- test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org - classiccmp.org

by cem14＠cornell.edu

Well, I've decided to bite the bullet and try to install OpenVMS 7.2 from the media kit I bought a few months ago >from Montagar. I have this Vaxstation 4000/60; I exchanged the RZ-24E it originally had by an ST31200N. I transferred a TZ30 drive from a storage expansion box that was used in a decstation 2100 to the right bay, and I got hold of a 512 bytes/sector DEC CDROM. The prospect of the installation is somewhat scary forme since I know nothing about VMS, but with the help of the OpenVMS installation guide I am to the point where I restored the system save set to the ST31200 (dka0) and booted off it. So far, the only choice I have made is to select Decnet plus over Decnet phase IV, as the installation instructions seemed to hint that it can work over tcp/ip . When it is done extracting those packages, I understand that it is going to ask me about passwords and about SCSNODE and SCSSYSTEMID. Can someone explain SCSSYSTEMID to me? I know nothing about OpenVMS or DECNET, but I am hoping to eventually set up things to boot the uVax II that I also have off the 4000/60; in addition, I'd like to connect everything to the university's 10T and run internet clients on the 4000/60 . accepting to being clueless, Carlos. -- Carlos Murillo-Sanchez email: cem14(a)cornell.edu 428 Phillips Hall, Electrical Engineering Department Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853

26 years, 3 months

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SUN 3/50

by mcguire＠neurotica.com

On April 10, Aaron Christopher Finney wrote: > Basically, it's a 15mhz 68020 with 4megs ram (stock). It's got a mono > frame buffer, scsi, ethernet built in. No power/space for internal storage > devices. I've got one w/12megs ram and it makes a pretty good mono X > terminal. 4mb is the max unless you have one of those nifty 3rd party memory expansion daughterboards. I've got one or two of them somewhere if anyone is really dying for one. They're pretty swappy at 4mb. > I think the last OS supported is SunOS 4.1. 4.1.1_U1 -Dave McGuire

26 years, 3 months

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SUN 3/50

by oliv555＠arrl.net

Got one of these as a freebie when I picked up a bunch of hardware I won (bought) at a university auction. Not being familiar with Sun products, can anyone tell me which flavor(s) of unix I might be able to load. Its currently a diskless pizza box, extra large. What kind of performance can I expect from this old thing... slow ?.... superslow.. ? Any links to related Sun sites ........ etc.. Thanks Nick

26 years, 3 months

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OT: Apple Mac LC II

by kla＠helios.augustana.edu

This is off-topic, so please reply directly. Thanks. My son was just given a Mac LC II without a monitor, but including a keyboard and mouse. I am not a Mac user or owner (until now), so I have no idea whatsoever to be looking for in a replacement monitor. Is the LC II a B&W or Color computer (I don't have the foggiest :-)? Help. The computer has a 160MB hard drive, a floppy drive, and what appears to be one memory SIMM (with four big chips on it, so I'm guessing 4MB at most). Cheers. Kevin * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Kevin L. Anderson Ph.D., Geography Department, Augustana College Rock Island, Illinois 61201-2296, USA phone: (309) 794-7325 e-mail: kla(a)helios.augustana.edu -or- gganderson(a)augustana.edu * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Opinions expressed here are my own and do not represent the administration of Augustana College.

26 years, 3 months

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Unknown DEC stuff and a few unknown ICs

by emanuel.stiebler＠mchp.siemens.de

>Also, I have these qbus boards from Sky Computer >that I have no clue what they are; they're all quad height (assuming that >means they have four connectors). They are Skywar-Q-A-03, Skywar-Q-B-03, and >Skydpmem-Q-02. Are there

26 years, 3 months

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Find Newspapers

by jrkeys＠concentric.net

Today I got a call from a man in Virginia and a e-mail from another who saw a reprint of the article done by the local Pioneer Press here in the twin cities. Has anyone on the list see the article on collecting classic ? If so can you e-mail me the names of the papers. Thanks John

26 years, 3 months

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no chars on uVAX console

by allisonp＠world.std.com

->I've removed all boards save the memory boards (2*M7609) >and the CPU (M7606-AA) > >Now I get characters (XON/OFF = on) and the bootprocess continues >until char 3 Xon/Xoff is DECs standard flow control, VTxxxS know how to do that. >I've tried to put some of the boards back but I am not sure if I have a >missing >board. > >Het boards were arranged as follows > slot 1 AB/CD >slot 1 ----------------M 7606------------------ slot 2 AB/CD >slot 2 ----------------M 7609------------------ slot 3 AB/CD >slot 3 ----------------M 7609------------------ slot 4/5 AB/AB >slot 4 -----M7516-------- (empty) slot 7/6 AB/AB >slot 5 -----M7555-------- ------M7546------ slot 8/9 AB/AB >slot 6 (empty) ---Dilog sq703a--- This was the smaller BA23? if so then the slot next to the m7516 is the bus grant break and the slot 6 empty is a bus grant break. Notice my margin comments. the odd ordering of slots 4-9 indicate direction of bus grant for Interrupts and DMA. >The uVAX used to contain a Serial concentrator or something That was likely a DHV11 or DZV11, worth having. >I've gathered that the first 4 slots are different from the rest of >the BA123, those beeing true Qbus 22 slots. Not quite. It's the AB/CD vs AB/AB serpentine bus grant. The BA123 has more of the AB/CD slots than BA23. FYI: AB are address/data Q22 and CD or special bussed for memory or cards that only need power. > Should I rearrange the boards ? If so what do you suggest? Yes. slot 1 AB/CD >slot 1 ----------------M 7606------------------ slot 2 AB/CD >slot 2 ----------------M 7609------------------ slot 3 AB/CD >slot 3 ----------------M 7609------------------ slot 4/5 AB/AB >slot 4 -----M7516-------- ------m7546------ slot 7/6 AB/AB >slot 5 -----M7555-------- ------sq703A------ slot 8/9 AB/AB >slot 6 (empty) (empty) Allison

26 years, 3 months

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[ClassicCMP] Heath H89 diskette request

by allisonp＠world.std.com

>On Sun, Apr 09, 2000 at 03:24:06PM -0400, allisonp wrote: >> >All H-89's were sold in kit form. The H-88 is another story. These were >> >early all in one computers and did have 8080 CPU's in the beginning. Most >> >H-88 units were upgrades to the H-19 terminals. >> >> Wrong! the H88 was the diskless version of the h89 and was z80. The h8x >> were all z80. The basic design was H19 terminal with an additional Z80 >> based card (with peripherals on ad in cards). > >Which part is wrong, that it's an upgrade from the H19, or that it's >substantially different from the H89? I'm pretty sure I remember Heath >selling an H19-to-H89 upgrade kit, but I dunno where the H88 fits in. That there was an 8080 in some versions. The H8 was the 8080 machine. There was an h19 to h88/89/90 upgrade and that was the cpu, PS and IO. The base H8x was a h19 with those added items. In many ways it was not unlike a Vt180 approach. Aquired two H89s and gave them away. Kept the H19 I built in 1978. Allison

26 years, 3 months

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[ClassicCMP] Heath H89 diskette request

by allisonp＠world.std.com

>All H-89's were sold in kit form. The H-88 is another story. These were >early all in one computers and did have 8080 CPU's in the beginning. Most >H-88 units were upgrades to the H-19 terminals. Wrong! the H88 was the diskless version of the h89 and was z80. The h8x were all z80. The basic design was H19 terminal with an additional Z80 based card (with peripherals on ad in cards). All of the H/Z series are related and part of the changes reflects Heath to Zenith transistion. The 88/89/90 were the same base machine with different features namely different memory configs and disk subsystems. Allison

26 years, 3 months

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[ClassicCMP] Heath H89 diskette request

by KB9VU＠aol.com

In a message dated 4/9/00 13:16:27 Central Daylight Time, ard(a)p850ug1.demon.co.uk writes: > An H/Z88 is a cassette-based system. It's a Z19 terminal with a Z80 CPU > board and a cassette interface. I don't know if the 3-port serial board > came in this machine or not. Although it's based on the Z19 terminal, > many machines were sold as H88 computers, etc, and were not > field-upgraded Z19s (although that was possible). The H-19 to H-88 kits changed later to H-19 to H-89 kits. I built both. After the Floppy controller (Hard Sector) was released, the upgrade kits could be ordered with the Floppy interface. Both my H-19 to H-88 kits came with the serial card. Not sure when the H-88 disappeared from the line up though. The last H-89 I built was an "A". The CPU and TLB's came with RFI shields on them. I still have that one. Runs a 4 MHz Z-80, Magnolia CP/M 2.2 and 3.0, Magnolia 128K RAM drive, Magnolia 5"/8" floppy Controller and the Magnolia Serial/SASI board. It still is a nice machine. Power supply upgrades were also included. Mike Stover, KB9VU CCA# 404 CRA# 77 MARS AFA3BO Florissant, MO

26 years, 3 months

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[ClassicCMP] Heath H89 diskette request

by KB9VU＠aol.com

In a message dated 4/9/00 13:16:27 Central Daylight Time, ard(a)p850ug1.demon.co.uk writes: > As I understand it, an H?? is a Heathkit, and came in kit form. Actually, > the CPU and terminal logic boards were factory assembled/tested, and you > only got to assembly the PSU, video board and case :-(. The Z?? is a > Zenith, and came assembled. You also got to assemble the Serial card and the HS Floppy controller. Mike Stover, KB9VU CCA# 404 CRA# 77 MARS AFA3BO Florissant, MO

26 years, 3 months

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Panic: Memory Address Alignment

by pete＠dunnington.u-net.com

On Apr 9, 14:32, Technoid(a)cheta.net wrote: > Now my last and only problem is that BOTH of my sun keyboards (type 4) > work well but BOTH of my optical mice have one led that DON'T LIGHT. > Working on this one. Also I don't have a mousepad but I think I can > construct one while I wait to find one. Are you sure about that? One of the LEDs is an infrared LED, with no output in the visible range. > I have had difficulties locating pinouts and other tech info on the mouse. > Any suggestions? ftp://ftp.ececs.uc.edu/pub/sun-faq/Docs/FixingASunMouse Also worth a look is the section on converting a Sun optical mouse to an SGI mouse, in http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Pines/2258/4dfaq.html -- Pete Peter Turnbull Dept. of Computer Science University of York

26 years, 3 months

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[ClassicCMP] Heath H89 diskette request

by KB9VU＠aol.com

In a message dated 4/9/00 16:55:02 Central Daylight Time, allisonp(a)world.std.com writes: > >All H-89's were sold in kit form. The H-88 is another story. These were > >early all in one computers and did have 8080 CPU's in the beginning. Most > >H-88 units were upgrades to the H-19 terminals. > > > Wrong! the H88 was the diskless version of the h89 and was z80. The h8x > were all z80. The basic design was H19 terminal with an additional Z80 > based card (with peripherals on ad in cards). > > > All of the H/Z series are related and part of the changes reflects Heath to > Zenith transistion. The 88/89/90 were the same base machine with different > features namely different memory configs and disk subsystems. > > Allison > > Yep, I misspoke. Thinking H-8 and talking H-88. Thanks for the correction. Mike Stover, KB9VU

26 years, 3 months

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[ClassicCMP] Heath H89 diskette request

by KB9VU＠aol.com

You said it better than I could Tony. Mike Stover, KB9VU CCA# 404 CRA# 77 MARS AFA3BO Florissant, MO

26 years, 3 months

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Dec at Home (was: Re: !Re: Nuke Redmond!

by allisonp＠world.std.com

>DEC ended up dumping some of their early micros on their own employees. >The used market was flooded with VT180s and PDT-11/150s for a while there, >as a result. But presumably the employees got special pricing, so it's >probably not fair to count them as real live sales to private individuals, >since they had special incentives. They were initally available with incentives, later they were cheap at end of product and then when internal use was phased out then were retired and often given away. Got my my systems by the later means while there. Allison

26 years, 3 months

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OT: NASA programming (was: Re: !Re: Nuke Redmond!)

by mtapley＠swri.edu

Richard Erlacher said, >The conventional wisdom where NASA is concerned, is that they HAD high >standards through the Apollo program and that shortly thereafter, a lot of >people left and apparently took vital talents with them. I've not worked >directly with NASA people in a very long time, and can't agree or disagree >with that view. I'm working at NASA right this very minute. I think it's pretty much impossible to categorize "NASA" as a single monolithic coding entity. Here at GSFC, there's one group running the ground system that is very conscientious and writes good code, with input checks, comments, version control, descriptive variable names, etc., and properly tests the code before running it for real. Then there's another group where their acceptance test run of the code (which I observed) gave a list of internal tests, all saying "passed". But when I asked exactly what each test did, it turned out that *half* of them did nothing other than print up the word "passed". This was flight code, btw, and they had not told us of any plans to upgrade it. It's better now, and fortunately is not critical to the mission in any case. But the bottom line is that even within a single NASA field center, there's a *lot* of variation. - Mark

26 years, 3 months

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!Re: Nuke Redmond!

by allisonp＠world.std.com

>Yes, KO thought the DEC product line should be marketed to professionals. >However, at the time, the people to whom a computer product had to be >marketed was the hobbyists. It had been amply demonstrated that, no matter >how marginally it fit, the personal computer as marketed to hobbyists would >"do" in place of the supermini, with the trend toward distributed processing PCs were useful in that they were local and flexible. reliability was hard to come by with them. >spreading wildly, while no one could replace the 1000 or so PC's that cost >what a supermini cost with a supermini. Professionals were, themselves, True, by '87 the price/perfomance crossover for the individual user was comming around. >facility where my neighbor works. Their Pro-380 didn't do so well next to >PC's costing less than half what they did. The high cost of DEC software >licenses didn't help either. By time the Pro380 hit, it was too late. Still it had things that PCs were trying to do often not well. The license issue was costly but we are paying for the alternative still. >About 15 years ago, I was put in the position of demonstrating that a >cluster of '386 PC's would outperform a custer of microVAXen in a given >environment. What brought down the house was by how much they outdid them. I did the same thing using z80s. What the vax did better was network, do general applications and groupware. It was (even as a cluster) and still is far easier to manage than 40 W95 PCs and 3 NTservers! I never achieved the generalized performance of a vax even with multiple z80s. >I was not nearly as sure of myself about that comparison as I had been in >the previous SCSI/ESDI comparison. In fact, because of the substantially >more efficient use of mass storage in the DEC MSCP, I expected that the PC's >would be I/O bound to their single hard drive, while the uVAX with a drive >pair could operate much faster. There's quite a difference between what >they can do and what they will do, I guess. I found I could bring a PC to it's knees IO wise faster than a loaded vax and when the PC folded it wasn't graceful... still isn't under MS anything. On the otherhand I've tuned vaxen and there are tricks that PCs still haven't learned. Try running multiple MSPC and mutiple SCSI controllers say two of each with one spindle per... then Qbus is the limiting element. PCs of the era of Qbus were ISA16 and they could never stand two EDSI and two SCSI controlled in the same box, assuming you could get Win3.1 to even install them. Of course the 8-10 mhz bus was the bottleneck and the controllers were not smart at all if they even had DMA. Reminds me of the guy at citicorp in 1990 telling me his 386dx/33 could crush the VAX750 (no racehorse). I wasn't impressed. He stopped making the claim of superiority when I asked when the last reboot was due to a crash. Seems the vax was an unattended server with 1yr 3months uptime and was also used to serve out his local PC database. Comparisons are like many thing statisical... mostly point reference. Allison My $02 on PCs is Linux/FreeBSD/netbsd was the best thing to happen to PC hardware as it was the first OS with some semblence of performance and concept of operational stability. If there is anything worng with PC vs VAX comparison is often the vax compared is nowhere near bleeding edge and the PC is. Then again the VAXs in question had more uptime than the PCs time in production. Also the VAX (running any OS of choice) had better IO buffering than most very highend PCs until the early 90s.

26 years, 3 months

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Sun Mouse

by mcguire＠neurotica.com

On April 9, Technoid(a)cheta.net wrote: > My sun mice only have one led lit per mouse. There should be two lit as > there is obviously a second led that is not. Any suggestions on repair or > replacement of the mouse. The box is perfect! -- It's normal to see only one LED lit...the other is infrared... -Dave McGuire

26 years, 3 months

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[ClassicCMP] Heath H89 diskette request

by KB9VU＠aol.com

In a message dated 2/6/00 15:25:49 Central Standard Time, west(a)tseinc.com writes: > > Mike > Thanks for the tip! > > Hey, I haven't got a chance to go through the stuff yet. Tell me, are these > H89/90's or Z89/90's?? Isn't the different an 8080cpu vs. Z80? > Just found this note Jay. All H-89's and Z-89's have the Z80 processor installed. The H-8 computers came with the 8080 installed. The Early H-89's had an ORG 0 problem with CP/M but none of yours have that problem ... they have all be modified. The Z-90 series came with the soft sector card installed from the factory. All H-89's were sold in kit form. The H-88 is another story. These were early all in one computers and did have 8080 CPU's in the beginning. Most H-88 units were upgrades to the H-19 terminals. How are you coming with your treasure trove of old H/Z stuff? I did find some more software and a few other spare parts. They are here whenever you holler. Mike Stover, KB9VU CCA# 404 CRA# 77 MARS AFA3BO Florissant, MO

26 years, 3 months

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Dec at Home (was: Re: !Re: Nuke Redmond!

by mcguire＠neurotica.com

On April 9, Charles P. Hobbs (SoCalTip) wrote: > Sort of speaking of which: did anyone ever buy any DEC equipment for home > use (Not VAXen and stuff, I'm more thinking about their PC's such as the > Rainbow?) When I was in my teens (1985 or so) I worked in a retail computer store in a mall. We carried original IBM PCs, Apple clones made by Franklin, Kaypros, and...DEC Rainbows & Pros. I only saw a few of them sell...but they did sell. -Dave McGuire

26 years, 3 months

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Dec at Home (was: Re: !Re: Nuke Redmond!

by allisonp＠world.std.com

>Sort of speaking of which: did anyone ever buy any DEC equipment for home >use (Not VAXen and stuff, I'm more thinking about their PC's such as the >Rainbow?) Yes. PDT150, low cost (then) PDP-11 running RT-11. Robin, VT180 CPM system. DECMATE series (wordprocessing with extensions) Rainbow PRO3xx All pre-PC boom or leading into that time. Keep in mind that the idea of home computer was a 1984-5ish or later event. Before that marketing was more aimed at hobbiests(anything), lowcost home systems(mostly gaming) and business systems (packaged or extensible systems). As a reference in 1985 a good business system was a $5-7000 (USD) investment. It didn't make much difference if it was PC, S100, Multibus or whatever. Around then things we take for granted were not cheap. In 85 10-40mb of disk with controller was ~$700, decent printer $400+ and so on. For example in 1981 my NS* Horizon (z80 64k) with 5mb hard disk, H19 terminal, Anadex printer was valued around $3700! A PC with all the trimings to do the same task was not cheaper. Allison

26 years, 3 months

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!Re: Nuke Redmond!

by allisonp＠world.std.com

>Your defense is unnecessary, since it's only by coincidence that I happened No defense, more a commentary on how much fun language can be. >This particular expression is use so much without a thought as to its actual >meaning. I'm not entirely certain how the term slough became associated >with an indeterminate but large number, but that seems to be what is meant. >I guess it started with someone referring to ducks or frogs or mosquitoes. There is that. My experience is the term "slew rate" commonly associated with op-amps. Now the common use, slew meaning a whole lot of them is more in the realm of slang and something I am accustomed to. So the juxtapostion of delta, large quantiry and also quagmire in that statement was subtle good humor. Then again I enjoy Samual Clements and his style of writing as well. Allison

26 years, 3 months

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!Re: Nuke Redmond!

by pete＠dunnington.u-net.com

On Apr 8, 10:13, Richard Erlacher wrote: > ----- Original Message ----- > From: Sean 'Captain Napalm' Conner <spc(a)armigeron.com> > > The project he's on is a complete disaster as the manager went for a > > Microsoft solution using slews of programs > BTW, your apparent juxtaposition of one word for its homomymn, and it > happens all too often with this particular one. There's this term, > pronounced "sloo" which is often misspelled "slew" but which should be > "slough" also pronounced "sloo" meaning a swamp or quagmire. Eh? Perhaps American pronunciation differs, but over here "slough" (meaning swamp) is pronounced to rhyme with "plough" ('plow') :-) Anyway, "slew" means "large number or quantity" [Oxford English Dictionary], which I'm sure is what Sean means... On the other hand, "slough" pronounced "sluff" means dead tissue that drops off from living flesh. Given the context... -- Pete Peter Turnbull Dept. of Computer Science University of York

26 years, 3 months

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Dallas module battery replacement...

by ethan_dicks＠yahoo.com

--- Aaron Christopher Finney <af-list(a)wfi-inc.com> wrote: > That's exactly what my friend did - ground away *carefully* with a dremel > until it was exposed. > > Jeff (Technoid) on this list mentioned in the Sun NVRAM thread that he'd > done this successfully...maybe he's got some practical advice for you. > On Sat, 8 Apr 2000, Tony Duell wrote: > > > > > > > Hi, > > > > > > Heard of few getting into theirs to hook into a new battery when > > > the old battery expired. I have done this on a 48T02 for my SPARC2. I did it at one end of the chip and I cut *through* the leads going up to the battery to disconnect it from the SRAM entirely. After I exposed the leads, I soldered on a 9V battery cable which I snapped onto a 9V battery top (removed from a dead battery), into which I soldered a 3V lithium battery that had solder leads already bonded to it (scavenged from a dead board of some kind). I placed all the active bits in a small ziploc baggie for insulation and closed up the case. I do have a replacement 48T02 on order ($15 from Mouser), but for now, I'm running. -ethan ===== Even though my old e-mail address is no longer going to vanish, please note my new public address: erd(a)iname.com The original webpage address is still going away. The permanent home is: http://penguincentral.com/ See http://ohio.voyager.net/ for details. __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Talk to your friends online with Yahoo! Messenger. http://im.yahoo.com

26 years, 3 months

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!Re: Nuke Redmond!

by allisonp＠world.std.com

> Since I only have v1.1 to examine and it doesn't have a DR notice, >maybe that's why there's a v1.1 :-). Exactly! That is why I said V1.0. finding a copy of 1.0 is the challenge. There are other signatures. Check the bytes following all the RET instructions. as there were some funnies there. Keep in mind you have to look in the BDOS for all this as the BIOS is customer code and the CCP is also modifyable. In DOS most of that is embedded in the command.com. Allison

26 years, 3 months

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no chars on uVAX console

by allisonp＠world.std.com

>> This was the smaller BA23? if so then the slot next to the m7516 is the >> bus grant break >I Thought on the BA123-bus the first 4 quad slots had an AB/CD >configuration but I'll try this one. See the excerpted comment from the earlier message. The BA23 and BA123 differ in the number of Q/CD slots with the BA123 having more. Allison

26 years, 3 months

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succes on the uVAX II

by allisonp＠world.std.com

Remember HELP is not always organized as expected. So finding exactly what you need is not always obvious. Allison

26 years, 3 months

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Where o where?

by dogas＠leading.net

I'm looking for a good spot to call home for my classiccmp related web pages (lotsa images&scans). I'd love to get it all under ARSDigitia ala http://photo.net but last time I checked, it required a Sun/AOLServer/Oracle trinity, so a few megabytes and a cool name will do... Oh yeah, free would be nice too. ;) Any suggestions? Thanks - Mike: dogas(a)leading.net

26 years, 3 months

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Kennedy 96xx takeup arm

by wilson＠dbit.dbit.com

I don't *think* this is OT, I don't see any IC date codes newer than '89... Is anyone here familiar with the inner workings of a Kennedy 9662 tape drive? FWIW, I think the 9610/9612/9660/9662 are all essentially the same drive, depending on the combination of {rack mount vs. table top} and {Pertec vs. SCSI}. My problem is, the drive keeps giving "TAK ARM?" errors, which according to the manual, means there's some problem with the takeup arm (i.e. the motor-driven arm which has the takeup pulley on it). I've been all through the manual section on how to adjust the various relevant sensors and I *think* I've got it more or less happy. I fiddled with the height of the capacitive disk thingy (which evidently is what encodes the arm position for the on-board micro), it was way off but now I'm getting more or less the voltage spread that the manual asks for and the "zero" position does give 0.0V. But I'm totally stuck with what to do next, partly because there are some differences between my drive and what's in the manual. The manual claims that there's a mechanical limit adjustment, but there's nothing in the area where the arrow points (it's not even visible on their sketch so I don't know what they mean here). The cam that drives the micro switch to set the limit of arm travel is nothing like what's in the book, I've been dinking with its set screw trying to move the limit one way or the other but the same mechanism seems to be what drives the *actual* mechanical limit (there's one peg which pushes another) and I don't seem to have independent control over them -- maybe that's on purpose since the manual wants the switch limit set a fixed angle past the mechanical limit (I would think they'd want it the other way around though???). Anyway I have no idea what to do next, is this familiar territory for any of you folks? FWIW the drive gave the same message when I first got it, but after I randomly poked and prodded around the takeup arm a bit it magically started working. So of course I'm suspicious that the actual problem is just a flakey connector or something (I've wiggled them all again) and not the mechanical adjustment at all, although as I say the range that the encoder was giving was all wrong. Unless it's actually my manual that's all wrong. I'd really like to bring this thing back to live, it was a wonderful tape drive. Thanks, John Wilson D Bit

26 years, 3 months

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My NEC APC is working

by dastar＠siconic.com

Y'all may recall I wrote a couple weeks back about needing an NEC APC to try to read these disks that a geophysicist sent me so Guatemala can find all their precious resources. Fast forward a few weeks: I spent an hour or so digging around my warehouse and managed to locate and then extricate the NEC APC I had. Tonight I finally got around to checking it out again (I got it over 4 years ago and when I played with it then I couldn't get anything to come up on it). Well tonight I was fiddling with it and realized the brightness knob was turned all the way down. It turns out this thing works after all! The system came with 2 disks in the drives when I received it. One in the A drive is labeled "SYS" and the other in the B drive something else, it's not important, since the system is trying to boot from A. When I first turn it on, the upper lefthand corner of the screen shows "[LOD]" and the disk light comes on. Actually, there are two red LEDs per drive. The bottom light is always on, and it seems when it's reading a disk the top one turns on. It tries the A drive and then displays "[LOD C]" and momentarily accesses the B drive. Then I get "[LER]". So I need to know what this all means. I'm assuming that either the disks are bad or the drive heads are dirty. Of course there may be something worse going on but I'm an optimist (mostly). So I could use the following if you've got it: a) information from the system manuals that explain the boot process. I've got the manuals but there is no way in hell I'd be able to find them without a full-scale re-organization of my warehouse, which I hope to do in my lifetime but definitely don't have the time for right now. b) a known good copy of a system disk. This is an NEC APC model APC-H02. The floppies are 8". Any help will be greatly appreciated and if we are successful with getting the data off you will be given credit for your assistance!! Remember, goats and village women! As ever, please reply directly to me as I am not subscribed to ClassicCmp. sellam(a)vintage.org Sellam International Man of Intrigue and Danger ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Looking for a six in a pile of nines... VCF Europe: April 29th & 30th, Munich, Germany VCF Los Angeles: Summer 2000 (*TENTATIVE*) VCF East: Planning in Progress See http://www.vintage.org for details!

26 years, 3 months

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succes on the uVAX II

by sipke＠wxs.nl

finally success !!! With only the CPU and the memory boards and the RDQ3 in the system I was able to boot into VMS 5.5. Had to reboot with "b /1" and "set uafalternate 1" to circumvent the login but it worked. Now let's start some serious learning about VMS ;-) Tomorrow we'll see about the other boards and the batteries are propably gone but those things seem manageble now thanx everyone for the help sipke

26 years, 3 months

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Freebies & Others

by kyrrin＠bluefeathertech.com

I'm CC'ing this to classiccmp and port-vax because what I have is pertinent to anyone using rackmount hardware (or VME boards). Both items are LOCAL PICKUP ONLY, Kent, Washington (southeast of Seattle). NON-FREEBIE... Asking $50.00 or best offer. Five-foot tall enclosed equipment rack for 19" hardware. Cosmetically OK, some scratching of the paint, no dents or drops that I can see. Rails front and back are pre-drilled and tapped for standard 10-32 screws. Has 'wiremold' brand plug strip mounted along one side to the rear, and a humongous (12" at least) cooling fan in the bottom. Said fan draws air through a removable/cleanable aluminum-mesh filter on the bottom/front, then blows it up from the bottom of the cabinet. It's noisy, but it moves a load of air! The power cord for said fan was frayed and cracking, so I cut it off. Can be easily replaced. It's on wheels, and includes a magnetic-latch rear door. Black/Light Tan color scheme. -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- FREE TO A GOOD HOME... Charles River Data Systems VME Chassis, Rackmount (std. 19"), with slides. Eight-slot, if I recall correctly, big beefy power supply, plenty of I/O connectors, and space to mount hard drives (5.25 or 3.5, your choice). Heck, I think I may even have the key for the keyswitch up front. If you buy the rack, and then decide you want the chassis, great. If not, said chassis is a first-come, first-served freebie. Thanks much! -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Bruce Lane, Owner and head honcho, Blue Feather Technologies http://www.bluefeathertech.com // E-mail: kyrrin(a)bluefeathertech.com Amateur Radio: WD6EOS since Dec. '77 "Our science can only describe an object, event, or living thing in our own human terms. It cannot, in any way, define any of them..."

26 years, 3 months

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OT: Need Sun Electric Corp product tech info.

by cfandt＠netsync.net

Yes, decidedly off topic but I intend for this msg to be the initial contact for answers to my questions. This shall be discussed further off-list, not here. I hope there are one or more folks who read this who've worked on or at least been around old time race cars which used Sun Tachometers and have an answer to the following: I'm trying to restore a Sun Tachometer Transmitter for a friend who's furiously trying to finish his 1953-vintage Kurtis Kraft race car restoration project before the upcoming AACA show season. It is a magneto-type ignition system and he's found a used Transmitter. Model number is EB37, MAGneto type and it is hung off a Ford Flathead V8. There are two batteries mounted inside the unit, obviously because often race cars with magneto ignition have no need of a battery whether it be 6V or 12V. They _look_ like NiCd cells, maybe 600-800 mAh capacity, but I'm not 100% sure. This unit is from back in the late 1950's and has a "1058" rubber-stamped in orange ink on the back of the case - I suspect Oct, 1958. Would anybody be able to confirm if these are indeed NiCd cells? Reason I'm not sure is I haven't found when NiCd batteries actually came into use and I believe they are a 60's invention, not 50's which this Sun unit evidently dates to. If not NiCd, what are they? Thanks for your time! Regards, Chris -- -- Christian Fandt, Electronic/Electrical Historian Jamestown, NY USA cfandt(a)netsync.net Member of Antique Wireless Association URL: http://www.antiquewireless.org/

26 years, 3 months

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Need Sun Electric Corp product tech info.

by allisonp＠world.std.com

>I hope there are one or more folks who read this who've worked on or at >least been around old time race cars which used Sun Tachometers and have an >answer to the following: > >I'm trying to restore a Sun Tachometer Transmitter for a friend who's >furiously trying to finish his 1953-vintage Kurtis Kraft race car >restoration project before the upcoming AACA show season. It is a >magneto-type ignition system and he's found a used Transmitter. Model >number is EB37, MAGneto type and it is hung off a Ford Flathead V8. > >There are two batteries mounted inside the unit, obviously because often >race cars with magneto ignition have no need of a battery whether it be 6V >or 12V. They _look_ like NiCd cells, maybe 600-800 mAh capacity, but I'm >not 100% sure. This unit is from back in the late 1950's and has a "1058" >rubber-stamped in orange ink on the back of the case - I suspect Oct, 1958. They are likely mercury cells, I used to have to find them for the tach(SUN) in the crown Vicki my brother had. common was the 5.8V/250mah. >Would anybody be able to confirm if these are indeed NiCd cells? Reason I'm >not sure is I haven't found when NiCd batteries actually came into use and >I believe they are a 60's invention, not 50's which this Sun unit evidently Nicads are quite old. Though the common form on the 50s-60s was the wet cells that looked like lead acid. They were also available as hermetic (well sorta) then and not cheap. Allison

26 years, 3 months

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!Re: Nuke Redmond!

by allisonp＠world.std.com

>>just an OBTW: I use QB45, if someone didn't take the minor effort to >>complie to an .EXE >>and instead used BRUN.... well they did their own disservice. >> >>Allison > >I don't think the MS qbasic for the mac ever offered a option to compile. >Basically nothing that was done with the package will run past about OS 7.1 >if that, so if it was just being stupid, everybody was. Good reason to keep >a few old macs around to play the old games etc. My fault, I assumed it was PC and dos world. I have no clue on MACs and can almost recognize one 2:3 tries. Allison

26 years, 3 months

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!Re: Nuke Redmond!

by allisonp＠world.std.com

>On Sat, Apr 08, 2000 at 12:18:23AM -0700, Mike Ford wrote: >> I was speaking in reference only to MicroSoft QuickBasic, and quite a few >> people were more than miffed when MS pulled the plug on it since the >> applications they wrote depended on a runtime module from MS. And yes I just an OBTW: I use QB45, if someone didn't take the minor effort to complie to an .EXE and instead used BRUN.... well they did their own disservice. Allison

26 years, 3 months

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Heathkit/Zenith H-110 (Z-100)

by KB9VU＠aol.com

In a message dated 4/8/00 12:48:11 Central Daylight Time, pryor(a)wi.net writes: > Mike, > I'll repeat my offer of $100 if you still have this stuff. > Jim Jim - also, I travel almost every week so let me know when you plan to pick up. Make sure you have room for all the books and other junk. The only item I can't find is the 8" drive. Probably went with the H-89 stuff I sold last month. Know anyone that is looking for an H-89? I found another one while I was cleaning off shelves. Mike Stover, KB9VU CCA# 404 MARS AFA3BO Florissant, MO

26 years, 3 months

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Heathkit/Zenith H-110 (Z-100)

by KB9VU＠aol.com

In a message dated 4/8/00 12:48:11 Central Daylight Time, pryor(a)wi.net writes: > Mike, > I'll repeat my offer of $100 if you still have this stuff. > Jim > > OK Jim - come get it. Mike Mike Stover, KB9VU CCA# 404 MARS AFA3BO Florissant, MO

26 years, 3 months

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Heathkit/Zenith H-110 (Z-100)

by KB9VU＠aol.com

I have an operational H/Z-110 low profile computer with the Zenith Color monitor. Unit has dual hard drives and a floppy installed internally. MB is the last revision produced and has 768K loaded. The optional Gemini card to run PCDOS (IBM) native programs is also installed. Outboard Zenith 8" floppy drive in the factory enclosure. Original User Manuals, Technical Manuals and Service Manual set with all service bulletins included. ZDOS, MSDOS version 2, CP/M-80, CP/M-86 operating systems. Several applications software items including Wordstar, Multiplan, Condor, and others (15 original 3 ring binder documentation sets) and other user software totalling over 200 5.25" disks. $150 for the whole lot. Pick up in the St. Louis area. I need to get this system out of the way and into a new home for someone to use. Help! Thanks Mike Stover, Florissant, MO

26 years, 3 months

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no chars on uVAX console

by CLASSICCMP＠trailing-edge.com

>Running Telemate as a terminal program i cannot set Hardware >flowcontrol on cause it tells me that CTS=off (baud = 4800) Hardware flow control? Gack. You want absolutely no hardware flow control, you want software flow control (XON/XOFF) only. My favorite terminal emulator for a PC-clone box is MS-Kermit, available for free >from ftp://kermit.columbia.edu/ , and this will do the job quite nicely. -- Tim Shoppa Email: shoppa(a)trailing-edge.com Trailing Edge Technology WWW: http://www.trailing-edge.com/ 7328 Bradley Blvd Voice: 301-767-5917 Bethesda, MD, USA 20817 Fax: 301-767-5927

26 years, 3 months

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!Re: Nuke Redmond!

by rcini＠msn.com

From: "Sean 'Captain Napalm' Conner" <spc(a)armigeron.com> and the Great Richard Erlacher once stated: > > Tim Patterson, who wrote the initial version of MS-DOS while at Seattle > > Products, may have had access to CP/M sources since Seattle Products sol d > > CP/M systems and they were working on an 8086 based computer in the late > > 70s. Tim probably modeled his QDOS (Quick-n-Dirty Operating System) clo sely > > after CP/M (some say he may have mechanically translated CP/M since > > copyright statements to Digital Research have allegedly been found in MS -DOS > > 1.x but I haven't seen any). Why not? It would have been a quick and e asy > > way to get an OS for the 8086 system up and running. > > I've heard that, too. Does that mean that anyone who writes a program to do > what he's seen another program do is making a copy? >>> Ask the lawyers or philosophers. I have a copy of DOS 1.1 that I've done a Sourcer disassembly of. I have not found anything referring to DR or CP/M anywhere in the resulting source. Now, one thought that I had is that there may be a sequence of code bytes unique to CP/M that was duplicated in DOS (nee, QDOS) by virtue of directly copying the CP/M source. This would produce a unique and identifyable signature. Since I only have v1.1 to examine and it doesn't have a DR notice, maybe that's why there's a v1.1 :-). If anyone has a copy of 1.0 that they can send me to work on, I'll do a book report for y'all... Rich [ Rich Cini [ ClubWin!/CW1 [ MCP Windows 95/Windows Networking [ Collector of "classic" computers [ http://highgate.comm.sfu.ca/~rcini/classiccmp/ <================ reply separator =================>

26 years, 3 months

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no chars on uVAX console

by sipke＠wxs.nl

Digging up some literature on the web about the uVAX II console cable I've ran into some conflicting info: Story I | The MicroVAXII serial console port is: | | 9 pin D with pinout | 1 - grnd | 2,3 - snd, rcv (crossed to terminal for partial null modem) | 8 to 9 - shorted together | (I think, I don't have a manual handy. If I'm wrong would someone please | correct me.) Story II |The pinout is a bit strange: |DE-9 (DEC) DB-25 (PC) |1 1 |2 3 |3 2 |4 5 |5 6 |6 20 |7 7 |8 -\ |9 -/ (short 8 & 9) together I have made the latter cable but adapted it to a 9 pin PC-serial connector and I am pretty certain it is wired ok. Running Telemate as a terminal program i cannot set Hardware flowcontrol on cause it tells me that CTS=off (baud = 4800) I get no characters on the terminal when I startup uVAX (BA123). It sounds like the HD's restore OK and the little display at the bulkhead says C after first showing a few other characters. Pressing the restart/run button seems to have some effect because I can see a few leds on the TQK50 blink for an instance (The box is open but the cabinet-open switch is taped into the on position) What's is wrong ? Does anyone have a clue

26 years, 3 months

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!Re: Nuke Redmond!

by allisonp＠world.std.com

>DOS and Windoze (aka kluge of the month club). CP/M I seem to remember only >got to 2.2. MS-DOS got to 6.22, and gosh knows how many kluges there will the CPM line I remember is: Dates are appoximate. 1.3 1976 1.4 1977 2.0 (2.2 released) 1980 MPM 1981 3.0 (aka cpm+) 1982 CPnet 1983 Allison

26 years, 3 months

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OT: Netpliance at InternetWorld

by af-list＠wfi-inc.com

Hi, I'm just back from InternetWorld, where I had a funny iOpener experience... They had a unit embedded in the front face of a refrigerator (touch-screen) at their display booth. At the end of the spokesmodel's little presentation (and I emphasize the word model - what all those beautiful women have to do with computers is beyond me), I couldn't resist tossing out, "Yeah, that's cool, but can you hack it to run Linux?" I must have been the 10,000th person to ask that day because she just snapped and started yelling at me, "will you people leave us alone about this! Jesus!" But it was too late...some other guy yelled, "yeah, but hurry and buy one before they pour epoxy in the back of it..." Cheers, Aaron

26 years, 3 months

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!Re: Nuke Redmond!

by allisonp＠world.std.com

>Since MUCH fewer than 1% of the people who use MS products are engagedin >activity which would make them aware of the differences and similarities >between MS-DOS and CP/M if they knew both OS' I'd have to say the internals >are really never going to be part of a legal argument. Most judges, after >all, don't write their own programs. Be aware that the judge did decide and MS was in trouble. In reality similar and copied were the issues then. User interfaces are less protected. I live in both worlds, both user and systems designer/programmer. So I have an appreciation of both sets of issues. To me MS makes both sides of the coin harder as it's hard to program defensively from an OS that eats itself while calling itself protected. Though I am finding NT4 a vast improvement. Allison

26 years, 3 months

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!Re: Nuke Redmond!

by allisonp＠world.std.com

>class) machines; hind sight and all that. And I'm not even saying it was >wrong for Tim Patterson to model the OS calls after CP/M. After all, that's >what he knew. Ahem, pattern after? it was wholesale copy of CPM1.3 lofted to 8086 after which the ALLOC code was replaced with FAT. (saved buffer space in ram) > I would say that the roots of MS-DOS 1.x are entirely in CP/M, while with >2.x the influence of other operating systems (notably Unix) start to show This is very true. Mostly because of the copying that was done. DOS 2.0 had to have similar functionality and yet be different plus CPM and DOS 1.0 lacked some needed features seen in VMS, UNIX, and others. >up. Then again, CP/M wasn't created wholecloth either, it had roots from >RT-11 (I think that's the OS), which Gary Kildall had experience with. True but the user appearance is only similar, the internal differences are significant. (Actually it was TOPS10 and OS/8) but they differ even more. >> I've heard that, too. Does that mean that anyone who writes a program to do >> what he's seen another program do is making a copy? > > Ask the lawyers or philosophers. > >> You're not even sure he >> actually saw and read the source code. How many programmers do you know >> who'd simply copy someone else's work in a case like this? Everybody wants >> to leave his own mark. By then most everyone had disassembled CPM and it was a trivial task as it was only 3.5k of 8080 code! Legit copies were even available to some people. Also there were clones of CPM (P2dos for example) and Turbodos. Allison

26 years, 3 months

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!Re: Nuke Redmond!

by mbg＠world.std.com

>DEC lives in my heart forever. I bleed DEC Vax blue and PDP11 >Magenta (sorry LCG guys... no China Red). Same here... I've been to the mill a few times since DEC sold it... I never go there without my original DEC badge... Megan Gentry Former RT-11 Developer +--------------------------------+-------------------------------------+ | Megan Gentry, EMT/B, PP-ASEL | Internet (work): gentry!zk3.dec.com | | Unix Support Engineering Group | (home): mbg!world.std.com | | Compaq Computer Corporation | addresses need '@' in place of '!' | | 110 Spitbrook Rd. ZK03-2/T43 | URL: http://world.std.com/~mbg/ | | Nashua, NH 03062 | "pdp-11 programmer - some assembler | | (603) 884 1055 | required." - mbg | +--------------------------------+-------------------------------------+

26 years, 3 months

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!Re: Nuke Redmond!

by mcguire＠neurotica.com

On April 7, Huw Davies wrote: > > I heard that DEC is making PCs and laptops these days that come bundled > > with Windows. > > Unless I'm sadly mistaken, DEC no longer exists. So they got bought. I can still pick up the phone and order a VAX or an Alpha...and get a damn good machine. As long as I can do that, DEC exists. -Dave McGuire

26 years, 3 months

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!Re: Nuke Redmond!

by allisonp＠world.std.com

>Try running Wordperfects Drawperfect 2.0 even today unde DOS 7.0 without >adequate FCBS (min: FCBS=2,0 in config.sys) and it won't work. > >FCBS are still among us, like the rudimentary footbones in a whale. Big time. I run Champion/dos at work (financial package) under W95 and it don't run unless FCBS=80 (minimum!). I won't say more about Paradox/dos. Allison

26 years, 3 months

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!Re: Nuke Redmond!

by allisonp＠world.std.com

>SCP and Micros~1 had had prior dealings, including sharing computer faire >booths, etc. In the course of those encounters, Patterson had seen the >F.A.T. structure used in the stand-alone BASIC that Micros~1 peddled to Fat was used in the Z80 basics from MS. Systems of not that had it were TANDY, NCR, NEC and a few others of the z80/cpm world. Side tidbit... 8086/88 part was available around 1978 (late) and systems using it were around in 1979. S100 and other systems were starting to build on it by late 1979 and DRI was late with CPM86. Hence the 8085/8088 boards for S100 and the other machine like rainbow that had z80/8088. There was at least on OS that ran on 8086/8 before DOS and that was a IRMX and I think ISIS-II as well. Allison

26 years, 3 months

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