Thanks for the update that's what I was figured would be the answer. The
S-bus card was a surprise, now I have to go on the hunt. Thanks again John
At 10:20 PM 1/29/98 -0500, you wrote:
>> Sun SPAREprinter model QA-6, anyone know how to do a self
>> print test on this unit I can not find any buttons or anything;
>
>It will not do much unless you have it connected to a SPARCstation running
>NeWSprint. The SPARCstation also requires a special S-bus card to
>interface to the printer.
>
>In other words, you have either a worthless printer, or a good excuse to
>go get yourself a SPARCstation.
>
>William Donzelli
>william(a)ans.net
>
>
>
I have several questions on some computers I have that I'm stuck in the
mud on.
Point Four Data Systems Mark 3 minicomputer: This thing dates from
1985-ish. It's rack-mountable, and I have a CDC Lark 25+25MB removable
hard drive for it. The manuals I got with it are for a different model of
computer. I can get into the MANIP monitor but few of the commands do
anything (particularly the one to IPL off the drive- it either hangs or
goes back to the MANIP prompt immediately.) I don't know if the drive
or any of the cartridges contain anything at all. Does anyone know
*anything* about this thing? Any info would be helpful, as I'm out of
ideas.
Anadex DP-6500 RapidScribe printer: I'm told it works. All of the DIP
switches are set off (and there's 30+ of them). It doesn't do much at
all. Does anyone have the DIP switch settings for it? I've searched the
WWW and found ribbons for sale but that's it.
Commodore 64: I bought a boxful of C=64 stuff today at a nifty junk market
I've never noticed before. The 64 boots to one of the following screens
(at random): black, blue and black stripes, blue and red stripes, red
screen, red-white-blue-black stripes, white and black stripes, or
multi-colored graphical garbage. Does this sound like a common failure
mode, and if so, which chip?
Also, what's a fair price for a Coleco Adam system: 2 keyboards, memory
box with datacassette drives, external numeric keypad with knob (paddle?),
and printer.
One more: fair price for Apple //c+ system: CPU, monitor, two disk drives
(one Apple, one other).
Enough questions. Thanks for your help,
Richard Schauer
rws(a)ais.net
Hi,
Picked up a few more items today. A book named The AmigaDOS Manual by
The Bantam Amiga Library and a copy of the Operating Manual for Jet also
for the Amiga. Also two manuals for Commodore disk drives, one says 1541C
and the other says 1541. And a GEOS User's Mamual for the Commodore 64 or
128. Any need any of this stuff? E-mail me privately.
Also got a strange Commodore cable. It has what looks like a double
ended HP-IB connector one end and a card edge connector on the other. All
the connectors have 24 contacts. Both ends have a heavy braided ground
strap. It looks like it's about 2 foot long. Any one know what this is for?
Joe
How is it I always manage to get so far behind? Sorry for the late
response...
At 06:17 PM 1/27/98 -0500, you wrote:
>Found an interesting (at least to me) luggable/portable at the local thrift
>the other day. It's a Sharp PC-7100. Very compact and sharp (no pun)
>design. About half the size and weight of an old Compaq, with a detatchable
Best I can figure it, (based on my 3,) is the PC-7000 had two floppy
drives, the PC-7100 gave up a floppy for the hard drive.
These are actually more interesting than you might think at first glance.
Notice how the handle can slide towards the back so it's off-center?
Notice the little metal inserts along the top edge of the back? There's a
printer (I've only got one) that attaches to the back for portability. The
handle can either be centered on just the main unit or on the main unit and
the printer.
>it. BTW, the screen has a blue/purple sort of tint to it. Kind of
>attractive in a psychodelic sort of way ( oh please, no more drug-related
I'm afraid I've got no docs, and it's been a while since I've booted any of
mine so I can't even say if any have the same tint. I would be interested
in hearing anything you find out about it, though!
--------------------------------------------------------------------- O-
Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad
roger(a)sinasohn.com that none but madmen know."
Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates
San Francisco, California http://www.crl.com/~sinasohn/
Sorry that I don't have all the information, but here goes:
I've got a freidn with an early Pentium 75, purchased July 1995. Needless
to say, it doesn't have Windows 95.
When trying to insall some "classic" Sierra games, like the VGA Quest
For Glory; the install progam has a list of sound cards that it supports.
It puts a check by sound cards supported by your system (IE Sound Blaster 16
would be a Sound Blaster, Sound Blaster Pro, and Adlib compatible), and his
would show up as "Sound Master." Now, it's my guess that Sound Master was a
"clone" of Sound Blaster, but early versions must have added more features.
Also, it wasn't "Sound Blaster Compatible" enough so that it used SB
drivers.
Sorry for the sketchy information,
Tim D. Hotze
-----Original Message-----
From: Cord Coslor <archive(a)navix.net>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
Date: Friday, January 30, 1998 2:54 AM
Subject: Sound Master PC card, etc.
>1) Here's an item that I am curious to learn about. I will transpose a
written
>description of this item... I hope it actually falls into the classic
computing
>category. Anyway, it is called the Sound Master PC and it says it is "a
total
>music and sound card.... sound and speech run through a direct memory
access
>(DMA) driven 8-bit digitizer. Sound Master PC incorporates an extra
microchip
>witha three-voice capability, the latestd esign for multi-part music and
>special effects. Combined sounds go to the built-in stereo amplifier...."
> Here's what I'm really interested in... "Sound Master PC also has
digital
>joystick ports which accept the 'fun' types of Atari, Commodore, or other
>game-machine joysticks. ...."
> "The board fits into any available slot on your PC. Mini stereo-speaker
jack
>and dual joystick ports are accessibe through the rear mounting bracket.
The
>package includes external speakers, plug-in board, instructioons, and a
one-year
>warranty."
>
>Does anyone know who might have made this unit? What year? Are the joystick
>ports really any good? I run a digital joytsick (Atari) through my Printer
>port.... but this sounds completely different.
>
>Feel free to add some input. Oh, how much would 'you' pay for something
like
>this. I have the opportunity to get up to ten of these things and am
curious
>what they're worth. ANyone else want to get in on the deal with me?
>
>I also have access to these:
>
>2) Voice Master Digitizer for the IBM, Apple, and Commodore Computers.
>3) The Speech Thing-- allows recording sounds through the printer port.
>4) C-20 cassettes (10 minutes per side) -- 20 for $6.60. Unused cassettes
in
>unused plastic case-NEW!
>5) 1000 tractor-feed mailing labels for $3.95.
>6) New 5 1/4" disks 100 for $5.40 (Single-sided, single or double density)
>7) 100 Double Sided, Double Density 5.25" for $5.50 --
>8) also new 8" disketes for $1.00 a piece!
>
>Let me know on some of this stuff and we can work out a deal.
>
>Love to get more info on it all,
>
>CORD
>
>
>--
> _________________________________________
>| Cord G. Coslor : archive(a)navix.net |
>| Deanna S. Wynn : deannasue(a)navix.net |
>|-----------------------------------------|
>| PO Box 308 - Peru, NE - 68421-0308 |
>| (402) 872- 3272 |
>|_________________________________________|
>
>
It's been awhile with the snow and cold I do not get to make all the
rounds. But here goes in the last few weeks I a PCjr and keyboard without
cable for free; Panasonic model RL-H7000W luggable for free some damage to
housing; another HP Thinkjet without power supply; Apple numeric keypad II;
3 Apple extended II keyboards for free; Mac SE/30 M5119 works great for
$15; Mac Classic M0420 works great $15; VisionScan scanner model n205 no
power supply for it-free; Information Storage Optical Disk drive for free;
3 IBM 3363 units for free; IBM 5144 monitor on a stand uses phono jack
hookup only free; several Mac plus kb's and mice for free; Alphacom 42
thermal printer very strange plug on this unit, anyone know how you power
this printer; Sun SPAREprinter model QA-6, anyone know how to do a self
print test on this unit I can not find any buttons or anything; AMSTRAD
640K PC keyboard in great shape free; Apple modem A9M0300 with power supply
free; Apple modem A9M0301 (2400b) missing power supply free; IBM Colorjet
printer 3852 model 2 free; GTCO Corp Digi-Pad5 controller blackbox free;
houston instrument pad model DT-11;Gulton Industries Recorder TR-711 TAC-59
free;2 Apple PC 5.25 drives A9M0110 can read PC 360k disk free;
ColorMonitor IIe free; IBM VGA 8513001 free works great; Apple Imagewriter
II A9M0310 free; IBM PS/2 50 with keys not tested yet free; Control Data
model 831 needs work free;Wang PC382 not tested yet $15; UNISYS Scanner
flatbed $10 not tested yet;Sun kb and mouse; NEC PC-8300 free not tested
yet someone built a power supply into the battery compartment; a Scanjet
controller card free and not tested;Commodore executive SX-64 portable
works great at Goodwill for $15;Commodore 64C in box with manuals for free;
Apple IIe 80col card for free (new in bag); AE timemaster card for apple
free; and a large number items not yet 10 years old but the prices were too
good to pass on and this way I will the units when they are 10 years old.
There are more items but I will stop for now. Keep Computing John
In a message dated 98-01-29 08:44:40 EST, you write:
<< > I looked in my never used copy of os2 version 1.3 standard edition and
found
> no mention of rexx so maybe it arrived in version 2.x but i'm not opening
my
> shrinkwrapped version to find out! minimum requirements for 1.3 are a 286,
> 2meg, and 12 meg of hdd space.
: Worth a try then. But am I right in thinking that the AT doesn't
: implement all the 286 modes properly? I'm sure the XT286 doesn't. >>
...an AT doesnt implement 286 models properly? i dont get it. AT=80286. now,
all 286 machines had a limitation about being able to switch from protected
mode to real mode and back to protected mode without major work and/or a
reboot. the 386 does this all smoothly under software control. it's also my
understanding the XT286 is just a regular old 5170 board in a 5160 case.
david
I just saw an interesting system It's a white steel box, about 5 x 8 in
and 12 inches deep. Top flips up. Its called an IBC or ICB, I forget,
and it's a Z80 based system with a floppy and Micropolis hard drive.
I also weighs about 20 pounds due mostly to its antiquated power supply.
Any info? It has a CPU card and separate controller card bussed
together laying stacked sideways over the drives and power suppy. All
the ports (many) are hardwired out the back.
I almost picked this up, and I should have. It's going for about 5
bucks.
I imagine the PS is shot, I didn't have a chance to check. Is it
possible to hook up a standard switching power supply (well that's
probably a dumb question).
Any clues, I might pick it up, if I don't go to Vegas 1st thing
tommorrow....
-Mike
<Not even approximately quiet -- I'd estimate that traffic's been
<higher than normal this last week or so, and had been wondering
<where you were in the flood.
Obviously missing something.
<If you want, I could package you a digest or two (might be best in
<digestible chunks for my ISP's sake, now that I think about it).
It's not what I missed but why I wasn't seeing it.
I did resub just in case.
Allison
Zane H. Healy wrote:
>
> >REXX on a PC?
[snip]
>
> The Amiga also has ARexx, not sure how long, but I've an Amiga OS 3.1
> manual on it.
>
AREXX was introduced as a third-party enhancement sometime during
Workbench 1.3 and quickly became a popular cross application protocol.
By Workbench 2.0 it was integrated into the operating system and became
a standard component. Most of the apps for the Amiga now have support
for AREXX control (one of the reasons it was such a dream for the
video/graphics whizzes as they could have several programs automatically
process images and digitized video without much effort)
Larry Anderson
--
-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
Visit our web page at: http://www.goldrush.com/~foxnhare/
Call our BBS (Silicon Realms BBS 300-2400 baud) at: (209) 754-1363
-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
> I've got the Techrefs in front of me (PC, and PC/XT)
>
> The PC motherboard schematics show that all 5 expansion slots are wired
> in parallel. There's nothing odd about any of them.
H'm. I use third-party books. Suppose if I wrote the author they'd put out
an updated edition?
>
> The schematics for both versions of the XT motherboard (64K-256K and
<Snip>
> > FWIW, I've run a variety of cards in XT slot 8 and PC slot 5 with no
> > problems.
>
> On clones, sure. But I have a genuine IBM PC/XT on my desk and the
> built-from-a-kit 8255 card wouldn't work in slot 8 without a little extra
> logic (which I made from unused gates on the card).
Nope. Real true-blues. Maybe it gets more tolerant with time?
manney
At 01:41 28/01/98 -0800, Aaron wrote:
>Does anyone have a remedy for bad case yellowing? I have the suspicion
>that it's a permanent chemical change, but I thought it might be worth a
>shot.
As I' ve previously said, I found FULCRON from AREXONS (if you can find it
there) to be the best in dissolving yellowish from computer plastics
(unbeatable against nicotine)
All you have to take care is to spray the pure product in a uniform way
(=the whole surface omogeneously) and brush it gently, alllowing the whole
surface to be in contact with the product.Then rinse: FANTASTIC!
Careful!
Avoid to spray and let drops come down + rinse without brushing!: where the
product
drop down, it leaves the surface CLEAN, but the rest still dirty. If you
rinse and try to apply the product again (even brushing it accurately) the
"clean-shadows-on dirt" will remain!
Ciao
????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????
? Riccardo Romagnoli,collector of:CLASSIC COMPUTERS,TELETYPE UNITS,PHONE ?
? AND PHONECARDS I-47100 Forli'/Emilia-Romagna/Food Valley/ITALY ?
? Pager:DTMF PHONES=+39/16888(hear msg.and BEEP then 5130274*YOUR TEL.No.* ?
? where*=asterisk key | help visit http://www.tim.it/tldrin_eg/tlde03.html ?
? e-mail=chemif(a)mbox.queen.it ?
????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????
This looks like a good place for drive and controller info...
David Given wrote:
>
> When dealing with old drives, I find the following site invaluable:
>
http://theref.c3d.rl.af.mil/
>
> It has controller and drive info for just about every drive under the sun
> (except the *really* wierd thing in my T3100). Very handy.
>
> David Given
> dg(a)freeyellow.com
At 03:25 PM 1/29/98 -0500, you wrote:
>Would that be the Southwestern Research Institute in
>San Antonio, Tx?
Yes.
Joe
>
>***** haleyk(a)okstate.edu ***** ***** ***** ends.
>
>
>
Two things: One, the person that said that appeared as the "from" on the
e-mail. ClassicCmp appears as the "to."
>"Why are manhole covers round?"
So that you can put them in any direction, without worrying about turning to
fit it in.
Tim D. Hotze
Kaypro 4 question....
I just picked up one of these bad boys from a thrift for $2.95 (my first
Kaypro) but I'm not
sure that it's feeling so good. I don't have a boot disk for it, and when I
power it on (it does power, that's a good sign) it says ," Please place
your diskette into drive A." The floppy never spins down, and putting a
CP/M booter in from another machine doesn't seem to generate any kind of
activity whatsoever. Is this normal behaviour, and I just need a boot disk?
BTW, does anyone know where I can get a boot disk for it?
Thanks,
Aaron
I'm trying to get NetBSD ona uVAX 2000. I was using
the wrong numbers in the disklabel. Now that I've figured that out,
the computer has antoher trick for me - I power it on, the RD53 spins up,
reaches top speed, and spins down before the CPU checkout finishes.
Did I kill a timing track or soemthing?
-------
Hello all,
Southwest Research Institute appears to be divesting itself of a
large lot of computer gear by closed bid. Here is the announcement:
----------------------------------------------------------------------
From: MBowen(a)swri.edu
Date: Wed, 28 Jan 98 17:07:23 CST
Reply-To: <MBowen(a)swri.edu>
Subject: fwd: surplus equipment for sale
Southwest Research Institute
Mark Bowen
Senior Buyer
Phone: 210-522-5005
Fax: 210-522-3964
Internet: mbowen(a)SwRI.edu
-------------
Original Text
Hi!
I just picked up an MZ-721, which is rather neat. Oddly, it loads Basic
>from tape, which seems fairly unusual for a cassette-based system.
Anyway, when I switched it on I got nothing but garbage on the screen,
and ning I do seems to change it at all. Shoud I consider this a dead
computer, take photos and treasure the manuals? Or is this the sort of
think which *may* be repaired, so I shoudl track down someone who fixes
these things and get them to look at it. Indeed, is it even worth the
effort?
I tried to find information on it, but almost everything seems to be in
Japanese. :)
Thanks heaps,
Adam.
I need the CMOS setup program for the Powermate SX/20; does anyone have
it?
______________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com
Have you tried Herb Johnson (Dr. S-100) ? He hangs out at comp.os.cpm , but
you can reach him via email at hjohnson(a)pluto.njcc.com If he can't help
you, I don't know anyone who can.
Cliff Gregory
cgregory(a)lrbcg.com
-----Original Message-----
From: classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu <classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu>
To: Cgregory <Cgregory>
Date: Wednesday, January 28, 1998 11:06 PM
Subject: Z280 systems
>Some of you may remember one of the last issues of SuperMicro magazine
>had a Z280 S-100 boards on the cover and a nice article about the board
>and a system using the board, as I recall.
>
>Does anyone have an idea where I could find or look for a Z280 based
>system, either ZCPM, or???. And either single or multiple processors.
>
>My goal would be to have a fairly complete system, however I think that
>would be possible from most any S-100 components, if one had the CPU.
>
>Does anyone still manufature S-100 stuff or its replacement Bus, which I
>don't recall???
>
>Or Z280 Z380 VME systems.
>
>I guess I better stop there or I'll leave the realm of "classics"
>
>thans,
>
>Mike
>
What is "x286emu" on Linux?
I've seen it in directories, but I'll be damned if it does anything
yet. No references I've seen and no hits on Web search engines.
Does it exist by itself, or is it part of a library for another
program?? Or...????
Thanks,
-Mike Allison
> ;-) Clearing the snow from my glasses, I saw Philip.Belben(a)powertech.co.uk
> typed:
>
> [nip about REXX]
>
> >REXX is/was
> >quite a nice language to use, but some features rendered it unsuitable
> >for serious programming - numbers, for example, are stored as strings of
> >digits in the character code of the machine you are using...
>
> Uh, Sir Philip?
>
> Maybe there are other reasons that your statement of unsuitability stands,
> but I can think of one programming language that's very handy (& powerful &
> serious) which stores it's digits as charcter codes: Perl. From experience
> I can tell you that one heckuva lot more stuff gets done with Perl on the
> WWW than Java -- and it's a lot easier to pgm. in.
Sorry, Roger, I didn't mean to start a language war. I've never used
Perl, but I'm told it's good.
REXX, like (I think) Perl, is a macro language. It is designed for
doing little tasks that don't need lots of computing power. I like REXX
- I really enjoyed using it at IBM. But it is an interpreted language -
if I was writing a major application I'd use a compiler - and numbers
stored as strings are fundamentally slow - I'd use one which stored
numbers in a way that is fast to use.
But I was being careless. I was actually thinking "number crunching"
when I said "serious programming". (NB I _have_ done number crunching
in REXX - the potentially infinite precision is very useful!)
Philip.
PS *** OFF TOPIC - Sam Ismail need read no further :-) ***
Manhole covers (and the apertures at the entrances of manholes :-) ) are
indeed round because they then won't fall down the hole if you drop
them. But other shapes share this property - triangular manholes are
quite common over here. Any "Curve of constant diameter" also has this
property. Examples of such curves may be found in the 7-sided coins in
use in the UK for 50p and 20p
P.
