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101090 discussions

[maybe OT]: Removing pesky floppy disk labels

by philpem＠dsl.pipex.com

Hi all, OK, so here I am sitting at my computer with a stack of 100 or so disks to reformat. Unfortunately most of said disks have been labelled using felt-tip pen. And the labels are the nasty kind that don't come off without a fight. Sooo... Has anyone got a method that will get these stupid things off without leaving a gummy, sticky residue or damaging my disks? I've tried WD40 (didn't work at all), 3-in-1 oil (don't ask), an upside down airblaster (freeze spray for half the price) and a few other things and nothing works! Anyone want to share their secret? Thanks. -- Phil. philpem(a)dsl.pipex.com http://www.philpem.dsl.pipex.com/

23 years, 5 months

Removing glued on heatsink (was: Anyone need 486 motherboards?)

by cb＠mythtech.net

Ok, anyone know of a safe way of removing a glued on heatsink? I have a few of these 486 CPUs where the heatsink is glued down. I could just jam a screwdriver in and snap it off, but that just doesn't seem very good for the chip. -chris <http://www.mythtech.net>

23 years, 5 months

Wanted: KZQSA Adapter - Never mind

by Fred.van.Kempen＠microwalt.nl

> Hmmmm, unobtainium huh??? Thats similar to Kryptonite I think ;-) No.. Kryptonite is sugar compared to Un. If you ever find someone you suspect of having, they'll fiercefully deny that... and then smile... --f

23 years, 5 months

Bringing up a 10 years dormant VAX 11/750

by healyzh＠aracnet.com

> I just a couple of days ago picked up a VAX 11/750. This machine has Cool! > been stored > in a damp shed for ten years or so, has had mice living in it, and the > usual assortment of spiders, etc. Oh, SHUDDER! It sounds like you're in for an interesting restoration process. > to the control panel and TU58 tape drive. I'm in the process of cleaning > all the components, > but am in search of some advice on this process, especially the power > supply. How long > should I let the power supply dry out from its prior damp condition, and > what should > I do to bring it up for testing without risking damage to other > components? I wish to > do this methodically and carefully. Unless this is a powersupply that needs a load on it when you power it on (anyone know?), I'd recommend having it totally disconnected when you power it on. I'd also recommend you have someone else standing by with a C02 Fire Extinguisher for safety. As for how long it needs to dry before powering up, I'm not really sure, if you've got it in a warm, heated location, I'd say a week or two should be plenty (probably doesn't need that much but it's better to ere on the side of caution). Something to do in the mean time is to look for corrosion and to get everything good and clean. I'm most concerned about your powersupply and backplane. Also take a look at the rollers in your TU58. While the following is for a PDP-8, you might find it useful. http://pdp-8.org/revive.htm Definitly read up on what Aaron has to say about Backplanes. Zane

23 years, 5 months

(no subject)

by f.heite＠hccnet.nl

> gil smith asked: > I am curious what your favorite cp/m system might be. My first 8bit CP/M machine was made by putting a Microsoft Softcard into my Apple ][ Plus, early 1981. After sitting there for a few years, the Softcard was moved to a new Apple //f. That's an Apple //e, where I had the Rom software patched by my dealer, to prevent the hard reset routine from overwriting a few bytes in every xx KB's. And, of course, the startup text on the top line of the screen changed to Apple //f to make it my "personal" machine. The //f machine was upgraded with serial and parallel cards, a clock/interrupt card, extra RAM, and finally a SASI interface card, connected to a 10 MB Xebec harddisk. For that SASI harddisk, as sold by my dealer, I wrote the boot prom, patches and drivers for Microsoft CP/M 2.2, ALS CP/M Plus, Apple DOS, Apple Pascal and finally Prodos. In the end, it was a system that could run not only two flavors of CP/M, but also all other OS's that were available for the Apple - all with megabytes of harddisk space. CP/M Plus was my favorite OS as it was the fastest one, mainly due to the large numbers of disk buffers that were possible in CP/M Plus. Sometimes I feel sorry that I sold all this for about fifty dollars... Freek.

23 years, 5 months

For Sale: Diamond D5 Wordprocessor

by julesrichardsonuk＠yahoo.co.uk

Hi, > > curious. Mine's definitely a Diablo unit and plugs into its own > > card within the > > Yes, a Diablo Hitype II. ha ha - just me being stoopid :) > > cardcage in the system unit. But there's also a seperate card > > in there (oddly, > > How many wires in the cable between the printer and this card? right, just taken another look... yes, it is 50 pins - but not connected to anything; the printer connects via a serial cable to a seperate SIO board (which seems capable of supporting 2 devices). A post-sale upgrade I assume, but they left the original Diablo board in the machine too. The SIO board has DIP-switches on it whereas configuration on the other cards seems to be solder-contact only. do you remember if your unit shows anything on the display prior to putting the system disc in? Be useful if it did in terms of tracing the fault with this machine. there's more cards in the cardcage than I originally remembered: disc #4 drive (x 2) disc #4 read/write disc #4 control 64K ram SIO interface 3 mode VDU output 3 mode VDU counter VDU memory CPU #9 Z80 RTC keyboard interface diablo interface The 3 VDU boards are coupled on the outer edge as well as on the backplane. Backplane connections are via 88 contacts, with the component-side of the cards being purely ground. Not sure if the layout was to any recognised design; probably proprietary though. cheers, Jules 88 __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Everything you'll ever need on one web page >from News and Sport to Email and Music Charts http://uk.my.yahoo.com

23 years, 5 months

Swapping boards on ST225 drives / Philips P3800 help

by julesrichardsonuk＠yahoo.co.uk

Tony (and others), > I have the schematics of the ST225 somewhere. I misremembered about the drive - I've just had the case off the machine to get some pictures in response to Stefan's post about the P4500 (at www.moosenet.demon.co.uk/temp/p3800 for anyone who's interested) The drive's a Rodime 202E which going from memory is 50MB or so. I'm quite keen to see if I can get this thing running now as it's got me curious. The key at the front has 3 settings - off, on and 'pm' - I have no idea what the latter does but the abbreviation might mean something to someone?? Applying power I get LEDs on the back of all cards, plus one labelled as +5V on the power supply board. No fan activity though and no hard disk spindle motor; maybe a +12V rail is dead or the problem might be more tricky to diagnose. There's five LEDs on the front of the case - labelled 1,2,3 and 4 plus one with a power symbol - none of those light when power is applied. Might be something stupid like the system is waiting for a console command before starting the disk but that's probably a little too hopeful :-) There's 6 cables hanging out the back, all terminated with 25 pin connectors. One's black and unlabelled, another is grey and unlabelled, and all the rest are grey and labelled as: '8 bit 3100', '16 bit 3100' '8 st' and '8 st4'. Mean anything to anyone? Are those terminal types or something? I'll reseat all the cards tomorrow and measure a few voltages to see what's what - plus connect the hard drive to a known-good supply and just check it does spin up. IC dates are all in 1984 so it's more recent than I thought (I'd guessed '82 or so) but no idea when it last ran or what it was used for. Hopefully the disk wasn't wiped prior to it being submerged in a flood! :) cheers Jules __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Everything you'll ever need on one web page >from News and Sport to Email and Music Charts http://uk.my.yahoo.com

23 years, 5 months

IBM 5150 brings $910 on EBAY

by Innfogra＠aol.com

I would say that the three original manuals and the DOS SW contributes mightily to the value to collectors. When Items like this sell for such high values I notice they usually include the original Software and manuals. Often they have the original boxes. Also condition is very important to collectors. This one purports to be in near perfect condition which is somewhat rare in its own right. Paxton Astoria, OR

23 years, 5 months

Micropolis hdd

by woftbo＠cox.net

I have been searching for information regarding the assembly of a Micropolis 1991 hard drive. What is the best method to disassemble the case to access the latching area? Dave S

23 years, 5 months

Removing glued on heatsink (was: Anyone need 486 motherboards?)

by dwightk.elvey＠amd.com

>From: "Don Maslin" <donm(a)cts.com> > > >On Tue, 29 Oct 2002, chris wrote: > >> Ok, anyone know of a safe way of removing a glued on heatsink? I have a >> few of these 486 CPUs where the heatsink is glued down. I could just jam >> a screwdriver in and snap it off, but that just doesn't seem very good >> for the chip. > >Better a single edge razor blade or a putty knife than a screwdriver! >Too much local load with the screwdriver blade - probably crack the >chip. > - don > >> -chris >> <http://www.mythtech.net> >> Hi I've always removed glued things from chips by heating it first with a hot plate. We used to remove the epoxied covers >from EPROMs this way in the lab when someone would plug one in upside down. This way we could replace the blown bonding wire ( the most common failure for reversed power ). It was handy to have a wire bonder around ( Ah, the good old days ). Dwight

23 years, 5 months

Philips P4500

by julesrichardsonuk＠yahoo.co.uk

> Does anybody know anything about a Philips P4500 ?? > I just now the size which is well, a decent size.... :) > Maybe someone has a picture ? not as such, but maybe it's a bigger brother of my P3800. In which case I'll be amazed - I heard of one other Philips system a few years ago which was a similar but more basic version of mine (P---, can't remember the number now), but the owner had long since disposed of it when I made enquiries. Never come across anyone who has the same system as mine, or even heard of it, and not heard of a 4500 either. My unit's about 1 foot wide, 4ft deep and 3ft tall and is some kind of multi-user CP/M system, or so I was told. It certainly has a lot of Z80 CPUs on the cards in the cardcage! Not a particularly lightweight system either. I can email an image off-list if you want. cheers Jules __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Everything you'll ever need on one web page >from News and Sport to Email and Music Charts http://uk.my.yahoo.com

23 years, 5 months

Philips P4500

by stefan＠softhome.net

Hiya, Does anybody know anything about a Philips P4500 ?? I just now the size which is well, a decent size.... :) Maybe someone has a picture ? Stefan.

23 years, 5 months

Whats this nubus card?

by cb＠mythtech.net

>Whats this nubus card? > >Workstation Technologies card. No idea but I believe it was an early video >conferencing setup. Appears to have an ADB or S-video connector, mini-Din >serial, a three row DB-25. Has a 68030/33 processor on board so it must >have some amount of horsepower in its day. Awesome looking card anyway. Hey.. no fair... I was going to buy first, ask questions later! (does this mean you beat me to responding to the guy on this?) -chris <http://www.mythtech.net>

23 years, 5 months

[OT] Fun find...

by patrick＠evocative.com

I've had a "grab bag" of chips in a box for months that I haven't had time to sort. Last night I got the bug, and while straightening pins and sorting, I found an AY-3-8500-1, one of the original "Pong on a Chip" chips. I found some schematics online quite easily. Condition of the chip is unknown, and I guess I'm going to have to build to find out, unless one of you has a suggestion for a quick health check? Patrick

23 years, 5 months

Drives? (was: RE: Tales of VCF 5.0?)

by fmc＠reanimators.org

Tom Uban wrote: > At 04:28 AM 10/29/2002 -0600, [Tothwolf] wrote: > >http://www.vintage-computer.com/images/VCF5/Tony%20Cole%20Vendor.jpg > >http://www.vintage-computer.com/images/VCF5/MemoryBillia2.jpg > > > >Does anyone recognize the drive with the numeric pad and LCD on the far > >right of the above two photos? It looks nearly identical to the 4 drives > >in my SGI 210S, and I'm still not exactly sure what type they are. > > It was labeled with a Seagate brand, but I think that when I last used one > like it it was a CDC brand drive, perhaps a Sabre. Didn't Seagate buy that part of CDC's disk drive business? -Frank McConnell

23 years, 5 months

Apple II Programmer's Aid ROM

by RCini＠congressfinancial.com

I didn't realize that Integer BASIC also included the ROM image...in which case I don't need it. Was there a special manual for those commands or were they covered in the DOS 3.3 book? Thanks. -----Original Message----- From: Sellam Ismail [mailto:foo@siconic.com] Sent: Monday, October 28, 2002 8:08 PM To: cctalk(a)classiccmp.org Subject: Re: Apple II Programmer's Aid ROM On Mon, 28 Oct 2002, Eric Smith wrote: > Rich wrote: > > I just read about this in the A2FAQ. Does anyone have this Apple ][ ROM > > and manual? > > If you've got a DOS 3.3 Master diskette (or a "BASICS" diskette), you've > got the ROM image. It's in the INTBASIC file on the DOS 3.3 Master. > > I've got a manual, somewhere. And of course if you boot the DOS 3.3 System Master on a 64K Apple ][, it will load the Integer BASIC ROM image (containing the Programmer's Aid ROM) into the upper 16K of memory. Then you can switch into Integer BASIC from Applesoft BASIC by typing 'INT' (which is a DOS command). To get back to Applesoft type 'FP' (for Floating Point, as in floating point BASIC). INT basically bank-switches in the ROM image in RAM. You can also press RESET to get back to Applesoft. Switching using either command will init your environment from scratch (i.e. any BASIC program in memory, either Applesoft or Integer, is lost). Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -- International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org * Old computing resources for business and academia at www.VintageTech.com *

23 years, 5 months

Need SA400 help

by acme_ent＠bellsouth.net

> From: Don Maslin <donm(a)cts.com> > Drive select - a choice of 1/2/3 - is determined by the programmable > shunt at location 1F. Installing a DIP switch is a much handier means > of selection. Configured for multiple drive installation, MX should be > open, HS shorted, and only the desired DSx shorted. Okay, that's clear. > Termination is by a 150Ohm resistor DIP. Thanks. There's an empty 14-pin DIP socket adjacent to the above-mentioned shunt, so I'd guess this is drive is missing the terminator. > The power connector is the same as used on more modern 5.25" floppy > drives with pin-1 at 12VDC, pin-2 12V return, pin-3 5V return, and pin-4 > 5VDC. Pin one is identified on the component side of the PCB. Thanks again, this drive does not have a "standard" power connector such as is found on late-model 5.25" drives -- it only has a four-pin header. Not being familiar with the SA400, I wasn't sure if this header was normal for this drive, or if it was some user's modification. Fred Cisin wrote: > Termination is required on the last drive on the cable. Lack of proper > termination can make for flaky operation, but will not generally > prevent it from working. Sure, but I didn't know the details of the terminator since it's missing on this drive. > I've never seen a factory switch on the front of one. Are you sure that > that wasn't a user added switch, such as one to override the write-protect > for flippies? Not sure at all, but it certainly is professional-looking. Due to my inexperience, I've never seen an SA400 before and I thought there might have been variations. Thanks to both of you for the information. Glen 0/0

23 years, 5 months

Apple II Programmer's Aid ROM

by paulrsm＠buckeye-express.com

Wayne Stewart did a PDF conversion--not just a scan--of the manual for the Apple II Programmers Aid ROM. There are a few typographical errors but it is very good. It is about 278KB. E-mail me if you want a copy. The empty ROM socket in the Apple II at addresses $D800-$DFFF never had an official Apple ROM but there were some third party ROMs such as the Inspector and the Senior PROM. In the Integer BASIC disk file on the DOS 3.3 system masters that area is filled with the Applesoft BASIC code from the same range of addresses. -- Paul R. Santa-Maria Monroe, Michigan USA

23 years, 5 months

Need SA400 help

by acme_ent＠bellsouth.net

> From: Fred Cisin (XenoSoft) <cisin(a)xenosoft.com> > The original post on this thread mentioned not having a "standard" floppy > power connector (Molex), and not knowing the pinout of the > connector(s). Upon very close examination I can see some stray flux around the solder connections to the four-pin header (which is present instead of the Molex connector), so my guess is that the original connector was removed by a user. The additional write-protect switch, however, is a *very* professional installation. > Could it be that his SA400 is an aftermarket drive for > Apple (or something else), where the Shugart board was replaced by > something weirder? Possible. The drive came from a home-built enclosure which also contained a home-made PSU and ZX81-compatible keyboard (no ZX81 board, though :<( ) Also, since all of my other systems use 40-track drives, I doubt I'll ever have any use for this thing. Are they still commonly available? If not, I may hang on to it "just in case." Otherwise, it's probably off to eBay unless someone on this list wants it and is willing to pay postage. Later -- Glen 0/0

23 years, 5 months

Tales of VCF 5.0?

by frustum＠pacbell.net

At 06:09 PM 10/28/02 -0800, dwight elvey wrote: >Hi > Actually, I was bummed. ... > I had a Poly-88 setup but I think only one in 10 noticed >and even then, I think only 2 in those ten knew what it was. I spotted it, and I knew what it was. But how could you tell that? Probably other people were the same. > Of course, my display was all about tape recovery and not >the Poly-88. I don't think, maybe, 5 people all together >realized that. That, I didn't spot. I noticed the waveforms on the wall, but amidst the din (auditory and visual) it didn't register. I wish I had noticed, though, since it is an area I want to spend some time working on one of these years. Rather than letting it be lost to the moment, is there any chance of you writing up your work and putting it online somewhere (even posting it to this list and letting it get archived would work). I've read a half dozen very terse summaries of emulators and such that do this, but most work only on really clean tapes. They simply do some DC correction, perhaps a bit of filtering, and then time zero crossings and decode from there. Have you done something more sophisticated than this? Some of the Sol tapes I've looked at are way too corrupted for such a simple technique to work. There are a lot of communication theory ideas that could be applied to the problem directly; in addition, the file format is going to have some known structure that could be used to help train the receiver and disambiguate some cases. I'd be interested to hear more. ----- Jim Battle == frustum(a)pacbell.net

23 years, 5 months

Destroying a SX-64.. :-(

by bpope＠wordstock.com

This is very sick. http://slashdot.org/articles/02/10/28/2137208.shtml?tid=137 This person modified a SX-64 to contain a 1.2 Ghz P3. Bryan

23 years, 5 months

Pinouts schema for DEC PRO console on printer port

by franco.tassone＠inwind.it

Hi all, I've heard of the possibility to have a serial console connected to the printer port of the DEC Professional series computers, and it is what I'd ike to have. Do you have any pointers to get it solved, or any hints ? The pinouts schema could be the best for me. Your help will be greatly appreciated. Franco

23 years, 5 months

Drives? (was: RE: Tales of VCF 5.0?)

by uban＠ubanproductions.com

At 04:28 AM 10/29/2002 -0600, you wrote: >On Mon, 28 Oct 2002, Erik S. Klein wrote: > > > http://www.vintage-computer.com/images/VCF5/ImageMap2.htm > >http://www.vintage-computer.com/images/VCF5/Tony%20Cole%20Vendor.jpg >http://www.vintage-computer.com/images/VCF5/MemoryBillia2.jpg > >Does anyone recognize the drive with the numeric pad and LCD on the far >right of the above two photos? It looks nearly identical to the 4 drives >in my SGI 210S, and I'm still not exactly sure what type they are. > >-Toth It was labeled with a Seagate brand, but I think that when I last used one like it it was a CDC brand drive, perhaps a Sabre. --tom

23 years, 5 months

Fw: Free VAX

by rschaefe＠gcfn.org

----- Original Message ----- From: "dneprcomp" <dneprcomp(a)rmortho.com> Newsgroups: comp.os.vms Sent: Monday, October 28, 2002 7:20 PM Subject: Free VAX > The following items are free: > 2 MicroVax II model DH-63003-E2 TK70 OS VAX IVMS ver. 1,7 > Terminal VT 220 > Tape Backup 8 mm > Plotter Bruning model ZETA 8A. > Location: Los Angeles > If interested please call Yakov at 818-704-8198 > >

23 years, 5 months

IBM 5150 brings $910 on EBAY

by gmphillips＠earthlink.net

31 bidders. 4 willing to pay over $700. Are these machines in good condition really that rare? http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2062770257

23 years, 5 months

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