I'm sorry about fouling up the title to this thing . . . it's about those
old FDC/HDC Doc's etc, I ran across a couple of months ago. A few were
missing, though I knew I had them somewhere. Now that they're found, I'm
trying to make a machine-readable and therefore searchable database.
If anyone wants copies, or if anyone can help with preparing these documents
for, of finding an accessible and stabile site for publication on the web,
your input/suggestions are welcome.
Dick
Dick
-----Original Message-----
From: Richard Erlacher <edick(a)idcomm.com>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Tuesday, September 21, 1999 12:41 AM
Subject: Re: Can anyone I.D. this part, possibly from IBM 5100
>In case anyone's interested, I've found my missing manual for the OMTI 10A
>SASI-bus-to-SA1000/Q2000 8" hard disk bridge controller and am scanning it.
>I also have the manual for the XEBEC 1410, as well as the WD1000&1002-05,
as
>well as the 1000-55 and 1001 from Western Digital. All these will be
>reduced to machine readable form eventually.
>
>If there's any urgency to your own need(s), let me know and I'll adjust the
>priority accordingly.
>
>Dick
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Wayne Smith <wsmith(a)gj.com>
>To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
><classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
>Date: Monday, September 20, 1999 11:24 PM
>Subject: Can anyone I.D. this part, possibly from IBM 5100
>
>
>>Last night I found a strange metal plate in one of the pockets of
>>one of my IBM 5100 manuals. It is stainless steel. Link here for
>>a scan:
>>
>>http://home.earthlink.net/~wmsmith/_uimages/plate.jpg
>>
>>Can anyone identify this? It does not appear related to
>>DC300 tapes. Thanks, all.
>>
>>Wayne Smith
>>
>>
>
Hi,
For years I am looking for some IBM 360/50 hardware manuals.
I am VERY interested in copies of :
- CE course material of this system
- The so-called MDM manual of the IBM 360/50
- Theory of Operation of the IBM 360/50
Anyone on this list who can help me ending my search for these IBM manuals ?
Henk Stegeman,
In case anyone's interested, I've found my missing manual for the OMTI 10A
SASI-bus-to-SA1000/Q2000 8" hard disk bridge controller and am scanning it.
I also have the manual for the XEBEC 1410, as well as the WD1000&1002-05, as
well as the 1000-55 and 1001 from Western Digital. All these will be
reduced to machine readable form eventually.
If there's any urgency to your own need(s), let me know and I'll adjust the
priority accordingly.
Dick
-----Original Message-----
From: Wayne Smith <wsmith(a)gj.com>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Monday, September 20, 1999 11:24 PM
Subject: Can anyone I.D. this part, possibly from IBM 5100
>Last night I found a strange metal plate in one of the pockets of
>one of my IBM 5100 manuals. It is stainless steel. Link here for
>a scan:
>
>http://home.earthlink.net/~wmsmith/_uimages/plate.jpg
>
>Can anyone identify this? It does not appear related to
>DC300 tapes. Thanks, all.
>
>Wayne Smith
>
>
Well, here's a list of what doc I've looked at so far, and, God be thanked,
that's most of it.
The format isTITLE followed by ORDER NUMBER # followed by number if more
than 1.
8086/8087/8088 MACRO ASSEMBLER OPERATING INSTRUCTIONS 121624-001 rev A
A USER'S GUIDE TO PROGRAM MANAGEMENT TOOLS 121958-00
ALTER TEXT EDITOR USER'S GUIDE 121956-001
BASIC-80 REFERENCE MANUAL 9800758-02
GUIDE TO WRITING DEVICE DRIVERS FOR THE iRMX 86 AND iRMX 88 I/O SYSTEMS
142926-003
INTELLEC DOUBLE DENSITY DISKETTE OPERATING SYSTEM HARDWARE REFERENCE MANUAL
98-422A
INTELLEC SERIES II MICROCOMPUTER DEVELOPMENT SYSTEM HARDWARE INTERFACE
MANUAL 9800555-02 rev B 2
INTELLEC SERIES III MICROCOMPUTER DEVELOPMENT CONSOLE OPERATING INSTRUCTIONS
121609-002 rev B
INTRODUCTION TO THE iRMX 86 OPERATING SYSTEM 9803124-03
iRMX 86 BASIC I/O SYSTEM REFERENCE MANUAL 9803123-04
iRMX 86 CONFIGURATION GUIDE 9803126-04
iRMX 86 DEBUGGER REFERENCE MANUAL 143323-001
iRMX 86 EXTENDED I/O SYSTEM REFERENCE MANUAL 143308-001
iRMX 86 INSTALLATION GUIDE 983125-04
iRMX 86 NUCLEUS REFERENCE MANUAL 9803122-03
iRMX 86 PROGRAMMING TECHNIQUES 142982-002
iRMX 86 SYSTEM DEBUG MONITOR REFERENCE MANUAL 143908-001
ISIS-II CREDIT CRT-BASED TEXT EDITOR USER'S GUIDE 9800902-02
ISIS-II PL/M-80 COMPILER OPERATOR'S MANUAL 98-300B
ISIS-II USER'S GUIDE 9800306-06 rev F 2
MCS-80/85 UTILITIES USER'S GUIDE 121617-001 rev A
MCS-86 ASSEMBLY LANGUAGE CONVERTER OPERATING INSTRUCTIONS FOR ISIS-II USERS
9800624-02
MCS-86 MACRO ASSEMBLER OPERATING INSTRUCTIONS FOR ISIS-II USERS 9800641-02
MCS-86 MACRO ASSEMBLY LANGUAGE REFERENCE MANUAL 9800640-02
PASCAL-86 USER'S GUIDE 121539-003
PL/M-80 PROGRAMMING MANUAL 9800268B 2
PL/M-86 PROGRAMMING MANUAL FOR 8080/8085-BASED DEVELOPMENT SYSTEMS
9800466-03 rev C 3
There are only one or two other documents unless I discover a box or two
more.
Though the containter with the FD's says iAPX sources, I see no reference
directly to iAPX on most of them. I've not examined them, however.
For now, I've agreed to give the manuals to Hans Franke. I don't have time
between now and VCF to get these scanned, so I'd like to arrange to get them
scanned and published on some fairly stabile web site somewhere, so any help
with the latter portion of this task would be appreciated. Since there's
such a large volume of this stuff (about a 30-35 cm high stack (12"-14")) I
was hoping to have it hauled out by someone going to VCF.
Dick
-----Original Message-----
From: morrison(a)t-iii.com <morrison(a)t-iii.com>
To: classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu <classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Cc: edick(a)idcomm.com <edick(a)idcomm.com>
Date: Monday, September 20, 1999 12:14 PM
Subject: RE: Intel OS DOC and SOURCE
>Not sure if this is relevant, but the Xerox S/W that comes with many
>scanners likes to read uncompressed TIFFs.
>
>Neil Morrison
>email:morrison@t-iii.com
>
>
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Richard Erlacher [SMTP:edick@idcomm.com]
>> Sent: Friday, September 17, 1999 10:41 PM
>> To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
>> Subject: Re: Intel OS DOC and SOURCE
>>
>> Well, I like my scanner because it has a sheetfeeder and because it's
>> legal
>> size, but, alas, it's only capable of a limited range of formats. After
>> all, I've had the thing for nearly ten years. Now, if you have a way to
>> massage the old style TIFF (targa) files into something better, perhaps
>> that
>> would be the thing to do.
>>
>> A lot depends on what requirements the TBD web host will have, and I'll
>> perhaps hold off until a site is found.
>>
>> OTOH, I did sort of allow that since Hans Franke is going to be at the
>> VCF,
>> though I'm not, I can arrange to get this stuff hauled out there for him
>> by
>> someone from here who's going. I will have to see whether he's willing
to
>> get this stuff scanned and appropriately compressed, then made available
>> via
>> the web.
>>
>> Wait and see . . .
>>
>> Dick
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Eric Smith <eric(a)brouhaha.com>
>> To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
>> <classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
>> Date: Friday, September 17, 1999 6:57 PM
>> Subject: Re: Intel OS DOC and SOURCE
>>
>>
>> >"Richard Erlacher" <edick(a)idcomm.com> wrote:
>> >> If there were a web site which would accomodate the many thousands of
>> pages
>> >> involved here I'd consider scanning the stuff and forwarding the
>> bitmaps
>> to
>> >> whoever wants them. Now, keep in mind that a typical TIFF of a
printed
>> page
>> >> in single-bit format is about 1 MB in size, and we're looking at a
>> 1-2'-high
>> >> stack of paper with both sides printed in most cases. LEt's see. . .
a
>> ream
>> >> is about 1-3/4" = 500 sheets . . . let's say 10 reams . . . so we're
>> looking
>> >> at 10 GB, right (GAWD! . . . I hope I've miscalculated!)
>> >
>> >No, for text and line art, just use TIFF Class F Group 4 compression.
>> >It's lossless, and for typical pages at 300 DPI it's only about 50K.
>> >Intricate pages somtimes wind up around 100K-120K.
>> >
>> >And although not all software can deal with that format, the Group 4
>> >fax compression is one of the native formats for PDF, so I now supply
>> >all of my scanned documents as PDF files. For a few examples, see:
>> > http://www.36bit.org/dec/
>> >
>> >Yes, I know that some people hate PDF format, and that you can't read
>> >them on a Commodore 64 or PDP-11/05. To which I say, too bad. I got
>> >many more complaints about other formats. Some people even wanted text
>> >pages in JPEG format, which is just about the worst conceivable format
>> >for them, since JPEG is a lossy format designed for continuous tone
>> >images.
>> >
>> >I've hacked a version of the imagepdf program from Thomas Metz's PDFLIB
>> >to directly import TIFF Class F Group 4 files into PDF files without
>> >decompressing them, so that it's not necessary to buy the $300 Acrobat
>> >program from Adobe.
>> >
>> >Eric
<I have to admit I am more than a little paranoid about spiders, and since
<watching a brown recluse segment on PBS, I simply don't poke my fingers
<into places I can't see.
My other no computer collecting half was bitten by a Brown Recluse years
ago at work (construction site trailer) and it was a nasty thing.
I'm very wary as we do have black widows and brown recluse in New England
and no doubt other nasty ones too. Most spiders that bite bring two risks
their venom and infection with the later being sometime worse.
take care and use Raid. Also most bug sprays are petroleum based and not
good for computers or cases.
Allison
Rumor has it that Aaron Christopher Finney may have mentioned these words:
>Coincidentally, relating my story to one of our clients brought a
>brown-recluse horror story out: she was bitten by one at home in Texas,
>went into a coma, and was paralyzed for nearly two weeks after. After more
>than a month in the hospital, she eventually regained full motor
>function and could speak without slurring...yikes.
Yikes is a *severe* understatement! Lemme tell ya, the classic computer
pickins' sure are slim up here, but stories like that make me damn glad to
live on the Canadian border. I've heard a few people say that the brown
recluse's might be able to survive up here, but I've never even heard of
someone seeing one - let alone confronting one myself.
[[ We have a lot of non-poisonous spiders up here in the summer and I get
bitten once every month or so -- Most folks get a nickel-sized welt for 3-5
days and might itch for a while from a bite from one of the nastier species
up here. Me? I usually get a dime-sized welt for 4-6 hours. Having been a
beekeeper for a few years does have it's advantages! ;-) ]]
Bringing this ontrack, tho: I *may* have stumbled across a mini-treasure of
Commie equipment. From what I hear, it sounds like a decked-out 64, one of
the real early PET's, and possibly a CBM machine. We'll see if this
actually pans out.
(It was used as a data collection device for a computerized farm feeding
system. One of the first dozen installed in North America, from what I
understand. This could be interesting...)
Take care,
Roger "Merch" Merchberger
--
Roger "Merch" Merchberger --- sysadmin, Iceberg Computers
Recycling is good, right??? Ok, so I'll recycle an old .sig.
If at first you don't succeed, nuclear warhead
disarmament should *not* be your first career choice.
<All I do is get the shop vac out andd suck out the case clean upon opening
<Also, with winter oming on it doesn't hurt to leave the eqauipment outside
<a day or two (sheltered) in subzero temps. Really good for killing off
<spiders, roaches, etc.
A good thing for many reasons. I've also been know to take really grungy
stuff apart outdoors in the sun and litterally soap it up and hose it down.
Never lost any equipment tht way but the stuff running out the bottom was
often scary.
Allison
I can't get in at all. If I had another system, I could
mount the volume and jigger the /etc/passwd file. But I
don't.
I can't even boot the kernal manually--
Jeff
On Sun, 19 Sep 1999 23:50:57 -0400 (EDT) "Sean 'Captain Napalm' Conner"
<spc(a)armigeron.com> writes:
>It was thus said that the Great jeff.kaneko(a)juno.com once stated:
>>
>>
>> Guys:
>>
>> I just scored a HP 9000/340 (I think), and the hard drive
>> has HP/UX loaded on it. I don't know the root password,
>> of course. Anybody know of a way to break into this, or
>> should I wipe it and start over?
>
> Can you log into it at all, with any account? If not, and you can't
>get
>it on the network, then you might as well wipe the disk and start
>over. If,
>however, you can get logged in, check `/etc/passwd'. If each entry
>looks
>like:
>
> root:Anu2szvaCOvwg:0:0:root:/root:/bin/tcsh
>
>(where the `:' delimeted second field is all characters) then you have
>a
>chance by running the file through a UNIX password cracking program.
>If,
>however, it looks like:
>
> root:x:0:0:root:/root:/bin/tcsh
>
>or
>
> root:*:0:0:root:/root:/bin/tcsh
>
>you might as well wipe the disk and start over. That is, unless, the
>person
>you recieved it from knows the root password (or knows someone that
>has the
>root password).
>
> -spc (But only wipe the disk if you have a copy of the OS to
>reinstall.
> If not, there are still ways ... )
>
___________________________________________________________________
Get the Internet just the way you want it.
Free software, free e-mail, and free Internet access for a month!
Try Juno Web: http://dl.www.juno.com/dynoget/tagj.
>It's an Apple IIe on a card. You probably need the software to make it run.
Software is required, but it's probably on Apple's ftp site. If not, I
remember seeing it in AOL's file libraries.
>Incidentally, the card only works with the LC as far as I know.
I believe it will work in a Color Classic, also.
>The connector may be for adding a 5 1/4" disk drive.
It uses the later 5.25" floppy drives (Unidisk?), not the Disk II drive.
Tom Owad
---------------------------Applefritter---------------------------
Apple prototypes, Apple II & early Mac clones, and the Compubrick.
------------------<http://www.applefritter.com/>------------------
><That eZ80 supposed to be 4x faster than original z80. Cool, nice to
><see a old dog with new tricks pop up again.
><
><It's on the slashdot.org, I saw it moments ago.
>
>???? What in the world are they babbling about?
>
> Well the original z80 was 2.5mhz and that was eclipsed some 10+
>years ago with Z80Hs and Z180s at greater than 10mhz. Now you can get
>z180s in cmos to 33mhz and the 32bit wide Z380 (with native z80) to
>20+mhz (in my 1996 data book, they are faster now).
>
>Where is the news?
I suspect that it's only news to the slashdot crowd. "Two (or three)
decade-old architecture still doing real work" is news for 99% of the folks
out there, though it isn't to us :-).
--
Tim Shoppa Email: shoppa(a)trailing-edge.com
Trailing Edge Technology WWW: http://www.trailing-edge.com/
7328 Bradley Blvd Voice: 301-767-5917
Bethesda, MD, USA 20817 Fax: 301-767-5927
<That eZ80 supposed to be 4x faster than original z80. Cool, nice to
<see a old dog with new tricks pop up again.
<
<It's on the slashdot.org, I saw it moments ago.
???? What in the world are they babbling about?
Well the original z80 was 2.5mhz and that was eclipsed some 10+
years ago with Z80Hs and Z180s at greater than 10mhz. Now you can get
z180s in cmos to 33mhz and the 32bit wide Z380 (with native z80) to
20+mhz (in my 1996 data book, they are faster now).
Heck I'm building a system using 12.5mhz z280s as a step up from the cmos
84c010 (10mhz cmos z80s). Oh, all of these are close to 10 years old.
Where is the news?
Allison
<Now I could access all hardware, but even within almost a year,
<I couldn't discover the processor beneth - well, it was just
<a complete hidden and 'non standard' design. Eventualy Sharp
<published an assemb manual.
I think the cpu was NEC 7806, 6k rom 128bytes ram plus external bus
and IO. The chip is z80 registers but NOT z80 compatable instruction
set. It's bigger brother is the 78pg11 and friends.
Allison
Last night I found a strange metal plate in one of the pockets of
one of my IBM 5100 manuals. It is stainless steel. Link here for
a scan:
http://home.earthlink.net/~wmsmith/_uimages/plate.jpg
Can anyone identify this? It does not appear related to
DC300 tapes. Thanks, all.
Wayne Smith
My first thought is to try:-
Don Lancaster's The Guru's Lair
http://www.tinaja.com
because I seem to remember him being involved with South West Technical
Products
Neil Morrison
email:morrison@t-iii.com
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Mike [SMTP:dogas@leading.net]
> Sent: Monday, September 20, 1999 3:18 PM
> To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
> Subject: Super Tech DAD-1 SS-50 board with a SWTPc 6809?
>
> Got one, no docs, dont know what it does... Does anyone?
>
> Thanks
> - Mike: dogas(a)leading.net
>
It's creeping up! A little over two weeks left...
In case anyone has been curious, or not... B^}
A couple of shots from within the depths of The Computer Garage of one
of the Altairs hard at work backing up disks for the VCF Faire exhibit have
made their way onto the 'Events and Appearances' page of the Computer
Garage web site.
Disorganized? Who me???
-jim
---
jimw(a)computergarage.org
The Computer Garage - http://www.computergarage.org
Computer Garage Fax - (503) 646-0174
>That eZ80 supposed to be 4x faster than original z80. Cool, nice to
>see a old dog with new tricks pop up again.
Just 4X faster? What about the Z180, Z280, and Z380, which are
even faster than that and have been available for years?
And, from what I can see (at http://www.zilog.com/ and
http://www.eetimes.com/story/OEG19990920S0022 ) it's not an actual
chip, but a design that you have to license to build into your
own FPGA/VLSI design.
--
Tim Shoppa Email: shoppa(a)trailing-edge.com
Trailing Edge Technology WWW: http://www.trailing-edge.com/
7328 Bradley Blvd Voice: 301-767-5917
Bethesda, MD, USA 20817 Fax: 301-767-5927
>> Is it possible to put a Unibus board in a qbus system, I know it
>> won't work, but will it physically fit into the backplane?
>Yes. Unibus and Qbus boards (and Omnibus boards for that matter) all use
>the same connectors -- 36 pin (18 pins to a side) 0.125" pitch edge
>connectors. A Quad-height board (4 connectors) for any of those buses is
>the same physical size.
>
>Putting a board in the 'wrong' system normally causes other things not to
>work, and may even cause damage, though.
I'm afraid that I was "wrong" about the board in the system. Digging
through my old Digital Pathways paperwork, I see that:
TCU-50 = Q-bus TOY clock
TCU-150 = Unibus TOY clock
My fault for relying on the "U" as meaning "Unibus" !
Tim.
GONE!!
Bidding is closed for this item
Bidding History (in order of bid amount):
oldcomputers (14)
Last bid at: $19,200.00
Date of bid: 09/19/99, 20:15:40 PDT
big-surf (149)
Last bid at: $19,100.00
Date of bid: 09/19/99, 21:02:05 PDT
apple-1 (82)
Last bid at: $9,999.00
Date of bid: 09/19/99, 19:54:44 PDT
spacenut (32)
Last bid at: $8,100.00
Date of bid: 09/19/99, 18:33:58 PDT
ciscoboy (70)
Last bid at: $7,500.00
Date of bid: 09/19/99, 17:59:25 PDT
mpz(a)earthlink.net (13)
Last bid at: $7,000.00
Date of bid: 09/18/99, 21:33:43 PDT
micromd (13)
Last bid at: $6,000.00
Date of bid: 09/19/99, 09:03:46 PDT
wind58 (13)
Last bid at: $3,100.00
Date of bid: 09/17/99, 06:37:51 PDT
pepe95 (1)
Last bid at: $3,000.00
Date of bid: 09/15/99, 07:12:42 PDT
george(a)racsys.rt.rain.com (8)
Last bid at: $3,000.00
Date of bid: 09/15/99, 07:52:08 PDT
sieler (39)
Last bid at: $1,550.66
Date of bid: 09/13/99, 16:12:14 PDT
retrobyte (16)
Last bid at: $1,500.00
Date of bid: 09/12/99, 18:49:11 PDT
sulumor (3)
Last bid at: $1,000.50
Date of bid: 09/12/99, 15:55:34 PDT
geary(a)acm.org (19)
Last bid at: $950.00
Date of bid: 09/12/99, 13:20:08 PDT
*!* (46)
Last bid at: $888.00
Date of bid: 09/10/99, 22:20:59 PDT
tjboldt (2)
Last bid at: $686.00
Date of bid: 09/10/99, 22:29:23 PDT
wetmouse (177)
Last bid at: $656.66
Date of bid: 09/10/99, 22:02:00 PDT
cyberjobe (0)
Last bid at: $600.00
Date of bid: 09/10/99, 14:17:18 PDT
interneter (30)
Last bid at: $575.00
Date of bid: 09/10/99, 07:45:41 PDT
mtmori(a)sycard.com (90)
Last bid at: $530.00
Date of bid: 09/10/99, 09:21:17 PDT
design.fort (19)
Last bid at: $510.00
Date of bid: 09/10/99, 05:21:39 PDT
joro-42 (19)
Last bid at: $500.00
Date of bid: 09/09/99, 23:52:13 PDT
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Innfogra(a)aol.com [SMTP:Innfogra@aol.com]
> Sent: Friday, September 17, 1999 11:44 PM
> To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
> Subject: Real Apple 1 Sale!
>
> I think this is a real Apple 1 sale, and in my own backyard.
> http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=162334931
>
> Less than 2 days to go.
>
> Paxton
Not sure if this is relevant, but the Xerox S/W that comes with many
scanners likes to read uncompressed TIFFs.
Neil Morrison
email:morrison@t-iii.com
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Richard Erlacher [SMTP:edick@idcomm.com]
> Sent: Friday, September 17, 1999 10:41 PM
> To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
> Subject: Re: Intel OS DOC and SOURCE
>
> Well, I like my scanner because it has a sheetfeeder and because it's
> legal
> size, but, alas, it's only capable of a limited range of formats. After
> all, I've had the thing for nearly ten years. Now, if you have a way to
> massage the old style TIFF (targa) files into something better, perhaps
> that
> would be the thing to do.
>
> A lot depends on what requirements the TBD web host will have, and I'll
> perhaps hold off until a site is found.
>
> OTOH, I did sort of allow that since Hans Franke is going to be at the
> VCF,
> though I'm not, I can arrange to get this stuff hauled out there for him
> by
> someone from here who's going. I will have to see whether he's willing to
> get this stuff scanned and appropriately compressed, then made available
> via
> the web.
>
> Wait and see . . .
>
> Dick
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Eric Smith <eric(a)brouhaha.com>
> To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
> <classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
> Date: Friday, September 17, 1999 6:57 PM
> Subject: Re: Intel OS DOC and SOURCE
>
>
> >"Richard Erlacher" <edick(a)idcomm.com> wrote:
> >> If there were a web site which would accomodate the many thousands of
> pages
> >> involved here I'd consider scanning the stuff and forwarding the
> bitmaps
> to
> >> whoever wants them. Now, keep in mind that a typical TIFF of a printed
> page
> >> in single-bit format is about 1 MB in size, and we're looking at a
> 1-2'-high
> >> stack of paper with both sides printed in most cases. LEt's see. . . a
> ream
> >> is about 1-3/4" = 500 sheets . . . let's say 10 reams . . . so we're
> looking
> >> at 10 GB, right (GAWD! . . . I hope I've miscalculated!)
> >
> >No, for text and line art, just use TIFF Class F Group 4 compression.
> >It's lossless, and for typical pages at 300 DPI it's only about 50K.
> >Intricate pages somtimes wind up around 100K-120K.
> >
> >And although not all software can deal with that format, the Group 4
> >fax compression is one of the native formats for PDF, so I now supply
> >all of my scanned documents as PDF files. For a few examples, see:
> > http://www.36bit.org/dec/
> >
> >Yes, I know that some people hate PDF format, and that you can't read
> >them on a Commodore 64 or PDP-11/05. To which I say, too bad. I got
> >many more complaints about other formats. Some people even wanted text
> >pages in JPEG format, which is just about the worst conceivable format
> >for them, since JPEG is a lossy format designed for continuous tone
> >images.
> >
> >I've hacked a version of the imagepdf program from Thomas Metz's PDFLIB
> >to directly import TIFF Class F Group 4 files into PDF files without
> >decompressing them, so that it's not necessary to buy the $300 Acrobat
> >program from Adobe.
> >
> >Eric
Guys:
I just scored a HP 9000/340 (I think), and the hard drive
has HP/UX loaded on it. I don't know the root password,
of course. Anybody know of a way to break into this, or
should I wipe it and start over?
Jeff
___________________________________________________________________
Get the Internet just the way you want it.
Free software, free e-mail, and free Internet access for a month!
Try Juno Web: http://dl.www.juno.com/dynoget/tagj.
>I have a QBus board that I would like to identify. Its made
>by Digital Pathways and the model number is TCU-50 Rev A. It
>is a quad size board and there are three small batteries in
>the top right corner of the board. There are no peripheral
>connectors on the card, so I figure its some type of clock
>or possibly a small amount of battery backed up storage (the
>machine it was take from was used for collecting process
>data). Any ideas of what it might be?
It's not a Q-bus board - what you have there is a Unibus clock board.
(There is a Q-bus version, not surprisingly called the TCQ-150.)
I posted Y2K patches to the Digital Pathways supplied RT-11 clock-reading
routines on vmsnet.pdp-11 a few years back, if you want to put this
board to use. Accessing the clock board is very simple; it's four
words from 160770 through 160776. The first word contains the date
(not in RT-11 bit order) as year (7 bits), month (5 bits), and day (5 bits),
the second word has the hour and minute, the third word has the number
of seconds, and the fourth word has the number of clock ticks.
With 100% certainty, you'll need to replace the batteries on the board.
--
Tim Shoppa Email: shoppa(a)trailing-edge.com
Trailing Edge Technology WWW: http://www.trailing-edge.com/
7328 Bradley Blvd Voice: 301-767-5917
Bethesda, MD, USA 20817 Fax: 301-767-5927
On Sun, 19 Sep 1999 09:58:54 -0700, wsmith(a)gj.com said:
>Has anyone ever heard of a "Kaypro PC-10"? The Kaypro PC models I am
>familiar with are the 16 and 2000. Someone is selling a manual for a PC-10
>on eBay:
>http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=164605910
>My guess is that it is an abortive non-portable PC effort.
It might be the same Kaypro XT clone that was sold by Ahrend in The
Netherlands. This was a very interesting machine. It had a passive
backplane, and the computer itself was on two cards. 8 Mhz V20, 20MB
hard disk, Hercules monochrome. Built like a tank, very reliable.
An autodetecting keyboard came with it, you could plug it in an XT or
an AT and it would always work. Ahrend did not sell too many of them,
after a few years they went out of the computer business (they are an
office furniture company originally).
Kees.
--
Kees Stravers - Geldrop, The Netherlands - kees.stravers(a)iae.nl
http://www.iae.nl/users/pb0aia/cm/ my Computer Home page
http://www.vaxarchive.org/ documentation on old VAX systems
http://vaxarchive.sevensages.org/ VAXarchive mirror
Net-Tamer V1.08.1 - Registered
You can boot the system in single user mode, remount / as read/write, then
use the passwd command to change the password. Reboot in multiuser, and you
should be ok.
-----Original Message-----
From: Bill Pechter <pechter(a)pechter.dyndns.org>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Monday, September 20, 1999 7:32 AM
Subject: Re: HP/UX, Passwords, and Rock 'n Roll.
>>
>> Guys:
>>
>> I just scored a HP 9000/340 (I think), and the hard drive
>> has HP/UX loaded on it. I don't know the root password,
>> of course. Anybody know of a way to break into this, or
>> should I wipe it and start over?
>>
>>
>> Jeff
>
>One possibility is booting up NetBSD or OpenBSD and using
>vi to blank out the password fields or using it to create a user
>account with no password and a SUID copy of a Unix shell.
>
>Bill
>
>---
> bpechter@shell.monmouth.com|pechter@pechter.dyndns.org
> Three things never anger: First, the one who runs your DEC,
> The one who does Field Service and the one who signs your check.
>
Dropped by a hamfest today. Got a DD11-DK, a RX11 board,
and a Macintosh LC.
Also got my newest and smallest toy yet!
It looks like a large calculator, and it's a little weatherbeaten, but
it's a computer. It's a silver obling piece badges as a "TRS-80 Pocket
Computer". It seems to undestand a subset of BASIC, it has a printer/cassette
interface (as a seperate unit, and the printer ribbon is shot), and acts
like any other TRS-80 I've met so far.
I have no clue as of the capabilities and limitations of this piece -
Anyone got any information? The LCD is cracked (t was dropped) and the case
is pretty beaten, but it seems to work fine. I'm probably going to open
it shortly, something inside it is rattling around.
Anyone else know any more about the unit? This looks neat enough I might try
to scan pictures of it and post them somewhere.
-------
A question for those who might have worked as exterminators putting
themselves through college...
Are there any potential risks to my old beauties by bug-bombing the
garage? I have had enough; I am still recovering from the effects of a
black widow bite I sustained while (stooopidly) reaching inside the main
cabinet of my HP-3000/37 the other day. Not too serious, apparently I'm
not particularly allergic and it was a rather mild bite, but I've felt
like I've had the flu for a few days. My doctor was amused that I got it
fooling around with computer artifacts, though, which led to me possibly
(crossed-fingers) inheriting some nifty old proprietary medical gear.
I'd like to just set off a few foggers in there, but my dilemma is that if
I cover up the gear with plastic well enough to keep the spray out, the
nasty little bastards may survive. Anyone done this? Thoughts?
Aaron
>I have a VaxStation 3520 in the garage that seems to boot.
If you either yank the graphics cards or hold the halt button in
during reset it'll use the MMJ as a serial console.
>It seems like a really nice box
>except for the BI bus
That's M-Bus, not VAXBI.
>(it has Qbus too!),
If you have the FTAM (Firefox Tape Adapter Module), you can only use
QBus devices that can tolerate upwards of 20 microseconds bus latency
(I have a specially modified RQDX3 somewhere...). If
you have the FQAM (Firefox QBus Adapter Module, designed after it
became apparent that FTAM was in trouble) the latencies are acceptable
but the QBus throughput is only about 250KB/s.
Welcome to the magic of write-back cache.
Roger Ivie
ivie(a)cc.usu.edu
>I assume that the board is mis-labelled or some mistake has
>been made, since I removed it from a working qbus system (an 11/73).
>Is it possible to put a Unibus board in a qbus system, I know it
>won't work, but will it physically fit into the backplane?
Yes, it will fit. If it was in there, well, then, maybe it really
is the Q-bus version. (Or my memory of TCU vs TCQ has faded...)
For that matter, Omnibus boards fit into Unibus and Q-bus backplanes too...
>I had trouble setting the clock on this system, maybe this is
>the reason.
If the RT-11 "TIME" command isn't incrementing, that has nothing to
do with the TCU - it's an indication that the line time clock (60Hz
for us) interrupt is somehow disabled.
With the board in, does it respond at its standard addresses of
160770 - 160776? If so, then it's installed in the right sort
of system.
You ought to see the value at 160774 incrementing once per second
if the clock is indeed ticking.
--
Tim Shoppa Email: shoppa(a)trailing-edge.com
Trailing Edge Technology WWW: http://www.trailing-edge.com/
7328 Bradley Blvd Voice: 301-767-5917
Bethesda, MD, USA 20817 Fax: 301-767-5927
>I have a QBus board that I would like to identify. Its made
>by Digital Pathways and the model number is TCU-50 Rev A. It
>is a quad size board and there are three small batteries in
>the top right corner of the board. There are no peripheral
>connectors on the card, so I figure its some type of clock
>or possibly a small amount of battery backed up storage (the
>machine it was take from was used for collecting process
>data). Any ideas of what it might be?
It's not a Q-bus board - what you have there is a Unibus clock board.
(There is a Q-bus version, not surprisingly called the TCQ-150.)
I posted Y2K patches to the Digital Pathways supplied RT-11 clock-reading
routines on vmsnet.pdp-11 a few years back, if you want to put this
board to use. Accessing the clock board is very simple; it's four
words from 160770 through 160776. The first word contains the date
(not in RT-11 bit order) as year (7 bits), month (5 bits), and day (5 bits),
the second word has the hour and minute, the third word has the number
of seconds, and the fourth word has the number of clock ticks.
With 100% certainty, you'll need to replace the batteries on the board.
--
Dr. Mark Green mark(a)cs.ualberta.ca
Professor (780) 492-4584
Director, Research Institute for Multimedia Systems (RIMS)
Department of Computing Science (780) 492-1071 (FAX)
University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, T6G 2H1, Canada
I have a QBus board that I would like to identify. Its made
by Digital Pathways and the model number is TCU-50 Rev A. It
is a quad size board and there are three small batteries in
the top right corner of the board. There are no peripheral
connectors on the card, so I figure its some type of clock
or possibly a small amount of battery backed up storage (the
machine it was take from was used for collecting process
data). Any ideas of what it might be?
--
Dr. Mark Green mark(a)cs.ualberta.ca
Professor (780) 492-4584
Director, Research Institute for Multimedia Systems (RIMS)
Department of Computing Science (780) 492-1071 (FAX)
University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, T6G 2H1, Canada
Hi,
Has anyone come across this machine before? It's a rubber-coated pen Windows
machine. Does anybody have any info on it? I just got one at the MIT Flea
today and am having some problems booting it.
Has anyone ever heard of a "Kaypro PC-10"? The Kaypro PC models I am familiar with are the 16 and 2000. Someone is selling a manual for a PC-10 on eBay:
http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=164605910
My guess is that it is an abortive non-portable PC effort.
On Thu, 16 Sep 1999 17:53:25 -0600 (MDT), vaxman(a)oldy.crwolff.com said:
8< snip helpful vms info >8
>> Thanks for all the info!
>>
>Welcome! try http://vaxarchive.org for more stuff... They seem to
>be having trouble staying up though, so try at different times of
>the day.
VAXarchive has indeed been down for a while, but it will be back!
The IP number of the machine hosting www.vaxarchive.org has been changed,
and there was a problem updating the name servers. It should be fixed
soon. In the mean time you can use the mirror at
http://vaxarchive.sevensages.orgwww.vaxarchive.org is the new name of vaxarchive.ml.org, it had to get
a new name after the ml.org service went away.
I'm glad you mentioned the site, makes me feel I'm not maintaining it for
nothing :-)
Kees.
--
Kees Stravers - Geldrop, The Netherlands - kees.stravers(a)iae.nl
http://www.iae.nl/users/pb0aia/cm/ my Computer Home page
http://www.vaxarchive.org/ documentation on old VAX systems
http://vaxarchive.sevensages.org/ VAXarchive mirror
Net-Tamer V1.08.1 - Registered
-----Original Message-----
From: Wayne Smith <wsmith(a)gj.com>
>Has anyone ever heard of a "Kaypro PC-10"? The Kaypro PC models I am
familiar with are the 16 and 2000. Someone is selling a manual for a PC-10
on eBay:
>
>
>http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=164605910
>
>My guess is that it is an abortive non-portable PC effort.
>
Yes, my boss owned a KayPro desktop XT or maybe it was an AT clone back in
1987. I got some of my work done on it that summer. I am not sure, but I
would imagine that that was the PC-10 or whatever back then. The 10
probably meant the size of the HDD.
I remember comparing it to the KayPro 2X I used at home and finding the CP/M
machine to be faster. One of the reasons I didn't upgrade until 1993. (I
upgraded to a $50 Packard Hell XT that I still have :-)
I have looked at Ebay and notice that the KayPro CP/M machines don't seem to
bring in much money. Makes me feel better about giving mine away in 1996.
Regards,
Jim, Tonkin Gulf Yacht Club Web Ring, www.TonkinYachts.cjb.net
Life is an endless struggle full of frustrations and challenges, but
eventually you find a hairstyle you like.
>This agrees with my statement. Note that you do not have to cancel bids if
>the reserve was not met and you don't want to sell. And your "valid reason"
>need be nothing more than you felt like it. Yes, you are obligated to sell
>to the legitimate high bidder (which presumably happened in the HP2114
>case)
Ah - but if you look further into the rules for cancelling, it states:
>You should only cancel bids if you have a good reason to. Also, please
>remember that bids cannot be reinstated once they've been canceled. Here
>are a few examples of a legitimate cancellation:
>
> Bidder contacts you to back out of the bid.
> You cannot verify the identity of the bidder, after trying all
> reasonable means of contact.
> You want to end your auction early because you no longer want to sell
> your item. In this case you must cancel all bids on your auction
> before ending the auction.
Note the last one here... "because you no longer want to sell your item".
This is not the same as no longer wanting to sell your item *on ebay*
because you have been offerred more off ebay...
I guess my feeling is that what the seller did was unethical since he did
want to sell the item. If he wanted to sell the item, and put it up for
bid, then he is accepting the risk, like anyone else, of not getting what
they would like for it. That should not be sufficient cause for stopping
the auction and making those who bid in good faith suffer from his
greediness.
>Because your cancellation will be put in the bidding history for this
>auction, bidders may ask you to explain your cancellation. So, please
>include a one-line explanation of your cancellation for the official
>record.
And from all the questions about what happened to the auction, and why
it was ended early... it would appear the seller didn't even do this.
Megan Gentry
Former RT-11 Developer
+--------------------------------+-------------------------------------+
| Megan Gentry, EMT/B, PP-ASEL | Internet (work): gentry!zk3.dec.com |
| Unix Support Engineering Group | (home): mbg!world.std.com |
| Compaq Computer Corporation | addresses need '@' in place of '!' |
| 110 Spitbrook Rd. ZK03-2/T43 | URL: http://world.std.com/~mbg/ |
| Nashua, NH 03062 | "pdp-11 programmer - some assembler |
| (603) 884 1055 | required." - mbg |
+--------------------------------+-------------------------------------+
>it's a computer. It's a silver obling piece badges as a "TRS-80 Pocket
>>Computer". It seems to undestand a subset of BASIC, it has a
printer/cassette
>>interface (as a seperate unit, and the printer ribbon is shot), and acts
>>like any other TRS-80 I've met so far.
They were also manditory purchases for freshmen for DeVry Institute's EET
courses circa '84
;)
Mike: dogas(a)leading.net
Does anyone have documentation on the USR Password Modem?
I have two of them I'd like to press back into service, but haven't a
clue how to set the password/callback control. Web searching on "USR
Password Modem" yields amusing, if not predictable, but irrelevant
results.
Regards,
Elmo
Today I hauled in something that I have no experience whatsoever with,
but that I'm sure most people in classiccmp own: a microvax II.
I don't know if it works, or how to hook a terminal to it to
test it. Here's what I've been able to gather:
Cards:
Slot description
1 CPU? it has two interesting-looking chips:
1: LSILIA 0485, 21-23413-01, DC379, TAC 8546
2: LSILIA 0486, 21-23389-01, DC379, CAC 8544
This is connected to a DB9M in the back panel (console goes here?
what is the pinout? what is the funny-labeled rotary switch next to
it?)
2 nemonix memory board, holds 56 TC511000AP-10 chips
3 dec memory board, holds 144 41256-212141302 chips
4 dec board, some labels are: LPWR M94V-1 25787, and "M7516" in the
extraction handle; connected to a DB15F in the back panel
5 dec board, (disk controller?), reads M7555 in the extraction handle,
connected to what seems to be an older RLL hard drive
Hard drive: RD53-A rev A
label in the back panel:
Model: 630QB-A2
product variation: changed from 630QB-A2 to DH630Q4E2 by WFD.
So what exactly is this beast and how can I test if it works?
Best regards,
Carlos.
On Sat, 18 Sep 1999, mark acierno wrote:
>is there a pdp8 mailing list????
There certainly is... PDP8-LOVERS:
Contact: pdp8-lovers-owner(a)onelist.com (James E. Carpenter)
Purpose: To facilitate communication and cooperation between
owners of vintage DEC computers, specifically, but not limited
to, the PDP-8 series of minicomputers. The list is gatewayed
to the Usenet newsgroup alt.sys.pdp8.
http://www.onelist.com/subscribe/pdp8-lovers
To subscribe, send email to
pdp8-lovers-subscribe(a)onelist.com
Listserver: ONElist
Another important PDP-8 online resources is the Usenet newsgroup "alt.sys.pdp8",
which gets a copy of Doug Jones' FAQ every two months (also readable at
http://www.cs.uiowa.edu/~jones/pdp8/
).
--
Tim Shoppa Email: shoppa(a)trailing-edge.com
Trailing Edge Technology WWW: http://www.trailing-edge.com/
7328 Bradley Blvd Voice: 301-767-5917
Bethesda, MD, USA 20817 Fax: 301-767-5927
is there a pdp8 mailing list????
mark acierno
>From: "Jay West" <jlwest(a)tseinc.com>
>Reply-To: classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu
>To: "Discussion re-collecting of classic computers"
><classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
>Subject: Re: INFO-PDP11 mailing list needs to move soon!
>Date: Sat, 18 Sep 1999 07:04:23 -0500
>
>I have a full time domain, and a burstable 10mb ethernet connection to two
>major backbones. I'd be willing to host the mailing list, and if desired
>would consider "absorbing" the charge of registering a domain just for the
>list.
>
>Jay West
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Bruce Lane <kyrrin(a)bluefeathertech.com>
>To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
><classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
>Date: Saturday, September 18, 1999 1:43 AM
>Subject: FW: INFO-PDP11 mailing list needs to move soon!
>
>
> > If any of you have a full-time domain under your control, and could
> >consider hosting the INFO-PDP11 mailing list server, please contact Pat
> >Barron as noted in the attached message.
> >
> > Thanks. Attachment follows.
> >
> >-=-=- <snip> -=-=-
> >
> >On Thu, 16 Sep 1999 18:29:53 -0400 (EDT), in vmsnet.pdp-11 you wrote:
> >
> >>>From: Pat Barron <pat(a)transarc.com>
> >>>Newsgroups: vmsnet.pdp-11
> >>>Subject: INFO-PDP11 mailing list needs to move soon!
> >>>Message-ID:
><Pine.GSO.3.96.990914180619.11989A-100000(a)smithfield.transarc.ibm.com>
> >>>Date: Thu, 16 Sep 1999 18:29:53 -0400 (EDT)
> >>>Organization: Info-Pdp11<==>Vmsnet.Pdp-11 Gateway
> >>>X-Gateway-Source-Info: Mailing List
> >>>Lines: 19
> >>>Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
> >>>Mime-Version: 1.0
> >>>Path:
>news1.jps.net!news-west.eli.net!uunet!ffx.uu.net!news.globix.net!news.idt.ne
>t!newsfeed.mathworks.com!news.kjsl.com!mvb.saic.com!info-pdp11
> >>>Xref: news1.jps.net vmsnet.pdp-11:71
> >>>
> >>>Due to some logistical changes at work, it appears that I will not be
> >>>able to host the INFO-PDP11 mailing list here for much longer. I am
> >>>currently seeking a volunteer to take over the care and feeding of this
> >>>mailing list. The ideal candidate should have a mail server under
>his/her
> >>>direct control, with good Internet connectivity. If you use an
> >>>automated list maintenance package like Majordomo, the actual time
> >>>required for list administration is not substantial. If you might
> >>>be willing to take on this task, please drop me a note and let me know.
> >>>
> >>>I have maintained this list for the last 11 years or so, and I've been
> >>>very glad over that time to take care of this discussion list. The
>PDP-11
> >>>was the first "real" computer I ever used, and it was where I got all
>of
> >>>my early experience with Unix kernel hacking, so it still holds a
>special
> >>>place in my heart. However, for good or bad, it appears that I will
> >>>[finally! ;-)] need to move on to other things - though even if/when
>the
> >>>list does move, I'll still be a reader!
> >>>
> >>>--Pat.
> >
> >-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
> >Bruce Lane, Owner and head honcho,
> >Blue Feather Technologies -- kyrrin (at) bluefeathertech [dot] com
> >Web: http://www.bluefeathertech.com
> >"...No matter how we may wish otherwise, our science can only describe an
>object,
> >event, or living thing in our own human terms. It cannot possibly define
>any of them..."
> >
>
______________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com
Richard wrote...
>First of all, there are doc's relating to ISIS-II which (IIRC) was the
8-bit
>development environment of the very early '80's.
That reminds me...
I'm trying to dig up an old contact who was the original owner of an ISIS
system like you mention. As I recall it was blue, a large bulky perfectly
square monitor, and there was an 8" floppy drive in the monitor case. There
was a hex keypad on the main bottom board too vaguely like the heathkit H8.
I'm somewhat confident that he still has the machine and would give it up, I
just haven't had the time to contact him. If anything comes up I'll let the
list know...
Jay West
I have a full time domain, and a burstable 10mb ethernet connection to two
major backbones. I'd be willing to host the mailing list, and if desired
would consider "absorbing" the charge of registering a domain just for the
list.
Jay West
-----Original Message-----
From: Bruce Lane <kyrrin(a)bluefeathertech.com>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Saturday, September 18, 1999 1:43 AM
Subject: FW: INFO-PDP11 mailing list needs to move soon!
> If any of you have a full-time domain under your control, and could
>consider hosting the INFO-PDP11 mailing list server, please contact Pat
>Barron as noted in the attached message.
>
> Thanks. Attachment follows.
>
>-=-=- <snip> -=-=-
>
>On Thu, 16 Sep 1999 18:29:53 -0400 (EDT), in vmsnet.pdp-11 you wrote:
>
>>>From: Pat Barron <pat(a)transarc.com>
>>>Newsgroups: vmsnet.pdp-11
>>>Subject: INFO-PDP11 mailing list needs to move soon!
>>>Message-ID:
<Pine.GSO.3.96.990914180619.11989A-100000(a)smithfield.transarc.ibm.com>
>>>Date: Thu, 16 Sep 1999 18:29:53 -0400 (EDT)
>>>Organization: Info-Pdp11<==>Vmsnet.Pdp-11 Gateway
>>>X-Gateway-Source-Info: Mailing List
>>>Lines: 19
>>>Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
>>>Mime-Version: 1.0
>>>Path:
news1.jps.net!news-west.eli.net!uunet!ffx.uu.net!news.globix.net!news.idt.ne
t!newsfeed.mathworks.com!news.kjsl.com!mvb.saic.com!info-pdp11
>>>Xref: news1.jps.net vmsnet.pdp-11:71
>>>
>>>Due to some logistical changes at work, it appears that I will not be
>>>able to host the INFO-PDP11 mailing list here for much longer. I am
>>>currently seeking a volunteer to take over the care and feeding of this
>>>mailing list. The ideal candidate should have a mail server under
his/her
>>>direct control, with good Internet connectivity. If you use an
>>>automated list maintenance package like Majordomo, the actual time
>>>required for list administration is not substantial. If you might
>>>be willing to take on this task, please drop me a note and let me know.
>>>
>>>I have maintained this list for the last 11 years or so, and I've been
>>>very glad over that time to take care of this discussion list. The
PDP-11
>>>was the first "real" computer I ever used, and it was where I got all of
>>>my early experience with Unix kernel hacking, so it still holds a special
>>>place in my heart. However, for good or bad, it appears that I will
>>>[finally! ;-)] need to move on to other things - though even if/when the
>>>list does move, I'll still be a reader!
>>>
>>>--Pat.
>
>-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
>Bruce Lane, Owner and head honcho,
>Blue Feather Technologies -- kyrrin (at) bluefeathertech [dot] com
>Web: http://www.bluefeathertech.com
>"...No matter how we may wish otherwise, our science can only describe an
object,
>event, or living thing in our own human terms. It cannot possibly define
any of them..."
>
If any of you have a full-time domain under your control, and could
consider hosting the INFO-PDP11 mailing list server, please contact Pat
Barron as noted in the attached message.
Thanks. Attachment follows.
-=-=- <snip> -=-=-
On Thu, 16 Sep 1999 18:29:53 -0400 (EDT), in vmsnet.pdp-11 you wrote:
>>From: Pat Barron <pat(a)transarc.com>
>>Newsgroups: vmsnet.pdp-11
>>Subject: INFO-PDP11 mailing list needs to move soon!
>>Message-ID: <Pine.GSO.3.96.990914180619.11989A-100000(a)smithfield.transarc.ibm.com>
>>Date: Thu, 16 Sep 1999 18:29:53 -0400 (EDT)
>>Organization: Info-Pdp11<==>Vmsnet.Pdp-11 Gateway
>>X-Gateway-Source-Info: Mailing List
>>Lines: 19
>>Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
>>Mime-Version: 1.0
>>Path: news1.jps.net!news-west.eli.net!uunet!ffx.uu.net!news.globix.net!news.idt.net!newsfeed.mathworks.com!news.kjsl.com!mvb.saic.com!info-pdp11
>>Xref: news1.jps.net vmsnet.pdp-11:71
>>
>>Due to some logistical changes at work, it appears that I will not be
>>able to host the INFO-PDP11 mailing list here for much longer. I am
>>currently seeking a volunteer to take over the care and feeding of this
>>mailing list. The ideal candidate should have a mail server under his/her
>>direct control, with good Internet connectivity. If you use an
>>automated list maintenance package like Majordomo, the actual time
>>required for list administration is not substantial. If you might
>>be willing to take on this task, please drop me a note and let me know.
>>
>>I have maintained this list for the last 11 years or so, and I've been
>>very glad over that time to take care of this discussion list. The PDP-11
>>was the first "real" computer I ever used, and it was where I got all of
>>my early experience with Unix kernel hacking, so it still holds a special
>>place in my heart. However, for good or bad, it appears that I will
>>[finally! ;-)] need to move on to other things - though even if/when the
>>list does move, I'll still be a reader!
>>
>>--Pat.
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Bruce Lane, Owner and head honcho,
Blue Feather Technologies -- kyrrin (at) bluefeathertech [dot] com
Web: http://www.bluefeathertech.com
"...No matter how we may wish otherwise, our science can only describe an object,
event, or living thing in our own human terms. It cannot possibly define any of them..."
Well, I like my scanner because it has a sheetfeeder and because it's legal
size, but, alas, it's only capable of a limited range of formats. After
all, I've had the thing for nearly ten years. Now, if you have a way to
massage the old style TIFF (targa) files into something better, perhaps that
would be the thing to do.
A lot depends on what requirements the TBD web host will have, and I'll
perhaps hold off until a site is found.
OTOH, I did sort of allow that since Hans Franke is going to be at the VCF,
though I'm not, I can arrange to get this stuff hauled out there for him by
someone from here who's going. I will have to see whether he's willing to
get this stuff scanned and appropriately compressed, then made available via
the web.
Wait and see . . .
Dick
-----Original Message-----
From: Eric Smith <eric(a)brouhaha.com>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Friday, September 17, 1999 6:57 PM
Subject: Re: Intel OS DOC and SOURCE
>"Richard Erlacher" <edick(a)idcomm.com> wrote:
>> If there were a web site which would accomodate the many thousands of
pages
>> involved here I'd consider scanning the stuff and forwarding the bitmaps
to
>> whoever wants them. Now, keep in mind that a typical TIFF of a printed
page
>> in single-bit format is about 1 MB in size, and we're looking at a
1-2'-high
>> stack of paper with both sides printed in most cases. LEt's see. . . a
ream
>> is about 1-3/4" = 500 sheets . . . let's say 10 reams . . . so we're
looking
>> at 10 GB, right (GAWD! . . . I hope I've miscalculated!)
>
>No, for text and line art, just use TIFF Class F Group 4 compression.
>It's lossless, and for typical pages at 300 DPI it's only about 50K.
>Intricate pages somtimes wind up around 100K-120K.
>
>And although not all software can deal with that format, the Group 4
>fax compression is one of the native formats for PDF, so I now supply
>all of my scanned documents as PDF files. For a few examples, see:
> http://www.36bit.org/dec/
>
>Yes, I know that some people hate PDF format, and that you can't read
>them on a Commodore 64 or PDP-11/05. To which I say, too bad. I got
>many more complaints about other formats. Some people even wanted text
>pages in JPEG format, which is just about the worst conceivable format
>for them, since JPEG is a lossy format designed for continuous tone
>images.
>
>I've hacked a version of the imagepdf program from Thomas Metz's PDFLIB
>to directly import TIFF Class F Group 4 files into PDF files without
>decompressing them, so that it's not necessary to buy the $300 Acrobat
>program from Adobe.
>
>Eric
In a message dated 9/17/99 11:33:54 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
fpp(a)concentric.net writes:
> eBay does not allow bidding on one's own auctions.
>
well of course! that's just being a shill which they've really tried to crack
down on.
-->this message printed on recycled disk space.
visit the computers of yesteryear at:
http://members.aol.com/suprdave/classiccmp/museum.htm
Shelton Caruthers <SCaruthers(a)compuserve.com> has a pile of some neat
TRS-80 stuff that he's wanting to sell for the best offer. Please discuss
details with Shelton. I am just passing this message along. I think he
will sell items separately but you have to discuss it with him.
Please reply directly to Shelton.
Reply-to: SCaruthers(a)compuserve.com
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Sat, 11 Sep 1999 21:56:46 -0400
From: "Shelton D. Caruthers" <SCaruthers(a)compuserve.com>
The following is a somewhat-complete list of the items:
HARDWARE (with all manuals):
TRS-80 Model 4 (working) with 128K RAM,
2 internal 5.25 drives
2 external 5.25 drives
TRS-80 Line Printer VIII
Modem II (300 b)
Orch-90 Music Synthesizer
TRS-80 Pocket Computer (with slight LCD damage)
PC printer/cassett interface (ie, docking station w/printer)
"Leather" case
Realistic cassette player
TRS-80 Pocket Computer Model 2 (with manuals)
additional 8K RAM module
"Leather" case
Color Plotter/cassett interface
RS-232 interface
TRS-80 Modem I
SOFTWARE (with manuals):
TRS-DOS v6 (pre year 1986 bug fix)
Profile 4 Plus
Deskmate (for later Tandy PC)
Microcom for Model III
Model 4 Hi Res Graphics Utilities
Super Scripsit (w/ audio tape training course)
Super Scripsit Dictionary
TRS-80 Disk Mailing List (Model I)
Series I Editor/Assembler (Model I/III)
TRS-80 Videotex/Compuserve Information Manager (Model I)
Other misc. games and utilities...
Pocket Computer Software:
Personal Finance
Games (multiple versions)
Statistics
Banners
Other...
Sellam Alternate e-mail: dastar(a)verio.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Puttin' the smack down on the man!
Coming this October 2-3: Vintage Computer Festival 3.0!
See http://www.vintage.org/vcf for details
[Last web site update: 09/17/99]
There are three interest areas potentiallyh addressed by these documents and
files.
First of all, there are doc's relating to ISIS-II which (IIRC) was the 8-bit
development environment of the very early '80's. Secondly, there are doc's
relating to iRMX-86, and some source files. Thirdly, there are doc's and
ostensibly source files relating to iAPX, which was another OS they were
pushing for the 8x86/87/88/89 family.
Some of the documents are assembler, debugger, compiler, etc. documents for
PL/M-80 and PL/M 86, PASCAL 86, the various macro assemblers and
cross-assemblers (in this case, for 8x86/88 family parts on their 8080/8085
platforms) and stuff like that.
There are also some manuals relating to the console hardware, etc, and the
MDS-80, among other things. There's even some hardware doc, though it's
user manual stuff.
If there were a web site which would accomodate the many thousands of pages
involved here I'd consider scanning the stuff and forwarding the bitmaps to
whoever wants them. Now, keep in mind that a typical TIFF of a printed page
in single-bit format is about 1 MB in size, and we're looking at a 1-2'-high
stack of paper with both sides printed in most cases. LEt's see. . . a ream
is about 1-3/4" = 500 sheets . . . let's say 10 reams . . . so we're looking
at 10 GB, right (GAWD! . . . I hope I've miscalculated!)
Well . . . It could be sent as PCX files, only about 1/4 the size, and
capable of being compressed as well . . . but it would still take a number
of hours of transfer time unless I go to the POP to do it. There I have 44
Mb/sec . . . Now, who's got that much space at their ISP?
Dick
-----Original Message-----
From: Christian Fandt <cfandt(a)netsync.net>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Friday, September 17, 1999 3:40 PM
Subject: Re: Find of the day
>Upon the date 03:05 PM 9/17/99 -0600, Richard Erlacher said something like:
>>Yesterday or the day before, I posted that I had found a number of Intel
>>ISIS-II, iAPX, and iRMX-86 manuals. Is there a website where these could
be
>>made available to whoever wants access?
>>
>>Likewise, I posted that I have about 20 diskettes in a case (not yet
>>examined in detail) clearly marked iAPX Sources. Before I send these off
to
>>one fellow who wants them, perhaps they should be made available to the
>>public at large. I'd be willing to send them to an appropriate web site
if
>>someone will recommend one.
>>
>
>Hi Dick,
>
>There are members on here, like myself, who are into the VME- and
>Multibus-based industrial/embedded systems. I have several Multibus-I
>boards and a couple of crates that I want to someday get running. iRMX-80
>and -86 would indeed be of use in my attempts at this and any help such as
>you're offering will be appreciated. Docs are just as important too.
>
>Thanks much! --Chris
>-- --
>Christian Fandt, Electronic/Electrical Historian
>Jamestown, NY USA cfandt(a)netsync.net
> Member of Antique Wireless Association
> URL: http://www.antiquewireless.org/
sorry about forgetting to change the subject . . . it was sort of a find,
though.
Dick
-----Original Message-----
From: Richard Erlacher <edick(a)idcomm.com>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Friday, September 17, 1999 3:12 PM
Subject: Re: Find of the day
>Yesterday or the day before, I posted that I had found a number of Intel
>ISIS-II, iAPX, and iRMX-86 manuals. Is there a website where these could
be
>made available to whoever wants access?
>
>Likewise, I posted that I have about 20 diskettes in a case (not yet
>examined in detail) clearly marked iAPX Sources. Before I send these off
to
>one fellow who wants them, perhaps they should be made available to the
>public at large. I'd be willing to send them to an appropriate web site if
>someone will recommend one.
>
>Dick
>
>
>
Yesterday or the day before, I posted that I had found a number of Intel
ISIS-II, iAPX, and iRMX-86 manuals. Is there a website where these could be
made available to whoever wants access?
Likewise, I posted that I have about 20 diskettes in a case (not yet
examined in detail) clearly marked iAPX Sources. Before I send these off to
one fellow who wants them, perhaps they should be made available to the
public at large. I'd be willing to send them to an appropriate web site if
someone will recommend one.
Dick
Since the Star came from upstate NY and went to Chicago I bet it was a real
sale. I bet the largest collection of computers in the world
(http://www.vintagecomputers.com) didn't have an original star and was
willing to meet a reserve price of $7500.
I look forward to the web site when they get it done.
Paxton
>> You've got me interested now, since I have a VMS CD but no way to hook a
>> CDROM to my MicroVax-II...how would one go about doing this?
>One of several ways:
>
> Find an RRD40 and qbus cotroller for it.
> Find an RRD50 and qbus controller for it
> Find a SCSI Qbus adaptor and a CDrom that works (different
> block size for PC)
>
>Other routes would be to get a working TK50 or TK70 with controller and
>have someone cut tapes for you (this is allowed).
Yet another route is to get a desktop VMS machine (say, a 3100-xx, or
an Alphastation) with a CD-ROM. Install VMS on the desktop machine, then
boot the Microvax-II into the cluster and MSCP-serve all the disks
(including the CD-ROM) between all cluster members. The hobbyist
license kit includes the clustering licenses as well.
Clustering is not only a powerful user tool, but a power system
management tool as well. Resources on clustered VMS nodes are - for
all important purposes - local after a machine boots into the cluster.
--
Tim Shoppa Email: shoppa(a)trailing-edge.com
Trailing Edge Technology WWW: http://www.trailing-edge.com/
7328 Bradley Blvd Voice: 301-767-5917
Bethesda, MD, USA 20817 Fax: 301-767-5927
> I guess my feeling is that what the seller did was unethical since he did
> want to sell the item. If he wanted to sell the item, and put it up for
> bid, then he is accepting the risk, like anyone else, of not getting what
> they would like for it. That should not be sufficient cause for stopping
> the auction and making those who bid in good faith suffer from his
> greediness.
At one time, and perhaps still today, eBay allowed the seller to place one
bid on his/her own auction. This happened to me once on an auction where
the seller outbid me at the last moment on a non-reserve auction. I was
outraged, until the seller pointed out to me that he was within the rules in
doing this. If it's still ok to bid on one's own auction, then the seller could put
in a huge bid, immediately cancel the auction, and then still abide by the "rule"
that the item be sold to the highest bidder. Right?
-----Original Message-----
From: Mike Ford <mikeford(a)socal.rr.com>
>Why all the Sherlock Holmes, this person obviously belongs on this list,
>somebody email them and invite them to join.
>
>
That would probably meet the definition of spam. Err..., you do it. :-)
Besides, what are you going to say: "Please join our list, and, uh, you got
any money left?" :-)
Just kidding, but I am sure you are all thinking the same as me; I wonder
what else does he wants to buy?
Regards,
Jim Rossbach, Tonkin Gulf Yacht Club, www.TonkinYachts.cjb.net
God Made Us Sisters and Brothers, Prozac Made Us Friends.
-----Original Message-----
From: Innfogra(a)aol.com <Innfogra(a)aol.com>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Thursday, September 16, 1999 6:21 PM
Subject: Xerox Star buyer?
>Does anyone know who WWW.VintageComputers.Com is or where they are located?
>Paxton
>
Why Network Solutions does :-)
The Data in Network Solutions' WHOIS database is provided by Network
Solutions for information purposes, and to assist persons in obtaining
information about or related to a domain name registration record.
Network Solutions does not guarantee its accuracy. Registrant:
Keystroke Engineering, LLC (VINTAGECOMPUTERS-DOM)
1233 N. Hoyne
Chicago, IL 60622
US
Domain Name: VINTAGECOMPUTERS.COM
Administrative Contact:
Zoghlin, Alex (AZ1172) zoghlin(a)IBM.NET
(773) 395-6226
Technical Contact, Zone Contact:
Hostmaster, Rapidsite Inc. (HRI-ORG) hostmaster(a)RAPIDSITE.NET
561-994-6684
Fax- 561-994-6617
Fax- - 304-243-2497
Billing Contact:
Zoghlin, Alex (AZ1172) zoghlin(a)IBM.NET
(773) 395-6226
Aaron Christopher Finney wrote:
>This page has everything you are looking for and more...
>
>http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dsladic/vice/doc/serial.txt
>
>Hope it helps!
>
>Aaron
>
>
>
Yes, it did. Though ATN poses a problem on where to put it. I'm thinking of puting a logic inverter on it and connecting it to DTR on the RS232 port.
Part of that article was cryptic when it came to the RESET pin I'll quote
RESET: Serial Reset
You may disconnect this line to save your disk drive.
Did the reset pin actualy screw up the disk drive or what and from reading the artical it sounds like it is not needed.
Charles
After searching all over the internet for this I've found the pin out
for the C64 serial port. The goal of finding this information: to
connect serial port of the C64 to the RS232 serial port on my computer.
Here's what I found.
Pin, description
1, ?
2, GND
3, ATN
4, CLK
5, DATA
6, RESET
The description that I found didn't list pin 1 for anything could this
possibly be +5V? If so I could connect this to CTS (I'm trying to keep
to the standard). ATN is probably attention which tells what device the
computer is going to talk to. CLK is probably a clock signal which
could be connected to Receive Clock. Could ATN be connected to DCD on
the PC? Also what are the logic levels on the C64 port is it inverted
compared to RS232 when it comes to 1 and 0 and what is the voltage on
pin five for 1 and 0.
Charles
Since someone mentioned that you can simply end an auction because you
want to, here are the specifics...
>Canceling Bids
>You can cancel bids in an auction if one or more of the following
>circumstances apply:
>
> 1.You've decided to end the auction
> 2.A bidder contacts you to back out of a bid
> 3.You can't verify the identity of a bidder after trying all
> reasonable means of contact
>
>Please note: Cancellations are publicized in the auction bidding history,
>and you will be asked to explain your cancellation to bidders. If the
>cancellation was not legitimate, you're also likely to hear about it from
>other users.
>
>Stop the Auction!
>
>You may miss out on just the bid you've been waiting for if you end your
>auction early. Still, there may be times when you have a valid reason to
>end an auction. You may stop your auction when you decide not to sell. To
>do this, you must cancel all bids on your auction before it ends. If you do
>not do this, you are obligated to sell to the high bidder.
Note this last part...
Megan Gentry
Former RT-11 Developer
+--------------------------------+-------------------------------------+
| Megan Gentry, EMT/B, PP-ASEL | Internet (work): gentry!zk3.dec.com |
| Unix Support Engineering Group | (home): mbg!world.std.com |
| Compaq Computer Corporation | addresses need '@' in place of '!' |
| 110 Spitbrook Rd. ZK03-2/T43 | URL: http://world.std.com/~mbg/ |
| Nashua, NH 03062 | "pdp-11 programmer - some assembler |
| (603) 884 1055 | required." - mbg |
+--------------------------------+-------------------------------------+
In a message dated 9/16/99 7:35:07 PM Pacific Daylight Time,
cfandt(a)netsync.net writes:
> Upstate NY! That's basically my area. Do you know which town Paxton?
No. The description of the Xerox Star listed "Upstate Ny" as the location.
The email address 'oldcomputers(a)yahoo.com' is harder to find information
about its' actual location.
The Seller of the Star also has been active in selling intel 4004, 8008 and
sets of intel processors on ebay.
Paxton
PS Paul Pierce may have the largest private collection in terms of Mass. IBM
knew that value=weight and made correspondingly heavy systems. I am sure
there are others out there with more individual systems.
>I would like to know if its possible use a 3 1/2" disk drive with my
If not, you should be able to install another disk controller into it. There
must be some kind of TSR which can help you with this also.
>little more "friendly" than DOS, such as a file manager
Well, I've been down that line, and I have not come up with a truly good way
to hide DOS with a dos program. Norton Commander is my favorite file
manager, someone here might have a copy to send you. Check out
www.filelibrary.com (which requires free registration) for all kinds of DOS
software. All the file managers you could dream of. All-in-all, DOS is a
good functional OS which doesn't have a lot of pretty stuff. Unless you're
going to USE the thing for word processing,etc. don't bother.
Vintage Computer Festival 3.0
October 2-3, 1999
Santa Clara Convention Center
Santa Clara, California
The Vintage Computer Festival is once again proud to present a tour
of The Computer Museum History Center in Mountain View, California.
The Computer Museum boasts the worlds largest collection of historic
computers, including some one of a kind machines. If you've never
visited the History Center then you should take advantage of this
opportunity.
Two tours are scheduled for 3:30pm on both Saturday and Sunday of the
Festival based on demand. If there is not enough demand for two
separate tours then all reservations will be consolidated to one tour
on Sunday, October 3. Each tour will last approximately one hour.
The tour is open to most everyone but you must register in advance
to reserve a seat on the bus which will be taking participants to the
History Center from the Santa Clara Convention Center. Since the
History Center is located on a United States military base (Moffet
Federal Airfield) foreign nationals will have to RSVP as soon as
possible so that their identification can be processed. United
States citizens and those with green cards should not have any
difficulty registering.
Please note there is a charge of $5 for the bus ride.
Complete information on making a reservation can be found on The
Computer Museum's web site:
http://www.computerhistory.org/events/vcf_10021999/tours.page
Spread the Word!
Remember to tell a friend about the Vintage Computer Festival. This
is a great event for the whole family since kids are admitted free.
There will be plenty of fascinating old computers on display that
will help introduce computing to a budding young mind.
Sell Your Computer
There are still a few booths available in the Vintage Computer Flea
Market but they are going fast! If you have a bunch of old computers
sitting in your closet, or want to cash in on the computer collecting
craze, there's no better place than the VCF Flea Market to sell your
old computers. Booths are $125 for the entire weekend. Don't wait
too long to decide, this price is only good until September 15.
You can also sell your items on consignment with the VCF. It's hassle
free! See http://www.vintage.org/vcf/vendor.htm for complete details
on vendor booths and consignment sales.
We'll see you at VCF 3.0! And remember, tell your friends!!
To be removed from this automated notification service simply reply to this
message with the word REMOVE as the first line of the message.
Vintage Computer Festival 3.0
October 2-3, 1999
Santa Clara Convention Center
Santa Clara, California
http://www.vintage.org/vcf
Well , I made a cable with the appropriate pin-out and
turned the thing on... here's what came on the terminal:
KA630-A.V1.3
Performing normal system tests
7..6..5..4..3..
Tests completed
>>> boot
2..
?54 RETRY
2.. (after a long time, I hit the halt button)
?02 EXT HLT
PC = 00001AA8
>>> boot dua0
2..
?42 NOSUCHFILE, DUA0
?06 HLT INST
PC = 00000EE6
Failure
>>>
Does that mean that the drive is busted, or just that there is no OS?
The drive spins up and it sounds like it is seeking after issuing
the boot command.
Carlos.
It appears the HP 2114 on ebay sold from what I hear, it's no longer listed
in any case. Just out of curiousity, did anyone here on the list get it???
Jay West
<>>> boot
<
< 2..
< ?54 RETRY
<
< 2.. (after a long time, I hit the halt button)
< ?02 EXT HLT
< PC = 00001AA8
<
<>>> boot dua0
<
< 2..
< ?42 NOSUCHFILE, DUA0
< ?06 HLT INST
< PC = 00000EE6
Either the drive is not dua0 or no OS on it.
Allison
Rumor has it that Fred Cisin (XenoSoft) may have mentioned these words:
>On Thu, 16 Sep 1999 CLASSICCMP(a)trailing-edge.com wrote:
>> This may be going counter to the tone of the discussion, but...
>> If the goal is the least-hassle way to read and write Apple ][ disks, isn't
>> the best solution
>> AN APPLE ][ ?
>Absolutely.
>
>> Besides, none of these other solutions are more than 10 years old!
>
>Apple Turnover, Matchpoint?, Quadlink, Diamond Trakstar 128, and Copy2
>Option board are all over 10 years old. Most of them were DISCONTINUED
>more that 10 years ago.
Not only that, but IIRC the original gist of the discussion wasn't "how to
read/write Apple ][ disks..." but was: "how to read/write Apple ][ disks on
an IBM PC."
For that, the Apple ][ really isn't the best solution.
Besides, Apple ][s are really tough to find up here... my buddy rescued a
//gs, tho...
[[ and later wondered how much he could get for it when he was hard-up for
cash...
Him: How much could I get for it?
Me: Maybe $20 tops... *if* you find someone interested in it.
Him: What're my chances of finding that someone?
Me: About the same odds of you gaining 600 pounds overnight and winning the
Mr. Olympia title. (he's had a lot of gastro-intestinal surgery over the
last 2 years -- he's over 6 foot tall and weights ~130lbs.)
Him: You've got to be kidding! It's got a hard drive...]]
Yea, he's still my friend, but as he owes me a lot of $$$, I'll prolly give
him the $20 for the machine (off his tab, of course... ;-)
Anywho, IMHO, YMMV, ABAF and all that jazz...
Roger "Merch" Merchberger
--
Roger "Merch" Merchberger --- sysadmin, Iceberg Computers
Recycling is good, right??? Ok, so I'll recycle an old .sig.
If at first you don't succeed, nuclear warhead
disarmament should *not* be your first career choice.
>Well, modern single-chip microcontrollers are very cheap, and they're
>easy to use. Probably less hassle than attempting to (legally) clone the
>Apple disk ][ controller.
This may be going counter to the tone of the discussion, but...
If the goal is the least-hassle way to read and write Apple ][ disks, isn't
the best solution
AN APPLE ][ ?
Besides, none of these other solutions are more than 10 years old!
Tim.
Hope you consider this message an encouragement.
It is directed to those are are new to the hobby or
those of you who are disappointed because you
still haven't found that special something even
though you have spent much time trying to find it.
Have we dried up sources of old computers? Hardly.
Can you still hope to find that missing system/
software/manual/etc.? Indeed.
The proof I offer is the PDP-9 that Merle Pierce, of the
Rhode Island Computer Museum, Inc., recently
told us about.
There weren't many of them to start with and it is
30 years old so what are the chances there would
still be one working everyday in a building in
Philadelphia. Pretty low, but still, against the odds
it is now safe for another 130+ years in the museum's
collection.
A while back a the fellow from the company in
Philadelphia that used the 9 contacted me. He
came to me because his 9 wasn't working and
upon doing a search of the web he discovered I
had a reference to PDP-9s since I used to have
one.
He asked me for help in fixing his, but I was no
help. I did mention how much I'd like to have
another one and that was end of our correspondence.
About 7 weeks ago he contacted me out of the
blue and offered the 9 and other gear if
I would come and pick it up.
Tempting. The customs and other regulatory
hassles made the trip impossible so I offered
the gear to Merle and the rest is history.
Seek and ye shall find. Really, lots and lots of
wonderful old small and big computers are
waiting to be discovered.
Yours in good faith.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------
Kevin Stumpf * Unusual systems * www.unusual.on.ca
+1.519.744.2900 * EST/EDT GMT - 5
Collector - Commercial Mainframes & Minicomputers from
the 50s, 60s, & 70s and control panels and consoles.
Author & Publisher - A Guide to Collecting Computers &
Computer Collectibles * ISBN 0-9684244-0-6
.
>Ok... you've got me curious. (swinging wildly toward being O.T.)
>What was there about this particular auction
>that might have led to a complaint which would have resulted in it being
>cancelled? (obviously, I did not see anything that threw up a flag)
I really haven't been following the entire thread, so don't know what
specific auction it was about -- I was just responding about the early end
to an auction in general. So I can't tell what might have been wrong with
it, if anything.
Megan Gentry
Former RT-11 Developer
+--------------------------------+-------------------------------------+
| Megan Gentry, EMT/B, PP-ASEL | Internet (work): gentry!zk3.dec.com |
| Unix Support Engineering Group | (home): mbg!world.std.com |
| Compaq Computer Corporation | addresses need '@' in place of '!' |
| 110 Spitbrook Rd. ZK03-2/T43 | URL: http://world.std.com/~mbg/ |
| Nashua, NH 03062 | "pdp-11 programmer - some assembler |
| (603) 884 1055 | required." - mbg |
+--------------------------------+-------------------------------------+
Hello,
First question for the list, does anyone have a technical manual on the
RF72 (1GB DSSI drive)? The questions I have are:
1) What function does the blue wire in either pin 1 or
pin 5 (depending on which is #1) of the power connector
provide?
2) What function does the three position dip switch provide?
(I've got a couple drives and some have switches set and
others don't.)
On a related topic, is there any documentation on the VAX "drive control"
thingys?
Various pieces of documentation I have offer tantalizing bits but I can't
find the definitive definition. The Sigma docs talk about "active" and
"passive" control panels, one of my BA213's has a 3 way DSSI panel with
plugs for plastic "unit" plugs, one of my BA213's has a dual unit and the
cab kit for SDI drives. My BA123 world box has four installed (not hooked
up to anything) These latter ones appear to be "passive" (they have a 10
pin connector on them as well)
--Chuck
Hi Group:
I have a friend who is looking for pdp-15 docs.
Anybody have any, or pointers to any on the web?
Kevin
==========================================================
Sgt. Kevin McQuiggin, Vancouver Police Department
E-Comm Project (604) 215-5095; Cell: (604) 868-0544
Email: mcquiggi(a)sfu.ca
Well then he'd have to pay the commision on $7000, no?
Neil Morrison
email:morrison@t-iii.com
> -----Original Message-----
> From: George Currie [SMTP:g@kurico.com]
> Sent: Thursday, September 16, 1999 1:44 PM
> To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
> Subject: Re: Ending Auctions (was Re: HP 2114 on ebay)
>
> > Second, the basic rules continue to hold. Which are:
> > - You offer something for sale, you have the option of setting
> > a reserve price and a minimum bid.
> > - When your auction ends, if the highest bid was above
> > your reserve then you _MUST_ sell the item to the highest
> > bidder. REGARDLESS OF HOW THE AUCTION ENDED.
>
> Speaking of this point, did anyone catch the auction for the Xerox
> Star? Talk about weird endings, it was around $2100 (reserve not
> met) until the very end, when suddenly a $7000 bid comes in
> (reserve met). But get this, the alias of the high bidder is almost
> exactly the same as the seller (seller was foobar, buyer was
> foo.bar). Sounds like maybe the second place bidder actually hit
> the reserve ($2300?) and the seller decided that he didn't want to
> sell it so put in a massive bid under a diff. alias?
>
> George
Rob Gregory contacted me saying he has an almost mint-condition IBM PC-XT
he wants to go to a good home or else he chucks it. He's also got some
printers he wants to throw into the deal, but that's for you to decide.
His phone number is 310/829.5903.
Please contact him directly of course.
Sellam Alternate e-mail: dastar(a)siconic.com
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Don't rub the lamp if you don't want the genie to come out.
Coming this October 2-3: Vintage Computer Festival 3.0!
See http://www.vintage.org/vcf for details!
[Last web site update: 08/17/99]
> -----Original Message-----
>
> Don Maslin <donm(a)cts.com> wrote about the Central Point cards:
> > First off, it is not a controller, per se, but rather a bridge adapter
> > that goes between the ISA FDC and the floppy drive and enhances the
> FDC's
> > native capabilities.
>
Along similar lines, can anyone explain how to use a Manzana Mux Card? I
picked one up recently, recalling it was supposed to let you expand the
number of pc internal floppies from two to four. If I'm not mistaken, it
installs as a bridge card (like the Central Point Option card) between the
standard controller and the drives.
Does anyone know how to configure it? It's got 3 jumper block areas. It
looks like one sets up the port address, but the others are a mystery. Also
I'm wondering if it needs a special software driver or something.
Now, the bonus question: can the Manzana card be used in combination with
the Central Point card to build a multi-format universal copy machine with a
wild mix of drive types? What would the bridge cabling sequence be in this
case?
--
Arlen Michaels amichael(a)nortelnetworks.com
Nortel Networks, Ottawa, Canada
>I just bought an Apple IIe system with a Mockingboard in it. Is this a board
>that was at all significant in the Apple world? It came with no
>documentation although there are three original disks that look like they
>came from Mockingboard.
The Mockingboard had substantial support from many Apple video games of
the mid-80's onward. Couple the Mockingboard with Steve Ciarcia's voice
synthensizer (both circa early 80's) and you've got abilities beyond what
was available for PC-clones until just a few years ago.
--
Tim Shoppa Email: shoppa(a)trailing-edge.com
Trailing Edge Technology WWW: http://www.trailing-edge.com/
7328 Bradley Blvd Voice: 301-767-5917
Bethesda, MD, USA 20817 Fax: 301-767-5927
A few years ago I came across a working IBM card punch, which reminded me of
my days at varsity!
But where could I store it in a tiny apartment?
Ah well,
Neil Morrison
email:morrison@t-iii.com
> -----Original Message-----
> From: kstumpf(a)unusual.on.ca [SMTP:kstumpf@unusual.on.ca]
> Sent: Thursday, September 16, 1999 10:50 AM
> To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
> Subject: Seek and ye shall find - the story of the latest PDP-9
> discovery.
>
...........
> The proof I offer is the PDP-9 that Merle Pierce, of the
> Rhode Island Computer Museum, Inc., recently
> told us about.
>
> There weren't many of them to start with and it is
> 30 years old so what are the chances there would
> still be one working everyday in a building in
> Philadelphia. Pretty low, but still, against the odds
> it is now safe for another 130+ years in the museum's
> collection.
>
...........
<> really do run in one clock cycle (rather than four). Also, they run at
<> up to 100 MHz. They would be much more suitable for implementing a
<> floppy disk controller.
Why not just toss a cray XMP against the problem. Seriously, in 1979ish
apple managed to do it with a little (very little) at something less than
2mhz... why would a PIC at a gazillion MHz be the hot ticket when the real
need is enough ram to store all them bits!
When you consider the data rate for DD 8" is 500kBits/sec the bandwidth is
not that bad.
Allison
--- allisonp(a)world.std.com wrote:
> About all the st251 has in it's favor is it's half height.
That and, in my experience, easier to find. Seagate shipped wads of them
for use in early AT's. I don't love them either (slow and hot), but I do
have several more of them than any other MFM drive besides the Micropolis 1325.
-ethan
===
Infinet has been sold. The domain is going away in February.
Please send all replies to
erd(a)iname.com
__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Bid and sell for free at http://auctions.yahoo.com
>> Can't do it all myself, but I'd like to see a port of a minimal
>>version of lynx to 2.11BSD unix. Anyone care to comment on how
>>(im)possible this is and what it would require? [[I'm tired of telnetting
>>to my FreeBSD box everytime I want to mess with the web.]] While we're on
>>it, what about emacs? That shouldn't be so bad since there's already a
>>uEMACS for RSX.
>>
>>jake
>On a related note, does anyone have a browser for RT-11? I've got Telnet
>and FTP running, but would love to add web access :^)
If anything was done for either 2.11 or RT-11, it'd have to be
*very* scaled down from the full lynx.
The CERN line-mode browser does fit on an -11. Of course, you
can always just telnet to port 80.
>Guess I really need to take a look at the source for lynx.
It's huge, and it expects enormous contiguous amounts of memory to
be available for temporary use. Not a realistic way to do things
in the PDP-11's 16-bit memory space.
--
Tim Shoppa Email: shoppa(a)trailing-edge.com
Trailing Edge Technology WWW: http://www.trailing-edge.com/
7328 Bradley Blvd Voice: 301-767-5917
Bethesda, MD, USA 20817 Fax: 301-767-5927
If you would include minor details like what the M# of the graphics board I may
be able to help. There were a few different ones used over the years. Complete
configurations can even be more helpful.
It may be a day or 2 before I can respond depending on what Floyd decides to do
to me. I have been getting the heavy rains most of the day and now the wind has
kicked up. Thank heavens for UPS's for the power flickers.
Dan
>I have a VaxStation 3520 in the garage that seems to boot. I gather it's
>a dual-processor model and it has SCSI, RGB, AUI, and TK70, all intact and
>able to boot. Problem is I have no KB, no mouse, and no head for it. (I
>had hooked it up to a monitor that had the right cables but the wrong sync
>stuff, so I had like four shaking images of the boot stuff.) Anyone know
>of a good cheap place to gather the junque I need to get this thing
>running right (and part numbers, etc)? It seems like a really nice box
>except for the BI bus (it has Qbus too!), but I guess that's fine if I
>stick with OpenVMS. ((Which version?))
>
>TIA
>
>jake
--- Christian Fandt <cfandt(a)netsync.net> wrote:
> Incidentally, for you other DEC mavens, I tried reviewing the VAXArchive at
> http://vaxarchive.ml.org/ but it seems to be either relocated or not
> available anymore. I felt it was a good VAX info resource. "Unable to find
> the server vaxarchive.ml.org" is the message thrown back which suggests
> it's MIA. Could anyone confirm?
The entire ml.org domain is defunct. I used to be antarctica.ml.org.
-ethan
===
Infinet has been sold. The domain is going away in February.
Please send all replies to
erd(a)iname.com
__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Bid and sell for free at http://auctions.yahoo.com
Does anyone know where I can get a vaxstation compatable terminal, keyboard,
and mouse????
thanx
mark acierno
______________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com
Ask eBay! They do get back after a while.
Neil Morrison
email:morrison@t-iii.com
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Christian Fandt [SMTP:cfandt@netsync.net]
> Sent: Wednesday, September 15, 1999 12:59 PM
> To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
> Subject: Re: HP 2114 on ebay
>
.....
> I couldn't even find it in the closed or "ended auction" area. Did he or
> somebody completely remove all reference to the auction? Can that be done?
>
.....
Does anyone know the power requirement on the RFxx series drives? I would
like to mount one in a BA123 and the RFxx connector is a 5 pin power
connector (which I have an extra of but I don't want to screw up!)
Also if you run these things without the 10 pin header plugged in, do you
need to jumper any of the pins?
--Chuck
<> Yup. RD53 is an RLL 40 meg, I think. Not very reliable in my experience
<> Somewhere on the system is probably a tk50 tape drive, too. Slow and not
<> very high density per cartrige, but they work.
BZZT! RD53 is MFM 70mb (100mb if RLL) and only old ones are unreliable...
then again a new one is far from likely.
They were reliable but the typical operational life was about 4 years
(100% powered on). After that they tended to decay. For that time (late
80s) 35,000 power on hours was pretty good though not exceptional. the
problem is the last ones were manufactured some 8 or more years ago!
<As a matter of fact, the DB15F does have the interlocks found in AUI's.
Nominal configuration, AUI for DEQNA or DELQA.
Things to check, if either box make sure the fans work, they are needed!
If its a BA123 end table box then there are three fans, they must all work
or bad things happen. Then check the power supply cables if the box is BA23
(narrow one) as they have been known to melt at the bus or PS connectors.
Generally this things are hard to kill and run well. VMS is available
VIA DECUS hobbiest liccense for free. You can use any media you can
find and versions to 7.2 (one older than current). Montagar sells a CD
with VMS and various other tools included. If unix is you favorite then
Netbsd is an ongoing project but the MVII port is reputed to be functional.
I run two of them one in BA23 and the other in the larger ba123.
Allison
<> 1 CPU? it has two interesting-looking chips:
<> 1: LSILIA 0485, 21-23413-01, DC379, TAC 8546
<> 2: LSILIA 0486, 21-23389-01, DC379, CAC 8544
<
<A couple of very custom DEC chips that form the VAX CPU IIRC.
The Microvax CPU is one chip. The DMA is the other. However neither is
a 78032 Microvax CPU. Maybe a later one.
<> what is the pinout? what is the funny-labeled rotary switch next to
<> it?)
Determins if the machine will stay in diagnostic mode, Inquire what language
to use (13 possible) and run straight through to trying to boot. If there
is a boot device it will try it, if not you get an error message and the
>>> prompt.
<> 3 dec memory board, holds 144 41256-212141302 chips
<
<DEC 4Mbyte memory board, I think.
sounds about right.
<> 4 dec board, some labels are: LPWR M94V-1 25787, and "M7516" in the
<> extraction handle; connected to a DB15F in the back panel
<
<Ethernet I guess. Nice if it is...
DELQA eithernet, the better one to have.
<> 5 dec board, (disk controller?), reads M7555 in the extraction handle
<> connected to what seems to be an older RLL hard drive
<
<Much more likely to be MFM than RLL. IIRC that board handles MFM hard
<drives and RX50 floppy drives.
RQDX3 controller, drive is likely Micropolus 1325(70mb) or
Maxtor2190(159mb).
Allison
<function for a given piece of hardware. Someone dumped a 286 & 12" green
<mono monitor at our store a few years back. Instead of throwing it out, I
<spent a couple of afternoons patching together some C code, a few batch
<files, and some other odds & ends and it's served us well as our cash
<register ever since. It also cranks out our monthly state sales tax report
<and maintains our customer database. 52 MB hard drive, 24 MB free -- I
<imagine we'll be using it every day for years to come.
Therein lies the appeal of many old machines to me. I can use them as
single point applications as they were cheap and do it well. The up
side is some are really interesting!
<Cost: $0.
Call me Yankee but, it's a frugal thing.
<I even have a couple of business apps (Tony Duell, don't gag ;>) which I ru
<on my Sinclair machines . . . just crank up the old imagination, Jim, and
<surely you'll come up with some good use for that old "clunker."
Oh, I forgot one. There's a program called "checks" that can be found on
the WC CDrom and the OAK.oakland.edu archives. Runs nicely on the kaypro.
Theres a lot of messydos and CPM software out there in the archives waiting
to be used.
Allison
Good for there time but very old and small.
< RD50 5mb Seagate ST506
< RD51 10mb Seagate ST412
Excellent drive for a 30mb full height, near indestructable.
< RD52 35mb Quantum Q540
Tended to get cranky when over 4-5 years old, most all are.
< RD53 71mb Micropolis 1325
Good find, 159mb and reliable.
< RD54 159mb Maxtor XT-2190
Excellent 20mb drive.
< RD31 21mb Seagate ST225
Peice of garbage, runs hot and has spindle problems.
< RD32 42mb Seagate ST251
Experience, I have them all and have used them all.
Allison
At 07:54 PM 9/15/99 -0400, Carlos wrote:
>Hi Zane; I don't understand; Jim and Chuck said that the pin-out was
>standard... why do you need a special cable?
I just plugged a DB9 to DB25 cable into it and the back of my FreeBSD box
and ran tip to it. Worked fine.
>> Unfortunatly it doesn't sound as if this system has a TK50 drive, they're
>> kinda hard to miss ;^)
>
>Yes, there's nothing but the hard drive in the front.
The "empty slot" with no cover is where the RX50 dual floppy goes. You can
find them around as they are pretty common. You'll need one of the black
"skids" for them as well. The funky card in the end of the card cage that
cables the hard drive has cables that go to the floppy as well.
If your cabinet is wide, sits on the floor, and has wheels, its a BA123
"world box" if it is about 6" tall, 19" wide and deep, it is a BA23 rack
mount box. Thanks to DEC's re-use of parts you can swap out the CPU in
these boxes to create a micro-PDP system (11/73 etc).
Power supplies are ok for reliability, but too heavy to ship. Lately a lot
of BA123's seem to be falling out of the sky around here.
>How can you tell one from the other? This has four horizontal front bays
>and one vertical; it is rated at 8.8A, 690W at 120V. The whole thing
>measures about 24" (height) x 13" (width) x 27" (depth)
Actually the part number should have told me it was a BA123 but your
description confirms it.
--Chuck
Upon the date 05:13 PM 9/15/99 -0400, cem14(a)cornell.edu said something like:
>
>
>Today I hauled in something that I have no experience whatsoever with,
>but that I'm sure most people in classiccmp own: a microvax II.
>I don't know if it works, or how to hook a terminal to it to
>test it. Here's what I've been able to gather:
Hi Carlos, from how you speak below it sure shows you do have no
experience whatsoever <g>! But we'll help fix that problem!
You've actually got a nice box (provided it still functions) that will be
rather fun to learn VMS or ULTRIX upon (if it still has either of those
OS's running on it). NetBSD is also available.
Your homework for tonite will be to study
http://anacin.nsc.vcu.edu/~jim/mvax/mvax_faq.html which contains much about
the MVII's.
Another URL which has MVII bits is:
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/afs/cs/usr/jmcm/www/info/info.html (aka ASUBI).
I've got an MVII that I've been working on upgrading the hard disk to an
RD54. I haven't had time to touch it since last winter as I've had a heap
of other projects more important. But I'm salivating at the thought of
getting her up and running with OpenVMS during the next winter sometime :)
The other DEC friends here have already given you some other important
comments and I'm sure a few more of us will chime in.
Have fun with it!
Incidentally, for you other DEC mavens, I tried reviewing the VAXArchive at
http://vaxarchive.ml.org/ but it seems to be either relocated or not
available anymore. I felt it was a good VAX info resource. "Unable to find
the server vaxarchive.ml.org" is the message thrown back which suggests
it's MIA. Could anyone confirm?
Regards, Chris
-- --
Christian Fandt, Electronic/Electrical Historian
Jamestown, NY USA cfandt(a)netsync.net
Member of Antique Wireless Association
URL: http://www.antiquewireless.org/
That would be your basic Microvax II all right.
It is a lot of fun to run VMS or NetBSD on them.
Presumably you've got one with the Floppy drives in the front since I
didn't see you mention the TQK50 controller or a 1/2" cartridge tape drive.
The RD53 is a bit small for a complete UNIX distribution (VMS does well
though) and you can net boot it from another server if you want. If you
join DECUS you can get a free license to VMS.
Console connects to the DB-9 in the back, standard serial port pin-out.
Plug in a terminal and fire it up to see if it can get through post. You
never know, it just may boot :-) Tony Duell would have you first carefully
remove all the boards and unplug all the peripherals, and then power it up
and test the voltages on the power rails, then plug in probably one board
(enough to "load" the supplys a bit and test again) and then re-install and
reseat everything and try booting it) But I only do that level of check on
really old stuff.
--Chuck
At 05:13 PM 9/15/99 -0400, cem14(a)cornell.edu wrote:
>
>
>Today I hauled in something that I have no experience whatsoever with,
>but that I'm sure most people in classiccmp own: a microvax II.
>I don't know if it works, or how to hook a terminal to it to
>test it. Here's what I've been able to gather:
>
>Cards:
>
>Slot description
>1 CPU? it has two interesting-looking chips:
> 1: LSILIA 0485, 21-23413-01, DC379, TAC 8546
> 2: LSILIA 0486, 21-23389-01, DC379, CAC 8544
> This is connected to a DB9M in the back panel (console goes here?
> what is the pinout? what is the funny-labeled rotary switch next to
> it?)
>
>2 nemonix memory board, holds 56 TC511000AP-10 chips
>
>3 dec memory board, holds 144 41256-212141302 chips
>
>4 dec board, some labels are: LPWR M94V-1 25787, and "M7516" in the
> extraction handle; connected to a DB15F in the back panel
>
>5 dec board, (disk controller?), reads M7555 in the extraction handle,
> connected to what seems to be an older RLL hard drive
>
>
>Hard drive: RD53-A rev A
>
>label in the back panel:
>
>Model: 630QB-A2
>
>product variation: changed from 630QB-A2 to DH630Q4E2 by WFD.
>
>
>So what exactly is this beast and how can I test if it works?
>
>Best regards,
>
>Carlos.
>
>
>
>
On Wed, 15 Sep 1999, Jim Strickland wrote:
>If it lands at the >>> prompt, try typing boot. I *think* the device name would
>probably be DUA0 for that controller, but if I'm wrong I'm sure someone will
>correct me. So if boot doesn't get it, try boot dua0. I think. Geez it's been
>a long time since I had my hands on a microvax II.
dua0 is indeed correct.
>When I was a grad school sysadmin, we used a 13mb uVaxII with a pair of ESDI
>disks (350 megs each, I think) as a file server for our office. Ironically
>of all the vaxen I worked on at that site, that box is one of the few that's
>still around, since the terminal server boots from it. :) I'm waiting and
>salivating for when the University puts all those vaxen in the surplus auction
>or (I hope I hope) takes me up on my offer to haul them all away for free.
>They've got a 4000/500 that was brand new when I worked for them that I *want*.
*drool* a 4000/500!! Now that *is* fast by today's standards. I've got a
pair of 4000/400s that I adore. They are *sweet*.
-Dave McGuire
>>> Roger Merchberger <zmerch(a)30below.com> 09/15 3:31 PM >>>
Rumor has it that James Willing may have mentioned these words:
>The offering can be found here:
>
>http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=160802545
>
>Looks like the eBay systems are running behind (yet again) in processing
>info on completed auctions. The final bid shows as $455.01 and it does
>not appear that there was a reserve.
Although, normally an ebay auction ends at the exact time that it's posted,
either 3, 5, 7 or more days later. However, this auction ended 5 days 3
hours, 22 minutes and 52 seconds after it began...
How could that be???
Just a thought,
Roger "Merch" Merchberger
***According to eBay:
"Ending Your Auction
You can use this form [omitted here] if you want to end your auction early. But
remember, lots of bidders wait until the very last minute to bid they're trying to
avoid being outbid! So you may lose a potential buyer by ending your auction
early.
If you are ending the auction because you no longer wish to sell your item, you
must cancel all bids on your auction before it ends. If you do not do so, you are
obligated to sell to the high bidder."
Wayne Smith
!
!
!
I wonder if one could use a PIC chip to do it. They'll do 20Mhz, and they
like bits.
Neil Morrison
email:morrison@t-iii.com
> -----Original Message-----
> From: ard(a)p850ug1.demon.co.uk [SMTP:ard@p850ug1.demon.co.uk]
> Sent: Wednesday, September 15, 1999 12:35 PM
> To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
> Subject: Re: Central Point Option floppy controller
>
..........
> But that doesn't mean that's the only way to read such disks. The format
> (as in just what pulses appear where on the disk) is pretty well
> documented. It wouldn't be that hard to use some random logic or an FPGA
> to make a disk controller that read apple disks and transfered bytes to
> whatever host you wanted to use.
>
> I would guess the pulse rate is going to be low enough that modern CPUs
> could read the pulse-stream off the disk directly and decode it. I'm not
> going to try it, but I would be very supprised if it couldn't be done.
>
>
> -tony
And what you never had sex with!
NM
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Don Maslin [SMTP:donm@cts.com]
> When using the card, the native FDC is only used to
> > select the drive and seek to the desired track.
> >
>
> That depends on what the meaning of 'is' is :)
>
>
> - don
>
It isn't
NM
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Russ Blakeman [SMTP:rhblake@bigfoot.com]
> Sent: Wednesday, September 15, 1999 2:21 PM
> To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
> Subject: Re: COBAL for TRS-80
>
> Hopefully it''s listed as COBOL and not COBAL or not too many people will
> locate the auction without this info.
>
> Phil Clayton wrote:
>
> If anyone needs COBAL for TRS-80 Model-1 or Model-3 computers,
> I have listed it on eBay its currently at only $1.25 plus shipping..
>
> <http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=163084785>
> Phil..
>
>
<There are some UMC parts that have the disk controller + data separator +
<precompensation, etc on the same chip. At least some of those claim to do
<single density in the data sheet, but fail to work properly in practice
<(the failure is a little odd -- the chip will find the sector and it will
<attempt to read it. But the last byte will be mangled, something like that)
One of my hacks is to use ISA boards like Hard disk controllers, FDCs and
others as "modules" for other busses and I've used boards with UMC supper
chips for standard modes including FM with ease. One of the problems is
most people don't know much about programing 765 cores.
<There are no pins for connecting an external data separator either.
Not needed. You have to set up the auxilary registers for the right clock
rate and precomp for FM.
<I don't know if you can kludge them to do single-density. Maybe decode
<the FM data externaly, re-encode it as MFM and fiddle the data rate :-).
<A heck of a lot of work, though.
Not required.
<I assume that the UMC 8272-clone (there is one, just a plain 8272 with no
<extra logic) will handle FM with the right external data separator, though
Yep an 9216 or similar works though the counter based design used on DTK
and some of the older compaq boards works fine if the clocks are correct.
Some of those ISA-8 boards using 765A or 8272 (and clones) are easy to mod
for most any data rate and mode. The lines to the chip for those functions
are (MFM, RDD, RDclk, VFO, WDD, WClk, WREN, PS0, PS1) and should be easy
to follow on some of thse boards. The 9216 or 9229 can do all modes and
the only thing remaining is to maybe change the crystal.
Allison