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

by hansp＠columbia.digiweb.com

I have trawelled the net and checked my own library but can find very little of substance on the PDP-9. Doea anyone have information on this machine? How rare is it? Regards, Hans B Pufal

28 years, 1 month

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Great end to week

by jrkeys＠concentric.net

Well Saturday was apretty good end to the week for me and the museum. At goodwill I found a HeathKit Educational system ET100 Learning computer with kb and cable for casette recorder. Also had with it the assembly manual and a memorex tape with some sort of programs on it just reading the hand wriiten label. The bottom was signed by Jay H. Jarrett VP Product Development and the person who put it together and dated 11-26-83. At used/new dealer I got the following 5 ea Duo Dock stations with bad ps's HP 2392A terminal users manual Itermec penlight bar code reader Memories, Micro-processors, Consumer Circuits, Industrial by MOSTEK 1975. IBM 3151 ASCII display station models 11,31, and 41 guide to operations. TI Application Report TMS 9900 system Development manual 1976. Honeywell IPC627 minicop user manual Mostek The F8 Microprocessor Preliminary Databook March 1976. Signetic's Designing with Microcomputers 1976. TMS 1976 Capactive-touch keyboard Interface Circuit manual 1977. HP Laserjet IIP has jamming problem needs some work. A BCC black notebook by Northgate for $19.99 needs some work. A ZEOS hand held unit for parts $9 black case no screen. Other items not ready for 10 year rule but it was a pretty good haul for a slow day. Keep computing John

28 years, 1 month

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HP 150 stiffies

by fmc＠reanimators.org

Tony Duell <ard(a)p850ug1.demon.co.uk> wrote: > > My vague recollection is that an "application master disk" is supposed > > to have a file that tells PAM about an application -- things like what > > I've got the format of the installation file for the master disk - it's > in one of the manuals for writing your own applications. But I have no > idea quite what the installation procedure does with that informaition. I think I remember knowing it at one time, at least well enough to fake it when I needed it once -- though whether that was through reverse engineering the file format or looking at a co-worker's ISV kit manual I can't recall. > What about doing a plain sector copy on a PC or something? The disk is a > standard double-density one so a PC controller should be able to read it. > Shouldn't be too hard to figure out what sectors are used and copy them over. Sydex has a shareware device driver that is supposed to let you use HP150 stiffies directly on a PC-compatible. I tried it a few months ago on a non-classic (hmm, 7 years to go) Toshiba notebook but it was not able to read the lone 150-formatted stiffy I had handy. Whether that is because of newfangled hardware, funky notebook hardware, inability of the software to handle single-sided stiffies, or bad vibes I don't know. I am able to read the disk in a 9114B on my Portable Plus though. Hmm, maybe I'll try DISKCOPY on it tonight and see if that gets me another stiffy that the 9114B can read. Cheap thrills. -Frank McConnell

28 years, 1 month

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PLease ID CD-ROM unit

by maxeskin＠hotmail.com

I have a CD-Rom unit here at my school that needs to be identified. We don't know where we got it, and have no docs. All we have is the external box, about 6" X 15" X 2". It is labelled "DATEXT CD-ROM DRIVE UNIT", and on the back says "MODEL DTX-10" and was made April 1986. It has a centronics plug on the back. The card that came with it has a single female socket,37 pin. It is labelled CD-IFI3, and has an NEC D8255AC-5 chip on it. It is a standard 8-bit ISA. Could someone tell me how useful this thing is, what drivers I need, background on it, etc? Thanks ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com

28 years, 1 month

2
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Osborne Executive (fwd)

by rws＠ais.net

Hi all- I received this message, and I can't help as I don't have an Executive (just a 1). Can anybody offer any ideas? You can either reply to him, or to the group and I'll forward them to him. Thanks, Richard Schauer rws(a)ais.net ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Mon, 11 May 1998 11:44:10 EDT From: JWMc33 <JWMc33(a)aol.com> To: rws(a)ais.net Subject: Osborne Executive I have three Osborne Executives, all of which give me fragmented type on the screen when I turn the computer on. A friend suggested that I need to change "the batteries." I can't find them. Can you help me? John McCormick

28 years, 1 month

1
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HP 150 stiffies

by fmc＠reanimators.org

ard(a)p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) wrote (after Doug): > > So, I'm simply trying to make a copy of my boot disk. It looks like I'm > > almost there. I can boot from the new disk, but PAM says I need to > > install some apps on the disk, and then she tells me to RTFM! I don't > > have the manual, so can somebody tell me how to install apps for PAM? > Touch 'Install Applic' (or press F1) > > Put the application master disk (I hope you have this...) into one of the > drives. Touch the appropriate label in the 'FROM' column on the screen. > Put the new disk in the other drive and touch that label in the 'TO' column. There's the rub, I think Doug is trying to copy a stiffy with installed applications and he wants the applications to be "installed" on the copy too. My vague recollection is that an "application master disk" is supposed to have a file that tells PAM about an application -- things like what files need to be copied for installation, what text to put in the application's block on the PAM screen, and what to run to when the user wants the application started. Installing the application gets the files copied and the other info stashed in some file (maybe a hidden one) that PAM keeps in the root directory of the boot volume. That latter file is probably what Doug needs to copy to his new boot disk. Of course it's been umpteen years since I last thought about this and so I don't remember the filenames. -Frank McConnell

28 years, 1 month

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Id on Xerox workstation

by hansp＠columbia.digiweb.com

Amongst the ACONIT collection (see previous message), I found a Xerox workstation. Its a desk side, brown tower case with a separte small box on top containing a 3.5" floppy drive. It has a large (21") screen and optical mouse. It is made up of 4 tall boards wth part numbers like 140K0xxxx where xxxx are digits. Can anyone id this system? Regards, Hans B Pufal

28 years, 1 month

2
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Saved my bacon...

by DSEAGRAV＠toad.xkl.com

THis running pulls 15 amps. Mustv'e been a fluke. Now, back to trying this RSTS tape... SAVRES says it has no header, and I can't boot from it... -------

28 years, 1 month

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More PDP-11 tricks... (How many amps did you just say?)

by DSEAGRAV＠toad.xkl.com

I've managed to blow some obscure breaker somewhere, so now the CD head gets to decide if I get to haul my PDP-11 elsewhere. I'm not allowed to turn it on for the rest of the week, or until I find out how many amps it pulls, pray to the goddess Apthrodite, offer burnt 95 CDs, etc... Anyway, I've produced the following: I have 2 BA-11 boxes plugged into a 861C power controller, a RA81, a RA92, and a 9-track drive rated at 2 amps. Also, a TU58. How many can this pull running, and how much does that *%%%#& RA81 pull when started? Note that the 2 BA boxes are on the 861C, everything else is in the wall. -------

28 years, 1 month

2
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Calculator displays

by Philip.Belben＠powertech.co.uk

I wrote: > I shall have a look at the website someone mentioned - thanks. > > But meanwhile, can someone who has a Sharp please e-mail me with a brief > description of the segments of this 8-or-9-segment display and which > ones light up for which digits. Amazingly, there is a good image of it on the website. My last request is therefore redundant. Thank you one and all. Philip.

28 years, 1 month

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remove

by JayDee400＠aol.com

remove

28 years, 1 month

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VCF2 dates & venue

by dastar＠wco.com

Its now official...the Second Annual Vintage Computer Festival will be held on September 26-27 at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, California. Another speaker has been added...Ray Holt. He designed the JOLT computer and also was involved in the development of the KIM-1 and SYM-1. That would be interesting in itself if it wasn't for the history-changing revelation that Ray will be sharing with those who attend VCF2. More to come! 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: 05/11/98]

28 years, 1 month

1
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S100 speech boards

by ard＠p850ug1.demon.co.uk

A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text Size: 1712 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://www.classiccmp.org/pipermail/cctalk/attachments/19980508/202caf53/at…

28 years, 1 month

2
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Schematics for Apple 1 anyone?

by dastar＠wco.com

I know this is (possibly) a long shot but does anyone have the schematics for the Apple 1? Sam Alternate e-mail: dastar(a)siconic.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Don't blame me...I voted for Satan. Coming in September...Vintage Computer Festival 2.0 See http://www.siconic.com/vcf for details! [Last web page update: 05/05/98]

28 years, 1 month

2
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HP 150 stiffies

by pete＠dunnington.u-net.com

On May 10, 11:50, Tony Duell wrote: > Subject: Re: HP 150 stiffies > > I think the real contemporary stiffies for those early drives didn't > > have the spring to pull the door closed. But I've never actually seen > > I have a couple somewhere... From memory, there is a spring - you slide > the door open against the spring and it locks open. Then you insert the > disk into the drive. When you eject it you pinch the corner to release > the catch and the door springs closed. That's what mine are like, too. The drives in the Sony WP were the same as the Apricot ones, mentioned in another reply, and Sony and Apricot upgraded to double-sided at about the same time. I've got the tech and service manuals for those drives, too. The 26-pin connector has the same signals as a modern 34-pin (barring ones that wouldn't be relevant here) and you can certainly make a simple adaptor. However, the data rate in the Sony and old Apricot systems was twice the normal rate for double-density, and the drives spin at 600 rpm instead of 300 rpm, so you can't just swap for a modern drive without changing other things to (like the PLL and differentiator circuit, and the BIOS). > BTW, does anyone remember Steve Ciarcia's homebrew touchscreen articles > in Byte? I have the reprints somewhere, and it works in the same way as > the HP150 touchscreen - IR LED/detector pairs around the screen. I've got that reprint somewhere, too. "Let Your Fingers Do The Talking", Byte August 1978 and September 1978. A 16 x 16 grid of emitters/sensors. A box near the ned of the article says "An industrial grade alphanumeric terminal incorporating touch panel input is being manufactured. For information contact: General Digital Corp, 700 Burnside Av, East Hartford CT 06108". Another box says, "NOTE: Any one building a unit from these designs should be advised that they are covered by a number of patents by the University of Illinois and may not be sold for profit". -- Pete Peter Turnbull Dept. of Computer Science University of York

28 years, 1 month

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HP 150 stiffies

by fmc＠reanimators.org

Doug Yowza <yowza(a)yowza.com> wrote: > I've been finding parts of HP 150's for a few months now, and I finally > collected enough of them today for a complete system (including a new > in-the-box integral printer), but I'm short on stiffies. Anybody know a > source of stiffies? I have the 9121 drive, which I think is single-sided. They aren't special, any decent double-sided 720KB stiffies should be usable. At least that is what I used to do. Well, that is, unless you have one of the real early 9121s that doesn't open the door on the stiffy. That's why some of the older HP stiffies have "pinch" stamped in the corner -- for those drives, you're supposed to slide the door over to the left 'til it catches, then pinch where indicated to close it. I think the real contemporary stiffies for those early drives didn't have the spring to pull the door closed. But I've never actually seen one -- they didn't last very long, in fact by the time we got a loaner demo 150 at that PPOE (early-mid 1983) the diskette stiffy doors were fully automatic. > The HP 150's touchscreen is pretty cool. Is there a driver for it that > emulates a mouse? IIRC, this Mac-like box predates the Mac, doesn't it? Yes it does predate the Mac. Driver to emulate a mouse? I never heard of one. Applications that wanted to use the touchscreen were mostly expected to pretend they were talking to a terminal and read the escape sequences that get generated by the touchscreen (preferable). Fairly late in my HP150 experience (1985-1986 or so), I got hold of a couple of freeware TSRs that you could load to implement chunks of the PC ROM BIOS interface on the 150. I don't recall exactly what they did (video and datacomm, I think) but I did manage to get WordPerfect 4.1 to run on the 150 with their help. And I found copies of them on a 150 stiffy last month! Not the original distribution, but I think all the files are there. Time to figure out how to get 'em up on the net for y'all. -Frank McConnell

28 years, 1 month

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Homebrew Computer Club Newsletter

by dastar＠wco.com

I was going through a box of stuff last night that I got several months ago from the same guy I got my first IMSAI from. He was around back in the day and used to attend all the Homebrew Computer Club meetings. Anyway, included in the box of magazines and brochures and such that he gave me was a folder with the Homebew Computer Club Newsletter from Vol.2 #1 (Jan. 1976) through Vol.2 #15 (Mar. 1977). This is sweet! I never knew that the HCC had a newsletter. Anyway, I haven't had a chance to go through them but there is some pretty wild stuff in them. The first issue I have has an "Open Letter to Hobbyists" from Bill Gates decrying the pirating of the Altair BASIC. The next issue has a response to Bill's letter chiding him for giving the software away in the first place and then complaining about piracy after the fact. Wild! I also found out I have Dr. Dobbs Journal of Computer Calisthenics and Orthodontia from Issue 1 on up through 1982. Sweet. I'll be reading through the Newsletters and will report any amazing revelations. Sam Alternate e-mail: dastar(a)siconic.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Don't blame me...I voted for Satan. Coming in September...Vintage Computer Festival 2.0 See http://www.siconic.com/vcf for details! [Last web page update: 05/05/98]

28 years, 1 month

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Bull/Convergent part ids

by hansp＠columbia.digiweb.com

I picked up some unknown (to me) parts today for next to nothing. I would like to know what they are and if anyone wants these I can send them for the price of shipping. 2 externally identical modules, black plastic cases with 50 pin double row sockect connector. One is marked "Bull SA, type CMM1123 XVA M 7C 22940" the other "Convergent XM-003 AB for use with Ngen computers" and a sticker "1MB" I think these are 1Mb memory modules for Ngen computer? Then I have three apparently identical units. Metal boxes 10" x 3.5" x 1". There is a 120 pin connector of two rows of 60 pins. At one end is a 16 position thumbwheel switch, on one edge there are 8 LEDs in two block of 4 numbered 1-8. They all have Bull SA stickers with "Type CPF 1102" and "XVA K 22 06606" printed on them. Regards, Hans B Pufal

28 years, 1 month

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HP 150 stiffies

by rigdonj＠intellistar.net

> >HP adopted 3.5" disks before they evolved into the disk used commonly >today, so newer disks aren't compatible. Of course, HP also used a >proprietary formatting scheme. > >-- Doug > Wronnngggg! They are compatible. I've been using regular commercial 3.5" disk in my HP 150, Integral and other HPs for years. You just have to format them in the HP machine to get the HP format. Almost all the HPs use different formats so you have to format them in the same type machine and drive that you're goint to use them in. FWIW all those floppy drives are made by Sony. I found a pretty good HP 150 FAQ. It's at "http://www.mdn.com/oksoftware/Computers/hp150faq.html". Joe

28 years, 1 month

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Off-topic help request

by dastar＠wco.com

Ok, how come when I'm using a windows95 based telnet client I get all sorts of wacky-assed errors when I'm using PINE, like "Folder closed due to access error" and "Folder reduced to 0 bytes" and "error this" and "error that". Basically stuff I never get when I'm using ProComm Plus. Why is this? Why is a bug-free telnet session such a chore under Windows? This is not just with the lame windows telnet either. I thought getting CRT would clear this up but it happens with that too. What's going on here? Any help would be greatly apprciated, especially in private e-mail. Sam Alternate e-mail: dastar(a)siconic.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Don't blame me...I voted for Satan. Coming in September...Vintage Computer Festival 2.0 See http://www.siconic.com/vcf for details! [Last web page update: 05/05/98]

28 years, 1 month

3
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HP 150 stiffies

by pete＠dunnington.u-net.com

On May 9, 22:12, Frank McConnell wrote: > I think the real contemporary stiffies for those early drives didn't > have the spring to pull the door closed. But I've never actually seen > one -- they didn't last very long, in fact by the time we got a loaner > demo 150 at that PPOE (early-mid 1983) the diskette stiffy doors were > fully automatic. The first Apricot computers in the UK, and Sony wordprocessor systems, both used single-sided stiffies, with the catch for the shutter. They did have the spring, though. I've still got a few. The Sony systems used a proprietary format that I never had details of, but the Apricot used a variant of MS-DOS with 9 sectors per track, but only 70 tracks (315K/disk). The Apricot disks were a delicate shade of disgusting red, to match the colour of the company logo, but the Sony ones were the blue that became "standard". > > The HP 150's touchscreen is pretty cool. Is there a driver for it that > > emulates a mouse? IIRC, this Mac-like box predates the Mac, doesn't it? i had one for awhile, but missing the keyboard, so I gave it to someone else (who had a keyboard). Anybody got a system disk they could make an image of? -- Pete Peter Turnbull Dept. of Computer Science University of York

28 years, 1 month

2
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Anyone interested in a CBM 8050 drive?

by rcini＠email.msn.com

I got a line on two 8050 floppy drives for the PETs. I want one; would anyone be interested in the second one? Rich Cini/WUGNET <nospam_rcini(a)msn.com> (remove nospam_ to use) ClubWin! Charter Member (6) MCP Windows 95/Windows Networking Collector of classic computers <<<========== Reply Separaator ==========>>>

28 years, 1 month

6
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Proposal: "Legacy" Open Products Partition

by photze＠batelco.com.bh

>> Yes, we should have "levels" of experience. So that a Level 1 job could be > >Does this need to be done formally? I mean, when, for example, I bought >the service manual for my monitor, or the IBM techrefs, nobody bothered >to check I knew what I was doing with them. They just took my payment and >sent the manual. Not really formally, perhaps semi-formally. All pages would be rated, but we're not going to have an exam or anything. >While we need to be not responsible for how the information is used, I >think that should be the end of it. Yes, but just to give an aprox. guide. For instance, if someone wants to fix their old mono monitor, and they have a Level 2 hardware experience, they wouldn't want to read the Level 5 document, especially if they're busy, and don't want to spend too much time. It could also be used to give people a basic feeling of what they can-and cannot do. >Perhaps you could enlighten me. I know of only one way to fix a PCB - >look for obvious failures/shorts, power it up and start tracing signals >with a logic analyser. Is that the easy way or the hard way, and what is >the other way. That's the hard way. There are 2 easy ways that I know of: 1) Take it to a shop or 2) Get a new one. Tim D. Hotze

28 years, 1 month

2
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Support for obsolete products

by jfoust＠threedee.com

I understand the economic logic of no longer supporting products that aren't being sold (aren't making money) and that are deemed obsolete by being two generations behind today's products. But at that point, the company has decided that any ill will caused by this decision isn't worth the cost or aggravation of continued support. Certainly some companies turn over continued support to third parties - when the third party thinks there's some money in it. But what about a non-profit organization for products that absolutely no one wants to support? Just send them the docs and let them archive them. Companies donate old office equipment to good causes, why not old docs or source code? - John Jefferson Computer Museum <http://www.threedee.com/jcm>

28 years, 1 month

5
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Proposal: "Legacy" Open Products Partition

by photze＠batelco.com.bh

>On the other hand, since DEC, HP and Tektronix have all helped me with >parts/docs for totally ancient machines, I am recomending those companies >to others. Exactly. This machine's a Compaq. Now, at the time, I solemnly thought that they were the best PC's available. Now, since then, I've had problems with the videocard, BIOS, busses, etc. When I contact their tech support, in general, they'll give me any solution that costs money, or charge me money for their time. >Be careful here. Ditto. >Some companies believe that they _are_ responsible for the information, >and any use to which it may be put. On several occasions I have been >refused a service manual because 'If you try to repair it and make a >mistake you could be killed' No amount of telling them that it's even >more dangerous to do the repair without the service manual worked. OK. So we'll need to say something like "No longer NEED be responsible for information." They need to share it, not give it. >It appears that there are too many lawyers who are there to put the blame >on somebody else when the customer makes a mistakes. I am not happy about >this, but.... > >Some companies will release 'safe' information (software sources, CPU >board schematics', but not 'dangerous' information (schematics of >monitors and PSUs, for example). I see. We'll need a disclaimer: "Anyinformation you recieve here could ultimately be harardous to your heatlh. DO NOT OPERATE HEAVY MACHINERY WHILE READING A TECHNICAL DOCUMENT." (Last sentence lighthearted.) >If we do convince companies to release information, we'd need to have >some proper legal document which removed any responsibility from the >company. You use this info and hurt yourself - it's your fault. Yep. Does anyone know how the GPL was made???? >> 2) Central orginazation. Something like GNU, but less proffesional. It >> would contain all archives collected, as well as user-made enhancements, >> notes or other docs. (For example: Getting a ST 251 to work under > >You'd need to make it very clear which notes were 'official' and which >were 3rd party. Ditto. Also, we'd need to prioritize companies. Companies that were most likely to give us info first, and then less last. So that if we had 5 or 6 industry juggernauts giving us information, then possibly a company like Sharp just might. Tim D. Hotze

28 years, 1 month

4
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A little off-topic help needed...

by rax＠warbaby.com

Hi All - This is somewhat off-topic (maybe way-off-topic, depending on how you feel about Macs), but I've been trying to find some 30 pin, 8 or 16 meg simms for my girlfriend's Quadra 700. Anyone know of a source? R. -- Robert Arnold Managing Editor The MonkeyPool WebSite Content Development http://www.monkeypool.com Creator and Eminence Grise Warbaby: The WebSite. The Domain. The Empire. muahahahahaaaaa http://www.warbaby.com Dreadlocks on white boys give me the willies.

28 years, 1 month

2
1
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ID some DEC parts...

by afritz＠iname.com

I'm not too familiar with the older DEC VAX hardware, but I've ended up with a MicroVAX 2000 and a few strange parts. H3104 -- 1 38-pin centronics on one side, 8 MMJs on the other (I'm guessing a terminal adapter of some sort) EE730 -- 1 DB9 and 1 DB15 on one side, 3 MMJs on the other. ( I don't have a clue what this is) BC16C -- a 25ft cable with a centronics on each end ( I'm guessing this connects the H3104 to the MV2k) What are these things? The middle item seems most puzzling to me. Adam ---------- Adam Fritzler afritz(a)iname.com http://www.afritz.base.org ----------

28 years, 1 month

2
1
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Calculator displays

by lgroebe＠insidermarketing.com

>On Fri, 8 May 1998 Philip.Belben(a)powertech.co.uk wrote: > >> The electronic one was interesting mainly for its display. It was >> fluorescent (greenish digits sealed in a long glass tube), but not >> 7-segment. Instead, there were (I think) nine segments, all of strange >> curly shapes, which made up digits much easier to read than the angular, >> blocky, 7-segment types. But I can no longer remember how these were >> arranged, nor even any details like the manufacturer of the calculator. >> >> Does anyone know of machines with such displays? > >Somebody was describing this same calculator to me yesterday. It was the >Sharp EL-8 and had a 9-segment display. > >> At what date were they made? > >Weren't these the first microprocessor-based calcs (4004) from around >1974? > The EL-8 was Sharp's original portable calculator from 1971 (in Japan in late 1970) and cost $345 back then (for your basic 4-function calculator!) The display is listed in my reference book as a flourescent -type tube display. I don't believe it used the 4004 chip - relatively few calculators actually did use the 4004. --Larry

28 years, 1 month

5
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Proposal: "Legacy" Open Products Partition

by photze＠batelco.com.bh

>More seriously, we need something like 'This information is provided in >good faith, and is believed to be accurate. However, neither the original >manufacturer or <%group distributing it> can take any responsibility for >errors or omissions. Some of the procedures described in this documation >can be dangerous and should only be performed by suitably qualified >personnel' Yes, we should have "levels" of experience. So that a Level 1 job could be done with anyone that knows how to wield a screwdriver... (things such as adding RAM, a hard drive, or add-in card.), while a Level 5 should only be done with someone who's had lots of electronics experience. (Such as fixing a broken PCB or motherboard, the hard way). We could have tutorials to get a Level 1 to a Level 5, but it would still be their responsibility. >BTW, what _are_ the qualifications for computer repair? :-). My PERQ 1 >says 'Only qualified personnel should remove covers'. Nowhere does it >state what the qualifications are, so I assume I have them :-) Actually, I always thought that it was who ever could pay them enough money to become a "solution provider." Seriously, we should have the Levels as an internal rating system. I haven't seen such a system, but has one like this ever been used? (It's better to use a pre-existing system then to develop a new one, especially if the old one does what you want.) >-tony Tim D. Hotze

28 years, 1 month

2
1
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HP Integral Re: the new Apple iMac

by fmc＠reanimators.org

Joe <rigdonj(a)intellistar.net> wrote: > Not exactly, it has a built-in floppy drive that you can boot from, or > you can use an external drive on the HP-IB. >BUT< they also had an > optional ROM that contained an entire HP-UX system. HP called it a > software engineering ROM. From what i've been told they're extremely rare. > HP also made another ROM that contained a complete HP Technical BASIC in it. It doesn't boot from any kind of disks, as near as I can tell -- just auto-mounts them and hooks them into the RAM-resident filesystem. And it doesn't buffer writes, so it's safe to dismount stiffies with the eject button. And having looked at the HP-UX 5.x manuals, "entire HP-UX system" means "that subset supported on the IPC". It's pretty cut-down but usable in a single-user stand-alone non-networked (not even UUCP) PC sort of way. -Frank McConnell

28 years, 1 month

1
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Floppiless (was: the new Apple iMac)

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<I kinda have to agree. My laptop has had a dead floppy drive for some ti <now; probably over 2 years. The only time I really miss it is a) when I <want to move data/pgms to a machine/person not "connected" or b) when I A handy way around that is to use intersvr and interlnk provided with dos 6.x. Those combined with a laplink serial or parallel cable can allow you to annex another systems drives for copies or installs. Using the parallel cable is faster. It's documented in the MSdos useres guide. I currently have a headless 386sx/25 with a few small hard disks, and two non 3.5" floppies and a CDrom that via parallel cable and the interlnk software serves and a sort of portable disk/cdrom/floppy to all my dos boxen. It's real handy for systems that only have a floppy or tiny hard disk. It saves having to have a network or anything more than a bootable disk with the programs on it (they are small!). Once running all of the disks on the server end are available as if they were connected locally. Allison

28 years, 1 month

1
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HP Integral Re: the new Apple iMac

by rigdonj＠intellistar.net

At 01:35 PM 5/8/98 -0500, you wrote: >On Fri, 8 May 1998, Don Maslin wrote: > >> I learned from a friend who picked it up (for $3.10) at the swapmeet that >> HP made a lunchbox that had HP-UX all in ROM. No drives in the box. > >The Integral PC! Tell him I'll give him $10 for it :-) It is 68K-based >and has a small subset of HP-UX in ROM, but it really wants to boot from a >disk hanging off its HPIB bus. Not exactly, it has a built-in floppy drive that you can boot from, or you can use an external drive on the HP-IB. >BUT< they also had an optional ROM that contained an entire HP-UX system. HP called it a software engineering ROM. From what i've been told they're extremely rare. HP also made another ROM that contained a complete HP Technical BASIC in it. I just picked up my third IPC. One of mine has the Technical Basic Rom, one has the HP-UX ROM but the last one has both! :-) Joe

28 years, 1 month

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the new Apple iMac

by pete＠dunnington.u-net.com

On May 8, 22:28, Ward Donald Griffiths III wrote: > John Ruschmeyer wrote: > > I presume the system, like the Performas et al., will come with a > > bootable > > CD which can be used to restore the system to "factory" condition. > > And there went everything that was put on the disk after it left > the factory. Not necessarily, if it's done "right". Sun sparcstations and SGI workstations come with the O/S on bootable CD, and re-installing doesn't imply deleting all the other stuff that was added since the first factory install. The O/S and support software/datafiles can be added/replaced in modular fashion. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Dept. of Computer Science University of York

28 years, 1 month

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Floppiless (was: the new Apple iMac)

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 07:31 PM 5/7/98 -0400, you wrote: >> Actually, if I were to design a computer, I would consider not >> including a floppy drive, or at least making it so that it doesn't > >I totally agree. Any more, floppy disk drives are more a PITA than they >are useful. Creation is no longer the focus of home computing---the >browser took care of that issue. This means having removable, writeable >media is less of a priority. In the corporate setting, where computers are >still used primarily for creation and dissemination, you have LANs to >alleviate the need for such media. > >The floppy plays little role in modern computing. I kinda have to agree. My laptop has had a dead floppy drive for some time now; probably over 2 years. The only time I really miss it is a) when I want to move data/pgms to a machine/person not "connected" or b) when I want to install (floppy-only) software. The first is handled by the net, the second by getting software on CD (or swapping my HD into an identical machine with a good floppy.) Nowadays, data and programs are both so big as to make floppies unusuable. (Can you imagine backing up 1GB to floppy? 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/

28 years, 1 month

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a few new finds

by jrkeys＠concentric.net

just a few new museum items: 1. TRS-80 model 100 portable manual 2. Zenith laptop model ZFL-184-01 3. Kaypro 16 20meg 1-5 1/4 FD 4. TI lowprofile KB 5. Corona model PC-21 6. Silicon Compilers D-Scan Graphic display model GR- 1104C missing kb 7. 2 Toshiba ext cd-roms 8. Sun shoebox 2 FD drives model SUNIPC-FPY2 one marked AT Compat the other PC compat 9. Beneath Apple ProDos by Don Worth and Pieter Lechner 10. 2 tech manuals for NeXT 1988 draft 11. Mac Performa 400 12. NeXT cube case 13. Apple Newton model 1000 with video tape and manuals 14. Sony ext scsi cdrom model CDU7205 15 8 ea Ti 99 game cartridges 16. Mac LCII needs HD 17. Many other non classic items waiting for their time

28 years, 1 month

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Help with AE

by jrkeys＠concentric.net

I looking for the address , web site, phone number or any info to locate a company called AE or Applied Engineering, or AE Research Corp. I need some parts from them and manuals. Thanks in advance John

28 years, 1 month

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newbie question. digest?

by everly＠interpac.net

is there any way to get this list in digest form? also hello to sam ismail and uncle roger :-). thanks, Loren.

28 years, 1 month

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Calculator displays

by Philip.Belben＠powertech.co.uk

Some years ago, when I was secondary school (grade|high school), someone donated two calculators which sat on a side table in the school computer room. One was a nice but not that rare wind-the-handle Facit. The other was more modern and electronic. The electronic one was interesting mainly for its display. It was fluorescent (greenish digits sealed in a long glass tube), but not 7-segment. Instead, there were (I think) nine segments, all of strange curly shapes, which made up digits much easier to read than the angular, blocky, 7-segment types. But I can no longer remember how these were arranged, nor even any details like the manufacturer of the calculator. Does anyone know of machines with such displays? At what date were they made? Did anyone ever do an LCD version of these, and if not, why not? And finally, what exactly were the segments and how did they fit together? I've tried to reconstruct the arrangement, but try as I might, I can't do it in fewer than twelve segments. Philip.

28 years, 1 month

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the new Apple iMac

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<But I remember one computer from the early 80's (don't remember the name) <where the floppy was the computer -- a small SBC mounted on top of the <floppy, and that's all there was. AmproLB a complete z80, 64k, 2serial, printer port and SCSI on a board the size of a 5.25" floppy. I have one. I also have a SB180 that is faster with 4x the ram on a card half the size. Neither stepped around the problem by putting all of the base software on rom. The EPSON PX-8 did. I also did it for a s100 system years before that. With EPROMS, EEProms and Flash ram as dense as they are a 1.44mb floppy seems a lot of work. Allison

28 years, 1 month

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Panasonic Senior Partner

by dastar＠wco.com

Well, I scored a Panasonic Senior Partner (IBM-compatible luggable) with a 20meg HD. No matter what the product, I always like what Panasonic manufactures. The design and (physical) user interface of stuff they make just works for me. Anyway, this one came complete with Rogue, Nethack and Mahjong installed. I just enjoyed a splendid game of Rogue which I haven't played in ages (made it to Level 8, Warrior with about 2500 gold). It also had some C code, some unix utils in C:\BIN and a file pertaining to Apollo workstations. Seems this machine used to be owned by a Unix hacker for sure. Sam Alternate e-mail: dastar(a)siconic.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Don't blame me...I voted for Satan. Coming in September...Vintage Computer Festival 2.0 See http://www.siconic.com/vcf for details! [Last web page update: 05/03/98]

28 years, 1 month

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the new Apple iMac

by peacock＠simconv.com

If this new Mac has no removeable media, what happens when the hard drive breaks? How do you re-install the OS? Off the net? Catch-22, OS isn't running, no TCP/IP stack. Off the USB? OK, then the boot ROM supports bootable media from the USB? I'm impressed, even PCs don't support that. And the removeable media of choice for the USB is? No wait, let me guess, a scanner...you load the OS by scanning in bar codes which contain the OS binaries. That would be, oh, about 100K pages to scan in? Or you just send the whole thing back to Apple, and if they have spares, and they are still in business, they send you back a nice new pre-installed disk, sans all the software and setup you had on it. Then you restore off the net, but uh oh, all you have is a 28.8Kb connection, and 400MB of backup. Good plan, system administrators will love this machine. No doubt corporate types will beat down Apple's door to buy it. Jack Peacock

28 years, 1 month

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Support for obsolete products

by jfoust＠threedee.com

John Ruschmeyer <jruschme(a)exit109.com> wrote: >One thing to remember here is that your logic is based on the premise >that the information still exists. Yes, of course. I wouldn't begin a quest of begging until I was sure the item existed. No Holy Grail searches for me. I think there are several categories of "lost": 1) it's somewhere in the vaults but we can't find it, 2) it's in the vaults but no I'm too busy to get it, 3) I can't get permission to get it out, 4) I've got it but I don't want to give it to you, 5) I can't give it you, 6) We'd have to pay a lawyer to say we can give it to you, etc. down through N) the company says they don't have it but an engineer we found on the net managed to save a copy. I'm more concerned about saving what we can, and getting official permission to do so, and being able to reproduce it in a more accessible fashion than it exists now. I can't do anything about things that don't exist. Tony Duell wrote: >Exactly. One problem that PERQ-fanatics have found is just who (out of >PERQ Logic Systems, Accent Systems, ICL, Varityper, etc) own what? And perhaps this can help the argument. If a company has completely lost or disregarded an asset that we can point out that they rightfully own, perhaps they'll be more friendly if we ask to take care of it for them. Buy-outs and acquisitions tend to prune away less valuable (but no less *interesting*) technologies. My Quest involves telling Lockheed-Martin that they own the Terak. Wish me luck. :-) Ward Donald Griffiths III <gram(a)cnct.com> wrote: >"Inventory" tax means that for as long as you hold the merchandise, >you will continue to be taxed every bloody year unless you bite the >bullet and throw the stuff away. In my understanding of accounting, this "tax" doesn't exist. I think the previous writer doesn't understand why the bean counters want to get rid of inventory. There are certainly exceptions that rile the blood of small- and large-L libertarians, but in my experience in US small business, you are only taxed once. A B.C. wants to reduce inventory for other reasons - it's money tied up in junk that's not selling, not gaining interest, and isn't growing in value. When it comes time to dumpster it, it becomes a write-off loss and its original cost is probably taken as a deduction of some kind, which alone makes it valuable to the bottom line. So, the original poster's notion is correct - the complications of taxation tends to make companies dump old stuff. It's like property tax - it forces people to find a way for the land to generate at least that much cash, which discourages people from buying land and simply preserving it as-is. - John Jefferson Computer Museum <http://www.threedee.com/jcm>

28 years, 1 month

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Zenith Z90

by fauradon＠pclink.com

Well I'll be darned! I read those post wondering what the diference was between a Z90 and a Zenith Z89 (Which is what I thought is what I had) just to finally discover that I don't have a Z89 at all. Better change that entry in the web site. Now I'm going to have to check all my machines and make sure I have all the model numbers right :) . Francois ------------------------------------------------------------- Visit the Sanctuary at: http://www.pclink.com/fauradon >Z90). The Z90 was a Zenith Data Systems-branded machine which is Heath >factory-built. It had a bit different setup than the factory-built or kit >versions bought from Heath (the H-89). Don't quite know what those >differences were though, but the H-89 and Z-90 were still very similar.

28 years, 1 month

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Calculator displays

by lgroebe＠insidermarketing.com

>On Fri, 8 May 1998, Larry Groebe wrote: > >> The EL-8 was Sharp's original portable calculator from 1971 (in Japan in >> late 1970) and cost $345 back then (for your basic 4-function >> calculator!) The display is listed in my reference book as a flourescent >> -type tube display. > >That sounds right. The guy I talked to mentioned that it was IC-based, >not micro-based. > >> I don't believe it used the 4004 chip - relatively few calculators >> actually did use the 4004. > >I think it was a deal between Busicom and Intel for a calculator chip that >produced the 4004 and started the microprocessor revolution, right? > >-- Doug True- although IIRC Busicom didn't actually use the 4004 as things worked out. There's a nice webpage devoted to the 4004 at: http://home1.gte.net/ccourson/4004.htm --Larry

28 years, 1 month

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Support for obsolete products

by sinasohn＠ricochet.net

At 02:14 PM 5/7/98 -0400, you wrote: >Some of the folks at Motorola are also good about stuff like this. Many >times I have needed data sheets for some of their more obscure, long >obsolete chips, and they came thru with free photocopies from some ancient >databooks. I dunno how efficient it would be, but perhaps interested parties could volunteer to format and html-ize old databooks, etc. for companies. They wouldn't have to do any effort (except provide the source documents) but then they could post them on their web site and make them available to anyone. --------------------------------------------------------------------- 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

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Vigilance and Vacuum Tubes (fwd)

by william＠ans.net

Found on another list... <snip> A talk on the SAGE System (1956-63) will be given at Moffett Field on Tuesday evening May 19, 5:30-7 PM. SAGE was Semi-Automatic Ground Environment, embodied as 22 monster computers (250 tons) each with 49,000 vacuum tubes consuming 3 megawatts of power. Parts of the last SAGE system, decommissioned in 1982, will be behind the speakers. For details, see www.computerhistory.org/sage. <snip> William Donzelli william(a)ans.net

28 years, 1 month

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Calculator displays

by allisonp＠world.std.com

<> The electronic one was interesting mainly for its display. It was <> fluorescent (greenish digits sealed in a long glass tube), but not <> 7-segment. Instead, there were (I think) nine segments, all of strange <> curly shapes, which made up digits much easier to read than the angular <> blocky, 7-segment types. But I can no longer remember how these were <> arranged, nor even any details like the manufacturer of the calculator < <These are called "Nixie Tubes". But don't ask me much more about it. I <just know what they're called. I have at least one nixie-tube calculato Not Nixie tubes as they were exactly 12 "segments" 0-9 and a decimal point on either side. Their color was neon orange from the gas use to fill them. They were glow discharge rather than fluoresent typically bluish green. VF diplays were also available in red, yellow, blue, green and white or combinations. Both technologies are from the "magic eye" tubes and neon lamps of 30years+ prior. The biggest difference between nixie from a calculator standpoint was nixies needed about a 60-80 volt swing to ignite/quench at low current where VF displays were typically 10-30v. I have a 40x2x(7x5) dot matrix character display bottle (VF) and several 7 segment claculator displays also VF in raw form. Nixies, my Yasu 355D frequency counter uses them (purchased new in 1974!) still works. Allison

28 years, 1 month

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No wait... I got another tape to boot...

by DSEAGRAV＠toad.xkl.com

I found a 3rd tape that boots OK. Seems the first 2 that I thought were good might not be! Sorry for being a pest. -------

28 years, 1 month

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OOps, I halt a 10, not 20/

by DSEAGRAV＠toad.xkl.com

-------

28 years, 1 month

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RSTS isn't done with me yet...

by DSEAGRAV＠toad.xkl.com

WHen trying to boot MS0:, from INIT 8.0-07, it halts at 20. I boot 8.0 off the DU0:, say BO MS0:, the tape shuffles back and forth awhile, and it stops at 20. What's that mean? -------

28 years, 1 month

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