test-drb

test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

101090 discussions

by allisonp＠world.std.com

< Does anybody have any information on a North Star Horizon? I may be < acquiring one of these soon but don't know much about it except that < it has wooden side panels and used to support a half-dozen terminals. < Is it a S-100 bus? Yes, I have one I built (and still use!) 20 years ago! Exteremely sold piece of s100 hardware. The top is wood too! Z80/S-100. Support for more than one user means it was running a timeshare version of NS* Basic. Allison

28 years, 1 month

Hello, new subscriber...

by jthiemann＠castleton.com

Hello, I just joined the list. While I don't have any specific questions _at_this_point_ :-) I have quite considerable experience with electronics and am willing to help out where I can (time permitting)... Of course I am always interested in software for my collection. A quick list: ZX81 with "real" keyboard, and of course 16k pack TRS-80 model 1 Vic 20 C64 SuperPET with 4040 drive Rainbow with 10Meg drive Northstar Advantage Bits'n'pieces of 2 PDP-11's (-23 and -73(?))- enough to have one working in debugger mode - no drives or anything MicroVax II with periphials, had it running Ultrix and NetBSD HP 75D and a few old HP calculators 128k Mac and Mac Plus The next two are my everyday use computers. Dubious if they count as "classics"... Amiga 3000 (AmigaOS 2.04, and NetBSD until the HD with the root partition went south...) SparcStation 1+ running NetBSD (NOTE: those are my home computers. Needless to say here at work I use the usual unspeakable... though occasionally I do reboot my computer into FreeBSD - but then I can't receive mail from the $%#& exchange server) I am hoping to aquire a (brand unknown) S100 Z80 box in the next few days... Joachim.

28 years, 1 month

Found a decent use for a PC...

by jfoust＠threedee.com

jpero(a)cgo.wave.ca wrote: >Early high end Dell series (I think!) had this dot matix that glows >yellow and rare motherboards that had POST display built in. Back in those days, they were known as PCs Ltd. I had a 286 like that. - John Jefferson Computer Museum <http://www.threedee.com/jcm>

28 years, 1 month

TRS-80 Questions

by lwalker＠mail.interlog.com

Here's a couple more for the TRS knowledgeable. >from a TRS novice. 1. Among the various TRS stuff I picked up recently was a TRS-80 monitor. It has a similiar connector coming out the front as the Model II. Was this the for the std. M.1 and M.3 ? 2. Included with a TRS CoCo 1 I picked up last summer was an adapter plugged into the cass.port. a label "TotalCommunications" on one side and "Telelearning" on the other. Into this was plugged another M/M adapter labelled " RS232 Gender Changer" Was this for hooking up a fdd and/or modem ? ciao larry lwalkerN0spaM(a)interlog.com

28 years, 1 month

DataNumerics DL8 more info...

by adavie＠mad.scientist.com

> Could you tell me just a bit about the DL8? What does it look like, does it > work, any software... manuals? I have no Doco or software for the DL8a, from memory there may be something in ROM, but I know that some of the ROM sockets are empty. It is contained in a single 19" rack mount case, mainly made from aluminium. On the back panel there is the fan, the power connector and a single female 25 pin D connector (I think it's a current loop port). The front panel is white with black lettering. All switches are toggle swicthes, some have red hoods, some have blue. I think there are seperate banks of switches for address and data as well as the usual halt, run, examine, etc. All the LEDs are red. I have powered it up and watched it count in binary, but as I don't know 8080 and have never programmed a front panel system I haven't done anything else Does this ring a bell for anyone? A

28 years, 1 month

Slow But OK

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<Pardon my ignorance, but what's an R6500? That wouldn't be an IBM <RISC machine, would it? No, non-ibm as it comes. It was the series of chips starting with the 6502 that wree used in the apple series, AIM, KIM, PET and Commodore machines. The number of hands the licensed 65xx chip design passed through is somewhat record as well! Allison

28 years, 1 month

a brain... my kingdom for a brain?

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<a) What should I be looking for in a logic probe. Any recommended model <(say, <$100) Unless the logic is fast (altairs arent!) any will do. <b) Ditto for multimeter. My favorites are a fluke m12 (digital) and a triplite-160(analog). <c) Where can I find a brain? :) think about it for a while ;) <I have it firing up and basically behaving, but some LEDs don't light whe <they should, but are definitely able to light when they want to. Nominal altair misbehavour. Several problems very likely some age and some design related. Switches are not making(corrosion internally), operating them may clean them up or replacement may be needed. Check with low current/voltage continuity tester(fluke m12 is good here). The pannel uses oneshot timers by the carload (74ls123 and friends) and they can be flakey. The mother board connections can be nasty from using solderplated edge connector board with gold edge (electromigration). The board edges can be cleaned with eraser but most systems with that disease end up with shake well before using (pull boards/reinsert to wipe contacts). I highly suggest this for any kit constructed altair pannel: 1. get drawings/schematics 2. clean well a. remove and disassemble to just the board with no hardware. b. Wash (yes really!) in dishwasher (best done when wife is not around) using some of the normal dish washer soap. NOTE: this will remove grime and any flux residues that may over time have become conductive or corrosive! We have no way of assuring a kit was constructed with quality solder/fluxes. c. dry well using WARM oven at 120-140F. (alternate is to soak in pan of 90% or greater isopropanal and air dry. NOTE: ISOPROPANAL IS FLAMMABLE) 3. Inspect and resolder any questionalble joints, use care. 4. Reassemble partially, to allow testing. NOTE: ONE MOD IF NOT DONE IS STRONGLY SUGGESTED... The 8800 front panel design has 120vAC power on it and that was/is very bad practice. As implemented it is a safety hazard and also a risk to the hardware. It is best to keep good distances between mains power and logic! Rewire so that the front pannel power switch is not connected to anything and mount a replacement in a protected spot on the rear pannel. I feel strongly about that, even as a museam peice it should be done. The existing switch can be left in place for appearances. Allison <A < <>Hmm... I've yet to find a classic computer fault that could not be <>tracked down using 3 things - a logic probe, a multimeter (DMM/VOM) and <>a _brain_. On the grounds that my brain isn't that good, I sometimes hav <>to use other test equipment, but when I finally do track down the <>problem, I generally realise that the symptoms were obvious from the <>start if only I'd realised what they meant. < <

28 years, 1 month

front panels

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<I may be in the running to buy an 8800b turnkey model which (sigh) doesn' <have the nice front panel that you describe for the 8800b. Can you tell <me how the turnkey works? Does it have a ROM'd bootstrap loader? Will <be able to program it if I don't have drives? The fronpanel less version of the MITS was the 8800b (turnkey) and it was generally configured to boot their disks. There may have been boot options for cassette or papertape boot as well. Allison

28 years, 1 month

Altair price check

by jfoust＠threedee.com

A few weeks ago, I turned down an offer to get an IMSAI and Altair system, reasonably intact, both for $500. What do I know. :-) Looks like a market ripe for wheeling and dealing. These online auctions are an interesting phenomenon. At first I thought they'd be a great place to pick up contemporary and antique computer stuff at good prices, perhaps with a few "sleeper" bargains. But the info flow is too good; it's my impression that prices are consistently driven *higher* than I'd regard as "street" price. Good news for people running auction services that take a percentage. - John Jefferson Computer Museum <http://www.threedee.com/jcm>

28 years, 1 month

IMSAI 8080 <> TRS-80

by bill_r＠inetnebr.com

Did anyone besides me notice that, judging by their ad in the latest issue of Computer Gaming World magazine, the software division of Metro Goldwyn Mayer (MGM INTERACTIVE INC.), producer of the original "Wargames" motion picture, doesn't know the difference between an IMSAI 8080 and a TRS-80? Their ad goes something like "In 1983, a teenage computer hacker almost destroyed the world with one of these: [picture of TRS-80 Model 1, with caption reading 'TRS-80, 4K RAM, no hard drive']". It goes on to talk about how much damage he could do with today's computers (go figure), and introduces their new "Wargames" computer game. Maybe the marketing department should jog down to the film vault and watch the movie, because _it_ used an IMSAI 8080 with a piece of paper stuck over the name for the young "hacker's" computer. Sheesh. -Bill Richman bill_r(a)inetnebr.com http://incolor.inetnebr.com/bill_r (Home of the COSMAC Elf Simulator!)

28 years, 1 month

e-mail address change

by manney＠nwohio.com

My e-mail address is now -- manney(a)lrbcg.com Let's hope the listproc gets it right, too! P Manney

28 years, 1 month

Computers that have appreciated (RE: Altair price check)

by KFergason＠aol.com

In a message dated 2/23/98 3:04:18 PM Central Standard Time, adept(a)Mcs.Net writes: > > I assume you mean machines that are worth more than their original purchase > > price. That would be a pretty short list... notably: > > > > - RCA COSMAC VIP (ditto) > > Hmm, whats one of these worth? I have 4 of them, but I have never seen any for sale. Kelly

28 years, 1 month

HP 935

by fmc＠reanimators.org

Adam Jenkins <adam(a)merlin.net.au> writes: > Anyone know what a HP 935 is? I assume it to be a Hewlett Packard laptop > of some sort, with an LCD display, but I don't know if it is MS-DOS, > CPM/M, a full laptop or one of the Tandy Model 100 computers, or what. :( I dunno, that makes me think HP 3000 series 935, which is a mini. Either that or they left out the "8" in 9835 and it is a desktop computer, possibly with a one-line LED display (9835B) or with a CRT display (9835A). Well, those are my guesses. I'm interested in hearing how far off I am. -Frank McConnell

28 years, 1 month

old SCSI controller

by rexstout＠ptld.uswest.net

The only things I know about this board is that it's a SCSI controller, and it's BIG. It's about 10"x12", has an 86-pin edge connectr on the bottom, two 50-pin edge connectors on the top, and uses eight 2651 SCSI chips. It's labeled "DATASTREAM ASSY 100716 REV A". Does anyone have any idea what this is for? TIA -JR http://members.tripod.com/~jrollins/index.html - Computers http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Lair/1681/ - Star Trek

28 years, 1 month

Recent Finds...

by foxnhare＠goldrush.com

This weekend's recent finds netted me two books: The first is called Computers and Man, by Richard C. Dorf, published by Boyd and Fraser Publishing Co. in 1974. It looks like it could have been a college text at one time. The real notable part is it is loaded with alot of pictures of earlier machines and computers from the late 60s and early 70s (such as a picture of an IBM 2321 strip file, which I think was mentioned here a few months back.). also a good description of core memory (which I have been searching for to go with my core memory board I won at VCF.) The other, which may be a duplicate (for me) was PET/CBM BASIC Programming and Applications by Gene Streitmatter and Larry Joel Goldstein published by Brady Books which had an unlabeled 5 1/4" disk shoved in it, the disk contained a few examples from the book written by the last owner (for the PET)... You never know what you may find though. Not as bad a Programming books of the time go, even some nice type-in games in the back. Larry Anderson -- -+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+- Visit our web page at: http://www.goldrush.com/~foxnhare/ Call our Commodore 64 BBS (Silicon Realms 300-2400 baud) at: (209) 754-1363 -+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-

28 years, 1 month

Weekend Additions

by dastar＠wco.com

Well, I thought I'd trumpet my trophies from today's hunting since I haven't done a trip like this one in a while and it was fun. Nothing really amazingly special today, but there were some nice finds. First stop: Computer Recycling Center Commodore Colt (PC-10C) - the Commodore IBM PC compatible, kinda neat. Has a WD hard drive inside (don't know what size) Radio Shack CoCo1 with the old-style (original) keyboard. I believe this is a 4K model. Came with the RS Modem I and a manual set plus some carts and a bunch of tapes with instructions Radio Shack Line Printer VII Zenith Data Systems Portable - this is the OEM'd Morrow Pivot Portable Everex external tape backup - this is cool...it uses cassette tapes for (apparently) 40MB backup. Coincidentally I found another one of these at stop #4 with a cassette. The cassette looks like your standard tape cassette but it has a notch on the tope of the casing in the middle. Can this drive use standard cassettes? It apparently plugs into the external floppy connector of an IBM PC Mac SE with 4MB RAM and 20MB HD Bunch of books, cables, Apple II software, other miscellany Total: $50 Second Stop: Surplus Store Atari 600XL with Atari 1027 printer (2) Lobo 5.25" drives for the Apple II (of course Marvin knows these were manufactured in Santa Barbara, CA!) Apple //e numeric keypad, joystick (2) Apple //c power supplies Miscellany Total: $30 (haggled down from $45) Third Stop: Thrift Store #1 Mattel Aquarius with Mini-expander and two game controllers in excellent condition (my first computer!) Atari 800XL Total: ~$15 Fourth Stop: Thrift Store #2 Burroughs C-7400 Electronic Adding Machine - I don't know if this should be called an adding machine or a computer. It seems to have some sort of computing ability. The keypad has this overlay with commands such as "GOTO", "IF" and "GOSUB" printed on it. I haven't fired it up yet but it has a one line LED (LCD?) display. Looks very neat. I don't normally collect adding machines except when one really jumps out at me. Any info? Data General External 5.25" Floppy Drive - I believe this drive was specific to the DG1 laptop. The funny thing is I just recently saw a photo of it on a web page and was thinking "Hey, I want one of those" A whole OS/2 library of books (like 10 volumes on OS/2 including developer manuals for Presentation Manager, etc). Total: ~$15.00 Fifth Stop: Surplus Store Northstar Advantage in excellent condition Panasonic Portable Data Terminal - similar to the TI Silent 700 but a little more polished Televideo PC-605 - this is a more IBM compatible model of the Televideo PC. This one apparently has a color CGA monitor instead of the more standard monochrome display. It also is supposed to have a PC compatible BIOS and can thus run some PC apps. It also has a HD (probably 20MB) Corvus Systems Hard Drive unit - I believe this goes with the rest of the Corvus Concepts computer. It has several connectors on the back labeled "Processor", "Drive"...it also has one labeled "VCR" and a video IN and OUT jack. McFrank, this is so you can backup to a VCR right? Misc. MicroPro software packages (CalcStar) Misc. books: Rexx, 8080/8085 Assembly Programming Total: $80 Grand Total: ~$190 Total spots visited: 5 Total Elapsed Time: 7hrs Deal Scale: 4 (1=Bad Deal...10=Great Deal!) [I've had better days] Sam Alternate e-mail: dastar(a)siconic.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Computer Historian, Programmer, Musician, Philosopher, Athlete, Writer, Jackass Coming Soon...Vintage Computer Festival 2.0 See http://www.siconic.com/vcf for details!

28 years, 1 month

front panels

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<>> panel. Does anyone remember other front panel S-100 cards besides MIT <>> IMSAI, Ithaca, and Wameco? Wasn't there a Byte-8 sold by Olson <Electronics <>> for a while that also had a front panel? < <>Yes, the Byte-8 had a front panel with, I believe, a hex keypad and a tw <>digit 7-segment LED display. Godbout. Equinox_100. <Was that just a display driven from a boot ROM or was it a real front pan <with displays directly driven from the bus, examine/deposit, single step <etc.? Usually a hex keypad meant a simulated front panel (CPU actually <running a debug program in the boot ROM). A true front panel needed 16 L <or 4 hex digits for address, 8 LEDs or 2 hex digits for data, and at leas <status LEDs for bus signals (SINP, SOUT, MEMR, INTA, etc.). Most were "simulated FP" though most offered better than real front pannel abilities. A few were hybrid, IE: the leds really did indicate what was on the bus and the cpu only ran the rom code needed to perform the needed actions and stopped. <All the panels <I have seen also had an extra 8 LED latched output port and sense switch <input port. Altair compatability hack. The sense switches were also port 0FFh so the software could read them. Allison

28 years, 1 month

Classic computing email list

by RWood54741＠worldnet.att.net

Please tell me how to subscribe. Thanks, Bob Wood

28 years, 1 month

HP 7958B

by healyzh＠ix.netcom.com

Today I picked up a HP 7958B unit which contains a "Bauart Gepruft model 97533-60051" Hard Drive. It is my understanding that this Hard Drive is an MFM Hard Drive, and I got this thing expecting to be able to find enough info on the net that I could hopefully fake my way through formating it for one of my MicroVAX's. No such luck, I've been able to dig up a big fat nothing on the net. Does anyone have any info on these things? I gather they were used with HP9000/300 systems. Zane | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Adminstrator | | healyzh(a)ix.netcom.com (primary) | Linux Enthusiast | | healyzh(a)holonet.net (alternate) | Classic Computer Collector | +----------------------------------+----------------------------+ | For Empire of the Petal Throne and Traveller Role Playing, | | see http://www.dragonfire.net/~healyzh/ | | For the collecting of Classic Computers with info on them. | | see http://www.dragonfire.net/~healyzh/museum.html |

28 years, 1 month

IBM Techref

by maxeskin＠hotmail.com

Tony, you mentioned that a lot of info was mentioned in the IBM techref, on the AT in your case. What is the kind of size of this set, for the AT let's say, and does anyone have extra copies? What about XT? (I have the quickref to it already) ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

28 years, 1 month

Prices & Rants(was: Future Computing Trends. Still is, I guess)

by manney＠nwohio.com

<Snip> > The oldest part is toshiba 1.44 I have no idea > how old but I think it was about 5 years old. Hard to find a good > floppy drive that will last that long now. But tell me if there is > one out there that good and costs $40 and I will take it! What's happening to prices? Just returned from a show...Mitsumi FDD's, $16, sound cards $12, speakers $10...cases $18!!! > Only problem with disposeable PC if the makers gives us the >machines > too non-standard and hard to expand n' upgrade ...a la Packard Bell...but now it seems EVERYONE is making purpose-designed motherboards and cases. The best thing about keeping older PC's going (just to keep this on track) is interchangability of parts: P/S, for example. What's gonna happen to us electronically challenged types when the HP Pavilion P/S smokes -- am I going to go, hat in hand, to HP for another -- at their prices?

28 years, 1 month

Found a decent use for a PC...

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<They'd be extremely handy as a diagnostic tool, especially when there's To a point but it also required somethings to work and added things that could break the system. <problem with a video card or memory, and instead of having to count a <bunch of stupid beeps to determine what the error code is, you can just <read it off the front panel. That's what POST-cards do. <Those front panels had value that was overlooked when the modern machine <were ushered in. The altair had some 30 switches and as many leds all costing a bit never mind a board full of logic. It's was an expensive solution to not using Eproms even small ones. Systems like the POLY-88, SOL, SWTP 6800 got along just fine without them. Most minicomputers were dispensing with them by 1970s in favor of rom boots. Allison

28 years, 1 month

Prices & Rants(was: Future Computing Trends. Still is, I gu

by maxeskin＠hotmail.com

I apologize for any weird layout, but this IS Lynx...(as always for me) >> Missed my point; I prefer to buy quality one if I can find one and >> that floppy example is what I'm driving at. If I had money... >> Mitsumi and Epson floppy drives are junk. I had too many of those >> fail before year is up and use was not that heavy. Panasonic and few >> Teac is just o. k. but not on my esteemed list. Also those cheapo I had a drive problem once. It was intermittent, and I never could understand what was wrong. Eventually, I swapped the cable and the drive, and it works now. The only FDD I've bought was a 3.5" TEAC for $70 at the world's worst store- CompUSA. It actually has a metal frame! >The one advantage of Teac drives is that you can get the service/repair >manual. I have it for several versions of the FD55 (5.25" drive) and the >FD235 (3.5" drive). It means you can be _sure_ your drive is correctly >aligned. I wouldn't bother if I had to. >What floppy drives would you recomend? Punched card, IBM ,circa 1928. >> more noisy. PSU have cheap parts inside and fan will fail inside. I >> do have bunch of PSU's with failed fans and all of them are sleeve >> bearing type, very doubtful of finding one with ball bearing fans > Once again, I wouldn't bother with such minor details when I run Windows 95. My Fan howls when I boot, then stops after a few minutes. I read an article once on how to replace a PSU fan with a silent external one. >The worst PC-clone part I own is a keyboard. One day when using it, the >manual for my 'scope slipped off the top of a PDP8e that's alongside my PC >and landed on the keyboard. The result was that many keys on the keyboard >failed to work. I spent the next _3 hours_ removing bits of broken SRBP >circuit board and soldering wires all over the place. Amazingly there was >a schematic printed on the box that the keyboard came in (which I'd cut >out and filed), but (I guess) not too suprisingly it was incorrect!. I keep bumping into kb's that have plastic film instead of PCBs. The problem is that sometimes, the film will bend down, and not detect the key, so I have to bash it. (Which I do enough anyway, given my OS) > >And don't get me started on monitors. Is it too much to ask for a monitor Well, now that we have LCDs, it should get better, though LCD can be crap too. Don't have to worry about focus, transformers, etc. But I'm sure that they'll figure out something to screw up. >worse than the 17 year old Barco I happen to have... Out of ten new Performas, about half have darker monitors. We don't know why. It seems that the monitor is the second least reliable part of the computer, after the rest of it :) In old machines, everything was hackable anyway, so that any bugs in hardware or software could be easily fixed by the likes of us. In modern machines, its too complicated to fix anyway, and one would never have the time to fix all of the bugs, and for me, hardware is a minor problem (since it never breaks for me anyway, even when I try) ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

28 years, 1 month

Copying TU-58's?

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<The person I've been getting a bunch of DEC stuff off of has a whole pil <of TU-58 tapes that he would like to get transfered over to something he <can read. I'm wondering if there is anyway I can attach the TU58 drive <I've got for my PDP-11/44 to my MicroVAX II and copy these tapes for him VMS does support Tu58 on vax on a serial port(it is a serial device). The real question is whats the target media? RX50, RX33, RX02? If one of those three the 11/44 can do RX02 and if you have a q-buss PDP-11 with a DLV11j or any other serial port at 176500 you can hang the TU58 off that and use RT-11 to do the tansfer. Allison

28 years, 1 month

Found a decent use for a PC...

by maxeskin＠hotmail.com

>They'd be extremely handy as a diagnostic tool, especially when there's a >problem with a video card or memory, and instead of having to count a >bunch of stupid beeps to determine what the error code is, you can just >read it off the front panel. > >Those front panels had value that was overlooked when the modern machines >were ushered in. I wouldn't say that! Some of the PS/2s, A popular WYSE 286 machine and so one have had LCD diagnostic panels ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

28 years, 1 month

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test-drb