In a message dated 1/10/99 8:04:23 AM EST, tim(a)thereviewguide.com writes:
<< I recently got an Apple II+. OK, it's not the most exciting
system in the world, but very cool in it's own respect. It's totally
FULL of all kinds of add-in cards (including a AD/DA converter),
and has 64K RAM. (48K+16K Pocket Rocket), etc. So basically,
it's a nice II+, but more important to me is the add on cards, which
probably hold tons of interesting secrets. There's a problem.
MACHINE WILL NOT BOOT. >>
does it beep when you turn it on? try removing most or all of the i/o cards
and try it again. if it was shipped to you, it probably got beat to heck.
reseat/replug everything component on the board and try that.
david
NorthStar (founded by 2 Berkeley professors) made one of the earliest S-100
5.25" disk sub-systems. IIRC, it sold for $699 which was cheaper than than
the 8" systems available, and made it a popular add-on for IMSAI and other
early S-100 machines. It always included NorthStar DOS and BASIC, but CP/M
was eventually adapted for it (by Lifeboat Associates I think). The Horizon
was a farily well-designed 4 MHz Z-80 S-100 box supplied with N*'s own 16K
(and later 32K, 48K, and 64K) dynamic RAM cards. The floppy controller was
designed to use 10 hole hard sectored diskettes (which are still available
>from California Digital for $10 a box!) in formats ranging from SSSD (90K)
to DSQD (800K). They also made one of the earliest floating point processor
boards (which I believe only their own BASIC supported, in precisions from 8
to 14 digits). They eventually added a range of HDs and continued with
their own operating system development including a multi-user environment,
though they also officially offered CP/M. I was one of the founding members
(along with John Dvorak, who at one time published a Software Review and
sold N* software out of his home!) of INSUA, the International NorthStar
User's Association which published a very good newsletter for many years.
NorthStar made the transistion past the introduction of the PC by offering
an all-in-one SBC system with graphics (the Advantage) and even had a
dual-processor (Z-80 / 8088) model. Despite attempting to expand their
marketing by linking up with General Bindery Corporation (spiral-bound and
other binding equipment) to sell NorthStars through business equipment
suppliers, they eventually went the way of all S-100 manufacturers - R.I.P.
Bob Stek
bobstek(a)ix.netcom.com
Saver of Lost SOLs
On Jan 10, 11:10, Andrew Davie wrote:
> First question: there are two drives, and each has a set of jumper pins.
> The pins are labeled..
>
> DS 0
> 1
> 2
> 3
> MX
> MS
> H M
> H C
>
> The top drive, on which the red LED lights when I power the drive, has
> jumpers across DS1 and HC. I am guessing that this drive is the second
> drive, and that the two jumpers that fell out of the casing belong on the
> second drive. That should be, I'm guessing, DS0 and mmmh... HM? Can
> anybody enlighten me on this?
Probably DS0 (Drive Select 0) and all other links the same as the other
drive (so HC, rather than HM -- that determines the behaviour of head
loading w.r.t. drive select/motor on/some other condition)
> Second question: Powering the Sorcerer (I thought I didn't have a
monitor,
> but the VIDEO IN on my VCR works nicely - it shows up well on my TV)
exibits
> some strange behaviour. What's trying to come up on screen is "EXIDY
> STANDARD MONITOR" and a few lines after that. But it simply stops after
the
> second or third character. Repeated efforts see it stop in different
> places - sometimes you see the whole lot, and it's actually usable for a
few
[...]
> I found a homebrew cartridge for this machine, and when its plugged in,
the
> wordprocessor it contains appears to work fine - everytime - with no
> apparent problems.
> So, the question is, what's wrong with the monitor?
Did you have a BASIC cartidge plugged in? If that were so, and it were
faulty, it might well interfere with what happens after a cold start.
If not, it could be a faulty monitor PROM. I can't remeber at what point
the monitor checks for a cartridge and hands over control, but it could be
that one of the monitor PROMs is faulty. That might only be visible when
no other cartridge ius fitted, and the CLI part of the monitor is executed.
> Third question: Assuming I actually get the machine powering up
correctly,
> and that the drive I have isn't missing some vital component - it will be
> time to insert a disk. Can anybody tell me how to actually use a drive
with
> the Sorcerer system? I'm afraid it's going to be some arcane "GO C800"
or
> something like that, from the monitor. I think I might need someone with
> documentation!
That's how they usually work, but there are lots of different Sorcerer disk
formats/systems. We'd need to know more about the specific disk system you
have. Usually the bootstrap is quite small, and in the area you mention;
you could probably find the start of the bootstrap code just by DUmping
memory and looking for it.
--
Pete Peter Turnbull
Dept. of Computer Science
University of York
>> Graphics we know were not going to happen on PDP11 or most other
>> 16bit cpus as they don't address enough space. OSs were driven by
>> the environment and it's tasks plus space needs.
>>
>> Allison
>
>Jerome Fine replies:
>
>While I realize that it would not have been possible to make
>their graphics part of the standard OS for a PDP-11, I
>was led to believe that the PR0 350/380 had access to
>their bit mapped screen displays. While doing such
>manipulations was likely discouraged, is that a true
>statement of the situation and in a few lines, how was
>it done? I may have a working PRO 350/380 and
>it would be interesting.
That depends on the extent of the graphics you want on PDP11.
I am thinking of the VS11 and the VSV21 board sets. They work
quite nicely - I have a few VS11's and my VSV21 is on loan at a
customer site. I also have full docs on them if anyone need info on them.
Dan
Having spent the last several hours plowing through the boxes of
doc that came (thank you thank you thank you) with the system.. it
seems that I have either a 250-II or a 550-II; I have to drag the
CPU out to tell which.
The Mag Tape susbsystem has some very interesting conversion
routines... not like DECworld... much simpler.
I am *really* curious to see what's on the 'Games' reel.
Cheerz
John
If so, I have some old copies of the ORA books if you
want them. Yes, X11 is well over 10 years old!
-Miles, loves X but still misses Sun's original graphics
system
> Hi (from the list owner). :)
Hi yerself.
> I usually tell people to stop eventually, though I am rather lazy about it.
> Generally, I come down harder on the poltiical discussions.
I acknowledge that I'm jumping in without the benefit of a lurking period,
and that what I've seen so far may not be statistically significant, but
I'd like to offer a little perspective. I subscribe to a pretty varied
assortment of lists (ranging from old Ramblers to new music), and this is
by far the highest volume, with each digest in the 3000-4500 line range.
This, folks, is a lot of mail. In the case of at least one of the other
lists I subscribe to, the list owner borders on tyrannical in keeping the
discussion on-topic. We like it this way. Otherwise the S/N just drops
off too hard, and the list becomes more burden than useful.
> The Altair-price discussions are generally considered to be on topic,
> not just because they deal with classic computers, but because they deal
> with changes in the hobby of _collecting_ classic computers. If you've been
> looking at prices and available machines for any length of time, you can
> probably tell that it just isn't easy to pick up machines that used to be
> fairly readily available. (PDP-8's and -11's, for example.)
Understood. Me, I'm interested in the exchange of technical information,
and as I suggested above, it might be argued that the volume and variety
of discussion is going to make the list a less-than-satisfying thing for
people with specific interests.
Might I respectfully suggest that, in the absence of aggressive subject
management by the owner, the list would be better broken into four, say:
classiccmp-historical
classiccmp-technical
classiccmp-overblown_prices_collector_scum_die_die_die
classiccmp-more_about_television_licensing_really
> Maybe I should start keeping a list of subjects that are on-topic by
> consensus, and those that are off-topic by consensus.
That's admirably democratic of you, but impossible in practice. It's
really just a job for one individual's discretion, and I have no reason
to not trust yours.
Jonathan
I have various & sundry HP/UX 6.2 manuals, such as a Systems
Administrator manual. These went with the HP 9000 Series
300 systems, circa 1988. Still in the binders, mostly.
Anyone need them?
I have a set of Beta diskettes for the Sun Roadrunner (i386).
I have what appears to be the complete OS, and the diagnostics
diskette. I have part of the dev. tools (should have all, I
will keep looking).
Anyone have a Roadrunner and need software?
-Miles
At 12:10 AM 1/7/99 GMT, you wrote:
>Outlook? I can assure you that it is possible to configure Microsoft
>mailers to send formatted HTML (which IMHO should not be allowed at all) or
>RTF in such a way that normal mailers simply see a plain text plus an
>attachment.
Which, I might add, is a pita. I end up with a directory full of files
like "remessag" and "quantel" and such because of these stupid attachments.
Overworks my hard drive, uses up disk space, and hides legitimate,
important files.
I dunno, but if you can't describe something adequately with plain text
plus attachements (as in included when necessary) perhaps you don't
understand your subject well enough. If you need to include formatting
(such as Word files or data or even code) it can be sent as an attachment
(which, I might add, is more useable than trying to cut and paste from an
e-mail message.)
--------------------------------------------------------------------- O-
Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad
roger(a)sinasohn.com that none but madmen know."
Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates
San Francisco, California http://www.sinasohn.com/
Just so everyone knows,
Hayes is gone. They closed down for good yesterday.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
-----
Max Eskin | kurtkilgor(a)bigfoot.com | AOL: kurtkilgor
Can anyone help me with this issue?
When I download my mail in Linux, the mail has a line in the header
called 'X-Status:' followed by a blank line. I have found that if I get
rid of this and the blank line, pine properly detects the Subject: and
From: of the letter. However, if I leave it in, it doesn't. I wrote a very
inefficient shell script to get rid of these lines, using a loop with grep
and sed. Does anyone know a better way?
Thanks.
----------------------------------------------------
Max Eskin | kurtkilgor(a)bigfoot.com | AOL: kurtkilgor
<be happy to send you a box of assorted unreliable S-100 DRAM boards that
<will keep you busy well into your retirement.
A good example! Also their very design sloppyness may be significant as
some were "of the time".
<Maybe that's the primary philosophical divergence here: I consider few
<obsolete machines to be inherently interesting, when there are so many
<others that are merely _thought_ to be obsolete but are still utterly
<useful given a current, robust OS.
Or some already have a robust OS that works even if it's not the current
vogue.
Allison
the list (which is supposed to be very single-minded) contains a number of
<people who actually are single-minded (Tony Duell, Allison Parent, Megan
<Gantry, Pete Turnbull, maybe others). This is good! Don't misunderstand
<me. It's the way it's supposed to be.
I resent that! I go off topic when the mood or whatever suits, like now. ;)
Allison
Well, I just got done winching the CDC 9766 drive down off my
truck, and boy are my arms tired...
The system is CPU, 32M of ram, 16 I/O ports, a Century 300M 10"
drive, a Seagate Sabre attached to a SCSI PORT!! (yay!) a Kennedy
9100 in Prime livery, and the usual load of cables and Stuff.
Also: I got the OS (PrimeOS 7.0 rev 20.2.8), a bunch of other
tapes, including a 7" reel marked 'games'. and several boxes of
docs and manuals. I have no idea how to tell what overall 'model'
the system is.. if the Primes went by models, like DEC PDP11, etc.
I was not all that interested in this machine, since I am *trying*
to stick to DEC and only DEC, but now that it's here I think it
might be fun to play with.
Oh, yeah, it has a Decwriter IV for a console... even came with
several boxes of spare ribbons.
It was heading for the dumpster.. I *had* to save it. The machine
was running when taken out of service and was de-commissioned by the
person who bought and operated it, so every thing was marked and
stored properly.
Cool... **another** project. ;}
And, other than the Seagate drive ('91), it's On Topic.
Cheers
John
Hi Doug and all,
Sorry, I only know the answer to this one:
At 03:48 PM 1/9/99 -0600, you wrote:
>Hey, any industrial controller collectors out there? I didn't think so.
>There are three fans inside the box, but it's sealed. I always thought
>that fans worked by exchanging hot air for cooler air. What good are
>fans inside a sealed box?
>
The black case itself is the heatsink. The fans only couple the heat sources
to the inside of the case. Sounds pretty neat.
-Dave
> But anyway, it *CAN'T* be much of a challange, as X.25 is that old
> (1), and, perhaps more imporantly, the Iraqi's aren't too bright when
> it comes to computer technology.
Who says? It's when you _don't_ have a lot of technology when you learn to
use what you _do_ have. Like how much more one can learn from an Apple ][
than from a Pentium system. A lot of Russian immigrants to the USA are much
better programmers, sysadmins, etc. than americans, because when they were
in Russia, they used old, well designed, systems intended for people who
knew what they were doing. They are likely to know how to make a 10K
program do the work of a 2M program which is what an american would likely
write (no offense intened). Plus, who knows? Maybe they modified the
protocol...
On Sat, 9 Jan 1999 ard(a)p850ug1.demon.co.uk wrote:
> Incidentally, I find the diversity on this list a good thing. Hearing
> about machines that I don't know about, or that I thought 'those are a
> poor design' (or worse) about is very interesting to me. So keep on
> talking about them....
I'm actually very surprised and disappointed by this newfound fascism.
We're _collectors_ or _hobbyists_ who are dealing with classic computers,
as well as hanging out on this list for _fun_. The people who shut others
up whenever we go mildly off topic, or when a machine they don't like is
brought up. Maybe there should be a contract for list subscribers. If you
were seeing people discussing something face to face at a party or
club meeting or conference that you didn't like, would you tell them to
shut up? I hope not, though the internet attracts socially inept
creatures. I expect the same level of politeness on the internet, in a
civilized discussion which I define this to be. I will not allow
technology to take humanity away from people, to the extent that I can.
----------------------------------------------------
Max Eskin | kurtkilgor(a)bigfoot.com | AOL: kurtkilgor
On Sat, 9 Jan 1999 dpeschel(a)u.washington.edu wrote:
> became. If they had just ripped off a better OS, that might have been nice
> as well. Something with long file names, or multitasking, or whatever.
> And OSs of the time DID have long file names. I don't know about
> multitasking (maybe OS/9 or FLEX were around when DOS was born?).
Interestingly, there were a number of attempts over the years to make a
better OS than DOS. An example is TSX-Lite, a multitasking, 32-bit version
of DOS that was shareware last time I looked. It had the right ideas but
worked very poorly. Caldera DR-DOS supposedly has multitasking but it
hardly works. OS/2 is very resource-intensive, worse than Windows 95.
Which makes me wonder; maybe something good could have been done before
Linux came about, but everyone was too lazy?
----------------------------------------------------
Max Eskin | kurtkilgor(a)bigfoot.com | AOL: kurtkilgor
Anyone in the US or APO/FPO in need of a good working Tandy CM-5 CGA
color monitor? $10 plus shipping and it's yours. It's not really heavy,
about 18 or so in weight. Good condition and all cables attached.
I live in zip 40144 in case someone needs to speculate the shipping
using the parcel calulator at http://www.usps.com/
Okay, okay, so a DECstation 5000/125 isn't very "vintage". But I did manage
to save one from certain death from my grad school (Carnegie Mellon), and it
has a nice big 21" monitor, two big 5 1/4" SCSI drives (each around 1/2 a
GB)... and no bootable OS.
It used to run Mach (I was on the Mach project at CMU), but I'd really like
to run VMS on the thing.
Does anyone know how/where/if I can get VMS loaded onto this guy?
Thanks all,
- Joe
Roger Merchberger <zmerch(a)30below.com> trashed my theory with:
> For the same reason some (many?) people here like their Commodore 64's &
> VIC-20's. _Personally_, I have no use for them (save a couple from the
> dumpster, but not even powered 'em up -- will be up for trade fodder soon)
> but for a lot of people on this list, they were their first computer.
> Sentimentality goes a *long* way on this list (which is his reason for
> owning the computer you don't want, BTW). Believe me, many folks are just
> as turned off by my RS/Tandys & Ataris & whatnot... but that's o.k. too.
Ya-but...
Look, just like everything else, there's "old good" and "old shit". Lots
of mediocre music was written two hundred years ago, which is why I refuse
to acknowledge "classical" music as a genre than has any inherent value in
defining the music. Just because it's old, it isn't by definition good.
Thus, I don't recognize anything particularly interesting in machines that
were badly-designed landfill-before-their-time any more than I do in mass-
market machines like the Radio Shacks and Ataris you mentioned. I see a
historical preserve (such as this) as being one better dominated by systems
that were examples of true innovation, and those tend to be the ones below
the radar of the consumer market. Do I have a problem with people who want
to fill their garages with original chiclet-keyboard-and-internal-cassette
Commodore PET 2001s? Hell, no. Enjoy 'em; start your own list dedicated
to 'em; stay outa my receding hair. I came here to find someone as serious
as me who can help me program 1702s.
This thread was about Compucolors. I ran a service bench when they first
came out, maintained them, and they were living, breathing junk. That
notwithstanding, I held onto a board set and a bunch of parts for many
years in hope of making it into my first machine with a color display.
When I discovered old SGIs, you can only guess how fast the Compucolor
parts hit the dumpster that they so richly deserved.
> Hang in there, find the delete key, and I guarantee you you *will* learn a
> lot while being on this list. I have.
Wish it was that easy, old son. On an average day I get about 200 pieces
of "real" (ie non-list) mail. That's why I insist on receiving ANY list
via digest - I can't afford to have a single list double the number of
messages I receive per day. So reading a 4500-line, 150-message digest is
a considerable amount of work, and not one that the "delete" key helps with.
Of course I want to learn. But not at the expense of endless dreary
discussions in the overpriced-collector-scum vein, or dreary Merka vs.
Euro drooling. I'm in Canadia - I'd have to throw rocks at both sides.
Jonathan
Victor the Cleaner said...
|
|classiccmp-historical
|classiccmp-technical
|classiccmp-overblown_prices_collector_scum_die_die_die
|classiccmp-more_about_television_licensing_really
That's only the beginning.
classiccmp-make-money-fast
classiccmp-bill-gates-sucks
classiccmp-bill-gates-rulez
classiccmp-religious-arguments
The list really isn't that high volume. I've seen
much worse. But mailing lists are why God invented
the "D" key.
-Miles
Doug Yowza <yowza(a)yowza.com> intoned:
> Oh sure, just drop on in and casually mention your MCS-4, the most
> desirable SBC on the planet. Do you need docs? Hans P. might know where
> to find them. And Hans F. has a few SC/MP SBC's. And we all have
> handheld PDP-8's, so the Intersil is dull stuff. :-)
Gee, wasn't just looking to brag or anything... I've actually been curious
rare the Intel is. I'd be interested in knowing how many are out there.
I'm okay on docs, but there's missing silicon, including the monitor proms.
Help!
Jonathan
On Sat, 9 Jan 1999 yowza(a)yowza.com wrote:
> Amiga to have happened in 1975, but if Bill Gates had stayed home and
> Linus Torvalds had been born a little earlier, man what a cool world we'd
> have today, 25 years later.
To tell you the truth, if Bill Gates had stayed home and Linus Torvalds
had never been born, we would have been even better off. I'm using Linux
right now, so I have Linus to thank. But then, I'm using a crappy Compaq
laptop which would never have been made (or made but not this crappy) if
not for Bill Gates. Linux is a solution to a problem that should not have
come about in the first place. I'd much rather be using some version of
the Dynabook, or an Amiga, or something totally different.
----------------------------------------------------
Max Eskin | kurtkilgor(a)bigfoot.com | AOL: kurtkilgor
In a message dated 1/9/99 8:06:42 AM EST, gram(a)cnct.com writes:
<<
By the way, whover was making the threat to someone else, I'd love
to have an RT myself. Second best keyboard ever made.
-- >>
i finally got my RT going after an individual from the RT newsgroup sent me a
keyboard since mine didnt come with one when i got it for $10. Seems to be a
standard corporate IBM buckling spring keyboard like i use everyday, except
the keyboard connector is shaped like the PCjr model! a standard keyboard
could probably be hacked to fit an RT. it seems the machine wont boot all the
way without the keyboard. now my RT boots AIX 2.1.2 i think and although i can
login as root thanks to the password taped to the side of the machine when i
got it, i have no idea what it can do. anyone know the location of some kind
of AIX tutorial. I found a
dos<->AIX command ref on the net, and although i did find a AIX FAQ, it's over
my head. I need something a little simpler.
>You guessed it the COSMAC Elf! And IIRC, the article was "Build a COSMAC
>Elf for Less than $100"
>Anyone got the issue date?
August 1976 "for about $80"
CDP1802
64K addressable
On chip DMA
16X16 matrix of registers
Flexible I/O
Francois
>
>--Chuck
>
D. Peschel said...
|
|What _I_ want to know is the relationship between OSF/1, a.k.a. Digital
|UNIX, and AIX. The manual entry for stanza(4) on our DEC system is the same
|as OSF/1 1.0, and it's SO badly written that only IBM could have done it.
|Plus stanzas are an IBM-ism anyway. I bet the entry is pretty much the same
|on AIX systems, too. (I just checked and our AIX doesn't have it. So I
|don't know -- it's just a guess.)
DEC first seriously attacked the UNIX market with Ultrix, which
was almost a pure BSD port. Over time they added a bunch of stuff
to it. They had a few really cool things, like they dxdiff, easily
the best GUI-based diff I've used.
Then along came OSF, a hodgepodge of UNIX vendors scared of the
idea of Sun and AT&T getting together and taking over the world.
So they put together OSF/1. This included people from a whole
mess of computer vendors, but DEC and IBM wre probably the biggest
contributors. The reference platform was a DECStation ?000 (I
forget which one).
By the time OSF/1 actually came out, it was obvious that it was
a fair example of design by committee, and the AT&T/Sun alliance
had pretty well faded away. So DEC, for who knows what reason,
oter than that they had the goods, decided to swap Ultrix out and
OSF/1 in. And everyone else went back to whatever they had been
doing before - AIX, HP/UX, whatever.
OSF actually did some cool stuff, but they had some real problems,
too. I was working at SecureWare, who was doing the security stuff
for OSF/1, and I remember new sandbox drops every day, and bugs
that had been fixed reappearing over and over in their original
form, and just general mayhem.
My favorite part, though, was when we built the kernel and X11
fully debugged, to track down a really nasty problem. Just booting
the OS ate up 70 or 80 MB of the 128MB in our DECStation, and
adding X11 on the hi-res screen ate up the rest of the RAM and a
fair bit of swap space. Then I tried to log in, which took almost
an hour exactly, beating the snot out of the disk drive, until it
finally came up - having used over 100MB of swap space. Starting
a Motif app ate the rest of our 256MB of swap space over the course
of two hours or so, at which time the system just rolled over and
stuck its little feet up in the air.
We never found the bug.
Three or four builds later, it was gone, somehow. Nobody at
OSF knew where it came from, where it went, or why. Oh, well.
My desktop machine at the time was the last of the Tektronix
68K-based systems running a BSD variant. It was slower than
their ill-fated 88K systems, but those ran SVR4, and mine was
fast enoug for me. It was a spiffy machine for the time. Of
course, I was just glad I wasn't running A/UX on really slow
Apples like most of my co-workers!
-Miles
<Zane H. Healy wrote:
<
<> Number 7?!?!?!? Give me a break, there is no better coffee table than a
<> BA123, unless it's perhaps some of the IBM RS/6000's (and that's all
<> they're good for)
<
<Zane, where do you live? Bill Donzelli and I need to make an
<appointment to come out and hurt you.
It would appear education is best attained with the extended use of 2x4
technology. IE: SMACK!, Listen up!
:) :) :)
Allison
<On Fri, 8 Jan 1999, Chuck and Francois wrote:
<
<> >You guessed it the COSMAC Elf! And IIRC, the article was "Build a COSMA
<> >Elf for Less than $100"
<
<Are you guys sure? I'm almost positive that was in Popular Electronics,
<and not Popular Science!
<
<I still say it was the ZX81. What do I win, Alex?
The ELF was introduced in Popular Electronics. the Sinclair was introduced
in Popular Science.
Allison
<Can someone tell me the CP/M command to copy a single file or program
<on my Kaypro from drive B: to drive A:
<I do not want to copy the whole disk just a single file or two..
<Thanks, Phil...
Your gonna hate this...
> PIP B:=A:file.foo
Allison
Yes it was in Popular Electronics that the Cosmac Elf was described.
I would give my vote to the ZX81, THe price is right $99 and I know that it
came as a kit (i built mine in 1982) actually it was my first computer.
-----Original Message-----
From: Miles O'Neal <meo(a)netads.com>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Saturday, January 09, 1999 1:33 AM
Subject: Re: Computer collector on Jeopardy!
>Doug Yowza said...
>|
>|I still say it was the ZX81. What do I win, Alex?
>
>I never saw that in a kit form...
>
In a message dated 1/9/99 8:47:47 AM EST, gene(a)ehrich.com writes:
<< It works real well.
My Aptiva 133 failed auto rollover to 2000 test but passed the rest.
It's worth getting a copy.
Don't know if the list carries it but I have attached a copy to this message.
It's a self extracting ZIP file that must be run from DOS. >>
uh, file attachments are a no-no...
www.pc.ibm.com/year2000
is another place to go to download a test program and also a driver that will
autochange the century byte for lazy computer users that wont issue the date
command.
david
Doug's "Ten Reasons Why I Collect Computers" inspired me to start compiling
the Pearls of Wisdom of our list members.
I'll be culling these from our daily e-mail, but if anyone wants to
contribute directly, e-mail me privately. Once I have a page or two, I'll
post it to my Web site for all to read (and laugh at, hopefully).
[ Rich Cini/WUGNET
[ ClubWin!/CW7
[ MCP Windows 95/Windows Networking
[ Collector of "classic" computers
[ http://highgate.comm.sfu.ca/~rcini/classiccmp/
[ http://highgate.comm.sfu.ca/~rcini/pdp11/
<================ reply separator =================>
At 12:48 PM 1/8/1999 -0800, you wrote:
>On Fri, 8 Jan 1999, Jim Strickland wrote:
>
>> > > Shure, today they are no longer produced with typewriters and
>> > > Spiritusumdrucker (sorry missing word - a copyingdevice using
>> > > special sheets and spirit for duplication), but rather on PCs
>> > > or high class DTP stations, but thats just the tool.
>> >
>> > Spiritusumdrucker! What a fantastic word! I think that would be a
>> > mimeograph?
>>
>> I always heard them called ditto machines. Print in blue ink that wipes
off.
>
>Sure but I think the actual latin name for them is mimeograph.
>
>> We had them in grade school. We did NOT have a photocopier - they were
>
>Me too. I used to have ditto duty making copies for the teacher. I also
>used to make up mazes and got to use the machine to make copies for the
>classmates.
>
>> apparently monstrously expensive to purchase and maintain at the time.
>> By the time I got to high school inexpesive photocopiers were readily
>> available, although we used the ditto machines even then. The
>> photocopier was fine for short runs or things where copy quality was
>> important. The ditto machine was faster and much cheaper per copy.
>> Of course I'm sure the ink on the master and the solvent on the
>> machine are carcinogens... (just kidding)
>
>By the time I was in high school dittos were a distant memory. To put it
>in (classiccmp) perspective, by that time inkjets were still on the
>horizon and dot matrix printers were still the shit.
>
>Sellam Alternate e-mail:
dastar(a)siconic.com
>---------------------------------------------------------------------------
---
>Always being hassled by the man.
>
> Coming in 1999: Vintage Computer Festival 3.0
> See http://www.vintage.org/vcf for details!
> [Last web site update: 12/27/98]
>
>
The Mimeograph (an Edison invention) used ink, as did the Gestetner (sp?)
while the Ditto used alcohol.
I still have a 1909 Mimeograph in my collection.
Charles E. Fox
Chas E. Fox Video Productions
793 Argyle Rd. Windsor N8Y 3J8 Ont. Canada
email foxvideo(a)wincom.net Homepage http://www.wincom.net/foxvideo
At 10:10 AM 1/8/1999 -0800, you wrote:
>On Fri, 8 Jan 1999, Hans Franke wrote:
>
>> Shure, today they are no longer produced with typewriters and
>> Spiritusumdrucker (sorry missing word - a copyingdevice using
>> special sheets and spirit for duplication), but rather on PCs
>> or high class DTP stations, but thats just the tool.
>
>Spiritusumdrucker! What a fantastic word! I think that would be a
>mimeograph?
>
>Sellam Alternate e-mail:
dastar(a)siconic.com
>---------------------------------------------------------------------------
---
>Always being hassled by the man.
>
> Coming in 1999: Vintage Computer Festival 3.0
> See http://www.vintage.org/vcf for details!
> [Last web site update: 12/27/98]
>
>
That was a DITTO machine, at one time handled by Bell & Howell. They had
to pull them out of the schools around here because the alcohol fumes made
everyone squiffy.
Cheers
Charlie Fox
Charles E. Fox
Chas E. Fox Video Productions
793 Argyle Rd. Windsor N8Y 3J8 Ont. Canada
email foxvideo(a)wincom.net Homepage http://www.wincom.net/foxvideo
I keep reading little pieces of information about this chip. (Actually, it
could be a multi-chip set... I don't know.) Apparently, it's _public-domain
hardware_. What a concept! :) Has anyone actually seen a system based on
this thing?
What? Where did I read about it, you ask? I think it might have been in
_Life with UNIX_, but I really don't remember. And it's too late to do a
Web search. I should really be in bed.
I'm surprised the FSF hasn't bought PD-32 systems en masse. It would be the
perfect platform to run the HURD on.
-- Derek
-----Original Message-----
From: Uncle Roger <sinasohn(a)ricochet.net>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Saturday, 9 January 1999 9:36
Subject: Re: Y2K stuff
>At 05:33 PM 1/4/99 -0700, you wrote:
>snip<
>An unrelated but similar (and ironically timed) issue is that of the new US
>20 dollar bills. I have seen a lot of vending machines/gas pumps/etc. that
>indicate they cannot handle the new bills.
Are they polymer rather than paper like all ours are now?
>The problem is, bills typically last 18 months at most.
The plastic stuff lasts somewhat longer, one reason why they now use it
here.
To save money, the govt withdrew all coins below 5c, we now have $1 & $2
coins,
and notes for $5, $10, $20, $50 & $100, all plastic with fancy printing and
a transparent
window. Near impossible to counterfeit. (Which is the other reason it was
done)
Cheers
Geoff Roberts
Computer Room Internet Cafe
Port Pirie
South Australia.
netcafe(a)pirie.mtx.net.au
Either in 1978 or around 1980 or 81, I recall reading
an article on AI-based image recognition with a micro
like the Altair or IMSAI. All in machine code, of course,
toggled in.
The guy called it Legion, because it was based on a
bunch of cells all making decisions. I think it may
have been a 5x5 grid of cells, each with its own algorithm
for voting yes or no. He would then show it a shape
(enter some data 8^), and Legion would, based on the
vote, tell him something (I forget what). Then he
would tell Legion the real answer. The cells that
voted correctly earned points, those that voted
incorrectly lost points.
As a cell lost points, it would eventually cross 0,
at which point it was a failure, and was cast out.
A different cell (algorithm) would take its place.
The idea was that hopefully, the cells would eventually
populate with algorithms with a high success rate.
He miscoded a test, though, and only the cells that
hit 0 exactly were cast out (into pigs, perhaps),
but those that jumped from +1 to -1 kept voting. A
program dump showd that some of these cells had
actually been performing a good service.
Anyone recall (much less have) this article? It was
very well written (a bit tongue in cheek)...
-Miles
OK, I give up! Since the list is no longer plain text,
will someone familiar with Eudora Pro 4.0 PLEASE tell me
how to configure Eudora it so that formatting like this:
****************** START PASTE *************************
------=_NextPart_000_0004_01BE3A7A.7073A200
Content-Type: text/html;
charset="iso-8859-1"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD W3 HTML//EN">
***************** END PASTE ****************************
Doesn't cause the rest of the digest to look like this:
***************** START PASTE **************************
------------------------------ Date: Thu, 7 Jan 1999 21:35:15 -0600 From:
"Paul Braun" To: classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu Subject: RE: Kim-1 Computer
Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Date sent: Thu, 7 Jan 1999 06:57:41 -0600
(CST) Send reply to: classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu From: Doug Yowza To:
"Discussion re-collecting of classic computers" Subject: RE: Kim-1 Computer
Originally to: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers > Mine is a
late model S/N 6176, postage cancled on May 18, 1977. > >From the few data
points so far, I'd say we've got monotonically > increasing serial numbers
starting with 1. (Of course, if they were C > programmers, then the first
one is S/N 0.) > > -- Doug OK. I had to look. My second KIM is #1051 with a
Rev. A board. It has the white ceramic MOS chips. This one shows plenty of
wear, however. It's mounted on a piece of masonite with a socket for the
one edge connector, a little bracket for a couple of 1/8" phone plugs (tape
connections), an expansion port (Centronics-type, I assume this is where it
was cabled up to a modified Selectric) and a terminal strip for power. The
LED's have had sockets installed under them, since I assume the originals
burned out. The 6502 also is socketed. This KIM was used by Stan Ockers and
Jim Butterfield while writing the "First Book of KIM". Stan would take it,
in the little briefcase he gave me along with it, to a computer club
meeting in Chicago where a guy had an IBM Selectric that he had modified to
work as a printer. Stan would load the programs he, Jim, and their partner
(sorry -- don't have my FBOK in front of me and the other name escapes me)
had written, and then print them out on the Selectric. These printouts were
then cut and pasted into the layout for the book. Is the bottom numbe on
the die cover the date code? If so, my 6502 is dated 1576. The thing is,
regardless of how much they sell for on e-pay, it means so much more to me
that Stan sat down and talked to me for an hour and a half about the book
and computing in those days and then gave me his KIM that I couldn't think
about selling it. Paul Braun NerdWare -- The History of the PC and the
Nerds who brought it to you. nerdware(a)laidbak.com www.laidbak.com/nerdware
********************* END PASTE *******************
THANK YOU VERY MUCH
=========================================
Doug Coward
Press Start Inc.
Sunnyvale,CA
=========================================
-----Original Message-----
From: Miles O'Neal <meo(a)netads.com>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Saturday, 9 January 1999 18:42
Subject: Re: new to the list
>I've a good mind to send a gaggle of RTs to your door!
You can send them to mine if you like, I don't have one, and I'd love
geniune Big Blue RISC machine of my very own..... Do they come with an
O/S?
:^)
Cheers
Geoff Roberts
Computer Room Internet Cafe
Port Pirie
South Australia.
netcafe(a)pirie.mtx.net.au
> > Well now that we are on the subject of Kaypro...What ever happened to
Alan Kay ?
> > Is this guy still around ?
> You mean Andy Kay? Yes, he is still around.
Alan Kay is also still around and quite active in the Squeak community,
Squeak being a portable revival of Smalltalk. He's now at Disney, believe it
or not.
Which leads to the question... anyone on this list have any Xerox Stars
(running Smalltalk, of course)?
Cheers,
- Joe
----- Original Message -----
From: Alan Kay <alank(a)wdi.disney.com>
To: <squeak(a)cs.uiuc.edu>
Sent: Saturday, January 02, 1999 4:51 PM
Subject: Re: How difficult is multiple inheritance?
>Folks --
>
>There is a cooler and most interesting way to approach all this. Much of
>the seminal work was done around the late 70s in PARC Smalltalk by Ira
>Goldstein and Danny Bobrow -- it was called PIE: Personal Information
>Environment -- and they have been written up as PARC Blue Books (as noted
>by Mike Klein previously to the Squeak list) ; *and* they can sometimes be
>obtained from PARC.
> The basic idea is to have an object made up of multiple perspectives
>e.g. a given object could have the perspectives of being an employer, an
>employee, a father, a son, etc., *and* the perspective of being an object.
>The internal representational strategy they used was to let a logical
>object be made of as many Smalltalk instances as were needed, especially if
>the perspectives were disjoint enough to give fits to simple-minded
>mulitple inheritance schemes.
>
>I have been a big fan of this general approach since Goldstein got it
>running. There are also a wealth of other terrific ideas in their papers.
>
>Cheers,
>
>Alan
jpero(a)pop.cgocable.net said...
|
|Is those RT's that bad? is there will be a problem if I tear it
|apart for its parts, the shipping and trying to selling would be a
|problem except no problem shipping parts except for case.
RTs were pretty bad. They were s l o o o o w w w...
And they had the most bastardized version of anything
daring to claim any kinship to UNIX that you can imagine.
The manuals were terrible. I suspect that if you were from
an IBM mainframe world, being forced at gunpoint to consider
PCs and UNIX and such, they were heaven-sent. But to
those of us already working with workstations and micros,
they were the Red Menace that Senator McCarthy warned the
world about - they just happened to be Blue.
|If you're really using the classics and using it as tables or
|something, protect them from spills, bumps etc..
Quick vignettes...
1) I contracted for IBM here in Austin for a while. There
was an RT on the austin.ibm.com network named "doorstop".
AFAIK, about all it was being used for was to answer the
pings for "doorstop".
2) At PSW, Frank King (the IBM upper manager who more or
less built the IBM workstation division) had just been
installed as president when we took him on a tour of the
premises. As we escorted him into the secure lab, his
eyes lit up as he saw an RT.
``An RT! Wonderful! What do you use this for?''
Tom Stewart pushed it in front of the door to hold it open.
``A doorstop? What else?''
3) During the time I was at IBM (14 months) I saw rooms and
rooms full of RTs. I kinda have to laugh, thinking about
what they were paying for space. One of the graphics labs
had about 30 linear feet of wall space, 10 feet high, just
stacked with the processor boxes, because they were running
out of other places to put them. I never figured out what
they were doing with them - whether they couldn't give them
away, or were afraid to, or what.
If I had one, I would probably protect it. If I had two, I
would protect one. For the other, I would have an auction.
The high bidder would get to step out back onto the rifle range
(why have 5 acre sin Texas without a rifle range?), and put a
7.62mm bullet into the RT's evil, beating heart.
And in Austin, there would be *lots* of bidders. I might not
make $6,818.00, but I'd make enough to pay my ISDN bill for
a while...
-Miles
Nah, I'm sure there are 3rd world countries that would take them.
But after they had them a while, they'd be even more pissed at
the US than they are now... 8^/
At 07:10 PM 1/8/99 -0800, you wrote:
> ... he said it was the first one he ever
>owned, which was a kit he bought thru Popular Science for $99. His name
>was Dennis. Is there a Dennis lurking on this list?? :)
And the computer was ....
You guessed it the COSMAC Elf! And IIRC, the article was "Build a COSMAC
Elf for Less than $100"
Anyone got the issue date?
--Chuck
At 11:48 PM 1/4/99 -0500, you wrote:
> o *DATA* - what about all those data files which have been
> recorded over the years? What form was date stored?
Working on a work-around at the moment wherein we need to store 5 digit
numbers, but the database (deployed at nearly 400 stores around the western
US) has only 2 bytes for this field. Unfortunately, COBOL only allows
values up to 9999 to be stored in a two byte field, even though 2 bytes can
(in theory) hold numbers from 0 to 65535 (or -32766 to 32767 or so).
So we need 4 bytes for COBOL to be able to deal with the new data. But, to
roll out a database change like that to the stores would take 5-6 months
(can't just muck around with live production systems, you know, and you
can't do anything while the stores are open (i.e., taking in $$$).)
Interestingly, the numbers we need to deal with are all less than 32000, so
they will fit in 2 bytes. So the work-around will be to store the data as
two character bytes and convert that within the program into a temporary 4
byte field. So what happens when the numbers get bigger than 32K? Well,
I'm sure the system will have been replaced by then... 8^)
(Actually, it will have; the new, replacement system was supposed to have
been finished by now. We're just patching the old system until it's done.)
>There are going to be more and more failures as we get closer. Last
>year, there was a report that an insurance company which normally
>issued 3-year policies could only do two-year. If they haven't
>fixed the problem, they're probably down to one year now...
In the late 1980's, I worked with a company that wrote software for leasing
companies. Companies that leased big computers and heavy equipment. In
addition to getting to know amortization tables intimately (I used to know
the formula to compute payments/periods/rates/etc. by heart!) I got to know
the y2k bug pretty well -- most of the leases were 10 year leases. We had
a y2k version out by '90 or so.
--------------------------------------------------------------------- O-
Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad
roger(a)sinasohn.com that none but madmen know."
Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates
San Francisco, California http://www.sinasohn.com/
Hey, check this out! KayPro is still in business:
www.kaycomputers.com
Sellam Alternate e-mail: dastar(a)siconic.com
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Always being hassled by the man.
Coming in 1999: Vintage Computer Festival 3.0
See http://www.vintage.org/vcf for details!
[Last web site update: 12/27/98]
Janet Morehouse in Baltimore has a Kaypro II that she is willing to give
away to whoever wants to come and pick it up. Whoever's local, give her a
jingle at MorehouseJ(a)dhmh.state.md.us.
Richard Schauer
rws(a)ais.net
-----Original Message-----
From: Charles E. Fox <foxvideo(a)wincom.net>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Saturday, 9 January 1999 0:50
Subject: Re: Americans (was: Re: Message formats)
>At 01:12 PM 1/7/1999 +0000, you wrote:
> The country is fine, but we always manage to elect nincompoops to govern
it.
You don't have a monopoly on that. We seem to have the same problem.
It's probably due to the fact that mostly nincompoops run for office.
Cheers
Geoff Roberts
Computer Room Internet Cafe
Port Pirie
South Australia.
netcafe(a)pirie.mtx.net.au
Hey, check this out! I was just watching Jeopardy and the first
contestant said he was a collector of antique computers! Alex asked him
what his oldest computer was and he said it was the first one he ever
owned, which was a kit he bought thru Popular Science for $99. His name
was Dennis. Is there a Dennis lurking on this list?? :)
Sellam Alternate e-mail: dastar(a)siconic.com
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Always being hassled by the man.
Coming in 1999: Vintage Computer Festival 3.0
See http://www.vintage.org/vcf for details!
[Last web site update: 12/27/98]
Seth, Doug,
Thanks, you're right, I'm confused. Looks like I'll track down NetBSD for my
DECstation, and look into buying a VAXstation 3100 at some point.
Thanks again,
- Joe
>>I've also been told by some credit card company call center reps that
they
>>couldn't do something or other for me because the "computer wouldn't let
>>them".
>
> Don't you know a brush-off when you hear it? Employees LOVE to blame
> things on the computer!
Reminds me of an event a couple of years ago.
As those of you who have met me will know, I am something of an eccentric.
A few years ago, I had a medical examination and the doctor, sorry,
physician (I doubt he has a doctor's degree) who examined me said I needed
glasses, go and see an optician.
I went to see the optician and had an eye test. I then tried to order a
monocle. There are (apparently) two standard monocle frames available, and
(complete with lens) the price was L42. Easy?
No. Nothing we could do or say could convince the order processing
software that one could order a frame with only one lens. Eventually we
got the price down to L45 - L42 for frame and one lens, and L3 for fitting
an existing lens to the other side. The girl taking the order then had to
go and find her superior, who used special authority to give me a 3 pound
discount.
So don't dismiss it too soon if someone says the computer won't let them do
it.
Philip.
<Okay, okay, so a DECstation 5000/125 isn't very "vintage". But I did manag
<to save one from certain death from my grad school (Carnegie Mellon), and i
<has a nice big 21" monitor, two big 5 1/4" SCSI drives (each around 1/2 a
<GB)... and no bootable OS.
<
<It used to run Mach (I was on the Mach project at CMU), but I'd really lik
<to run VMS on the thing.
<
<Does anyone know how/where/if I can get VMS loaded onto this guy?
No you can't. It's not a VAX or Alpha, it's a MIPS processor so the choices
other than MACH is UNIX or some flavor of unix.
Allison
<:: Perhaps this will help others out there in dating KIMs.... I tried
<::slicing into the card to count the rings, but the results were
<::inconclusive.
<
<I can definitely say, without even getting mine out of the closet, that I
<probably have one of the youngest. Mine is a Revision D KIM-1, and it's
<a Commodore board, not a MOS Technology one.
The one I have is a 1977 (date codes on chips) with REV-B etch and the
only number on it is a crude 5404 white stamp on the back. It works!
Allison
<SC/MP, and Intersil 6100 (the pdp8-compatible one) respectively. I'd also
<like to hear from anyone who has or is familiar with any of these machines
I have working examples of both, interesting machines.
Allison
At 08:29 PM 1/4/99 -0500, you wrote:
>> Is it? My current credit card has an expiry date after the end of this
>> year and I've never had any problems with it.
I've got a credit card that expires in '00 and it doesn't work!!! Oh wait,
it's at the limit. Never mind. 8^)
>I think that 'maintenance errors' could potentially occur in power plants,
>and what is more likely, some will be shut down just in case.
Sure, and since I might crash into a building, I'll drive my car into one,
just in case. There are a lot of people out there looking at what will
happen on 1/1/00 (and, btw, 1/1/99, 2/29/00, 1/1/27, etc.) myself included.
As a related anecdote, I recently found (and fixed) a M12 bug -- the system
I wrote to manage events and generate web pages and e-mails for the Free
List (http://www.sinasohn.com/freelist/) crashed and burned at the
beginning of December because I had screwed up the date computations. A
few frantic hours later and the Free List went out, better late than never.
--------------------------------------------------------------------- O-
Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad
roger(a)sinasohn.com that none but madmen know."
Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates
San Francisco, California http://www.sinasohn.com/
What's new?
* Altair related auction archives from Ebay for 11/98, 12/98 now online
* classiccmp archives w/Altair keyword available in easily searchable
format
* Steve Shepard inventory of Altair documentation now online
* Altair owner registry is better organized and growing
* New links always being added!
> David Freibrun
> http://altaircomputers.org
> david.freibrun(a)mvo.cendant.com
> (949)367-3881
>
-----Original Message-----
From: Sam Ismail <dastar(a)ncal.verio.com>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Saturday, 9 January 1999 5:44
Subject: Re: Sociology and Message formatting
>On Fri, 8 Jan 1999, Hans Franke wrote:
>
>> Shure, today they are no longer produced with typewriters and
>> Spiritusumdrucker (sorry missing word - a copyingdevice using
>> special sheets and spirit for duplication), but rather on PCs
>> or high class DTP stations, but thats just the tool.
>
>Spiritusumdrucker! What a fantastic word! I think that would be a
>mimeograph?
Quite probably. Spiritusumdrucker means "printer using spirits"? I think.
Well, we just called it a Spirit Duplicator. We used to use them
when I was still in Air Traffic Services to run off Pre Flight Information
Bulletins
for Pilots, (a list of NOTAMS, WX etc for their flight). Prior to that, we
used to prepare them by means of a local teleprinter, with a perf tape that
had the current stuff on it. Took a while though. (75 baud)
By the time I left, we had caught up and were using a conventional
photocopier.
Cheers
Geoff Roberts.
Computer Room Internet Cafe
Port Pirie
South Australia.
netcafe(a)pirie.mtx.net.au
I think there's a few in PA that could take at least a mainframe. Maybe
two...
-----Original Message-----
From: Charles E. Fox <foxvideo(a)wincom.net>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Thursday, April 08, 1999 2:17 AM
Subject: potholes
>
> Did anyone catch the bit on ABC news last night about the use of old
>computers to fill potholes?
> I think some of our Windsor potholes would require at least a mini.
>
> Regards
>
> Charlie Fox
>
>
> Charles E. Fox
> Chas E. Fox Video Productions
> 793 Argyle Rd. Windsor N8Y 3J8 Ont. Canada
> email foxvideo(a)wincom.net Homepage http://www.wincom.net/foxvideo
>
>
At 12:53 01/08/99 -0800, Sellam wrote:
>On Fri, 8 Jan 1999, Christian Fandt wrote:
>
>> Were there many computer companies, if any, who were not manufacturers but,
>> like RCA from around 1921 to 1928, sales-only outfits? I'm thinking of
>> pre-PC compatible days, '82 and earlier, because as you know, any major or
>> fly-by-night outfit could put their name on a PC nowadays. Also, strictly
>> non-PC computer companies are included even up to ten years ago (to keep it
>> on classics). Keep it on-topic and change your Subject line if you reply on
>> some other on-topic subject.
>
>Sure, plenty! I can't think of a whole lot of good examples right now,
>but for starters there was Bell & Howell with their "RARE!" black Apple II
>models.
Were those black models part of the equipment one got with the Bell &
Howell mail order computer electronics school? If so, I had not thought of
that type of "non-manufacturer".
--Chris
-- --
Christian Fandt, Electronic/Electrical Historian
Jamestown, NY USA cfandt(a)netsync.net
Member of Antique Wireless Association
URL: http://www.ggw.org/freenet/a/awa/
At 05:33 PM 1/4/99 -0700, you wrote:
>those credit card pumps may not be ok, even if the credit card is. Do I
An unrelated but similar (and ironically timed) issue is that of the new US
20 dollar bills. I have seen a lot of vending machines/gas pumps/etc. that
indicate they cannot handle the new bills. The problem is, bills typically
last 18 months at most. I expect that by summer, we won't see any more
old-style $20's in circulation. A real problem if they haven't updated the
machines yet.
(Hmmm... Maybe I'll start hoarding old 20's... 8^)
--------------------------------------------------------------------- O-
Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad
roger(a)sinasohn.com that none but madmen know."
Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates
San Francisco, California http://www.sinasohn.com/
At 05:25 PM 1/4/99 -0700, you wrote:
>What boggles the mind is that this is a problem at all. It seems hard to
>believe (in retrospect) that people really did deliberately build software
>with only 2 digit years. I know it saved a few bytes, and yes, I remember
1,000,000 records (a small sample) x 2 bytes x 3 dates (birthdate, initial
trx, most recent trx) = 6,000,000 bytes. That was a lot 20 years ago.
Keep in mind, also, that reading in a record required enough workspace to
hold the record, and this may have been a limiting factor as well. Not to
mention bandwidth issues -- we may not think much of downloading a 6MB file
now, but imagine doing that 20 years ago with a 300bps modem.
>when a byte of memory was a significant amount, but still. How did standard
>programming practice come to be so short sighted as to assume that software
>infrastructure would be thrown out and replaced on a regular basis?
Today it is. We keep hoping that one of these days Microbloat will get it
right... 8^)
But seriously, 20+ years ago, it wasn't so much that it was expected that
it would be replaced as it was the idea that if they can get the software
out the door now, they may still be around to fix the problem later,
whereas if they hold off, they may not be around.
It was also a self-perpetuating problem. No point in building a 4-digit
date if your source data (internal or external) is 2-digits. In fact, a
4-digit program might fail if given 2-digit data.
There are lots of reasons, many of them valid (at the time).
--------------------------------------------------------------------- O-
Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad
roger(a)sinasohn.com that none but madmen know."
Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates
San Francisco, California http://www.sinasohn.com/
>
> I wonder if it was a mistyped $50.00....
> --
Somehow I doubt it. I looked at this listing extensively because it has links
to his web site. He has very interesting comments about ebay. He states he
makes a living off ebay but I notice he is a stockbroker. Looking at his
current auctions he specializes in collectable ceramics and coins at normal
realistic prices. He has some Transoceanic tube radios that have not met their
reserves.
The Osborne is a nice collectable with lots of SW and Documentation. These are
the type of items that bring high prices. However his asking price is
ridiculous. I think this is a classic case of speculation by someone who is
not knowledgeable in the field but has a nice find. What is interesting is
that he does know how to sell on ebay.
This, the recent Kaypro and other high priced asking prices have lead me to
wonder if there is a new scam being played on ebay. With all the hits it is a
great source of advertising. List something at a high asking price or reserve.
You pay $2. People who are really interested I think would contact the seller
after the sale to try to find out what happened. The seller could then
negotiate a sale independently, without paying the commission to ebay. The
commission on a high-priced item, while not a lot, is considerably more than
the $2.
The gentleman :) with the Osborne has some very interesting comments about
selling on ebay. His site is http://www.freewarehof.org/
It is obvious that he is a speculator. It is also interesting to notice that
his site link (rey2) to his current sales on ebay has been delisted by them.
His current sales are under a very similar but different name (rey).
I communicated with the $1000 Kaypro seller. He wrote me that he pulled the ad
after he realized that it was priced to high. He also left me an opening to
make an offer. Since I am not buying I didn't reply but I haven't seen it
relisted. Marvin, have You seen it again? I don't follow ebay all that well.
Paxton
At 03:24 PM 1/1/99 -0800, you wrote:
>BBSes are, IMHO, a dying breed. However, they do still fulfill a niche
>that the 'net does not. There are significant numbers of people who are
Another niche is in local groups that want to provide a forum for their
members, but cannot afford to provide net access for all its members. My
local Atari club is one such group. Not all atari users in this area are
on the net, so a 'net-only solution is not acceptable, and we can't afford
to connect the BBS to the 'net. Mind you, it doesn't get used a lot...
--------------------------------------------------------------------- O-
Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad
roger(a)sinasohn.com that none but madmen know."
Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates
San Francisco, California http://www.sinasohn.com/
> The same is not true of html. It's not the waste of bandwidth - it's the
> fact that it's darn difficult to read. And it doesn't convey any extra
> meaning
Actually, I wouldn't even mind simple html, like <HTML><BODY>message
text</BODY></HTML>. But most of those programs make crazy html documents
that would make its original authors cringe, no doubt. 20 lines of code,
mostly weird numbers and font commands and style sheets and so on. Now
_that_ is unreadable, and I don't consider it real html, either.
> OK, I'll do {\bf bold face} like that. Documented standard, you know...
Of course, doing it *with asterisks* is a lot easier to type and
understand.
> What about the waste in _my_ resources - the carbon-based computer I am
> using to compose this message - in trying to decode the real information
> from a pile of useless html tags ?
Indeed. Some people think they are doing me and others a great service by
sending messages with no value whatsoever, and they think they ought to
send it in what format is convenient to _them_. Nah.
> Well, there's be a good reason for doing that in the UK. The license for
> a colour TV is something like 4 times the cost of one for a black and
> white TV. And the extra 'entertainment' might not be worth that much.
TVs require licenses in the UK? What about if you buy a CRT and make your
own?
At the risk of turning off our new list member I'll throw my USD $0.02
into the fray. Commercial vs non-commercial broadcasting was a hot
topic back in the early 1920's when broadcasting first began on a
large scale in the U.S. Many people were opposed to crass commercials
for toothpaste, etc flooding the airwaves and wanted an alternative
which would have took the form of a use tax as in England.
Interesting but true, one of the first if not the first radio stations
that was supported by commercials was WEAF in New York city, one of
several commercial stations owned by Ma Bell (AT&T). The chain of
stations owned by AT&T were sold to RCA to become NBC in 1926
following anti-trust suit threats and corporate fighting. AT&T and RCA
basically had come to a 'gentleman's agreement.'
Marty
______________________________ Reply Separator
_________________________________
Subject: OT! Re: Message formats
Author: classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu at internet
Date: 1/8/99 2:53 AM
On Thu, 7 Jan 1999, Tony Duell wrote:
> The license is for something like 'installing and operating a TV
> receiver'. The money from it is used to fund the BBC. One license covers
> all the TVs (and VCRs, etc) in use at one 'household'. A colour license
> allows you to operate B/W TVs as well (but not vice versa of course). Yes
> there are other terms, conditions and exceptions but that will do for now.
I'm sorry, but I just gotta say, requiring a license to watch TV is
something I would overthrow the government over. I've never heard of a
more cockamamy tax.
The way we fund public TV and radio in the U.S. is annoying (pledge
drives) but they only last for a couple weeks until the necessary funds
are accumulated and they only happen but once or twice a year (and I'm
proud to say I pay my "membership" dues dutifully...public radio in the US
is top notch).
ObCC: Can't think of anything so screw it.
Sellam Alternate e-mail: dastar(a)siconic.com
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Always being hassled by the man.
Coming in 1999: Vintage Computer Festival 3.0
See http://www.vintage.org/vcf for details!
[Last web site update: 12/27/98]
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From: Sam Ismail <dastar(a)ncal.verio.com>
To: "Discussion re-collecting of classic computers"
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Subject: OT! Re: Message formats
In-Reply-To: <m0zyKVc-000IyJC@p850ug1>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
X-To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
X-Listprocessor-Version: 8.1 beta -- ListProcessor(tm) by CREN
My first KIM-1 (from Computer Components, L.A., CA, in 1977) is
marked much the same as Marvin describes:
It is a MOS KIM, the component side has etched Rev. A, and beneath
the KIM-1 logo is etched EC - 715. Beneath that is what looks like a
round QC inspection stamp, ?CC 201 ECI in the circle.
The earliest chip is a NatSemi LM565CN (7340). The 6102s are all
'76, as are the 6502, and both 6530s.
The solder side has that 'rubber stamp' looking number between the
edge connectors: 3879 [*not* the date] in whitish ink, and to the
right is a partially obscured stamp in black, ending in 15. Near the
top right is another 'QC' stamp, a circle enclosing ACC, 201, ????.
Below this is a partial sqaure stamp, barely readable, with the
letters 'est' visible. Below *that* is a partial triangle stamp, not
legible at all.
Perhaps this will help others out there in dating KIMs.... I tried
slicing into the card to count the rings, but the results were
inconclusive.
Cheers
John
Zane Healy wrote:
> Again, how typically American! I'm starting to hate American's to the
> point I'm looking for another country to move to, since I'm embarrased to
> say that I'm an American myself. Anyone know any good countries that I
can
> move to, and not be embarassed to be associated with? The Internet is
not
> an American only thing!
I'd recommend Britain, except that we hate Americans too, and you might not
be too welcome ;-)
Canada might be worth a try, though.
Philip.
Picked up some more goodies, got a Plus+ Hardcard 40 hard drive(SMS OMTI
chipset for the controller side! Maybe I can plug it into my Apollos...),
and two DEC boards. The first one seems to be a CPU card,, it's part number
is L0111. The second one looks like I/O or a drive controller, it's an
L0101. I have no idea what they go into, but a glance at my PDP-11 card
list has another Lxxxx on it, and it's a Vax card. So maybe I have some VAX
cards? I don't know. Anyone know exactly what they are? I really doubt
they'll plug into my PDP-11/84, but it might be a good idea to stop me
before I try... :-)
--------------------------------------------------------------
| http://members.tripod.com/~jrollins/index.html - Computers |
| http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Lair/1681/ - Star Trek |
| orham(a)qth.net list admin KD7BCY |
| ham-mac(a)qth.net Portland, OR |
--------------------------------------------------------------
Banks do close inactive accounts. The process is called "Escheatment" (I think I've got that right), and the laws, which are vary specific, vary by state in the US and by whatever government entity elsewhere. The banks do not get to keep the money, however, it is (usually, anyway, again the laws vary) normally turned over to the state, where it remains available on some basis should it be claimed (which is fairly rare).
I'd really like to get hold of a functioning
(or close) Compucolor or Intecolor from the
early 80s. The ones we used at Georgia Tech
were all in one unit (I think), a big color
monitor console sort of thing, like God's own
ADM3a, in technicolor. (I could be wrong,
but that's what I seem to remember.) I'd
prefer one with a disk drive.
I think this was the coolest thing ever for
learning graphics stuff.
Anyone have one a mere mortal can afford?
-Miles
I think it's a bit niave to think that a KIM-1 is only going to bring
150-250 $ these days on eBay.... My guess would be over 500.
Alas
- Mike: dogas(a)leading.net
I just checked my two KIMs for dates. Here's what I have:
Board#1: Labeled "Rev. A", oldest chip date 5276 (Dec 76); white numbers
on back "2788". The 6502 is a white ceramic DIP with a "3776" date code.
Board#2: Labeled "Rev. B", oldest chip date 4276 (Oct 76); white numbers
on back "5895". The 6502 is a white ceramic DIP with a "3776" date code.
Small tag says that the 6502 has been replaced.
[ Rich Cini/WUGNET
[ ClubWin!/CW7
[ MCP Windows 95/Windows Networking
[ Collector of "classic" computers
[ http://highgate.comm.sfu.ca/~rcini/classiccmp/
[ http://highgate.comm.sfu.ca/~rcini/pdp11/
<================ reply separator =================>
Philip.Belben(a)PowerTech.co.uk
>AFAIK there is nothing in any contract I take out with a bank that says
>that if I deposit money and leave it there for over 2 years they are
>entitled to it. I come back 10 or 20 years later expecting to retrieve my
>savings. Yes, I did this with my German bank account in 1995 having not
>touched it since (I think) 1985. It was still there and I could still draw
>money out when on holiday in Germany.
When I was about 3 months old my parents opened an account with Barclays in
my name with about ?2 in it. When I turned 12 the bank began to send me
letters saying that, because of the interest gained I now had ?7. When I
turned 16 the bank suddenly lost all information about me, resulting in the
loss of that money. I'm not saying it's a great deal and it's not as if I
spend sleepless nights worrying about it but I'd like to know where my money
went and why did the account disappear. This type of thing does happen and
the blame is usually placed on "computer error." The Y2k problem is just a
convenient way of "accidentally" losing some of the information regarding
many of the accounts that are considered non-active.
--
Gareth Knight
Amiga Interactive Guide | ICQ No. 24185856
http://welcome.to/aig | "Shine on your star"
Hi!
Does anyone have a boot disk for an NEC APC III?
I found that my error when I try to boot is because of the "Stoned" Virus.
One other question: Is there any way to replace the 720k 5.25" (That's what
I was told it had) with either a 360k floppy, or a 720k 3.5" drive?
ThAnX,
--
-Jason Willgruber
(roblwill(a)usaor.net)
ICQ#: 1730318
<http://members.tripod.com/general_1>
<QUESTION - to any of the folks out there who
<put these kits together originally...
<Is this the way you received them from MITS?
<With the front panel and/or the power supply
<pre-wired and assembled?
Altairs were available two ways Assembled and Tested and pure kit.
the pure kit ones ALL the board had to be populated and the FP was one of
the worst with all the leds.
Allison
-----Original Message-----
From: Tony Duell <ard(a)p850ug1.demon.co.uk>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Friday, 8 January 1999 8:43
Subject: Re: Message formats
>Needless to say they didn't know. Nor do they know what license (if any)
>is needed to receive amateur television...
Can't help with the other examples, but IIRC, in days of old, when we had
such things as TV licenses, it was still legal for an amateur (or
non-amateur) to use amateur tv without a broadcast listeners license.
The test was whether the tv transmission was on a normal broadcast channel
and could be received on an unmodified tv. If it needed a separate rx then
you didn't need a license. The PMG had just about lost interest in the
whole concept of receiver licensing by this stage anyway, though they made a
last attempt to get people to comply with a massive (for those times) tv and
radio adverstising campaign which didn't really net too many more licenses.
Shortly thereafter, they dropped the whole system. The only receivers that
require a license these days are certain satellite systems (under some
special circumstances). Otherwise you are free to look/listen to anything
you like. (Except mobile phones - in theory)
Cheers
Geoff Roberts
Computer Room Internet Cafe
Port Pirie
South Australia.
netcafe(a)pirie.mtx.net.au
Don't tell Andrew Davie, but I'm trying to compete with him in the realm
of weird computing machines.
I just took delivery of a Cybernetic Systems Mathiputer.
It's a stupid odd-shaped math toy that quizes you on arithmetic. It looks
like somebody took a steel globe, split it in half, and put the two halves
back together inside out and sideways (hey, Chuck, I need a diagram here).
It had LED's, incadescent lights, and three rotary switches for input.
Weird enough?
It appears to be from around 1974, and it's got several ceramic and gold
Fairchild parts. Some are 3XXXDC series, such as 3807DC. Does this ring
a bell for anybody? Was there a CPU or calc chip in that series?
-- Doug
Philip.Belben(a)pgen.com said...
|
|So don't dismiss it too soon if someone says the computer won't let them do
|it.
Years ago my dad got fed up with the fact that he
had a couple dozen gas, credit and other cards with
our name spelled without an apostrophe. He called,
wrote letters, and generally waged a one man war.
People were calling back begging him to please keep
the cards, the computers did it, there was no way.
Dad eventually cut most of them up and sent them
back. He even had a VP or two call him!
Dad had an ace in the hole. He knew a COBOL programmer,
who explained that it was just basically stupidity,
laziness, or being overly clever that led to these
problems, and reminded him that our bank used computers
and COBOL, and that everything related to us at the
bank had apostrophes in our name.
Dad eventually did manage to talk to MIS people at
a couple of the companies, and after a bit of argument
they agreed that this would be resolved within a year.
Dad was amazed that it would take this long, but when
they talked about budgets and politics he calmed down
(since he was head of a college chemistry department
and acting dean). Eventually they came through.
I've always wondered just how much Dad's private war
had to do with the fact that today, the commercial
computer program that won't take apostrophes in a
name (at least in the USA 8^) is rare. Now if the
programmers would just program searches to try it
with and without the apostrophe when one is entered
(since people still leave them out on occasion...)
-Miles
On Jan 6, 18:33, Barry A. Watzman wrote:
> Subject: Message formats
>
> [ plain text
> Encoded with "quoted-printable" ] :
I am NOT sending in HTML format, but it is MIME encoded. Sorry, but I use
my E-Mail client (Windows messaging) for more than just this discussion
group, and I need the ability to send and receive formatted text for some
of them, including my employer. I'm not going to change formats on a
message-by-message basis just to eliminate the equals signs at the ends of
the lines.
No, it's not just MIME-encoded. We're not complaining about equals signs
at the ends of lines (which, incidentally, arise because Microsoft don't
understand MIME). Apart from this message, all the ones I've seen from you
have been encoded as "multipart/alternative". The few I've bothered to
read (because it IS a bother) have contained a copy in some other format as
well as the plain text.
And as you can see from the way my mailer has quoted your message, the
lines aren't split except at paragraph breaks. You need to get a mailer
that works :-)
"Windows messaging"? Do you mean Microsoft Mail? Or something like
Outlook? I can assure you that it is possible to configure Microsoft
mailers to send formatted HTML (which IMHO should not be allowed at all) or
RTF in such a way that normal mailers simply see a plain text plus an
attachment.
--
Pete Peter Turnbull
Dept. of Computer Science
University of York
At 01:37 PM 1/1/99 +1100, you wrote:
>somewhere, the words "that does not compute" in a silly monotonic
>computer-like voice. Annoyed the hell out of me! Was it just me this
Remember how hilarious it was back then when Scotty picked up the mouse and
said "com-PUT-er..."?
--------------------------------------------------------------------- O-
Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad
roger(a)sinasohn.com that none but madmen know."
Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates
San Francisco, California http://www.sinasohn.com/
Marvin wrote:
> Doug Yowza wrote:
> >
> > So, now we know how much an unassembled Altair kit will go for, and we
> > know that most people can't tell the difference between an assembled kit
> > and an unassembled one.
>
> Or partially assembled one! I saw the photos and was kind of
> wondering what
> the story is. Perhaps I missed something in my quick glance, but I didn't
> see any boards mentioned, and just some photos of what looked like an
> assembled box, and a bunch of parts.
I kind of enjoyed the "I've never powered it up" disclaimer at the bottom.
Should be sort of obvious for an unassembled kit?
I notice from the pictures of the Altair 8800 kit
on eBay that the front panel and power supply
have been wired and assembled.
The kit I found
also has the front panel and power supply
wired and assembled.
QUESTION - to any of the folks out there who
put these kits together originally...
Is this the way you received them from MITS?
With the front panel and/or the power supply
pre-wired and assembled?
Thanks,
Bob Wood
______________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com
>QUESTION - to any of the folks out there who
>put these kits together originally...
>Is this the way you received them from MITS?
>With the front panel and/or the power supply
>pre-wired and assembled?
No. At least not mine on the 'kit a month' plan.
The way MITS was it wouldn't suprise me if
they did ship out some partially built to fill
demand for kit orders, but it wasn't in my case.
More trivia: The last 'kit-a-month' installment
of $60 got you the CPU chip. By that time generic
8080's were less than that so I just bought an
NEC chip elsewhere to save a few $$.
Chuck
cswiger(a)widomaker.com
Mark Metzler wrote:
>I knew you should have held onto all those Altairs longer,
>Bob!
Actually I have managed to hold on to more than I
have sold, Mark. I had decided to stop listing my
Altair stuff on eBay for now because there seemed to be a glut
of Altair items going on there. But this is the first
whole original 8800 that has been listed since earlier
last year when the two were on simultaneously. It will
be interesting to see if this selling
price causes more to be listed.
Bob
>
>At 10:29 PM 1/6/99 PST, you wrote:
>>$6710.00 Wow!
>>
>>http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=5282
>2778
>>
>>
>>______________________________________________________
>>Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com
>>
>>
>
>--- Mark Metzler
>
> VON NEUMANN MACHINES
>Online Computer History Bookstore/Museum
>http://home.pacbell.net/mmetzler/vnm.html
>
>______________________________________________________
>Get your free web-based email at http://www.xoom.com
>SPECIAL OFFER: 250 Web Site Templates, Only $29.95! -
>http://orders.xoom.com/email
>
>
______________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com
I know the Altair was historically significant, and it's very collectible,
but give me a break! I paid less than that for my car.
I'm hoping the fix was somehow in on this auction, in an attempt to drive
collectible prices up - otherwise, I'll have to give up all hope of ever
owning any pre-1980 computers that I don't already have.
If this is truly where the market is going, most people on this list might
be able to retire on the Riviera after all! :v)
Mark.
At 10:29 PM 1/6/99 PST, you wrote:
>$6710.00 Wow!
>
>http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=52822778
>
>
>______________________________________________________
>Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com
>
>
I have decided it is time to clean out some of the computer stuff.
Following is a list of computers and components that are available.
Basically, except for the last group of DEC uVax cards & where noted
elsewhere, everything is free to those who come and pick up the items.
I basically don't want to get involved with the shipping of any large
items, such as the CPU boxes or monitors. If you just have to have
some component that I can ship in a moderate sized box, then all I
ask is a little something to cover my time and shipping.
I live just south of Terre Haute, IN, USA. If your interested in
anything, send me an email.
I would like to apologize for the length of this list. I did not realize
how much stuff there was 'til I put it in a list. I decided for now to
hold off on the Intel/PC related stuff.
Mike Thompson
----------------------------------------
Convergent Technologies
Model CR-5100-A31
Some kind of Unix box
Contains:
68000 CPU board with 64K of 8Kx8 and parallel port
Memory expansion board with 2M of 256Kx1
20 channnel RS232 board with 20 9 pin D connectors
Micropolis 1325 70mb MFM hard drive
Also have a spare 10 channnel RS232 board with 10 9 pin D connectors
I am told that this is a working machine and was being used as a
print server.
----------------------------------------
Wang components
The following are from a Wang machine, model is unknown
PM007 - PC Color Emulator board, has 15 pin D connector labeled 'Input'
and 9 pin D connector labeled 'Analog RGB'. Board measures 8x12.
PM009 - Medium Resolution Color Graphics board, has 8 pin DIN connector
labeled 'Analog RGB' & 6 pin modular connect labeled 'Local Keyboard'
Board measures 8X12
Micropolis 1325 70mb MFM hard drive.
Condition of these items is unknown.
----------------------------------------
Motorola
Model VME/10 System
Contains:
1 ea MVME400 board
1 ea MVME201 boards
Micropolis 1304 43mb hard drive, may be bad.
Also have a monitor, but no video cable.
Believe the keyboard is around here somewhere.
Also have the following loose VME bus cards:
VME Module 01-W3471, circa 1987
contains: 68020, 68851, 4mb of 1Mx1; front panel has leds for
Fail, Halt, Run, Scon, push switches for Abort & Reset, and
a 25 pin D connector. Have 2 of these.
MVME147SC-1. circa 1990
CPU with around 8mb of RAM
MVME931-1
This is a wire wrap prototyping board
The next card is for the VME bus but is labeled Jupiter Technologies.
I suspect it came from a UGC box. It contains a 68000 and around
2mb of RAM, it is marked as being an 'IOP' card.
The last 2 cards were custom made by a local company and are probably
of no use to anybody. Listed here to more or less keep track.
Condition of all this is unknown.
----------------------------------------
IBM
Model 5182
Personal Computer Color Printer
Parallel Interface, dot matrix
132 column
This works, but needs a new ribbon
----------------------------------------
Hewlett Packard
Model 2631G
132 column dot matrix printer
This has a 24 pin connector similar to the 36 pin Centronics
connector. Does anybody know the interface on this one?
----------------------------------------
Micropolis
Model 1325 70mb hard drive
This is a loose one, and condition is unknown
----------------------------------------
DEC
MicroVax 2000
I have the case, boards and power supply. The RD54 was snatched up
by a subscriber just recently.
Also have a spare MS400 2mb board and this is unused still in
original box.
----------------------------------------
DEC
DS200 Terminal Server - 4ea
DELNI - at least 6 ea
----------------------------------------
Apple
Macintosh II
I have 4 machines, 3 are working, one is dead.
Of the working:
2 have 1 floppy drive, 1 has 2 floppy drives
they all have 40mb hard drives.
2 have Viking video cards with a Viking Monoterm monitor (are a little dim)
1 has an Apple video card with a Apple color monitor
Have keyboards and mice for all three.
Have complete (I think) manuals and disks for each machine.
One machine has Interleaf loaded on it.
I have a couple spare video cards & an external 20mb drive.
I have 1 set of Interleaf manuals and 2 sets of disks.
I believe the loaded with version 6 of the OS.
I would like to get a little something for these. I might be convinced
to ship components, but do not want to ship anything big, especially
the monitors.
----------------------------------------
IBM
RT Model 135, Type 6150.
It has a 5 1/4 floppy, and two hard drives (100MB & 300MB),
plus the usual video and a network card. The monitor is a
Model/Type 5081-19, 19" color with RGB inputs.
I have a fairly complete set of manuals and disks for the machine.
The machine was working and is loaded with AIX 2.x.
I say was, as it was sitting in the garage when a tree was blown
over and crashed through the garage roof almost exactly where
the machine was. The only damage was from water, mostly running
down through the monitor. The CPU had some stuff on top of it
and I doubt that much if any water got into it. I have not tested
it since then and the insurance company has settled on it.
If you want to come pick it up, fine. I am willing to pull components
out of this and ship them. I hate to see things like the network
card go to waste. All I ask is a little something for my time and
trouble.
----------------------------------------
DEC
The following cards were pulled from uVax II's and all machines were working
at the time they were removed from service. Since I am asking a little
for any card, I will guarantee them in that I will replace (where possbile)
or refund. If your interested in multiple cards, let me know, I can
probably work out a deal.
KA630-AA / M7606 - CPU Module, MicroVax II, 4 ea $15
MS630-BB / M7608 - 4 MB Memory Module, 1 ea $10
KDA50-Q / M7164 & M7165 - SDI Disk Interface, 1 set $20
DQ256 (Dilog) - SDI Interface, 1 ea $10
TSV05 / M7196 - Tape Controller, 1 ea $10
TQK70-SA / M7559 - TK70 Tape Controller, 1 ea $10
DELNA / M7513 - Expander Module, connects ext. RD50/RX50 to controller, 3 ea
$5
TQK50 / M7546 - TK50 Tape Interface, 2 ea $10
DHV11 / M3104 - 8 Line Async Multiplexer (quad height card), 1 ea $10
DZQ11 / M3106 - 4 Line Async Multiplexer (dual height card), 2 ea $10
M9404 / M9505 - Cable Connector, 3 sets of cards plus some cables, $5
END OF LIST
--------------- --------------- --------------- ---------------
---------------
-----Original Message-----
From: Joe <rigdonj(a)intellistar.net>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Thursday, 7 January 1999 12:30
Subject: 53rd state was Re: Y2K
> Naw, you're not even close to being the 53rd state! We're going after
>Puerto Rico right now, the ten Canadian provinces are next, then Mexico.
>You guys are way down the list. It must be sad to realize that you follow
>even Mexico!
>
> Sorry, couldn't resist! :-)
There's a line there, ah what the heck.
Sad is not the word, relieved perhaps! :^)
I couldn't resist either. Mind you, looking at TV here,
or driving around any medium sized city, and seeing the
Kentucky Fried Chicken, McDonalds and Hungry Jacks (=Burger King)
outlets, and seeing all the kids roaming around in those silly baggy shorts
with their baseball caps on backwards, it's getting hard to tell the
difference.
At least we still speak real English, despite the school systems apparent
inability to teach kids to write and spell in it.........
Ahem, to get back on topic, I have a Circa 1989 Toshiba T1200 laptop that
has a
Puredata 8023 (assume Ethernet) card in the expansion slot.
There is nothing for this on the Puredata website, and my email to their
support on 30/12/98 has not been responded too (yet).
The card has an etch that reads
PDT8023 [R]
[C] 1989 Pure Data
Made in Canada
0060012002
The T in the ident suggests a special (Toshiba?) build.
The card has a single BNC socket and a switch marked 0 and 1,
which is probably a power on/off function.
There are three jumpers marked E1 E2 and E3. E2 has a shorting
bridge on it.
There is a bar coded sticker on the component side.
The sticker is damaged, looks like 002x1945
(digit marked by x is unreadable, possibly a 6 or an 8)
Several of the chips on the board have a date and a hex number on
a paper sticker on them. Listed below.
March 1990
800020000
March 1991
800019100
March 1991
800019702
March 1991
800019801
March 1991
800019900
I'm after some Netware drivers for it. (This is an XT laptop)
I've tried the NE1000 drivers to no avail.
I'm assuming it uses the IRQ (3) that is reserved for the internal modem.
Any help appreciated.
Cheers
Geoff Roberts
Computer Room Internet Cafe
Port Pirie
South Australia.
netcafe(a)pirie.mtx.net.au
Found on Usenet. Anyone near the U. of Iowa want to talk to this guy?
It sounds kind of beat up, but might make a good parts box.
-=-=- <snip> -=-=-
On Wed, 6 Jan 1999 15:17:30 -0600, in vmsnet.pdp-11 you wrote:
>>From: Brian Deitte <bdeitte(a)blue.weeg.uiowa.edu>
>>Newsgroups: vmsnet.pdp-11
>>Subject: Clueless questions about a for sale PDP 11/73
>>Date: Wed, 6 Jan 1999 15:17:30 -0600
>>Organization: The University of Iowa
>>Lines: 18
>>Message-ID: <Pine.A41.3.95.990106150728.112902A-100000(a)black.weeg.uiowa.edu>
>>NNTP-Posting-Host: black.weeg.uiowa.edu
>>Mime-Version: 1.0
>>Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
>>X-Sender: bdeitte(a)black.weeg.uiowa.edu
>>Path: news1.jps.net!news.pbi.net!151.164.30.35!cyclone.swbell.net!newsfeed.berkeley.edu!netnews.com!news-feed.fnsi.net!cyclone.i1.net!uunet!in1.uu.net!news.uiowa.edu!black.weeg.uiowa.edu!bdeitte
>>Xref: news1.jps.net vmsnet.pdp-11:803
>>
>>Hello. I've been given a PDP 11/73 that was going to be thrown away.
>>I've searched for quite a few hours on the Web for resellers, and all I
>>could find was agora and auction-it.net. Any advice on a price range or
>>where to look for someone who wants one is appreciated.
>>
>>If you've read this far, I assume you're interested in some way, so here's
>>some extra information:
>>According to a a picture I saw somewhere, its a BA23 standing tower.
>>I found the following cards: M3106(2), M8017AA, M7546, M7555.
>>The front has a TK50 and a Micropolis "Disk Memory Unit" with a S/N
>>7074231037.
>>Some of pins on back are broken, and the power cord has been snipped, but
>>supposedly it worked at its former residence, although I don't even know
>>how to test it.
>>
>>Feel free to send by email if you feel this is irrelevant to this
>>newsgroup. Thanks, Brian.
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
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..."
From: Zane H. Healy <healyzh(a)aracnet.com>
<snippity>
Thanks Zane. Looks like I may get my first taste of rt-11. My boat's come
in.
- Mike: dogas(a)leading.net
-----Original Message-----
From: Zane H. Healy <healyzh(a)aracnet.com>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Thursday, 7 January 1999 14:43
Subject: Re: Message formats
>Again, how typically American! I'm starting to hate American's to the
>point I'm looking for another country to move to, since I'm embarrased to
>say that I'm an American myself. Anyone know any good countries that I can
>move to, and not be embarassed to be associated with?
Come on down (under).
>The Internet is not an American only thing!
No it isn't. I accept that the original concept and the early development
work
took place in the US. The growth of the net has made it a global
phenomenon,
though the spam is nearly all American in origin!
>
>I'd like to point out a few things, my reaction to a message that was about
>%30 HTML caused this thread to spring into being. I'm using a e-mail
>client that can handle it without any problem, I've also got a dedicated
>384k line, so bandwidth isn't a problem for me
Lucky boy. That sort of bandwidth is way out of reach of most people in
this country.
A typical home user would probably have a 28.8 or 33.6k modem, with a few
56k's
thrown in. 56k doesn't always work well, heck I'm using a 56k USR modem,
but
it won't connect to my ISP faster than 33.6k, even though the ISP supports
it.
Phone line quality most likely. ISDN is available, but it's timed by the
second,
and frightfully expensive to install, so most ISP's won't allow a dial on
demand,
they will only do ISDN for a permanent connection. Change ISP's did I hear
you
say? There are only 2 here. We are in the country ~100 miles from
Adelaide,
plenty more there, but it's 50c a minute for a long distance call during the
day,
and it's not a lot different there
Since a permanent 33.6k modem line (like this one) costs around $290 a
month,
and a commercial 64k ISDN permanent is around $1000 a month, you don't see
a lot of users on it yet.....
Oh yes, our local phone calls are not timed (yet - they keep threatening -
mostly
because of net users) but the backlash from consumers is keeping them on the
back foot - for now. They are not, however, free, it's 30c a call, though a
local call
in Australia can cover a sizeable area depending what area code you are in.
The 08 area code covers the entire state of SA, which is roughly 5 or 6
times
the area of the UK. Local calls are roughly a 50 mile radius of the place
you call from.
Cheers
Geoff Roberts
Computer Room Internet Cafe
Port Pirie
South Australia.
netcafe(a)pirie.mtx.net.au
From: Zane H. Healy <healyzh(a)aracnet.com>
<snip>
Thanks Zane...
Being pdp experience deficient, I appreciate the info. I have a 11/93 that
I haven't been able to get working yet... I'm looking forward to my first
rt-11 experience.
- Mike: dogas(a)leading.net
-----Original Message-----
From: Miles O'Neal <meo(a)netads.com>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Thursday, 7 January 1999 14:08
Subject: Re: Message formats
>Max Eskin said...
>|
>|TVs require licenses in the UK? What about if you buy a CRT and make your
>|own?
>
>It's illegal, of course.
>
>Ifthey don't catch you, there's no license fee.
>
>If they catch you, you're sent to Australia.
>
>Talk about a win-win situation!
For who? We quit taking POME years ago.
We still get pom immigrants though......;^)
Cheeers
Geoff
Computer Room Internet Cafe
Port Pirie
South Australia.
netcafe(a)pirie.mtx.net.au
At 05:02 PM 1/6/99 -0800, Sam wrote:
>I've also been told by some credit card company call center reps that they
>couldn't do something or other for me because the "computer wouldn't let
>them".
Don't you know a brush-off when you hear it? Employees LOVE to blame
things on the computer!
Joe
-----Original Message-----
From: Barry A. Watzman <Watzman(a)ibm.net>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Wednesday, 6 January 1999 14:42
Subject: Y2K
>The problem arises simply because people (programmers included) normally
write dates in the format >"mm/dd/yy", as in 12/31/99. Not just in computer
programs, but in normal, day-to-day lives. It's that simple, >and that is
all that there is to it.
Only if you live in America. Much of the world (like here, or the UK, New
Zealand etc)
use dd/mm/yy in their "normal, day-to-day lives."
I have personally had numerous headaches with software written (mostly) in
the USA where
this unwarranted assumption on date useage is hard coded into the damn
software.
Accounting packages are prime offenders. So is a well known DOS based Fax
program.
This usually results in users moving to a package that does not make silly
assumptions
about date useage outside America. I know there are 250+ million of you,
but we're not
the 53rd state. (Yet anyway) We "ain't gonna" change the way WE do things
here.
It would make our lives a lot easier if such things were an option, some
authors get it
right, and allow it to be a config option, sadly, lots don't.
Oh, and our financial year is from 1 July to 30 June, not 1 January to 31
December.
Had that trouble as well. Grrrr.
Cheers
Geoff Roberts
Computer Room Internet Cafe
Port Pirie
South Australia.
netcafe(a)pirie.mtx.net.au
In a message dated 1/6/99 8:26:02 PM US Eastern Standard Time,
rigdonj(a)intellistar.net writes:
> >I've also been told by some credit card company call center reps that they
> >couldn't do something or other for me because the "computer wouldn't let
> >them".
>
> Don't you know a brush-off when you hear it? Employees LOVE to blame
> things on the computer!
it's not a brush off, really. in my helpdesk job, computer applications we use
wont do certain things unless required info is present or in right format.
sure, there are stupid operators, but the computer sometimes is at fault too.
Hi folks,
I have a chance to pick up some SMS Q-bus systems that were being used as a
security entry system. I dont know anything about them and assume (because
of the Q-bus moniker) these to be uPDP equivilents. The apparently two
computers are in a 19' rack system. I haven't and won't see them until
Saturday so that's all the info so far... Please help, anybody know these
systems?
Thanks
- Mike: dogas(a)leading.net
-----Original Message-----
From: Tony Duell <ard(a)p850ug1.demon.co.uk>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Thursday, 7 January 1999 13:13
Subject: Re: Message formats
>The license for a colour TV is something like 4 times the cost of one
>for a black and white TV. And the extra 'entertainment' might not be worth
>that much.
They STILL do that? Heck, we tossed it out in the early 70's.
The compliance rate was very low, and the Radio Inspectors
got so tired of the door to door checking and subsequent abuse
(sometimes physical - some Aussies are less than polite when dealing
with bureaucratic bull....) that they were glad to see the
government call it a day.
Cheers
Geoff Roberts
Computer Room Internet Cafe
Port Pirie
South Australia.
netcafe(a)pirie.mtx.net.au
-----Original Message-----
From: David Wollmann <dwollmann(a)ibmhelp.com>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Sunday, December 27, 1998 2:49 PM
Subject: Re: OT, but info needed: RAM uprade
>On Sun, 27 Dec 1998, Jason Willgruber wrote:
>
>
>When IBM ELS were designing the original 5150, 16-bit cards would have
driven
>the cost out of their US$4,000.00 retail target range, so they went with
the
>crippled 8088. A decision that, in hindsight, makes about as much sense as
>including a cassette drive and (what was it???) 16K RAM on the first model.
>
>
The tape drive was actually a useful idea, which should have been continued
all the way throughout the PS/2 line. It allowed whoever was using the
computer to actually make use of the ROM BASIC. The floppies aren't
available in ROM BASIC, and once a program is typed in, there's no way to
save it. The cassette drive worked in the same way that the cassette drive
in TRS-80's did. It acted as the storage device in ROM BASIC. In fact, I
don't even think the PC came with a cable to connect it to a tape deck. You
had to run down to RadioShack and pick up a TRS-80 cassette cable.
I think I actually have an entire 60-minute tape full of PC-BASIC programs
(somewhere). I think one of the not-so-smart things that IBM did was to
remove the cassette interface and to keep the now-useless ROM-BASIC in
there.
--
-Jason Willgruber
(roblwill(a)usaor.net)
ICQ#: 1730318
<http://members.tripod.com/general_1>