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

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 08:13 PM 6/10/98 -0500, you wrote: >It's not even classic yet: > >GRID INTROS FIRST MS-DOS LAPTOP WITH BUILT-IN POINTER >BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS, U.S.A., 1990 >AUG 16 (NB) > -- Grid Systems Corporation has introduced the GridCase 1550sx, the first >PC-compatible lapto... Well, that just means it won't be priced outragiouslt on ebay. 8^) Definitely significant, though. >a mouse. I hate mice, and hate track-balls and other stationary pointers >only slightly less, but I *love* IBM's eraser head. Some people see this I agree in theory, but disagree with your conclusion. (Can't stand the eraser.) >A mouse requires you to remove your hands from the keyboard and switch [...] >if I have to move a stupid pointer across the screen, the eraser head >let's me keep most of my fingers on keys where they belong. Yes, but so does a trackball or trackpad centered below the keyboard (which is one of the main reasons I bought my current laptop.) Best of all, IMO is the tootsie-roll from the Outbound. Mostly, however, I stick to keyboard commands (my one complaint about the MacOS -- you can't pull down menus and such from the keyboard). I strongly feel that anything you want to do should be doable from the keyboard -- if you're willing to remember how. (Example: in MS Word, there is a keyboard command to set bold/underline/etc. If I used Word a lot, and used bold/underline/etc a lot, I would remember it. Instead, for the few times I do that, I don't mind using the mouse. On the other hand, I can do just about anything in Eudora without using a mouse-thingie.) I do use a trackball -- a Logitech Trackman Marble. It's comfortable, accurate, and simply works great. The advantage of a trackball/other over a mouse is that on a mouse, when you click, you are also moving (however slight) the moving part. With a trackball, you can take your thumb completely off the ball before clicking. And I'll shut up now lest I get flames for mumbling off-topic too much. --------------------------------------------------------------------- O- Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad roger(a)sinasohn.com that none but madmen know." Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates San Francisco, California http://www.sinasohn.com/

28 years, 1 month

1
0
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Dash 030 (was: Early Mac Clones)

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 12:57 AM 6/11/98 +0000, you wrote: >> nice servers for their time, with great cases. > >As for the rest.. smile when you say it, some of us still run IIx's and >IIfx's. :-) Sorry, what I meant was, at the time they came out, they were top-of-the-line. Today, with the advances since, they are simply great servers. (And, when I get the time to set it up, I fully intend to put one to use as a server for the Macs in Rachel's classroom.) >Seriously, though, there is an article on one of the MacTimes sites >which argues for using an older system as a server. Basically, it Also, if all you're doing is internet stuff, an older IIci or basic '486 is just fine. But that sort of thing that got a lot of us on this list in the first place. --------------------------------------------------------------------- O- Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad roger(a)sinasohn.com that none but madmen know." Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates San Francisco, California http://www.sinasohn.com/

28 years, 1 month

1
0
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Bit slices?

by red＠bears.org

Hej allesammen; What's a 'bit slice'? Are they served with a twist of lemon? I suppose a better way of asking that is how is a 'bit sliced' processor or ALU differentiated from a 'normal' one? ok r.

28 years, 1 month

3
2
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Clueless Museums (was: Final Xerox Star demo)

by higginbo＠netpath.net

At 10:26 PM 6/10/98 -0400, William Donzelli wrote: >> Packard Bell: Today's headache, tomorrow's obscure collectible. Hey, you >> never know: People might start collecting only the badly designed systems. >> It could happen. > >OK, enough Packard-Bell bashing. Send me every PB model 250 you can get >your hands on - I will even pay shipping (and for the crate). Heh heh. I thought that comment would flush out a PB person or two. :) They have actually gotten alot better, but I don't think you'll ever see any in the Smithsonian like some classic systems. - - john higginbotham ____________________________ - webmaster www.pntprinting.com - - limbo limbo.netpath.net -

28 years, 1 month

4
3
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Early Mac Clones

by desieh＠southcom.com.au

Mac XTs where the first as far as I know Mac clones............. bascailly a Mac in a IBM 5150 case......... Desie -----Original Message----- From: nerdware(a)laidbak.com <nerdware(a)laidbak.com> To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers <classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu> Date: Monday, June 08, 1998 1:47 Subject: Re: Early Mac Clones Date sent: Sun, 07 Jun 1998 13:46:25 -0400 Send reply to: classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu From: Ward Donald Griffiths III <gram(a)cnct.com> To: "Discussion re-collecting of classic computers" <classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu> Subject: Re: Early Mac Clones > Zane H. Healy wrote: > > > I think that's the same book I've got a copy of around here. Interesting > > reading, but I've basically never seen any of that stuff anywhere. Though > > I found it really interesting, has anyone ever seen a Mac Plus or simular > > system recased into a PC case? It would be a fun project, but I've got to > > many other projects :^) > > > > The closest I've got to a Mac clone (I'm writting this on a PowerMac > > 8500/180) is a Amiga 3000 with emulation software. The Amiga is actually > > about as fast as the real thing. > > I had a coworker in the late 80s who had his Mac and his Amiga 2000 > recased and rack-mounted, sharing a rack with a lot of _serious_ > video editing gear. > -- IIRC, NewTek (makers of the Video Toaster) decided that since they were having some trouble getting the Toaster accepted in the mainstream because most people thought the Amiga was only a toy, they created an interface card for a Mac that would allow the Mac user to run the Toaster-equipped A2000 (private-labeled for NewTek) from his Mac, thereby making it 'legit'. I had to laugh at the thought of paying a grand or more just to see the Amiga Workbench come up on a Mac screen instead of the "toy" Amiga screen. Of course, this 'toy' made multimedia possible before Uncle Bill said it was ok to use it.....too many people forget that. Not you guys, though. (I hope.) One of my other favorite Amiga stories was something I swear I read in AmigaWorld or Byte -- right after the A1000 came out, Gates had a press conference to talk about Windows. Some reporter asked him about multitasking, and Gates replied that multitasking really wasn't possible in anything under 8 megs of ram. To which the same reporter replied, "But doesn't your own Amiga Basic multitask nicely on a 512k Amiga?" A question which Gates promptly ignored and moved on......... Paul Braun NerdWare -- The History of the PC and the Nerds who brought it to you. nerdware(a)laidbak.com www.laidbak.com/nerdware

28 years, 1 month

3
4
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Files as files

by maxeskin＠hotmail.com

In general, file systems seem to fit into several simple categories. Let's say UNIX-like, DOS-like, simple (just data), and that's about it I've looked at Apple manuals, and the Apple ][ format is kinda like DOS in terms of having an array of blocks and stuff. Except Apple's is quite a bit more elegant. Since some people here are fond of praising the VAX, how does its file system work (typically)? > >That used to be one of my interview questions for Unix programmers: your >buggy program just created a filename with {control characters, leading >dash (-), leading slash (/), '*', etc} in it. How do you delete it? > >Does anybody collect file systems? That would be semi-useful for somebody >doing data recovery. I have no idea what the Newton "soup", for example, >looks like. One of my favorites was the Regulus (unix-like) filesystem. >It maintained a bitmap of free blocks and could easily allocate a best-fit >contiguous region for your file (I think they had an option to creat() for >contiguity). This made file access *fast* when you needed it. I still >find fragmentation a nightmare even on Linux. > >-- Doug > > ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

28 years, 1 month

3
2
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Mac Portable Power Supply

by maxeskin＠hotmail.com

IF you mean the AC adaptor, you can use later ones (powerbook). This is actually beneficial because later ones are strong enough to power the machine alone, while the Mac Portable one needed the battery to be inside and working. I powered my mac portable for a few months w/two adaptors. The I put the battery in. Happily, it recharged fully from that high current (it was dead otherwise; I got the portable because it wouldn't start up because of the battery. I got it to run by hooking the battery up to mains AC long enough to "recharge" it). >I was wondering if anyone had a Mac Portable power supply, and wanted to >sell it cheap. > Thanks :), > Mike Sheflin > >______________________________________________________ >Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com > ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

28 years, 1 month

1
0
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Files as files

by maxeskin＠hotmail.com

How do UNIX files work? Is there a header of some sort? BTW, I think it's an incredible pain that the Mac has no built in way to change file types. If they get lost, I have to used DiskEdit or some such thing to restore them. > >Even the Mac or its apps seemed to be confused about the nature of >what should be in the resource fork - some apps stored all their >data there, using it as a sort of mini-database of tagged chunks >of data. If there's anything classic about today's computers, >it's the nearly universal recognition that a file's a file. >Departures from this are interesting but rare. > >The other non-file info such as the filename itself, the date stamp, >attributes, etc. are treated in an incidental fashion. The Amiga >file system, for example, had a "file comment" of about 80 characters >of extra text to describe the file that wasn't always preserved. >This may have been inherited from Tripos. > >And then there's the way something like the effects of Radix-50 >(packing three chars into two bytes) has percolated through the >years as three-character filename extensions from RT-11 (or >earlier?) to CP/M to DOS and Windows, which are overused and >abused in many ways. > >One of my latest three-great-ideas-before-breakfast ideas is >to write a program for Windows that sniffs and identifies files >in the manner of Unix's "file". That's the problem with files as >files: you can easily lose track of what's in them, especially >if you lose that three-char extension, or it gets wrapped in >an archive format or attachment, etc. > >- John >Jefferson Computer Museum <http://www.threedee.com/jcm> > > ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

28 years, 1 month

7
7
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Clueless Museums (was: Final Xerox Star demo)

by maxeskin＠hotmail.com

Before we go any further, which Packard Bells are we talking about? I don't know the old ones (I rescued a 286 PB still in the box from a compactor about a year ago and hid it where I thought it would be safe; I doubt they will ever get that ceramic off the dumpster's ram), but the new ones are ugly and had that stupid navigator thing that looked like screenshots from Myst (do they still?). But, how bad can a design get (am I asking for it?)? >You mean there's a difference? :) > >Packard Bell: Today's headache, tomorrow's obscure collectible. Hey, you >never know: People might start collecting only the badly designed systems. >It could happen. > > >- >- john higginbotham ____________________________ >- webmaster www.pntprinting.com - >- limbo limbo.netpath.net - > > ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

28 years, 1 month

1
0
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Mac Portable Power Supply

by icyblackhand＠hotmail.com

I was wondering if anyone had a Mac Portable power supply, and wanted to sell it cheap. Thanks :), Mike Sheflin ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

28 years, 1 month

1
0
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Bit slices?

by mcquiggi＠sfu.ca

Bit slice processors are designed so that they can be ganged together with suitable interconnection, making an 8 bit ALU out of 2 - 4 bit units, etc. Generally good for accumulators etc with more complex instruction decoding outboard. My 2 cents... Kevin At 02:39 PM 11/06/98 -0400, you wrote: > >Hej allesammen; > >What's a 'bit slice'? Are they served with a twist of lemon? > >I suppose a better way of asking that is how is a 'bit sliced' processor >or ALU differentiated from a 'normal' one? > >ok >r. > > >

28 years, 1 month

1
0
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Files as files

by pete＠dunnington.u-net.com

On Jun 11, 3:36, Doug Yowza wrote: > That used to be one of my interview questions for Unix programmers: your > buggy program just created a filename with {control characters, leading > dash (-), leading slash (/), '*', etc} in it. How do you delete it? Quickest general method is "rm -i *", though you may sometimes need "rm -i .*" instead/as well. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Dept. of Computer Science University of York

28 years, 1 month

2
1
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Attn: Ward Griffiths

by jeff.kaneko＠ifrsys.com

Guys: I would address this to Ward directly, rather than to the list, but our jerked-around mail system now removes the original senders address. My apologies. Ward: Please e-mail me at: jeff.kaneko(a)ifrsys.com There's something I'd like to discuss with you. Thanks! Jeff We now return you to our regularly scheduled programme . . . .

28 years, 1 month

1
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Microsoft's Computer Museum

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 12:47 AM 6/11/98 +0100, you wrote: >That makes me wonder if they're going to attempt to rewrite history >_again_... After all the Altair (it was the Altair, wasn't it) was hardly Well, possibly, but the optimist in me says that maybe, just maybe, they'll do it right, what with all that money they have laying around.... (Pardon me, while I go kill said optimist. Feel free to continue laughing...) --------------------------------------------------------------------- O- Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad roger(a)sinasohn.com that none but madmen know." Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates San Francisco, California http://www.sinasohn.com/

28 years, 1 month

1
0
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Early Mac Clones

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 11:18 PM 6/10/98 +0000, you wrote: >> >Dash '030 from (iirc) 68000 systems. It's an actual Mac II-type > >Apparently very popular (at one time, at least) with prepress houses. Yes; one of mine came from a company called Landor Associates that was responsible for recent Olympic Logos, Radio Shack's latest logo, Most (if not all) of McDonald's packaging and branding, and a lot of Microsoft's packaging/branding. Great company, and good at what they do. (In addition to the Dash, they had an outbound running around, but I don't know what happened to it.) --------------------------------------------------------------------- O- Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad roger(a)sinasohn.com that none but madmen know." Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates San Francisco, California http://www.sinasohn.com/

28 years, 1 month

1
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Early Mac Clones

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 02:48 PM 6/10/98 PDT, you wrote: >Is this device better than a mouse, in your opinion? Is it an ADB >device? Is it better than a mouse? Is Ben & Jerry's Phish Food better than a rotten banana? Is a Jaguar XK8 better than totalled Ford Aspire? Yes, it's better. Unfortunately, it's an integral part of the Outbound case, and therefore not applicable to any other computer. The outbound, if you're unfamiliar with it, is a Mac Clone laptop. There are two models; mine sports a 68030, and uses a standard 2.5" IDE laptop hard drive. Great machine. (If my screen wasn't ferschimmled I'd be using it all the time.) --------------------------------------------------------------------- O- Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad roger(a)sinasohn.com that none but madmen know." Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates San Francisco, California http://www.sinasohn.com/

28 years, 1 month

1
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FA: Various systems

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 02:48 PM 6/10/98 -0500, you wrote: >Actually, the ad was for auctions at Haggle Online, http://www.haggle.com. (nudge, nudge, wink, wink, say no more, say no more...) 8^) For them not familiar with it, Haggle is kinda like ebay, though less crowded. More importantly, it is also building an online museum of classic computers. This is probably due to our own Doug Salot somehow being involved in the whole mess... --------------------------------------------------------------------- O- Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad roger(a)sinasohn.com that none but madmen know." Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates San Francisco, California http://www.sinasohn.com/

28 years, 1 month

1
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FA: Various systems

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 01:37 PM 6/10/98 EDT, you wrote: >This is NOT a flame, but i'm just wondering the point of posting items that >have been put up for sale on ebay, et al. all that means is every item will The point is that you thereby inform a whole passel of people that the items are for sale, including many who might not otherwise know. Gets the seller potentially higher prices. And, someone here might find out about something they really want. On the other hand, it may annoy some folks here. btw, it seems to me that prices on Haggle are not quite as wild as on ebay. (Though I do check ebay regularly too.) >is announced as being for sale, the subscribers to this group should get >first crack. Well, tyhat would be nice, but the collective "we" can't force anyone to do anything. This has come up before, and the consensus seems to be that it's a tough decision whether to offer things here (and be a hero) or on ebay (and get rich.) --------------------------------------------------------------------- O- Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad roger(a)sinasohn.com that none but madmen know." Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates San Francisco, California http://www.sinasohn.com/

28 years, 1 month

1
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Cross listing Ebay items

by jfoust＠threedee.com

At 08:26 PM 6/10/98 -0500, you wrote: > >Or the $1500 Lisa 2? That one went from $300 to $1500 in one bid, but it >only takes one sucker, err, collector. The auction sites are just like any other web site: you don't know what's really happening, such as if the transaction actually takes place at that price. Certainly the auction sites do not list their failure and debt-collection rates. I think the auction offers and supposed final bids are interesting to hear - they're at least as interesting as the brag-of-the-week >from those lucky Silicon Valley and Redmond thrift-store cruisers who appear to be filling a U-Haul for $50 every weekend. On Wed, 10 Jun 1998, Ward Donald Griffiths III wrote: > Hell, I'd rather fix rams with my teeth the way the old Basque herders > used to than a Packard-Bell computer. At least us sheep ranchers understand your jokes. - John

28 years, 1 month

1
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Early Mac Clones

by maxeskin＠hotmail.com

But there's a difference between a Z-80 running a text-mode interface, and an 8088 running a GUI. Also, remember that Bill Gates didn't know very much about operating systems, as opposed to languages. MS Windows is the only OS MS programmed ground up, something they only started after the A1000. And, I've never seen Windows multitask under 8MB in the way the Amiga or a UNIXoid computer can. >> and Gates replied that multitasking really wasn't possible in >> anything under 8 megs of ram. To which the same reporter replied, >>"But >> doesn't >> your own Amiga Basic multitask nicely on a 512k Amiga?" >> >> A question which Gates promptly ignored and moved on......... > >Especially since the TRS-80 Model 16, with the Xenix OS partly done >by Microsoft, multitasked (and multiusered) quite nicely even with >only 256K of RAM. Not to mention the Color Computer running OS-9 in >64K. >-- >Ward Griffiths >They say that politics makes strange bedfellows. >Of course, the main reason they cuddle up is to screw somebody else. > Michael Flynn, _Rogue Star_ > ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

28 years, 1 month

3
2
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Clueless Museums (was: Final Xerox Star demo)

by higginbo＠netpath.net

At 10:13 PM 6/10/98 -0400, Ward Donald Griffiths III wrote: >Hell, I'd rather fix rams with my teeth the way the old Basque herders >used to than a Packard-Bell computer. You mean there's a difference? :) Packard Bell: Today's headache, tomorrow's obscure collectible. Hey, you never know: People might start collecting only the badly designed systems. It could happen. - - john higginbotham ____________________________ - webmaster www.pntprinting.com - - limbo limbo.netpath.net -

28 years, 1 month

6
6
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Files as files

by pete＠dunnington.u-net.com

On Jun 11, 4:20, Ward Donald Griffiths III wrote: > Unix started with a 14-char filename limit (and allowed [still does] > characters in filenames tricky to get at from the shell). I still have two disks with filenames which include DEL and NUL characters. > I always figured if you couldn't describe > what a file was for in 14 characters, you should be in a different > profession. The current fashion for doing things like including > things like extended version numbers in filenames does not change my > opinion. Nor mine :-) -- Pete Peter Turnbull Dept. of Computer Science University of York

28 years, 1 month

1
0
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Digital DF02 modem

by dastar＠wco.com

Ok you DEC-heads. What baud rate does the Digital DF02 modem jog along at? Sam Alternate e-mail: dastar(a)siconic.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ever onward. September 26 & 27...Vintage Computer Festival 2 See http://www.siconic.com/vcf for details! [Last web page update: 06/07/98]

28 years, 1 month

3
2
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IBM PC DOS 5.02 (OT)

by photze＠batelco.com.bh

Hi. I just got a shwrink wrapped copy of this, and wanted to know if anyone wanted it before I used it... I'll either sell it or trade it for PC/Apple ][ stuff. Ciao, Tim D. Hotze

28 years, 1 month

1
0
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Dash 030 (was: Early Mac Clones)

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 07:14 AM 6/10/98 -0700, you wrote: >Does "Mac II-type motherboard" mean its a genuine Apple motherboard, or >do you just mean its similiar to the Mac II motherboards? Sorry... By "Mac II-type" I meant that size mb. Both that I have use real Apple motherboards. One is (iirc) a Mac IIx, the other is a IIfx. Very nice servers for their time, with great cases. --------------------------------------------------------------------- O- Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad roger(a)sinasohn.com that none but madmen know." Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates San Francisco, California http://www.sinasohn.com/

28 years, 1 month

3
2
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Files as files

by pete＠dunnington.u-net.com

On Jun 10, 11:10, Allison J Parent wrote: > <word. I do not know if ODS-1 (RSX FILES-11) or the RSTS filesystems > <precede RT-11, but if I had to guess, I would say yes. IIRC, both use > <9.3. > > Did you mean 8.3? RT-11, RSTS and RSX-11 were 8.3 as was early VMS and > unice. RT-11 has always been 6.3, RSX-11 is 9.3 IIRC, and UNIX doesn't have any fixed format - though early versions had a fairly small limit on name length (12 chars?). All versions of UNIX allow as many dots as you can fit in the length. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Dept. of Computer Science University of York

28 years, 1 month

4
3
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FS: Apple Lisa Vintage Computer! Very rare! (fwd)

by dastar＠wco.com

@Get this for humor. The funny thing is, he'll probably get this price for it! Sam Alternate e-mail: dastar(a)siconic.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ever onward. September 26 & 27...Vintage Computer Festival 2 See http://www.siconic.com/vcf for details! [Last web page update: 06/07/98] ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Shadow303(a)my-dejanews.com Newsgroups: comp.sys.apple2.marketplace Subject: FS: Apple Lisa Vintage Computer! Very rare! Date: Mon, 08 Jun 1998 14:39:20 GMT Apple Lisa computer for sale! Looks a bit used but in excellent condition! Has tons of extra software! I want 2,000 dollars or best offer. E mail me. Cliff -- Sam Alternate e-mail: dastar(a)siconic.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ever onward. September 26 & 27...Vintage Computer Festival 2 See http://www.siconic.com/vcf for details! [Last web page update: 06/07/98]

28 years, 1 month

1
0
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Microsoft Re-Liscencing?

by photze＠batelco.com.bh

Hi. Just heard about this, so I dunno really what I'm talking about... Appearantly, this company is (was) selling liscences for DOS 3.3. I'm guessing that this is from a deal with MS. Has anyone ever seen this? Is it available with another product, such as early Windows releases? Ciao, Tim D. Hotze

28 years, 1 month

3
2
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Basic PDP-11ish questions

by healyzh＠ix.netcom.com

OK, to aviod confusion the first system in question is a SMS-1000, with a PDP-11/73 board, 2MW RAM, RL02 Controller (DL), TK50 Controller (MU), Dilog DQ606 Floppy Controller (DY). The SMS-1000 has an internal Floppy and HD, which it thinks are a RD51 (DU) and RX50 (DU). The boot ROMs support DU (DSA, the HD and Floppy), MU (TK50), and MS (TS). I'm able to boot off of RL02 by entering in the bootstrap from ODT. I've got RSX-11M and XXDP RL02 packs, and can boot from either. I've managed to make a bootable XXDP floppy diskette. I can boot the machine directly off of the XXDP floppy on power up. I can boot the XXDP floppy >from the XXDP RL02 pack, and then boot the XXDP RL02 pack from floppy. However, if I power up and boot from floppy, I can not boot the XXDP RL02 pack. Is this because the Boot ROMs don't support RL02's? Does anyone have any instructions for a Dilog DQ606 controller? I gather that it can be configured to act as several different floppy drives. The drives that came with it are labeled as being a RX-50 and a RX-33, yet RSX-11M sees both as RX-02's. I'd like to get these changed back to RX-50 and RX-33. What does the device name 'MS', device type 'TS' stand for? My guess is a 9-Track tape drive. I've also got a PDP-11/44 that I'm slowly working on restoring. It's in two racks, one has a pair of RL02's which have been cleaned up. The other has the CPU, 2 RX-02's, 2 TU-58's, and a battery backup. In looking at the CPU, it looks as if it has a LED for the battery backup. Does that battery need to be in the system? I would just as soon remove them and not have anything to do with them since they are old lead-acid batteries, and I'm not very fond of such things (spent 3 1/2 years of my time in the Navy working on UPS's). Is there any reason that I can't just plug the whole thing into a power source outside of the rack. I'm asking since for all I know the battery and powersuppy in the bottom of the rack are some kind of power conditioning circuit. Also does anyone have any recommendations on how to go about testing out the power supplies on the 11/44? I'd just as soon not blow anything up. I have powered up the RL02's, but that is all so far. I'm waiting to test the power supplies before I get the remaining boards that I need for the system. Thanks, Zane | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Adminstrator | | healyzh(a)ix.netcom.com (primary) | Linux Enthusiast | | healyzh(a)holonet.net (alternate) | Classic Computer Collector | +----------------------------------+----------------------------+ | For Empire of the Petal Throne and Traveller Role Playing, | | see http://www.dragonfire.net/~healyzh/ | | For the collecting of Classic Computers with info on them. | | see http://www.dragonfire.net/~healyzh/museum.html |

28 years, 1 month

3
5
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Early Mac Clones

by jeff.kaneko＠ifrsys.com

Hey, not to mention those guys that unpackage their CoCo III's and put them into PeeCee cabinets to add SCSI, more disk drives, extra memory, etc. etc. etc. Jeff At 05:45 PM 6/8/98 -0500, you wrote: >>bit hard getting a mac into a pc case though, remember that macs have all >>the connectors on board, >> >>desie > > >Can't be any worse than the people that put Atari's or Amiga's in a PC >case. I've seen a Atari TT030 in a PC Tower, and it's quite popular among >Amiga people to tower their A1200's. All it takes is some creative cabling. > > Zane >| Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Adminstrator | >| healyzh(a)ix.netcom.com (primary) | Linux Enthusiast | >| healyzh(a)holonet.net (alternate) | Classic Computer Collector | >+----------------------------------+----------------------------+ >| For Empire of the Petal Throne and Traveller Role Playing, | >| see http://www.dragonfire.net/~healyzh/ | >| For the collecting of Classic Computers with info on them. | >| see http://www.dragonfire.net/~healyzh/museum.html | > > >

28 years, 1 month

2
1
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Cross listing auction items

by higginbo＠netpath.net

I'm trying my darndest not to get too involved in this thread, even though I started it, but I need to set the record straight: The URLs I sent weren't from ebay, they were from Haggle Online. An online auction that is totally free to buyers and sellers, unlike ebay, that charges a fee to sellers. Not that it really matters, since online auctions seem to be the new "great satan" on this list. I would like to point out though that if you don't know the true value of an item, why not let the public decide? What's wrong with making a little bit of money off a hobby? I know this probably isn't over, but I'll try to stay out of it, regardless. At 07:15 PM 6/10/98 -0700, Sam Ismail wrote: >I and others have said in the past that there's no wrong reason for >wanting to collect computers, but this craze I see going on at eBay is in >the very least stupid. - - john higginbotham ____________________________ - webmaster www.pntprinting.com - - limbo limbo.netpath.net -

28 years, 1 month

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Early Mac Clones

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<One of the smallest multitasking systems I've seen was the I/O processor <on the PERQ 2's. It was a Z80 with 4K ROM and 16K RAM, but said ROM <contained essentially a cooperatively multitasking kernel. Some tasks <were in ROM, others were loaded into RAM. OK, so the user never realised <what was going on, but that doesn't alter the fact that it was there :-) The smallest I've seen run on 8080 and fits in some 100 or so bytes. It was published in Kilobaud April 1978 page 102 and yes it was real. To multitask on most anything all you need is an interrupt and save the context of the current task and start some new task... the order, where the tasks are and memory allocation can be somewhat tricky but, for small tasks its pretty trivial. I've done it in 8048 MCUs where the resources were 64byts of ram and 1k of rom and the tasks were keyscan, display, serial IO and code conversion. The timer provided the interrupt. Allison

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Early Mac Clones

by desieh＠southcom.com.au

bit hard getting a mac into a pc case though, remember that macs have all the connectors on board, desie -----Original Message----- From: Sam Ismail <dastar(a)wco.com> To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers <classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu> Date: Monday, June 08, 1998 5:41 Subject: Re: Early Mac Clones >On Sun, 7 Jun 1998, Tom Owad wrote: > >> What edition do you have? My 2nd edition book says a listing of clones >> is given in edition 1, as oppose to just saying they exist. I'd love to >> get a list of old Mac clones. > >I made a timely find today of the first edition of _Build Your Own >Macintosh and Save a Bundle_. In Chapter 2 it has a price comparison >between the clone "Cat" Mac and the real Mac. The computers it lists are: > >Cat Mac SE >Cat Mac SE 30 >Cat Mac II >Cat Mac IIfx >Cat Mac IIcx >Cat Mac IIci > >It will indeed be interesting if I ever find one of these homebrew clones >(For the curious, the book basically tells you to buy Mac motherboards and >parts from third-party suppliers and stick them in a PC case. That's it.) >They would be hard to spot since I don't even give a first look to PC >clone boxes. There's not really anything special about them anyway, other >than the fact that it is novel. > >Sam Alternate e-mail: dastar(a)siconic.com >--------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- >Ever onward. > > September 26 & 27...Vintage Computer Festival 2 > See http://www.siconic.com/vcf for details! > [Last web page update: 05/30/98] >

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Stupid lusers...

by JRichardson＠softwright.co.uk

>> The MC68010 is the heart of my favorite computer ever, the AT&T Unix PC >> (built by Convergent Technologies). I've got three, two work fine, one >> is for parts. _Still_ the prettiest machines in my collection. Do you mean the NCR Tower series? Or was this some other offering by AT&T? I seem to remember that the old Tower 400's had 68010's - I've still got a few boards somewhere for one (system board was about 1 metre long and half a metre high!). I've got a complete Tower 700 with a 68030 as main CPU, and performance still rates really highly even these days...) Jules

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Files as files

by pete＠dunnington.u-net.com

On Jun 10, 14:56, Max Eskin wrote: > How do UNIX files work? Is there a header of some sort? Not really. Certainly not consistently across all file types. Often command scripts have a comment at the top, and some versions of unix (eg, Irix) embed a "tag" number into executables so they can distinguish individual programs/versions quickly, but other than that, filetype determination is done by looking at various parts of a file and comparing what's found ("magic numbers") to a database (the "magic" file). So, for example, my system "knows" a certain file is a command script because the first 256 characters are all ASCII (which means it's probably a text file of some sort) and the file permissions are set such that it's executable (not merely readable). It also knows that a certain file is an ELF-format executable for a 32-bit little-endian MIPS processor with a version 1 architecture (ie it will run on *old* MIPS cpus as well as newer ones) because the bytes at offset 1 are "ELF", at offset 4 there's a binary "1" (which in this context means 32-bit not 64-bit), at offset 5 there's another "1" (little-endian), at offset 16 "2" means "executable", and at offset 18 "0" means "MIPS" (not Sparc, 80x86, 68000, etc). Some magic numbers are much simpler to decode, of course: a file that begins with "GIF89a" is a GIF file, surprise, surprise. And the more you dig, the more detail you can work out. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Dept. of Computer Science University of York

28 years, 1 month

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Clueless Museums (was: Final Xerox Star demo)

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<And another point. There are a lot of ways to make (say) an oscillator. <If you're designing something you probably only need to know a couple of <them. But if you're repairing it, you'd better understand the one that <was used. True! I have the advantage that I see designs and immediatly see the core of the design with all the fluff removed. But it's years of experience and a good basic grounding in circuit theory that allows me to look st stuff I've never seen and synthsize the elements of the design in my head and troubleshoot it, right down to seeing it's weak points of likely failure. Allison

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Clueless Museums (was: Final Xerox Star demo)

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<Related to this, there's a myth that design is difficult, but design is easy, it's a process. The initial creative thought is hard. <faultfinding/repair can be done by almost anybody. Well, having done <both, I personally find them equally difficult. Perhaps that means I'm <no good at it, but... Troubleshooting is a very complex process that I've never been able to teach to anyone but those that naturally could. For me troubleshooting is something that I find natural and easy. I carry that to design as just a different problem to solve (cheaper, faster, better; pick any two). But working with field circus underscored that thinking is not something you can mandate. Allison

28 years, 1 month

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Cross listing auction items

by higginbo＠netpath.net

At 07:58 PM 6/10/98 -0500, Doug Yowza wrote: >auctions. I'd suggest that the exact opposite is true. Whenever somebody >asks this list "how much is this thing worth", the answer is invariably >"whatever somebody is willing to pay". Basically, valuation of >collectibles is a democratic process not an analytical one belonging to >some exclusive domain of experts. Exactly, hence the value of an auction environment. That is what "whatever someone is willing to pay" means, isn't it? - - john higginbotham ____________________________ - webmaster www.pntprinting.com - - limbo limbo.netpath.net -

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Help on Grid Laptop

by manney＠lrbcg.com

There's an interesting GRiD support page at http://limbo.netpath.net/hw/GRiD/new.html >Is it a 1550SX? Try ftp://ftp.ast.com/GRID/conf1550.exe

28 years, 1 month

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GRiD Latop, another problem

by manney＠lrbcg.com

Thanks for the advice -- it worked just fine!. Now...Windows (3.1) setup hangs when loading...when it's still in the DOS screens (before starting the Windows part.) Any ideas? manney(a)lrbcg.com "Un sot trouve toujours un plus sot qui l'admire." >Most (all?) GRiDs allow the boot device to be selected by holding down a >key at boot time: >'F': floppy >'H': hard disk >'B': bubble disk >'R': ROM disk >etc. I'm also hav manney(a)lrbcg.com "Un sot trouve toujours un plus sot qui l'admire."

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FA: Various systems

by SUPRDAVE＠aol.com

This is NOT a flame, but i'm just wondering the point of posting items that have been put up for sale on ebay, et al. all that means is every item will already be overbid on for an insane price. it is my opinion that if anything is announced as being for sale, the subscribers to this group should get first crack. david In a message dated 98-06-10 13:21:21 EDT, you write: << Some items on auction: Apple Portable, currently at $53.00 http://www.haggle.com/cgi/getitem.cgi?id=201635376 TI-99/4A, complete with about 15 games http://www.haggle.com/cgi/getitem.cgi?id=201639758 Also, looking for cheap Type I PCMCIA/JEIDA RAM cards. 1mb-4mb range. >>

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MS Museum (RE: Ack, not again (RE: Cross listing auction items))

by kaikal＠MICROSOFT.com

Well, apparently we need to demolish the existing one-story building where the current museum is located, and it's always been a bit cramped for big school tours, so a new larger location was pretty much de rigeur. I don't know if anything will be added, and no, I'm not on the museum staff. Kai -----Original Message----- From: Doug Yowza [mailto:yowza@yowza.com] Sent: Wednesday, June 10, 1998 6:17 PM To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers Subject: Re: Ack, not again (RE: Cross listing auction items) On Wed, 10 Jun 1998, Kai Kaltenbach wrote: > Please stop this, we've been over it a million times. We've been over the "is it OK to sell stuff here" question a million times. The auction thing adds a nice twist because they address the all-important valuation issue. Anyway, did you have anything to do with the Microsoft Museum announcement, and do you know what Bill is looking for and how much he'll pay? -- Doug

28 years, 1 month

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Ack, not again (RE: Cross listing auction items)

by kaikal＠MICROSOFT.com

Please stop this, we've been over it a million times. It ALWAYS generates MORE traffic on the list to argue about it than it does to simply ignore the auction posts if you don't like 'em. Kai

28 years, 1 month

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IBM 700 Laptop Significance?

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 12:58 AM 6/10/98 -0500, you wrote: >The first DOS laptop with a pointing device was the GRiD 1550SX, and it >had an isopoint (tootsie-roll) similar to the Outbound Mac-clone. What year did the 1550sx come out? I'll have to watch for it... 8^) --------------------------------------------------------------------- O- Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad roger(a)sinasohn.com that none but madmen know." Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates San Francisco, California http://www.sinasohn.com/

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IBM 700 Laptop Significance?

by lwalker＠mail.interlog.com

> On Tue, 9 Jun 1998, Zane H. Healy wrote: > > > Was this one of the ones from about '92? If it's the one I'm thinking of, > > it would be the first with the 'pencil' pointer in the keyboard. For all I > > know, the first built in pointer (I'd not seen any prior to this). Of > > course I really remember it running AIX and OS/2 at the same time (I hate > > AIX, but sure wish they had released that product). > > That must be it. The TP700 was the first with the TrackPoint (eraser > head). Interestingly enough there was a thread recently on comp.sys.ibm.ps2 re the collectiveity of PS2 s. Most mentioned the 700. Some quotes : "The Thinkpad 710T (IBMs first Trackpad). I have one - without the 5MB TP-File. There were two different model-lines out: one has a 2.5" IDE HD, the other has a 5,10 or 20MB PCMCIA Solid State disk. The SSD-models have a different planar and cannot be converted into IDE-models. I have a SSD-model (2523-AY9) but no TP-Filecard. Too bad." " 9552 Thinkpad 700 C, one of the last microchannel Thinkpads" ciao larry > > The first DOS laptop with a pointing device was the GRiD 1550SX, and it > had an isopoint (tootsie-roll) similar to the Outbound Mac-clone. > > -- Doug > > > lwalker(a)interlog.com

28 years, 1 month

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IBM 700 Laptop Significance?

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 10:28 PM 6/9/98 -0700, you wrote: >Was this one of the ones from about '92? If it's the one I'm thinking of, >it would be the first with the 'pencil' pointer in the keyboard. For all I >know, the first built in pointer (I'd not seen any prior to this). Of That's probably it. Though not the first with a built-in pointer. As Doug mentioned, GRiD had one, as did the Mac Portable (1989) and the Atari STacy (year?). Not sure what year the Outbound came out but I'm pretty sure it was pre-thinkpad (maybe '89ish?). --------------------------------------------------------------------- O- Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad roger(a)sinasohn.com that none but madmen know." Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates San Francisco, California http://www.sinasohn.com/

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FA: Various systems

by higginbo＠netpath.net

Looks like I made a real splash with my first post since resubscribing! In my defense, all I have to say is this: If don't really know the current street value for an item and I want to get rid of it, the best thing to do IS put it on auction and post to similar lists and newsgroups. I'm sorry if I offended anyone. During my hiatus, I was spending alot of time on usenet, a place where this is done all the time. Guess I got a little brainwashed. If it's gonna cause a problem, I won't let it happen again. At 01:37 PM 6/10/98 EDT, SUPRDAVE(a)aol.com wrote: >This is NOT a flame, but i'm just wondering the point of posting items that >have been put up for sale on ebay, et al. all that means is every item will >already be overbid on for an insane price. it is my opinion that if anything >is announced as being for sale, the subscribers to this group should get first >crack. - - john higginbotham ____________________________ - webmaster www.pntprinting.com - - limbo limbo.netpath.net -

28 years, 1 month

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Early Mac Clones

by tomowad＠earthlink.net

>A (very!) non-portable Mac "Clone" that I haven't seen mentioned yet is the >Dash '030 from (iirc) 68000 systems. It's an actual Mac II-type >motherboard in a huge server case. Ports were accessable on the top, and >has about 6 or 7 drive bays up front. The front covers the drives and can >be locked closed. Huge P/S, with filter on the back. Very serious >systems. I've got two, actually. Does "Mac II-type motherboard" mean its a genuine Apple motherboard, or do you just mean its similiar to the Mac II motherboards? Tom Owad

28 years, 1 month

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Early Mac Clones

by maxeskin＠hotmail.com

Is this device better than a mouse, in your opinion? Is it an ADB device? >At 12:25 PM 6/8/98 -0700, you wrote: >>>Outbound >> >>Anybody have any of these? Any experience with them. I would love some >>further information. > >I have an Outbound. Fantastic machine. The pointing device alone is worth >getting the computer for. (Imagine a pencil tucked up against the bottom >edge of your keyboard. Roll it towards the screen and away to move the >cursor up and down. Slide it left and right to move the cursor left and >right. Wonderful!) Unfortunately, mine has a problem with the screen; if >anyone has any spare parts, or knows anything about them, I'd love to hear >from you! (I'd really like to put this machine to use!) > > >--------------------------------------------------------------------- O- > >Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad >roger(a)sinasohn.com that none but madmen know." >Roger Louis Sinasohn & Associates >San Francisco, California http://www.sinasohn.com/ > > ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

28 years, 1 month

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Wang PC-002 ??

by rigdonj＠intellistar.net

After reading Doug's message, I checked at my favorite trift store and found a pile of manuals for a Wang PC. NOT Personal Computer but Professional computer! The manuals seem to be sort of generic to all Wang PCs. None of the manuals mentioned a model number of the computers themselves but they did list the model numbers of the various options and accessories. I also found three Wang computers. They were under a pile of stuff so I didn't get a good luck at them and I don't know if they were Wang PCs or a different model but they looked like the PCs. Two looked like 8 slot electronics units (that's what Wang calls them) and the other looked like a 5 slot unit. Joe At 02:18 PM 6/9/98 -0400, you wrote: > >Greetings, > >I saw a very large Wang box at a thrift store yesterday, I *think* the >little sticker on it said "PC-002". I didn't see the keyboard, but I >didn't look. > >The machine was really big, I think about twice the height of an old >IBM-PC and about the same width. It was longer than it was wide. > >It had two full-height 5.25" floppy drives. > >>From the back it looked like it had several large horizontally-mounted >cards inside, including one with two coaxial cable connectors and another >with two female DIN connectors. > >I would have paid close attention to it had my arms not already been full. > >I didn't see the keyboard, but it was probably stacked up in the pile with >all the normal PC crap keyboards. > >If I am to go back for it, I'll have to take the car as I doubt I'd be >able to survive the walk to the bus while trying to carry that thing. > >Does anyone know what this thing is? > > >Doug Spence >ds_spenc(a)alcor.concordia.ca >http://alcor.concordia.ca/~ds_spenc/ > >

28 years, 1 month

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