsouth.net

On Tue, 1/31/17, geneb <geneb at deltasoft.com> wrote: > On Tue, 31 Jan 2017, Alfred M. Szmidt wrote: >> Can someone please fix the mailing list software? This has been >> reported every once in a while by a bunch of people for over ten >> years. > > Bounces aren't caused by the mailing list, they're caused by the > destination mail server. What I've been wondering for a while is the span of time over which the bounces are counted. I can understand shutting a subscriber off for getting 10 bounces in as many minutes. On the other hand if those 10 bounces are spread over two months, it seems rather severe. BLS

9 years, 1 month

4
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Pac-Man (Alfred M. Szmidt)

by c.murray.mccullough＠gmail.com

As Alfred wrote: "How about some credit where credit is due, and not rewriting history willynilly. Toru Iwatani was the designer (not Nakamura) of Pac-Man, Shigeo Funaki did the code and Toshio Kai the music. Nakamura was simply the man behind the company, not the father of Pac-Man." I agree that his company created Pac-Man and in a corporatized world, then as is now, the owner(s) get the credit; i.e., Jobs of Apple, etc. And "rewriting history willynilly"; as an historian I definately try not doing that. Happy computing. Murray :)

9 years, 1 month

2
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For Sale: Computer & Electronics Magazines: Byte, Creative Computing, Pop. Electronics, More...

by sellam.ismail＠gmail.com

I have several pallets of many boxes containing oodles of computer and electronics magazines that need to go. I'm not sure what all is exactly there but I'm going to be digging through them over the course of the next several months, so I'll probably just continue to update this thread with new material. There may well be lots of complete runs of certain magazines, and probably some frustrating discontinuities from boxes that didn't make it over. In any event, there is a lot of good stuff. Here's what I have pulled so far: Popular Electronics, nearly a complete run from 1974 through 1984; also 1950s-1970s issues (uninventoried) Electronics Magazine, 3 bound volumes, April - December 1959 (see photo) - I plan to sell these in a complete set once I uncover all of them that I still have. It's possible I still have a complete run from the 1920s through the 1980s or so. PC World, Vol 1. #3 on upwards, incomplete (see photo). Dr. Dobbs, Volume 1, #2, photocopy of V1#1, many early issues from inception in mid-1970s thru... (again, this is just what I've pulled so far) Softalk, November 1982 onwards (incomplete, please see photos) Byte, January 1977 (Vol. 2, #1) through March 1983 (again, just what's been pulled so far, at one point I had maybe 5 complete runs of Byte) All photos can be seen here: http://s350.photobucket.com/user/Sel...ines/Batch%201 <http://s350.photobucket.com/user/Sellam_Abraham/library/Vintage%20Computer%…> I'll try to answer any questions as best I can. As a preliminary FAQ of sorts: 1. Yes, I will assemble bundles of magazines for different individuals upon request and ship them all at once. I will probably want some for of payment in advance though to secure the deal. 2. Yes, I will most likely ship via USPS media mail rate for the common stuff (this is how I received most of my magazines over the years) as this will be the cheapest method. For more valuable issues we can discuss more secure modes of shipping. 3. Yes, I have complete runs of a lot of magazines, but it will take time to dig them all out. I once had a complete run of nearly every (US) computer and electronics magazine ever published. What I now have is anywhere from a large to a substantial portion of that library. I don't know, this is the first time I'll be going through everything to see what's left. 4. These magazines have been stored in file boxes standing on their edges for years, packed very tightly. In not so tightly packed boxes some issues have curled up. In almost all cases, the magazines were kept in a cool, dry, dark environment so they will all be in about the condition I got them. In some cases I expect water damage. 5. I will charge more for the more sought after issues and peanuts for the long run schlock. My desire is to sell in bulk. The more you buy, the better your price. That should cover things for now. Happy shopping. Sellam FYI FWIW I cross-posted this from http://www.vcfed.org/forum/showthread.php?56035-Computer-amp-Electronics-Ma…

9 years, 1 month

1
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Visible LINCtape Tracks

by michael.99.thompson＠gmail.com

We applied some Magnetic Developer to a piece of LINCtape and can see the tracks. You can clearly see the extra space between the Mark and Data tracks. When we can get access to a microscope with an attached camera we should be able to see the bits. -- Michael Thompson

9 years, 1 month

3
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LC8-P (M8365) PDP8 printer interface schematics

by chd＠chdickman.com

I am looking for schematics or any documentation for the LA180 interface for the PDP8/e. A scan would be great. I want to see if I can use it to interface to a Centronics interface printer. -chuck

9 years, 1 month

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RT-11 Basic source available

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> I _do_ have working binaries (I think) for the MACRO-11, BCPL compiler, > and linker.. but they may or may not run under vanilla V6 ... > Let me try them and see if they run under vanilla V6 ... and if so, then > I can hand out the whole package. OK, I have verified that all the tools to run and re-build MACRO-11 do in fact run under vanilla V6. (Which is no big surprise - I'm very familiar with the changes to MIT-V6+, and most of them were in area like the terminal driver, etc; there was no reason to change any of the file-handling primitives. Here: http://ana-3.lcs.mit.edu/~jnc/tech/pdp11/macro.tar is a tar file with the whole works, along with the MACRO-11 source. Just download and explode, and read the 'README' file to start with. It does not yet include the source for the 'bind' linker (used with the .REL files that MACRO-11 puts out), because that's in BCPL, and there's no point in adding the source for that until I've put the BCPL compiler itself out, which I will do once I can confirm that it can correctly compile itself (it's written in BCPL) and re-create itself. If the first person to try MACRO could send me feedback, to see if the whole process works, I'd be grateful. Noel

9 years, 1 month

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Pac-Man

by c.murray.mccullough＠gmail.com

A sad day: The father of Pac-Man, Masaya Nakamura, passed away. I remember playing this on very early microcomputers. Happy computing! Murray :)

9 years, 1 month

3
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nice looking Series/1

by aek＠bitsavers.org

http://www.ebay.com/itm/IBM-Mainframe-Series-1-/172507912099 hopefully someone out there can grab it

9 years, 1 month

3
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RT-11 Basic source available

by Flash688＠flying-disk.com

jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu (Noel Chiappa) wrote: > Hi, I don't know if this is of any use/interest at all, but I have retrieved > an old/early copy of RT-11 Basic (V01-05 18-JUL-73, DEC-11-LBACA-A-LA1) > modified to run under V6 Unix, if anyone has any use for such a thing. > > I also have a DEC MACRO-11 which runs under V6 Unix, which generates .rel > files; there is a 'bind' (written in BCPL) which is a linker which reads .rel > files. (There is a BCPL compiler, written in BCPL, to compile it.) Then there > are two command 'relld' and 'ldrel' to convert back and forth from .rel to > a.out. I would also be very interested in getting a copy of all your BASIC and MACRO-11 sources. I can handle most of the usual media, but pulling it off an FTP site might be best. Thank you very much for thinking of us. Alan Frisbie

9 years, 1 month

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Need manual for a floppy drive...

by geneb＠deltasoft.com

I've got a Panasonic JU-455-5 AAG (5.25, 360K) that I'd like to use in a Kaypro 4. I've worked out the configuration of the drive based on a snippet of info on the net that had some jumper settings, but I can't get the activity light to operate. I've set the configuration to use the light when either motor on is detected, or the drive select, but neither seem to work. I figure a "real" manual on the drive would help. Note that the drive seems to operate without issue other than the drive light. Boots, etc. g. Tnx! -- Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007 http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind. http://www.diy-cockpits.org/coll - Go Collimated or Go Home. Some people collect things for a hobby. Geeks collect hobbies. ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes. http://scarlet.deltasoft.com - Get it _today_!

9 years, 1 month

5
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RT-11 Basic source available

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Phil Budne > I'd be interested in seeing it all preserved/available. That is the goal. > Maybe .. Apout would be a quicker way to run the binaries you have > (than to have to hack the vanilla v6 kernel) _Iff_ the existing binaries won't run under vanilla V6: For me, going the Apout route would require learning about Apout. Bringing up the MIT-V6+ under an emulator (so they could be run) would be a _lot_ less work, since I'm already intimately familiar with it, and I already have vanilla V6 running under an emulator (which I could use to produce a MIT-V6+ kernel that would boot under the emulator - the existing kernel images wouldn't, they use disk controllers that the emulators don't support). > I'm still looking for (NCP) ARPAnet code for v6! That's there too - that's being discussed on the TUHS list. See the archives. Noel

9 years, 1 month

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RT-11 Basic source available

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Warner Losh >> I have retrieved an old/early copy of RT-11 Basic (V01-05 18-JUL-73, >> DEC-11-LBACA-A-LA1) modified to run under V6 Unix >> .. >> I also have a DEC MACRO-11 which runs under V6 Unix, which generates >> .rel files; there is a 'bind' (written in BCPL) which is a linker >> which reads .rel files. (There is a BCPL compiler, written in BCPL, to >> compile it.) Then there are two command 'relld' and 'ldrel' to convert >> back and forth from .rel to a.out. > I'd be interested... Interested in just the BASIC, or in the whole package? For those who are interested in running any of this stuff on a UNIX of some sort (as opposed to, say, taking the BASIC source and editing it to run under some DEC OS, using the pre-existing MACRO-11 on such a system), there are dependency issues one is going to have to deal with. That's because the MACRO-11 is written in MACRO-11, and the BCPL compiler (which one needs to compiler the linker) is in BCPL. So before either one can be assembled/compiled... one needs a working assembler/compiler (as the case may be), along with a linker. Can you say 'dependency loop'...? :-) I _do_ have working binaries (I think) for the MACRO-11, BCPL compiler, and linker.. but they may or may not run under vanilla V6 (they ran on the much-modified MIT-V6+, which is kind of an early PWB with a lot of MIT additions). Let me try them and see if they run under vanilla V6 (which I have running under Ersatz-11), and if so, then I can hand out the whole package. That all will take a couple of days to deal with. Noel

9 years, 1 month

2
1
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Compaq 9000 Series Rack

by cctalk＠ibm51xx.net

Hello All, So maybe not quite classic but I believe in the vintage time frame - does anyone, ideally in the greater LA but even SoCal area, have a line on an Opal White 22U Compaq 9000 Series Rack? This is the half height rack not the full height 42U which seems to be everywhere (you can see pictures of a similar unit here: http://www.vcfed.org/forum/showthread.php?55953-Compaq-22U-Rack-9122). I don't have enough space for a full height one and the half height fits the bill nicely. TIA and sorry for interrupting the DEC talk! -Ali

9 years, 1 month

1
0
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RT-11 Basic source available

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

Hi, I don't know if this is of any use/interest at all, but I have retrieved an old/early copy of RT-11 Basic (V01-05 18-JUL-73, DEC-11-LBACA-A-LA1) modified to run under V6 Unix, if anyone has any use for such a thing. I also have a DEC MACRO-11 which runs under V6 Unix, which generates .rel files; there is a 'bind' (written in BCPL) which is a linker which reads .rel files. (There is a BCPL compiler, written in BCPL, to compile it.) Then there are two command 'relld' and 'ldrel' to convert back and forth from .rel to a.out. Noel

9 years, 1 month

2
1
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SONY NWS-1250 PSU

by plamenspam＠afterpeople.com

I recently obtained Sony portable model - NWS-1250 from Japan. There is a bottom label "AC 100V", however the PSU has 100-120V and 220-240V label. The exact PSU model is Sony 1-413-548-11. Is it safe to plug it in 220V AC or to wait the arrival of step-down transformer ? The other problem is that the disk has been wiped. Does anyone have NEWS-OS CISC version media ? Best regards, Plamen

9 years, 1 month

4
4
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What's the rarest or most unusual computer-related item do you own?

by COURYHOUSE＠aol.com

Doug! We would like a scan of your dad's certificate! We have an ongoing collection on this computer at SMECC 1955 Honeywell computer business was originated from the Datamatic Corporation, founded in Newton MA, as a joint-venture by Raytheon and Honeywell, to produce large-scale computer systems. Raytheon sells its 40% interest to Honeywell in 1957.. 1957 Installation of the first Datamatic D-1000 to Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Michigan. Honeywell Datamatic 1000 uses 3 inch wide tape we have a 3 inch very very heavy reel and the 30 something track tape drive head.... could this someday be the start of the ultimate DIY tape drive build and tape recover? see more on this computer here... and we have modules for this tube computer we need to photo and more stuff to scan and add. http://www.smecc.org/honeywell_datamatic_1000.htm In a message dated 1/29/2017 1:27:26 A.M. US Mountain Standard Time, billdegnan at gmail.com writes: On Jan 28, 2017 8:51 PM, "william degnan" <billdegnan at gmail.com> wrote: > > > On Jan 28, 2017 8:40 PM, "Chuck Guzis" <cclist at sydex.com> wrote: > > > > On 01/28/2017 05:12 PM, Douglas Taylor wrote: > > > I have a certificate that my father was given in 1957 for training on > > > a Honeywell Datamatic 1000 computer. > > > > > > Here is a summary of this 'advance' in computer technology from the > > > ACM: > > > > > > The DATAmatic 1000 (D-1000) is a high-capacity electronic > > > data-processing system designed specifically for application to the > > > increasingly complex problems and procedures of present-day > > > business. The system incorporates significant new systems techniques, > > > as well as several basically new component developments. One of the > > > outstanding features of the D-1000 is its ability to feed information > > > from magnetic tape into the central processor at a sustained rate of > > > 60,000 decimal-digits per second, and to deliver data after > > > processing back to magnetic tape at this same rate. The operational > > > speed of the central processor maintains full compatibility with the > > > high speed of information transfer. Consequently, the difficulties > > > caused by programs which are either tape limited or processing-time > > > limited do not arise in the majority of commercial applications of > > > this system. > > > > Doug, you can probably re-live part of your dad's experience. There are > > some Datamatic 1000 manuals on bitsavers: > > > > http://bitsavers.informatik.uni-stuttgart.de/pdf/honeywell/datamatic_1000/ > > > > Big, wide tape reels. > > > > --Chuck > > > > I am pretty sure I have the first print of that manual, but I thought Datamatic was a pre-Burroughs machine not Honeywell...I am not home to check, if you'd like me to I can Monday. That's the base 10 system, right? I also have some orig decimal counter tubes IIRC too. I suppose that all qualifies as pretty rare. Or I am confusing with a different, similarly - named system. > Bill Yup I must be mistaken. Nevermind I'll check when I get back to my office B

9 years, 1 month

3
3
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ps2 memory - with weird square silver IBM Circuit packaged memory on the ...

by COURYHOUSE＠aol.com

Thanks Guy! Mystery solved! I will put this note in with the memory stick.. Ed# _www.smecc.org_ (http://www.smecc.org) In a message dated 1/28/2017 6:00:46 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time, ggs at shiresoft.com writes: At one time IBM was the largest manufacturer of memory and consumed *all* of it internally (e.g. for IBM products). At the time all of IBM?s ICs were in the ?aluminum? cans unless they needed more exotic cooling. In the PS/2 days, we ended up using some IBM produced memory because we could get a better internal transfer price than buying out in the market because the various IBM fabs had a bit of excess capacity and wanted it used. TTFN - Guy > On Jan 28, 2017, at 11:44 AM, COURYHOUSE at aol.com wrote: > > The talk of PS2 memory brought something back to me I have in a drawer > here... > > ps2 memory - with weird square silver IBM Circuit packaged memory on > the stick. > > What is the story on this? was IBM making it's own memory chips or just > repackaging them into > their silver square packaging? > > Now I will have to dig these things out. > > Thank Ed# _www.smecc.org_ (http://www.smecc.org) >

9 years, 1 month

2
1
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ps2 memory - with weird square silver IBM Circuit packaged memory on the sti

by COURYHOUSE＠aol.com

The talk of PS2 memory brought something back to me I have in a drawer here... ps2 memory - with weird square silver IBM Circuit packaged memory on the stick. What is the story on this? was IBM making it's own memory chips or just repackaging them into their silver square packaging? Now I will have to dig these things out. Thank Ed# _www.smecc.org_ (http://www.smecc.org)

9 years, 1 month

3
2
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Looking to read past EOT on DDS/DLT/LTO

by sieler＠allegro.com

Re: > From: Chuck Guzis <cclist at sydex.com> > I believe that ANSI refers to them as "partitions", IIRC, defined by a > special page in the MODE_SELECT command. Each partition has its own EOD. > > Using the MODE_SENSE code page 11h will turn up information as to a tape > bing multi-partitioned. As it happens, they (partitions vs. set marks) are different concepts. A DDS-1, -2, -3, -4 can be either a single unpartitioned tape *or* it can have precisely/exactly/only two partitions. (I didn't check newer DDS standards) Completely separately from any discussion of partitions: a tape basically consists of entries of type "Data" (user data) and "Separator Marks". The standards (e.g., ECMA-139 / ECMA-150 / ECMA-170 for DDS-1, ECMA-198 for DDS-2, ECMA-236 for DDS-3, and ECMA-288 for DDS-4) specify: "In this ECMA Standard, there are two types of Separator Marks which are referred to as Separator 1 and Separator 2. Some other standards, e.g. those which define an interface between a tape drive and a host computer, use the terms "file mark" and "set mark" to denote Separator Marks. It is recommended that Separator 1 be equated to file mark and Separator 2 be equated to set mark. ("file mark", of course, is also referred to as an EOF (End Of File)) I knew DDS-* drives were insanely complicated, but after reading parts of the standards, I now realize I was grossly underestimating just how insanely complicated they are! SDLT-1 supports "set mark" (and they're called that, not "Separator Mark 2" :), but not partitions. DLT-1 and Ultrium-1 support neither "set mark" (nor multiple kinds of separators) nor partitions. Stan (ECMA = European Computer Manufacturers Association) ISO/IEC 17462 = ECMA-288

9 years, 1 month

1
0
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Sorcerer Software

by terry＠webweavers.co.nz

For anyone who has a newly acquired an Exidy Sorcerer, this page might be helpful. http://www.classic-computers.org.nz/blog/2017-01-23-software-for-real-sorce… Terry (Tez)

9 years, 1 month

1
0
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crimp connectors that fit over wire wrap posts

by fritzm＠fritzm.org

Hi all, I?m working on an RK11-C, and need to repair a couple of components that are flown between backplane pins via crimp terminals that slip directly onto the wire wrap pins. I?m having trouble sourcing these connectors, probably because I don?t know the correct terms to search under. Anybody have a suggest? cheers, ?FritzM.

9 years, 1 month

2
2
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old 5.25" floppies 1S/2D

by sales＠elecplus.com

I have a carton of old 1S/2D floppy diskettes here. I used them 28 years ago to make backups. I have no use for them, and I have no idea if they still work. They will need to be formatted. There are in boxes of 10. A few might be 2S/2D. FFS to a good home. Cindy Croxton Electronics Plus 1613 Water Street Kerrville, TX 78028

9 years, 1 month

1
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XTIDE - boot menu callback via int 18h

by rdawson16＠hotmail.com

Thanks all for getting me going. I cheated at first with a real Maxtor 20 GB hard drive, and Alexadre's suggestion to FDISK with just a few cylinders, and that worked. Now, going to a CF card, same plan, no errors with FDISK, FORMAT C:/s, and I can see command.com is there if I boot from a floppy. I am able to read/write to the CF just fine, copy to it with /V and all OK. It will not boot from XTIDE, and I get this error. I read that some CF will not work. Can you recommend ones that do, and I will go get one. They one giving me trouble is: Sandisk Ultra II, I have had it for years in the junkbox. SDCFH-2048 is what XTIDE reports. Will a new, current CF fix the problem? Enlighten me on what boot menu callback means. Thanks, Randy

9 years, 1 month

1
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I finall flashed my XTIDE rev 1, now what?

by rdawson16＠hotmail.com

Yippie! But what a long haul it was. Just getting the data on a disk that I could read was a nightmare. I bought a USB 3.5 floppy drive (Sabrent SBT-UFDB, $19 at Frys), and it does not write 720K reliably. Comments on the net say it does not work, under windows 7 lots of errors, but bringing up in Linux (Fedora) it sort of does work. Remember to unmount so that it flushes the data out to the floppy! After several back and forth tries with abort, retry, fail errors, I finally got xtidecfg to run on the target (Compaq model 1, the luggable XT). Next, I could not flash the EEPROM. Turns out I had one 74F573 in upside down. $100 Digikey overnight later, I got one (several, I spared all the parts and the EEPROM just in case). OK now XTIDE comes up on boot, and responds with the timeout screen and lets me select the floppy for the boot. I have a Compact Flash adapter and card, while I wait for the soldering iron to heat up and make the power cable for it, I wanted to ask, what are the next steps? FORMAT, or FDISK /MBR? What is the recommended way to initialize the CF flash and put a system on it? Anything special to do, so that I can use the whole 2GB of the flash? Thanks to anyone who has been there and done this... Randy

9 years, 1 month

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Looking to read past EOT on DDS/DLT/LTO

by sieler＠allegro.com

Hi, Maciej mentioned "winding a tape past a medium error and read...". I have several times successfully skipped past media errors on DDS-1 drives by doing a FSF (Forward Skip File ... tells drive to skip to the next EOF). (Although, IIRC, once I encountered a read error, I couldn't do that ... I recall having to 'sneak up' on the error by positioning the drive to the prior EOF and then skipping forward. But since I haven't done it for more than 10 year, maybe my memories are classic, er, rusty.) My recollection is that DDS-1 (and perhaps -2?) had 'set marks' that few people knew about, and even fewer ever used. The explanation I recall is that the drive could do a "forward to next setmark" *much* faster than "forward to next EOF". (BTW, when reading, a setmark was reported like an EOF (although if you requested extra status you could tell them apart).) I never tried using the skip-to-next-setmark to get past errors, partially because the tapes I was recovering years ago didn't have setmarks. (Set marks are one reason I prefer my tape archiving format, since I record them, as well as retry information :) Al: thanks for expanding my answer about cutting out a portion of the tape ... I'd forgotten about helical recording. (Note that on ordinary multi-track tapes, cutting a section does indeed lose data from n different places on the tape ... any tape that requires multiple passes over the tape to get from BOT to the full capacity of the tape.) Stan

9 years, 1 month

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Service Manual Direct 831, Direct 825 or Basic Four S/10

by ad＠ardiehl.de

finally got one of the Basic Four S10. Does someone have a service manual for these or the Direct Inc. models ? The one i got was a little bit damaged due to shipping within Europe. Found at least one transistor and one cap that broke off the video monitor board. Will try to fix that next week. The Basic Four S/10 was developed and build by Direct Inc, Santa Clara, California. They sold the machine as a serial terminal (Dec/HP) as well as a terminal in combination with a CP/M 2 board. Direct 825 with CP/M: http://basicfour.de/pics/s10/Direct_825.jpg Direct 831 as a terminal without the second cpu/floppy controller board: http://basicfour.de/pics/s10/s-l500.jpg and the basic four s/10: http://www.obsoletecomputermuseum.org/mai/ Btw, I'm also looking for MAI Basic Four Software for the Models 2000, 210/510/730 Thx machine with floppy and terminal boards: http://basicfour.de/pics/s10/3.jpg --------------------- Armin Diehl ad at ardiehl.de

9 years, 1 month

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General Electric EF-140

by bill.gunshannon＠hotmail.com

I hope this is considered apporopriate for this list, if not, I am sure y'all will let me know. :-) And, yes, it is about a truly classic computer. I am trying to restore my 1961 General Electric EF-140 Analog Computer. The insulation on all of the wires has basicly turned to stick goo. I would really like to rebuild it. Does anyone have or know where I might find a wiring diagram for this box? I got it thru National Technical Schools when I was about 11 years old and sadly, while it survived, my mother threw out all of the courses and manuals that came with the correspondence course I took back then. If someone has it but it's buried away, no problem. I just loaned it for a static display at the University where I used to work in the CS Department. I expect they will want to keep it for at least the Semester. On another note, it's good to be back on the list after many years away. I still have and use a number of systems that people here would consider more in line with their notions of Classic Computers. Some of you may even remember me. I was and still am big on PDP-11's and VAX. But I also have a number of old Micros as well (and some of the newer ones that try to bring the old flavor back like the Maximite and The P112.) bill

9 years, 1 month

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ISO: Documentation for a Northern Scientific NS-600

by derschjo＠gmail.com

Hi all -- Went spelunking in a hoarder's basement this morning (long story) and came out with a few interesting items, including a Northern Scientific NS-600. >From what I can tell it's from the late 60s and is capable of storing and analyzing digital data (and can display it on a tiny scope display). There isn't any real documentation out there, just a few research papers here and there noting its use in various experiments. Anyone have anything on this? Thanks, Josh

9 years, 1 month

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Anyone have the service guide for a Sanyo VM4209 monitor?

by AppleCorey＠optonline.net

I need the schematics. I'm not sure I trust all those "manual" sites on the web that want to sell you a PDF for $15. My monitor seems to be acting up. Thanks in advance, Cheers, Corey corey cohen u??o? ???o?

9 years, 1 month

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Looking to read past EOT on DDS/DLT/LTO

by sieler＠allegro.com

Hi, We have a friend with a "tape" (DDS, DLT, or LTO ... don't know which yet) to which was written a system backup. Thousands of files, with an EOF between each file, and a double EOF + EOT at the end. The problem: They then accidentally overwrote the start of the tape yesterday with about 1 KB of data, plus EOT. (By EOT I mean the "logical end-of-tape" indicator placed there by the drive firmware when a tape is rewound / unloaded after it's been written to.) So, we want to try to recover the files after that 1 KB + EOT. On reel tape, no problem. I'd read until I hit the double EOF, and then skip the partial file (by looking for the next EOF), and then...gravy. But, DDS/DLT/LTO drives won't let me get past that darn logical end-of-tape. Are there solutions anyone can suggest? I've only heard of two approaches: 1. find a drive with modified firmware, one that treats an EOT like an EOF While I heard some existed for DDS-1 drives, that lead was 20 years old :) 2. insert tape, start writing (at the start), write until I'm sure I've written over the area where the EOT was, power cycle the drive read from the start, skipping over the data I just wrote, handle the possible corrupted record, and the I've got good data from past the EOT (note that this method loses a small amount of old data past the EOT that we overwrote). On DDS drives, I used this technique once or twice successfully, although I seem to recall I couldn't do the "read until I get to the good stuff" because of the probability of a bad record on the tape (where the power fail was) ... but the solution was to load the tape and then say "skip forward 3 EOFs", and the skip-to-EOF would quietly ignore (usually) any bad record before the EOF. BTW, if this is DDS, it's unlikely to be newer than DDS-4 (but possible), if it's DLT, it's likely one of the first two or three generations, and if it's LTO, it's extremely unlikely to be anything other than LTO-1. thanks, Stan

9 years, 1 month

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IBM 7074 and then some: "Systems we love" conference

by steve.maresca＠gmail.com

Just wanted to share an excerpted story just sent to me by a colleague, regarding an IBM 7074 supplying data to Java middleware, ultimately feeding a modern webapp stack: http://thenewstack.io/happens-use-java-1960-ibm-mainframe/ This comes from a conference which occurred last month titled "Systems we love" : http://thenewstack.io/systems-we-love/ http://systemswe.love/ Cheers, Steve

9 years, 1 month

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Fourth release of the HP 3000 Series III simulator

by jdbryan＠acm.org

The fourth release of the HP 3000 Series III simulator is now available >from the Computer History Simulation Project (SIMH) site: https://github.com/simh/simh This release adds the HP 32234A COBOL II Extended Instruction Set firmware, enabling execution of programs produced by the COBOL II ('74 and '85) compilers. The new SET CPU CIS option enables the firmware. In addition, two new debug tracing options were added. The SET CPU DEBUG=OPND command turns on memory byte operand tracing to show the values supplied, e.g., to the CMPS (Compare String) instruction. The SET CPU DEBUG=EXEC command turns on execution tracing for a specific instruction or instruction family. The full set of new features is listed in the release notes that accompany the simulator source files. In addition, an updated HP 3000 Simulator User's Guide that covers the new commands is provided in Microsoft Word format with the source download and also as a PDF file at: http://alum.mit.edu/www/jdbryan/hp3000_doc.pdf The preconfigured MPE-V/R disc image available here: http://simh.trailing-edge.com/kits/mpe-vr-software-kit.zip ...has been updated to add the COBOL II runtime routines to the system Segmented Library and COBOL example programs to the OPERATOR.SYS account. The startup command files also now enable the COBOL II instruction set. -- Dave Bryan

9 years, 1 month

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DECUS TECO for OS/8

by chd＠chdickman.com

I am trying to build the DECUS TECO with VT support for OS/8. TECO came from ibiblio and the assembler listing says it is OS/8 TECO VERSION 7. I am using MACREL-V1B. It all assembles without error, but the linker fails with a NO ROOM message. I can't find any information on what NO ROOM means from the MACREL documentation. This is using SIMH PDP8 with 32k words. I also found MACREL V2 source, but it in in MACREL, but I have not tried to bootstrap it using V1. I was hoping to make source editing just a little bit easier. -chuck

9 years, 1 month

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11/34 with drives on ebay

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Jay West > A fully working 11/34, in a complete period rack (with all side panels > and filler panels), and 4 working RL02's, VT220, a Decwriter ... > $1000 isn't realistic at all. It should definitely be higher than that. I concur. My methodology for _accurately_ valuing something like this is to create as comprhensive a list of sub-items as possible, then value them, and then add it up; something like this: $A Bare H960 $B 2 x H960 side panels $C BA11-K (box and power supply) $D BA11-K slides $E DD11-PK backplane $F PDP-11/34 CPU boards $G MS11-L $H 4 x RL02 drives $I 15 x RL02 packs etc etc. Alas, the listing doesn't say exactly which boards are in the 11/34 (and not even any pictures of the insides). I don't know exactly how much $A, etc are - I have varying levels of experience with these things, but for instance, I know that MS11-L's are much desired, and command high prices. Note that the listing does have a reserve, so their actual asking price is above $5K. Getting that total out of one bidder may be a bit too far; they might have better luck getting it sold if it was a couple of smaller lots. Noel

9 years, 1 month

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Looking to read past EOT on DDS/DLT/LTO

by sieler＠allegro.com

Hi, Thanks for the notes/comments/suggestions. Recovery service: not that I've found. Most of the ones I know of have *us* as their HP 3000 experts (i.e., we help them :) ... when I've asked in recent years about handling damaged or overwritten DDS (or newer) tapes, I've always been told 'no'. The "cut out some tape" would definitely not work. At least LTO, probably DLT, have multiple tracks and the tape makes multiple passes from start of tape to end of tape as it writes the entire tape. That means on a 16 track tape, you'd lose part of 16 different sections if you cut out a piece of tape (ignoring the question of whether or not the drive could resynch after such an error :) Eric's reply is closest to home ... that's why I mentioned a 'hacked' drive, hoping someone might know specialists who have one. Chuck mentioned an approach I had mentioned: the power kill during writing approach. I'm hesitant to try that as it will (based on dim memory of doing it 15 years ago on a DDS) lose a small bit of data ... if it works at all. I'm giving up for now. thanks, Stan > From: Eric Smith <spacewar at gmail.com> > > I hope someone can prove me wrong, but I think that short of a major effort > to hack the drive firmware, the data is gone. Modern tape drives are "too > smart" to allow reading past logical EOT, and the tape format is too > complex to allow fooling the firmware by any simple means. > > ------------------------------ > From: "Nico de Jong" <nico at farumdata.dk> > > I've had the same problem some years back, with a DDS-3, IIRC > > I did some research, and the most reasonable outcome was that it was not > possible by normal means, because some algorithm reading synchronisation > data couldnt find out what was happening, so, the backup was ruined..... > > ---- > From: Chuck Guzis <cclist at sydex.com> > > With nothing left to lose, I suppose that one might overwrite the EOT > and then kill power during the write, then attempt to read backward from > the end of the tape. > > ------------------------------ > From: "js at cimmeri.com" <js at cimmeri.com> > > Would it be possible to just physically > cut the 1kb + EOT portion of tape out, > and then attempt to read from > beginning? I suppose this would depend > on how the backup data is formatted on > the tape (using some kind of container > format with error checking, for instance). > > ------------------------------ > From: Jerry Weiss <jsw at ieee.org> > > Have you approached a commercial recovery service for a quote? > A few do tape media. Whether they quote or not may provide a data point about how feasible it may be. ----

9 years, 1 month

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Looking to read past EOT on DDS/DLT/LTO

by cruff＠ruffspot.net

For the NCAR Mass Storage System, when we upgraded our tape drives to Sun STK T10000 models, we lost the ability to skip past the EOT mark with standard firmware. We asked Sun to provide a firmware modification that let us issue four or so reads after reaching the EOT mark, and the drive would then continue on until it found good data again. We didn?t need it very often, but it was handy to recover single copy data.

9 years, 1 month

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PS2 Model 30 memory

by jwsmail＠jwsss.com

I have a friend who wants to add more memory to a PS2 model 30. They are off in the wilds of Oz and acquired this for a good price and would like to just upgrade it to run some programs they have which do not run on modern faster systems. I know this is a snake pit to deal with, and can get more info if someone can get me some information or point me at references for them to look at. What I'm really interested in doing is seeing if just the memory can be had, and it isn't easy to find Sim modules these days, though I suspect there are metric tons of them rotting in places forgotten and not recycled yet. anyway any info to get started would be useful. i see there are entire systems on epay, and may suggest just buying one of them and cannibalizing them for their memory should the asking price for the individual SIMM parts be ridiculous. i could buy the system, us the system to be sure the memory does something and send them the memories alone for reasonable shipping. It would also net them a backup hard drive which are very scarce in even good times as well. I'm hoping that the memories were common to other systems and not some oddball special IBM part. Old advertisements that show up on google show a number of people making them, but that doesn't mean they can be found now of course. thanks jim

9 years, 1 month

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Selling off my collection

by sellam.ismail＠gmail.com

I'm starting the long process of selling off my entire collection. There's a lot to go through. Some more details are here: http://www.vcfed.org/forum/showthread.php?55964-Selling-Off-the-Collection And some photos are here: http://s350.photobucket.com/user/Sellam_Abraham/library/ Keep in mind the machines represented here are the cream of the crop. I have much more stuff in the form of 40 pallets that needs to get sorted through and moved on. I'll be much more inclined to sell off that stuff quickly, but with these I am ready to take my time. That being said, I'll entertain any reasonable offer. I still have a bunch of photos of magazines to post (just scratching the surface). Pallets worth. Probably best to contact me directly if you're interested in something. I have much, much more. Thanks for looking! Sellam

9 years, 1 month

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Selling off my collection

by COURYHOUSE＠aol.com

How much is the - -Bell Labs MAC-8 Microprocessor Trainer Kit thanks Ed# In a message dated 1/25/2017 11:01:50 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time, sellam.ismail at gmail.com writes: I'm starting the long process of selling off my entire collection. There's a lot to go through. Some more details are here: http://www.vcfed.org/forum/showthread.php?55964-Selling-Off-the-Collection And some photos are here: http://s350.photobucket.com/user/Sellam_Abraham/library/ Keep in mind the machines represented here are the cream of the crop. I have much more stuff in the form of 40 pallets that needs to get sorted through and moved on. I'll be much more inclined to sell off that stuff quickly, but with these I am ready to take my time. That being said, I'll entertain any reasonable offer. I still have a bunch of photos of magazines to post (just scratching the surface). Pallets worth. Probably best to contact me directly if you're interested in something. I have much, much more. Thanks for looking! Sellam

9 years, 1 month

1
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8085 Address Decoding

by witchy＠binarydinosaurs.co.uk

Evening folks, Could a stuck bit or floating pin cause this address sequence? 0.142261562500000,'3896' (0x0F38) 0000111100111001 0.142262937500000,'3897' (0x0F39) 0000111100111010 0.142264250000000,'3898' (0x0F3A) 0000111100111011 0.142265562500000,'3899' (0x0F3B) 0000111100111100 0.142266937500000,'3900' (0x0F3C) 0000111100111101 0.142268250000000,'3901' (0x0F3D) 0000111100111110 0.142269562500000,'3902' (0x0F3E) 0000111100111111 0.142270937500000,'61618' (0xF0B2) 1111000010110010 (should be 0x0FB2?) 0.142271937500000,'61619' (0xF0B3) 1111000010110011 (should be 0x0FB3?) 0.142261562500000,'3896' (0x0F38) 0000111100111001 0.142262937500000,'3897' (0x0F39) 0000111100111010 0.142264250000000,'3898' (0x0F3A) 0000111100111011 0.142265562500000,'3899' (0x0F3B) 0000111100111100 0.142266937500000,'3900' (0x0F3C) 0000111100111101 0.142268250000000,'3901' (0x0F3D) 0000111100111110 0.142269562500000,'3902' (0x0F3E) 0000111100111111 0.142270937500000,'61618' (0xF0B2) 1111000010110010 0.142271937500000,'61619' (0xF0B3) 1111000010110011 0.142261562500000,'3896' (0x0F38) 0000111100111001 0.142262937500000,'3897' (0x0F39) 0000111100111010 0.142264250000000,'3898' (0x0F3A) 0000111100111011 0.142265562500000,'3899' (0x0F3B) 0000111100111100 0.142266937500000,'3900' (0x0F3C) 0000111100111101 0.142268250000000,'3901' (0x0F3D) 0000111100111110 0.142269562500000,'3902' (0x0F3E) 0000111100111111 0.142270937500000,'61618' (0xF0B2) 1111000010110010 0.142271937500000,'61619' (0xF0B3) 1111000010110011 My Executel ROM disassembly puts this block of code between 0x0F38 and 0x0F3E: 0F38 L0F38: 0F38 : 7B "{" [4] mov a,e 0F39 : 95 " " [4] sub l 0F3A : 5F "_" [4] mov e,a 0F3B : 7A "z" [4] mov a,d 0F3C : 9C " " [4] sbb h 0F3D : 57 "W" [4] mov d,a 0F3E : C9 " " [10] ret Does that make sense? I might not have a full disassembly since L0F38 is only called from two places and neither of them jump back to 0x0FB2 but I know that doesn't necessarily mean it's wrong. Cheers, -- Adrian/Witchy Binary Dinosaurs creator/curator Www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk - the UK's biggest private home computer collection?

9 years, 1 month

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