test-drb

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101090 discussions

Off-topic informational anti-spam anecdotal

by maxeskin＠hotmail.com

I don't know how much truth there is in those descriptions of various boxes, but there a very frequent warnings on messing with line voltage because of what "hackers" call "gestapo". >That's what's funny about the phone companies in the UK versus those in >the US. I could plug my phone line into a 240v outlet and the phone >company couldn't do a damn thing about it. > >Sam Alternate e-mail: dastar(a)siconic.com >------------------------------------------------------------------------------- >Ever onward. > > September 26 & 27...Vintage Computer Festival 2 > See http://www.siconic.com/vcf for details! > [Last web page update: 07/05/98] > > ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

27 years, 11 months

Off-topic informational anti-spam anecdotal

by maxeskin＠hotmail.com

>they couldn't charge you on anything if they found out you were physically >messing with the line. Couldn't they cancel your service if they felt that their station equipment was at risk of damage? ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

27 years, 11 months

Rebuilding Mac Portable batteries

by maxeskin＠hotmail.com

You can order them with equivalent ease from Radio Shack, for about $7.75. It might end up being cheaper, since RS won't charge you shipping and handling. Of course, they might be getting it from the same source as you. > Now all I need is the batteries... > >Rich Cini/WUGNET <nospam_rcini(a)msn.com> > - ClubWin! Charter Member > - MCP Windows 95/Windows Networking > - Preserver of "classic" computers ><<<< ========== reply separator ========== >>>>> > > > > ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

27 years, 11 months

More finds

by jrkeys＠concentric.net

Picked a few things this week for the museum , so pleas do not ask me about selling them. If I ever get month off to check what all I have in storage I will be unloading all extras. The finds: 1) Franklin ACE2100 cpu and monitor (mono) not tested yet both were free; 2) Franklin ACE2200 cpu, monitor (mono), keyboard, Franklin joystick, and all cables, it also was free; 3) EXELTELII was a trade; 4) new IOMEGA cleaning kit for 8" media $1 at Goodwill; 5) OPENDOC video from Apple; 6) TG Products chip tester; 7)Super Expander cartridge for the C64 60 cents at Thrift; 8)Super Graphix jr by XETEC for the Commodore cost $1.60; 9)IQSuperPC Trivia Blitz cartridge A cost $1.80; 10)AppleColor RGB monitor 80 cents at thrift not tested yet; 11)some QX-10 items for free; 12) about 15 various books. That's been it so far I will be going out later today to the thrift's about 45 miles from my home and working my way stopping at any place looking interesting. Keep computing John

27 years, 11 months

FW: Student asking for old DEC equipment

by kyrrin＠jps.net

If anyone can help this fellow out, please contact him directly. -=-=- <snip> -=-=- On Fri, 17 Jul 1998 16:07:29 -0400, in comp.sys.dec you wrote: >>Hello everyone in DEC land. >> >> I'm a student at Eastern Connecticut State University and was wondering >>if someone out there had an old DEC workstation that they were going to >>throw out and would be willing to donate. I'd be willing to travel >>through most of New England to fetch it (CT,MA,RI,Southern VT, Part of >>NY/NJ). It would have a loving and useful home next to my SparcStation >>LX and I could finally dispose of my PC. >> >>Donald Lewis La Barre III >>iggy(a)megahits.com -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Bruce Lane, Sysop, The Dragon's Cave (Fido 1:343/272) http://table.jps.net/~kyrrin -- also kyrrin [A-t] Jps {D=o=t} Net Spam is bad. Spam is theft of service. Spam wastes resources. Don't spam, period. I am a WASHINGTON STATE resident. Spam charged $500.00 per incident per Chapter 19 RCW.

27 years, 11 months

Thanks to the list...

by ddameron＠earthlink.net

Hi Doug and all, At 05:19 PM 7/17/98 -0500, you wrote: >> 5) Check the +8, +/-16, and GND pins on the bus connectors before >> powering up, make sure nothing's shorted. > >I found the power supply wasn't very well regulated, so you might see >higher voltages without a load. Which pins on the S-100 bus correspond to >those volatages? I just checked the mobo terminals, one of which was >unlabeled. Pins 1-50 on front, 51-100 on rear. Pin 1, 51 +8 Volts. Leftmost from the front, front and back. Unregulated (just filtered rectified DC from the power transformer) for the +5 volt regulators. (Usually very easy to trace or test) Pin 2, +16 Volts, unregulated. Pin 52, -16 Volts, unregulated. In my system I put fuses in these lines. Make sure the filter capacitors have bleeder resistors attached, so they will discharge without a load. Otherwise you might have problems when plugging in a card later :-(. Pin 50, 100 Ground. There were other ground lines on later cards, which you may have to check for when you start to mix cards, such as pins 20, 70, which were Unprotect, Protect in the early S-100 systems. -Dave

27 years, 11 months

Q-bus boards I need ID of...

by cfandt＠servtech.com

There are actually three boards I need to ID, the third is possibly a tape controller. Here's the rundown: #1 A Q-bus dual width board made by DTC. Has a 50-pin header next to a single ejector handle. All TTL chips, no LSI or CMOS devices. Two 8-section DIP switches on board. Only markings are a FAB, ASSY, REV and S/N numbers. The ASSY number is 007-00002. Could this be a Q-bus SCSI board (I hope, I hope, I hope)? But there's no CPU or ASIC, etc. onboard to handle DMA, SCSI device protocoll, etc. :( An appropriate driver in conjunction with the OS would have to do this. #2 A Q-bus quad width board of unknown manufacture. Two 50-pin headers at handle-edge of board. A marking on the component side says it's a "Q BUS/LEXID INT." with a number 77D609871P1 under it. A number stamped on the backside is "GE77D609871G1" with "SER NO- 44" under it. Those part numbers look like old GE part numbers. Did General Electric make any equipment for the DEC world? #3 This is what I feel is an Archive tape controller. It has "ARCHIVE CORP. Copyright 1983" silk screened onto the component side. No other numbers on the silk screen, dang it. It is 5.5" x 7.75" with a 50-pin edge connector (marked "J1") on one 5.5" end and a 50-pin header (marked "J3") at the other end. "J2" is a 4-pin recepticle which is the same as the power connector on a 5.25" floppy or hard drive and is on the edge connector-end of the board. The EPROM label has 80182-010 on it. Has an 8031 microcontroller chip, an 8155 and an Archive LCC ASIC plus a bunch of TTL and one small CMOS RAM chip (Mitsubishi M5M2167P-70). Other numbers found on the board seem to be component part numbers however there is a hand-written number on the solder side which is 80158-013/A. Could this be an important identifying number? I want to try to identify these boards to see if theyt are useable in the systems I'm keeping, especially item #1. Thanks for the help. --Chris -- -- Christian Fandt, Electronic/Electrical Historian Jamestown, NY USA Member of Antique Wireless Association URL: http://www.ggw.org/freenet/a/awa/

27 years, 11 months

DIGI-COMP 1 Assembly Instructions now available

by tomsaddressformaillists＠altavista.net

Due to popular demand, I have finally gotten around to adding the DIGI-COMP 1 Assembly Instructions to the collection of other scanned DIGI-COMP 1 manual pages at http://galena.tjs.org/digicomp/ . They are all 300 DPI grayscale images - in other words, huge! The parts list alone (Page 1) should be immensely helpful for those wishing to create their own DIGI-COMP. Thanks to everyone who e-mailed me over the past few days! Tom -- This account is used so mailing lists don't clutter up Tom's real account. If you really want to talk to Tom, use tom(at)galena.tjs.org

27 years, 11 months

sources

by icyblackhand＠hotmail.com

I live in Union County NJ. Are there any good old computer sources around here??? Mike ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

27 years, 11 months

Rebuilding Mac Portable batteries

by rcini＠email.msn.com

After a little research, I figured out how to rebuild a MacPortable battery pack for about 1/3 the cost of buying one on the resale market (I've seen prices between $60 and $75 per battery). Anyway, the pack is rated at 6v/5ah, and contains three, 2v/5ah Gates Cyclon "X" cells. The X cells are two sizes above the conventional D battery. Gates no longer makes these batteries, having gotten out of the battery business. Hawker Energy Products (http://www.hepi.com) now makes these cells. These are available from Battery Specialties (1-800-854-5759) for $7.24 each ($21.72 total). Opening the battery case is also easy. The pack top is ultrasonically welded to the bottom case, but if you score the top plastic in the groove where it meets the bottom case, and then bang it with a small slot-headed screwdriver and a hammer, you can open it easily. Replace the internal cells with the new ones, observing all polarity markings and ensuring that all insulating plastic and foam pieces are replaced. You can then seal it with plastic welding cement such as X7. The only problem that I can see is creating the bars that join the cells. I'll probably use 12g copper wire in stead of bus bars. Now all I need is the batteries... Rich Cini/WUGNET <nospam_rcini(a)msn.com> - ClubWin! Charter Member - MCP Windows 95/Windows Networking - Preserver of "classic" computers <<<< ========== reply separator ========== >>>>>

27 years, 11 months

VC404 The Standard

by lwalker＠mail.interlog.com

One of my recent curbside finds is a machine put out by a Canadian company based in Waterloo Ont called Volker-Craig model vg-400. On the front it has a title VC404 The Standard. It has a k-b attached with ribbon cable which is about the size of a C64 with Function Pf1-12 buttons as well as a separate pod with APL,PAGE,FULL,LOCAL on the left vertically. There is a full qwerty alphabet and numerical pad as well as some specialized keys the most unusual of which is a key labelled "rub-out" and no down arrow. In the back it has a 25 pin RS232 connector, a BNC labelled "composite video" ,2 switches : one 3-pos.to configure parity the other "Transparent on off" It also has cutouts for parallell and serial (maybe a 9pin dshell for different modems) I haven't opened it up yet, and I must admit to doing what the impeccable Tony Duell would deem unforgiveable (sorry Tony, Couldn't he'p m'se'f) I plugged it in and tuned it on. It worked except for a stuck k-b which stopped printing to screen when I punched another key than local on the right-most pad. Obviosly a terminal of some sort, but the keypads are not what I would expect. My guess is it's a terminal for the deaf which hooked up to a service. But why all the other k-b functions. Any ideas ? ciao larry lwalker(a)interlog.com

27 years, 11 months

Thanks to the list...

by Anthony.Dellett＠Staples.com

Well... I finally found one, I ordered a used Imsai 8080 from an undisclosed place in CA (they had one on consignment) and they're shipping it to me here in Boston. Thanks to those on the list who gave me pointers on how to find one. Now I gotta order replacement switches for the front panel (Tony heads to his web browser) Tony

27 years, 11 months

Thanks to the list...

by allisonp＠world.std.com

< 2) DISCONNECT THE FRONT PANEL AC SWITCH!!! Put an on/off power switch < in the back, use a hole next to the fan (most back plates had one. < Don't run the AC power through the front panel. This one applies to Altair8800s BIGTIME and any others that has mains ac near logic. The designers that did that should be made to stand in a puddle and work on it! Allison

27 years, 11 months

Thanks to the list...

by peacock＠simconv.com

Not so easy, you would have to grind down the back spacers so the front panel stayed in alignment with the bus slot. Just adding the ring would push the panel card forward. Jack >Don't know how they are but I can guess - has anyone tried puuting the screws in, then the spacers, then putting a C or E ring on the screw as a keeper to make it a captive screw and spacer?

27 years, 11 months

Thanks to the list...

by peacock＠simconv.com

> Well... I finally found one, I ordered a used Imsai 8080 from an > undisclosed place in CA (they had one on consignment) and they're > shipping it to me here in Boston. Advice to a new IMSAI owner: 1) if you take the front panel off, tape the plastic sandwich with the film for the front panel logo so it doesn't come apart. Also, tape the allen head screws on so they don't come out. This is real handy when the time comes to reassemble. You will discover you need 4 hands to do it: one to hold panel, one to position screws, one to hold spacers in back, one to tighten screws. 2) DISCONNECT THE FRONT PANEL AC SWITCH!!! Put an on/off power switch in the back, use a hole next to the fan (most back plates had one. Don't run the AC power through the front panel. 3) If its been heavily used, chances are the bus connectors may be worn. Wiggle cards a bit when STOPed and see if status lights change. You might have to hunt for the least worn slots. 4) Look for purple plague. If it's old, the socketed IC pins or card edge connectors may have oxidation (usually purple or black discoloration). You may need to check the front panel for this if it's socketed. 5) Check the +8, +/-16, and GND pins on the bus connectors before powering up, make sure nothing's shorted. Jack Peacock Using IMSAIs since 1975

27 years, 11 months

Transputer documentation required

by JRichardson＠softwright.co.uk

Hi, So can any of you recommend a good book on how transputers work in a broad sense? I occasionally have the urge to take all the old PC system boards lying around and construct some form of transputer system - ok, so it's impractical, would be a lot of work, and wouldn't be of any benefit at all, but it would be an interesting exercise :) (so I'm crazy... just seems a shame that I've got various system boards lying around unused that can't be made into complete machines and are of no use to anyone else...) Jules >

27 years, 11 months

Thanks to the list...

by maxeskin＠hotmail.com

The reason is that if the cord runs through the whole IMSAI, a problem can cause a whole lot more damage. Also, if there is a problem with insulation, you are a lot more likely to electrocute yourself by touching a switch in the front than in the back. >Why not? I powered-up through the front panel, but with the >front-panel removed from the backplane. >-- Doug >Using IMSAIs since 1998 :-) > > ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

27 years, 11 months

Transputer documentation required

by JRichardson＠softwright.co.uk

>> So can any of you recommend a good book on how transputers work in a >> broad sense? I occasionally have the urge to take all the old PC system >> boards lying around and construct some form of transputer system - ok, >> so it's impractical, would be a lot of work, and wouldn't be of any >> benefit at all, but it would be an interesting exercise :) > >> A transputer is a specific type of processor from inmos (IIRC), so you you learn something new every day (or in my case, several hundred things ;) I always thought that transputer was a general term for any processing component in a parallel system. >> However, you could certainly build a parallel processing supercomputer >> from a bunch of old PCs. In fact, that was the original idea behind Cal >> Tech's Cosmic Cube which eventually led to Intel's hypercubes (such as the >> iPSC/1). hmm, wait for Java chips to really take off and write the whole lot in Java... now there's a plan... :*) > >> I wouldn't be surpised if somebody still has the Cosmic Cube code around, >> which would allow you to network some 8088-based machines to create a >> hypercube. I have an old Unix-based hypercube simulator from Intel which >> was based on the Cosmic Cube code, but I haven't looked into the copyright >> issues. parallel systems was a whole area that I never got too heavily in to at university and regretted it afterwards (and being a fairly specialist area it probably means you can get away from bad products produced by monopolising companies :^) I was tempted to ask how fast these 8088-based 'cubes were, but I suppose it's really hard to describe real-world performance of such systems without actually using them... Jules >

27 years, 11 months

Transputer documentation required

by maxeskin＠hotmail.com

What exactly is a transputer and how is it different from a normal CPU? >A transputer is a specific type of processor from inmos (IIRC), so you >wouldn't be able to easily make one from bits of other computers How many processors were in the Cosmic Cube? What kind of speeds did it reach? There was once a Circuit Cellar article on building a parallel processing computer out of a 286 and IIRC from 16 to 256 microcontrollers. All that could do was calculate the mandelbrot set, though, at speed reachable by an i486 (yes, I know that's not the point). >In fact, that was the original idea behind Cal >Tech's Cosmic Cube which eventually led to Intel's hypercubes (such as the >iPSC/1). > ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

27 years, 11 months

Valve robots, was How many computers?

by maxeskin＠hotmail.com

>>Doing it in transistors wouldn't be the same :-) I assume that with enough picking and matching it is possible, _in theory_, to build a similar circuit by replacing vacuum tubes with transistors, i.e. it's just a matter of taste in your case. >> >>-tony >> ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

27 years, 11 months

Off-topic informational anti-spam anecdotal

by Philip.Belben＠powertech.co.uk

Tony Duell quoted me as having written: >> battery - 12V was all that was left after voltage drop when the 30mA or > > Don't forget the few volts (probably 10V or so) dropped across the line relay > coils at the exchange to sense the off-hook condition. The system is > (obviously) designed so that a short on the line (no matter how short the > line is) won't cause damage. Applying 'battery' straight to a line wouldn't > allow for this. Good point. >> had to go the several miles to your house and back. May still be like >> that, come to think of it. > > AFAIK it is. The specs of 'phone lines rarely change, and there are plenty > of 706's and 746's still in use. Maybe even the odd 300-series. I still use a tone-dial 746 as one of my phones and a rotary dial 300-series wall mount version (don't know the number) as my other. The only two reasons I don't use my type 332 are 1) the induction coil is dead and 2) I have now borrowed microphone and speaker diaphragm to keep the wall mount one going. > Note for US types. UK 'phone wiring then was even stranger than it is Another note for US types. Type 330 and its derivatives = pre-war design of phone. My 332 actually has cloth insulation on internal wires, although the (much rarer) wall mounted one has plastic insulation. Late 1950s (?), much lighter design, PCB based, introduced, called 706. As components got smaller, the number and size of PCBs reduced, and the 746 has all the components, including the line drop compensator (resistors, diodes, light bulbs) on a single PCB. This design remained in use for around 20 years - PCB from phone circa 1970 interchangeable with PCB from phone circa 1990, the main difference being the size of the capacitors and (if you're lucky) the provision of a few extra screw terminals. (dial, bell, handset etc. all terminated with ring or fork (spade) terminals to screw onto these). I keep several type 746 phones in stock - people still occasionally want rotary dial phones... >> the 1960s (? What date is the 706 anyway ?), many UK phones had the >> "line drop compensator" on a plug-in module, presumably so you could >> swap it for one with different resistors... > > AFAIK the 'line drop compensator' had a constant-current barretter lamp > on it, and there was only one version. Certainly I've only ever seen one > version, and that's the one shown in all schematics. Alas my copy of I've only ever seen one version, but then again, I've never seen a schematic that actually gives the resistor values. > You could plug the 'line drop compensator in upside-down, whereupon it > was out of circuit and it bridged the appropriate terminals to use the > 'phone without it. I beleive you did this at the end of very long lines. Could be what I was thinking of. Philip.

27 years, 11 months

Valve robots, was How many computers?

by ddameron＠earthlink.net

Hi All, At 12:57 AM 7/17/98 +0100, you wrote: >> >> >> Has anyone built any of these? Does anyone have any extra copies? >> >Indeed it is. 1966 IIRC > >One day I might have a go at said robotic dog - assuming I can find >enough DF92s, etc. Doing it in transistors wouldn't be the same :-) > >-tony > Any kind of description would be appreciated! What did it do? How many tubes/valves, etc.? I looked up the U.S. equivalent tube for the DF92 valve and found the 1L4. A similar one, much more common is a 1U4, used in many portable radios before transistors. All battery filament (1.4 volts, 50mA) miniature pentodes.

27 years, 11 months

Cross-Assembly (was RE: Re-compiling old DOS)

by peacock＠simconv.com

>86-DOS (the base of MS-DOS 1.0) at least was developed on a DEC 2020 station and transfered via serial line to an INTEL ISIS system for writing Disks, or to the SCP 8086 S100 system for runntime tests. This seems to be another one of those cases where what was once a common software development technique is being lost to changing times. In the 70's, when micros first came out, it was common practice to buy a cross-assembler and simulator that ran on a mini or mainframe. Code was developed and maintained in a familiar environment, run through the simulator, testing as much as possible, then burned into EPROM and installed in the target system. IIRC the original IBM PC BIOS was built this way. When Intel came out with the 8086, they did offer an assembly language translator for 8080 to 8086 code. For the most part there is a 1:1 correspondence for 8080 instructions, except when it came to status flags, so the translator was relatively easy if you had a clean design. In practical terms it was less useful because all you got was the same program without taking advantage of the features unique to the 8086, like segments or 16-bit operations. Cross-assemblers were not unique to micros either. The lab where I worked in the 70's had several stripped down DG Nova 1200s used as embedded controllers. These machines had no console or disk, no operating system, just a paper tape reader bootstrap and a front panel plus some custom electronics. The development cycle was to write a program on the mainframe (CDC 6600), punch a paper tape (yes the CDC did have paper tape output!), load it into the Nova, sacrifice a candy bar to the computer gods, then hit the Run switch. Debugging was front panel lights/switches, several cases of Coke, vending machine candy, and the good ole Single-Step toggle. Jack Peacock

27 years, 11 months

How many computers?

by pete＠dunnington.u-net.com

On Jul 16, 19:28, Tony Duell wrote: > > devices play merry hell with Acorn's Tube code, which tends to see that > > something is there but can't deal with it. > > :-(. What do you do on a machine with a DNFS ROM, then if you add a Torch > Copro? It depends on the version of the Torch ROM. In some cases, changing the order of the MCP (for Torch Z80) and DNFS ROMs makes it usable. Usually I softload the MCP ROM, though, else it complains if the Torch Z80 isn't there. > > I suspect it used the same ROM as the Z80. A colleague used to have a > > Graduate, so I'll ask him today. > > Please do. I've got the Z-80 host ROM (and know of a few more if this one is > dead), but I don't have any other Torch ROMs. I forgot :-( I'll remember today, honest. I've got several versions of the MCP ROM, if you need one. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Dept. of Computer Science University of York

27 years, 11 months

Off-topic informational anti-spam anecdotal

by JRichardson＠softwright.co.uk

Ok, so given that there are people out there who know about phone systems, how would I build a device that sat on the phone line and could detect whether the line was in use or not - it's extremely annoying when you have a modem and voice phone on the same line and your voice call gets interrupted by a burst of modem noise! :) btw, this is for a UK system - I've seen curcuits to do exactly this job, but they never say whose phone systems their designed for, and I'd imagine that US and UK systems work with different setups.... cheers Jules (ok, so it's not on-topic - thought I'd ask though before this thread disappears :)

27 years, 11 months

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