test-drb

test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

101090 discussions

by dquebbeman＠acm.org

> Jonathan Engdahl wrote: > > Do you mean that kid's game with the blinking lights that you > > had to memorize and push the buttons in the same order? I just > > this evening tossed one. I found it in the attic in many pieces. > > The circuit board looked intact. Shall I go dive for it? > > Those were neat. I had one a few years after they came out. My mother > bought it at a garage sale. I think it is long gone now. I liked it a > lot. I can hear it now in my head :-) Maybe if I would have played > itmore, I would have a better memory now :-( Let's give the original poster a break, I think he was serious. John and Chad, just in case you *weren't* being tongue-in-cheek, that's not the Simon he was talking about... -dq -Douglas Hurst Quebbeman (DougQ at ixnayamspayIgLou.com) [Call me "Doug"] Surgically excise the pig-latin from my e-mail address in order to reply "The large print giveth, and the small print taketh away." -Tom Waits

23 years, 3 months

HP9845B: Schematics and Infomation how to repair

by asholz＠topinform.com

Dear ClassicComper's. I've a HP9845b, which run for a long time, but now it's dead. I think, it's caused by the powersupply, because there are no voltages to be measured at its testpoints. Does someony has experiences in reparing this powersupply, or much better some schematics. Greetings from Germany Andreas

23 years, 3 months

TTL computing

by csmith＠amdocs.com

> -----Original Message----- > From: r. 'bear' stricklin [mailto:red@bears.org] > Maybe I missed something important, but rather than installing blown > fuses, couldn't you just.. have an empty socket? Indeed -- or you could just have some switches, but in order to actually "program" the thing with a separate device, fuses are the (probably) easiest way, and the most true to life. Chris Christopher Smith, Perl Developer Amdocs - Champaign, IL /usr/bin/perl -e ' print((~"\x95\xc4\xe3"^"Just Another Perl Hacker.")."\x08!\n"); '

23 years, 3 months

VAX 11/750 Power

by meltie＠myrealbox.com

Hello all, I would be extremely grateful if those of you with VAX 11/750s out there could either take pictures or draw diagrams of how the PSU blocks are connected in this wonderful system. I have (finally) received my first piece of Big Iron but it has death of the 2.5v PSU, and all the PSU bricks were removed and handed to me before I could note their positions. Also, if any of you have a terminal going spare (vt or hardcopy, either ist gut) then shout out and we can talk... Manifest -------- VAX 11/750 RA60 with two media RA80 Original DEC cardboard software box full of dusty DECTapes including all VMS install tapes. CPU Printset ~1 Metric Ton of dust and decayed foam Thanks Alex

23 years, 3 months

cartridges

by md10＠wanadoo.fr

Skipped content of type multipart/alternative

23 years, 3 months

TTL computing

by csmith＠amdocs.com

> -----Original Message----- > From: Roger Merchberger [mailto:zmerch@30below.com] > If you actually put sockets on the board and insert the fuses > into that, > you could simulate an EPROM/Flash[like] part. ;-) It'd take a while to > "erase & re-write", but hey... ;-) Exactly what I wanted to do. I thought about setting them flat against a board and using the small (half-inch long) "glass tube" inline fuses. If I can get those to smoke the glass dramatically enough when they blow, it would be easy to replace the blown parts with fresh fuses for a new program. Not to mention that it may be fun to be able to re-arrange the fuses ;) Chris Christopher Smith, Perl Developer Amdocs - Champaign, IL /usr/bin/perl -e ' print((~"\x95\xc4\xe3"^"Just Another Perl Hacker.")."\x08!\n"); '

23 years, 3 months

Half on, half off -- New CD-R drive and 512-byte blocks

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

I've used a plextor plexwriter, toshiba 2x, some noname ($29.95 new!) scsi successfully. The cdrom,(hobbiest) does however not boot on any of them, though the standalone backup does and that is used to copy the images to a small RZ25 for actual running. Allison -----Original Message----- From: Alexander Schreiber <als(a)thangorodrim.de> To: classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org <classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org> Date: Wednesday, April 10, 2002 10:17 PM Subject: Re: Half on, half off -- New CD-R drive and 512-byte blocks >On Tue, Apr 09, 2002 at 04:27:50PM -0500, Dan Wright wrote: >> I do know, from experience, that any SCSI Plextor CDROM/CD-R/CD-RW will boot >> basically anything -- Sparc, SGI, RS/6000, HP,.... I've tried plextors of >> varying ages (old 8plex caddy-loader up to a 12/4/32 CD-RW that's about 1 year >> old) and they all work great... > >In this case, I've got bad news or you. You might be out of luck trying >this with a VAXstation 3100. My VAXstation 3100 started to boot the VMS 7.1 >install CD, but barfed halfway through loading the kernel. I was not >happy with either the 4x, the 8x or the 12 SCSI Plextor, nor with the >Toshiba drive (all set to 512 byte/sector). Ripping a DEC RRD42 out of >one of my DECstations finally did the trick. Seems like this machines >are rather ... touchy about what they boot from. > >Regards, > Alex. >-- >We're gonna be body guards for teen rock-stars. Wouldn't the cause of freedom >be better served if we killed them instead? > -- Schlock from the ''Schlock Mercenary'' comic strip >

23 years, 3 months

Half on, half off -- New CD-R drive and 512-byte blocks

by csmith＠amdocs.com

Hi everybody. This isn't strictly on topic, but I think the intent of the question makes it close enough. I just bought a new CD-RW drive -- a Sony CRX145s -- and am curious about whether it may read the 512-byte blocks necessary for using it as a backup boot device on my VAXen, Sparc, SGI, etc. Does anyone know whether this, or just for information, some other CD-RW unit, will do such a thing? Note that I do know that discs are written in 2048 byte blocks, and the answer won't affect its performance in writing disks on these systems. I am also aware that doing this for the long term may needlessly shorten the life of the drive. As I said above, it is more for curiosity, and eventually I would like to know that in case my RRD42 dies, I have a backup. :) Chris Christopher Smith, Perl Developer Amdocs - Champaign, IL /usr/bin/perl -e ' print((~"\x95\xc4\xe3"^"Just Another Perl Hacker.")."\x08!\n"); '

23 years, 3 months

TTL computing

by IVIE＠cc.usu.edu

Thilo Schmidt wrote: > The Address of the ROM is the current-state (lets say the line-number > of the programm). Every line of Code consists only of the "outputs" and > one or more "next states". The "inputs" select which "line" comes > next: Either the next "line" of Code (that's what the counter is for), > or one of the "next states". I made a mistake there, the Microcoded Machine > has to look like that: > > |---|---> OUT > address | R |---> > |-->| O |---> |--[Counter] > | | M |----| | > | |___| \MUX/<--- IN > | | > |-[StateReg]<-- Actually, there are a grundle of ways to do this. Here's a scheme that doesn't require a counter, but requires wider microcode: > |---|---> OUT > address | R |---> > |-->| O |---> > | | M |------| > | | |----| | > | |___| \MUX/<--- IN > | | > |-[StateReg]<-- In this case, each microcode word contains two addresses: one for when the input is true and one for when the input is false. If you want to go to the "next" word, the appropriate field in the microcode contains the current address +1. And then there's: > |---|---> OUT > IN ---->| |---> > address | R |---> > |-->| O |---> > | | M |-----| > | |___| | > | | > |-[StateReg]<-- This does away with the mux by using the input as one of the address bits. It doesn't get more simple than this. You used to be able to get registered EPROMs; using those, the state and output registers are built into the EPROM and all you have to do is wire it up. And write a grundle of microcode, of course... The Firefox QBUS Adapter was implemented this way. Some of the outputs ran back around to control a mux to select which input was being examined by the microcode for a given state. Hmm, I'm going to have to turn your drawing sideways, I think: > INPUTS > ||| > ||| > VVV > +----------->\MUX/ > |+-------+ | > || | | > || V V > || +--------------+ > || | ROM | > || +--------------+ > || | ||| > || V VVV > || [State and Output reg] > || | ||| > |+--------+ ||| > +----------------+|| > || > VV > OUTPUTS Since this was done using registered PROMs, the only parts are ROMs and the mux. And a synchro register for inputs; I don't recall whether I synchronized the inputs before or after the mux. Am I the only person who sees registered SRAMs intended for cache and things "Hey! A huge microcode store that can run really fast!"? Some of them even have JTAG inputs you could use to load the microcode. Fundamentally, a state machine consists of inputs, outputs, a state register, and a next state decoder. A microcoded system just uses a ROM for the next state decoder. Roger Ivie ivie(a)cc.usu.edu

23 years, 3 months

New MV-II boots! And, of course, Questions....

by doc＠mdrconsult.com

I'm quite tickled. Also inordinately proud of myself (for figuring out the BA23's slightly different connections & stuff and not letting loose any Magic Smoke). First thing: Thanks, Terry! I really like it. Terry's rackmount MicroVAX II has been condensed into a single BA23. For the nonce, I'm running a single RD54 and a TK50 on their respective controllers, and a DELQA ethernet board. The KA655-A with 32M is a LOT faster than the KA630 with 13M. The TK50 is slow as ever.... I was hoping the BA23 would be quieter than the BA123. It's not. Questions: Does the KA655 CPU make this a MV-3800, a MV-III, or a MV-II with a KA655? Terry, looks like you were right: The memory board, which is a DataRAM 63016 C0. Listed online as a 16M board some places and 32M others. The system sees it as 2 16M boards. Is this kosher? The 3-position CPU-RAM ribbon cable is plugged at one end and at the middle connector. Does it matter? I'd _really_ like to run the RX50 instead of the TK50. Unfortunately, I don't have a cable. Can a PC floppy cable be modified to work? It looks like, from reading past posts, connecting on the "B" connector - i.e. no twist - ought to do the trick. Not quite brave enough to just plug it in and see. Last (not really applicable in the BA23), I see references to terminating the last RD5x on an RQDX3. Is that termination effected at the distribution board (M9058 in the BA123) or on the drive? Drive 1 and Drive 2 don't look any different. Which may be why they're, um, terminally off-line. Doc P.S. - I've always wanted to say "For the nonce"....

23 years, 3 months

VAX 11/750 Power

by Antonio.Carlini＠riverstonenet.com

>Hello all, I would be extremely grateful if those of you with VAX >11/750s out there could either take pictures or draw diagrams of how the >PSU blocks are connected in this wonderful system. You have the printsets. You'll find that in addition to the schematics, they also include (almost) enough information to build the PSU from scratch. If you have The Installation Manual (there are several, two of which you can find at http://208.190.133.204/decimages/moremanuals.htm ... except it's still down...) specifically EK-SI75F-IN-001 has some pictures on pp1-18, 2-1 The printset is probably a better guide! >I have (finally) received my first piece of Big Iron but it has death of >the 2.5v PSU, and all the PSU bricks were removed and handed to me >before I could note their positions. Oddly enough, the last one I saw had exactly the same problem. The 2.5V PSU was not regulating properly. >Also, if any of you have a terminal >going spare (vt or hardcopy, either >ist gut) then shout out and we can talk... I don't have one spare, but people who do might want you to pin down your location a little ... Antonio

23 years, 3 months

Decitek 262 info wanted...

by jos.mar＠bluewin.ch

I obtained a cheap (10 USD) Decitek papertape reader from Ebay. ( A tip for those who believe that to be impossible : try .de instead of .com ) However it has a seemingly exploded IC on it : IC "I" below R5 and R4, has had it top half blown off..... Anybody with a similar reader could look up what kind of IC it was ? And if anyone has the pinning for this reader handy... I just saw that Decitek still exists. Do they react kindly to hobbyists ? Jos Dreesen

23 years, 3 months

TTL computing

by ajp166＠bellatlantic.net

some items sorta conspired to drive cpus to multiples of 8bits. ASCII chars width of data paths internal to MOS cpus early on. byte wide memories, especially rom/prom/eprom Personally I like either 18 ot 24 bits and have thought that the PDP-8 with the right side (address portion) of the word stretched to 18 bits or better yet 24 would be a nice machine. 24bits is majik as it's a multiple of 8. PDP-8 addressing as 24bit 524288 word page, current and also there is page 0 addressing! A field would be 16MB. EMA would not be needed. Allison -----Original Message----- From: Ben Franchuk <bfranchuk(a)jetnet.ab.ca> To: classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org <classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org> Date: Wednesday, April 10, 2002 11:21 AM Subject: Re: TTL computing >Richard Erlacher wrote: > >> 12-bit CPU's out there ??? Everybody knows that 12-bitters haven't existed >> since the '70's! After all, they stop existing on the day the last one is >> shipped. The device manufacturers stop considering a market as viable once >> the potential for 100K pieces per week per manufacturer is no longer there. > >True about manufacturing, but I wish one had more choice with computer >hardware/software for the PC user.I think DEC sold the PDP-8 until about >1990. Since I can't find a 12/24 bit CPU that I like I am building my >own. A 12/24 bit cpu chip could have came out around 1980 with the >8086/6800. Part of the challenge in the cpu design I am doing in FPGA is >to have it emulate (for the most part) a fictional 12/24 bit cpu in a 40 >pin dip.The last thing I added was a 8 bit refresh counter for dynamic >memory and a single channel DMA for a floppy. Running at 4.9152 Mhz ( >800 ns memory access, 512Kb of ram ) I hope the Squash the XT market in >1983!. :) > >-- >Ben Franchuk - Dawn * 12/24 bit cpu * >www.jetnet.ab.ca/users/bfranchuk/index.html >

23 years, 3 months

Twinax (was Re: Last run at the local Uni Surplus for a while ...)

by csmith＠amdocs.com

> -----Original Message----- > From: Ethan Dicks [mailto:erd_6502@yahoo.com] > I do happen to have some twinax baluns from a former tenant of a > shop that my former employer took over. They previous guys > had an AS/400 > and terminals on peoples' desks. The best computer in the place was a > 486 tower, in 2000! They were in the forklift business - Wait -- if I understand you properly, they had an AS/400, but the best computer was a 486? I'm missing something here, and I'm certain to be near enlightenment when I figure it out... Chris Christopher Smith, Perl Developer Amdocs - Champaign, IL /usr/bin/perl -e ' print((~"\x95\xc4\xe3"^"Just Another Perl Hacker.")."\x08!\n"); '

23 years, 3 months

HD drives and the PCjr

by spectre＠stockholm.ptloma.edu

I installed a PC HD 5.25" floppy in my long-suffering PCjr by replacing the old IBM drive. It all seems to work on DD disks, but not HD disks. Do I need to upgrade something else? (being somewhat ignorant on old PCs). PCjr with 128K RAM expansion, floppy card, parallel port module, Cartridge BASIC running IBM PC DOS 2.1. -- ----------------------------- personal page: http://www.armory.com/~spectre/ -- Cameron Kaiser, Point Loma Nazarene University * ckaiser(a)stockholm.ptloma.edu -- This signature is free of dihydrogen monoxide! Ban it now! www.dhmo.org ----

23 years, 3 months

TTL computing

by csmith＠amdocs.com

> -----Original Message----- > From: Fred Cisin (XenoSoft) [mailto:cisin@xenosoft.com] > Since the it is for illustration, rather than for significant > real usage, > 16 bits should be plenty to show how it works. > Glass fuses don't blacken unless you really whack them with a lot of > current, and can sometimes be very hard to even see visually > whether they > are blown. > Ceramic fuses, such as what VW used to use would be the easiest to > visually check which ones are blown, but it's hard to find > them in smaller > sizes than 8 amps. > Would you be programming in place, or "cheating" and assembly the unit > with fuses that are already blown? Ideally programming in place, with a home-made "programmer" -- probably it would be mostly switches, etc, with no logic in it... very simple design. At least that was the idea. Chris Christopher Smith, Perl Developer Amdocs - Champaign, IL /usr/bin/perl -e ' print((~"\x95\xc4\xe3"^"Just Another Perl Hacker.")."\x08!\n"); '

23 years, 3 months

Does anyone have a live VT52?

by celigne＠celigne.freeserve.co.uk

Does anyone have a live VT52 to hand? I'm working on a patch for xterm, and I have a query about its behaviour that could be answered by having someone type five characters in local mode and reporting the results. Unfortunately my VT52 is dead and I haven't spent the time to discover why, yet. I promise that these five characters won't kill yours!

23 years, 3 months

An example of a computer recycling / resale shop

by jfoust＠threedee.com

This one is in Madison, Wisconsin. It looks like they're offering businesses 50% of the selling price on their old stuff: http://www.cascade-assets.com/ And at their spring cleaning round-up, they charge $5 per monitor. - John

23 years, 3 months

Does anyone have a live VT52?

by Antonio.Carlini＠riverstonenet.com

>Ooh, you tease! Any chance of that >document escaping altogether? Assuming it's still there, and that you get Boundless and/or COMPAQ (and/or HP if you don't get your skates on ...) to OK it, then there should be no problem :-) >They are online, but the schematics don't list the contents of the ROM I thought you had a VT52 - so just dump the ROM. Actually, dump the ROM anyway - it must be past its sell-by date by now! >Of course, deliberate decisions are made about how faithful a later >model would be when emulating an earlier one. After all, a VT220 in >VT100 mode doesn't emulate a VT100; it emulates a VT102 (or VT100 plus >Level 2 Editing Extension, if you like). Yes - and I doubt that the VT52 emulator makes *any* attempt at emulating the VT52 quirks. In fact, it's quite possible that noone knew all the VT52 quirks and so the VSRM may have required only adherence to the published VT52 information (which admittedly may have had internal-use-only enhancements). When I wrote that VT102 emulator, way back when, the customer for whom we were implementing it had requested VT103 emulation on the basis that it was a higher number than VT102 and so must be better. I never saw one in real life but the manual documented it as a VT100 + LSI bus (no, I did not implement the LSI bus ...). I suppose I should just count myslef lucky that they didn't happen to know about the VT105 or VT125 or VT131/VT132! Antonio

23 years, 3 months

Twinax (was Re: Last run at the local Uni Surplus for a while...)

by mcguire＠neurotica.com

On April 10, Geoff Roberts wrote: > I despair of ever getting my AS400 working. I have the machine, I have the > necessary adapter in the machine, I have terminals, I have twinax. > I don't have the 25 pin d to 8x twinax connector gizmo (I can supply an IBM > part no). I've had a few offered to me, but they all want very serious > money for it. Considering I paid $25AU for the lot I'm not that interested > in shelling out a couple of hundred for the terminal interface box and > cable. Is constructing the adapter an option? Twinax connectors can be had readily, at least on this side of the ocean. I actually have one of the adapter boxes you're talking about (for my AS/400); I'd be happy to crack it open and investigate its innards for you. -Dave -- Dave McGuire "Anybody who is willing to EAT YOU probably isn't St. Petersburg, FL such a good person to be hanging out with." -Sridhar

23 years, 3 months

ADM-3A: choose your colour?

by csmith＠amdocs.com

> -----Original Message----- > From: Fred Cisin (XenoSoft) [mailto:cisin@xenosoft.com] > Hmmm. Is the iMac available in ADM3a blue? and cream? I'm glad somebody else noticed this. Personally, I have my ADM-5 plugged into a VAXStation 2000 and a sign that says "iVAX" on it. Chris Christopher Smith, Perl Developer Amdocs - Champaign, IL /usr/bin/perl -e ' print((~"\x95\xc4\xe3"^"Just Another Perl Hacker.")."\x08!\n"); '

23 years, 3 months

Native CP/M

by cpg＠aladdin.de

Hi, On 04/09/2002 09:09:48 PM ZE2 "Hans Franke" wrote: >As a nice give away you also get an 8080 CPU for free. There >have been two solutions AFAIR. One was booting MS-DOS and >starting a bootloader for CP/M80 (a), the other was a CP/M >disguise for MS-DOS (b). > >The Bootloader programm loaded an 8080 BIOS which supported >hard MS-DOS Hard disks into memory, did setup the memory >tables for the 8080 and switched into 8080 mode to boot CP/M >from HD. There where several problems regarding disk storage, >so the system worked only reliable from floppy disks. I heared >also about a Version which booted from almost ordinary CP/M >floppies. All switching code fitted into the PC boot sector. >I never had this version, and I didn't play a lot with the >hard disk version, but I used the other programm (b) for >several years. > >You could start CP/M programms right from the MS-DOS command >line, or switch into CP/M command line. The Programm itself >replaced CP/M and redirected all CP/M functions to MS-DOS >functions - thanks to the similarities :) There where even >'utilities' to switch DOS pathes wihile in CP/M, etc. pp. >The performance was quite acceptable (faster than a 8080 at >5 MHz), and you could use almost all PC Hardware. > >I used this programm to run CP/M applications for several >years under MS-DOS - I never had the time to redo them for >the PC. I even kept the XT some time as CP/M machine when >I already had an 386. The machine was also equipped with a >screamer add on board, so the CPU was running most of the >time at 8 MHz. I have a V20 PC-XT in working order. Do you still have those tools. I'd like to try out CP/M on it. IIRC, the German c't magazine once had such tools. Back then I already had this V20 PC-XT, but didn't want to mess with CP/M. After just having made the transition from C64 to PC (MS-DOS), CP/M was "old stuff" back then :-) regards, chris

23 years, 3 months

Half on, half off -- New CD-R drive and 512-byte blocks

by csmith＠amdocs.com

> -----Original Message----- > From: Richard Erlacher [mailto:edick@idcomm.com] > You may have the answer, here, in that IF it's a SCSI device > (which it is) and > IF it's capable of behaving as a reader (which it is) then > it's up to the SCSI > subsystem to move the data into the system. IF the device, > in whatever mode > it "comes up" in is able to read the SCSI CD, then it should > be no different > than any other CD drive, irrespective of the ability to write > the device. For what it's worth, I tried on a MicroVAX 3100 last night, but it didn't work too well. (Just set there, basically) I might try a few other things. Doc mentioned he had trouble booting VMS with some drives that would (somehow) otherwise work, so I'll probably try the SPARC (Really, would you consider running anything other than VMS on a VAX? :) Chris Christopher Smith, Perl Developer Amdocs - Champaign, IL /usr/bin/perl -e ' print((~"\x95\xc4\xe3"^"Just Another Perl Hacker.")."\x08!\n"); '

23 years, 3 months

Last run at the local Uni Surplus for a while...

by csmith＠amdocs.com

> -----Original Message----- > From: Roger Merchberger [mailto:zmerch@30below.com] > AFAIK, you'll need to wait for a broken lap... the AS/400 > twinax runs at > 1.5Mbit and I don't think that changes at all; besides, I That's pretty impressive for a console connection... > thought that the > AS/400 ran EBCDIC, not ASCII, which could make for some > interesting looking > login screens... ;-) You could be right there, but it's a very nice terminal. :) I might be willing to write an EBCDICGetty for it, or something. Chris Christopher Smith, Perl Developer Amdocs - Champaign, IL /usr/bin/perl -e ' print((~"\x95\xc4\xe3"^"Just Another Perl Hacker.")."\x08!\n"); '

23 years, 3 months

classiccmp-digest V1 #915

by alan.pearson＠cramer.com

> I actually would be very suprised if you could strip things > down enough to have a 'usable' system with the core 3.3 Developer > installed in under 100MB. Afterall, that would have to include the > swapfile as well as user space for whatever project you were working > on. I don't have a lot of extra stuff installed on mine, mainly just > CAPer, and the full NS 3.3 User and Developer isntalled takes nearly > 300MB. It's early days for me on NeXTs, so I don't know a whole lot about the development environment yet :-) Looking at the developer docs on channelu I got thinking that since the libraries are already there all I *really* need to start hacking about are the usual cc/ld/gdb tools (I could live without make, ar, nm etc) and the includes for the APIs. In theory I should be able to make all of these myself - I've got lots of versions of the GNU tools source lying around, it should be easy to build 68k versions of the ones I need, and I could cobble the includes together on an "as needed" basis using the developer docs and example code on the net as a starting point. Painful, but - here's the question - possible? Al.

23 years, 3 months

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test-drb