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

by jwest＠classiccmp.org

A system I have always wanted (spent much of my career working on) has finally been acquired. A Prime (Pr1me) model 2250 aka "rabbit". The cpu chassis is in the foreground. I do have the bezels (they were removed for shipping). In the background you can see the rebadged cipher F880 in the same type of rack that will sit next to it. https://www.flickr.com/photos/131070638 at N02/25084207344 I'm told it has two 158mb priams, an ics1, and either 1mb or 2mb ram. Will post more pics when I get around to opening it up. Best, J

10 years, 3 months

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Free file downloads

by sales＠elecplus.com

I just found this download site. It includes drivers, games, etc., and many programs and drivers for Win NT and up, Linux, and Mac. No spyware or crapware, just good files. Maybe not old compared to a lot of posts here, but there are drivers for many very old cards for very old Win systems. http://www.oldergeeks.com/downloads/index.php Cindy --- This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software. https://www.avast.com/antivirus

10 years, 3 months

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tops20 assembly tutorials

by dave＠661.org

Would someone please point me towards a tutorial of some sort on running the assembler on TOPS20 as presented in Mark Crispin's Panda distribution? -- David Griffith dave at 661.org A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail?

10 years, 3 months

4
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Panels Update - Relese Notes 8/e (A and B)

by rodsmallwood52＠btinternet.com

*_Relese Notes 8/e (A and B) Drilling _*1. The keylock hole has been pre drilled to make sure the art work lines up 1.1 This hole has not been beveled inside as the method of doing it has only just been devised and missed the panel run. However the fix is not difficult. A fine grit conical grinding wheel does the job with no damage to the panel. 2. The switch spindle hole has not been predrilled due to the following issue: 2.1 DEC did an ECO to replace the selector switch. Instead of six positions starting at 12 o'clock and steps of 36deg anticlockwise going to 6 o'clock. (A type panel) They used a switch that started at 15deg anti clockwise from top centre (12 o'clock) and that goes in 30deg steps finishing 15deg short of bottom centre (6 o'clock ). Now the hole position no longer lies on the vertical line between top centre and bottom centre. Its offset to the right due to the crossing position having moved due to the change of angle. They then did something strange. They redrew the top and bottom lines between the 15deg position and what would have been the circle crossing point of the original descending vertical line. That made it worse. In the end they just drilled the hole very oversize and hid the line under the skirt of the knob. I only have a key and lamp board for an A type panel so I can't tell if when they changed to the new switch they moved it to the right to take care of the change of angle. So for B type I chose to draw the lines at the correct angles. A switch spindle located at the intersection of the lines would then move through the correct angles You can now drill the hole to suit your spindle position Rod Smallwood

10 years, 3 months

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Panels Update - Shipment Alert

by rodsmallwood52＠btinternet.com

Hi Guys A shipment of PDP-8/e (A and B) panels went out to-day. Tracking numbers will be sent to customers on Monday Next up 8/f and 8/m. New orders for PDP-8/e (A and B) , 8/f and 8/m will be accepted when we have free stock. Rod Smallwood

10 years, 3 months

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OT: lenses (Was: Front Panels - PDP8 and PDP 11

by COURYHOUSE＠aol.com

Hasselblad did not use tessar. tesar was a good lens but certainly not the hi end ed# In a message dated 3/10/2016 8:01:07 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time, mgariboldi at gmail.com writes: 2016-03-10 16:59 GMT+01:00 Zane Healy <healyzh at aracnet.com>: > > > On Mar 9, 2016, at 11:37 PM, Paul Anderson <useddec at gmail.com> wrote: > > > > Popular or Modern Photography 20 or 30 years ago had an article on the 10 > > best lens ever made. I think Zeiss made 3 of them, and they were the only > > company with more than one. > > One of my all time favorite lenses is the Hasselblad 80mm f/2.8 Planar C > lens made by Zeiss. Even their low-end Tessar lenses are awesome. > Anything made for Hasselblad could hardly be called 'low-end'. (A bit like a 'low-end' SGI, there was basically never such a thing... certainly not in terms of original cost.) The only truly low-end Carl Zeiss optics are probably the *Pentacon* series, made by the post-WW II Carl Zeiss Jena branch of the GDR. Take a look at the Sony a7 series of bodies, people are using RTS lenses on > them. You can put almost anything on them, and they?re a full frame > sensor. I know that the wider lenses might have some fringing issues at > the edges. Which (affordable) lens *doesn't* have imperfect edges, especially completely analog lenses without any in-camera digital correction. (This can also be done afterwards, if one knows the possible distortion values.) The Sony a7-series aren't exactly cheap. More affordable and rather good, too, are ?4/3 cameras, especially in conjunction with a focal reducer, if the crop is too much of an obstruction. I gain an extra stop of light, on top of reducing the crop, with my M42/Praktica thread mount lenses. My thorium-coated Asahi Pentax Super-Takumar 1.4/50's maximum diaphragm is effectively widened to an impressive ?/1. On top of that I have in-body image stabilization, good high ISO handling and other features, all at the fraction of the cost. On top of that, I can exchange my lenses with my dedicated ?4/3 Super 16 digital film camera. > I?ve started looking seriously at the a7 series, as it would allow me to > use a lot of lenses I have, that I can currently only use on 35mm film > bodies. > Nothing prevents you from using a full frame lens on a smaller (e.g. APS-C) sensor body. The crop isn't always a negative, sometimes it can change a mediocre tele-photo prime into an excellent one. > Since I started shooting more than just Nikon, it?s a lot harder to find > Nikon lenses I really like. The only AF lens I really like is the Nikkor > 50mm f/1.4G, at f/5.6 it can compete with my 50mm Summicron. > At ?/5.6 only? Well, that's rough... - MG

10 years, 3 months

3
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SimH & Panels: new BlinkenBone release

by j_hoppe＠t-online.de

Hi, the BlinkenBone project made much progress last months. ("BlinkenBone" is this "connect physical and simulated panels to SimH" thing). New features: - a PDP-8/I front panel Java simulation. http://retrocmp.com/projects/blinkenbone/simulated-panels/248-blinkenbone-s… http://retrocmp.com/projects/blinkenbone/simulated-panels/251-blinkenbone-p… The PDP-8/I SimH extension needs validation against a physical machine. - Oscar Vermeulen's PiDP8 can be connected as panel. http://retrocmp.com/projects/blinkenbone/blinkenbone-physical-panels/249-pi… - most Java panels can now be 2400 pixels width (monitors keep growing) - Repackaging: Precompiled distributions at https://github.com/j-hoppe/BlinkenBone/releases There are distributions for Win32, Ubuntu 32/64, and RaspberryPi Raspbian. A single distribution contains now all simulations (PDP-11/40, 11/70, PDP-10 KI10 and PDP-8/I). - Ported from SimH 3.8 to v4.x. I'm back! - Sources on GitHub at https://github.com/j-hoppe/BlinkenBone.git Since the BlinkenBone projects expands beyond expectation, the web doc is completely reordered (== trashed?) Not all content is stable yet and links will float, rely on http://retrocmp.com/projects/blinkenbone at the moment. There's also the shortcut www.blinkenbone.com . As always, error feedback is welcome! have fun, Joerg

10 years, 3 months

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OT: lenses (Was: Front Panels - PDP8 and PDP 11

by COURYHOUSE＠aol.com

I saved one hassie from my photo era before the computer business and after USAF I was a commercial photog. I used ELM's for fashon work and had a couple of cms and a SWC wideangle fixed lens one.... I kept one c w/ 80m mm and a 150 mm and a few backs .... things used to be worth a lot but not so anymore... I may take my c over to the university to add to our SMECC museums tools of the journalist display we have there... Better used there than sitting in my desk drawer at the office...I have a kodak/nikon AP early digital camera I need to take over there too. Pretty funny the reason I got a computer in '79 which led to me getting into the computer biz was to keep a database of photos and transparencies I had for stock photo use. The lure of getting back into electronics and the new era of affordable small computers lured me in ! Ed# _www.smecc.org_ (http://www.smecc.org) In a message dated 3/11/2016 12:07:46 A.M. US Mountain Standard Time, healyzh at aracnet.com writes: > On Mar 10, 2016, at 10:05 PM, COURYHOUSE at aol.com wrote: > > I wonder if the tele tessar was a true tessar design or just a use > of 'the name' ? I have seen snipits in google referring to it being a true > telephoto... with a true tessar formula lens IS NOT. I think it?s based on the Tessar, but is something different from what?s in the Hasselblad manual. The cross-section is definitely different. There are apparently at least two Tele-Tessar designs, with different numbers of elements. > ok the norm for the hassleblad was a80 mm f 2.8 planar... > > in the rolliflex the tessar was the entry level lens... the planar the > upgrade. > > my first 'real' camera was a 1933 rolliflex with a f3.5 tessar. not > bad at all but a little soft wide open. > I still have this camera. and the low shutter speeds are a little > slow but OTW rest is fine.. > In HD I bought an argus c3 from my geometry teacher for $8 and > used it a lot more shots per roll and would operate eye level and > had a pretty good split image rangefinder.. the lens was decent too. > > when I went in USAF sold the C# to my brother but kept the > rolliflex ( wish I had saved both! as the argus shot some of my first > press work) adn when in USAF got a SLR. I?ve not been able to justify the cost of a Planar Rolleiflex, though I?d really love one with a nice f/2.8 Planar lens. Both of mine have the 75mm f/3.5 Tessar. The older of my two is from 1936, the newer from about 1958. For me the Rollei is more of a small lightweight travel camera, or shooting for fun, than a serious camera. Sort of a ?getting back to my roots? sort of thing, as I started with a Yashica 44LM TLR. What I really need to do is spend the money and get my Hasselblad?s 80mm f/2.8 Planar C CLA?d, as the shutter on it isn?t accurate (or fast) at any speed. :-( It?s my "serious work" Medium Format camera. Zane

10 years, 3 months

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Options for resurrecting VAX 4000/400 and Vaxstation 3200

by roland.schregle＠gmail.com

Dear all, I have two VAXen that I'd like to resurrect simply for the sake of playing around with The Real Thing[tm] running VMS. Note that I'm completely new to VMS and DEC hardware -- hence the interest! Box #1 is a VAX4000 model 400 with no working CPU (KA-675) and 2x 32Mb RAM, an RF72 (wiped), plus a KZQSA QBUS controller. PSU is good, fans squeal on startup but run silently once spun up. Have VMS installation media in CD. I have two KA-675s for this beast: Board #1 (originally installed) has a failed B-cache (console reports SUBTEST_35_12, DE_B_Cache_diag_mode.LIS) and crashes with an asynchronous write memory failure when booting VMS from CD. Board #2 (DOA from eBay but fully refunded) has a dead DSSI bus 0 controller and crashes on SHOW DEV; I assume that's a write-off. Any chance of identifying the flaky B-cache SRAM on board #1 and replacing it? Alternatively, anyone out there have a KA-675 for sale? Box #2 is a VAXstation 3200 with TK50, and an RD54. PSU and fans ok (and very quiet), ditto CPU. The RD54 is unformatted; I understand this can only be formatted in the field with a VS2000 or with some obscure field diagnostics. There's no SCSI controller, so I can't install from CD. I haven't been able to track down VMS installation media on TK50, and I doubt they'd still be readable anyway. On top of that I have no idea what condition the drive is in, as I have no blank tapes to test with. I've found tape images online but see no way to dump these to TK50 (assuming the drive is ok), unless I get a TZ30. What are my options and chances of success for getting either of these boxes up and running with VMS? A KA-675 and TZ30 can be obtained from resellers, but I hesitate to invest several hundred in something this old purely for the occasional mucking about. I have also considered selling the units (or parts thereof) if nothing gives. Any ideas much appreciated, --GT -- "END OF LINE" [MCP, 1982] "... nowhere in the standards is it specified that 'programs that use a lot of memory may randomly crash at any time for no apparent reason'" [Stackoverflow forum, 2012]

10 years, 3 months

8
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Front Panels - PDP8 and PDP 11

by COURYHOUSE＠aol.com

""The cameras (they were huge) and the darkend rooms they worked in no longer exist."" These cameras you speak of were wonderful.... I rode a Robetson for part of a summer making halftones and line shots for a print shop in AZ here. In my off time I was allowed to shoot all the old docs and old Eastman Kodak camera catalogs I wanted to and print them up as posters! The lens was a Goerz Red Dot Artar and the sharpest flat field lens I had ever used!! Back to computer panels.... Rod thanks for doing the work to create these! ed# _www.smecc.org_ (http://www.smecc.org) In a message dated 3/2/2016 3:32:48 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time, rodsmallwood52 at btinternet.com writes: Hi Guys Having got 8/e (A & B) plus 8/f and 8/m into production its time I made a few comments. The aim has always been to reproduce the original panels using the process DEC used all those years ago. Needless to say we had to go through the learning curve with only photographs, scans and one 8/m original panel to go on. In the interests of origiality I have kept what we used call 'features' as found in the documentation and the sample we had. I'm trying to reproduce the original, not produce an improved or fixed version. The only process deviations I have allowed myself are as follows: 1. The original versions would have been drawn twice full size by hand on matt paper in indian ink. One sheet per colo(u)r would have been requred. They would then have used a process camera to reduce to one to one positive masters on clear acetate film. The cameras (they were huge) and the darkend rooms they worked in no longer exist. I used to do just that in the early '70's but whats weird is where I worked is less than 50 yards >from the silk screen studio doing the work now. Now I use Inkscape and its layers to do the same thing. The screeners have an Epson printer the size of a piano to print my layers in black onto clear film. After that the process is the same as it was. They take a fine meshed cloth streched onto a frame. Its coated (by hand) with a photo sensitive emulsion, when dry it gets exposed through the master using a UV light source. The the parts proteced by black on the master are water soluable and get washed out and hence let the ink through. So one screen per layer is required 2. DEC would have printed the images first and routed or milled the holes using some kind jig later. As long as the hole stayed inside the white line that was deemed to be OK. We drill (laser cut) first and screen afterwards. Regards Rod

10 years, 3 months

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OT: lenses (Was: Front Panels - PDP8 and PDP 11

by COURYHOUSE＠aol.com

Paul - My darkroom became a storage room! still have the monster 5x7 durst enlarger w/ vacuum easel that I had since the 70s. what a beast! then I have small 2x3 omega to pull strips of negatives though to print. yea the digital stuff was a game changer indeed... I do not know about the contax rts lenses fitting new bodys.. they were nice lenses, It would be good to use them! Ed# In a message dated 3/10/2016 12:41:11 A.M. US Mountain Standard Time, useddec at gmail.com writes: I also don't know if I will ever use my darkroom again, and have Omega D2, other enlargers, print washers and dyers, etc that I don't need. On Thu, Mar 10, 2016 at 1:37 AM, Paul Anderson <useddec at gmail.com> wrote: > Popular or Modern Photography 20 or 30 years ago had an article on the 10 > best lens ever made. I think Zeiss made 3 of them, and they were the only > company with more than one. > > I know there are a lot of great optics out there, but I still love Zeiss. > I have several Zeiss cameras, binoculars, microscopes, etc. > > With everything going digital, and various health problems, I haven't > touched my Contax RTSs in years. I was planning on buying a digital body to > use my optics, but they never released one. > > If anyone knows of a good digital body that will adapt to RTS optics, > please let me know. > > Paul > > On Wed, Mar 9, 2016 at 7:25 PM, Fred Cisin <cisin at xenosoft.com> wrote: > >> posters! The lens was a Goerz Red Dot Artar and the sharpest flat >>>> field lens >>>> >>> On Wed, 9 Mar 2016, Rod Smallwood wrote: >> >>> Thanks,, >>> Our cam was fitted with a high grade Ziess lens that cost a fortune >>> even then, >>> >> >> Zeiss made a lot of lenses, some of which were great. >> Goerz made a few of the greatest lenses ever made. >> >> For personal use, I'm looking for Leitz Summicron in all focal lengths, >> and Nikkor 105mm that was made in mid 1960s. >> And, if I can ever get a 4x5 digital back, I want a Goerz Dagor. >> All out of my price range. >> >> >> >

10 years, 3 months

2
1
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Xerox: MFM emulator: disk images available

by tmfdmike＠gmail.com

I've been hacking Xerox recently and using Dave's excellent MFM emulator. I'm making two working bootable images available. One is Lisp - the 'Lyric' distribution. It boots and works and appears complete and useful but I haven't explored Lisp enough to grok it. The other is a clean install of Viewpoint 3.1 with document editor and a few assorted utilities and games - and terminal emulators. Both come with readme files and configuration info. They can be picked up at: http://corestore.org/vpemu.zip and http://corestore.org/lispemu.zip With a following wind I may get other Xerox disk images up in the not too distant future - Star; 8010 and 8090 servers for starters. Maybe a Medley Lisp system. I'd be interested in hosting any other useful images for disk emulation - not just Dave's and not just Xerox - SCSI2SD etc. too - that anyone feels like contributing. Enjoy! Mike http://www.corestore.org 'No greater love hath a man than he lay down his life for his brother. Not for millions, not for glory, not for fame. For one person, in the dark, where no one will ever know or see.'

10 years, 3 months

1
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Speaking of card cages...

by cramcram＠gmail.com

Has anyone ever reproduced the card guides used in the 8/A chassis? I assume these are identical to those used in PDP-11s as well. My are beyond brittle. Thanks, Marc

10 years, 3 months

4
8
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QSIC update

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Henk Gooijen >> He's now starting in on interrupt cycles; once those work, he >> effectively has emulation of a minimal small RK > sounds very good - nice progress! Interrupts are now working, and as of yesterday (when I finally managed to get all the bugs out of my diagnostic - we can't use the DEC ones since it doesn't yet emulate a full RK drive) it will sit and read and write blocks as long as we let it, interrupting after each transfer. I'm about to upgrade the diagnostic to test more features, such as multi-block transfers, etc. Dave is about to start work on SD card support. > When you get to it, that will be a fast swap drive ;-) Indeed! It seems to transfer a complete sector in about 600 usec, when running a 'disk' in RAM - it's only even that 'slow' because for some reason, which Dave is investigating, the CPU (an 11/73) seems to take about 1usec to do a DMA grant after the previous cycle, even when it and the QBUS are idle (the CPU is in a WAIT instruction while the transfer is happening, with my diagnostic). Each individual word seems to take about 900 nsec; not great, but not bad. Dave's going to look at that in some detail, too. And of course there are zero seek and rotational delays, so it will be pretty zoomy (although of course the SD 'disk' will also have that characteristic, but we don't yet know if the SD will support the full QBUS bandwidth, the way the RAM certainly will). But even if it is that fast, it's still probably worth having the RAM disk, because it will avoid putting write cycles on the SD card memory. (I myself plan to put /tmp, and pipes, on a RAM disk, for just that reason. In V6 Unix, at least, a system call to move pipes off the root disk is one line of code... :-) Noel

10 years, 3 months

1
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Sequoia Computer Systems?

by jwest＠classiccmp.org

Anyone have any pictures, datasheets, or other ephemera related to Sequoia Systems line of fault tolerant systems? This is unrelated to the "IBM Sequoia". The Sequoia computers I'm referring to were around roughly '86+ish maybe and were fairly large minicomputers. Their claim to fame was being "massively fault tolerant". I am not sure, but Ian Sandler may have worked there on that design before heading to General Automation perhaps, not sure I have my history right. What I do recall for sure, is I worked on a lot of programming on the Sequoia systems (the ones I used ran Pick or one of the MVRDBMS's) at Eagle Snacks (back when that was part of the Anheuser-Busch family). On a whim I decided to google and while I can find a few white papers on the Sequoia Fault Tolerance design, I see no marketing brochures, datasheets, pictures, etc. I do recall a story from back when I worked there. the head of eagle snacks was called into the office of the VP of AB for a dressing down, because all the other departments submitted downtime reports to him on their systems and Eagle Snacks (running on the Sequoia) did not submit any reports for over a year. When asked why he wasn't submitting downtime reports the eagle snacks guy replied "because we haven't had any". The VP said - yes, but I see here maintenance logs that you had cpu boards failed and replaced, memory boards failed and replaced, "etc etc". and the ES guy said "Right. No downtime". Anyone remember these systems? Best, J

10 years, 3 months

3
2
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PDP 8/A restoration (update to squaring up card cage)

by jws＠jwsss.com

One of the photos of the PDP 8/A 400 came from this Herb Johnson page, which is a diary of what I'm going to be doing after I true up the card cage. Excellent looking diary of what to check with the unit I have. Hopefully with less drama and more things checking out. http://www.retrotechnology.com/restore/8a_repairs.html thanks Jim

10 years, 3 months

1
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Early Microprocessors in Industrial Microcomputers

by billdegnan＠gmail.com

Not a lot is said about early use of microprocessors in industrial microcomputers. Everything you read about is so home computing oriented, but I believe actual sales would have been greater in the industrial space 1974-77. I compiled a quick thread on my site about the earliest use of microprocessors in industrial microcomputers on my web site with links to a related article from EDN Microprocessor Design Series Volume II and scans of Process Computer Systems product brochures. PCS was a pioneer in industrial micro-computing. If anyone has info to share / correct please let me know and I will add to the thread. http://vintagecomputer.net/browse_thread.cfm?id=631 -- @ BillDeg: Web: vintagecomputer.net Twitter: @billdeg <https://twitter.com/billdeg> Youtube: @billdeg <https://www.youtube.com/user/billdeg> Unauthorized Bio <http://www.vintagecomputer.net/readme.cfm>

10 years, 3 months

11
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OT: lenses (Was: Front Panels - PDP8 and PDP 11

by COURYHOUSE＠aol.com

I need a 90 mm summacron for my m2 (drop me a line off list if anyone has one) Yes I know the 105 f 2.5 nikkor you speak of great sharp portrait length lens for the nikon F! we have a small 105 mm red dot Goertz we used for copy work on 2 1/4 x 3 1/4 in compur shutter the one on the Robertson process camera I used in the 70s was 18 inch focal length as I remember. Ed# In a message dated 3/9/2016 6:53:06 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time, healyzh at aracnet.com writes: > On Mar 9, 2016, at 5:25 PM, Fred Cisin <cisin at xenosoft.com> wrote: > >>> posters! The lens was a Goerz Red Dot Artar and the sharpest flat field lens > On Wed, 9 Mar 2016, Rod Smallwood wrote: >> Thanks,, >> Our cam was fitted with a high grade Ziess lens that cost a fortune even then, > > Zeiss made a lot of lenses, some of which were great. > Goerz made a few of the greatest lenses ever made. > > For personal use, I'm looking for Leitz Summicron in all focal lengths, and Nikkor 105mm that was made in mid 1960s. > And, if I can ever get a 4x5 digital back, I want a Goerz Dagor. > All out of my price range. Personally I need a nice ASPH 28mm or 35mm Summicron. I have the original Nikkon 35mm f/2, one of the very first made, it?s been Ai?d, and it?s an AMAZING lens. The Goerz Dagor?s are actually pretty cheap at the moment, I?ve been thinking about them for my 8x10. I?m using a mixture of modern lenses on my 4x5. Somehow I don?t ever expect a digital 4x5 back to be affordable. I know one Photographer that has one, and it?s really only useable for reproduction work, in the studio. Keep in mind that digital backs that can cover 4x5 or larger are scanning backs. Have you considered adapting a scanner as one? I?ve seen in the past where folks have done that. Personally except for one project, I shoot B&W film when I?m shooting 4x5 or 8x10, I then process and print it myself. For the 8x10 (and hopefully eventually 11x14), I only shoot B&W, and only contact print. Zane

10 years, 3 months

1
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OpenBSD drops support for VAX

by ian.finder＠gmail.com

A sad day indeed... :( https://twitter.com/MiodVallat/status/707636166112182272 -- Ian Finder (206) 395-MIPS ian.finder at gmail.com

10 years, 3 months

1
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Available: Q1 Corporation Q1 Lite

by mattislind＠gmail.com

Hello! We are considering (haven't decided 100% yet) to not keep the Q1 Lite system we have. Here are some pictures: https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B-rp4vyPPYu1d2pRTVM5TmM0UEU&usp=sha… It is a 8080 system with PL/1 built into to ROMs. Vintage 1975-76.It has a plasma screen and comes with an orange desk with built in quad floppy drive and also a daisy wheel printer. There are also two big hard drives and a hard drive controller. Is there interest? Trade for something interesting. /Mattis

10 years, 3 months

2
3
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Tweaked card cage

by jws＠jwsss.com

I've got a PDP8/A chassis which has a card cage that has been tweaked off in the front just a hair. Enough that you can't get the cards in by an interference amount of clearance. Anyone have any idea on how they handled this? I'm thinking of using some blocking and then a 36 or 48" pipe clamp to apply diagonal persuasion to get it back in true. The rear of the box is not impacted. In the body shop trade this is called "diamond" and usually gets your car totaled if your frame has that damage term applied to the chassis. I don't see any other damage other than this, no chip damage or cracking to the back plane, which is of course brittle. The rear dimension of the chassis is good, and I can't see what caused this. Could have been a drop, or could have been under too many layers of crap and was tweaked. Other clever ways to apply very gentle but forceful pressure to true up the cabinet is appreciated. Also how much to go past square to account for the "spring" back of the steel once the force is removed would be nice too. Thanks Jim

10 years, 3 months

3
2
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MEM11A questions

by ggs＠shiresoft.com

Hi, Over the weekend I was looking through some old CAD files and came across my original design for the MEM11A. It was an SPC board that contained only 128KW of FRAM. I?m wondering if there?s any interest in that board. I do have to iterate on the design a bit but I should be able to get something ready sooner than with my current board design (plus I know it will fit in an SPC form factor because I?ve already done it). What I?d like to know from folks is if there?s interest in that design? Would there still be interest in what I?m now calling UMF11 (Unibus Multi-Function)? I won?t have pricing (on either) until I build (and debug) a couple of prototypes because I need to know what the assembly costs would be (no I won?t be offering kits). To also answer the other question, no I haven?t run into any issues with the UMF11, I just came across this long forgotten design and wanted to know if there?s any interest in it as I can probably get it into ?production? sooner than the UMF11. Thanks. TTFN - Guy

10 years, 3 months

5
14
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Release of the HP 3000 Series III simulator

by COURYHOUSE＠aol.com

I will have to try this... a great undertaking Dave! Ed# _www.smecc.org_ (http://www.smecc.org) In a message dated 3/8/2016 6:29:11 A.M. US Mountain Standard Time, jwest at classiccmp.org writes: Awesome Dave! Can't wait to test drive it. A very sincere Thank You for all the time & effort you've spent on that. Best, J

10 years, 3 months

1
0
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Release of the HP 3000 Series III simulator

by jdbryan＠acm.org

I am pleased to announce the release of a simulator for the HP 3000 Series III computer system. It is available from the Computer History Simulation Project (SIMH) site: https://github.com/simh/simh The simulator runs the MPE-V/R operating system, supports a selection of simulated disc and tape drives, and accommodates up to sixteen concurrent users. A software kit containing a disc image with MPE preinstalled is available as described in the release notes that accompany the simulator. I would like to thank Frank McConnell and Al Kossow for their invaluable help in answering questions and supplying documentation for the HP 3000. -- Dave

10 years, 3 months

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11/23+ box with Microvax Memory

by jws＠jwsss.com

I see on the usual site, an 11/23 box with a couple of random boards, one of which is an M7608 board. This is a Microvax memory board. I wonder if one can build up a Microvax in that backplane, or if that is not recommended. It would obviously be an 18 bit backplane. The backplane is H9276A. The auction also has a M9047 Bus grant card in it, so is essentially just the box. But I'd never seen Microvax parts plugged into those backplanes, and it made me think. thanks Jim

10 years, 3 months

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HP 21MX paper tapes

by mattislind＠gmail.com

I have been going to our HP 21MX paper tapes that come with a M-series system that we received many years ago: http://www.datormuseum.se/documentation-software/hp-paper-tapes I tried to check if they already were available online somewhere but didn't find them when doing quick checks on random tape part numbers in the spread sheet. Maybe they are and then I don't need to bother reading them. Otherwise I will try to read them if there are interest and when I get time. /Mattis

10 years, 3 months

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Cables

by jws＠jwsss.com

Anyone have a source for IDC cables / supplies? I'm in need of some 40, 50 and various other cables and connectors. I need some specifically for dec systems so those would be even better. The most urgent need is cables for the PDP 8/A front panel cabling. They are all 40 pin. I've got a unit with the programmers panel, so need cables for it and for the basic power panel. thanks Jim

10 years, 3 months

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OT: domain for sale

by evan＠snarc.net

Is anyone interested in buying technologyrewind.com? It would be a good name for a collector's site.

10 years, 3 months

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Passing of Ray Tomlinson

by c.murray.mccullough＠gmail.com

We communicate today, as yesterday, via email. Ray Tomlinson,a 1960's ARPAnet pioneer has passed on. He 'invented' the @ symbol. My how old things are truly great. Murray :)

10 years, 3 months

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Usenet News Servers

by robert.jarratt＠ntlworld.com

My ISP appears to have stopped updating the newsgroups it hosts. What news servers do people round here recommend? Thanks Rob

10 years, 3 months

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I want a front panel for my lsi 11 w/switches and lights

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Ed Sharpe > I want a front panel for my lsi 11 w/switches and lights! That's going to be a little tricky. The LSI11 obvously doesn't have a hardware interface on/in the CPU which would allow a lot of the functions traditionally found in a front panel (e.g. examining registers, single step, etc). Some of them can be done (e.g. a halt/run switch, which LSI-11's already support), and others could be 'sorta' done - e.g. if the CPU is running, DMA could be used to read/write memory locations. Probably the best way to have an emulated front panel is to build a board that i) emulates the system serial console on the QBUS (i.e. responds to 177560-6), and ii) has a micro or something which uses ODT to emulate the full range of normal console commands, and drives a set of LEDs and switches. E.g. hitting the 'continue' switch when the processor was halted would issue a 'P' command to ODT; when the 'halt' switch is raised, it would read the PC printed when the CPU halted, and display that in LEDs, etc, etc. Sounds like an amusing project for someone. Any takers? :-) Noel

10 years, 3 months

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Imaging RX02 disks for simh (was: Re: MU-BASIC V2 and RT-11 V03B distribution disks.)

by thebri＠gmail.com

How the heck do you copy an RX02 disk for use in simh? I've been trying to transfer RX02 images between simh and a real PDP11 (that has only two RX02's, console, and ethernet). So far, I've only attempted sending an RX02 image from the PDP to simh, but simh fails to read it: "?DIR-F-Invalid directory". Even after adding 13*512 bytes to the start for the missing track, I still get invalid directory. My process is to COPY/DEVICE/FILES DY1:/START:0/END:330 DY0:BLOCK1.DAT, then FTP that off the PDP, delete the file, and do the remaining two thirds of the disk. Once all are transferred, "cat *DAT > floppy.dsk". I can transfer RX50 images using the same recipe, though I haven't tried sending an RX50 image created on simh back to the PDP. For what it's worth, I'm having the same problem with Alan Baldwin's TCP/IP disk images from http://shop-pdp.net/rthtml/tcpip.htm. simh can't read the individual DSK images, but could read the *.PKG with the disks inside, and >from that, I could (RT-11) MOUNT each disk to a logical device. b On Thu, Jan 28, 2016 at 11:50 AM, Mattis Lind <mattislind at gmail.com> wrote: > I found some 8 inch floppies with distribution kits for MU-BASIC V2 and > RT-11 V03B. I imaged those and put them here > http://www.datormuseum.se/documentation-software/rx01-and-rx02-floppy-disks > if anyone is interested in playing with MU-BASIC. There are both RAW disk > images and to be used in SimH and like and also DMK/IMD files. > > The system that floppies came with is this little ( > http://www.datormuseum.se/computers/digital-equipment-corporation/pdp1103-l > ) > system once used at Scania in S?dert?lje. >

10 years, 3 months

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I want a front panel for my lsi 11 w/switches and lights

by COURYHOUSE＠aol.com

I want a front panel for my lsi 11 w/switches and lights! Ed# _www.smecc.org_ (http://www.smecc.org)

10 years, 3 months

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DEC TU81 - "Logic Off" permanently illuminated-

by u.tagge＠gmx.de

Hi All, maybe someone can help me to bring my TU81 back to life again. I have checked the following, before turning on: - All capacitors on the Mail Power Supply and the one below the vacuum pump are fine > OK - Voltages check > OK - Fuses > The Fuse for the diagnostics power connector was burned: changed Problem is, that the "Logic Off" is constantly illuminated, after turning on. I had a look into the Tx81 Pathfinder documentation, and checked the following. - Check if Blower is running > OK - Disconnecting all DC connectors > Same result Pathfinder tells me changing the power supply. I hear only an relay clicking when turning on the Power Supply, also, when nothing is connected, in this time the "Logic Off" light blinks one time. I think, that the power supply checks itself that the voltages are OK, and that this fails. Any hints or tips? Many Greetings Ulrich

10 years, 3 months

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Another passing ... Ray Tomlinson

by cctalk＠snarc.net

http://www.techrepublic.com/article/email-inventor-ray-tomlinson-dies-at-74/

10 years, 3 months

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VCF SE 4.0 Announcement

by earl＠baugh.org

Many of you may have heard about this already, but to make sure everyone knows, We are proud to announce the fourth annual Vintage Computer Festival Southeast (VCFSE) in Roswell GA. The Festival, on April 2nd and 3rd, features over 35,000 square feet of exhibits, museums, presentations, and interactive entertainment. Exhibitors are available for live demonstrations and offer attendees the unique opportunity to experience a true piece of technology history. New this year, a live auction offers bidders a chance to start or expand their personal collections. (Registration is still open, visit the link at the bottom if you'd wish to exhibit -- vendors are also welcome) The Festival offers very popular hands-on electronics projects for children and adults. Gaming fans will enjoy a wide array of vintage video game consoles in a retro gaming section, where visitors can play classic games. Gamers of all ages are encouraged to test their vintage gamer skills on a huge classic video game wall. This year, the Festival celebrates the 40th anniversary of Apple computer. Attendees will experience the complete history of Apple at the Computer Museum of America?s Apple Pop-Up Museum, a large, one-of-a-kind display of extremely rare computers. The museum features a dynamic presentation of the small start-up, founded in a garage by two young friends in 1976, that became the world's leading computer company. Guest speakers include renowned industrial designers and engineers who have played integral roles in computer history. Attendees will hear a first-hand account from industrial designer Jerry Manock, who created designs for the Apple II and III in the 70s and 80s. Vintage computer enthusiasts will enjoy a presentation from acclaimed computer engineer Bil Herd, creator of several noteworthy designs, including the Commodore 128. Computer Museum of America?s companion exhibit, ?LINK: Personal Computing >from Switches to Pockets,? features the links from the past to the present with displays of iconic computer brands including original computers like the IBM PC, as well as some very rare and unique machines such as the Kenbak-1. VCFSE is hosted and produced by the Atlanta Historical Computing Society and the Computer Museum of America. VCFSE is the premier vintage computer festival in the southeast and part of the VCF family of vintage computer festivals, which include VCF East in New Jersey, VCF Midwest in Chicago and VCF West in California. The VCF mission is to educate, promote and demonstrate the evolutionary significance of vintage computers, software and gaming to today?s new generation of innovators by offering attendees a chance to experience the technologies, people and remarkable stories that embody the history of the computer revolution. VCFSE 4.0 will be held at Kings Market Shopping Center, 1425 Market Blvd, Suite 200, Roswell, GA 30076, in what was previously a Comp-USA Super Store. The Festival is open from 10 AM to 7 PM on Saturday and from 10 AM to 5 PM on Sunday. Adult admission is $10 per day or $15 for a two-day pass. Children ages 17 and younger are admitted free when accompanied by a parent or guardian. For more details, please visit http://vcfed.org/wp/festivals/vintage-computer-festival-southeast-4-0/ or http://vcfse.org

10 years, 3 months

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jrIDE sidecars: Interested in another chance?

by mbbrutman＠brutman.com

Short story: We are thinking of producing another set of 25 and want to know how much interest there is out there. If you are interested in purchasing one please email me. --- What is it? An IDE interface, clock/calendar, and a memory expansion sidecar for the PCjr. The BIOS extension allows booting from recent IDE/PATA hard drives that support LBA addressing mode. (Compact Flash with an adapter or Disk On Modules also work.) The memory expansion brings the machine from 128KB to 736KB. The last time we did this the price was around $75 for the kit of parts; you have to supply your own sidecar shell. See http://www.brutman.com/jrIDE/jrIDE.html for more details. Mike

10 years, 3 months

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QSIC update

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> So here's a quick update on where Dave Bridgham and I are with the > QSIC ... We have the first of two wire-wrap prototype QBUS motherboards > more or less (see below) done .. the hardware is 'mostly' working; most > of the work from here on out will be FPGA, etc, programming. There > _are_ a few additional QBUS lines used for bus master (DMA) and > interrupts which we haven't used yet, and one of the first things done > now is to get those two kind of bus cycles working > ... > With that in hand, we can do the first controller (RK11), using memory > in the FPGA to simulate a small disk. Well, Dave has made a big step down that road; he has DMA working (both the bus arbitration cycle for DMA, as well as master-mode transfers to and from QBUS slave memory). He's now starting in on interrupt cycles; once those work, he effectively has emulation of a minimal small RK (he already has all the registers, since he needs them to control the DMA to and from the RAM disk). At that point I should be able to test it by making it the swap drive on a Unix V6 load. Noel

10 years, 3 months

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Big-Board II & Micro Cornucopia User Group Disks

by james.h.simpson＠gmail.com

Thanks very much to all who posted a reply. The BBII disk files was something I didn't have, and the CD image had some very interesting stuff. I did go and download the bitsaver files also. Thanks again!

10 years, 3 months

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Documentation on DEC's Omnibus Module M865 (Console Teletype Control)

by admin＠meiner.ch

Hi guys... I am currently looking for documentation (configuration, SCH, ...) on DEC's M865 Teletype-interface. Not the M8650 or M8655, mind you. Could someone point me to the right direction? Thanks a lot, Martin

10 years, 3 months

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Running RT11v4 on 11/03

by rich.cini＠verizon.net

All ? Now that I have a running 11/03 (through the Heathkit HT-11 I bought) I thought I?d try to get something running other than XXDP using the TU58 emulator. Malcolm Macleod has a quick walkthrough of how to make this work with an 11/23 and the TU58 emulator from Will Kranz (http://www.avitech.com.au/pdp-11-03/make-tu58-rtv4-image.html). Even though the tutorial is for the 11/23, I think that the 11/03 can run RT-11 from an RX01, and the H11 came with an optional custom version of RT-11, so I feel that it should theoretically work. I followed the tutorial and it reads the image but barfs at some point and the CPU halts. Not sure why. Has anyone tried this? Rich -- Rich Cini Collector of Classic Computers Build Master and lead engineer, Altair32 Emulator http://www.classiccmp.org/cini http://www.classiccmp.org/altair32

10 years, 3 months

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VCF Midwest Dates Set: Sept 10-11 2016

by silent700＠gmail.com

Planning for the 11th annual Vintage Computer Festival Midwest shall begin in earnest in early April. But since the dates have been locked in for some time, there's no harm in getting them out early. Returning to last year's great new location, this time with an extra room and even more Visio-driven planning, VCFMW will once-again be *the place to be* for retro-tech enthusiasts in the Midwest! In an effort to accommodate as many schedules as possible, our dates have shifted back a bit vs. last year. So please make a note on your calendar, VCFMW 11 will be the weekend of September 10th and 11th, 2016. As always, the fun will begin on Friday night with early load-in, group dinner(s) and general frivolity. Many details are yet to be worked out, but we envision a slight schedule change (later Saturday and earlier Sunday start and further optimization of the room and table layouts. The old vcfmw.org URL still works, as well as the new page from our friends at the Vintage Computer Federation: http://vcfed.org/wp/festivals/vintage-computer-festival-midwest More info will be added in a few weeks, as well as a new registration page for tables, talks and vending. Please hold your tabling requests until the announcement next month (I have to draw the chart first!) Every minute of last year's show set a new standard as we went into our double digits. We look forward to seeing you all (and more) again this year. -j

10 years, 3 months

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VCF West XI exhibit registration is open

by cctalk＠snarc.net

VCF West is making a glorious comeback on Aug. 6-7 at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, California. Exhibit registration is open! http://www.vcfed.org/registration/exhibitor_register-online.php?event_id=3

10 years, 3 months

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Best name for PDP-11/05-10

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Mattis Lind > I have a physical tech manual (which is not the same as the one at > bitsavers) > ... > I should probably scan that tech manual if someone hasn't done it > already. The ones I have found online are: DEC-11-H05AA-A-D Jan, '73 PDP-11/05 computer manual DEC-11-H05AA-B-D Sept, '74 PDP-11/05, 11/10 computer manual DEC-11-H05AA-B-D Supplement 1 July, '74 PDP-11/05, 11/10 10-1/2 inch mounting box and power system DEC-11-H05AA-B-D Supplement 2 July, '74 Description of data paths module M7260 revision M DEC-11-H05SS-B-D Jan, '75 PDP-11/05-S, 11/10-S system manual EK-11005-TM-003 April, '75 PDP-11/05, 11/10 computer manual (The 2nd-4th are in a single file.) > Compared to the one at bitsavers it for example include an appendix > related to some minor modifications that had been done to the CPU board > set. The ones that are available seem to be pretty comprehensive coverage of the 05-10, the 05N-10N, and the 05S-10S. If yours has some significant material that is not in the others, then please scan it. Otherwise, it may not be worth the trouble (especially if you do not have an auto-feed scanner... :-). > the system came with an extra 5.25 inch memory box. Identical to the > CPU but different backplane for three more MM11-L modules Right, that's the ME11-L, which is an MF11-L backplane in a 5-1/4 box; it normally came with one MM11-L board set (16KB) installed, and one could add two more sets. Noel

10 years, 3 months

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Pdp-10 emulation

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Tedd Martin Vazquez > After reading I believe using TOPS-20 I will have more to explore Actually, as an operating system, ITS is far more interesting (virtual devices, etc) - but it is indeed a pretty steep learning curve to start using it. So I agree that TOPS-20 is the place to start. Noel

10 years, 3 months

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Looking for a 2W 1 ohm fusible resistor

by witchy＠binarydinosaurs.co.uk

Morning folks (other timezones are available) One of the casualties in my expiring VT100 PSU last weekend was a 2W resistor named R22, or at least it seems more dead than its twin at R47 which gives a steady reading on my DMM. Seems that they're surprisingly difficult to find these days with none of the main parts stockists having any. Anyone got one or two lurking in a bits box somewhere? Cheers! -- Adrian/Witchy Binary Dinosaurs creator/curator Www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk - the UK's biggest private home computer collection?

10 years, 3 months

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Vince Briel?

by dave＠661.org

Has anyone heard from Vince Briel lately? I've bene trying to get in touch with him for some Micro-Altair artwork. The forum at brielcomputers.com is stangnant. -- David Griffith dave at 661.org A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail?

10 years, 3 months

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New Scans: IIT RUSH Time-Sharing

by silent700＠gmail.com

That would be the Illinois Institute of Technology and their "Remote User Shared Hardware" time-sharing scheme on the IBM 360, circa July 1967. Check out the prices - even per-minute pricing on core! http://chiclassiccomp.org/docs/index.php?dir=%2Fcomputing/IIT Enjoy -j

10 years, 3 months

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Paging Toby Thain [was RE: PDP-10 programming [was RE: Dumb Terminal games (was Re: Looking for a small fast VAX development machine)]]

by RichA＠LivingComputerMuseum.org

Hi, Toby, I answered your private note, but Outlook/Exchange informed me this morning that it would not send the message for 48 hours and so was giving up. I just don't want you to think I'm ignoring you. My answer was that it's not for me to say, but the author is a friend. Rich Rich Alderson Sr. Systems Engineer Living Computer Museum 2245 1st Ave S Seattle, WA 98134 http://www.LivingComputerMuseum.org/

10 years, 3 months

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Unidentified DEC gear available, NSW-AU

by jwest＠classiccmp.org

DEC Gear available. Unlike most dec gear, I must admit that I can't identify exactly what this is. Several racks, I was guessing AFT or Instrumentation Testing. Looks like one or more cpu or expansion cabinets in some of the racks, and some DEC AD/DA interface stuff. I was left with the impression that there may be one or more racks that are not shown in the pictures provided. I was told that racks are in "several different buildings on the estate" (residential). The first rack looks to be in very bad shape (perhaps a power supply), but the other racks don't look so bad. I am not sure that I can get more pictures from the owner, but will try. I think that in order to get pictures of the fronts (what we all probably want to see), the owner would have to move stuff (and them) and would rather not. The equipment is located in NSW, Australia. It sound like they just want it to go to a good home. If someone is local to NSW Australia and wants to spearhead going onsite to take a closer look for others and/or pick up the gear themselves, let me know offlist and I'll give you the contact info. To those on the list that aren't down under - any ideas what this is? Pics are temporarily at http://www.ezwind.net/nsw-au Best, J

10 years, 3 months

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