Dave wrote:
>On Mar 19, 2010, at 8:44 PM, Ben wrote:
>>> And now, I can get datasheets for pretty much any random component in
>>> seconds, rather than having to wait for weeks to find a copy of a
>>> databook that I don't have. I have nearly three thousand PDF
>>> datasheets
>>> now, and those are just for parts that I've been interested in for
>>> one
>>> reason or another. (curiosity, repair, use in new design, found a
>>> chip
>>> somewhere and wanted to know what it is, etc) I have about 35-40
>>> databooks, and now I have FAR more useful information available to me
>>> then when I used to use those databooks regularly.
>>>
>>> Not all change is automatically bad.
>>
>> 3 am I want to check a datasheet ... it is 30 seconds including the
>> time
>> I take to turn on the light switch.
>> I need to use windows and the internet it is about 20 minutes later
>> I may have the information.
> That's because you use Windows. I get it in seconds. Every time.
A couple random thoughts:
Google goes through phases where searching for a random TTL or CMOS
or old microprocessor or transistor part number returns 95%+ sponsored
spam links to places that don't have the part but want to sell you the part anyway.
At other points Google is working "nicely" and the top couple hits are to the
actual datasheet.
If the part is a "basic part" that is still available in some commercial form or another
I find that going to Mouser or Digikey is often more effective today than going
through Google. And I say that being a big Google user.
Mouser and Digikey tend to keep parts in their search engines with links to datasheets for maybe a decade
or two after they leave special order. And it's useful to know that yes, the CA3146
is being discontinued. Or that the CD4007 is actually the same as the CA3600 :-).
Lots of Windows installations have a zillion spyware things running that interfere
greatly with downloading the PDF after you find it. Sometimes these things
make you believe that they're actually toolbars, but they aren't. Usually the
download accelerators fall in this category too... launching 50 simultaneous
download sessions to fetch a 3 page datasheet is usually a big loss.
I know that I'm being OS-ist when I talk about Windows like that, but really
it's the unknowing users getting sucked into thinking "another toolbar? Hey,
I want that!" and "another download accelerator? Hey, I want that!" that
are at fault. When you see a web browser and literally 75% of the screen
is taken up by toolbars and download accelerators that really are actually
all spyware, something is seriously out of whack, but I'd estimate that probably
90% of Windows PC's that are not vigilantly patrolled end up that way.
Tim.
I appreciate the old databooks very much... but with bound books
keeping them open on the bench to the page you want was always a problem.
Anything without a good binding fell apart 30 years ago. Even the ones
that are well bound (e.g. the hardback TTL books from TI) don't last
forever although they were printed by the millions and are still readily
found.
What I actually like, is having a big 23" or bigger screen at the bench
with web access to the datasheets. That's pretty decent. I can zoom the
pinout big enough that I can read it from the other side of the bench,
or I can open the pinout and the state table simultaneously in two
windows. Pretty good, at least as long as I have my glasses on.
But the screen still isn't as good as having the datasheet right there
on the bench (flat on the bench) a foot or less away from the circuit.
I wonder how a Kindle will do on the bench? Anyone drop their soldering iron
on a screen yet? The good pages in the databooks always had solder
or food or both on them, that made the good pages easier to find!
And don't bother lecturing me about not having food and solder in the
same place. We all grew up with solder when we were kids, and everyone
knows that WE'RE PERFECTLY NORMAL now that we're adults!
Tim.
Folks,
I've a 7937H that turns on and passes diag fine, but as soon as I
try to access it, I get a servo error. I suspect the HDA assembly but
have no spares to swap to confirm.
The entire drive is free for pickup from Rockville, MD. If you
want small parts shipped, there will be a charge for shipping and
handling...
Email me if interested. This notice will be in effect for 1 week
>from date of posting. After that, please disregard..
Thank you,
John Singleton
jsk at cimmerik.com (remove all the k's)
You guys may already know of this, some perhaps not.
All the OS's are there, MSDOS, Concurent CPM, Windows 1 thru 3
Autocad, Orcad, Mathematica, Maple, Matlab
Graphics like Dr. Halo
Programming languages MASM, Turbo Pascal
http://vetusware.com
Randy
_________________________________________________________________
Hotmail is redefining busy with tools for the New Busy. Get more from your inbox.
http://www.windowslive.com/campaign/thenewbusy?ocid=PID27925::T:WLMTAGL:ON:…
Dave wrote:
>Ben wrote:
>> And if you are lucky the fifth or sixth hit is a *free* pdf.
> I've never seen one that required payment, but I've seen plenty of
> places that SUPPOSEDLY have the PDF you're looking for, but actually
> don't.
Most commonly, I find places that try to sell me parts that haven't been
made for 30 or 40 years, but the page is simply a numeric list of every part
in some huge number range.
How can it be a viable business model to buy google advertising to sell
parts that you do not actually have? My guess: counterfeits, esp
relabeled counterfeits. Or maybe the advertising cost is so completely
negligible that they can afford to put up ads for things they don't have?
I remember "too cheap to meter" but that's ridiculous.
Tim.
1. Re: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic
> Message: 1
> Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2010 13:05:18 -0400
> From: Dave McGuire <mcguire at neurotica.com>
> Subject: Re: Does a Northstar S-100 Bus Horizon Classify as a Classic
> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts"
> <cctalk at classiccmp.org>
> Message-ID: <2C8AA3F6-864D-4777-A584-466024E6A276 at neurotica.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; delsp=yes; format=flowed
> On Mar 19, 2010, at 1:12 PM, Robert J. Stevens wrote:
>
>> I have a set of the Steve Ciarcia Circuit Cellar Magazines if
>> Anyone is Interested
>> Volume I originally cost $8.00
>> Volume II originally cost $12.95
>> Volume III originally cost $16.95
>> Volume IV originally cost $18.95
>> WOW
>> Wow indeed.
>> Are these in fact "Circuit Cellar Ink" magazines, or are they the
>> compendium of Ciarcia's Circuit Cellar columns from BYTE magazine?
I was not aware that there were Different Publications of his Work.
These are indeed compendiums from BYTE. I guess I should have called
them Books.
But the are in Pristine Condition Looks like they have never been opened
MUCH
Bob
I have put online some pictures and schematics of a rather pathetic homebuilt TTL machine I constructed around 1985
Specs 12 bit wide, 8K ram, 256 word hardware stack.
CPU 3 x 74181
Hardcoded instruction set.
No blinkenlights, but, almost as good, 4 nixies as display.
Since I just cannot be bothered to make a proper homepage, I have just put everyting on my FTP server.
Find the goodies here :
ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/T3
Jos Dreesen
Hi folks,
> melamy at earthlink.net wrote:
> > if you want specs to programming microchip ics, go here...
> >
> > http://www.microchip.com/stellent/idcplgIdcService=SS_GET_PAGE&nodeId=1407
> I was under the impression that the FLASH specifications didn't cover
> the ICD hardware, but there you go...
> But they're handy anyway. I've got a Maplin PIC programmer kicking
> around somewhere -- the original software only programmed the 16C84
Despite the horrors of programming PICs; they do have at least one
redeeming feature here - they're genuine classic architectures, being
designed in the mid-70s for General Instruments ;-)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PIC_microcontroller#History
-cheers from julz @P
Hi! I am getting ready to make another manufactured PCB order for some S-100
PCBs. These are the S100Computers.com and/or N8VEM boards.
These are the S-100 regular prototyping board, S-100 backplane, S-100
buffered prototyping board, S-100 IDE, and S-100 ASCII keyboard.
If you are interested in getting in on the S-100 board order please contact
me. Thanks and have a nice day!
Andrew Lynch
*Many thanks,
I found a leaking capacitor just as you have described. I've ordered
new ones and will soon be able to replace it.
I'll let you know if that fixes the problem (It should!).**
Normand
*>* Old DEC Power Control 861C Hi,
*>*
*>* looks like I am not getting the posting in my e-mail but my messages do get
*>* posted.
*
This issue came up a few months back. Apparently gmail filters the
replies to your own messages somewhere (and not to somewhere sensible!).
Perhaps somebody else can rememebr the details.
>*
*>* I found this replyto my previous message by Tony Duell
*>* <cctalk%40classiccmp.org?Subject=Re%3A%20Old%20DEC%20Power%20Control%20861C&In-Reply-To=%3Cm1NM4jS-000J3uC%40p850ug1%3E>in
*>* the archives.
*>*
*>* To follow-up, the 861C emits a crackling noise for the first few seconds (20
*>* or so) and then I can hear a relay chattering (very noisy!).
*>*
*>* Also the light on the front panel is flashing continuously (maybe that's
*>* normal.)
*
old DEC neons tend to flicker randomly (and it's truely random).
The basic design is for the mains :
Mains in--->filter --->Breaker-+--->Unswitched outs
|
+--->Contactor (big relay)-> Switched outs
The contactor is controlled (in the 861) by a reed relay on the little
PCB inside. This has a differentially-wound coil to give the 'ground for
on' and 'ground for off' functionality on the 3 pin connector. The reed
relay coil is powered by a little transformer/rectifier/capacitor
circuit, mostly on the PCB.
My first suspicioun is that capacitor. Open it up and look for any
electrolytics on the PCB inside.
-tony
go here then...
http://ww1.microchip.com/downloads/en/DeviceDoc/51242a.pdf that will at least give you debugging information that Microchip released.
Steve "some chap" Thatcher
-----Original Message-----
>From: Tony Duell <ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk>
>Sent: Mar 19, 2010 2:44 PM
>To: cctalk at classiccmp.org
>Subject: Re: Disc analyser news update
>
>>
>> On Thursday (03/18/2010 at 12:06AM +0000), Philip Pemberton wrote:
>> >
>> > You know, there is a reason Microchip released the ICD2, ICD3 and
>> > PICKit2 Debug Express. All of the three support in-circuit debugging
>> > over the programming pins -- set a code breakpoint (or watchpoint), wait
>> > for it to trigger, then dump the program state.
>>
>> And do those debugger tools run on any OS other than Windows?
>
>Not that I could see. And the specs that I was pointed to by some chap
>here give details on programming the PICs, but nothing on the debugger
>commands, so it appers you can't write your own debugging tools.
>
>>
>> > Beats the LEDs-and-switches debugging method, or the "hook a terminal
>> > up" trick...
>>
>> If the answer to the above is No, then it does not beat the "hook a
>> terminal up" trick... or an LED trick or plenty of other tricks...
>> not by a long shot.
>
>Exactly.
>
>-tony
I have a S-100 N* Horizon that I have been trying to get to run for years.
Is there anyone out there running one or have one or Interested in one.
I also have a bunch of S-100 Vector Graphic Cards, CPU, Memory, I/O
Cards but no FDC's
I am looking for any S-100 Serial I/O cards that I might be able to just
in a Test Computer setup so I can test some of the Cards I have.
Also Floppy disk controllers for the S-100 Buss.
TIA
Bob in Wisconsin
On Thu, Mar 11, 2010 at 2:02 PM, Sridhar Ayengar <ploopster at gmail.com> wrote:
> Chuck Guzis wrote:
>>
>> When Fry's... Jolt cola... bizarre chocolate-flavored diet soda (Canfields)...
>
> I swear by Bawls, and write a wide variety of languages on a daily basis.
Bawls is good, but at my local store, I've run into a variant I like
more - "Antarctica" Guarana soda from Brazil. It's stocked in the
International aisles at the grocery closest to my own house (a Giant
Eagle) and the store closest to a friend's house in Cleveland - so
it's not just us.
It tastes a bit like Bawls (vs tasting like a cola or lemon/lime
drink), but I think it's smoother and less sour.
It's around $3.something for a 2L, so not particularly inexpensive,
but a nice treat.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guaran%C3%A1_Antarctica>
I have yet to throw it into the rotation for a serious hacking
session, but with a day job sucking up evening hours, too, it's been a
while since I've been able to get my head into that mode for extended
periods of time. Summer is looking good (since I am consulting in the
educational world right now).
-ethan
if you want specs to programming microchip ics, go here...
http://www.microchip.com/stellent/idcplg?IdcService=SS_GET_PAGE&nodeId=1407
best regards, Steve Thatcher
-----Original Message-----
>From: Tony Duell <ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk>
>Sent: Mar 18, 2010 3:36 PM
>To: cctalk at classiccmp.org
>Subject: Re: Disc analyser news update
>
>> You know, there is a reason Microchip released the ICD2, ICD3 and
>> PICKit2 Debug Express. All of the three support in-circuit debugging
>
>How 'open#' is this internface/specification. Is there enough detail
>availble for me to write the host program for a machine/OS of my choice
>(becuase I will bet the one Microchip supply doesn't run on the machine I
>would want to run it on, or indeed on anythign I own)
>
>-tony
>
I just came across your question about CMC.
My personal knowledge is that it was a competitor of my company in 1968 when it came out with a minicomputer-based system with multiple keyboards to replace IBM keypunch machines. Two of its competitors were Inforex and Honeywell. Another competitor at the time was Viatron but that company didn't last long.
>Message: 15
>Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 15:09:37 -0400
>From: Keith < keithvz at verizon.net >
>Subject: Re: great abandonware for your classic PC
<snip>
>And even if there were some type of agreements, I think the "First Sale"
>??Doctrine would have to kick in here somewhere.
>
>Even Microsoft lost(ok, gave up) their copyright suit when a college kid
>??sold his Windows OS disk on ebay.
>
>Keith
Also,? in October of 2009, Autodesk lost its suit against a man who bought a copy of AutoCAD at a garage sale and then tried to sell it on eBay:
"US court says software is owned, not licensed" http://www.channelregister.co.uk/2009/10/06/software_ownership_ruling/
Jos asks:
>William Blair wrote:
>> 5 MB (approx.) for only $3,200/month ($24,978 in 2009 dollars)!
>>
> I wonder what use case would justify that kind of expense, or would tape
> storage not have been that much cheaper ?
Undoubtedly tape is cheaper (not just per byte but also per drive)
but it's not random access.
Clever things were done with tapes, usually in batch mode. The RAMAC
made it possible to think that multiple files (not in the computer
sense but in the business sense) could be updated simultaneously in
real-time.
It is a fallacy to confuse the cost of a storage unit with the value that
The data on it provides. Clearly as the cost of storage has dropped new
applications that previously weren't economically feasible open up.
e.g. When I got started in digital music in the 80's, the most technically
advanced mixing systems began using hard drives instead of tape for digital music storage and manipulation.
Tim.
I've wondered this for a long time and maybe someone here can shed some light.
Back in 1975-76 I was using the PDP-11 and Oregon Museum of Science
and Industry (OMSI) and they had a thing called "OMSI RT" on their
system. It was an RT-11 run time system (RTS) under RSTS. They were
selling V1A for $2350 a copy (I still have a copy of the on-line help
file giving the information).
The product ran the Fortran compiler, MACRO, Pascal, etc., as the
later RT-11 environment from DEC did. OMSI RT claimed compatibility
with RT-11 V2 and also required a DEC binary license for both RSTS
(V5B or later) and RT (V2)
My question is: did DEC buy this from OMSI to (improve?) and include
in RSTS or was the DEC RT-11 environment created some other way
(either developed in-house or purchased from someone else)? Does
anyone know the origins of the RT-11 emulation under RSTS?
Thanks,
John
I have a VAXstation 3100 model 38 I bought on eBay for the princely
sum of ?0.99. Sadly it came without disks and I have no wide-SCSI
disks of <1GB.
But I want to get it working & looking at the old dead kit pile.
As far as I know you can't boot a traditional VAX from a disk of
<1GB... but could I put the core of VMS on a small slow narrow SCSI
disk, like an
80MB or something, and put most of it on the only Wide SCSI disk I
have, a 10GB...?
I was considering either attaching an external SCSI2 disk of 80-120GB,
or possibly trying to fit one internally if I can find an appropriate
convertor. I have a fast/wide 8GB or 10GB disk I could use for main
storage, but I don't think I can boot from it... Can I?
My VMS knowledge is /very/ rusty & I was only ever a sysadmin, not a
developer. I've never brought up a bare system or anything.
Also, I have several external SCSI CD-ROMs, including 2 Apple units. I
seem to recall that VAXen want a weird block size, same as Sun kit...
is that correct? How would one tell if a certain drive could do this
or not? Is it a DIP switch setting or just a SCSI bus command?
--
Liam Proven ? Profile: http://www.linkedin.com/in/liamproven
Email: lproven at cix.co.uk ? GMail/GoogleTalk/Orkut: lproven at gmail.com
Tel: +44 20-8685-0498 ? Cell: +44 7939-087884 ? Fax: + 44 870-9151419
AOL/AIM/iChat/Yahoo/Skype: liamproven ? LiveJournal/Twitter: lproven
MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? ICQ: 73187508
Hi. First time poster.
I have a bad flyback transformer on a video board that I've been unable to locate. I've also been unable to find any information about this transformer, or the board that it's on. I have lots of information about what the board is inside of, but nothing on the board itself.
It's for a green monochrome Plato Display Terminal, called an AST-1 Student Terminal; even the original designer of the equipment, Jack Stifle at the University of Illinois, does not have any information any more on the video driver board itself. note: The AST-1 Student terminal was supposed to be a lightweight inexpensive replacement for the original Plato IV and Plato V terminals, and was manufactured by the University of Illinois
I've been able to find many defails from University of Illinois archives, including all schematics except for the video driver board.
The transformer is marked as :
VT-521, EIA-528-8521, type sb-1, E36324
I assume EIA 528 means Electronic Industry Association manufacturer 528, with the product (or factory ID) and that's an internal number. The only "cross-reference" is to a SUN microsystems display, but I have ordered that flyback and have found it to be the wrong one...
Here are the links to the photos that I've taken of the board:
http://customer.telswitch.com/plato/ast001.JPGhttp://customer.telswitch.com/plato/ast002.JPG
The first photo is of the "markings" that the manufacturer must have put on, the second photo is of the actual board itself.
The tube that it uses is a Clinton CE745w12h31vrz (which is a standard 745-style tube).
Thoughts?
Thanks!
Aaron
Ok, Im gonna go get some powerball tickets and cross my fingers! I like the
two newton prototypes that look like an early attempt at creating an iPad,
this stuff should be in a real museum, not up for sale in my opinion. It
would be interesting for a piece on how some creations are created in
prototype some 10-20 years before their time. Another good example, look at
how long SGI has put stereographic 3D glasses ports on their computers, and
have had the capabilities, but now it is finally hitting the consumer TV
market.
On Tue, Mar 16, 2010 at 11:37 PM, Zane H. Healy <healyzh at aracnet.com> wrote:
> At 11:18 PM -0400 3/16/10, Dave McGuire wrote:
>
>> On Mar 17, 2010, at 12:04 AM, Zane H. Healy wrote:
>>
>>> I see a couple items there that I'd be interested in, but no way am I
>>> spending that kind of money on anything like that!
>>>
>>
>> I've never seen the general attitude of classiccmp summed up so
>> succinctly. ;)
>>
>
> There was a time when I would have considered bidding on at least one of
> the items. Now I'm trying to do a massive shrink of my own collection, and
> the money I used to spend on Classic Computers is now targeted for more
> realistic things.
>
> The disturbing thing is, while I'm trying to get rid of most of my
> collection I'm in the middle of my biggest (and best) Commodore haul ever.
> It is free, and slowly being delivered from out of state. Oh, well, I said
> I was keeping a lot of the Commodore stuff. :-)
>
> Zane
>
>
>
> --
> | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator |
> | healyzh at aracnet.com | OpenVMS Enthusiast |
> | | Classic Computer Collector |
> +----------------------------------+----------------------------+
> | Empire of the Petal Throne and Traveller Role Playing, |
> | PDP-10 Emulation and Zane's Computer Museum. |
> | http://www.aracnet.com/~healyzh/<http://www.aracnet.com/%7Ehealyzh/> |
>
Thanks for the tip... figures I wouldn't try eBay for that. ;)
I was actually wanting one as an upgrade for my Coleco ADAM. I had installed
a TIM board with the 9938 in one back in the day, and wrote some
initialization software for it. Was thinking about building my own board to
do the same again.
-----REPLY----
Hi! The Coleco ADAM is a Z80 computer right? If you are up to some
experimenting the other related item at the N8VEM that might be interesting
to you is the PropIO. Using a shim socket, the PropIO can be interfaced to
the Z80 CPU socket. Then with proper software support it can provide PS/2
keyboard, VGA, and microSD for your computer. Assuming of course the ADAM
design is compatible. Basically if the ADAM can access an IO port it should
work fine but the best way to be sure is to check the schematic.
One of the N8VEM builders has done some experimenting on a Kaypro and a
SpectraVideo 728 with the Z80 shim socket to PropIO and it worked fine in
both cases. It might be a neat expansion option for you if you are
interested. I am looking for some hardware experimenters to test the system
out on some various Z80 computers. I am not aware of anything like it for
the ADAM but don't follow it too closely either.
If you are interested (or anyone else) please let me know. Thanks and have
a nice day!
Andrew Lynch
PS, the PropIO shim socket approach *should* work for any of the N8VEM
expansion boards so if you are interested in expanding your Z80 computer or
adding peripherals to your Z80 home brew computer this might be helpful to
you since you won't need to reinvent it. It could add simple interfaces
such as IDE/FDC (DiskIO) or Zilog Peripherals (CTC, DART, dual PIO) as well
as the PropIO.
> Subject:
> Booting a VAXstation
> From:
> Liam Proven <lproven at gmail.com>
> Date:
> Mon, 15 Mar 2010 18:20:19 +0000
> To:
> "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" <cctech at classiccmp.org>
>
> To:
> "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" <cctech at classiccmp.org>
>
>
> I have a VAXstation 3100 model 38 I bought on eBay for the princely
> sum of ?0.99. Sadly it came without disks and I have no wide-SCSI
> disks of <1GB.
Hi, Liam.
First thing to do is find yourself a copy of the manual for the
machine as you can do a bunch of stuff with it just from built in
diagnostics.. I seem to recall them being out on the web.. possibly here:
http://deathrow.vistech.net/~cvisors/DEC94MDS/
I know Antonio Carlini had a site with lots of nice docs too.. but my
link is dead.
Also check out older posts where people were in the same boat.. such as:
http://www.classiccmp.org/pipermail/cctech/2004-December/036556.html
My machine came with a TZ30 drive, an RD54 CD, and hard disk all
internally... mine's the M48..same as yours but with bigger case.
You might need a special cable for the external SCSI.. as its got a
funny connector on the computer end. I found one on ebay.
For hard drives, I found that I had to experiment with different ones..
not all would work (even if under 1gb). Most did, however.
Enjoy,
John Singleton
> -----Original Message-----
> From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org
> [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of geoffrey oltmans
> Sent: Tuesday, March 16, 2010 10:50 AM
> To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts
> Subject: Yamaha V9958?
>
> Does anyone know where you can order one of these (AKA MSX-Video?).
> Barring that, its earlier cousin the 9938 would be good also.
[AJL>]
Hi! On the N8VEM project we are getting ready to release a
TMS9918/AY-3-8910 Sprite Color Graphic and Sound (SCGS) board. The board is
basically done and awaiting the PCB trace route optimization to complete
before ordering manufactured PCBs.
There are also plans for a follow on V9938 board. V9958 has "issues" that
make it less desirable than the V9938 IMO especially since it cannot
generate composite video. It can generate RGB video though and has some
enhanced scrolling ability. None of these chips can generate VGA compatible
video though so be fore warned.
http://n8vem-sbc.pbworks.com/browse/#view=ViewFolder¶m=Color%2520Graphic
s%2520and%2520Sound
http://n8vem-sbc.pbworks.com/browse/#view=ViewFolder¶m=SCGS
As always, constructive comments welcome; send flames and pointless
criticisms to /dev/null
We've had some luck procuring the chips from leemoom611 on eBay. I've
bought several chips now (TMS9918, TMS99118, V9938, V9958) without issue.
Seems like a decent guy but I can't say much other than it worked for me. I
have no business connections with him other than a satisfied customer.
You are welcome to join us on the N8VEM project if you are interested in a
TMS9918 or V9938/V9958 home brew computer project or whatever you'd like to
do. Regardless, I wish you the best of luck with your project. Please keep
us (me?) posted on your progress.
Thanks and have a nice day!
Andrew Lynch
On 16 Mar 2010, at 03:10, cctalk-request at classiccmp.org wrote:
>
> Message: 14
> Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 21:44:49 -0000
> From: "Andrew Burton" <aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk>
> Subject: Re: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering)
> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts"
> <cctalk at classiccmp.org>
> Message-ID: <005201cac490$8be1db90$f0fdf93e at user8459cef6fa>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Teo Zenios" <teoz at neo.rr.com>
> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts"
> <cctalk at classiccmp.org>
> Sent: Thursday, March 11, 2010 10:25 PM
> Subject: Re: Caffeine and hacking (was Re: Soldering)
>
>
>> I gave up drinking cola with caffeine and now mostly drink 7-up with
>> artificial sweeteners (you end up getting a sweet tooth late in the day).
>>
>> I used to guzzle mountain dew in the morning when I worked and I found if
> I
>> didn't my mind would be a little cloudy until I did so I gave it up.
>>
>> Yes, you do lose a bunch of weight when switching to diet pop, but you
> gain
>> it back slowly when you get a craving for sweets (you body doesn'y like to
>> be fooled by fake sweetener).
>
>
> You can say that again (the bit in brackets in the last sentence). If I
> drink Diet Cola it makes me sick, as in regurgitating what I ate recently.
> So I stay well away from diet drinks... but I have a few other allergies too
> (hayfever, asthma, eczema and certain plastics cause irration to my skin
> after contact for 5-10 minutes). I suppose I should count myself lucky that
> I'm not allergic to sunlight.
I'm very sorry to hear that. Two things you might like to consider.
Is the Diet Coke in a plastic botttle, and if so is the plasticiser getting into the drink? Of course if you have the same reaction to it in a glass bottle then thats not it.
Is it the Aspartame sweetener? Its nasty stuff, affects the pancreas, particularly for diabetics and some experts even think the 'diabetes epidemic' is caused by it. My 87 year old mother had type one diabetes (controlled with tablets). They told her to cut down her sugar intake, so I started to go through what I buy online every week and found lower sugar versions. Coke -> Diet Coke and Robinsons Orange -> No Added Sugar Robinsons Orange etc. Soon her daily sugar measurements were off the scale, the gauge only reads up to about 25 beyond that it just says high. The medics gradually increased her tablets, switched to injecting insulin, saying now it was type 2 diabetes, the dosage went up to 74 units per day. Then one of the 'carers' (who was not medically trained) told me some of her other clients had cut out Diet Coke and become much better. I was sceptical so asked one of the nurses and though she did not want to say so on the record she suggested I cut down my mothers consumption of Aspartame. I've been doing that though some things like orange squash all seem to have it in. Now the medics are gradually reducing her insulin and frequently have to give her chocolate in the morning to get her sugar level UP to four so that they can give her her insulin without causing her to have a fit when they administer it. Try googling Aspartame Diabetes for what one doctor says about it.
On the original topic, when I programmed in microcode assembler then assembler and Coral66 then Pascal I drank Ribena : result all my molars have huge fillings which might cause a blip in the mercury price when they need to be replaced :-) Now I program in C++ and have switched to Rose's lime. Of course outside work its bitter ale, either Shepherd Neame Masterbrew or when I'm in London Courage Directors. I can see the site of the old Fremlin's brewery out of my office window, thats the beer from which the word gremlin derive's its name. When I'm finding logic faults on my ICT1301 mainframe its cloudy lemonade and McVities Digestives (plain ones, not chocolate ones) to make up for skipping lunch.
Hi Guys:
Just thought I would drop a line and let everyone know that I have some old
computer equipment for sale (might even be free to a good home) as listed
below:
1. PDP8A system, with programming front panel. Comes with PDP8/A Field
Drawings Manual, and I believe it has an A/D peripheral.
2. Somewhere, (I haven't seen them for years) I have a pretty extensive
library of PDP8/I manuals on Microfiche. This includes the 32K Disk
Subsystem, Hi Speed Paper Tape reader, PDP8/I Math enhancement, Dectape
System, etc. Used to have the paper copies, but they were
too bulky so I paid to have them put on Microfiche (which was quite pricey
as I recall).
If anyone is interested, I'll try to come up with more info, including a
complete list of the manuals on fiche, and a list of the boards installed in
the 8/A.
I also have some old modems, including one from an ASR33 TTY, and a 1200
Baud commercial modem from the early 80's. In addition, I have a
couple of old S-100 System enclosures with backplanes and power supplies,
along with a whole box of S-100 boards including 8085 CPU, memory,
A/D, comm cards, and various I/O. Even some manuals to go with...
My name is Darrell, and you can contact me at 1MetalGuru(at)gmail.com
>
>But practically, what this means is: No Money. Ergo, I can't afford to
>buy any new bits. The reason I got this machine was its extreme
>cheapness! (Under a pound - for Colonial types, that's about a buck
>sixty.)
>
With any luck it may be possible to scrounge an RZ26 for a similar
price to the machine.
>
>Well, what size of disk would I want? I may have some 500MB units
>knocking around, possibly bigger. The problem now is finding ones
>/small/ enough, not big enough!
>
I've managed to crowbar a bootable subset of VMS 5.5-2 into 70MB.
It was so long ago I don't remember if this included any Decwindows
functionality. More recent versions with more fluff will probably
need more. 500MB would certainly be worth a try though.
Alternatively, use a disk larger than 1GB and hope for the best.
You won't have lost anything if it doesn't work. When doing the
install, just install the critical items first, with the hope
of having everything that is accessed by the firmware ROMs for
boot appear below the 1GB mark. Opt not to have a dumpfile. The
biggest problem will probably making sure to get the index file
(which is used to locate all the other files on the disk) below
the 1GB mark. As far as I recall, VMS places the index file in
the middle of the disk by default but this can be overridden when
the disk is initialised. The only question is whether this option
is available when doing an install from scratch.
>
>Is there any incantation I can type at the firmware monitor to tell me
>if it "sees" a device as a CD-ROM? Or is being seen as a CD no
>guarantee?
>
SHOW DEVICE at the >>> should list the devices on the SCSI bus. I don't
think it will tell you if the sector size is correct though. The only
way to be sure is to try it.
As far as I know, CDs containing a bootable and usable version of VAX/VMS
were not produced although they were for Alpha/VMS. A VAX would normally
boot the standalone backup program from a CD to do a VMS installation
rather than booting directly into VMS from the CD.
>
>I don't wish to question authority, as it were, but the internal
>cables are 104 pin (If I'm counting them correctly) and the external
>SCSI port on the back is 72-pin mini-D. That *looks* like wide SCSI to
>me! If it's not, then what kind of cabling is it? The ordinary
>narrow-SCSI stuff I knew from back in the '80s and '90s was 50-way
>ribbon cables with 50-pin IDC connectors internally and either 50-pin
>Centronics or D25 connectors externally.
>
The external SCSI connectors on a 3100 are rather strange. They are a
narrow SCSI bus presented on a male 68pin connector. It is definately not
wide SCSI even though it looks like it. To use it, the first thing you
will need is a cable with a female 68pin connector on one end and a 50 pin
centronics type connector (or something else reasonable) on the other.
Are there connectors for internal SCSI disks? They should be normal
50pin IDC types.
>
>Yes, but how do I *tell*, that's the question!
>
I just picked up an IBM labelled CD drive off the floor. It has a
jumper at the back labelled "SECTOR SIZE". It's a fair bet that the
two sizes available are 512 and 2048. If you find a drive with a
sector size jumper, it will probably do.
>
>When you say "a small-ish drive", what counts as "small" for VMS? Or
>rather, what sort of drive should I be looking for to /not/ have to
>muck around when installing it?
>
1GB is more than adequate to install VAX/VMS. I remember 3100's used
to often come with an RZ23 which I think was 109MB. This was generally
regarded as too small to install a useful system on. I would have
a go on anything bigger than 200MB.
Not having to muck about probably involves spending a little to get
an appropriate disk. On the other hand, having to muck about a bit
may will give you the experience you are looking for.
I'd suggest giving it a go with whatever you have.
>
>My hope is to get the machine booting into DECwindows. I don't plan to
>use it as a server, more as sort of glorified X-terminal if anything.
>
Recent versions of Decwindows are disk and memory hogs, especially on
VAX. It is likely that it will be very slow. It may be wiser to
concentrate on terminal based access initially at least.
Regards,
Peter Coghlan.
This stuff is too new and too big for me - located in Illinois (as per bid site). Note that Craters & Frieghters service is available.
Jack
----- Forwarded Message -----
To: "Jack Rubin" <jrubin at spertus.edu>
Sent: Monday, March 15, 2010 3:09:20 PM
Subject: RE: old DEC gear
Hi
We have a couple of items forsale on ibid. A Vax 6620 and a TU81
tapedrive current price $1.00 each
Here is the link http://ibid.illinois.gov is is under the electronics
section.
This stuff is too new and too big for me - located in Illinois (as per bid site). Note that Craters & Frieghters service is available.
Jack
----- Forwarded Message -----
To: "Jack Rubin" <jrubin at spertus.edu>
Sent: Monday, March 15, 2010 3:09:20 PM
Subject: RE: old DEC gear
Hi
We have a couple of items forsale on ibid. A Vax 6620 and a TU81
tapedrive current price $1.00 each
Here is the link http://ibid.illinois.gov is is under the electronics
section.
>
>> As far as I know you can't boot a traditional VAX from a disk of
>> <1GB... but could I put the core of VMS on a small slow narrow SCSI
>> disk, like an
>> 80MB or something, and put most of it on the only Wide SCSI disk I
>> have, a 10GB...?
>
> You can use a sub-1GB disk to boot from, yes. Booting is, as I
>understand it, the only restriction.
>
Booting is not the only restriction. As far as I know, the same low
level drivers in the ROM that are used for booting are also used
for writing crashdumps. The problem is that short (6byte?) SCSI
commands are used and the addresses wrap back to zero when trying to
address parts of the disk beyond the 1.0something GB point.
This means that if a dumpfile is located further out than that
point on a large disk that VMS has otherwise successfully been installed
on, it is possible to end up getting the lower part of the disk
overwritten by a crashdump if the system should crash.
It is possible to install a minimal VMS configuration on a small disk
and access data on a disk larger than 1GB. However, it is difficult to
use the larger disk to expand the VMS system as DEC software often
wants to be installed on the system disk, ie the one that booted the
system. The difficulties can sometimes be overcome but it may take
an experienced VMS hacker to do this.
I think the best idea is to get something like an RZ26 disk which is
around 1GB and use that. It is also possible to boot the 3100 remotely
>from another VMS system but this is probably not an option here.
Regards,
Peter Coghlan.
Jay,
On Tue Jul 27 2004 at 09:34, Jay West wrote:
> I'm finally digging into my 21MX E-series machines in earnest. In
> trying to inventory and document what all I may have, I've found a few
> things that stump me and my "docs on hand". Perhaps folks here can shed
> some light on these.
>
> [...]
>
> Microcode roms I can't identify:
>
> 93585-80006
> 93585-80007
> 93585-80008
OK, I'm a little late in responding (about six years late :-), but these
are the E-Series double-integer firmware instructions (.DAD, .DSB, etc.).
They are a product from the HP "specials" group, so they weren't on the
regular price list. The relevant HP manual is 93585-90007 at Bitsavers.
> 18A0580X012
> 18A0580X022
> 18A0580X032
These are another HP "specials" group product: "93578W Special Pascal
Library Subroutines" for the E/F-Series. These are microcoded replacements
for the bit-field extract, deposit and indexing run-time function calls
emitted by the HP Pascal compiler for access to packed arrays and records.
I gather these were used to reduce execution time in Pascal programs.
I've not found a manual for these.
-- Dave
There's a strange computer in Kansas USA on eBay, wrong side of the pond for me anyway. It appears to be for calculating milling machine feed rates. The seller seems to think its a CNC control box but I'm fairly sure it isn't. I found it interesting anyway, the item number is 320502473280. No connection to the seller.
Ive used lots of RGB/VGA converters over the years
for various bits of equipment, mainly older 8 bit
micros.
There never seems to be a one solution to fit every
case, and I've found that different converters work
best with different systems.
Sometimes I've found using two converters works best,
eg going from RGB + composite sync to composite video,
and then from composite video to VGA. Just my 2c
Got a few here that might be of interest to folks on the list:
-- Fundamentals of COBOL Programming (1968, 1973)
-- Programs for Electronic Circuit Design (1986), Radio Shack
-- How to Build A Working Digital Computer (1969) Hayden
-- Writing BASIC Adventure Programs for the TRS-80 (1982) Tab
These (along with a couple hundred others) I have listed on Amazon, but feel
free to contact me off-list and let me know if you'd like any of them. I'd
like to cover shipping costs, and "a little extra" and get them into the
hands of somebody that wants them.
Oh, and I still have that IBM binder mentioned in an earlier post -- got
three replies, wrote three responses to 'em, and so far nobody has gotten
back to me yet to answer "What do you care to offer for it", I'm not just
gonna eat the postage, etc. :-)
--
Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and
ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can
be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters"
-
Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James
M Dakin
Just thought I'd let people interested know I'm selling my SBC6120 board,
it's a first run, but still quyite useful, when you look at the new ones
that run $600 for a kit. It includes the CPU.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=300406995665
I have a little board (2 by 3 inches) with a few TTL chips (7408 and
7474s) with a short ribbon cable terminated with a 14 pin DIP header.
No numbers, but the board says APTEC, 1976 REV B, and a "phase 2"
symbol. I think this was part of some old microcomputer stuff I used
to have. Any ideas what it could be?
--
Will
>
> Date: Thu, 18 Feb 2010 13:07:58 -0700
> From: Ben <bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca>
> Chuck Guzis wrote:
>
>> Soldering now is far safer than it used to be. I can still recall
>> the glorious sensation of picking up an American Beauty 100W
>> soldering iron by the wrong end.
>>
>> I suppose that we should be thankful that we don't use an
>> oxyacetylene torch for PCB work...
>
> I guess that is why BYTE[1] went from a hardware magazine
> to software.
Some of the best advice I got in college was from an EE professor who told
us, "If you drop your soldering iron, don't try to catch it on the way
down. Just let it go."
Jeff Walther
Recently acquired a VCB02 (thanks again, Ulli!) which I hope to get
running in my MicroVAX III. I'm looking for the cable that connects
>from the bulkhead to the monitor, keyboard and mouse (my research has
revealed this to be referred to as "BC18Z-10" in DEC documentation). I
have a compatible keyboard, but I'd like to find a mouse as well...
Anyone have one to spare, or know of a decent supplier?
Thanks,
Josh
Hello, with all this talk about SD card for QBUS machines, I was
wondering: SD (and SDHC) is easy to interface (if you're not too
concerned about speed) and has been attached to pretty much everything
under the sun; (well, I guess Jim is still working on the C= version
of IEEE-488) so is there anyone making an SD card drive for SCSI?
To me that would be a very versatile classic interface; I'd love to
have a dead-silent drive for my Amiga, Macs and Sparcs. ST owners
would like it too, I'm sure. I know there is one company making
SCSI-to-CF interfaces, aimed primarily at old synthesizers
(http://www.scsiforsamplers.com/).
Unfortunately, the online "search space" is somewhat poisoned due to
the fact that most Linux/BSD/whatever OS's use a SCSI emulation to
access SD cards - but eyeballing several pages of results I didn't
find any SD-to-SCSI devices.
I certainly don't have the technical chops to make something like that
myself from scratch - but I'd guess a low-speed hack to do it could be
accomplished with a Atmel or similar chip with at least 21 IO pins (16
for the SCSI side, 5 for the SD card) but I don't know what kind of
line drivers would be needed on the SCSI side. Is anyone aware of
such a project in the works?
Joe.
--
Joachim Thiemann :: http://www.tsp.ece.mcgill.ca/~jthiem
Hi folks,
Joachim Thiemann wrote:
> so is there anyone making an SD card drive for SCSI?
A good one to look at is:
http://www.circuitgeek.com/the-outstanding-avr-based-scsi-ram-disk/
The above project has also been adapted to work with a standard ATA hard disk and Compact Flash. It's an open development project: you can download the source code to the firmware and schematics. His website seems to be down right now though.
And there's also this:
http://www.reactivedata.com/Products/SCSI_Bridge_Emulators_to_CF/index.php
It seems to me that a good route would be to build, say a QBUS card driven by a microcontroller. Given that even an AVR can handle SCSI comms at a hardware level by itself it can probably handle MSCP and a lot of the interface logic.
-cheers from julz @P
I collect Zeiss equipment, and almost anything optical made brass. But a
Hasselblad...hmmm.
Paul
On Mon, Mar 8, 2010 at 9:59 PM, Zane H. Healy <healyzh at aracnet.com> wrote:
> At 7:44 PM -0800 3/8/10, David Griffith wrote:
>
>> I'll take your unwanted Model M keyboards.
>>
>
> Hehehe... I only have two, and they're among the very few Classic Computer
> items that I want to keep.
>
> Is anyone in Oregon looking for Classic Hardware? If so what. I'm looking
> to start selling off my collection. Though someone with a nice Leica (with
> lenses), or Hasselblad or Large Format Lenses might be able to score a good
> trade.
>
> Yes, this includes rare systems. Except for some PDP-11, VAX, Alpha, and
> Commodore gear I think I'm looking to unload most of my classic gear.
>
> The only computer I use at home any more is my Mac. I just don't have time
> or interest in Classic Computers any more.
>
> Zane
>
>
>
> --
> | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator |
> | healyzh at aracnet.com | OpenVMS Enthusiast |
> | | Classic Computer Collector |
> +----------------------------------+----------------------------+
> | Empire of the Petal Throne and Traveller Role Playing, |
> | PDP-10 Emulation and Zane's Computer Museum. |
> | http://www.aracnet.com/~healyzh/ |
>
Suppose my power company claims that the charge is $0.02407 per
killowatt/hour. If I have a computer (or anything) that draws maybe 100
watts. that should be 0.1kw/h x 0.02407 x 24 hours = 5.7768 cents per day
or $1.73 a month. I've been under the impression for quite some time that
it costs $20 a month to run a typical modern desktop computer 24 hours a day
for a month. I know there are taxes and fees thrown into the power bill.
But what's wrong with my math? Was I wrong before or am I wrong now? I got
this kw/h price from the power company web site burried in a pdf somewhere.
It looked like the right price to me. Maybe the actual charge is much
higher?
brian
Hi. I'm curious if anyone's got RTE-M booting from mini-cartridge (such
as 2645A terminal) or 8" floppy (such as 9885M) for their HP 1000 21MX
(eg. 2113E).
I'm attempting restoration of a 2113E with the extremely kind assistance
of J. David Bryan, and would love to find a bootable primary copy.
It would also be great to hear what OSes folks are running on these, and
which version they like the best.
Thanks very much,
John Singleton
Rockville, MD.