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

by dburrows＠netpath.net

I have had a few in the past but I only have a 9610 right now. Just got it a couple weeks ago and have not tested it yet. Dan >I'm taking a quick survey of who among us uses (or >at least owns) Kennedy 9x00 series tape drives. > >I do and I know that some others do (e.g. John > <jpl15(a)netcom.com>). > >Anyone else fit this description? > > >Jon >

27 years, 8 months

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TRW swapmeet

by A_Finney＠wfi-inc.com

Well, my first TRW was a bit of a wash (literally). It rained, and apparently was a pathetic showing. That aside, I managed to pick up an Atari 1027 LQ printer for $8, *brand new* (stickers, still covering the paper slot) in box with manuals, and a Sparc 1 with 24megs of RAM (no HD) for $15 in great shape (even has the sbus covers!). Nice brunch at Coco's after with John and Marvin... Aaron

27 years, 8 months

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Who owns Kennedy 9-track Drives?

by CLASSICCMP＠trailing-edge.com

>I'm taking a quick survey of who among us uses (or >at least owns) Kennedy 9x00 series tape drives. > >I do and I know that some others do (e.g. John > <jpl15(a)netcom.com>). > >Anyone else fit this description? In the past, I had numerous Kennedy 9100's, a few 9300's, and some other 9000-series models (generally the "others" were swing-arms, not vacuum column.) I still have an assortment of common spare cards (not too surprising, considering I lived a few miles from Kennedy's homes in Altadena and Monrovia) and numerous manuals. -- 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

27 years, 8 months

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Getting rid of background programs in System 7.1.1

by SUPRDAVE＠aol.com

or you can hold down the shift key as soon as you get the happy mac icon. that will disable all extensions. > > When ever I boot, before the Finder comes up, there's about 5 icons In the > > lower left-hand corner. I know that one is MS Mail, and the other is for > a > > network. I'm not sure what the other icons are for. I'd like to get rid > of > > these programs (extensions?) that are running in the background, since all > > they do is eat up memory. I can't access them after Finder opens, and > > nothing happens when I click on them before it opens. > > > > Any suggestions? >

27 years, 8 months

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ID these DEC floppy disks?

by pete＠dunnington.u-net.com

On Nov 28, 11:40, Christian Fandt wrote: > >> > BL-T540B-M1 CZUFDB1 USER TESTS > >> > BL-T541B-M1 CZXD1B1 FIELD SERVICE TESTS 1 > >> > BL-T542B-MC CZXD2B0 FIELD SERVICE TESTS 2 > >> > BL-T565B-MC CZXD3B0 FIELD SERVICE TESTS 3 > >> > BL-T583B-MC CZXD4B0 FIELD SERVICE TESTS 4 To which Pete replied: > >They are indeed XXDP disks. They're the field service set for a > >microPDP-11/23+. They contain XXDP Ver.2 plus relevant disgnostics, the > >User Tests disks has the XXDP utilities and confidence test, Tests 1 has > >object files and some utilities, Tests 2 has KDF11/BDV11/DLV11J/etc tests, > >Tests 3 has less-frequently-used interface tests, Tests 4 has other tape > >and disk tests. > I have no documentation on these disks, therefore, a few questions for you > and the others: > > ** Will the disks still work with the 11/73 and the third-party disk > controller? They'll work with the processor; they'll work with the the 3rd-party disk so long as it emulates an RX50 with MSCP protocol. > ** Is there an online index or something where you looked up those 'CZ' > part numbers or do you have the user's manual or same software in your > library to find the info above? (i.e., How did you know what they were and > how can I find the same?) I have the same set (and a lot of other XXDP/XXDP+ files), and I have listings and notes from DEC maintenance courses. > ** Any online manuals for these diagnostics? Or, anybody willing to sell a > xerographic copy of them to me? There were some manuals on microfiche; I have course notes on paper for XXDP/XXDP+ and my own notes for XXDP Version 2 (I think that's what it was called; some people referred to it as XXDP++ but that wasn't what DEC called it) as on those disks. There's a key to the names. For the older versions: Hxmnrp.SYS is a system file: H means SYSTEM, x=M,D,U,S,Q for Monitor, Decice Driver, Utility, Supervisor, or miscellaneous ; mn is the device mnemonic for the medium supported; rp is the revision and patch level. tmnirp.BI? is a diagnostic program; t processor type, eg V or Z mn device mnemonic, eg RQ i program identifier, eg C rp revision and patch level, eg B2 ? is N or C (BIN=binary, BIC=relocatable binary) Thus ZRQCH0.BIC is for any processor, using an RQDX controller, third diagnostic of the set (this one happens to be a disk formatter, but you would only know that if you knew what was in the set), eight version, never patched. There are some special mnemonics: DI directory utility SU setup utility AA XXDP supervisor file AB PT/AMS supervisor file SA User manual Apart from that, most of the mnemonics are simliar to the letters of the device name (eg RQ for RQDX, MR for MR11/MRV11, DL for DL11/DLV11, etc) but usually not the standard DEC device driver mnemonics. Dtirp.BIN is a Unibus test; t is the test type, rest as above, except 0 instruction test 1 adressing test 6 AA11/VT06/LAB11 test 8 Unibus test The common processor type letters for QBus are J 11/23, 11/24 V 11/03 Z any processor If I can find the source files, I'll put machine-readable notes on my web pages (probablyt as PostScript). That is mostly XXDP V2 stuff. I *might* have some machine-readble XXDP+ notes; if I can find any I put them up too. I'll post a note to the list if and when... -- Pete Peter Turnbull Dept. of Computer Science University of York

27 years, 8 months

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Recent Finds & Thoughts

by allisonp＠world.std.com

< Actually, if you set the azimuth of the replay head to be the same as th < recording head, you do improve the signal and the HF response. It doesn' Not much at all. We are talking halftrack heads or wider and you get phase cancelation if the gap is not perpendicular to the tape travel on record. if the play back head is narrower say using a stereo playback or one of the quad decks then you can tweek some but it still only buys you a little. Keep in mind that impats the upper limit of the HF response and most tape systems were designed to stay way clear of that. The best upper freqency response you could count on was 9-10khz from your 35-50USD portable that was sold for or commonly used. Most modulations schemes were either modem high pair (~2200hz) or phase encoded data (FM) if you FM data using a data rate of TARBEL (187char/SEC) you were using tones that were around 3000hz and 1500hz. TRS80 was in the same range. So the actual bandwidth needed was far less than 5khz. Kansas CITY format was exactly 8cycles of 2400 or 4cyles of 1200 for one or zero. FYI I droped using audio cassette save for when I needed to get some neat software from one format to mine. I went direct saturation where the NS or SN polar flux change carried the information. The same heads at audio that might work at 9khz audio did respectable 9600 baud using FM encoding. LAter I would find some low impedence heads that would allow me to hit a solid 1600frpi (800 bits/inch). This fixed some of the ills that plague audio schemes. < become perfect, but it does get better. VCRs (certainly UK VHS ones) use < this trick to reduce crosstalk between adjacent video tracks (which are < read by different heads on the head drum) and to allow a stereo audio < signal to be recorded under the video track and then replayed by a < separate head at a different azimuth setting. Different world and heads. Heical scan systems the path across the tape is different from linear travel and since the tape effectively moves in two directions operation is different than a portable audio cassette. Allison

27 years, 8 months

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Windoze, anyone?

by fauradon＠pclink.com

No I believe OBM was correct: Obsolete Business Machine (of couse this is spacific to the jr;) Francois ------------------------------------------------------------- Visit the desperately in need of update Sanctuary at: http://www.pclink.com/fauradon/ >Max, > OBM is supposed to be IBM. I forgot to check my spelling before sending. > John > >John Amirault wrote: >

27 years, 8 months

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ID these DEC floppy disks?

by pete＠dunnington.u-net.com

On Nov 22, 14:34, Kevin McQuiggin wrote: > Christian Fandt wrote: > Subject: Re: ID these DEC floppy disks? > Looks like some XXDP diagnostics, but let's see what Tim and others have > to say, to be sure. > > In that heap of goodies I'm keeping from that DEC Haul back in the summer I > > found a DEC 5.25" floppy disk package containing five floppies of the > > following: > > > > BL-T540B-M1 CZUFDB1 USER TESTS > > BL-T541B-M1 CZXD1B1 FIELD SERVICE TESTS 1 > > BL-T542B-MC CZXD2B0 FIELD SERVICE TESTS 2 > > BL-T565B-MC CZXD3B0 FIELD SERVICE TESTS 3 > > BL-T583B-MC CZXD4B0 FIELD SERVICE TESTS 4 > > > > All evidently are diagnostic tests for some sort of DEC machine which uses > > a 5.25" floppy drive. Could anyone identify which machine given the above > > info? They are indeed XXDP disks. They're the field service set for a microPDP-11/23+. They contain XXDP Ver.2 plus relevant disgnostics, the User Tests disks has the XXDP utilities and confidence test, Tests 1 has object files and some utilities, Tests 2 has KDF11/BDV11/DLV11J/etc tests, Tests 3 has less-frequently-used interface tests, Tests 4 has other tape and disk tests. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Dept. of Computer Science University of York

27 years, 8 months

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Uknown Cartridge found..

by charlesii＠nwonline.net

classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu wrote: > > Forgot to mention in my find was a cartridge titled > "Mach 128" its by Access software inc.. > Obviously for the C-128, but don't know what it does.. > Has a switch on top and a reset button? on it.. > Anyone ever seen this Cart before ? > Phil... Probably sonthing simimluar to mach speed for the C=64. I helps load disks faster. Verry useful application. It doesn't work however with copy software. Charles

27 years, 8 months

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World Power Systems scam

by eric＠brouhaha.com

A while back someone asked about the famous World Power Systems scam. While I don't have the whole story, I've put a little bit of information and scans of some of the advertisments from the April 1979 issue of Byte on a web page: http://www.brouhaha.com/~eric/retrocomputing/wps/

27 years, 8 months

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HP3000 help needed

by fmc＠reanimators.org

Aaron Christopher Finney <A_Finney(a)wfi-inc.com> wrote: > I've read the HP3000-L FAQ and searched most of the day for info, but > there isn't much geared toward the Classic HP3000 home-hobbyist. Yeah, and some of us 3000 fans view this as a problem. > 9144 tape drive - I've already deduced that it's a low-density, 16-track > capable of 67/134 megs and the tapes have to be purchased pre-formatted. The HP part numbers for the tapes are 88140SC (150m) and 88140LC (600m). It may be that you can get tapes from 3M with an "HC" suffix and those can be made to work too. I thought the 134MB version was the 9145 (32-track) drive. > 2563A Printer - with a modular connector. Modular? Hmm, haven't seen that before. > 9123 3 1/2" dual floppy - picked up after-the-fact at a yard sale. It's > HP-IB, but has a weird DIN power connector cord. No P/S. This is for the HP Touchscreen II (aka 150C) -- the flavor of the 150 with the 12" display. It's got the DIN socket for that power cord. I don't think the 3000 will play nice with it in any event. > (2)HP3000 series 37's - these are piggy-backed, is this the usual > configuration? . Here's where I need some info: I'm thinking that what you have there is one 37 where the second box provides I/O expansion. It's an option, my 37s don't have that. > The "top" unit has a DB-25F in slot one, and an HP-IB in slot 4, as > well as those DE-3F (correct terminology?) connectors in ports 0-5. When I had a bunch of them on a 3000/64-68-70 (it got upgraded) I just called them ATP connectors. Unfortunately I don't remember the pinout, but it's three-wire RS-232 so not real hard to figure out -- harder to find connectors for! > The "bottom" unit has the DB-25F in slot one, the HP-IB in slot 4, > and an AUI (ethernet? Is this a Lanic board?) in slot 5, as well as > the 3-pin deals in ports 0-5. Above the ports is a female > Centronics-50 which connected to what I believe is a terminal > splitter, p/n 40290-60003. Above that is a *very* high-density 99-pin > male connector, this is attached to the board with the HP-IB > connector. I'm wondering if the DB-25Fs are INPs -- basically synchronous serial interfaces for computer-to-computer or computer-to-remote-terminal-mux stuff. If it says AUI, it's a LANIC. For that matter, if it's got the slide-lock it's probably a LANIC. The "Centronics"-50 doesn't have wire ears, it has threaded holes for screws, right? If so, it probably is for the terminal port splitter. That's the only sort of terminal interface I have in my /37s -- I didn't know it could have "real" ATP connectors until a conversation with Stan Sieler a couple of weeks ago. I've *no* idea what the 99-pin connector is! Unless it's the interconnect that's supposed to go between the backplanes in the two boxes. > The two units are connected vi an HP-IB cable on port 4 of each. Also, > the top has the keyed power switch for both. This bit about the HP-IB cable going between the units is something I really don't get. I'd expect there to be an interconnect of some sort between the two boxes and that the HP-IB interfaces are independent I/O channels. If the bottom unit doesn't have the keyed power switch, then I don't think it's an independent 3000. > What I need is *really* basic info on the system and some pointers to > information sources. Some quick ones: > 1) How in the heck do the two 3000/37 units come apart? Are you sure you want to do this? > 2) How do I wire a terminal to this? At a guess, the console port will be one of those port 0s. > 3) Is the AUI connector an ethernet card? A lanic card? Likely so. > 4) Could someone please ID all the rest of the ports? Tried that. > 5) Is there a graphical display capability on this machine? As an add-on? Not directly. You could connect a terminal with graphics capability (HP 2648A, 2623A, 2627A; 2625A and 2628A with the graphics options; the 150s; probably some others that I'm forgetting) and there were additional software products (HPDRAW, EASYCHART, DSG/3000) that knew how to use them to produce drawings and charts. > 6) What kind of Pertec tape interface is available for this machine? Well, unless that's what's inside a 7970E tape drive cabinet, I'd say none. By this point (mid-1980s) HP was using HP-IB for discs and tapes. > 7) If my 2nd drive is damaged, how might I go about getting an OS for it? Tricky. I don't know whether MPE for the classic 3000s is available at all now. > I apologize for such a long post and my absolute lack of knowledge here. I > had a buddy who was supposed to help me out (3000 guru) but he's just gone > overseas for work indefinitely. It's such a cool system, the way it's put > together, and there's a bunch of neat freeware that I'd love to use too. > Any help at all would really be appreciated. Time for another glum part of the picture. Roughly speaking, there's two kinds of 3000: the kind with series <= 70 and the kind with series >= 900. The former are the "classic" 16-bit stack architecture. The latter are PA-RISC architecture. The freeware is very probably for the latter. -Frank McConnell

27 years, 8 months

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Color QuickDraw

by roblwill＠usaor.net

My Mac Portable doesn't have Color QuickDraw in ROM, but It will run on it, providing I boost it up to the full 9 mess RAM. It begins to load, but then gives a "not enough RAM" error. -- -Jason Willgruber (roblwill(a)usaor.net) ICQ#: 1730318 <http://members.tripod.com/general_1> -----Original Message----- From: Eric Smith <eric(a)brouhaha.com> To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers <classiccmp(a)U.WASHINGTON.EDU> Date: Friday, November 27, 1998 5:19 PM Subject: Re: Color QuickDraw > >Actually the SE/30 does have Color Quickdraw in ROM. All Macs that Apple >shipped with 68020, 68030, and 68040 processors (and their variants) have >Color Quickdraw in ROM. The later ones even have 32-bit Quickdraw. > >This is true irrespective of whether the Mac has a B&W display built in. >For instance, on the SE/30 it is possible to install a color display adapter >in the PDS, and it works fine and in full color without needing any >special software installed. >

27 years, 8 months

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Copying files from disks to hard drive in System 7.1 Pro

by roblwill＠usaor.net

As you can see by my previous messages, I don't know much about Macs. Yet another question: How do I copy a file from a floppy disk to the hard drive? I tried the drag-and-drop like Windows, and the icon goes to the HD (desktop, or a folder on the HD). I eject the disk, then double-click the icon to run the program. It tells me to insert disk "Untitled" (that's what the disk volume is named). I insert the disk, and it runs the program off of the disk. This gets a bit annoying after a while. I'm sure there's some way to copy the files over to the HD, but how?? ThAnX, -- -Jason Willgruber (roblwill(a)usaor.net) ICQ#: 1730318 <http://members.tripod.com/general_1>

27 years, 8 months

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TI99: Ring network for TI's?

by allisonp＠world.std.com

< be able to send/receive. This also means both computers must be in < perfect sync so they catch the rising/falling edges of the signal. < IHMO, it's not a very good idea! Simple encode a one as one ful cycle of 4800hz and a zero as a half cycle of 2400hz (FM encoding). Recieving that is simple wait for the bit to change and then wait to see if there is a change at one half (or window >from 1/3 to 2/3) and then decide if that was a one or zero. since there is a once per bit change (minimum) you can sync the machines by sending a header of say 16 zeros. The casette tape soctware does exactly that but at a slower rate as the recorders are not so good as direct wires. Allison

27 years, 8 months

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Recent Finds & Thoughts

by allisonp＠world.std.com

< copying them onto a correctly aligned machine would be the first thing t < do to remove such hassles in the future :-). I still don't see how < incorrect azimuth can be used as a copy protection system. It can't. People were likely adjusting them to try and get reliability in loading and assumeing that was the copy protection. Audio tape is as difficult to copy protect as a vinyl recording, you can't effectively. Commercial casettes tend to have lower levels as the dup machines try not to saturate the tape as that would introduce distortion to music, also most were design for stereo (narower head). Most cassette recorders use a mono head (wider) so they pack up less and also when the record they write a wider path meaning they recover more on play back. Stereo tapes tend to play at lower levels and have poorer response on mono decks because of the head with differences. The only way to copy protect and audio tape is not try or make it so it only works on a given machine. Audio cassettes and computers stopped being company around or before '85 and I was there and never saw "copy" protection. I did see a lot of off speed, poorly recorded, tape with horrid print through, dropouts from poor tape (some you could see through!) and other recording errors that would never be noticed if it were music. Actually the best protections was each vendor had a different tape standard for format, data rate and encoding method. None of that was deliberate, most was simply implementation artifacts. The best being L1 trs80 used a slower rate than LIIs on the same exact hardware. Allison

27 years, 8 months

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HP3000 help needed

by A_Finney＠wfi-inc.com

/* note: sorry if this is coming through twice - I had a power outage right as it was sending so I don't know if it made it the first time. */ Well, I finally got around to ripping apart the HP3000 rack I got from John Lawson a couple of months ago. And desperately need some pointers... I've read the HP3000-L FAQ and searched most of the day for info, but there isn't much geared toward the Classic HP3000 home-hobbyist. What I've got is this: 9144 tape drive - I've already deduced that it's a low-density, 16-track capable of 67/134 megs and the tapes have to be purchased pre-formatted. 2563A Printer - with a modular connector. 9123 3 1/2" dual floppy - picked up after-the-fact at a yard sale. It's HP-IB, but has a weird DIN power connector cord. No P/S. (2) 7914 drives - one of these may be a non-op, having suffered some damage during transit. (2)HP3000 series 37's - these are piggy-backed, is this the usual configuration? . Here's where I need some info: The "top" unit has a DB-25F in slot one, and an HP-IB in slot 4, as well as those DE-3F (correct terminology?) connectors in ports 0-5. The "bottom" unit has the DB-25F in slot one, the HP-IB in slot 4, and an AUI (ethernet? Is this a Lanic board?) in slot 5, as well as the 3-pin deals in ports 0-5. Above the ports is a female Centronics-50 which connected to what I believe is a terminal splitter, p/n 40290-60003. Above that is a *very* high-density 99-pin male connector, this is attached to the board with the HP-IB connector. The two units are connected vi an HP-IB cable on port 4 of each. Also, the top has the keyed power switch for both. What I need is *really* basic info on the system and some pointers to information sources. Some quick ones: 1) How in the heck do the two 3000/37 units come apart? 2) How do I wire a terminal to this? 3) Is the AUI connector an ethernet card? A lanic card? 4) Could someone please ID all the rest of the ports? 5) Is there a graphical display capability on this machine? As an add-on? 6) What kind of Pertec tape interface is available for this machine? 7) If my 2nd drive is damaged, how might I go about getting an OS for it? I apologize for such a long post and my absolute lack of knowledge here. I had a buddy who was supposed to help me out (3000 guru) but he's just gone overseas for work indefinitely. It's such a cool system, the way it's put together, and there's a bunch of neat freeware that I'd love to use too. Any help at all would really be appreciated. Thanks, Aaron

27 years, 8 months

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Triumph of the Nerds 2.0.1

by allisonp＠world.std.com

< As it was, it bored me to tears with it's dicussion of Venture Capital. < spent half an hour discussing Cisco's experience. But, I see your point Most of the industry was venture capital and managing same. The one we talk about in a historical sense were often the least successful doing exactly that! < >One thing Max, BBS systems were never really an Internet thing. They we < >stand-alone computers that could be dialed-up and info uploaded or they were the internet before there was one. many of the BBSs were linked so email from one to another was possible (FIDO come to mind). Allison

27 years, 8 months

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Recent Finds & Thoughts

by Philip.Belben＠pgen.com

> I have many old computer cassettes, and have been thinking of recording them > onto a computer in order to preserve their contents. The signal from computer > tapes oscillates between two levels, right? This being the case, it should be > possible to record them using 1-bit sampling. Perhaps record with 8- or 16-bit > sampling and then convert down to single bit. This is one of those things that depends on the hardware. The PET and its descendants did indeed use one bit in that manner. There are quite full descriptions of the waveforms it generates in several manuals. One-bit sampling is not necessarily a good idea. What you then have is: PET writes to tape nice square signal of well defined timing. Signal comes off tape with rounded corners, noise etc. You sample it at 1 bit and write to a file. Later you read the file on a modern machine and reconstruct the audio. This is a nice square signal, with timing dependent on (a) the distortion of the original recording/playback process, (b) the noise added by tape ageing etc., (c) your sampling at 22 kHz. It goes through some audio system with not necessarily a good bandwidth and arrives at the PET cassette port. The PET then has to interpret it... Worse still if you're using an audio CD. The CD player will be filtering according to what's best for the human ear, not what's best for the computer. My advice: If you're going to do 1-bit sampling, process _immediately_ to try and reconstruct the original signal. That is what the machines do (often in hardware), after all. Then remember that some machines _don't_ use 1-bit encoding. The BBC micro, for example, uses a standard modem chip of the time, and the outputs look (I think) fairly sinusoidal... > Are there any programs to do this conversion? I imagine the equivalent of a > Schmitt trigger (in software) would work. What about playing back a 1-bit > audio signal? Are there any standard audio file formats that can be used to > store 1-bit data? > > The final 1-bit audio files should be highly compressible, so they could be > archived with zip etc. to reduce size. Agreed. 1-bit sampled audio - or multiple bit sampled audio processed to reconstruct the 1-bit waveform - should be many times more compressible than ordinary sampled sound. In theory, the compressed file need be only a few times the size of the original program, but I doubt this will be achievable. > Actually recording tapes to audio CDs is quite wasteful since you can only get > 70 minutes or so on a CD (an issue if you have hundreds of cassettes). My > approach would be to archive tapes as described above; of course burning an > audio CD is useful for transferring the data back to the source computer. I agree with whoever pointed out that you can use the two tracks of the stereo audio for different programs. Cross talk is negligible. That's 140 min. After all, those of us with reel-to-reel tape have been doing this for years... Audio CD is necessary in my opinion. The point of this exercise is to plug your computer into your sound system and load programs _without_ the need for a modern machine to retrieve archives and things. If it wasn't for copy protection, turbo loaders and the like I'd favour sampling the output of the computer's cassette port... Philip. PS PET and many later C= machines have one more problem: they didn't use standard audio cassette machine, but one with a special Commie board in it and a custom interface.

27 years, 8 months

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Color QuickDraw

by roblwill＠usaor.net

Will Color QuickDraw run on a non-color Mac (Portable)? If it will, where do I find it? I need it to run a program. ThAnX, -- -Jason Willgruber (roblwill(a)usaor.net) ICQ#: 1730318 <http://members.tripod.com/general_1>

27 years, 8 months

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"Backup tool" wanted

by CharlesII＠nwonline.net

I'm making backup disk images for my Atari 800. I was wondering if anyone has the equivlent of Fast Hack Em for the Atari? Also dose anyone know of a drive emulator for the Apple II? Charles

27 years, 8 months

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Recent Finds & Thoughts

by allisonp＠world.std.com

< ::How did that work? Made the S/N ratio horrible on copies? AFAIK no < ::cassette recorder, at least not of the cheap consumer type, ever had < ::automatic level control on _playback_. < < That was the idea, yes. All that would do is make a high precentage of poorly readable tapes. Likely they load their own loader that used a modified format that was not the same. Lowering the level on audio casette where you only have at best 34db (non dolby) of headroom on a portable would make a very crummy recording. Dubbing through a level controlled amp would beat that in a heart beat. The trick is imposing low freq noise like hum or other tones below 40hz that are unheard at normal play speeds as they are under the ability of the head to resolve. When you dupe tape at high speed 5x-10x the then say 20hz tone is now a resolvable 100-200hz and gets embedded (summed with data) as interfering noise (like a bad AC hum). < ::> days before automatic level control), or required odd azimuth settin < ::> would be toasted by dubbing. This probably shouldn't interfere with < :: < ::All that having the wrong azimuth would do is reduce the HF response. < ::There's no way to tell an original played back on a machine with the < ::heads at a different azimuth setting to the recording machine and a co < ::of that recorded and played back on the same tape deck AFAIK. No casse < ::recorder had software-controllable azimuth. This is all bogus. Recording with the azimuth off kills the HF response and no amount of tweeking with recover that on playback. It's not on the tape so there is nothing you can recover. The wider the head gap or track width the worse it will be. Casette recorders were full track mono (half the width of the tape) so they were wide! If it's wrong on playback same thing save for it's correctable. Back in the audio cassette days I've seen more attributed and fixes created based on presumed behavour. Every thing from amps to filters and other funky curcuits that often weren't fixing the tape or recorders problems but some illness in the system cassette interface. The best example of that was they TRS80. For example my fix for there interface believe it or not was remove ALL the analog on the input side and drive the gate z24 pin9 through a 10uf cap with a 270ohm pull down on the pin. There were at least two articles with filter/amps and other circuits all unneeded for that! Most all didn't usnderstand the interface or the behavour of audio tape. Allison

27 years, 8 months

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Latest acquisition.

by hhacker＠gte.net

For Thanksgiving, I acquired a Silicon Graphics IRIS 3130, which is a 680x0 based application specific system. Don't know a whole lot about it, yet, but I will post as I learn. What I do know is that it runs Unix and is intended as a tool for the production of animation. It has a GenLock feature, so if some of you have such experience, I would like to know what you know. William R. Buckley

27 years, 8 months

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Intergraph on ebay

by A_Finney＠wfi-inc.com

I'm probably really slow; did everyone else already see this? http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=43755633 Aaron

27 years, 8 months

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Xerox MemoryWriter, $10.00

by kyrrin＠bluefeathertech.com

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27 years, 8 months

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Triumph of the Nerds 2.0.1

by kurtkilgor＠geocities.com

Did anyone else see this? I thought it was much worse than 2.0, but can someone comment on its accuracy, whatever? I thought he left out a lot of stuff, about bulletin board systems, and such.

27 years, 8 months

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2.9BSD/DZ-11 clone screw

by DSEAGRAV＠toad.xkl.com

I got my hands on a Aviv DZ-11 clone. 16-line MUX. So, I go about shoving it in the 83. It boots 2.9BSD off a RL02. Shove device in, set CSR and interrupt vector, and fire up BSD. I screwed with the dtab line - With it using dzdma in place of dzou, I can't make the MUX go. The kernel attaches it, but I can't seem to be able to talk to it. So, I switched to dzou. Now, upon boot, I get the message: dz 0 csr 160100 vector 320 no address found for dzou SERIOUS CONFIGURATION ERROR^G^G^G I've tried other vectors and other bus slots, and get no improvements with either method (dzdma or dzou). Any ideas? (Oh, and if you've got another SDZV11, the DIP switches are BACKWARDS of their labels! 1=0 and 0=1. Cute, eh?) I also have a DHV11, but no idea how to tell BSD it's there. All I ever get from it is dh ? csr 160020 vector 370 didn't interrupt I think I need to set the DM address, but have no idea what to set it to. -------

27 years, 8 months

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Noisy RD53: Cure?

by kyrrin＠bluefeathertech.com

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27 years, 8 months

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HP-71B

by danjo＠xnet.com

> On Fri, 27 Nov 1998, Peter Wilton-Jones wrote: > > I have just come into ownership of an HP 71B with bar code > > reader but am unable to scan with the reader or get a > > program saved on it. Could you possibly put me in touch > > with somone who may know. Cheers. Please contact him directly.... p.g.g.wilton-jones(a)braford.ac.uk BC

27 years, 8 months

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Stuffit.

by roblwill＠usaor.net

I downloaded Mosaic for the Mac, but I can't use it. I need a newer version a Stuffit. The version I have is 1.5, and it just doesn't cut it anymore (it was on the computer when I got it). I tried to download it, but you need the new version to open the archive to install the new version (basically useless). Does anyone have a copy that they could email to me or something (TeleDisk?)? ThAnX, -- -Jason Willgruber (roblwill(a)usaor.net) ICQ#: 1730318 <http://members.tripod.com/general_1> PS>> If you have a copy, but don't have TeleDisk, let me know, and I'll send you a copy.

27 years, 8 months

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networking newbie

by SUPRDAVE＠aol.com

In a message dated 11/27/98 1:04:56 AM US Eastern Standard Time, jpero(a)pop.cgocable.net writes: > Back to topic about oldie machine (8573 P75 will be 10 years real > soon!) cannot answer networking question, but ps2 models are now coming under the 10 year rule. my favourite machine!

27 years, 8 months

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Copy Protection

by charlesii＠nwonline.net

I'm making backup disk images for my Atari 800. I was wondering if anyone has the equivlent of Fast Hack Em for the Atari? Also dose anyone know of a drive emulator for the Apple II? Charles

27 years, 8 months

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Audio Cassette formats

by mark_k＠iname.com

On Wed, 25 Nov 1998 Sam Ismail wrote: >In my experience, sound files do not compress well at all with PKZIP. I >don't know about WAV files in particular, but I'm lucky if I can squeeze >10% off the ADPCM files that I work with. Are you talking about digitised computer tapes or music? I have some digitised (VOC format) files of ZX Spectrum game tapes. For example, Altered Beast. Not sure at what rate this was sampled, but: uncompressed file size = 12,725,061 bytes compressed file size = 504,546 bytes Which is a pretty good compression ratio. That is using the lharc archiver; I imagine zip would give similar or better compression. There are lossless compression systems designed for audio, but I bet they weren't designed with computer tapes in mind. On Wed, 25 Nov 1998 Allison J Parent wrote: >FYI, protable casette recorders 3db point is 11-14KHz for the better ones >and they typical ones used 9.5-12.5KHz is more realistic. > >Sampling above 20Khz is wasting bandwidth and recording time. > >Even the fastest audio formats (sudding and TARBEL187bytes/sec) had >bandwidths below 5KHz. Many game tapes for e.g. ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64 used turbo loaders. Not sure what the highest data rate was, though at least some C64 programs loaded at 3000 baud. 3db point may not be completely relevant; at least for the old ZX Spectrum, you had to hook up the tape player with volume set at or near the maximum. For systems which (notionally) record a bilevel signal -- this may include almost all of them -- it may be that sampling at a very high rate and then doing some kind of post-processing of the sample to reduce it to 1-bit resolution would be beneficial; the result could be closer to the original signal output from the computer when the master tape was created. On Wed, 25 Nov 1998 Marvin wrote: >Someone mentioned that there are copy protection schemes for cassette tape, >and I was curious what these might be and how they might interfere with >recording the tape onto my HD. Sure. Tape copy-protection was used by almost all commerical (game) software. This involved some devious tricks, as well as turbo-loading routines. It was designed to prevent people from copying games by reading into the computer and saving out again. It shouldn't have any bearing on sampling the tapes at all. Some techniques used were auto-run loaders, fast loaders and custom formats in general, greater-than-RAM-size blocks of data. -- Mark

27 years, 8 months

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Old 386 and 486 pc's

by jeff.kaneko＠juno.com

It was the ST-1150R. It is an RLL rated version of the ST-1100. These drives are both scarce because they were high-capacity ST-506 3.5" drives. Maxtor made plenty of 5.25 full height MFM 80+ MB drives, but the Seagate ST-1100/1150R was the biggest ST-506 3.5" drive available (if anyone knows of a bigger 3.5", ST-506 interface drive, I'd like to hear from you). There are some applications where only such a small drive will fit; and the use of an IDE or SCSI drive is not possible, becuase the interfaces aren't supported. Jeff On Wed, 25 Nov 1998 16:57:12 -0500 "PG Manney" <manney(a)lrbcg.com> writes: >>One was an Everex with a mondo-scarce RLL drive. . . > > >Which one? RLL's aren't _all_ that scarce. > >manney > > ___________________________________________________________________ You don't need to buy Internet access to use free Internet e-mail. Get completely free e-mail from Juno at http://www.juno.com/getjuno.html or call Juno at (800) 654-JUNO [654-5866]

27 years, 8 months

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Collector

by CypressCEO＠aol.com

I am a 8008 and 8080 computer collector. I would like a subscription to your newsletter. Please send it to: SCHUROD(a)aol.com

27 years, 8 months

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Recent Finds & Thoughts

by allisonp＠world.std.com

< All that having the wrong azimuth would do is reduce the HF response. Correction: Having the wrong azimuth would do is reduce the already terrible HF response. Also if the motor speed is off that will add to the grief (don't assume it is!). used to work on portable casettes and 2% error was common and some were 5%+ wow and flutter from bad casette cases/ < There's no way to tell an original played back on a machine with the < heads at a different azimuth setting to the recording machine and a copy < of that recorded and played back on the same tape deck AFAIK. No cassett < recorder had software-controllable azimuth. Most all have a trap door for a screw driver. the adjustment compensates for head wear, mecanical error in the guides, sloppy transport. one set if the transport is any good it need not be touched. Most portables of the era were terrible. Allison

27 years, 8 months

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Audio Cassette formats

by allisonp＠world.std.com

< Many game tapes for e.g. ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64 used turbo loaders. N < what the highest data rate was, though at least some C64 programs loaded < 3000 baud. 300 cps, maybe. Sill the bandwidth had to be under 7-9khs as the group delays in portable cassettes are terrible as you near their upper 3db point. Still that is only twice the Tarbel data rate. < 3db point may not be completely relevant; at least for the old ZX Spectr < had to hook up the tape player with volume set at or near the maximum. It is relevant as that is the result of the head gap and media limitations. Most portables a tone at 15khz was usually at least 20db down if not worse. The HF falloff for casette is poor and portables of the era terrible!! Most the amplifier chain was easily good for more than that! A fair number the bias osc for recording was only 35khz so anything over 17khz would alias till the cows came home but the head never saw it nor the media as it couldn't do it. The bulk of audio casettes were on the 30 cps range using 300baud systems or the later ones used 150-190cps using phase encoding like tarbel, trs80 or cosmac(lots of others too). Most all were most sensitive to: *Dropouts. short periods of far lower level (or none!). *Speed variations due to transport not being able to hold or not being on speed. *Group delays (phase shifts) from trying to put HF (above 5-6khz) through the electronics, heads and media. Compared to CDrom the bandwidth, speed and noise are TERRIBLE and barely approximate 1/4 the cdrom capability. Allison

27 years, 8 months

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Front Panel Theory

by allisonp＠world.std.com

< I don't suppose anyone has any schematics for a "I-can-build-this-front < panel-computer-out < of-nothing-but-Radio < Shack-and-Jameco-parts-sit-it-on-a-shelf-and-say-look-at-that-wow" < project, now do you? Just something to play around with, that's all. Like I said last night, Bursky's book _The S100 bus Handbook_ has the IMSAI and altair front pannels. There's not a lot of majik but lots of connections and a good handful of basic TTL. Allison

27 years, 8 months

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M7454: Unibus only?

by CLASSICCMP＠trailing-edge.com

>Next: Does anyone know if the M7454 module (Unibus TU80 controller) >is Unibus only, or can it also be used on QBus systems? Plug it into a Q-bus backplane, and you'll let the magic smoke out! If you want a Q-bus tape controller, look for a Emulex TC02/03, QT13, Dilog DQ132/152, or the like. Tim.

27 years, 8 months

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Digital LA210 Letterprinter

by geoffrob＠stmarks.pp.catholic.edu.au

Hi guys, Anyone have specs/instructions for these? I have rescued one I would like to use on my VMS 6.0 box. It appears to be intact, powers up and prints a self test, (seems very fast by dot matrix standards) but it's filthy as hell, I'm trying to clean it up at the moment. It came from a lead smelter - and looks like it. But I have no specs, don't even know if it needs a straight cable, handshaking or null modem, default baud rate etc. A list of the dip switch settings or a pointer to some online docs would be terrific. Cheers Geoff Roberts Computer Systems Manager Saint Marks College Port Pirie South Australia. My ICQ# is 1970476 Ph. 61-411-623-978 (Mobile) 61-8-8633-0619 (Home) 61-8-8633-8834 (Work-Direct) 61-8-8633-0104 (Fax)

27 years, 8 months

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Front Panel Theory

by lfb107＠psu.edu

I don't suppose anyone has any schematics for a "I-can-build-this-front panel-computer-out of-nothing-but-Radio Shack-and-Jameco-parts-sit-it-on-a-shelf-and-say-look-at-that-wow" project, now do you? Just something to play around with, that's all. I'd appreciate any info, Thanks! Les

27 years, 8 months

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M7454: Unibus only?

by kyrrin＠bluefeathertech.com

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27 years, 8 months

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Into the modern age

by allisonp＠world.std.com

< One thing I'm a bit surprised by is the speed of the video being much < faster than I'd imagined it would be. Now to get some software to run Why? DEC would and did do things to keep it from being a turkey. The Video is not a simple bit map and there is a drawing engine in there. Also VAX instruction set is fairly efficient doing bit manipulations. < on it; I've found some stuff already, but can someone point me at some < share/freeware software to run under DecWindows (besides the DECUS < archives)? In particular, I remember using an ephemeris program in schoo < that I could swear was freely distributed. Check, there was a fairly good flight sim and other stuff as well. < Does the DECUS hobbyist license cover all versions of VMS/DECWindows? V5.4 through 6.1. It may work with earlier. < I'm running 5.2 on this machine; would upgrading to 6.1 noticeably degra < performance? Would additional features balance out any slowdowns? Beside < new features, my entire manual set is for 6.1... Having manuals is a good reason to be at that level. being at 6.1 may slow it a tiny bit but it's worth it. The other end is for 6.1 I'd call a 200mb scsi the minimum acceptable where 5.1 you can get by with 121mb. However a 400mb-1gb small scsi should not be hard to find cheap. Allison

27 years, 8 months

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Need DTC brand Qbus SCSI board info

by pete＠dunnington.u-net.com

On Nov 26, 12:49, CLASSICCMP(a)trailing-edge.com wrote: > Subject: RE: Need DTC brand Qbus SCSI board info > >No LSI chips on board; only two ROM chips (82S123N's with paper labels "LSH > >1" and LSD0" typed on them) plus others are typical 74xxx-series chips (LS, > >S and 7400-series) except bus I/F chips are the typical DS8641N's. > >It is suspected to be SCSI as there is a 50-pin pin connector on the > >ejector end and a tag on the antistatic bag has "Probably SCSI" written on > >it by what is apparently a DEC dealer/reseller in Pittsburgh. > > 50-pin connectors might hint that it could be SCSI, but it could be > a lot of other things too. 8-inch SA800-type floppy is the most obvious. > > DTC also sourced some boards which were controllers for SA1000-type > and SA4000-type hard drives. It could also be a QIC tape controller; I've seen dual-height versions of those from about that era. I doubt it would be SCSI in discrete logic (no LSI) in that small a space. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Dept. of Computer Science University of York

27 years, 8 months

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My adolescent fantasies FINALLY fulfilled!

by Arlen.Michaels.amichael＠nt.com

Aaron Christopher Finney <A_Finney(a)wfi-inc.com> wrote: >This is an ATR8000 with a CO-POWER upgrade board. Like you said, it was >an 8088 upgrade with 256k RAM and let you run MS-DOS and CP/M-86. In >CP/M mode, you could use the extra memory as a RAMdisk. Maybe what I have is just a partial system. There's nothing on my board that can run native CP/M (ie, no 8080 or Z80 processor). It's just one board carrying the 8088, RAM, (boot?) eprom, and logic. It's not even clear how it connects to anything else--apart from an empty dip socket in the corner and a couple of lugs to connect +5 vdc, there's no obvious electrical interface. Of course, I have no documents to help me :) Clearly I don't know what I'm missing: is there another base board that's supposed to go with this "Co-Power" card? >It wasn't just for the >ATR8000; they also made them for Kaypro, Osborne, Xerox, Zorba, and >Bigboard. Did they make a different model for each host computer, or did they use a single pcb design with different interconnects and/or eproms to suit each target system? <snip> >I got a bunch of price-lists/product brochures with this one, and will >scan it all and make it available in the next few days for anyone >interested. BTW, does someone have the actual owner's manual for it? >Funny enough, with all these books and papers, the only thing I am really >missing is the honest-to-god owners manual. A scan or copy of one would >be much appreciated. I'd love to find out more. Arlen Michaels amichael(a)nortel.ca

27 years, 8 months

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LA210 switches - here you are

by ard＠p850ug1.demon.co.uk

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27 years, 8 months

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Front Panel Theory

by pete＠dunnington.u-net.com

On Nov 26, 9:42, Allison J Parent wrote: > Subject: Re: Front Panel Theory > < Do you mean if you execute a HALT instruction? > No. Halt is a instruction. WAIT/ is a device pin. > the WAIT/ state on z80 does not generate refresh as it's a extended T2 > state and refresh is not output until the cpu proceds to the T3 state. Yes, I know - but you wrote "halt" not "wait" so I was surprised (and it was late at night, so I didn't think about what you probably meant). -- Pete Peter Turnbull Dept. of Computer Science University of York

27 years, 8 months

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Need DTC brand Qbus SCSI board info

by CLASSICCMP＠trailing-edge.com

>No LSI chips on board; only two ROM chips (82S123N's with paper labels "LSH >1" and LSD0" typed on them) plus others are typical 74xxx-series chips (LS, >S and 7400-series) except bus I/F chips are the typical DS8641N's. >It is suspected to be SCSI as there is a 50-pin pin connector on the >ejector end and a tag on the antistatic bag has "Probably SCSI" written on >it by what is apparently a DEC dealer/reseller in Pittsburgh. 50-pin connectors might hint that it could be SCSI, but it could be a lot of other things too. 8-inch SA800-type floppy is the most obvious. DTC also sourced some boards which were controllers for SA1000-type and SA4000-type hard drives. >It could be an earlier SASI type board too as the date codes on the chips >run from mid-1982 to a few from the first weeks of 1983. IIRC, that's >around the tail end of the SASI protocol days and beginning of the SCSI >protocol. >Anyway, I need to get info on this to see if it could be used on either my >MicroVAX II or MicroPDP-11/73. If it is a SCSI/SASI controller, it certainly isn't MSCP-emulating, which would make it not particularly useful for a stock OS. You can always plug it into a machine and scan the I/O page to see what address it turns up at. This will give you a big hint as to what it emulates (if anything!) -- 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

27 years, 8 months

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Arrgh!

by kyrrin＠bluefeathertech.com

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27 years, 8 months

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more interesting finds!

by JRichardson＠softwright.co.uk

missed the start of this thread, but: >NOTE: X-Window terminals were often crammed full of memory (2 to 16meg >generally), usually SIMS. This often gets stripped first, even before the >surplus shop gets it. they generally (always? think it's actually part of the system design on some boxes) need a boot ROM to boot from a host system (maybe some sort of binaries for the terminal held on the host server too?). I gather that these ROMs were often purchased seperately from the terminal itself (presumably several giving different configurations for a particular terminal were on offer) and so you may have a terminal without the ROM, in which case getting hold of one might be interesting... cheers Jules >

27 years, 8 months

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rescued and available

by allisonp＠world.std.com

Hey S100/CPM fans... I managed to collect the following: 5 Compupro 85/88 cpu cards 8085/8088 5 Compupro System support cards (extended interrupts, RTC and more) 3 Compupro Disk-1 DMA floppy controllers (does both 8 and 5") 2 Compupro DISK-3 DMA Hard disk controller (MFM) 1 CCI Printerfacer printer buffer card MANY Compupro Interfacer I/2/3/4 cards Some compupro RAM16, RAM20, RAM21 All expected to be good as they were removed from regular service in 93/94 time frame and clean. I also have DOCs for the boards maybe more. Also several Intergrand dual disk mounting boxes for hard disks or floppies. These can mount full height floppies or hard disks and have nice power supplies. Suitable for MFM or SCSI drives. They have MFM drives likely quantum D540 (31mb RD52) or fugitsu. I have several dual 8" disk boxes with drives(2sided). Expectations they are good. Also several loose full and half height two sided drives. I also have several S100 crates (compupro, TEI and Intergrand) all heaver than a small train. Two are BIG as they mount a pair of FULL height 8" drives. Power supply is a moose! And terminals... All Telvideo 9xx series and all work. I've already taken out what I want so this is the EXCESS. Offers to me off line. Shipping for the boards can be done. The boxes are local pickup only as they are big and heavy! terminals may be shipable. This will not be on Ebay or others. I'd like to get a nominal amount plus shipping for my effort and the 100 mile trips it took to get them. Allison

27 years, 8 months

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