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

Desperately need BA11-N/BA11-S Technical Manual

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: tony duell > Do you have a URL for the prints (to save me going through all possible > candidates on bitsavers)? Yeah, as per my 'where are subsystem prints' page, they are in the 11/23 print set MP00740, pg. 81-87 (schematic on pg. 87): https://archive.org/details/bitsavers_decqbusMP0_10391074 (Doesn't seem to be on BitSavers?) > What is the fault with your board? First, I should explain that I do have a working PM board, so we can swap back and forth to see what a working one looks like. It also verifies that the fault is on that board, since the working one is fine in that chassis. Anyway, on the bad one, both ACLO and DCLO (BPOK and BDCOK, I guess the QBUS guys call them :-) are being pulled low. Looking at the board, D5 (the Q3 end) is at ground, the other end is at around ~-3V; with D4, both ends are at ground. On the good board, both ends of each diode go to -12V shortly after the machine powers on. (Advance thanks for any help! :-) Noel

10 years, 9 months

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Backups [was Re: Is tape dead?]

by couryhouse＠aol.com

Well then we have hp 3000 stuff from 23 years ago...?Was ?then..?But soon we will see if these tape sets live.. it will be good if so as there is hp software ?of unique ?nature ?that only existed being saved on our tape sets..... then there ?is the older hp 2000 stuff.... ?5 fascinating unique things ?some were rewritten for 3000. But a few not and if you want ron on a 2000 you can not go backwards. ..need more hp2000 and 3000 hardware help! ?Ed# ?www.smecc.org Sent from my Verizon Wireless 4G LTE smartphone -------- Original message -------- From: Chuck Guzis <cclist at sydex.com> Date: 09/16/2015 11:54 AM (GMT-07:00) To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Subject: Re: Backups [was Re: Is tape dead?] On 09/16/2015 11:20 AM, Al Kossow wrote: > On 9/16/15 11:15 AM, couryhouse wrote: > >> We have 10 years of backups.ed# >> > ever verified them? Mine go back to sometime around 1980.? I have customer records that go back to 1987.? Curiously, we got a note from a fellow needing an update to CopyQM.? He registered his product in 1992.? We found it and provided him with a 1999 update--the last we did before the sale of the software (the terms of sale allow us to support existing customers). Just keep carrying the stuff forward.? I've even provided other authors with copies of their own source code after they'd lost track of it. You never know when having complete archives will come in handy.? But you already know that, Al! --Chuck

10 years, 9 months

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Backups [was Re: Is tape dead?]

by couryhouse＠aol.com

Enough repeated material over time just in case but yes,at one point random did . BACK UPS on backups ?on backups in my cases. Of course if one orig source file is bad from 10 years ago ?the backups of said file are eckky too. ?I await the dvds made of stone stuff I like to stash backups off site scattered about the country too. Geographical diversity is great... az though saver than calif ...earthquakes. ..and safer than areas with floods and huricanes.. I guess it is all a roll of the dice ?though. .. ?but just do it lots and cast it far and wide. I have no only museum stuff to worry ?about but also the news service stuff we do.....Ed# www.smecc.orgSent from my Verizon Wireless 4G LTE smartphone -------- Original message -------- From: Al Kossow <aek at bitsavers.org> Date: 09/16/2015 11:20 AM (GMT-07:00) To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Subject: Re: Backups [was Re: Is tape dead?] On 9/16/15 11:15 AM, couryhouse wrote: > We have 10 years of backups.ed# > ever verified them?

10 years, 9 months

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Backups [was Re: Is tape dead?]

by couryhouse＠aol.com

We have 10 years of backups.ed# Sent from my Verizon Wireless 4G LTE smartphone -------- Original message -------- From: Robert Feldman <r_a_feldman at hotmail.com> Date: 09/16/2015 10:40 AM (GMT-07:00) To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Subject: re: Backups [was Re: Is tape dead?] >From: Mouse <mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG> > >> I think a more important issue in backing up is "How many GENERATIONS > >to you keep around?" > >For many purposes, that's an important consideration, yes.? There's >something (small) I back up weekly for which I keep the most recent >seven backups, the oldest backup in each of the most recent twelve >months, and the oldest backup in any year.? I'm considering something >of the sort for my house backups - live replication to a backup host, >with a once-a-week freeze of the replica, storing past replica drives >on a scheme somewhat like the above. There is a ramsomware variant that encrypts the files but silently decrypts them when they are accessed. It does this for six months before deactivating the on-demand decryption and displaying the ransom message, the theory being that by that time all of the backups will be of the encrypted files, and thus will be useless for restoring good versions. As to how one can become infected, see http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/08/27/malvertising_feature/?page=1. Major sites, such as The New York Times, Reuters, Yahoo!, and Bloomberg, have been serving malware -- including ransomeware -- through hijacked advertisements. No need to click on anything, the ad serves up the malware. BTW, where I work got hit with ransomeware in December. We were lucky that it first hosed the accounting/time tracking database, which generated errors when someone tried to enter her time. When I went to restore a backup of the database, I noticed the ransomware's html ransom note file and shut down the system before too many more files were encypted. We were able to restore everything (except the originally infected user's computer, which we wiped and reinstalled) from an unconnected backup drive. Bob ?? ?

10 years, 9 months

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PDP-11 manuals scanned/scanning

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Noel Chiappa > I have also gone through my set of manuals and prepared a list of all > the ones which aren't online. > ... > EK-1184A-TM-PR4 11/84 Technical Reference (Preliminary) > EK-1184E-TM-001 PDP-11/84 System Technical and Reference Manual > EK-1184E-MG PDP-11/84-E User's and Maintenance Guide So I spaced. 1184E-TM-001 _is_ online; not sure how I missed it! > From: Henk Gooijen > I would be very interested in the 11/84 docs, as far as not available. I'm not sure there's much in the other two which isn't in the other 11/84 manuals which are already online - I think the content is mostly the same, just arranged differently. A few minor tweaks (e.g. that sentence I found a while back about the BIAK/BDMG jumpers on the 11/84 backplane), but nothing major. I'll get to them at some point - alas, I bound them, so now I have to un-bind them before I can scan them! Oh well!! > I have EK-KK11A-TM-001 "KK11-A cache memory technical manual" Lyle Bickley made that one available a couple of months back. It doesn't seem to have made it into the repositories, though? Should I upload a copy to my web site, and send along the URL? > From: Jerome H. Fine > However, both of the directories at the next level up are blocked. If > there is any possibility that both these directories could be made > available to allow the other PDF files to be viewed Err, there are no other PDF files there, except the 11/73 CPU board prints, which I mentioned here recently and have now been mirrored. > If not, a list of the actual links to the other PDF files which are > available to be viewed would be appreciated. I should probably throw together a web page with links to all the PDP-11 files there (e.g. the one I just put together, of print sets that are available inside other print sets), and link to that from my home page. > Also, do you have any files of source code or binary distributions of > RT-11 files? Alas, being of the MIT persuasion, we never did anything with DEC software (except TWENEX, on the DECSystem20's), so I have nothing of anything to do with DEC software - Unix all the way! ;-) Noel

10 years, 9 months

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12" Floppy Disks

by binarydinosaurs＠gmail.com

Morning folks, I've been contacted by a teacher who's looking for any information about 12" floppies. Am I imagining that they really existed? I'm sure I've seen one or seen adverts for them, maybe at Bletchley Park. Others he's contacted think he's getting confused with 12" laser discs but I'm not so sure. Anyone? -- adrian/witchy Owner of Binary Dinosaurs, the UK's biggest home computer collection? www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk

10 years, 9 months

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Desperately need BA11-N/BA11-S Technical Manual

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

So, I'm trying to fix a broken Power Monitor Boards (the thing that drives ACLO/DCLO) in an H786 (BA11-N power supply), and although I have the prints, I can't make head or tail out of them. (The circuit is a maze of op-amps and 555's. OK, OK, so maybe an analog guy can take one quick look, and understand instantly how it works. But I don't have that gene! :-) So I'm looking for a BA11-N or BA11-S Technical Manual, to explain it to me (my experience is that the DEC Tech Manuals for power supplies are _really_ good at that). (Either the BA11-N or BA11-S since, although the PM boards have different part numbers in the two - 54-12528-0-1 in the BA11-N/H786, and 54-15048-0-1 in the BA11-S/H7861, the circuits in the two seem to be pretty much identical, looking at the prints.) Alas, neither seems to be available online. (The BA11-N is EK-BA11N-TM-001; the BA11-S is in the "PDP-11/23B Mounting Box Technical Manual", EK-23BMB-TM-001.) I have clues to the existence of a couple of copies of the BA11-N one, though. A "David Powell" (then at ICUKnet in the UK) sent out a message saying he had one, but the email address for him at ICUKnet no longer works - I haven't (yet) tried to find him via LinkedIn because it's a common name. I don't suppose anyone here knows him, do they? Also, this page: http://ed-thelen.org/comp-hist/Book-Catalog.html which claims to be the "Book Catalog (incomplete) of the Computer History Museum, as of July 27 2002" says they have one. Would it still be there, and is there any chance that, if so, it can be scanned an put online? Many thanks, in advance, for any help with this - I'm pretty desperate! Noel

10 years, 9 months

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Still seeking 3B2 information

by lists＠loomcom.com

Hi everyone, I've made tremendous progress on my 3B2 emulator. It's being implemented under the SIMH simulator platform, which has been a huge help. My WE32100 core is getting closer to being complete. I'd consider it alpha quality right now, but it has enough instruction coverage to pass the 3B2's power-on self tests and to (barely) run some of the 3B2 firmware mode tools. Implementing the WE32100 core has been thanks to the processor manual and assembly language manuals that are available on BitSavers, but outside of the CPU, virtually all of my understanding of the 3B2's architecture has come from studying the ROMs and the SYSVR3 source code. I've also been helped by having remote access to a running 3B2 so I can assemble and disassemble code using the real AT&T tools. Beyond that, I have found precious little documentation. I'm at the point now where I'm pretty well stuck until I can find more information. I understand large chunks of the memory map now and should be able to do things like simulate the floppy and hard disk controller, but there are large gaps in my understanding. There are many undocumented registers that are used by the firmware, but don't appear in the SYSV source code anywhere. What they mean and what they're for is anybody's guess. I've just stubbed them out for now. If anybody has access to schematics, architecture docs, or other memory map information, I'd be eternally grateful if you could share it! -Seth

10 years, 9 months

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PDP-11 manuals scanned/scanning

by jhfinedp3k＠compsys.to

>Noel Chiappa wrote: >OK, so I finally got set up to scan manuals, with a scanner with a document >feeder, so I don't have to sit there and feed the beast! So now I can scan in >a number of 'missing' (online, at least) PDP-11 manuals which I happen to >have. > >The first thing through the machine was the DZV11 Technical Manual (which >Paul Anderson was gracious enough to loan out, to enable it to be put online >- thanks Paul!), now available here: > > http://ana-3.lcs.mit.edu/~jnc/tech/pdp11/EK-DZV11-TM-001_Jun78.pdf > >(as always, please download/distribute/replicate to other repositories). >I also did the 11/34 cache board user manual, now here: > > http://ana-3.lcs.mit.edu/~jnc/tech/pdp11/EK-KK11A-UG-001_Oct78.pdf > I was able to look at both manuals. THANK YOU!! However, both of the directories at the next level up are blocked. If there is any possibility that both these directories could be made available to allow the other PDF files to be viewed, that would be appreciated. If not, a list of the actual links to the other PDF files which are available to be viewed would be appreciated. Also, do you have any files of source code or binary distributions of RT-11 files? I have a number of RT-11 DOC sets which I am no longer using: V05.05 RT-11 DOC set V05.04G RT-11 DOC set V05.02 RT-11 DOC set I am not positive about the latter two, but the V05.05 RT-11 DOC set is probably available unless Jay West wants it now rather than waiting for the V05.07 RT-11 DOC set. Since not of these dead tree RT-11 DOC sets are bound, they would be easy to (automatically) scan - except that each of the RT-11 DOC sets is approximately 5,000 pages and both sides must be scanned for a total of about 10,000 pages each. Since the V05.07 RT-11 DOC set is already scanned and available as many PDF files, there may not be any interest in the prior versions. Please let me know. If no one is interested, then I will start discarding them in a few months. I have promised to send the dead tree version of my V05.07 RT-11 DOC set to Jay West, but that will wait until I am on the other side of the green rug - or at least close enough. Jerome Fine

10 years, 9 months

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Clearpoint Q-RAM 11 chip locations

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

Documentation for the Clearpoint Q-RAM 11 board seems to be rather scarce; all I could find was a user manual, with no technical info (manual or prints or other documentation) online. (I'd be glad to be proved wrong! :-) So as part of a project I needed to figure out which memory chips were which; now that I've worked it out, I'm putting that info online here in the archives, where eventually Google will find it, and make it available to anyone who needs it. So, looking at the card from the component side, with the handle at the top, and the contact fingers at the bottom, there's an array of memory chips 12 columns wide, and 6 rows high; I see no ID system on the card, so I number the columns A-L (from the left), and the rows 0-5 (from the top). The card can have 4 banks of 128KB each, for a max total of 512KB. The chip-bit relationship is pretty random: Bank 0 - Columns A, E, I: 01 I2 02 E5 04 I3 010 A5 020 A4 040 A2 0100 A0 0200 A1 0400 E3 01000 A3 02000 E0 04000 E4 010000 E1 020000 E2 040000 I1 0100000 I0 Bank 1 - Columns B, F, J: Bank 2 - Columns C, G, K: Bank 3 - Columns D, H, L: The banks 2/3 column assignments are a guess, not verified as yet. The bit allocation seems to be the same in all banks; I tried a few in bank 1, and they matched the ones in bank 0 (suitably offset in column, of course). Noel

10 years, 9 months

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release dates of early microcomputer operating systems, incl. Intel ISIS

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Dave G4UGM > although ENIAC first ran a program it was stored as acoustic waves I don't think ENIAC used acoustic delay storage? Perhaps what you're thinking of is that in the original ENIAC usage, there was no 'program' as we now think of that term; the machine had to be configured (via connecting up computing units with cables) for each separate problem, i.e. more 'configurable' than 'programmable' (at least in the Turing machine sense). Hence the debate over whether it or the Baby was the first 'computer'. Noel

10 years, 9 months

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A poltergeist in my machine?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Jerry Weiss > Check if the -5v charge pump is stable and supplying the correct voltage. > I recall a problem ... in which the on board pump went slowly bad. > Depending on the data content and tolerance margins for the memory > chips, we saw very erratic problems. That doesn't sound like my problem; this board was _consistently_ failing hard (would not write _any_ data, no-how, no-where), and then *poof* it was pretty consistently totally working (passing memory diags, etc). And the change from 'consistently not working at all' to 'working completely' happened when I 'touched' (see below) that pin with a probe. So either i) it was pure coincidence (possible, I suppose), or ii) there was some wierd causality. > From: Jon Elson > 1. There was a conductive hair on the board, and you knocked it off > with the probe. I'd brushed the board pretty comprehensively with a toothbrush to get all the dust off. (Yeah, I know, static - but it's pretty humid here right at the moment! ;-) > 2. There was a bad solder joint and the pressure of the probe broke > through the oxide. ... This is my highest probability guess. ... > 3. The chip has a bad internal wire bond, and the pressure on the lead > made it work. Well, I was using a DIP clip, so the pressure on the pin was pretty consistent before and after. Yeah, attaching the 'scope probe to the second pin would have wiggled the clip a tiny bit, but I'm still dubious. My current best guess, after sleeping on it, relates to the fact that the 'magic' pin was an output from a delay line. Delay lines, in that era, were apparently potted confections of inductors and capacitors. So maybe the extra current drain with the probe on somehow affected one (or more) of the capacitors in the delay line? A total WAG, but it's very mysterious! Noel

10 years, 9 months

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release dates of early microcomputer operating systems,

by Wayne.Smith＠warnerbros.com

> Date: Tue, 15 Sep 2015 03:03:05 -0600 > From: Eric Smith <spacewar at gmail.com> > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > <cctalk at classiccmp.org> > Subject: Re: release dates of early microcomputer operating systems, > incl. Intel ISIS > > Are you sure ISIS (one) didn't have disk support? I thought that was > shipped with the first Intel MDS-DOS floppy systems for use on the > MDS-800 in 1975. A 1975 edition of the MDS-DOS Operator's Manual is > listed among other Intel manuals at: > > http://www.intel-vintage.info/aboutme.htm Looked up the copyright registration for the manual and related items: A712678. MDS-DOS diskette operating system operator's manual 79 p. Add. ti: Intel diskette operating system microcomputer development System MDS-DOS operator's manual. (c) Intel Corporation; 22Dec75. A712670. Intel diskette operating system microcomputer development System MDS-DOS hardware reference manual. 1 v. (c) Intel Corporation; 15Dec75.

10 years, 9 months

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DEC Alpha 3000 Model 600

by rodsmallwood52＠btinternet.com

I thought it might be nice to have a DEC based graphics work station. I had the Alpha, a high res monitor and the Hobbyist Media CD for ALPHAVMS 8,3. (yes the system supports 8.3) SFSG .. So CD in the drive and switch on. First a nice colour graphics demo/test. Then the nomal system level stuff. >>> prompt, enter SHO DEV and our CD drive shows as DKA400 just where it should be. So Boot DKA400: and off we go. After a while a menu appears from which you can load layered products you need. It gets part way through the load and falls over with a data error. The cd is a real bought and paid for Media CD and is not a copy. Before I do a lot of tedious emaling (HP have taken the Hobbyist program in house) has anybody successfully loaded an Alpha with ALPHA VMS 8.3? Regards Rod

10 years, 9 months

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ZX Spectrum disk interfaces

by lproven＠gmail.com

A question born only of idle curiosity. In thge 1980s, I bought an MGT +D disk interface for the Sinclair ZX Spectrum: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%2BD In the end, I traded mine in for its upmarket cousin, the DISCiPLE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DISCiPLE (I link to WP as I originally wrote those articles, IIRC. :-) ) I have noticed that multiple people have now cloned the +D: http://sintech-shop.co.uk/sinclair/-d-disk-interface-clone/a-6196/ http://www.rwapsoftware.co.uk/spectrum/spectrum_storage.html#plusd But this post, from FB, claims that the Beta Disk interface can handle high-density drives, giving 1.5MB per disk: https://www.facebook.com/groups/speccy4ever/permalink/1237322356346334/ Given that HD floppies and drives are far more readily-available than DD these days, how come most 8-bit interfaces can only handle DD? Is it purely a data rate issue? -- Liam Proven ? Profile: http://lproven.livejournal.com/profile Email: lproven at cix.co.uk ? GMail/G+/Twitter/Flickr/Facebook: lproven MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? Skype/AIM/Yahoo/LinkedIn: liamproven Cell/Mobiles: +44 7939-087884 (UK) ? +420 702 829 053 (?R)

10 years, 9 months

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PDP-11 manuals scanned/scanning

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

OK, so I finally got set up to scan manuals, with a scanner with a document feeder, so I don't have to sit there and feed the beast! So now I can scan in a number of 'missing' (online, at least) PDP-11 manuals which I happen to have. The first thing through the machine was the DZV11 Technical Manual (which Paul Anderson was gracious enough to loan out, to enable it to be put online - thanks Paul!), now available here: http://ana-3.lcs.mit.edu/~jnc/tech/pdp11/EK-DZV11-TM-001_Jun78.pdf (as always, please download/distribute/replicate to other repositories). I also did the 11/34 cache board user manual, now here: http://ana-3.lcs.mit.edu/~jnc/tech/pdp11/EK-KK11A-UG-001_Oct78.pdf I have also gone through my set of manuals and prepared a list of all the ones which aren't online. I will slowly be scanning these in, but if anyone has a particular need for any of these, please let me know, and I'll move it to the top of the queue. They are: EK-881PC-UG-003 881 Power Controller User Guide EK-H9646-UG-002 H9646-AH/AJ Cabinet System User Guide DEC-11-H40SA-B-D PDP-11/40, -11/35 (21 Inch Chassis) System Manual EK-FP11C-OP-001 FP11-C Floating Point Processor User's Manual EK-1184A-TM-PR4 11/84 Technical Reference (Preliminary) EK-1184E-TM-001 PDP-11/84 System Technical and Reference Manual EK-1184E-MG PDP-11/84-E User's and Maintenance Guide EK-DHU11-TM-001 DHU11 Technical Manual (although IIRC that last is in a glued binding, so it's not really amenable to being auto-fed unless I rip it apart, which I am loathe to do). I also have: DEC-11-HR6B-D PDP-11 Conventions Manual but that's in print format (i.e. large pages), and I'd have to hand-feed that one through my A3 scanner. The auto-feed scanner I have is an older Epson, which I got on eBay for not very much. I'm using just the Twain driver from Epson; I'm doing my scanning >from IrfanView (a _very_ useful image tool, which if you don't have it, download it, it's free) which spits out the CCITT4 TIFF's directly - and can even number the output files backwards - incredibly useful when scanning hunks of double-sided pages on a single-sided scanner! If anyone wants to get set up to scan manuals, and wants to copy what I did, let me know, and I'll provide details. Noel

10 years, 9 months

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FS: PDP-11/55

by rob＠krten.com

Hi all, I have a PDP-11/55 for sale (Ottawa, Ontario, Canada). Bids open until 2015 09 15, buyer to arrange shipping, I will have it wrapped and ready to go. Please visit: www.krten.com/~rk/museum/index.html For pictures, detailed inventory and contact info. Sealed bids via eamil please. Winner will be notified 2015 09 16, machine will be ready to ship same day. Must be shipped / picked up no later than 2015 10 09. Sold AS-IS / where is, untested, unpowered since received. Comes with H960 rack and 2 side panels. Cheers, -RK -- Robert Krten Visit me at http://www.ironkrten.com

10 years, 9 months

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M8192 KDJ11-A ZKDJB2 XXDP Test Failure

by holm＠freibergnet.de

While checking my repaired KDJ11-A M8192 Board with xxdp I get the following error: BOOTING UP XXDP-XM EXTENDED MONITOR XXDP-XM EXTENDED MONITOR - XXDP V2.5 REVISION: F0 BOOTED FROM DL3 124KW OF MEMORY NON-UNIBUS SYSTEM RESTART ADDRESS: 152000 TYPE "H" FOR HELP ! .R ZKDJB2.BIC ZKDJB2.BIC ERROR WHILE TESTING BOARD FUNCTIONS ERROR # =001166 ERROR PC =040662 043632 @ The Board is working flawlessly otherwise. Can please someone with such a CPU can do a similar test and what does this error mean? I get this error with two different J11 Chips. In the Docs ( http://bitsavers.trailing-edge.com/pdf/dec/pdp11/xxdp/PDP11_DiagnosticHandb…) is shown thatthe test should ask for a Switch Register setting, in my case it doesn't. Is the test defective? Regards, Holm -- Technik Service u. Handel Tiffe, www.tsht.de, Holm Tiffe, Freiberger Stra?e 42, 09600 Obersch?na, USt-Id: DE253710583 www.tsht.de, info at tsht.de, Fax +49 3731 74200, Mobil: 0172 8790 741

10 years, 9 months

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R: Re: 12" Floppy Disks

by supervinx＠libero.it

May be he's a fisherman :) They tend to oversize everything :D -------- Messaggio originale -------- Da: Fred Cisin <cisin at xenosoft.com> Data:15/09/2015 14:01 (GMT+01:00) A: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Oggetto: Re: 12" Floppy Disks On Tue, 15 Sep 2015, Adrian Graham wrote: > Morning folks, > I've been contacted by a teacher who's looking for any information about > 12" floppies. Am I imagining that they really existed? I'm sure I've seen > one or seen adverts for them, maybe at Bletchley Park. Others he's > contacted think he's getting confused with 12" laser discs but I'm not so > sure. > Anyone? First, how old is he? If he is under 50, then he may be looking for the EARLY_PERCEPTION 12" floppy.? "Man, those things were HUGE! ENORMOUS! When my elementary school teacher brought one into class, it was bigger than my foot!" What he is misremembering is an 8" disk. If he is over 50, then he may be looking for the FADED_MEMORIES 12" floppy.? "Man, those things were HUGE! ENORMOUS!" What he is misremembering is an 8" disk. Or, he may be looking for the CREATIVE_MARKETING 12" floppy. When TVs were round, the measurement was the diameter.? When they stopped being round, the measurement was the diagonal, or largest length.? More recently, they've started to round up.? And, now, I think that they are measuring the diagonal of the box that it is shipped in.? The diagonal of an 8" disk jacket is about 11", rounded up to 12" Very large objects tend to be remembered as even larger.? I have a [damaged] 24" platter from a hard disk.? When mentioned later, most people remember it as being "three or four feet diameter!" We have had numerous prior queries about the 12" floppies.? One tipoff is that sometimes the person asking will remember that floppies had TWO sizes, "five inch" and "twelve inch".? 3.5" will either be called "three inch", or "hard disks"!? It is simply a misremembering of eight inch. As Eric pointed out, floppies STARTED at 8", and went DOWN from there. But, could we be wrong? Of course. But, I'm willing to bet $20 that nobody can send me a 12" floppy. -- Grumpy Ol' Fred???? cisin at xenosoft.com

10 years, 9 months

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Even more PDP-8/A weirdness (was: Re: PDP-8 diagnostics SR settings?)

by charlesmorris800＠centurytel.net

More testing this evening. Drive 1 ran for 8 ten-minute AJRLIA read-write passes before I stopped it, with a single error flagged during pass 6: WD1 0235 WD2 0000 ER 4001 CB 1117 indicating a Data CRC error and a Read header without CRC command. Not completely unexpected, a lot of data is being read and written and there is a soft error rate of 1 in 10^9 bits and hard error rate of 1 in 10^12, IIRC. Meanwhile I keyed in the Oscillating Seek program from the RL01/02 Users Guide manual (page C-6) and set it for 511 cylinders. It seeks without any problems swinging the head from Track 0 to Track 511 and back, on both drives. No Fault, no nothing except seeking. Perhaps I was overthinking the "wrong command" theory. I did reseat the 2708 EPROM (state machine) on the controller card. One VERY interesting thing I learned from a close reading of the manual and this test program though: The controller reports Ready status *immediately* when a seek command is given, even though the seek has not completed!! (pg. 5-15, para 5.3.4) And that seek can take up to 100 ms for 511 tracks on an RL02. A long time in computer terms, even at 1.6 us per instruction cycle... Now I'm wondering if AJRLHA diagnostic doesn't wait long enough for the seek to complete before trying something else. The Oscillating Seek does (by calling for a dummy Read Header command). Still don't understand the Write error that shouldn't have been there from that diagnostic... Not happening tonight though. I can run RL2FMT on either drive, boot OS/8 with no problems (other than the brief flash of both Fault lights), PIP files from one drive to the other. Could OS/8 do its initial Seek without waiting long enough for it to complete, too? Would love to hear from any experts on the internal workings of OS/8 especially relating to RL02's. -Charles

10 years, 9 months

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Even more PDP-8/A weirdness (was: Re: PDP-8 diagnostics SR settings?)

by charlesmorris800＠centurytel.net

Recall that the other day, I was seeing this on running AJRLHA.DG: STATE NOT 5 AFTER SEEK WITH 0 DIFFERENCE (this error and register dump prints twice in succession. State 5 = Lock-on, keeping on track). WD1 0317 (lower head, heads not out, spin-down) WD2 0204 (write data error, write gate error). This one worries me. WDE is "write gate on but no transitions on write data line". The drive should never be trying to write when there is no data being sent, and this diagnostic program does not do any writes to disk! So a fault, head retraction and shutdown is the proper response to this fatal error. I'll have to put a logic analyzer on the appropriate bits and see why it thinks it's supposed to be writing... or where the command came from. ERROR FLAG SET ER 2000 (Operation incomplete within 200 ms). Probably because the drive shut down when the WDE error occurred. CB 0003 (Seek) Today the fault immediately on starting the test is still present (and yes, Henk, it did occur to me that there might be something wrong with the diagnostic because all the others work! Has anyone got the source code for AJRLHA?) However, there are different initial errors today! Diagnostic starts (Fault light comes on immediately): Prints this block twice: Error flag set ER 2002 (Operation incomplete, Drive error) CB 0103 (12-bit data mode, Seek state). <--- This seems to be OK, 8-bit mode is required for Maintenance, Get Status or Read Header, but not Seek command) then Error flag set ER 2000, CB 0103; (same as above but no Drive error) Fault light goes off; then ER not as expected but error flag not set: WD1 0235 (Heads out, upper head locked on track) WD2 0002 (volume check bit) ER 0003 (Drive error; Drive ready); WD1 0335 (same except lower head) WD2 0002 (volume check bit) ER 0003 (Drive error; Drive ready); Per the user's manual, the Fault light only comes on with the following errors: 1 Drive-select error, 2 Seek time-out error, 3 Write current in heads (during sector time) error, 4 Loss of system clock (this condition is not latched and not represented in status word), 5 Write-protect error, 6 Write data error, 7 Spin error. I am confident that the reported fault is not 1, 4, 5 or 7. The drive is being selected properly, works except on initial test, the write protect switch is not set, and the drive stays spinning with Ready light on when not being accessed. However, that still leaves a seek time-out (reported today) or a write error (seen two days ago) when there shouldn't *be* any writes. I really want to find out why the drive previously thought it was being told to write, at the wrong time. I just had a new idea: What if a command register is being corrupted between the setting by the program, and the drive electronics? Say a Write Data command (CB xxx5) is erroneously received by the drive but the proper registers for a write have not been set up. That would Fault the drive and the diagnostic would report an error. Another example: The diagnostic is issuing the proper Seek command (CB xxx3), but the drive is actually receiving something else, so the expected seek would time-out in the diagnostic, and depending on the command the drive actually is reading, could light the Fault too . When attempting to run Dumprest for RL during the previous session, I had to add retries for seeking because the program would halt with a seek error there too. So I'm now suspicious of an intermittent or partial short (another whisker?) between the command registers and the drive. Maybe it's not "hearing" the controller properly! It's even got the correct expensive DEC cables between the card and the drives, and a terminator on the farthest drive. Jon wrote: >I'm pretty far away from competence on PDP-8s anymore, but the symptoms >sound like maybe the drive faults on LONG seeks, but as long as the seeks >are short, it works OK. There might be a one-shot in the controller that >allows so many ms for a seek to complete, and due to aging capacitors, the >delay is now too short. But, that's a totally wild guess, there could be >troubles in the drive seek electronics that only occur on longer seeks. That's an interesting SWAG, thanks :) I checked the 22 uf capacitor (and 39K resistor) that provide the timeout delay. They are OK. If anything the 22 uf is well on the high side, thus giving a longer delay. Time to toggle in some more programs I guess. What really bugs me is that this whole system was completely working for years... up until it didn't :P

10 years, 9 months

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Control Data 160

by bpettitx＠comcast.net

Chuck Guzis <cclist at sydex.com> wrote: Subject: Re: Control Data 160 Ebay I believe the eBay lister stated that it was a 160, not the -A. So no return jump for you... --Chuck Which would make it even more scarce. There were only a little over a 100 of the 160 models made. And 40+ of them were rebranded as NCR machines. There were 495 160-As made officially. (There were also a small number shipped without serial numbers to the good people at Langley.) I know of at least 5x 160-As still in existence, besides my own. Which should be going to a museum this week if they can sort out shipping glitches. My system includes a 161-A Typewriter in lousy shape and a 167-2 Card Reader in perfect shape. Plus all manuals, software (with listings) and spare parts. Even the paper tape rewinder! I did not know any 160 machines survived, so who ever bought it has a unique item. I have looked for 15 years for an 8092 = the first true 8 bit computer. Haven't found even a hint or rumor of one. I am working with Al Kossow, to see that this material is eventually in his archives. Billy Pettit

10 years, 9 months

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M8192 KDJ11-A ZKDJB2 XXDP Test Failure

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Holm Tiffe > "Ensure that halt trap option is disabled (jumper W9 installed)." Well, either that was transcribed incorrectly, or the person who wrote it confused. On the M8192, per EK-KDJ1A-UG-002, pg. 2-1, W_5_ is the halt trap option, and W9 is... BEVENT recognition. One removes W9 to enable the LTC (using the QBUS BEVNT line). Which kind of explains your results... :-) Noel PS: BTW, the M8190 (KDJ11-B) in similar - the onboard ROM diagostics barf if the LTC isn't on (i.e. the switch on the chassis to enable BEVNT has to be on).

10 years, 9 months

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21MX proms (per request

by gerardcjat＠free.fr

That triggers again a question I had for a while ... HOW OFTEN theses old PROM fail ?? Who had been through this problem and does it "really" worth to have some blanks "just in case" ?? --- L'absence de virus dans ce courrier ?lectronique a ?t? v?rifi?e par le logiciel antivirus Avast. https://www.avast.com/antivirus

10 years, 9 months

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Control Data 160

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Mark Linimon > excellent post. Ditto. Thanks for sharing those memories, and history, with us, Mr. Pettit! Noel

10 years, 9 months

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Even more PDP-8/A weirdness (was: Re: PDP-8 diagnostics SR settings?)

by charlesmorris800＠centurytel.net

As previously posted, reseating the boot ROMs in their sockets cured the corrupted boot loader issue. Got lucky there :) In my system there are two RL02 drives. I will call them "Top" and "Bottom" here, after their physical locations. I put the OS/8 pack that had been acting strangely in the bottom drive (faulting the disk and halting the 8/A when OS/8 was interrupted with Ctrl-C) in the top drive, and switched unit plugs. It works perfectly there! Ctrl-C returns to the "." prompt as expected. The pack I formatted also still reads four 4000+ blocks partitions when switched to the bottom drive. As before, the AJRLHA diagnostic (Seek/Fctn) still faults and prints errors, but only at the start of testing the drive. Thereafter that drive shows no errors. Then the program will switch to the other drive and the same problem occurs. Specifically (edited and reformatted for clarity, with results interpreted from the RL02 user manual): (Ready light goes out, Fault light on) STATE NOT 5 AFTER SEEK WITH 0 DIFFERENCE (this error and register dump prints twice in succession. State 5 = Lock-on, keeping on track). WD1 0317 (lower head, heads not out, spin-down) WD2 0204 (write data error, write gate error). This one worries me. WDE is "write gate on but no transitions on write data line". The drive should never be trying to write when there is no data being sent, and this diagnostic program does not do any writes to disk! So a fault, head retraction and shutdown is the proper response to this fatal error. I'll have to put a logic analyzer on the appropriate bits and see why it thinks it's supposed to be writing... or where the command came from. ERROR FLAG SET ER 2000 (Operation incomplete within 200 ms). Probably because the drive shut down when the WDE error occurred. CB 0003 (Seek) (Fault light goes out) ER NOT AS EXPECTED BUT ERROR FLAG NOT SET (prints this block twice) WD1 0235 (heads out, lock-on, keeping on track) WD2 0002 (Volume check bit, no errors) ER 0003 (Drive Error and Drive Ready) CB 1004 (8-bit mode, Read Header) BAD STATUS RECEIVED FROM DRIVE (also prints this block twice) WD1 ACTUAL 0235 (heads out, lock-on, keeping on track) WD2 ACTUAL 0002 (volume check bit) WD1 EXPECTED 0234 (heads out, seek - track counting) WD2 EXPECTED 0000 (no errors) Some of these errors look like a "cascade"... because the first false-write error occurred, the others are flagged before the drive can become ready again. Then it goes on to run for about 10 mins, flickering the Ready light constantly so it's very dim, obviously accessing as fast as it can. No further errors. Next the program switches to drive 1 and the results are identical, except the "STATE NOT 5" message has WD1 0217 (upper head, heads not out, spin-down). So only the Seek diagnostic is giving errors... the AJRLIA diagnostic (Read/Write) and 'KA (Performance Exerciser) do not show errors. Writes the entire pack and reads it with no errors. I suspect it has automatic error retry but without the source code, that is speculation. Anyhow it may be time to break out the scope and RL02 service manual and check some settings and waveforms... But I still think this is actually a problem with the RL8A controller and not *both* RL02's, since both drives return the same errors, and never had problems like this before... Any help making sense of this mishmash of errors would be greatly appreciated :) -Charles

10 years, 9 months

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punchcard svg file available

by gerardcjat＠free.fr

@ simski, who wrote : >Hi, > Hmm. russian carsds. sounds interesting. I'm certainly interested in > their looks. could you post a scan of one of them? Well, they very much look ( and feel ) like original IBM ones, with : - Right angles : NO rounded corners - Characters printed : standard 0 to 9 row numbers with 1 to 80 column numbers over "0" ligne and "9" ligne - only two cyrilic "labels" (??) printed sideway at the leading and trailing edge of the card. Color is what ** I ** call light brown, but there is certainly a more accurate word for it, something like "bistre" ?? All the prints are printed quite "light" and I am not sure it will go through scan correctly (!!) . I will try next week ( scanner un-connected right now ;-) ) If interested ( as collector's item ?? ) , I may send a couple. PM me. --- L'absence de virus dans ce courrier ?lectronique a ?t? v?rifi?e par le logiciel antivirus Avast. https://www.avast.com/antivirus

10 years, 9 months

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Control Data 160

by bpettitx＠comcast.net

"wmachacek" <wmachacek at q.com>wrote: Subject: Control Data 160 I have a CDC "160 Computer Programming Manual" that I obtained many years ago when I was working with CDC equipment. This manual caught my eye and I squirreled it away since we were using the 160-A computers not the 160s. This manual has a publication number of 023a and a date of 1960. The picture shown inside the manual is pretty much like the one described herein. It shows the dropped side panels. The manual shows the Ferranti paper tape reader and the BRPE paper tape punch as standard equipment. As optional equipment it shows Ampex magnetic tape handlers (FR300 or FR400), an 80 column punched card reader (no maker listed), an 80 column card punch (no maker listed), a line printer (no maker listed), a Soroban-modified IBM electric typewriter, and a digital communications line buffer. This manual has 45 pages and shows a full view of the computer and a close-up of the front panel. I always kept this as a kind of a CDC oddity as I had heard that the 160s were a proto type and never actually went into production. At least that is what I heard back then. I hope this information kind of helps to better identify these computers. Bill ............................................... Bill, I have a copy of that manual here and was just looking at it. I believe I have all of the 160 and 160-A documentation and software. I have been giving it all to Al Kossaw to add to bitsavers. He is overloaded with so much that needs scanning, that it may be a while before getting posted. The early 160's used IBM punched card equipment. The 088 was the usual card reader of choice. Punching was via an IBM 523 or 521.. Printing was on a 1402 or 407. All these devices used an adaptor called the 1610. Later, printing shifted to the Analex 1000 lpn drum printer. Horrible machine to work on. A cheaper printer also became available: the 501 drum printer. It was made by Holley Carburator! I think it was their only venture into computerdom. Very unreliable machine, used Teflon hammer assemblies. I never saw a straight line of printing on any of those machines. Much of my early career at CDC was swapping out the foreign peripherals and replacing them with CDC ones. Including the Ferranti Paper Tape Reader. I'm a little hurt that the 160 is thought to never have gone into production. I was a customer engineer in the Twin Cities area and worked on lots of them, including some that went to NCR. Even Honeywell used them to test production .transducers. This was the first 12 bit machine, and went into production in 1958. It was extremely reliable. Other than paper tape gear and typewriter repairs, the only failures I can remember are burned out light bulbs and push button switches. Its main signifigance was the development of processing the peripheral operations so the large mainframes were freed up for the big jobs. That lead to the 6600, 7600 and the Cyber Series of computers. Even today, I/O is staged so the big processors are freed up. The 160 was a Seymor Cray design. The 160-A was designed by James Pederson in the early 1960's. It was at the request of several customers who needed more peripheral processing power in the fledling space industry. Most of the early 160-A sales were to the aerospace industry. I first worked on them while in the Army. They were used on missile engine test fixtures in Humtsville, Alabama. Incredibly reliable machines. My personal machine (s/n 190) is still working, complete with all origianl parts. Made in 1963. 52 yers old and still chugging along. Sadly, I had to give it up for health reasons. It's now on its way to a Museum. Billy Pettit

10 years, 9 months

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Tandy CoCo Joystick Adapter

by iridius＠yahoo.com

Greetings cctalk list .. I'm about to do a one time run of some CoCo 3 Joystick adapter PCB's. Using this simple PCB, along with one IC, 8 resistors, some wire and the two connectors, an adapter can be built to adapt an Atari style 9 pin Joystick to a CoCo 6 pin DIN, allowing one to use a digital joystick with their Tandy Color Computer. More info at .. http://www.lemon64.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=57859

10 years, 9 months

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C-64 / Epyx FastLoad bug(s)? Workaround?

by drlegendre＠gmail.com

Anyone here using (or have used) a C-64 with the venerable Epyx FastLoad cartridge? I'm running into a VERY annoying bug, and would like to know what if anything is known about it. Bug works like this.. Use the FL "$" command to display the disk directory. Immediately after, try to save a program to disk that has a certain number of chars in the filename in common with another filename on the disk. For instance [SAVE "PROGRAM03",8] when a file (or files) named "PROGRAM01", 'PROGRAM02", etc. already exist. The bug results in a 74 "drive not ready" error, and the save fails. Sometimes picking a more unique filename will allow a save. Other times, it seems no filename will allow a save. Only way I've found to get around the error is to load a different file.. which is no good, as it will overwrite the one in memory. So far, I've only noted the bug when working with BASIC files. What's up with this? Is there a workaround?

10 years, 9 months

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WTB: Teletype parts

by drlegendre＠gmail.com

Need the following items for an ex-Bell System Model 15 TTY: Keycaps - F K L C V B N with punctuation symbols, rather than fractions. I have a set with fractions to sell or swap. Keycaps - CARR RET and NULL (blank). These are missing. Platen crank - This is missing. Think that's all for now. I put out a word on Greenkeys but haven't had any luck, though I'd try the ever-helpful classicmp list! Please contact off-list where appropriate. Thank you!

10 years, 9 months

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Even more PDP-8/A weirdness (was: Re: PDP-8 diagnostics SR settings?)

by charlesmorris800＠centurytel.net

Update: The first thing I tried was removing and reseating the boot ROMs (465A2/469A2), since they did not use good machine-tooled sockets. Now the boot loader performs normally, no incorrect locations, and OS/8 boots from Drive 0 whether using the boot key or manual start at 0001. Great! So of course, ANOTHER new problem shows up... OS/8 boots and runs, will run PFOCAL, BASIC, give directory listings... But when I hit a Ctrl-C (for example, during a directory listing), Drive 0 Ready goes out, the Fault lamp lights and OS/8 halts. The last instruction showing on the display is 07605, 6213 (CDF CIF 1). I can hit the boot key and as soon as the drive becomes ready again, presumably relocating track 0, the system boots back to the "." prompt. The DF/IF logic is on the same Option 2 board with the bootstrap and auto-restart circuitry. Maybe there's yet another bad connection I have now disturbed... Time to start running diagnostics again! I am really feeling like I'm on a snipe hunt here... sigh. This system was working for many years up until about 2 years ago, then it all went to pot.

10 years, 9 months

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bendix GE-15?

by w2hx＠w2hx.com

I think someone on one of the lists was inquring about this. Some items that might be of interest http://www.ebay.com/itm/Rare-Vintage-Bendix-G-15-Mainframe-Computer-Circuit… http://www.ebay.com/itm/Rare-Vintage-Bendix-G-15-Mainframe-Computer-DA-1-In… and a bunch of magazine advertisements Eugene

10 years, 9 months

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information about the Bendix G-15 and Rice Research Computer?

by linimon＠lonesome.com

So I have finally been prodded by some people to put together a web page for the G-15 computer. As well, I am going to put up information about the Rice Research Computer (later known as the R1), and its intended succesor, the R2. Right now my web pages are pretty skeletal and mostly consist of some old G-15 documentation scans I did in early 2000. Apparently I have some things that are not on Bitsavers (yet). I have at least one more document that I need to scan, the Technical Manual. I do have some R1 documentation which I intend to scan and then send to either CHM or Rice University Fondren Library. To some of you that I have already contacted off-list, this will be duplicate information. Sorry about that. To the others, please let me know if you have any information about these computers that you would be willing to share publicly. Also, beta-testers of the website would be appreciated; email me off- list for the URLs. I mean, it it _really_ skeletal (e.g. 2 days old.) mcl

10 years, 9 months

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Even more PDP-8/A weirdness (was: Re: PDP-8 diagnostics

by charlesmorris800＠centurytel.net

>So, either something is corrupting the bus, or the memory is bad. > >Correct me if I'm wrong, but if I got this right, you wrote the boot >code by hand into memory, single-stepped it, and after a while, you had >bad contents in memory. > >Now, execution here would only be reading from memory, and not writing >to it. Furthermore, this is MOS, so it does not get rewritten on reads. >That would, to me, suggest that the memory board is the problem. >Do you have any other memory board around? > >Johnny I mistyped while doing many things at once. (It appears that the memory does NOT change while single stepping through it by hand. Fortunately.) See my update - reseating the ROMs fixed the boot corruption problem. I am not sure if the 32K SRAM board actually reads and rewrites - it does not do so internally, it's just SRAM and a couple of bus buffers. Whether the 8/A memory cycle does rewrite each time or not, I don't know. Now I've got yet another RL02 (maybe) problem to chase down... -Charles

10 years, 9 months

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Even more PDP-8/A weirdness (was: Re: PDP-8 diagnostics SR settings?)

by charlesmorris800＠centurytel.net

Since the computer doesn't mind doing boring, repetitive tasks, I set the 11/23+ to yet again remaking the bootable RL02 pack (3 hrs at 9600 baud while I did other things). Plunked it in (without the programmer's panel connected), hit the boot switch on the limited function panel, and it fired right up to the "." prompt. Did a directory of the free space which printed, set the date to 11 Sep 75, and had a phone call for a while. Back to the console, entered R BUILD (just to do the PR, not save it) and system halts. Reboot - back to the same crap of fault light flashes on the drives, no boot. Sigh. So I hooked up the programmer's panel, flaky though it may be, (just not touching the SR) and discovered that some of the bootstrap routine is being corrupted in zero page! And not the same Bit 4 as before, and not all the time... a 4027 (JMS IO) got changed to 4007, the constant of 0377 changed to 0017, the 6601 RL02 instruction was now a 6401, etc. Still always middle bits though. Now, the secondary bootstrap (from the RL pack) does overwrite the zero page including the running boot code. (The first read from the pack is 200[octal] words, or one page). The boot routine never sets the MA address register so it could be overwriting core starting at 0000. The boot listing comments say execution does not continue in the primary boot (at 0001-0035), from the last IO call at the point when the RLCB function causes the page of data to be read from the disk into core. But the changes I'm seeing aren't right, regardless. The OS/8 boot routine would never use a 6401 (an IOT for a secondary console device, in this case my Omni-USB)... Next I pulled the RL8A out of the backplane and tried manually entering and single-stepping through the boot code, skipping manually over the RLSD instruction in the disk IO subroutine. That didn't seem to corrupt the code. Hit the Boot key (with the RL8A still removed) and those three or four words are wrong again, the same way. Thus verifying that the changes are not coming from the secondary boot on the disk! If I remember correctly, the boot ROMs have to load the boot routine into core at 0001-0035 (done by hardware on one of the three-board set) and then start execution at 0001. I thought this might be bit-rot in the ROMs, so I tried toggling in the bootstrap code to those locations and single-stepping beginning at 0001 after a few loops through showed the code changed again. Remember, the RL8A is not present in the bus. So the fault can't be on that card! I'm thinking something else is loading part of the memory data bus when it should not be, which is either on the CPU or it's a problem with the 32K memory card itself. Now that I think about it, when I discovered the problem on our clone panel a couple of days ago, I also found a couple of core locations that had been corrupted in the restrl program, not in page 0 though. Figured that was also artifact of the buggy panel, but now it's looking like something else. The only things in the backplane now are the 3-board set, the 32k card, and the Omni-USB. Today I have discovered a pattern to the corruption! Addr Orig. Altered 0005 4027 4007 0011 6615 6415 0015 7325 7005 0021 1026 1006 0025 0377 0017 0031 6601 6401 Notice the middle 4 bits are always being set to 0000 which is an open-circuit (on the Omnibus a logic-1 is pulled down to 0 volts). I am not sure of the significance of the repeating address pattern yet. Not only that, those locations *only* are wrong after the BOOT key (or switch) is toggled. Running from loc. 1 by (0001, LA, RUN) does NOT corrupt the bootstrap in core (with the RL8A still removed, so the DMA facility doesn't factor into it). An even more important finding is that if I manually clear the bootstrap code by depositing 0000 in all its locations, when I hit the BOOT key, it deposits the "altered" version into core! No wonder the machine won't boot... still unsure as to why it did the first time yesterday, though. So now I need to look at the boot ROM circuitry which is on Option 2 board M8317. There are not three ROMs, DEC used some weird packing scheme to fit into two 256x4 ROMs. Most likely there is a 4-bit latch or an open-collector buffer chip that is flaky. I'd just yank the board and try booting without it, but the IF and DF registers (for memory extension beyond 4K) are also on that card so OS/8 would crash... And the best news of all so far: I keyed in the boot loader by hand, started it manually at 0001... and OS/8 booted from Drive 0 which confirms that the boot ROM area is the cause! Now to track it down... I sure hope it's not another solder whisker. Meanwhile, I used the system for over half an hour, running PFOCAL, formatting disk packs in Drive 1, checking the handlers loaded with BUILD. All working. -Charles

10 years, 9 months

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punchcard svg file available

by gerardcjat＠free.fr

Shall I understand that some of you guys, are looking for blank punch/punched cards ?? I have about a hundred ( here in .... France !! ) Let me know if this can help. These came from ex Soviet Union, and, as far as I can tell, they "fell and taste" like original IBM cards that was used to "play" with some 40 years ago. --- L'absence de virus dans ce courrier ?lectronique a ?t? v?rifi?e par le logiciel antivirus Avast. https://www.avast.com/antivirus

10 years, 9 months

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internet blocking problem ?

by hollandia＠ccountry.net

Per your request, I tried the URL: http://members.iinet.net.au/~daveb/simplex/simplex.html I did the search you requested, and tried the following URLs: http://members.iinet.com.au/~stepho/mick.htm http://members.iinet.net.au/~pontipak/redsquare.html http://members.iinet.net.au/~perthdps/convicts/stories.html http://www.iinet.net.au/~rmine/gctrebs.html http://www.iinet.net.au/~worcom http://members.iinet.net.au/~janwyllie/ http://members.iinet.net.au/~tom-hunter/ http://www.iinet.net.au/~gduncan/ http://members.iinet.net.au/~jacob/worldtp.html In every case shown above, the result was the same: The server at members.iinet.net.au is taking too long to respond. Only two of the sites I tried gave a different result. They were: http://members.iinet.net.au/~glrmc/ It gave me a blank page. and http://members.iinet.net.au/~margretr/ It gave the following error message: "XML Parsing Error: unexpected parser state Location: jar:file:///C:/Program%20Files/Mozilla% 20Firefox/browser/omni.ja!/chrome/browser/content/browser/aboutNetError.xhtml Line Number 335, Column 68: <div id="ed_connectionFailure">&connectionFailure.longDesc;</div>" My particulars are: 7:59 PM 9/10/2015 Gateway computer, connected by modem. Windows XP Professional v5.1 Firefox 35.0.1 Computer Country (ccountry.net) Medford, Oregon USA IP address: 12.73.18.147 You're welcome! Kurt > > So, I wonder if I can ask classiccmp members, especially in > the US, to check if they can view this page: > http://members.iinet.net.au/~daveb/simplex/simplex.html > > > If you want to do some more research, just Google > members.iinet and you will see a lot of hits of the form: > http://members.iinet.net.au/~some_name > > Thanks for any help or info you can offer! > > Jon > > >

10 years, 9 months

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FS: three PDP-11 boards

by charlesmorris800＠centurytel.net

I was going through my board collection and found three PDP-11 boards I've never used in years and don't see a foreseeable need. No idea of condition, but they're visually clean and neat, stored in antistatic bags. The serial cards came out of (my) working 11/23+ but I've not tested them (since I already have a 16-line card and only 2 terminals). I have (one each): M7957 DZV11-M Quad height 4-line serial card M8053 DMV11 "Microprogram Control" synchronous controller card Dilog CQ1610 16-line serial card. Make any reasonable offers. + shipping from US zip 65775. thanks Charles

10 years, 9 months

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Control Data 160

by wmachacek＠q.com

I have a CDC "160 Computer Programming Manual" that I obtained many years ago when I was working with CDC equipment. This manual caught my eye and I squirreled it away since we were using the 160-A computers not the 160s. This manual has a publication number of 023a and a date of 1960. The picture shown inside the manual is pretty much like the one described herein. It shows the dropped side panels. The manual shows the Ferranti paper tape reader and the BRPE paper tape punch as standard equipment. As optional equipment it shows Ampex magnetic tape handlers (FR300 or FR400), an 80 column punched card reader (no maker listed), an 80 column card punch (no maker listed), a line printer (no maker listed), a Soroban-modified IBM electric typewriter, and a digital communications line buffer. This manual has 45 pages and shows a full view of the computer and a close-up of the front panel. I always kept this as a kind of a CDC oddity as I had heard that the 160s were a proto type and never actually went into production. At least that is what I heard back then. I hope this information kind of helps to better identify these computers. Bill

10 years, 9 months

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PDP-11 architecture Was: internet blocking problem ?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Jon Elson elson > I actually LIKED the PDP-11 architecture quite a LOT, but the limited > memory was a big killer. The good thing about the PDP-11 was the 16-bit word size. (It resulted in what's probably the most elegant architecture, in bang/buck terms, of all time.) The bad thing about the PDP-11 was the 16-bit word size. (For the reason you point out.) Noel

10 years, 9 months

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punchcard svg file available

by simski＠dds.nl

Hi All, just to let you know that i've made a vector graphics file for A hollerith punchcard. https://hack42.nl/wiki/Bestand:Punchcard.svg enjoy -- Met vriendelijke Groet, Simon Claessen drukknop.nl

10 years, 9 months

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internet blocking problem ?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Jon Elson > so MANY others who could not access the members.iinet page were finding > they got stopped at cogentco. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Well, to be precise 'Cogentco was the last node on the route which responded'. It's impossible to say whether i) that node tossed packets that tried to go further; ii) it forwarded them to some other node (identity unknown) which did toss them (and didn't allow/handle traceroute), etc. One can't draw any conclusions about whether it's i) from the fact that it's _also_ still responding to traceroute packets sent to that address: one would have to know whether it does the a) 'is this packet to a destination I'm filtering' check before it does the b) 'I decremented the TTL and it's now zero', or the other way around. If b) it could be the node that's dropping the packets. But given that other 'last hops' are also producing similar results, I'm still thinking it's Ii.net which is tossing the packets, not the 'last hop' one can see on traceroutes. Noel

10 years, 9 months

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PDP-11 architecture Was: internet blocking problem ?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Johnny Billquist > it really is a few bits short of perfect ... > .. when you look at the EIS and FPP extensions, which could not > retain the general instruction layout format because of a lack of bits. Well, if they'd tried to keep the same general layout, I don't think EIS, floating point, etc would have all fit in 16 bits. Maybe they should have made it a 18-bit machine? ;-) But I keep circling back to the observation that the -11 architecture's incredible flexibility/complexity ratio happened precisely _because_ it had to be crammed into 16 bits (along with a big dollop of genius :-). Given that I think the big challenge of the next generation of computer science is going to be managing complexity, it's too bad we don't teach more young CS students the -11 and UnixV6 - to show them just how much you _can_ do, with how _little_, if you put your mind to it. > I still would not consider overlays as any part of the PDP-11 > architecture. But maybe that is just me. No, I agree with you 100%. Plenty of PDP-11 OS's did not support them. Noel

10 years, 9 months

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IBM 026

by COURYHOUSE＠aol.com

who could be lucky enough to own 2 link 8s? Ed@ In a message dated 9/11/2015 10:22:34 A.M. US Mountain Standard Time, wdonzelli at gmail.com writes: Yeah, about those... Warning! Warning! -- Will On Sep 11, 2015 11:06 AM, "Paul Koning" <paulkoning at comcast.net> wrote: > > > On Sep 11, 2015, at 10:58 AM, Noel Chiappa <jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu> > wrote: > > > >> From: Ed Sharpe > > > >> well SMECC needs one hopefully to make work so we can show the youn'ins > >> how cards were punched! > > > > Well, here's an 029 (not quite what the OP was looking for, but good > enough > > for you all, I expect) for a not insane amount of money: > > > > http://www.ebay.com/itm/281796720725 > > Is that TWO Linc-eight systems in the background??? > > paul > >

10 years, 9 months

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IBM 026

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Ed Sharpe > well SMECC needs one hopefully to make work so we can show the youn'ins > how cards were punched! Well, here's an 029 (not quite what the OP was looking for, but good enough for you all, I expect) for a not insane amount of money: http://www.ebay.com/itm/281796720725 Noel

10 years, 9 months

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KDJ11-A/M8192 identified as PDT11/50 from resorc /a?

by holm＠freibergnet.de

..have repaired a HH725 Harddisk /TA7245BP was bad since a tantal Elko had a short) and booted now RT11 V5.07 with the new now repaired 1/73 CPU. Resorc /A give the following informations: .resorc /a RT-11XB (S) V05.07 Booted from DL0:RT11XB Resident Monitor base is 111774 (37884.) USR is set NOSWAP TT is set NOQUIET Indirect file abort level is ERROR Indirect file nesting depth is 3 PDT 11/150 Processor FP11 Hardware Floating Point Unit Extended Instruction Set (EIS) KT11 Memory Management Unit Cache Memory 50 Cycle System Clock Device I/O time-out support Multi-terminal support Hmm, is that normal that the CPU gets identified as PDT11/150? Interestingly it finds an FP11 but the Socket is empty. For an M8186 the output is more that what I've expected: .resorc /a RT-11XB (S) V05.07 Booted from DL0:RT11XB Resident Monitor base is 111774 (37884.) USR is set NOSWAP TT is set NOQUIET Indirect file abort level is ERROR Indirect file nesting depth is 3 PDP 11/23 Processor FP11 Hardware Floating Point Unit Extended Instruction Set (EIS) KT11 Memory Management Unit 50 Cycle System Clock Device I/O time-out support Multi-terminal support Regards, Holm -- Technik Service u. Handel Tiffe, www.tsht.de, Holm Tiffe, Freiberger Stra?e 42, 09600 Obersch?na, USt-Id: DE253710583 www.tsht.de, info at tsht.de, Fax +49 3731 74200, Mobil: 0172 8790 741

10 years, 9 months

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internet blocking problem ?

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> From: Don North > Basically see no problems accessing any of the pages on sites. > ... > 12: be2019.ccr21.lax04.atlas.cogentco.com 22.400ms asymm 8 > 13: no reply > 14: no reply > 15: ae0.cr1.mel4.on.ii.net 217.966ms asymm 19 Oh, that's really interesting. A bunch of us get as far as Cogentco, and then it stops working. But you get through... which implies that the _route_ in Cogentco to Ii.net is OK. Which in turn implies that it's Ii.net who are blocking (via packet drop, I assume), based on the IP _source_ address. So it sounds like the earlier post (too lazy to track it down) which says this is Ii.net responding to complaints from others (since they haven't blocked access to _all_ of ii.net, just that 'members' site) is right. Noel

10 years, 9 months

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Amiga 2000HD spotted, STL

by jwest＠classiccmp.org

Local electronics haunt has an Amiga 2000HD on the shelf. I was in a rush so didn't get any particulars. It did not appear to have a monitor or keyboard. Didn't see a price tag, but just from past experience I'd guess the owner tagged it around $50. I'm not in to them, no interest.. But if someone is interested I'd be happy to look further, ship, etc. J

10 years, 9 months

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IBM 026

by COURYHOUSE＠aol.com

well SMECC needs one hopefully to make work so we can show the youn'ins how cards were punched! hopefully something to be gotten here in AZ but I am open.... Thanks Ed# _www.smecc.org_ (http://www.smecc.org) In a message dated 9/10/2015 5:27:02 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time, isking at uw.edu writes: Are you looking for one to buy, to use, to study for restoration...? I know some folks who have them, but they're not for sale. :-) On Tue, Sep 8, 2015 at 4:59 PM, <COURYHOUSE at aol.com> wrote: > wow... that is absurd! $24,999 > someone needs rehab... > > > In a message dated 9/8/2015 4:57:08 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time, > hilpert at cs.ubc.ca writes: > > > http://www.ebay.com/itm/RARE-VINTAGE-IBM-26-INTERPRETING-CARD-PUNCH-OWN-A-PI > ECE-OF-HISTORY-/161725243156?hash=item25a7935f14 > -- Ian S. King, MSIS, MSCS, Ph.D. Candidate The Information School <http://ischool.uw.edu> Dissertation: "Why the Conversation Mattered: Constructing a Sociotechnical Narrative Through a Design Lens Archivist, Voices From the Rwanda Tribunal <http://tribunalvoices.org> Value Sensitive Design Research Lab <http://vsdesign.org> University of Washington There is an old Vulcan saying: "Only Nixon could go to China."

10 years, 9 months

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