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

Case designs (was: New Definiton REQUIRED)

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 09:22 AM 11/17/97 -0600, you wrote: >> excellent PS/2 '87 era series that can be ripped apart with bare >> hands except for motherboard and PSU screws. > >FWIW, my absolute favorite box of all time is the VAXstation 4000/60 or /96; >you can get everything out of the box quickly with no tools. In contrast, >it's only been in the last few years that I've gotten coordinated enough to >keep from mutilating my knuckles every time I go into a VAXstation 2000... I dunno if it's my favorite, but I do like the Mac IIci (intro'd in '89 -- almost 10 years) beacuse it too comes apart with no tools (mostly.) My first computer, the Atari 600XL was great because the cartridge slot was in exactly the right position to use it as a handle. The one downside of the m100 is it had no handle, nor did it's little slipcover. (And the RS blue case was too expensive -- then; I've got one now.) Any other thoughts on case designs? I still think the Lisa was beautiful, and I'll have to check out the 3b1. --------------------------------------------------------------------- O- Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad sinasohn(a)ricochet.net that none but madmen know." Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates San Francisco, California http://www.crl.com/~sinasohn/

28 years, 5 months

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CLASSICCMP digest 241/core

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<Take that 800 mA pulse, and multiply it by the length of all the wires <hooked to each drive line. What you end up with is a rather good radiator <of high-frequency hash! Many machines housed the entire core assembly, <including drivers, in a different box than the CPU for this reason. <PDP-8/E's and -8/F's, where the memory does sit in the CPU box, have a <special shielding card that segregates the memory from the rest of cards <to keep this hash out of the CPU circuitry. also to keep out of local TVs. Some of the core systems were boxed to keep a constant temperature as ferrites are temerature sensitive. Allison

28 years, 5 months

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core memory, long.

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<800mA to switch! Ouch! No wonder the PSU was so bulky. Actually its 800ma per bit, the half select lines were some 400ma each plus sense inhibit signals. A large memory could easily be in the several tens of amps with all the surrounding logic. Typical power systems for code machines were very robust and heavy. <Truth. Trying to time right time to catch the bounce back and avoid <the read pulse that is there on the sense wire. Yeah, it's read in <serially fashion because that one wire is strung back and forth <through all cores just once. You have to fashion the circuit to <retore the orignal bits because the read process destroys the data. Sensing the read data is fairly easy as it will occur in a fixed point (all other things being constant) in time after the coincident select pulse. Coincident selection takes half the total current needed to switch the magnetic state of the core and divides it between two wires of the matrix where the two coincide is the selected core and the resulting magnetic field causes it to switch state. Writing is a matter of causing it to switch to the reverse state. ONE core in a larger array. Typical arrays are 16x16 or 64x64. A memory typically would contain many arrays organized as 4096 by 12 or 4096 by 16 or wider and possibly larger. One such machine the MIT/Lincoln TX2 had a main memory of 65536 38 bit words (2.5megabits). \ /---inhibit wire \|/ -----+----X SELECT wire /|\ / | \-----sense wire y --SELECTwire This is a single bit of a core plane, the + could be a doughnut of ferrite that can be magnetized in either direction depending on direction of current. The sense wire as that is a serpentine single wire that goes through each core. It's routing is such that for half the plane its sense is reverse to suppress induced noise from the select wires. Some planes use a forth wire threaded in the same way as an inhibit. Inhibit is so a one or zero representation can be forced. So we can select a core and read it's results and the selection process is in effect and erasure meaning we have to put back data. Reading is done by selecting a core using the X and Y select lines with thenough current to make the core magnetic filed to change if it was previosly different. This change or lack there of induces a current in the sense wire that we can detect. If there is no change in the magnetic field there will be a small pulse if there is a change in the field there will be a bigger pulse. Comparators are used to compare that pulse to a known reference and if big enough sends a pulse on to a latch (flipflop) to save that. Writing is like reading we select a core with the currents reversed to force the magnetization the other way, if we do not want to write we also force current through the inhibit wire so that it counters the magnetic field of the selection and inhibits the reversal. Before more detail is given it's sufficient to say that a core memory system is actually a goodly portion of the then current computers timing and cost. I have only glossed over the reson core works and the logic to do so is fairly involved as it requires sequential activities to occur precisely every time and at the correct time. Yes, core is destructive read out and the data read out must be stored written back. Most CPUs of the time would do a read/modify/write to take advantage of that. Living exampes of that include PDP-1 through PDP-11, TI990 and I believe NOVA. There is a whole class of logic that uses cores to propagate logic pulses and even perform logical operations on combinations of pulses. Cores have inherant memory from teh magnetization. There was a few computers built to exploit that and had few active devices(transistors or tubes). They are faster than relays but slower than tube or later transistor cicuits. Allison

28 years, 5 months

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More boards today! VAX 780 and more...

by dseagrav＠bsdserver.tek-star.net

A whole lot, and all of it for $20! Any info on these appreciated. So, how close am I to building a 780? :) PDP-8 M8320 BUS LOADS M8315 KK8-A OMNIBUS CPU, 8/E INSTRUCTION SET M8317 OPTION BOARD #2, MEM EXT & TIMESHARE, BOOTSTRAP, PWR FAIL START SOME UNNUMBVERED VAX NETWORK BOARD, INTERFACED TO A APOLLO. M7769 KFQSA. (A SCSI adpater?) UNKNOWN: M8013 RLV11 DISK CONTROL X2 M8014 RLV11 BUS CONTROL EMULEX SC03 EMULEX TC12 X2 EMULEX CS02 DLV11-J (I know what THIS is!) M7138 QBUS TO LASER PRINTER DMA INTERFACE MODULE VAX 780: X3 M8210 32K X 72BIT MOS RAM [MS780] M8212 MS780-A MDT MEMORY DATA M8218 KA780, SBI LOW BITS INTERFACE M8226-C KA780, DEP, CPU DATA PATH E M8227 KA780, CPU DATA PATH D M8228 KA780, CPU DATA PATH C M8229 KA780, CPU DATA PATH A m8230 KA780, CEH CONDITION CODES, EXCPETIONS, HI BITS M8231 KA780, ICL, INTERRUPT CONTROL, LOW BITS M8232 KA780, CLK, CPU CLOCK M8233 KU780, WCS, WRITABLE CONTROL STORE M8234 KA780-A, PCS, PROM CONTROL STORE M8236 KA780, CIB, CPU CONSOLE INTERFACE M8238 KU780-A, 2K WCS X2 M8270 DW780-A USI, UNIBUS ADAPTER SBI INTERFACE X2 M8271 DW780-A, UNIBUS ADAPTER CONTROL M8272 DW780-A UNIBUS ADAPTER MAP & DATA PATH X2 M8273 DW780-A, UNIBUS ADAPTER ADDR m9040 11780, TRM SBI TERMINATOR VAX ??? L0007 11/750 MBA MASSBUS ADAPTER X8 L0200 4MB MOS ARRAY [MS86] X3 L0222 (MTM) MEM ARRAY TERMINAL BOARD [KA86] L0224 SBI/A-BUS TERMINATOR [KA86] X2 L0104 SBI INTERFACE FOR CI PORT L0100 CI LINK INTERFACE L0101 IPB (CI CONTROL STORE + PKT BUFF) L0201 CONSOLE CONTROL KA86] L0204 MBOX DATA PATH [KA86] L0206 IBOX DATA PATH [KA86] X2 L0207 IBOX CONTROL A [KA86] L0208 IBOX INST BUFF [KA86] L0212 SBIA SBI INTERFACE [KA86] X2 L0214 IBOX CONTROL B [KA86] L0215 CSA CONTROL STORE ARRAY [KA86] L9200 MEM LOAD FOR 8600 Whew!

28 years, 5 months

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CLASSICCMP digest 241

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<Are there any obvious choices of better cores for a simple homemade <core plane? I might try playing with steel 0-80 (and smaller) nuts Permalloy was a common one and the size was generally 50 mils or smaller. TX2 used this with 80mil od and 50 mil ID, it switch time was 1uS and required 800ma to switch and yeilded 100mv if it switched. There was no data given if it didn't switch but I'd bet 20mv would be believable. Cycle time for a memory with cores like that would be 3-5us. The TX2 ran them at 5uS. Other materials can be used but a good sharp B-H curve is desired and saturable ferrites were used for the smaller 30-40 mil cores. Saturable ferrites are used in power conversion in current designs so they exist. There is a relationship between core size, material and speed. <this weekend, but I doubt they'll be particularly good - probably it'll <take a rather sizable current*turns product to magnetize these. Turns are 1, and the current from some of the older stuff was around 400-800ma and the smaller later stuff in the 100-200ma region. <Assuming I do find a readily available material that works, would others <be interested in a write-up about building your own core memory plane? <I'm envisioning circuitry to allow one to toggle in bits to various <locations and read them out again. The logic driving it is likely <to be simple TTL (maybe some 74LS138's or 74154's for X-Y decoders) <plus some analog electronics for the drivers and sense/inhibit <circuitry. If I'm clever enough, it'll be be doable with readily <available (i.e. Radio Shack) parts. This would be interesting. Additionally if it could be applied to some of the core planes out there with ??? characteristics and origins it may help. there was an article written back in the late 70s in BYTE on using CC core memories. FYI the TX2 used 64x64(4kbit) core planes for main memory to make a larger 256x256x38 bit memory. The fast memory(registers) were 64x19bits using two cores per bit (bigger signal less noise). the array was 8x8 using 128 cores. A small 8x8 or 16x16 array would be trivial to wire and drive. It's the timing for the read pulse and keeing noise out of things that is twitchy. Allison

28 years, 5 months

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CLASSICCMP digest 241

by prp＠hf.intel.com

> From: Philip.Belben(a)powertech.co.uk > Subject: Re[2]: Talk Of Building A Computer... (Don't react until you read this first part through:) You can of course never build a real classic computer, by definition its not a real classic unless its really old and was built by people who were, at the time, working with state of the art components and techniques. Part of the attraction of the old machines is that they subtly document the skills, preconceptions and ignorance of their designers and the prevailing conventional wisdom. Another part of the attraction is to have a piece of equipment that has been in existence for so long and still works. So the best you could ever do is come close. Any attempt will be a compromise of some sort, so an interesting question is how close is close enough? The closest I think is to attempt to exactly recreate a particular early machine. Chris Burton is doing this with the Manchester SSEM and Tony Sale with the Colossus, both with significant help from other folks in the Computer Conservation Society. I've seen them in progress, they are both fabulously, meticulously accurate (as far as I can tell) and very nearly as much fun as if the original machines still existed. And despite all the help they are largely one-man projects, or could have been, which shows that its actually possible to consider doing it "right" by yourself if you have the time. Sort of like building a boat or an airplane. People can do that. All this having been said, I'm sure you feel as I do that it would be fun to build a machine in the classic style but an exact recreation is too much. So how authentic do you have to be? My point is this - *** Its up to you ***. Since any such project is necessarily a compromise, the exact tradeoffs are not really important. Your project should reflect what you want from it, other people's opinion doesn't matter unless its a group effort. Here are a some projects I personnally find interesting: 1. A small Williams-tube memory. Designed and built from scratch using 6SN7's and a common 5" oscilloscope CRT like maybe a 5GP1. (Chris has beaten me to this but it doesn't matter - for that matter, Williams beat us both; the fun part is doing it yourself.) 2. A complete 32-bit CPU and memory in the classic style, an accumulator machine, built in just 4 parts: a FPGA, DRAM, EPROM and clock. This is easily possible with existing technology. It would also have a 2.5" IDE disk drive for mass storage and a small printer and keyboard for user I/O. It would be fun to do and would demonstrate the incredible miniaturization of electronics when compared with my room sized IBM 7094. 3. Emulators for all my old machines, and machines I wish I had. This is the only project I've actually made any progress on. So do what you find most compelling. -------------------------------------------------------------------- Here are some thoughts on the current proposal (building a machine in the classic style of a tube machine but with discrete transistors to be more practical), some of these reinforce comments others have already made: Your main problem is not the logic, it is the memory. There is no old memory that is anywhere near as easy to use as, say, SRAM. Your major choices are core, magnetic drum/disk, or delay line. Core is going to be a lot of work. Drum or disk will require expertise in mechanical fabrication but is pretty attractive otherwise. Acoustic delay line (the only kind with reasonable capacity) may be best but will require some research and experimentation. I would recommend magnetostrictive wire acoustic delay line memory if you can figure out how to build it and don't mind having a very small memory. About the logic, while very early tube circuits were strange using multiple grids, in most tube computer circuits the actual logic was done with diodes. The tubes then invert and drive the next stage. Flip-flops were used for temporary state storage and sometimes for registers. A very common computer tube in the US was the 5965 dual triode. To see some IBM 705 circuit drawings (all but the inverter, which apparently wasn't used much in this machine but was used in others such as the 709) look at http://www.teleport.com/~prp/collect/705dwg/ The diode/tube logic translates very nicely into common early transistor circuits such as RTL, RCTL and DTL. For a project like this I would recommend building a serial accumulator machine, one which works on one bit at a time and has a single architecturally visible register, like the PDP-8. It will have much less logic than a parallel or multiple register machine and will be very classic. A serial CPU will be a good match with serial memory such as drum or delay line memory. A good, pretty clean example is the Royal McBee LGP-30. Better is the SWAC which had a very good clean minimal architecture but was parallel, a serial version would be pretty easy. Note that small tube machines like the LGP-30 and Bendix G-15 have only around 300 tubes. To get an idea of how big it would be, the Packard Bell PB250 (see http://www.teleport.com/~prp/collect/mini.html ) is just what I've been talking about - serial, transistors (RCTL) and delay line memory. It takes up half a 19" rack, same as a PDP-8 but I think the logic is physically less dense. About a quarter of the volume is taken up by the memory. Paul

28 years, 5 months

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Mac286

by cmao＠eos.ncsu.edu

I recently got a AST Mac286 NuBus board but no SW. Can you share your SW with me, if you have one. Thanks,chimin

28 years, 5 months

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HORRAY!!! (And a little boo...)

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 05:56 AM 11/21/97 +0000, you wrote: >Okay.... possibly keyboard, but probably HDD. I tried my current keyboard... >it's a Windows 95, and I still got that error. Try <http://www.searchlight.com/$WEBMSG.Read.SLBBS-R.3631.read> -- it's a listing of the various POST (Power-On Self Test) error codes. (Or, do a search at AltaVista (<http://altavista.digital.com/>) on <"power on self test" and error> (with quotes, no <>'s.)) --------------------------------------------------------------------- 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.crl.com/~sinasohn/

28 years, 5 months

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10 years and change/use it or lose it

by COAKLEY＠AC.GRIN.EDU

> > You mean, there's still another educational institution that uses VAX > > Notes as a major means of mass communication? > > > > What's your mailer? > > One thing, Notes is kind of internal "newsgroups" that you can > subscribe while as authorized users logged on there. I know all about it. I'm required to use it daily, both for work and for class. I was just surprised to hear of a fellow Notes-user. > The vax email > program that you write and reply to is PMDF and has POP3 server as > well. We have no POP server here (or we do, but we have no dialup PPP service, so it's useless unless you're connected to the network). We use Dreams as an interface to PMDF, which has its nice features. > Also it has newsgroups reader on there but it's too clumsy and > hard to use. SLRN can be compiled under VMS (at least, 0.9.0.0 could be). I find it a lot easier to use than NEWSRDR. -- Ben Coakley http://www.math.grin.edu/~coakley coakley(a)ac.grin.edu Station Manager, KDIC 88.5 FM CBEL: Xavier OH It is good to rock. It is very good to rock wearing a big ass pumpkin on your head. It is very, very good if that pumpkin is on fire. --Jessica Stern

28 years, 5 months

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10 years and change/use it or lose it

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<> > You mean, there's still another educational institution that uses VAX <> > Notes as a major means of mass communication? <I know all about it. I'm required to use it daily, both for work and for <class. I was just surprised to hear of a fellow Notes-user. < <> The vax email I have VAXnotes up and running on my collection of vaxen here. Trying to workup CMUip slip or slirp. What I like about Vaxnotes was you coul have public conferences or private authorized people only conferences. Allison

28 years, 5 months

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TRS 80 with Green Screen

by allisonp＠world.std.com

Thus wrote: <Robert M. (Bob) Donan E-mail: donan(a)utk.edu <The Tandy TRS80 Model III, as delivered, did not come with a green <screen. Either the machine has been upgraded (requiring a different <video board) or it is not a Model III. I may be able to help you either <way as I have been repairing Radio Shack computers since 1979. You <could help me answer your questions by answering the following <questions: There were at the time several companies offering replacement CRTs to go >from white to Green or amber. they were same tube different phosphor with no other alterations required. H19s and a few other terminals/systems were modified that was as well. Robert, Did you work for tandy? I was up in PA when the TRS80 hit. Allison

28 years, 5 months

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Well, the 34a is back among the living...

by dseagrav＠bsdserver.tek-star.net

IT runs again, boots RT-11. The decision to stop screwing with it came when I realized I didn't have any 18b RAM boards, and RSTS won't run in 64KW of core. (128KB). So, I'll have to get something lighter for it to run if it's to be timesharing. Or get RAM. I may do that today. All the RAM I have is 22b boards from the '44. My next project will be to get that running, then maybe the VAX 750.

28 years, 5 months

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HORRAY!!! (And a little boo...)

by photze＠batelco.com.bh

I just got my XT working!!! (My first classic) Well... not really working... I get a "601 Error", and then it says "Press F1 To Resume" I remember a similiar error w/my current computer... I replaced the keyboard when all was done. Just for a little interesting bit, the manufacturer of the chip (I forget the term) on the keyboard is Zilog.... same neon light style logo as way back when. Well anyway, I would like to thank Max, who sent me the processor that got it working, (Sorry, tried to e-mail him, and got an error) and I would like to know if anyone can help w/ the 601 error. Thanks, Tim D. Hotze

28 years, 5 months

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TRS 80 with Green Screen

by donan＠utk.edu

The Tandy TRS80 Model III, as delivered, did not come with a green screen. Either the machine has been upgraded (requiring a different video board) or it is not a Model III. I may be able to help you either way as I have been repairing Radio Shack computers since 1979. You could help me answer your questions by answering the following questions: 1. Does the computer have a silver or cream coloured cabinet? If the cabinet is silver in coulur, it is a Model III cabinet and the innards may have been renewed. As the Model III and Model IV (non-gate array) use the same footprint for their internal circuit boards and drive towers, they are easily interchanged. 2. If the cabinet is cream couloured it is most likely a Model IV gate-array. Robert M. (Bob) Donan E-mail: donan(a)utk.edu Graduate Teaching Associate Department of Human Resource Development The University of Tennessee 310 Jessie Harris Knoxville, TN 37996-1900 (423) 974-2574 Department. (423) 579-2808 Residence

28 years, 5 months

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Lost Email, New address

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

Well, I managed to trash my e-mail and lose everything in my inbox. (1000+ messages) So, if anyone wrote to me recently, please resend it. Sorry! Further, I am getting rid of my CRL account, so if you have my e-mail address as <sinasohn(a)crl.com>, please change it to either <sinasohn(a)ricochet.net> or <roger(a)sinasohn.com>. Thanks! --------------------------------------------------------------------- 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.crl.com/~sinasohn/

28 years, 5 months

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Wrong Way:New Definition REQUIRED

by carl.friend＠stoneweb.com

On Wed, 19 Nov 1997 06:42:28 GMT, Bill Richman inquired: > [...] And does anyone have an Intecolor in their collection? Yep. I've got an ISC 8001 with 24 kB of user memory, 48-line option, dual 5 1/4" floppy drives, and ROM BASIC. It's a nice box. ______________________________________________________________________ | | | | Carl Richard Friend (UNIX Sysadmin) | West Boylston | | Minicomputer Collector / Enthusiast | Massachusetts, USA | | mailto:carl.friend@stoneweb.com | | | http://www.ultranet.com/~engelbrt/carl/museum/ | ICBM: N42:21 W71:46 | |________________________________________________|_____________________|

28 years, 5 months

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Dilog CQ2010, what is it?

by dseagrav＠bsdserver.tek-star.net

I have an interestin quad-height board labelled Dilog CQ2010. It has a 50-pin plug (Like a SCSI plug), and a few DIP switch blocks. What is it? Anyone know?

28 years, 5 months

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Talk Of Building A Computer...

by Philip.Belben＠powertech.co.uk

Kevin McQuiggin wrote: > Hi Tim: > > If you're going to try this, I'd suggest starting with something simple > like an adder or a flip flop, or a register. You'd get an idea of what > would be involved with a simple processor. But I think it would end up > being pretty expensive. [...] Tim Hotze had written: >Hello... some time ago, there was talk of building a computer, and now I >think that I've got a (bad, possibly) idea. In the earlier half of this >century, transistors weren't avaible... vaccum tubes... huge ones, but >now, the transistor has made small ones possible. My point: If we were >to take a tubed design, and re-build it with transistors, we could >probably make it a decent size. > So, what da ya think? I think there is something even more fundamental here. Valves (thermionic, in tubes) have quite different behaviour to trannies. A JFET behaves fairly like a triode, but designs that use pentodes and nonodes and things as multi-input gates are going to be very difficult to translate. Of course by the 1960s there were somve very nice valves around that weren't available to the 1940s computer pioneers - the 7586 nuvistor springs to mind: a very nice triode in a metal can about 1 inch tall including pins, and less than half an inch in diameter. Can't remember the spec, though. Such devices could make a valve machine quite a bit smaller than Colossus, Eniac, Edsac, etc. Or if you want to be way out, what about tubes with several valves in? Things like double diode triodes are quite common, and someone even put most of a radio set into one tube (passive components and all). So how about making our own. A tube containing, say, a 4-bit D-type latch? Make a few in that range and a valve computer becomes almost manageable! Besides, the smaller it is, the faster you can make it... Philip.

28 years, 5 months

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Talk Of Building A Computer...

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<The main memory of the DEUCE was built form mercury delay lines of 1024 <bits, and the 1024 bit shift register chip had just become available. <The connection was obvious and we spent hours discussing the rebuilding <a TTL version of DEUCE, for which he still had the logic diagrams. Alas <the project was never completed but I have dreams of doing it one day. With current parts the Turing machine could almost be practical/useful as it would be easy to provide enough memory to simulate a very long tape and enough speed to transverse it quickly. It's been a long time since I've looked at that machine. <Take the idea even further : the technology exists today to build most <if not all first generations machines on a single chip. Indeed I wonder <if an FPGA might not be able to be reconfigurable to build many of these In most cases yes. Some are quite simple when reduced a logical description. The PDP-8 has seen this treatment many times using the 6100. 6120 and even gate-arrays. Allison

28 years, 5 months

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HORRAY!!! (And a little boo...)

by SUPRDAVE＠aol.com

601 post error is a floppy drive and/or controller error. time to check your cabling and swap out parts if you have them. david

28 years, 5 months

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Talk Of Building A Computer...

by allisonp＠world.std.com

From: HOTZE <photze(a)batelco.com.bh> <Hello... some time ago, there was talk of building a computer, and now I <think that I've got a (bad, possibly) idea. In the earlier half of this Not a bad idea but, it appears you have no technical concept of the extent of it. <century, transistors weren't avaible... vaccum tubes... huge ones, but <now, the transistor has made small ones possible. My point: If we were <to take a tubed design, and re-build it with transistors, we could <probably make it a decent size. < So, what da ya think? The operating characteristics of tube and transistors are far enough apart that circuit techniques applied to one donot apply well to the other. The redesign would not be tivial For most of the tube designs drum memory and mercury filled acoustic delay lines were memory. a few used williams tubes. You would find that difficult to duplicate. To further make a point most of the early transistor designs were evlotionary results of tube designs. One of the first transistor designs was TX1 and TX2(early 50s, MIT/lincoln labs) and theywere not small. Later ones in the 60s were PDP-1, Perkin Elmer, CDC, to name a few and these were large as large machines(fast, big) were the goal. The first small machines were the LINC and PDP-8. Figure 5-10 thousand transistors and thousands of diodes, resistors, capacitors. A foot print for a typical transistor -8 is aroung 20 square feet plus access space. The closest you could come and expect to complete on a singular basis would be a to copy the archectecture of an older machine using ICs. It wouldn't be the real thing, original peripherals would be hard to come by and there may be a base of software if you elect to copy something like a PDP-8. I'd do it as an engineering exercise and beacuse I happen to like certain old archetectures. The result would not be a classic by any means. Allison

28 years, 5 months

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Talk Of Building A Computer...

by allisonp＠world.std.com

From: Philip.Belben(a)powertech.co.uk <So how about making our own. A tube containing, say, a 4-bit D-type <latch? Make a few in that range and a valve computer becomes almost <manageable! Besides, the smaller it is, the faster you can make it... A four bit latch using valves would require not less than 8 triodes plus buffers. Very hard to do in one envelope... Also tubes had some characteristics that made it very hard to design fast enough logic that distance(size) was a factor. I have a few 7586 and 6ds4/6cw4 nuvistors and they are 0.8" tall and 0.45 dia and make really good rf amplifiers but slow switches. Allison

28 years, 5 months

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Talk Of Building A Computer...

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<If you're going to try this, I'd suggest starting with something simple <like an adder or a flip flop, or a register. You'd get an idea of what <would be involved with a simple processor. But I think it would end up <being pretty expensive. I have some partial designs for transistor hardware. A flipflop design used for the TX2 required 10 transistors, 22 resistors, 8 capacitors, two inductors and three operating voltages. A register 8 bits wide would require 8 of these plus gating logic possibly doubling the number of components needed. You can now see why early machines were register sparse. FYI I have an article for a TIC-TAC-TOE computer using tubes and Neon lamps and it required some nine 2d21 thyratron tubes and 190 neon lamps(serve as gate logic mostly and two per box for display). This is a very limited fixed logic machine and it required a lot. Allison

28 years, 5 months

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KAYPRO 10 MANUALS NEEDED

by bernier＠mail.co.leon.fl.us

HI, I'VE GOT A KAYPRO 10 AND IT'S BEEN A MILD CHALLENGE TO ENDEVOR TO OPERATE.IF YOU COULD PART WITH THE OPERATING MANUALS I'D BE BLESSED.THANKS BERNIE

28 years, 5 months

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What's MUD mean? (PDP-11 related, not MUD... You know what I , mean!)

by dseagrav＠bsdserver.tek-star.net

There's a few slots up by the CPU labled MUD. I think I know what it means. But I want to make sure. Does it mean Modified Unibus Device? And does that mean DMA slot? And does that mean all the screwing with the backplane I did was unneccesary?

28 years, 5 months

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Nifty HEATHKIT equipment available

by dhouse＠abac.com

HEATH Computer Enthusiasts: In September I picked up a Western Union Telegraph Company Model 102 Teleprinter for our museum. It and a complete Heathkit Computer system were the belongings of Charlie Eheman,K6ESN "K6 Every Saturday Night" of San Diego. Charlie was a WWII Navy Chief Radioman; he passed away on August 20, 1997. His brother, Ed Eheman of Texas was in San Diego cleaning out Charlies house. I am looking for someone to actually put the Heathkit system to GOOD use; in its day it was the "cat's meow." It is all in good shape with EXTENSIVE documentation. H9 Video display terminal H10 Paper tape reader and perforator H11 Digital computer (a DEC PDP11) H14 Dot matrix printer H19 Video display terminal H27 Dual 8" Floppy Drive Complete with cables and all manuals, builders notes, including the programming courses, paper tape, 8" floppy disks, etc. Don Robert House, N.S.E. NO JOB IS SO IMPORTANT NADCOMM AND NO SERVICE IS SO URGENT- 3841 Reche Road THAT WE CANNOT TAKE TIME Fallbrook, CA 92028-3810 TO PERFORM OUR WORK SAFELY. e-mail: dhouse(a)abac.com BELL SYSTEM http://www.hem.com/nadcomm 760-723-9959 Telephone 760-781-5161 Facsimile

28 years, 5 months

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AST six pak plus

by SUPRDAVE＠aol.com

ok, now that everyone's finished hashing out the 10 year rule... I was going through some of my old junk and discovered the above mentioned card. I need the utilities disk; i think it was called superpak or something like that which had the clock driver, print spooler, and ramdisk setup. I also have a copy of the super pak utilies disk user's guide if anyone wants it. it's the first edition, as i am keeping the second edition that i also got. david

28 years, 5 months

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Old stuff found

by jrkeys＠concentric.net

I would like a list of the items jrkeys(a)concentric.net At 08:45 AM 11/19/97 +0000, you wrote: >Found on comp.sys.tandy > > Greetings: > > I have acquired a pile of boxes from an estate sale. Numerous old > computer pieces-parts that I thought might be of some value, but I > don't know where to 'advertise' them -- and now they must go. > > Included are > computers - TI & Radio Shack, some in perfect condition -- one is > in a heavy steel case, RS keybd, could be home brew from misc > parts but I can't tell, could it possibly be a stock TRS 80? > software - cartridges & 5 1/4 floppies > printers - are ribbons & print heads still available? > ref books - old, specialized, probably junk > monitors - USI, PI2, mono, unfamiliar connectors > {also 2 non-computer antiques: 1) an old Associated Press > linotype machine, with ribbons, very heavy. 2) 3M copier.} > chips - small, many, stored in plastic tubes > LNW Research products - look like large keybds but may be > more than that -- one box is different as follows > > You should see this manual, it is beautiful. Yes, Virginia, there is > such a thing as an Antique Computer. Wish it had a date in it; ref is > made to a CA sales tax of 6%. "System Expansion for the TRS-80 [pc > board & user manual] w/ serial RS232C / 20mA I/O > floppy controller > 32K bytes memory" (awesome) > etc.... > Found a date. Guess! Answer to follow at signature. > > So please, somebody, send me a clue, what can I do. > Anyone know an address where I can list these? Are old puters > so plentiful as to not have any value as collector's items? > > Thanks much. > > ---mikey > > DON'T PEEK THE1ANSWER9IS8DON'T1PEEK > > > >Found on comp.sys.ti > >I have a couple TI99/4As, an expansion box with a disk drive and other >stuff (very heavy), another disk drive, and some carts that a coworker >was going to throw away. I live in Gilroy, CA and work in San Jose, >CA. Anyone interested? > >Bostone1 > >Bostone1(a)aol.com > >

28 years, 5 months

1
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New Definiton/ Vaporware lives still!

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<Speaking of Alpha's, is there any chance that I can put my own together? A <agree... it's just plain stupid, and I hate Intel anyway... kind of like in Sure, you can buy them used for prices that aren't all that expensive compared to late model 486 or early p5s. The older ones are now some 4-5 years old. The OS for it will cost you. You have three choices that I know of, OpenVMS (my favorite), Digital Unix, or NT. I don't know that anyone has done a UNIX port outside of digital. Allison

28 years, 5 months

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IBM s/36

by henrio＠edu.tsai.es

Hi all! I?m afraid this computer is off-topic (dated 1988). Sorry. An IBM 5363-I has recently been given to me, but I don?t know anything at all about its internal architecture or capabilities. I only own the Central Unit; no cables, no floppies, no tapes, no manuals, no terminals. * It has two 15-pin sub-d connectors in one expansion card. They seem to be for attaching two serial terminals (syncronous? type 5250?) * In another expansion board it has a 9-pin sub-d connector. * There are too four twin-axial connectors. Can anybody help me on this subject? Thanks in advance. -- Sergio Izquierdo Garcia mailto:henrio@edu.tsai.es

28 years, 5 months

1
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Old stuff found

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 08:45 AM 11/19/97 +0000, you wrote: >Found on comp.sys.ti > >I have a couple TI99/4As, an expansion box with a disk drive and other >stuff (very heavy), another disk drive, and some carts that a coworker >was going to throw away. I live in Gilroy, CA and work in San Jose, >CA. Anyone interested? If only I had some way to get to the south bay on a weekday (or time on a weekend)... Oh well, surely someone will save this...? --------------------------------------------------------------------- O- Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad sinasohn(a)ricochet.net that none but madmen know." Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates San Francisco, California http://www.crl.com/~sinasohn/

28 years, 5 months

1
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Case designs (was: New Definiton REQUIRED)

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 11:40 AM 11/19/97 -0600, you wrote: >> >Heck, if I was in somebody else's house I'd probably have my trusty >> >Leatherman with me. > ^^^^^^^^^^ >Well, I know it's a LART of some kind... What's a leatherman exactly? One of the Village People... 8^) Sorry -- couldn't resist. (Saw them in concert a year or so ago.) Anyway, a Leatherman is a multi-tool -- pliers with various blades, saws, screwdrivers, etc that fold into the handle. Whole thing folds up into an innocuos little rectangle. Kind of a modern-day swiss-army knife. --------------------------------------------------------------------- O- Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad sinasohn(a)ricochet.net that none but madmen know." Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates San Francisco, California http://www.crl.com/~sinasohn/

28 years, 5 months

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10 years and change/use it or lose it

by COAKLEY＠AC.GRIN.EDU

> It's going as long as we have newbies comes in, even happens on other > newsgroups and in our notes on vax at my college. Sheesh! You mean, there's still another educational institution that uses VAX Notes as a major means of mass communication? What's your mailer? -- Ben Coakley http://www.math.grin.edu/~coakley coakley(a)ac.grin.edu Station Manager, KDIC 88.5 FM CBEL: Xavier OH It is good to rock. It is very good to rock wearing a big ass pumpkin on your head. It is very, very good if that pumpkin is on fire. --Jessica Stern

28 years, 5 months

2
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web page down?

by yakowenk＠cs.unc.edu

Did something unexpected happen to the web page? I haven't been able to get it in several days now. It used to be here: http://haliotis.bothell.washington.edu/classiccmp/index.html Cheers, Bill.

28 years, 5 months

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New Definiton REQUIRED

by yakowenk＠cs.unc.edu

I'm quite happy with the ten-year-plus-flexibility definition, as described by Bill Whitson. Remember the sign-on message from when you first subscribed? (Maybe it changes from time to time? I'll include the one I got at the end of this.) He specifically states that the main intent of the ten-year limit is to avoid "discussion of technical problems with the standard PCs and Macs, other than the really old stuff". Perfect. No WinDoze d00dz begging for warez, but talk about fixing up the older critters is explicitly 100% in-bounds. By the "not-heavy-handed" clause, talk about the unusual not-yet-ten-year-old machine is okay too. Unless you are insisting on discussing current PCs and Macs, or want to be more restrictive, there is nothing that needs adjusting. (I personally wouldn't mind ruling out all PC/Mac talk, but that's just me, and I wouldn't actively push for that.) Can we please drop this now? Bill. ] NAQ (Never Asked Questions) 0.1 ] ] What is it? ] ] This list is for the discussion of Classic Computers - ] primarily for those people who collect and restore ] old machines. It is brand new - no subscribers yet ] so sign up. The collection and restoration of computers ] is becoming a big enough hobby that I felt a need for ] a place to talk about it. ] ] What is a classic computer? ] ] Well that's hard to say but since I created the list I'll ] do it anyway. A classic computer is a machine that has not ] been produced for 10 years or more. It's an arbitrary ] definition but at least uncomplicated. ] ] What are the guidelines? ] ] The list is designed for discussion of collecting, restoring, ] and maintaining old computers. I'm not going to be heavy ] handed with restricting discussion. I'd just like it to be ] clear that the list is not the proper place for discussion ] of technical problems with the standard PCs and Macs (other ] than the really old stuff). Anyone can lurk - if you're ] going to post, just use your own good judgement. ] ] This IS NOT and will NEVER BE a list for discussion of "which ] computer is best?" and anyone who posts the ubiquitous "why ] don't you just go buy a PC you moron" will be immediately ] unsubbed. ] ] Beyond this - have fun! That what keeps us going with these ] old machines.

28 years, 5 months

1
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Dilemma

by yakowenk＠cs.unc.edu

Are there any archaeologists in the house? Not being one myself, I wouldn't be too surprised if some archaeological treasures had been lost forever in the process of some enthusiastic 18th-century archaeologist applying 18th-century state-of-the-art technology to the study of some artifact. Maybe some singular fossil got dissolved in acid in an attempt to determine its chemical composition, where we could now pop the thing under an electron microscope and learn about its cell-structure. (Of course, maybe our electron microscope would do some damage that would prevent later generations from bringing that thing back to life! Who knows?) Had that guy just left the thing alone a couple centuries ago, we might now be able to extract much more knowledge from it. And/or, if we leave it alone now, it might be much more valuable after a couple more centuries. So, which will be more valuable a couple centuries down the road, another set of used floppies plus easily-readable copies of the software that was on them, or decayed but pristine floppies? I think I know which will be rarer. And maybe, just maybe they'll be able to read them even after the oxide coating has become so much dust. (Anyone care to speculate on the technology to do that?) I have the impression that museums generally collect things with the goal of having them available as needed to extract knowledge >from them; scientists often take samples, even destructively when the utility is great. Are we in this group yet? Is there really any knowledge to be gained from these, that is otherwise unavailable? If we are pretending to be museums, should we have the same goals? Personally, I am not a museum; there are only a handful of systems I am interested in, and I want to keep them running, and even make new hardware/software for them. But I might think twice about that if I got a never-used never-even-opened system dropped in my lap. Maybe I'd contact a real museum. Enough talk. Back to hacking. Cheers, Bill.

28 years, 5 months

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Subscribe

by richa＠insync.net

Subscribe Richmond Armstrong

28 years, 5 months

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Case designs (was: New Definiton REQUIRED)

by engine＠chac.org

At 12:41 11/19/97 +0000, ARD wrote: >> where I'm at someone's house for dinner, and they say "Oh, BTW, my >> computer's not working," and I didn't bring a screwdriver and they don't >> own a #2 Phillips. > >And just what are you going to do when you've pulled the cover? Unless >it's just a board/cable that needs reseating you're going to need some >test equipment, a soldering iron, etc., anyway. I have _never_ been anywhere >with that sort of equipment and not had a screwdriver with me. > >Heck, if I was in somebody else's house I'd probably have my trusty >Leatherman with me. Certainly I take your point, but the context here is one of unrivaled banality. Your "just a board/cable that needs reseating" covers about 90% of the "emergencies" of this type that come anywhere near me. Both 5.25 floppies and MFM hard disks have connectors that loosen spontaneously. IDE "controllers" pop out of their sockets, for some reason. And there was always the lady who thought her computer "didn't work" because the connector to the hard disk LED had popped off -- even though that was all that was wrong. __________________________________________ Kip Crosby engine(a)chac.org http://www.chac.org/index.html Computer History Association of California

28 years, 5 months

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Wrong Way:New Definiton REQUIRED

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 12:50 AM 11/19/97 GMT, you wrote: >successful. I agree with Jeff in that the thing that makes most of >the systems "special" to me is the fact that not everybody could just >go down to the local Best Buy/Circuit City/Sears store, buy one, plug >it in, and use it. It took some determination, some ingenuity, and a I bought my Atari 600XL from Sears, and I would have to say that not everybody at the time could have put that to use. btw, the HP3000 has been produced for, what, 20+ years continuously, and some of the various models are extremely collectible. --------------------------------------------------------------------- O- Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad sinasohn(a)ricochet.net that none but madmen know." Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates San Francisco, California http://www.crl.com/~sinasohn/

28 years, 5 months

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Case designs (was: New Definiton REQUIRED)

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 08:50 PM 11/17/97 -0800, you wrote: >Personally I think some of the cooliest designs are the 68k based Atari's. >The perfect example is my Atari TT030. Couple the case design with TOS, I had forgotten about the TT... Definitely cool. Don't have one, though. Didn't they open up pretty easily? >the ROM based windowed OS, and you've got a cool design. The only down >sides are TOS's single task nature, and the mouse again. But multi-tasking is available as an add-on. --------------------------------------------------------------------- O- Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad sinasohn(a)ricochet.net that none but madmen know." Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates San Francisco, California http://www.crl.com/~sinasohn/

28 years, 5 months

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Intro msg: Teraks, emulators, reviving cassette data

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 03:51 PM 11/18/97 -0600, you wrote: [much interesting introduction snipped] >In another area of the JCM, I've begun to collect ancient ASCII art >from the 60s and 70s: Einstein, Spock, Snoopy, etc. I've written a >more, and I'd like to record personal anecdotes about the creation >of these old artworks. I'd also like to get an actual print sample Hi! An anecdote for you... When I was in high school, one of our little gang of computer hoodlums managed to come up with an ascii printout of a naked woman. During lunch, we hung it up behind the pull-down projector screen. When classes resumed, we were (naturally) giggling like mad about how witty and clever we were to have not only obtained this delectable bit of naughtiness, but also at outsmarting the teacher. Well, he (the teacher) figured out something was up, and inquired about it. Somehow he learned of our devilry and went over to check it out. Well, rather than tearing it down and punishing us, dirty old man that he was, he promptly rolled the screen up and left it hanging there for all to see! Ah, to be young again... --------------------------------------------------------------------- O- Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad sinasohn(a)ricochet.net that none but madmen know." Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates San Francisco, California http://www.crl.com/~sinasohn/

28 years, 5 months

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Intro msg: Teraks, emulators, reviving cassette data

by jfoust＠threedee.com

I'd like to introduce myself to the list. I maintain the somewhat imaginary "Jefferson Computer Museum" at <http://www.threedee.com/jcm>, which has info about my several Terak systems. The Terak was a PDP-11/03-based graphics workstation circa 1978-85. My "Terak Museum" web page is the proud recipient of the "Geek Site of the Day" award for October 16, 1996. I also have historical info about the UCSD P-System, including an emulator, source code and very early Pascal compilers. In the months to come, I will add info about other systems I have, including a Zilog MCZ Z-80 development system, CBM PET and NEC systems. I've also been given permission by Claus Giloi to distribute the C source to his Windows-based Altair and IMSAI emulators. If you haven't seen this, it's a nifty graphical recreation, letting you click on the toggle switches to drive the emulator and watch the LEDs blink. In the years to come, I'd like to enhance it to include virtual peripherals, or with inexpensive recreations like an opto paper tape reader. Recently, I've been researching the possibility of reviving old audio cassette tape storage of computer data. With today's PC audio digitizers and a little software, it should be possible to decode and synthesize tapes in formats such as Tarbell tapes for S-100 systems, 88-ACR, Commodore PET, VIC and C-64, Bell 103 recordings, etc. A software approach would have several advantages: you don't need the original hardware, and it has a better chance of restoring out-of-spec data. A little digging revealed the "soundmodem", a driver for Linux and DOS that is a software-based FSK modem that can handle 300 to 9600 baud in real-time using a SoundBlaster as the digitizer / DSP. It is used by ham radio operators. To experiment, I digitized an old wobbly CBM PET tape and did a bit of post-processing in contemporary sound software and it normalized the volume quite well. I suspect with commercial audio software, one could even invoke filters to remove print-through. At 22 or 44 kHz mono 8-bit samples, there's certainly enough headroom to distinguish these relatively slow-speed signals. I'm sure with some formats, just watching the zero-crossing timing would work. I wonder if this technique could be used to rescue old N-track reel tapes that have become unreadable over the years, by intercepting, digitizing, and post-processing the tape-head signal. What would help the most is to get specifications for the old standards. I don't have any documentation, although I'm digging through the basement to find my old Kilobauds. I sent an e-mail to Don Tarbell, who is apparently still on the Internet, but no response so far. It would also help to see more samples! If you have any old cassettes, please consider digitizing them and sending them to me. In another area of the JCM, I've begun to collect ancient ASCII art >from the 60s and 70s: Einstein, Spock, Snoopy, etc. I've written a program that converts teletype-style overstrike art into Adobe Illustrator documents, which are easy to re-size and print on today's laser printers. I have dozens of pictures from DECUS tapes, but I'm always looking for more, and I'd like to record personal anecdotes about the creation of these old artworks. I'd also like to get an actual print sample of the entire printable font from an ASR-33 teletype, in order to scan and convert it into an authentic Postscript bitmap font. - John

28 years, 5 months

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Case designs (was: New Definiton REQUIRED)

by engine＠chac.org

At 12:48 11/19/97 +0000, you wrote: >The Rainbow, Pro series and DECmate 2 are very easy to pull to bits, >agreed. I once dismantled one on a train, much to the amazement of the >people sitting near me. ROTFL! Only you, Tony, or at the very least, you first among equals. ____________________________________________________________ Kip Crosby, honcho, mechanic and sole proprietor, Kip's Garage http://www.kipsgarage.com: rumors, tech tips and philosophy for the trenches Coming Spring '98: The Windows 98 Bible by Kip Crosby and Fred Davis!

28 years, 5 months

2
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Case designs (was: New Definiton REQUIRED)

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<They're still going. Their modern stuff is not _as good_, but it's still <very well built. Oh, and the electronic design is up to the same high <standards. there is some truth and a fair amount of fiction. Some of the older stuff was overbuilt and it cost. The Barco had everything out front for a reason, when was the last time you have to converge a new monitor? Some of the older stuff that was a fairly common adjustment. Alos how much of the stuff made before say 1983/4 would pass FCC/DOC/TUV RF radiation requiments. Some of those new cases that come off easy are even RF tight, no small trick. Years ago it was box in box construction to get that. Some things in racks are still expensive as the racks and the system then support collectively have to be RF tight without being airtight. In addition you pay for weight, in shipping, cost of materials and sometimes time to produce. Now for a reality check. The last generation of transistor computers were fairly small. PDP-8, PDP12 being examples. All that quality. Well one of the itelms in that are a plastic/ceramic packaged transistor used in heaping piles. Electrically a decent enough device for the time and cheap too. One little problem, the transistor die is glued to a ceramic pad then wire bonds from the leads to the die and a drop of epoxy to enclose the component. Problem, epoxy is not hermetic and the bonds go from the affixed die to lead posts via they epoxy and as things heat and cool sometimes the forces are great enough to lift the lead right off the die. The result is transistors that work when cool and quit when warm. Needless to say that case design would disappear after a few years. Why use it to build a computer? Well in the 60s it would take say 10,000 of them and the same part in a metal case was several times the price as in $0.25 VS more than $1.00. It was the best option at that time. An aside for the crazies like me. If a straight-8 were built using modern surface mount transistors and components to the same electronic printset and current multilayer board and packaging techniques it would shrink by a factor of 5-10 without resorting to ICs not available at that time. The only challenge would be the core memory (the raw cores would be hard to find and expensive to assemble). Electronic packaging and construction has undergone considerable advancement and is more than wrapping metal or plastic around it. Some items like the cheap screws were also common with a few altair kits when MITS was having trouble. Or some of the other near vapor machines. I may add that I can buy a minitower box with PS these days for well under $100 but at the time of the altair the RAW cabinate from the vendor like that one was well over $100 and you still had to cut holes in it and fill it. I may add the Altair (8800) box was actually pretty flimsy compared to IMSAI or the later Horizon, Vector MX or CompuPro boxes. Allison

28 years, 5 months

2
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FS: Jupiter ACE computer

by rkneusel＠post.its.mcw.edu

I'm auctioning off my Jupiter ACE: http://kreeft.intmed.mcw.edu/auction.html Let me know if you have any problems. - Ron Kneusel rkneusel(a)mcw.edu

28 years, 5 months

1
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Wrong Way:New Definiton REQUIRED

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<in, regardless of how long it was produced. Were the others you <mentioned all produced for more than 2 years running? Sometimes I All of them were over two years. How about PDP-11s manufactured for over 25years and the older members are easily 20+ years old yet some members of the line are near impossible to find. Like Ford falcons they were cranked out but that doesn't mean they still abound. <"Really" think that the only place you'd find more attitude than in <this group would be in a flock of "Valley Girls". It's New York Girl to you! Bottom line, despite some peoples wishes the owner of the list has set the standard and it's reasonable enough to work well. Leave it alone. Allison

28 years, 5 months

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Wrong Way:New Definiton REQUIRED

by allisonp＠world.std.com

From: bill_r(a)inetnebr.com (Bill Richman) <How about making the rule something to the effect of "Systems older <than 20 years, or which were actively produced for less than _x_ (2?) <years running" ? Too complicated? At least it would cover almost all <of the "unique" machines. If they were made for more than 2 years, Really. Lets see the LINC was over twenty years ago and made for more than two years. There are very few of them. Back then (64-66ish) a couple dozen were a lot of any machine! It would also eliminate the Altair, Imsai, KIM-1, PDP-8 and a few others. It doesn't work. Allison

28 years, 5 months

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Case designs (was: New Definiton REQUIRED)

by engine＠chac.org

At 09:04 11/18/97 +0000, you wrote: >I've never understood this love of screwdriver-less cases. If I'm going to >be fixing a computer I'm going to have a soldering station, scope, logic >analyser, cutters, etc with me. So having a screwdriver set is no big deal >either. Wellll....I wouldn't mind a fastener that gave me the choice, like some kind of knurled goodie with a screwdriver slot. That would cover the case where I'm at someone's house for dinner, and they say "Oh, BTW, my computer's not working," and I didn't bring a screwdriver and they don't own a #2 Phillips. __________________________________________ Kip Crosby engine(a)chac.org http://www.chac.org/index.html Computer History Association of California

28 years, 5 months

3
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New Definiton REQUIRED

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 01:39 PM 11/16/97 -0500, you wrote: >OK, I am probably going to get yelled at... > >> Okay.... recently, there's been lots of "off-topic" stuff going on here >> about computers... but I think that it's not "off-topic." > >In my opinion it is. There are lots of good, smart people on this list >that can help everyone with modern(ish) equipment, but there are also lots >of them on other lists and USENET. I agree. I even think that there are better sources of info on the day-to-day operation of things like an Atari ST or Falcon (which I have) than here. If you want to know how to copy disks under CP/M, you'll be better off in comp.os.cpm. Which is not to say that such a question would necessarily be unwelcome, just not as well answered. Better might be "Where/who should I ask about formatting CP/M disks?" Mind you, I've answered PC questions posed to a Land Rover list (and suffered through discussions of florists in Oregon and which guitars are the best (I like Fenders, if I could afford one) on the same list.) >> if you remember, in the "welcome" message, it >> said that it was hard to state the definiton of a classic... but 10 >> years or older would do. Well, 10 years is kinda arbitrary (and probably rather recent at this point.) Still, gotta do it somehow. My personal guideline is non-mainstream stuff (non-pc and non-mac) unless it's something really weird (like the Outbound laptop or the IBM PC Radio.) Still, that keeps it to >10yrs for almost everything except the occasional oddity. I wouldn't, fer instance, bother mentioning the Sharp PC-7100's or Compaq lunchbox here, even though they're probably 10yrs+ (Sharps for sure.) (Except, of course, as part of a larger discussion on the history of portable computers.) In any case, as with any such list, the decision and definition really belongs only to the list owner (Bill Whitson in this case) no matter how much he might solicit or be affected by input from list members. (And, of course, we all have the option of setting up our own DOS-PC-Collectors or whatever list if we want.) Personally, I'm not all that into DEC stuff (though a PDP 11/70 was my first and I thought it was great) so I wouldn't mind seeing less VAXstationery this or DECwindowshades that messages, but I wouldn't think of suggesting that others not post them. I just delete them (sometimes even without reading them -- Sorry!) --------------------------------------------------------------------- O- Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad sinasohn(a)ricochet.net that none but madmen know." Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates San Francisco, California http://www.crl.com/~sinasohn/

28 years, 5 months

9
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Old stuff found

by krh03＠csufresno.edu

Found on comp.sys.tandy Greetings: I have acquired a pile of boxes from an estate sale. Numerous old computer pieces-parts that I thought might be of some value, but I don't know where to 'advertise' them -- and now they must go. Included are computers - TI & Radio Shack, some in perfect condition -- one is in a heavy steel case, RS keybd, could be home brew from misc parts but I can't tell, could it possibly be a stock TRS 80? software - cartridges & 5 1/4 floppies printers - are ribbons & print heads still available? ref books - old, specialized, probably junk monitors - USI, PI2, mono, unfamiliar connectors {also 2 non-computer antiques: 1) an old Associated Press linotype machine, with ribbons, very heavy. 2) 3M copier.} chips - small, many, stored in plastic tubes LNW Research products - look like large keybds but may be more than that -- one box is different as follows You should see this manual, it is beautiful. Yes, Virginia, there is such a thing as an Antique Computer. Wish it had a date in it; ref is made to a CA sales tax of 6%. "System Expansion for the TRS-80 [pc board & user manual] w/ serial RS232C / 20mA I/O floppy controller 32K bytes memory" (awesome) etc.... Found a date. Guess! Answer to follow at signature. So please, somebody, send me a clue, what can I do. Anyone know an address where I can list these? Are old puters so plentiful as to not have any value as collector's items? Thanks much. ---mikey DON'T PEEK THE1ANSWER9IS8DON'T1PEEK Found on comp.sys.ti I have a couple TI99/4As, an expansion box with a disk drive and other stuff (very heavy), another disk drive, and some carts that a coworker was going to throw away. I live in Gilroy, CA and work in San Jose, CA. Anyone interested? Bostone1 Bostone1(a)aol.com

28 years, 5 months

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Fwd: Re: Info? HP1000 F series

by dwalterm＠ix.netcom.com

James Willing <jimw(a)agora.rdrop.com> wrote: > While wandering around one of my favourite surplus gear haunts today, I cam > across a couple of HP 1000 F series minicomputers. While they look neat, I > know just about nothing about them. Anyone out there familiar enough with > them to give me the 'infamous 25 words or less' speech on their significance? They're real-time control systems, based around the 21MX processor family (which succeeded the 2100 (ca. 1972) and 211[456] (ca. 1967)) and running one of several flavors of HP's RTE operating system. I've never actually used them. I worked on them for years.... You will still find them in Nuclear Power Plant control rooms, all phases of automotive testing and even handling online ATM transactions. The E series was even used as a fast front end for Burroughs mainframes. Also lots of military applications. The front panel/door drops down to show the memory backplane. The top three boards are the two channel DMA, Memory Protect and MEM (Memory Expansion Controller). This was needed if you wanted to use more than 32K of memory. The back backplane was for the I/O cards. Near the bottom is the TBG (Time Base Generator). The Model 2117F had more slots and the hardware floating point processor was a separate box. The more rare version had the Floating Point boards built into the top of the regular case. This meant a loss of memory and I/O slots.... These systems had all kinds of I/O available from paper tape puches/readers to mag tapes to all kinds of hard disk drives, floppies, terminals, A/D, other instrumentation, etc. Later they had SCSI and various proprietary and standard networking. Lots of great memories :-)

28 years, 5 months

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Wrong Way:New Definiton REQUIRED

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 06:20 PM 11/18/97 +0000, you wrote: >the following info: (1) The definition is bendable, as circimsances dicatate, >(2) The definition is pretty much fine as it is, but (3) (The BIG one) Many Ultimately, the definition is up to Bill Whitson. If people start talking about stuff he's not interested in, or that he doesn't feel to be the provenance of this list, he'll a) warn people, b) unsubscribe people, or c) shut the list down. So personally, because I certainly don't want b) or c) to happen, and I'd rather a) didn't have to, I'll stick to the topics Bill had in mind when creating this list. If I'm really desperate to talk about which 486 motherboards are collectible, I'll start my own collect486 list. >computers will NOT be significant classics... origionally, as has been pointed >out, the "10 year" rule was to make sure that IBMs weren't included... first the I think it was set so as to avoid current/mainstream computer support questions. (Which I'm sure most of the people on this list could answer, but that's not why they've subscribed to this list.) The (admittedly debateable) position that generic PC's are *not* significant/collectible/etc. and thusly are not the provenance of this list is a (IMO) welcome side effect. (Note: some pc's *are* significant or collectible -- lots of portables, the corner case one (packard bell?), monorails, Kip's Rose Hill PC (to Kip), etc. -- they're just not the focus of this list.) --------------------------------------------------------------------- O- Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad sinasohn(a)ricochet.net that none but madmen know." Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates San Francisco, California http://www.crl.com/~sinasohn/

28 years, 5 months

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Case designs (was: New Definiton REQUIRED)

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 06:57 AM 11/18/97 -0800, you wrote: >At 09:04 11/18/97 +0000, you wrote: >>I've never understood this love of screwdriver-less cases. If I'm going to >>be fixing a computer I'm going to have a soldering station, scope, logic >>analyser, cutters, etc with me. So having a screwdriver set is no big deal Another thought... I've not yet figured out how to squeeze >24 hours in a day, and I've got about 54 hours worth of stuff to do every day, so anything that saves a little time is welcome. >where I'm at someone's house for dinner, and they say "Oh, BTW, my >computer's not working," and I didn't bring a screwdriver and they don't >own a #2 Phillips. Some people (esp. on this list) may not realize it, but there are actually hordes of people out there who go their entire lives without ever owning a single screwdriver. Which is why I've got two in/on my laptop case, several in my laptop "kit", and a swiss army knife with a flat sd, phillips sd, pliers, and (8^) corkscrew. --------------------------------------------------------------------- O- Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad sinasohn(a)ricochet.net that none but madmen know." Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates San Francisco, California http://www.crl.com/~sinasohn/

28 years, 5 months

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Case designs (was: New Definiton REQUIRED)

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 09:04 AM 11/18/97 +0000, you wrote: >I've never understood this love of screwdriver-less cases. If I'm going to >be fixing a computer I'm going to have a soldering station, scope, logic >analyser, cutters, etc with me. So having a screwdriver set is no big deal It's not so much for *fixing* as it is for *upgrading*. If you want to swap in a new floppy drive or add memory or what-have-you, it's much easier on some computers than others. S-100's were great in some respects -- just lift the ears and the boards pop right out. Or, drop 'em in the channels and they slide right in. The Mac 8500AV, on the other hand, requires nearly a complete disassembly just to add some memory. --------------------------------------------------------------------- O- Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad sinasohn(a)ricochet.net that none but madmen know." Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates San Francisco, California http://www.crl.com/~sinasohn/

28 years, 5 months

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Heathkit H-11

by rcini＠email.msn.com

What do you think of this... I have a guy in Jacksonville FL with a Heathkit H11 system. CPU, dual 8" disk drive unit, all software and manuals. Cost of shipping (to NY). Is the H11 just a repackaged PDP-11?? What else can you tell me about it? Rich Cini/WUGNET <rcini(a)msn.com> - ClubWin! Charter Member (6) - MCP Windows 95/Networking

28 years, 5 months

3
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New Definiton REQUIRED

by engine＠chac.org

At 14:02 11/18/97 -0800, Tim wrote: >.... Some drives have even removed the >drive select jumper options, forcing you to use the half-baked concept >of a cable with a twist in the middle. Half-baked, yet burned. ____________________________________________________________ Kip Crosby, honcho, mechanic and sole proprietor, Kip's Garage http://www.kipsgarage.com: rumors, tech tips and philosophy for the trenches Coming Spring '98: The Windows 98 Bible by Kip Crosby and Fred Davis!

28 years, 5 months

2
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New Definiton REQUIRED

by manney＠nwohio.com

> Age, also, alone, does not make a classic. I doubt that the standard >run-of-the-mill '386 PeeCee will ever amount to anything except to, >perhaps, archaeologists who dig one out of a landfill. There were too >many of them made, and they were (are) regarded as "disposable". Look >at the construction - modern machines aren't made to be repaired any >more than a disposable cigarette lighter is made to be refilled. They >burn out, you toss' em, and buy another one. Well, not quite. You'll have a motherboard problem with Packard Bell, Compaq and the like -- but many use "generic" motherboards; thus a Baby AT case would fit anything from a 286 to a Pentium whatever (btw, shouldn't a P5 be called a Pentium Pro Lite?) Floppy disks, of course, have been standardized since the original PC, both in interface and form factor; EIDE/SCSI for hard disks, IDE for CD-ROM's. I upgrade PC's much of the time (probably sell 10 used systems/upgrades to 1 new system) and can tell you that upgrading _is_ viable in the PC world.

28 years, 5 months

2
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New Definiton REQUIRED

by kaikal＠MICROSOFT.com

As I recall, there's a little app around someplace that allows you to put whatever you want on the Wyse front panel display. > -----Original Message----- > From: PG Manney [SMTP:manney@nwohio.com] > Sent: Monday, November 17, 1997 10:29 AM > To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers > Subject: Re: New Definiton REQUIRED > > > another weird feature on Wyse 286 that can show time and > >date, mhz display like 8mhz, 12mhz and backlighted! :) > > Hey, I just had one of those come in for repair! The hard drive table aldo > has double digit numbers, something I've never seen before. >

28 years, 5 months

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Wrong Way:New Definiton REQUIRED

by engine＠chac.org

At 18:20 11/18/97 +0000, Hotze wrote: >....pretty soon, we'll be getting in to a >time where the words "IBM Compatible" are going to get replaced with "PC." The >fact is, there are just too darn many 386s to contemplate... we have a few >options... (1) Allow only the first/last (IE Deskpro 386 first, I don't know >about last).... Nuh uh. ALR 386 first, Compaq second. The ALR 386 is one of the most collectible of all Intel boxes. __________________________________________ Kip Crosby engine(a)chac.org http://www.chac.org/index.html Computer History Association of California

28 years, 5 months

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IBM 5100

by michaelg＠gray.mb.ca

I own two complete IBM 5100 systems. My original machine was fully loaded with 64k and both APL and BASIC in ROM. It also had the serial I/O card and I used to remotely access the machine with an ASR33 teletype at 110(?) baud. With the proprietary vertical market software plus the IBM software, I paid about $64,000 in 1975(?), or about a buck a byte. The other, purchased ten years later for spares, has BASIC only and I forget the amount of memory. I also have the entire library of IBM software released for these machines and all documentation including the service manuals. I have two external tape drives and two printers as well and boxes and boxes of tapes. I wrote a fully-funcional word-processor in APL for use with the "Paper Tiger"-series printers. I wrote over 100 user manuals on this machine and output camera-ready copy. If anyone out there needs any info or assistance with the 5100, perhaps I can help. -- Michael. -----------------------------------------------+------------------------ Michael Gillespie | Voice/Fax 204.943.9000 President, Telecommunities Canada Inc. | michaelg(a)tc.ca President, The Gray Research Group | michaelg(a)gray.mb.ca Project Manager, Blue Sky Community Networks | michaelg(a)freenet.mb.ca --- No good deed will go unpunished. ---- Standard Disclaimers Apply ---

28 years, 5 months

1
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Wrong Way:New Definiton REQUIRED

by allisonp＠world.std.com

From: HOTZE <photze(a)batelco.com.bh> <computers will NOT be significant classics... origionally, as has been poin <out, the "10 year" rule was to make sure that IBMs weren't included... firs <IBM/PC, then the IBM XT, then the AT, and pretty soon, we'll be getting in Where in the world did that come from? Since anything greater than 10 years old would have been made in 1987 or before there is a whole class of PCs, XTs, and even ATs that fit. However, 386s(barely), 486s and P5s do not. Also I think the idea of the list was to not help me be a general "help me fix my PC forum". it's a common problem that new PC oowners are everywhere in every forums asking for help usually far from the topic and intent of the list (comp.os.cpm come to mind). I don't mean help with a older XT or PC but the "I just got a p6/233 and it doesn't...." stuff. 10 years, that's simple enough for most of us. Allison

28 years, 5 months

1
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New Definiton/ Vaporware lives still!

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<From: HOTZE <photze(a)batelco.com.bh> <(1) Are old/new Motherboards compatible (IE 300 Mhz now, 600 Mhz later) I don't know or care. Likely not but there are reasons I say so. <(2) Where on God's creation can the parts???? (As for the OS, I'll probably take Linux, or NT, but I though there was translation software for x86 written...) I can't solve your geography problem. Here in the USA Alphas are plentyful as in western europe. The news groups have several a week for sale. Yes there is DEC software for x86 emulation. All you need to do is spend money as most all of it is current enough to buy. It is far to new to even discuss it further here Alpha is a 90s machine! By definition not eligible for status here till 2000+. Allison

28 years, 5 months

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New Definiton REQUIRED

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<> > latest thing to come down the 'pike - it's all ASICs, custom silicon, <> > and surface mount stuff on wafer-thin boards. In short - not built <> > to last. Nor is it designed to. Surface mount offers compact and also better signal integrity for ultrafast logic. There are many good reasons for surface mount that are in the realm of quality improvement. Yes, it's take more skill to fix and some of the parts are not easy to come by. FYI in the industry there a few descriptions of part of the problem. Good, fast, cheap, pick two. Cost of repair exceeds value of unit. Fix/trash decision. Many machine were made the way they were because technology of the time balanced against cost were deciding factors. Allison

28 years, 5 months

5
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Data General model 6122 disk subsystem available

by pcoad＠wco.com

There is a local (Silicon Valley) guy who has a model 6122 disk subsystem with two packs. It has a capacity of 277MB and requires 3 phase power. Included are also some shipping cases for the packs. I believe that the subsystem weighs about 200-300 pounds. The dimensions are approximately 20" x 48" x 30". It was used with a Data General Eclipse S/140. My understanding is that the unit can be had for the price of shipping or for free you are willing to pick it up. I am willing to take care of the labor for packing and shipping. This unit will be scrapped soon if a home cannot be found for it. --pec -------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Antique Computer Collection: http://www.wco.com/~pcoad/machines.html

28 years, 5 months

1
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Software Needed

by photze＠batelco.com.bh

Hello... I just got that spiffy coco2 emulator, and I need software for it... Thanks in Advance, Tim D. Hotze

28 years, 5 months

1
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HD Floppies in DD Drives

by Philip.Belben＠powertech.co.uk

> William Donzelli wrote: > > > says that they will last at least ten years. The best solution (other than > > mylar punched tape) is probably the older WORM drives (not MOs!), as they > > Purely out of morbid curiosity, has anybody ever considered making Tyvek > tape? The stuff is damned near impossible to tear and difficult even to > stretch enough to lose data. That is actually a very good idea. I shall dig out some tyvek samples and cut some inch-wide strips for initial tests. If this is OK, I shall contact the manufacturers. I'll post results here, but can't make any promises as to timescale. FWIW I kept some tyvek samples (from an office supplies catalogue) for use as gasket paper on my car. Works a treat on things like carburettors, gear levers, etc. Don't fancy trying it on cylinder heads, though... Philip.

28 years, 5 months

2
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For Trade: (New) Inmac 16 sector 5 1/4" floppy disks

by bill_r＠inetnebr.com

I need some 5 1/4" 10-sector floppies for my various "classic/antique" machines. I thought that was what I was buying in a recent on-line auction. What I ended up with was 16-sector floppies. I don't even know what uses these; certainly nothing I have. Accordingly, I'm offering to trade for 10-sector versions. These are Inmac DS,DD, 16 hard sector 5 1/4" disks with envelopes. Quantity 30 (3 boxes of 10). Two boxes are still factory shrink-wrapped. The 3rd was until I opened it to verify that I'd gotten the wrong thing; none were used. Make a trade offer, or alternatively, does anyone know where and how much I might be able to just *buy* some 10-sectors? -Bill Richman bill_r(a)inetnebr.com http://incolor.inetnebr.com/bill_r ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "When they took the fourth amendment, I was quiet because I didn't deal drugs. When they took the sixth amendment, I was quiet because I was innocent. When they took the second amendment, I was quiet because I didn't own a gun. Now they've taken the first amendment, and I can say nothing about it." -www.paranoia.com

28 years, 5 months

2
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Model 100, again

by manney＠nwohio.com

>Ok, I still haven't been able to find out what's wrong with the LCD in my >Tandy Model 100 (the rest of the machine works fine, as I was able to tell >by blind-writing BASIC progs that beep the speaker). Just type PRINT CHR$(7), which will process ASCII BEL (Control G).

28 years, 5 months

8
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One from the 'believe it or not' file...

by lfb107＠psu.edu

>In a message dated 97-11-17 12:20:14 EST, HOTZE put forth: >RE: the unix box, and the issue whether to power it up: >back in the 1980s i collected beer cans and it was clearly established that >cans were worth more if full, or emptied from the bottom so the drink tab was >left undisturbed and full 6packs were the most valuable, so i say if it's >left alone, it would be "worth" more. i have an unused ibm 5150 in the >original box with the original cardboard shipping disks along with the >original keyboard in its' box. they may not be worth a lot now, but will be >eventually, especially with their boxes and documentation. >david I think we are forgetting one thing. Sure the 7300 would technically be "worth" more still in the box, but there is a limit to what you'll be able to actually get. You see these things very often for free (3B2's as well) on the comp.sys.att newsgroup so what does that make it worth then? I would have to vote for "just use it." Any parts can be scavenged from PC's or usually for free on the ng. LeS

28 years, 5 months

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One from the 'believe it or not' file...

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 04:38 PM 11/17/97 +0000, you wrote: > EXACTLY!!!! There are people who collect baseball cards (Somehthing which > I DO NOT do) and leave them in the packaging.... they don't even know what > cards are inside.... for all they know, the information could lead them to I know a guy who has a collection of CA lottery tickets (the $1 scratch-off tickets) that is complete (except one that he missed). One of each type, unscratched. Sure, he could be missing out on $10k or something, but to him, having the collection is worth more. (He also has a collection of scratched ones.) --------------------------------------------------------------------- O- Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad sinasohn(a)ricochet.net that none but madmen know." Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates San Francisco, California http://www.crl.com/~sinasohn/

28 years, 5 months

1
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One from the 'believe it or not' file...

by SUPRDAVE＠aol.com

In a message dated 97-11-17 12:20:14 EST, HOTZE put forth: > You see... that's the thing... I don't have anywhere to start but HERE. I've > really only been REALLY interested in the PC business since '93, and > collecting classics since May... I don't have ANYTHING.... I don't know > anybody (except all of you lovely people out there....), and so I need > somewhere to start... IBMs seem to be what I'm good at (I program them now > as > a hobby, so I know x86) I would take an IBM/PC, or, if they're easy to find, > > a PC jr. well, gee, i have an extra pcjr and power supply laying around here... dont know what shipping would be, however. RE: the unix box, and the issue whether to power it up: back in the 1980s i collected beer cans and it was clearly established that cans were worth more if full, or emptied from the bottom so the drink tab was left undisturbed and full 6packs were the most valuable, so i say if it's left alone, it would be "worth" more. i have an unused ibm 5150 in the original box with the original cardboard shipping disks along with the original keyboard in its' box. they may not be worth a lot now, but will be eventually, especially with their boxes and documentation. david

28 years, 5 months

1
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Coco For "Sale"

by dfitts1＠pdq.net

Sirs, I received your name from Bill Yakowenko. I have a TRS-8080 Color Computer 2 with mod kit to solve the overheating problem and memory upgrade. My system also includes a disk drive, multi-pak interface, cassette recorder, x-pad graphics tablet, deluxe joysticks, external serial/parallel port interface, X-10 light/appliance controller, light pen, editor/assembler module and parts for an experimenter's I/O port. I also have OS-9 and numerous other programs and very much documentation including all original manuals. Finally, I have many Color Computer magazines, including almost every issue of Color Computer News. I'm interested in finding this equipment a good home at extremely low or no price other than postage. I'm not sure what services you provide but if you post messages such as the above would you please post this? Too, what is your website address? Thanks, David Fitts

28 years, 5 months

1
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tape readers unique solution

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<Could cut some canned trannys open that is touchy to light and fill They all are! 2n5777 is a good photodarlington I've used a few. <those sensors from dead mouses, you can use either IR LED or strong <light. (YES! those light bulbs generate lot of IR). At lower than optimum voltage the IR is very there! IR however penetrates some paper tapes real well (if oil soaked better than white light!). It's been years since I've built one but I could reproduce it in an afternoon or two if need be. Allison

28 years, 5 months

1
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HD Floppies in DD Drives

by engine＠chac.org

At 13:29 11/15/97 -0500, you wrote: >I don't think that indestructibility of the tape is the issue...the coating >is the problem -- sliding across the head. What are you gonna bond to Tyvek? No, no, no! Tyvek PUNCHED tape! Coat nothing! Build a carbide punch-head.... Pull it through whippin' fast, like Colossus. __________________________________________ Kip Crosby engine(a)chac.org http://www.chac.org/index.html Computer History Association of California

28 years, 5 months

1
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help needed on a amiga 500

by darlene＠iamerica.net

It sounds like your machine needs a good cleaning, the disk drive is not reading the disk"maybe". I have four working commodore c64 computers, and the drives need to be cleaned. Even more after laying around for a long period of time. If your drive turns when you try to load something it sounds like it could be a dirty drive. It's not much to go on, but I have seen these small things stop folks in their tracks. good luck, bad eye bill.

28 years, 5 months

1
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New Definiton/ Vaporware lives still!

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<Um, Linux 2.0.30 now have Alpha support, PPC, 68k (amiga), 386, Mips, <Sparc, Ataris. Linux is Unix kind which you can source unix source <code to it by freely available complier and make 'em. I rememberd that after I sent the message. Old brain cells. Allison

28 years, 5 months

1
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One from the 'believe it or not' file...

by jrkeys＠concentric.net

I would vote to leave it alone, as this is a real classic untouched. John At 08:40 AM 11/16/97 -0800, you wrote: >You know, I always hate these moral dilemmas... > >In the last few days the collection received an AT&T UNIX PC (aka 7300, >3b1) in extremely good condition. It arrived with all of the original >docs, software, and mouse. The docs were unwrapped , and the mouse was in >its original foam packing. "Kind of nice when someone packs things away >properly" I thought. > >Well, its been a bit busy around the garage the last couple of weeks, so I >put the unit and its associated stuff on the shelf and covered it up for a >time. > >Last night, while I was working on a notebook (yes, one of those 'modern' >things) for one of my wife's friends, I decided to have another look at the >UNIX PC while I was waiting for a disk scan to finish... > >Found a spot for it on the bench, made a cursory check of the unit (nothing >loose, nothing rattling...) and powered it up. It hummed and beeped >happily and started drawing little boxes on the screen as I recalled it >doing when it was starting up... > >However, about 3-4 minutes and 4-5 lines of little boxes later, it starts >to dawn on me that it should not be taking quite this long to get a prompt >of some kind. So, I move the keyboard to have a look at the floppy drive >(it hides behind the keyboard you see) and sure enough the machine is >looking for a floppy. > >Fine... so, I grab the binder containing the software distribution, open it >up... > >All of the disks are still sealed! At this point it starts to dawn on me, >that this machine has never been run! A comment flashes back to mind; made >by the person who gave me the machine... "My father bought it for his >company, read the manuals and realized that he had no idea what he was >doing..." > >I find myself wondering... Back around 1985 when this thing was released >(and about $10k+), who could have afforded to buy one of these things, open >the manuals, decide that they were in over their heads, and just put it on >the shelf without even loading the software??? EEK! > >And so, the dilemma... do I open the disks and crank this critter up? Or >just pack it all away as another classic 'artifact'? (or leave it until I >have a fair amount of time to spend with it) > >No flame wars please, just the random philosophical question... > >-jim > >--- >jimw(a)agora.rdrop.com >The Computer Garage - http://www.rdrop.com/~jimw >Computer Garage Fax - (503) 646-0174 > > > >

28 years, 5 months

2
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One from the 'believe it or not' file...

by allisonp＠world.std.com

Along the same lines.... While digging through one of my boxes of stuff for a part I found a partial S100 Jade Double density disk controller kit unassembled. Of course I remember why I had it, the person that gave it to me back in '82 wasn't up for the assembly task, raided it for parts and gave me the remains. At the time I wasn't interested in getting a 1793 based controller going as I was getting 765As for free and all the assistance >from it's designers I could use. Well guess what. I'm 98% of the way through assembling it. Then I have to assemble the source code as there are no disks but lots of listings in the manuals. It's z80 based in that it has its own CPU as a bus slave. Should be interesting to get going. Oh, all the missing parts are from my collection and a few are date coded before the board! It was all I had of some parts. Allison

28 years, 5 months

2
1
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New Definiton REQUIRED

by fmc＠reanimators.org

HOTZE <photze(a)batelco.com.bh> wrote: > [...] if you remember, in the "welcome" message, it > said that it was hard to state the definiton of a classic... but 10 > years or older would do. I do not wish to offend the owner, but they > are one person, and they can make mistakes... and together, as a group, > the chances of making an accurate definiton are smaller with us. Right. Not too many people are going to agree on this. There's probably a few people out there who think the Atari Portfolio is a classic and I think it's under 10 years old. The IBM PC/AT is 13 years old now but I have difficulty thinking of it as a classic and I really couldn't care less. But the 10 year rule is simple and not without precedent (it's roughly the way other things are judged "antique" -- if I remember correctly the "magic number" is 100 years for furniture and housewares and 20 years for automobiles). That's why we have it, we know it's not perfect but it does provide a clear cutoff. (Aside to You Know Who You Are: knock it off, OK?) > Possibly (out for MUCH revision...) is the definition "Any computer > which has aged sufficently to be considered "outdated" by the computer > market and has historic signifiance, OR is 10 years old or older." The > one evedeint place that requires revsion is the "historical signifiacne" Does it? The problem is that inside 10 years it's very difficult to judge historical significance. And just because it's older than 10 years doesn't make finding the historical significance any easier. I'm hard pressed to think of what was significant about the PC/AT, as near as I could tell at the time it was put to work as a bigger faster IBM PC, still running all the same old MS-DOS applications, still one at a time. And from conversations I've had with folks who were doing Unix stuff on the 80286 then, they didn't think 80286 protected mode was progress w/r/t the PDP-11. Well, what did the PC/AT have that the PC/XT didn't? 1.2MB minifloppies (although I saw those retrofit onto XT-class PCs), 16-bit slots, a cascaded interrupt controller to handle the additional interrupt request lines...and the A20 gate that let you get at another little chunk of RAM up above the 1MB boundary while still in real mode. Hmm. How many of these things do we consider historically significant now, and how many will we still consider significant in 5, 10, 25, 50, 100 years? -Frank McConnell

28 years, 5 months

4
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New Definiton/ Vaporware lives still!

by carl.friend＠stoneweb.com

On Mon, 17 Nov 1997, Allison remarked to us: > You have three choices [for an Alpha OS] that I know of, OpenVMS > (my favorite), Digital Unix, or NT. I don't know that anyone has > done a UNIX port outside of digital. Linux has been successfully ported to the Alpha architecture. ______________________________________________________________________ | | | | Carl Richard Friend (UNIX Sysadmin) | West Boylston | | Minicomputer Collector / Enthusiast | Massachusetts, USA | | mailto:carl.friend@stoneweb.com | | | http://www.ultranet.com/~engelbrt/carl/museum/ | ICBM: N42:21 W71:46 | |________________________________________________|_____________________|

28 years, 5 months

1
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by yakowenk＠cs.unc.edu

Hey all. I think its about time I de-lurk and introduce myself. My name is Bill, and I'm very interested in SwTPC and SSB stuff. We had a couple SwTPC 6800 systems in my high school way back when, and I'd love to see one again (or own one!). After signing up for the Classic Computer Rescue Squad, I started thinking, if a big old machine actually needed a rescue, what would we do? I mean, maybe we should collect info on how big these old things are, in terms of floor-space, tonnage, time to dismantle, and so on. Then, when a rescue call comes in, we could maybe decide if we can feasibly deal with it, and if anyone actually wants the thing. If only three guys show up to dismantle 200 tons of vacuum tubes, it isn't gonna happen on-schedule. And it's one thing to keep a mini in a corner, but not all of us can arrange space for, say, a 360. So there are legitimate (if sad) reasons that we might have to pass up a find. Also, would it be good to have a rescue checklist? I can think of a dozen things that might be good to do during a rescue, but I'll bet I wouldn't think of half of it in the excitement of rescue-day. I guess I'm volunteering to collect this, if you all think it's a good idea and want to suggest things. Okay, I'll close with the obligatory lists: Want: SwTPC 6800, CT-64, CT-VM, MF-68 EPROM burner Have (willing to trade away): DecScope terminal (ie: vt52), works DecMate-III (don't yet know if it works) Apple //c with monochrome monitor, some manuals, works Radio Shack CoCo 2's, work Defaced (ie: no faceplate) Amiga something-or-other, with no monitor, keyboard, docs, or anything, probably doesn't work Have (and will keep!): Radio Shack CoCo 1's and a CoCo 3, tech manual IBM PC-XT clone SwTPC S/09 (down with disk problems) Lear-Seigler ADM-31 terminal (bought today!) Of course, some of this stuff would have significant shipping costs associated with it, unless you live nearby (central NC). Cheers, Bill.

28 years, 5 months

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Found on AuctionWeb...

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<Also, a trackstar E for use with Tandy/IBM compatibles (Apple //e emulator Trackstar 128 Funny I have one of them, haven't figured out what to do with it yet. Not being an apple user it's an odd item in my collection. Allison

28 years, 5 months

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New Definiton REQUIRED

by manney＠nwohio.com

> another weird feature on Wyse 286 that can show time and >date, mhz display like 8mhz, 12mhz and backlighted! :) Hey, I just had one of those come in for repair! The hard drive table aldo has double digit numbers, something I've never seen before.

28 years, 5 months

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by manney＠nwohio.com

>Well, what did the PC/AT have that the PC/XT didn't? 1.2MB >minifloppies (although I saw those retrofit onto XT-class PCs), 16-bit >slots, a cascaded interrupt controller to handle the additional >interrupt request lines...and the A20 gate that let you get at another >little chunk of RAM up above the 1MB boundary while still in real >mode. ...and the hard drive info in ROM. But, you're right. The 286-386 jump was more significant than the 8088-286 jump, even though so of those 286 changes that you mentioned are still with us that Pentiums are "AT" (not 386) class machines.

28 years, 5 months

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Classic Computer Accumulation Squad

by manney＠nwohio.com

>Hey, for years one of the standard excuses for getting a home computer >was "Hey, we can keep recipes on it". For that of course, you really >want a membrane keyboard -- pasta sauce in a Keytronics is fatal. I always _loved_ seeing the adverts of smiling Mom (no flour on her hands, natch!) booting up the family PC to get her recipes. Some of those early recipe programs would specify oddities such as "5/48 tsp chives". > >And _of course_ a similarly protected laptop belongs in the bathroom, >when you're setting down to do some serious Usenet reading. Hey, I used to program in the bath with my HP-71!

28 years, 5 months

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One from the 'believe it or not' file...

by manney＠nwohio.com

>And so, the dilemma... do I open the disks and crank this critter up? Or >just pack it all away as another classic 'artifact'? (or leave it until I >have a fair amount of time to spend with it) Open it up -- play with it -- computers are meant to be _used_.

28 years, 5 months

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by IVIE＠cc.usu.edu

> Rainbow machine is very quirky demanding > weird hardware and quirky disks in both format and hardsectored. :( Bear in mind that from the perspective of us CP/M folks, demanding absolutely rigid hardware compatibility is quirky... > IBM produced > excellent PS/2 '87 era series that can be ripped apart with bare > hands except for motherboard and PSU screws. FWIW, my absolute favorite box of all time is the VAXstation 4000/60 or /96; you can get everything out of the box quickly with no tools. In contrast, it's only been in the last few years that I've gotten coordinated enough to keep from mutilating my knuckles every time I go into a VAXstation 2000... Roger Ivie ivie(a)cc.usu.edu

28 years, 5 months

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by engine＠chac.org

At 15:42 11/17/97 +0000, you wrote: >This is what I like about the Zip IDE drives it's a right design like >the floppy drive machism. But I wished Iomega sell one in SCSI >version as well which means we have to press for it! er....There are SCSI Zip drives, both int and ext. I've got an internal here, use it to store the techno and ambient I listen to through an AWE32. __________________________________________ Kip Crosby engine(a)chac.org http://www.chac.org/index.html Computer History Association of California

28 years, 5 months

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by IVIE＠cc.usu.edu

Allison wrote: > <> acceptable OS. Although CP/M running native on a Pentium 133 is pretty > <> cool, and fast! By collecting Non-PC's there a tons of OS's to play with > > CP/M-80 running on a 16mhz z180 is far more interesting. ;-) Bear in mind: - Z180s now do up to 33MHz - The average 128Kx8 15 ns SRAM - is fast enough to run at 33MHz with no wait states - contains enough on-board logic to do address decoding in a simple Z180 system Sigh; I see ads in Circuit Cellar for folks that take 68HC12s in surface-mount packages and mount them on an adapter board for folks that want through-hole parts. Anyone know of someone doing the same thing with either the Z182 (or, better yet, the Z195) or at least generic footprints of the appropriate size? Roger Ivie ivie(a)cc.usu.edu

28 years, 5 months

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tape readers unique solution

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<A little bit of head banging and we realized that to read paper tape, all y <need is a hand scanner, dark background, some kind of rig to hold the scann <in position above a 1" channel and, well, programming as appropriate. smashing ants with atomic cannon. The simplest form of scanner is 9 photocells(photo transistor or diode) lined up under the tape, light above and the 9th (sproket hole connectd to the data available(or ack) of a parallel port such as the PC printer port. Tape movement, pull by hand. should be good for 300->3000 char sec easily. It's trivial hardware. Program: Copy LPT: file.tap Done. Allison

28 years, 5 months

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New Definiton/ Vaporware lives still!

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<being sold as "outdated". I know managers refusing to buy DEC Alpha's <because the Intel Merced chip is supposed to be available in a couple <of years - and the first Merced's will be only a bit slower than today's <currently available Alpha's. Talk about being blown away by vapor... Lessee, wait a few years to get what's available now. Excuse me I must be missing something here as doesn't business have to go on in the mean time??? Talk about pinning hopes on the sky. This is straight out of the early micro years when products would be hyped only for the company to go bust before anyone would see it or worse deliver it years late and working poorly(sorta like WIN95!). Allison

28 years, 5 months

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One from the 'believe it or not' file...

by allisonp＠world.std.com

< What do we do with that example? Leave it packed away? Fire it <up for the edification of the locals (worldwide)? This is a knotty <question, and one that harks somewhat to the same question asked by <those who restore, and fly, antique aircraft. If we fly it, there's <always the possibility that we might have a failure and the example <(artifact) may be destroyed - if we don't, we're ignoring the essential <beauty and function of the design. The classic example of this and a conter arguement is the BeeGee Racing aircraft. It was considered a widowmaker, as it nearly or did kill most of the pilots that flew it!. A replica was made and the plane has been flying for several years at airshows and doing remarkable acrobatics... guess what it hasn't killed the pilot. What was lost was that it took a healty respect and some knowledge of design and flight to figure out that it wasn't so much the plane as the pilots that were the problem and they have learned about the flight characteristics of a plane that was deemed unflyable. Not to mention seeing a piece of flying history debunked. < I, offhand, am tempted to say "park the craft" and find another one <that's a bit more beat up. Restore that one, and drive it to your <heart's content. But save the "factory original" one - like an old <Tucker. With some exception cars and place can be preserved where some parts of computers must be exercised or potentially fail. The other issue is this may not even be a working example at this time. It's one thing when it's the last one, another when there are more to see. Allison

28 years, 5 months

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One from the 'believe it or not' file...

by ware＠xtal.pharm.nwu.edu

At 08:40 AM 11/16/97 -0800, James Willing wrote: (AT&T 3B1 found...) >However, about 3-4 minutes and 4-5 lines of little boxes later, it starts >to dawn on me that it should not be taking quite this long to get a prompt >of some kind. So, I move the keyboard to have a look at the floppy drive >(it hides behind the keyboard you see) and sure enough the machine is >looking for a floppy. Is the hard disk spinning up? I purchased two "new" (in the box with shrink-wrapped software) UNIX PCs about a year ago. One of the internal hard disks (a Micropolis 20 MB 1/2 height ST-506 interface MFM unit) did not spin up, presumably due to stiction or a relative thereof. The computer with this disk exhibited the behavior that you describe. The other machine started up a "Welcome to the UNIX PC" application that prompted me to insert the first disk of the installation media. On the systems that I have (1 MB RAM, 20 MB HD 7300s), the system software was not preinstalled, presumably to allow the version of the OS that was shipped with the machines to be changed easily. If you have opened the media, try booting the machine with the diagnostic disk. If this works, the hard disk is likely to be the culprit. As Ward Griffiths mentioned, the 3B1 uses ST-506 interface MFM disks, but it can only access 67 MB without hardware modifications. There are utilities on the diagnostic disk that you can use to test, format, partition, and make filesystems on the hard disk. If you can't get the hard disk working with these utilities, replacing it isn't too difficult. The ST-251-1 in my UNIX PC isn't original, but neither are the GNU utilities, csh, and Perl that I have installed on it. If you're fortunate enough to have the (somewhat rare) Ethernet card or the (somewhat more rare) TCP/IP software for it, be sure to check out the 3B1 FAQ before putting it on a network. There are some major security holes, especially in the windowing environment. Brian Stuart has a lot of good information (and the comp.sys.3b1 FAQ) on the Web at http://colossus.mathcs.rhodes.edu/~stuart/3b1/3b1.html . >I find myself wondering... Back around 1985 when this thing was released >(and about $10k+), who could have afforded to buy one of these things, open >the manuals, decide that they were in over their heads, and just put it on >the shelf without even loading the software??? EEK! I purchased mine from a guy in Chicago who had a warehouse full of them, new in the box. I doubt that many individuals buy computers and put them away without using them (except for collectors), but many businesses like to have spares on hand. Additionally, a lot of new "obsolete" machines get written off and sold as scrap. I don't know, but I suspect that this was the story of my machines. If you would like to try the diagnostics without opening the software, let me know, and I'll get you a copy of the diagnostics disk (from release 3.51). -- Scott Ware s-ware(a)nwu.edu

28 years, 5 months

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New Definiton REQUIRED

by photze＠batelco.com.bh

Okay.... recently, there's been lots of "off-topic" stuff going on here about computers... but I think that it's not "off-topic." In my mind, there is no doubt that the early mass-produced CD-ROM drives (not the origionals of 1984, but the ones that were made to be put into PCs, not servers) are classic componets, even though many are of this decade. In my opinion, the first 486 PCs (not servers) are classics... ones that are still used, but classics... even though most of 'em were made in like 1991-93... arguebly, early Pentiums (60, 66 Mhz) could be classics, as they steped into a new era (superscaler arceticture) for the mass-production market even though the Pentium chips wern't even on the market until mid-1993... if you remember, in the "welcome" message, it said that it was hard to state the definiton of a classic... but 10 years or older would do. I do not wish to offend the owner, but they are one person, and they can make mistakes... and together, as a group, the chances of making an accurate definiton are smaller with us. Possibly (out for MUCH revision...) is the definition "Any computer which has aged sufficently to be considered "outdated" by the computer market and has historic signifiance, OR is 10 years old or older." The one evedeint place that requires revsion is the "historical signifiacne" but I'm not sure how to include that while still aknowladgeing the presence of many of the best machines and componets that did indeed fail in the process... but at least Wang's did eventually fall.... I can't even rememeber all of the problems that they had... Openly, innocently, and waiting for improvement (on my quote, not the other stuff,), Tim D. Hotze

28 years, 5 months

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One from the 'believe it or not' file...

by carl.friend＠stoneweb.com

On Sun, 16 Nov 1997 08:40:43 -0800, Mr. Willing made the following comments: > And so, the dilemma... do I open the disks and crank this critter up? > Or just pack it all away as another classic 'artifact'? (or leave it > until I have a fair amount of time to spend with it) Pack it away, sealed up, and find another 3B1 to work on. I know a chap "down under" who has a LINC-8 in its original ply- wood crate stashed in a storage locker. The thing has not seen the light of day since it came off the line in 1968. It is one of 142 ever built. What do we do with that example? Leave it packed away? Fire it up for the edification of the locals (worldwide)? This is a knotty question, and one that harks somewhat to the same question asked by those who restore, and fly, antique aircraft. If we fly it, there's always the possibility that we might have a failure and the example (artifact) may be destroyed - if we don't, we're ignoring the essential beauty and function of the design. I, offhand, am tempted to say "park the craft" and find another one that's a bit more beat up. Restore that one, and drive it to your heart's content. But save the "factory original" one - like an old Tucker. ______________________________________________________________________ | | | | Carl Richard Friend (UNIX Sysadmin) | West Boylston | | Minicomputer Collector / Enthusiast | Massachusetts, USA | | mailto:carl.friend@stoneweb.com | | | http://www.ultranet.com/~engelbrt/carl/museum | ICBM: N42:22 W71:47 | |________________________________________________|_____________________|

28 years, 5 months

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Powells Bookstore (was: Anyone have a copy of this book) & VIC Kernel

by rcini＠email.msn.com

Thanks for the suggestions re: Powell's Bookstore. They had the book for $60, a $23 savings over Amazon. Granted, it is a used copy, but if my used books are a guide, I should get a quality book. Highly recommended store for tech books. I'd like to visit it someday. Also, for those interested, I finished my VIC-20 Kernel documentation project. Right now, I have completely recompilable source code for the Commodore VIC-20 kernel ROM. It took me over 2 years, part time, but it works. Anyone who is interested in finding out more, send me a private e-mail. Rich Cini/WUGNET <rcini(a)msn.com> - ClubWin! Charter Member (6) - MCP Windows 95/Networking

28 years, 5 months

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Classic Computer Rescue Squad

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<> The most amazing thing is being in a real computer room (i.e. dozens <> of 14" drives) when the power suddenly goes *off*. The silence is <> astonishing. I was in a computer room at dec when a power failure hit. Imagine 30 RA81s and 82s plus two 8650s going silent. The lastime I heard that deafining silence the engine on my plane stopped in the air! It's not the loud but the sudden lack of it. Allison

28 years, 5 months

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Classic Computer Accumulation Squad

by carl.friend＠stoneweb.com

On Sun, 16 Nov 1997 11:59:57 -0600, "Uncle Roger" remarked in our collective presence: > As for me, there is currently [...] a Data General One & a Mac Plus > in the dining room, [and a list to be envious of if you collect > microcomputers!] It looks like it's confession time here. The "no computers in the dining room" is silly, at best. At this moment, I'm typing away on my Linux box in the dining-room looking at least 10 computers, not counting the micro I'm writing this on. There are another 4 in the kitchen behind me, two of which have seen power this weekend. (6 of the dining-room ones saw power over the weekend.) Rules are made to be broken. Computers, of course, fit anywhere you can find space for them. Even big ones. The bathroom, though, is straight out. Too humid. Before some wise-$@# decides to have at me for typing on a "modern" machine, let me remind him that even I have to pay the electric utility >from time to time. ______________________________________________________________________ | | | | Carl Richard Friend (UNIX Sysadmin) | West Boylston | | Minicomputer Collector / Enthusiast | Massachusetts, USA | | mailto:carl.friend@stoneweb.com | | | http://www.ultranet.com/~engelbrt/carl/museum | ICBM: N42:22 W71:47 | |________________________________________________|_____________________|

28 years, 5 months

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New Definiton REQUIRED

by carl.friend＠stoneweb.com

On Sun, 16 Nov 1997 19:26:14, Mr. Hotze remarked to us: > Possibly (out for MUCH revision...) is the definition "Any computer > which has aged sufficently to be considered "outdated" by the computer > market and has historic signifiance, OR is 10 years old or older." Given the marketplace today for "commodity" computers, what you buy today is, by definition, obsolete as there'll be something "better" along tomorrow. In a word - "why bother?". Age, also, alone, does not make a classic. I doubt that the standard run-of-the-mill '386 PeeCee will ever amount to anything except to, perhaps, archaeologists who dig one out of a landfill. There were too many of them made, and they were (are) regarded as "disposable". Look at the construction - modern machines aren't made to be repaired any more than a disposable cigarette lighter is made to be refilled. They burn out, you toss' em, and buy another one. Such was not always the case. Pre-PeeCee, machines were usually constructed very carefully. I don't doubt for a minute that engineers in the early '60s envisioned their creations happily hummimg away in the year 2000 - the boxes were built to last. Pop the hood on the latest thing to come down the 'pike - it's all ASICs, custom silicon, and surface mount stuff on wafer-thin boards. In short - not built to last. Nor is it designed to. That, of course, is just my opinion. And a cynical one, too. ______________________________________________________________________ | | | | Carl Richard Friend (UNIX Sysadmin) | West Boylston | | Minicomputer Collector / Enthusiast | Massachusetts, USA | | mailto:carl.friend@stoneweb.com | | | http://www.ultranet.com/~engelbrt/carl/museum | ICBM: N42:22 W71:47 | |________________________________________________|_____________________|

28 years, 5 months

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One from the 'believe it or not' file...

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<67MB stock, and no expansion was possible 67MB (1024 cyl by 8 head) was <ever supported -- the users came up with ways to add a second and/or <larger hard disk, but most of the components needed have long been <discontinued. disk maximum 1024x8x17 is easily twice (140) the 67mb! A second drive should be a latter of connectors and cables, all still available. Shouldn't be that much majik. Allison

28 years, 5 months

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