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

Creating an NTFS Boot disk (was Re: DOS feature on formatting disk)

by r_a_feldman＠hotmail.com

Microsoft does provide instructions on how to create a boot floppy for an NTFS system ("How to Create a Bootable Disk for an NTFS or FAT Partition," http://support.microsoft.com/kb/119467), but it is an involved process. You're probably better off with one of the 3rd party utilities that has been mentioned by others. BTW, I located this KB article after someone I know thought he would be good and clean up his root folder by moving "unnecessary" files -- including ntldr -- to other folders. Next time he rebooted: surprise! no boot. Bob

21 years, 3 months

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RTL Logic

by melamy＠earthlink.net

Michael, to get a version running, you could "build" an inverter on a 14 pin header with the inverter pinout you need. I realize it would take a couple of 6 resistor packages and six transistors. At least you could replace the "part" with the real one when you find it. It might actually be a conversation piece to show people what went into the RTL chips themselves. Just a thought anyway. best regards, Steve Thatcher -----Original Message----- From: Michael Holley <swtpc6800(a)comcast.net> Sent: Jan 7, 2005 1:04 PM To: cctalk(a)classiccmp.org Subject: Re: RTL Logic My goal on the Tic Tac Toe machine was to build an exact replica of the Don Lancaster 1971 design. I have 2 of the MC789 inverters so I could build one unit.

21 years, 3 months

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How the Mac was born... supposedly...

by aek＠spies.com

Anyone remember Coherent Unix? I worked at the company up until its demise, so I'd be happy to answer any questions about Coherent or MWC in general. -- A rundown of the history would be interesting. I recovered a very early version of the C compiler that DGC worked on, and he filled me in on some info on the really early days of the company.

21 years, 3 months

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4 floppy disk drives on a PC?

by dwight.elvey＠amd.com

>From: "Fred Cisin" <cisin(a)xenosoft.com> > >On Mon, 17 Jan 2005, Jim Leonard wrote: >> Yep. DOS had only one quirk, though: If you wanted to format a 720K disk in a >> 1440K drive, you had to specifically tell DOS to format as 720K. Otherwise, it >> assumes you're going for 1.4, attempts it, and fails. You can choose /f:720 >> with later versions of DOS; use "/t:80 /n:9" for 3.x. > >/F:2 would also work for some versions. > >With XP, /T:80/N:9 seems to be the only way that still works! > Hi Fred Are you using a fresh disk or one that has already been formatted once before? I've seen it do this as well but never explored it much to see if a blank disk would still work. Dwight

21 years, 3 months

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Troubleshooting an IBM 5155 - (portable personal computer)

by CCTalk＠catcorner.org

> From: ard(a)p850ug1.demon.co.uk [mailto:ard@p850ug1.demon.co.uk] > To: cctalk(a)classiccmp.org > > > I don't kwow what it means when I reply to my own replies, > but here goes. I > > I do it all the time, but then I am know to be insane... > > > have the same continuity measurements on head 0 and head 1. > > However, if I swap the controller board > > the problem > > stays with the drive. > > Ah, so it certainly looks like a head problem :-( > > > > > So, if I have the same continuity, and the problem doesn't > > seem to be on the > > controller, I can only guess either dirty or magnetized > > heads. > > Magnetized heads are not normally a problem with floppy > drives, at least > not as big a problem as dirty heads. > > It's a pity you don't have a 'scope. I'd ask you to connect it > (differential inputs) to TP1A and TP1B, ground to TP2. Those are the > outputs of the read preamplier part of U2 (3470). You could > then compare > the read signal from the 2 heads. I'll see if anyone in the local radio club has any I could borrow for a few evenings. I know how to use one, it's just been a few years. I have an old Heathkit scope behind me, but there's another thing waiting for my attention. The trace is about as wide as my pinky and as noisy as heck. Not real helpful I'm afraid. > > > > > Since I don't have access to a tape head demagnetizer (hey, > > all I use is > > DTRS for my recording), how else could I demagnetize these heads? > > Can you not still buy demagnetizers? There are plenty of magnetic > recording heads still in use... > > But I would try really cleaning it first. It could be a speck of oxide > stuck across the gap or something. I stopped by the local pharmacy (chemist on your side of the pond I think). I had to special order non-diluted alcohol. It should be hear tomorrow. Of course I have to work late tomorrow, so my wife will pick it up. I think Radio Shack still carries an inexpensive head demagnetizer. I'll check. It will probably be special order too. In the mean time, I put the original drive in there and one of the spare DS/DD drives I had laying around (doesn't everyone on this list?). It is now working with an A: and B: drive. Now I just need to do some cosmetic work and this little machine will be in great shape. What is the general opinion on adding an HD to this machine (if it will even work)? I've got plenty of ST-406/ST-512 interface drives and controllers for 8 bit machines. Of course I only want this for show and tell, so it is not a requirement. Kelly

21 years, 3 months

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Troubleshooting an IBM 5155 - (portable personal computer)

by CCTalk＠catcorner.org

> -----Original Message----- > From: ard(a)p850ug1.demon.co.uk [mailto:ard@p850ug1.demon.co.uk] > Sent: Saturday, January 15, 2005 9:53 PM > > Qume drive working, but don't know where to go next. I > guess I could swap > > the boards between the two units, but that'll only tell me if it is > > electronic or electro-mechanical. > > > > Other than that, any suggestions for figuring out if it is > alignment, broken > > sensor, or something electrical? > > The alignment adjustments, in general, are what are known as > 'interchangeability adjustments'. In other words, if they're > a bit off, > the drive will be able to format, read, and write its own disks, but > those disks will not be useable on other drives, and vice versa. > > So what you do first is to hook the drive up as B: and try > formatting a > blank disk in it. Note that if, for some reason, the machine > thinks it > only has one drive, it'll map A: _and_ B: to that drive. > You'll get some > obvious messages if this has happened, in which case the problem is > certainly not just alignment. Well, I did this and learned something VERY important. The disk only formatted as 180K. So, it doesn't see that it is a double sided drive. The same diskette put back in the working drive formatted to 360K. So, how do these drives tell if they're dealing with SS vs. DS meadia? Does it just look for a signal from the second head? Is there another sensor that indicates "yep - double sided". This is how it works with 8" drives. The index hole is in a physically different spot. Thank you for all of your help so far!! > This sounds like track0 sensor problems. I assume you've > blown the dust > out of the sensor? If you have a multimeter and logic probe, > I'll dig out > the schematic and tell you what to look for. Yes, I have blown the dust out of the sensors. See above. How do these drives signal that they are DS? That seems to be where the error is coming in. Any tips based on the schematic would be of help. Since all I have at the moment is a DMM and a homemade logic probe, my tools are lacking to fully solve this problem. Thanks again, Kelly Kelly

21 years, 3 months

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Windows crashing, was Re: Bill Gates: Teen Heart-throb!

by cb＠mythtech.net

>I'm only speaking for the desktop client. :-) The same issue exists with Win2k Client and all flavors of XP. It isn't so much a "bug" as MS totally changed the way the feature works, and has made it very difficult to get running again. What used to be a great ability in Win98 has been ripped out and really made as hard to use as MS possibly could have (they act like no one does mail merge faxes!). But this is WAY off topic now, so I'll stop. -chris <http://www.mythtech.net>

21 years, 3 months

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Windows crashing, was Re: Bill Gates: Teen Heart-throb!

by cb＠mythtech.net

>I'm no Microsoft fan by any means. But most of the "Windows sucks" claims >are >just obsolete and irrational. Nah, they just moved the suckyness elsewhere ;-p (sorry, I just wasted the day trying to get Win2k Server and MS Office to do a freaking Mail Merge to Fax... something that Win98 does with ease, albeit with Win98's level of stability... and I still don't have it working exactly right... it will now fax merge, alas it displays a security warning for each and every fax that I have to click "YES" to allow the fax... and I can't just sit hammering the return key, as there is a 5 second delay between when it displays the warning, and when it enables the Yes button... real helpful when I'm trying to automate hundreds of faxes!!!). -chris <http://www.mythtech.net>

21 years, 3 months

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DEC pdp-11/53 and uVAX II on eBay (Illinois, USA)

by classiccmp＠crash.com

Just noticed an eBay auction for a DEC pdp-11/53 and uVAX II, neatly packaged inside a CNC measuring machine that includes A/C units. It's big, it's heavy, and it needs to be picked up at their premises and taken away. That's in Rockford, Illinois in the USA. I have no connection to this, other than regretting that I can't nab that pdp-11/53 for myself... eBay Auction #5157158461 http://tinyurl.com/6vye5 Good luck, --Steve.

21 years, 3 months

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DOS feature on formatting disk

by dwight.elvey＠amd.com

>From: gordonjcp(a)gjcp.net > >> Hi Gordon >> There are a number of possibles but the track 0 sensor >> doesn't effect the incremental stepping mechanism used >> in these drives. There is no way that it can be off without >> being completely off and head over the wrong track. > >If the head isn't sliding all the way back to the home position it can be >far enough back to close the track 0 sensor *but* still be about half a >track too far in. This is how I have repaired about a dozen 720k drives >in old samplers. > >Gordon. Hi Gordon and Bj??rn I understand what you are saying but this is not the issue here. The bad drive is occasionally messing up ALL tracks, not just track0. When I take the disk to another drive to reformat, because the track0 is partially readable, it refuses to format. It will not format at all until the track0 is erased. If it were just track0 that was the issue, I'd have looked at problems of getting the track0 stop and sensing switch adjusted. Dwight

21 years, 3 months

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no more UPS!

by dwight.elvey＠amd.com

Hi The other thing is that a 20 year old box will not hold together all that well. Even in a good environment, the bonding breaks down. I have one large box that is the original and I wouldn't consider it safe to ship in that box( 1978 ). Dwight >From: "Chad Fernandez" <fernande(a)internet1.net> > >One of the reasons that I stopped using UPS is because the lady at the >counter always made it sound like she was doing me a favor for allowing >me to ship a computer in something other than it's original box. I >explained to her that the box had been thrown away in the early 80's. > >Chad Fernandez >Michigan, USA >

21 years, 3 months

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DOS feature on formatting disk

by dwight.elvey＠amd.com

Hi DOS has an irritating feature when asked to format a disk. If track 0 is partially readable it will fail to format, even if you use the /u option. I've been moving data from one machine to another and the source machine has a flaky drive. It sometimes trashes track 0. I've found that the only way to get around this problem is to wipe the disk with a strong magnet. Why can't it just try to format first and then check track 0. Why must it fail to format because track 0 is partially readable when I specifically asked it to unconditionally format? Dwight

21 years, 3 months

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la120 consumables

by jwest＠classiccmp.org

Anyone know a good (cheap) source for LA120 ribbons? Jay West

21 years, 3 months

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Any one remember...?

by cb＠mythtech.net

> It's amazing that NOBODY has written a Star Trek Game > for current computers that let's you just explore the > Galaxy, fight Klingons if you like, but just have > fun... I guess you mean EXCEPT for the whole run of *actual* Star Trek games available for Windows? Or are those too "shoot-em up" for what you are thinking of? -chris <http://www.mythtech.net>

21 years, 3 months

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no more UPS!

by SUPRDAVE＠aol.com

The company I work for uses Airborne/DHL and I've had no problem with them. Minor issues, but that's to be expected. I'm happy with them and there's a station nearby. UPS sucks. They beat the shit out of packages. I've mentioned in previous threads about crushed boxes I've got from them. USPS is ok, but the post office nearby is always busy. Averages 12 people in line all the time it seems. Getting through there is slow since the employees do not know what speed of service is. I'm happy to have discovered Fedex ground. Heck of a lot cheaper sending large/heavy goods than USPS. I use it when sending out ebay goods.

21 years, 3 months

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no more UPS!

by cb＠mythtech.net

>> UPS's response... "Oh, well, if we can't find them in the system, then we >> can't track them. Are you sure you shipped them?" Upside... at least they >> never tried to charge me for the missing packs. > >So why did you walk off without tracking numbers?! I had tracking numbers. These were all packages created with the UPS shipping software in my office (software UPS provides to you free if you ask for it). I then walked the packs a few doors down and dropped them off at the UPS Drop Box in front of the local printing place. Something I had done many times in the past without issue. I gave them tracking numbers for the packages, and they said they had no record of those numbers in the system at all. An online tracking yielded the same results (so at least the rep wasn't lying to me). -chris <http://www.mythtech.net>

21 years, 3 months

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Any one remember...?

by RCini＠congressfinancial.com

Actually, a Star Trek game for Windows does exist: http://andy3ware.com/startrek/download.htm I haven't played it in a while, but I remember it was pretty good. -----Original Message----- From: cctalk-bounces(a)classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk-bounces@classiccmp.org]On Behalf Of Ethan Dicks Sent: Wednesday, January 19, 2005 8:27 AM To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Re: Re: Any one remember...? On Fri, 14 Jan 2005 09:48:25 -0800 (PST), Al Hartman <alhartman(a)yahoo.com> wrote: > I also miss all the Star Trek like games, like Time > Trek, Super Star Trek and Star Trek 3.5. > > It's amazing that NOBODY has written a Star Trek Game > for current computers that let's you just explore the > Galaxy, fight Klingons if you like, but just have > fun... Someone has ported one of the Classic BASIC Trek programs to Inform, so it runs on anything that has a Z-Machine (PalmOS, Frotz, etc...) bin at http://www.ifarchive.org/if-archive/games/zcode/ztrek.z5 source at http://www.ifarchive.org/if-archive/games/source/inform/ztrek.inf And I remember running across a rendered 3Dish implementation of a Trek game for Windoze boxes, but I don't remember what it was called. -ethan

21 years, 3 months

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Any one remember...?

by alhartman＠yahoo.com

From: dittman(a)dittman.net (Eric Dittman) > > I'd be interested to hear about your experiences with > > this board. Do you like it? > All I've done is play around a bit. With the column of keys > inoperative I can't do much until I fix it. > Too bad you lost the literature. I'd love to find out more > about it. Was it ever advertised or written about in "80 > Micro"? It may have been. I lost all my 80-Micro Magazines too... I seem to remember it being reviewed at least once. > I find that some of the old games on the TRS-80 are more fun > than games I see on today's consoles and PCs. There was more > emphasis on gameplay back then. I know.. My sister and I used to play "Galaxy Invasion" for HOURS... I also miss all the Star Trek like games, like Time Trek, Super Star Trek and Star Trek 3.5. It's amazing that NOBODY has written a Star Trek Game for current computers that let's you just explore the Galaxy, fight Klingons if you like, but just have fun... EGA Trek on PC's was cool. Shame he never continued developing that... As for the Trash Compactor Info... Someday as I go through old boxes of stuff I might find it. I'd be surprised to find I threw it out... It must be buried in the bottom of a box somewhere.. That, and information on the "Hydra" board. I think I have one. Which is an ISA Board that Emulates a MacPlus on a PC using an EGA Monitor for output. I bought this card that someone told me was a Hydra Board, but he had no software or manuals for it. Maybe someday I'll get it to work. Al > -- > Eric Dittman > dittman(a)dittman.net __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail - now with 250MB free storage. Learn more. http://info.mail.yahoo.com/mail_250

21 years, 3 months

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How the Mac was born... supposedly...

by aek＠spies.com

> I miss 'ihnp4' and will always wonder where Indian Hills is. ihnp4 was an impressive machine, indeed. much of the uucp traffic in the midwest went through it. Bell Labs Indian Hill is on the far west side of Chicago. 5ESS was developed there. A friend that worked there was the first person I knew who had Unix running at home (starting with mini-unix, then V6)

21 years, 3 months

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How the Mac was born... supposedly...

by cb＠mythtech.net

>but which ones were >the most viable, and which ones contributed most to the explosive growth >of the internet? That would be the flood of AOL floppies, and the run of $300 PCs after rebate because you signed up for AOL for 3 years at $20/mn. Everyone who was "hip" was getting online. AOL made it hip, and everyone who thought they could suck a dime out of the public joined in. The internet was just convenient because college students were talking about it, and it was free content that these fly by night ISPs could offer, while charging the same rate AOL/CompuServe/Prodigy et all were charging for their "custom" content. At least that is the way I saw it go in the mid 90's. -chris <http://www.mythtech.net>

21 years, 3 months

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DOS feature on formatting disk

by dwight.elvey＠amd.com

Hi Gordon There are a number of possibles but the track 0 sensor doesn't effect the incremental stepping mechanism used in these drives. There is no way that it can be off without being completely off and head over the wrong track. One full increment of the step is one track. This is not possible in DOS because it needs to read the headers correctly to write. It is writing so I'd guess it is more likely not a full step issue as would be caused by the track 0 sensor. Anyway, I suspect that by the sound that the unit makes, compared to a good one is that the head assembly is somehow loose or warn. It is not positioning solidly and cross writing the other tracks. All this is academic since getting inside this laptop to the level needed to repair the drive is more than it is worth. This is the unit with the failing video ( one bus bit missing ). Once I get the data off it, I may not do anything else with it. I'm even considering just transferring the hard drive. That is also major surgery on this laptop ( I know because I put an oversized [ byte wise ] drive in there myself ). These things were never intended to be taken apart. I'm mostly pissed because the stupid format command. The drive messes up about every third or fourth transfer. In only about 1/3 of those cases does it trash track 0. I then just use the magnet. Still, I see little reason why it needs to see anything on track 0 if it is doing an unconditional format. You'd think it would just step to track 0 by the sensor and format it. It would then look to see if it was OK. Dwight >From: "Gordon JC Pearce" <gordon(a)gjcp.net> > >Dwight K. Elvey wrote: > >> Sure but what about not reading track 0 before formatting >> means it should abort the formatting without first doing >> a low level format of that track. It is just stupid. >> If I completely erase the track, it formats just fine. >> As Sellam says, it is just stupid design. >> Dwight > >I'll bet you'll find that the drive isn't seeking back to track zero >correctly. All other tracks will be OK but there will be a small >buildup of shite on the slider knocking the head a tiny bit "inside" the >proper place for track zero. > >What this means is that it partially overwrites track zero, and rewrites >a new one. But there will be a certain amount of interference between >the two tracks, and it will not successfully read. > >Gordon. >

21 years, 3 months

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no more UPS!

by cb＠mythtech.net

>and we dumped the arrogant schmucks >after 90 days of frustration, wrong billing, stupidity, lost/damaged >[expensive: $150K] items Er, Yup... UPS lost a weeks worth of packages on me. About 150 packages shipped over the course of a week, all via 2 day service... not a one showed up in their system, and to this day, not a one has been located. Best guess I can come up with, the driver was picking them up from the drop box, and just throwing them out all week. UPS's response... "Oh, well, if we can't find them in the system, then we can't track them. Are you sure you shipped them?" Upside... at least they never tried to charge me for the missing packs. But that is still better then Airborne used to do... overnight packs would be delayed, I'd call to find out the status, and they would tell me "it is scheduled for delivery tomorrow" (hmm... define OVERNIGHT). Next day would come, no package... I'd call again, and be told "no such package exists in the system" (hmmm... it was there YESTERDAY, when it should have been HERE!). Following day comes... package shows up, looking like a mountain lion tried to snack on it. That was just about every package I got from Airborne Express... which alas, all the early Mac Catalog dealers insisted on shipping via, so I was stuck dealing with them far longer then I wanted. -chris <http://www.mythtech.net>

21 years, 3 months

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Data General 4/X haul from Bakersfield

by tomj＠wps.com

Oh my most definitely worth it. Just a quick report, it's late, it's been a long day, 3 of 4 lanes closed on return trip adding 2 hr delay, I'll inventory later. Photos taken (in dark lab at night), will upload tomorrow. The system was a DOE project measuring the output of a test cooling tower, some coal burning experiment. The system is contained in 4 fancy blue DG racks with doors and pretty blue trim panels. Casters were left on and racks bolted to the floor of a custom mobile trailer -- double windows, monster A/C system (Bakersfield summer sun peels paint -- literally). Big analog input system wired to panel bolted to the wall, cables ran out to sensors whereeverthehelltheywere. No sun-bleached colors here! No mouse (eg. meeces, little mammals) presence detected, no birds, insects, or even humans for 20 years. Consists of: Nova 4/X, 6070 disk, two 6120/6123? vacuum column tape drives, plus a Computer Something Inc 48 channel analog input system (with full documentation), DG data acquisition system, DG isolated IO system (cage, cards, docs). Nova I think is 128K, with mapped RDOS (according to manual notes and patch tape labels). I dont know nova4 cards by eye, will deal with later. ALl spotlessly clean. It looks like it was turned off around 1984/1985 and just left alone. One brand-new-sealed-in-box cartridge for the 6070. One possibly- new-but-could-be-bad-in-box cart, plus one in the hole, for three total. Dasher RO terminal, dusty but perfect, two cases new sealed ribbons and a box of greenbar. Too bad no keyboard! Can I add one? Some big beige modem, with manual. Custom software full documentation (listings, oper man, schematics, all mans for the hdwe). Huge set (may be multiples) of DG manuals, 90% sealed never opened. 3-ring type (std DG) but no binders (also typical DG). Appears to include Everything. Two sets of DG fiche (likely software) one never opened til I opened it; I found 2nd already opened a few minutes later :-( WIll get out the reader in a week or two. About a dozen "system" tapes (backups, dumps, bootable), a couple of scratch tapes, about 8 DG patch tapes. One tape that must be a data collect from a program run. All doors were closed, so there's little dust inside cabinets; about what you'd see in a system in use for a year or so. THe trailer was well insulated and sealed, built for field use. No surface rust of any kind anywhere. I took even the listings scattered all over the floor and stepped on heavily. YOu never know. One minor mistake: the A/D system appeared to be standard telco wiring at first, so it got dyked out. The wall panel could have been unscrewed and taken home intact. Not really a big deal, as it seems likely that the AD thing will be redeployed as such, and it was just generic wiring, not DG. THe 6070 was restrained in the rack, and for shipment I had to remove the disk pack. I wiped off all the dust surrounding first to minimize contamination. I even found the orig. shipping drive dustcover! I taped the head opening shut, so the heads wouldn't zoom out (sorry, but I didn't know what else to do; circumstances didn't allow determining the right procedure and I've never shipped or unpacked one) but I put it in the truk so that the head path was perpendicular to the truck's travel eg. sideways. Inserted dustcover and clean towel over it, heads still properly retracted when I got home. The bad news: the A/C has been off for 20 years! Lots of orangy dust on the floor and rack externals. It seems more like disintegrated plastic than clay. Bubble wrap was fully disintegrated. Who knows what the heat did to the media. We'll see! Previous owner was fine; long story he got the trailer with a lot of other surplus goods, wanted to scrap the computer junk inside, told it would need to be recycled. A computer-savvy friend of his told Bruce, etc. So now my lab is at 120% (physical) capacity, which is actually a problem. I didn't really intend to packrat another computer (esp. one so large). But I do like the Nova4, even if it does have a stack pointer. The CPU, a tape, disk will certainly fit in two racks; it might fit in one. I assume systems like this one (random industrial duty) have no increased value or juice "complete", so paring it down to managable size might be in order. I'm not in a hurry -- yet. I will want my lab back at some point! On Wed I travel to Santa Fe (friend's 50th) (mine soon!) won't have time to work on it til I get back.

21 years, 3 months

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Another HP card available

by jwest＠classiccmp.org

I have an extra HP microcode board, free to anyone who needs it. It's an M series only board... DMI microcode option (not FFP+DMI, just DMI). Jay West

21 years, 3 months

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no more UPS!

by cb＠mythtech.net

>Use DHL. Their rates are highly competitive with both UPS and Fedex and >they seem to be saturating the streets with their bright yellow trucks. >I'm increasingly moving my business over to DHL since they seem to want it >more. I'll wait to see how others fair with DHL... they bought Airborne Express, which was simply THE ABSOLUTE WORST carrier there was... cheap as hell, but you got exactly what you paid for. I never had a good experience with Airborne. And after boycotting them for years, I gave in and let a guy ship me an item Airborne since he insisted they were the best (even after relaying the many many stories I had of destroy and/or delayed and/or lost packages)... low and behold, the box came in ripped to pieces with manuals hanging out the largest of the holes. No, thanks, I'll wait on DHL until I know for sure that all the Airborne people were fired. -chris <http://www.mythtech.net>

21 years, 3 months

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HP 7914 drive part available

by jwest＠classiccmp.org

I have a PCA for an HP 7914 disc drive, part number 07914-60001. Cosmetically good shape, but I have no 7914 nor will I likely ever. Anyone want it? Jay

21 years, 3 months

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Another bad PET rom! - and more UPS

by dave04a＠dunfield.com

Hi Guys, Had a PET 2001-8N arrive a couple of days ago - non-functional but in otherwise very nice cosmetic condition. At first I thought it was missing a ROM, as there were only 4 ROMs in the machine, however after looking at them I realized that it has BASIC 2 installed which is one ROM smaller than BASIC 4 which is what is in my virtually identical 2001-32N. Bit of debugging, and I discovered that the problem was --- yes! - yet another bad PET rom! - fortunately, it was the EDIT ROM which is the only 2K device, and hence the only device which can be directly replaced with a more commonly available 2716. (CS3 which is tied to +5 in the PET lines up with VPP, CS1 lines up with -OE, and A11 which is always low on accesses to EDIT ROM lines up with -CE). Programmed a 2716, dropped it in and up it came! Now on to UPS --- I *NEVER* use UPS - not only do they usually break things, but they charge horrendous brokerage fees to import from the US to Canada. Case in point - in spite of my explicitly telling him NOT to send via UPS - they guy sent it UPS ... Apparently because they agreed to pack it for him. To their credit, they did a non-bad job - the PET was wrapped in about 5 layers of bubble wrap, and then placed in a large box stuffed with plastic peanuts - much as I dislike PP's, the bubble wrap protected the machine from getting filled with lots of little styrofoam bits and seemed to keep it fairly centered in the box. - the machine arrived in excellent condition, although the cost for UPS packing and shipping was higher than I had agreed to. So - it arrives at my door with a bill for an additional $42 --- thats what UPS charged to provide customs with the declaration that he had filled out. ... I *NEVER* use UPS! Regards, Dave -- dave04a (at) Dave Dunfield dunfield (dot) Firmware development services & tools: www.dunfield.com com Collector of vintage computing equipment: http://www.parse.com/~ddunfield/museum/index.html

21 years, 3 months

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4 floppy disk drives on a PC?

by vcf＠siconic.com

I know we've discussed this before but the right Google search terms are eluding me. Is it possible to get 4 floppy drives onto a PC? If so, how? If I stick two controllers in the PC and configure one with a different base address and interrupt (assuming I can find a card that allows me to do this) will DOS automatically recognize the second controller and extend the drive letters C: and D: to the drives on that card? -- Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org [ Old computing resources for business || Buy/Sell/Trade Vintage Computers ] [ and academia at www.VintageTech.com || at http://marketplace.vintage.org ]

21 years, 3 months

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Strange RK03 / RK05 clone with Plessey-controller

by cheri-post＠web.de

Hello everybody, just saved a disk drive with a PDP 11/23 from being trashed. Unfortunately, someone came before me and took out several parts of this beastie. The most interesting thing: A Cipher disk drive Model: SF-1221 with a Plessey controller PN: 703340-101J. A 50pin cable goes to some sort of Plessey converter, another 50pin cable from the converter to the cipher drive. The drive needs to be cleaned. On the front panel, a little plate is missing which may have housed some buttons... Moreover, I found a disk pack which goes with the drive: DEC 2200 BPI-12 Is this a RK03 or RK05 pack ? Concerning the drive and the controller: Google turned out NOTHING. Who can give me little help identifying these peripherals ? Thanks alot ! Pierre ______________________________________________________________ Verschicken Sie romantische, coole und witzige Bilder per SMS! Jetzt bei WEB.DE FreeMail: http://f.web.de/?mc=021193

21 years, 3 months

3
2
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4 floppy disk drives on a PC?

by dwight.elvey＠amd.com

Hi Eric I think he means that as long as he stays on that drive, he has no issues. The write problem is obvious to anyone that thinks about it a little ( I hope ). 1. A truely blank disk ( bulk erased ) can be formatted and written on by a 1.2M drive and will work in most cases on a 360K drive. This may written on by a 360K drive as well and still work on a 360K. 2. Once a disk has been written on first by a 360K drive and then a 1.2M, it can only be read on a 1.2M drive! That's life. Dwight >From: "Eric Smith" <eric(a)brouhaha.com> > >Doc wrote: >> I have a 5.25/3.5" combo drive that handles all four of those formats >> (and 3.5" 360K) just fine. The gorgeous part is that it occupies a >> single 5.25" bay. > >Won't write 360K 5.25" disks reliably. 1.2M drives have a narrower head >gap than 360K drives, because they use 96 TPI rather than 48 TPI. > >Eric > >

21 years, 3 months

5
6
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Troubleshooting an IBM 5155 - (portable personal computer)

by CCTalk＠catcorner.org

> > > The heads are selected by U4 (75451 dual AND gate/driver), > > the outputs of > > which are pulled to+5V, and slo drive the bases of Q7 (Head > 1) and Q6 > > (Head 0), PN2222 transistors via restors. One input of each > > of the AND > > gates comes from the power-OK circuit, built round Q9 and Q10 > > (as this is > > common to both heads, it's working correctly), the other > > input comes from > > the sides select signal on the connector (U4b, for head 1) or > > from that > > signal inverted by U8b (7414) on U4a, for head 0. That should > > give you > > some components to check. > > > Are you sure U4a drives Q6 and U4b drives Q7? Tracing the > board shows them > on Q7 and Q8. Yikes. Any chance you could scan the schematic > and email it? > 1bpp tiff, bmp or pcx would do. The higher the resoultion the > better, but I > could probably make due at 150dpi. > > You could even send it in seperate parts. I could then stitch > them together. > Making some preliminary measurements, it's beginning to look > like a head > problem. I am reluctant to actually load the heads until I > have to. I still > have not "cleaned" the top head thouroughly, although it seems clean > examining it through a loop. > > I may just install a pair of known good drives in the machine and > troubleshoot these two independantly. At least I would have > matching drives > in the machine until I can figure out what is wrong here. > > Thanks, > Kelly > I don't kwow what it means when I reply to my own replies, but here goes. I have the same continuity measurements on head 0 and head 1. However, if I swap the controller board (I know, Tony, you generally frown upon "swapping" for troubleshooting, but I couldn't find anything electrically), the problem stays with the drive. So, if I have the same continuity, and the problem doesn't seem to be on the controller, I can only guess either dirty or magentized heads. I noticed that if I close the drive with no media and open it slowly, the heads stick together until there is a bit of load on them to pull apart. Kind of like the are lightly magnetized. Since I don't have access to a tape head demagnitizer (hey, all I use is DTRS for my recording), how else could I demagnetize these heads? I'm going to bed now. More tomorrow. Kelly

21 years, 3 months

5
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Troubleshooting an IBM 5155 - (portable personal computer)

by CCTalk＠catcorner.org

> > > The heads are selected by U4 (75451 dual AND gate/driver), > the outputs of > which are pulled to+5V, and slo drive the bases of Q7 (Head 1) and Q6 > (Head 0), PN2222 transistors via restors. One input of each > of the AND > gates comes from the power-OK circuit, built round Q9 and Q10 > (as this is > common to both heads, it's working correctly), the other > input comes from > the sides select signal on the connector (U4b, for head 1) or > from that > signal inverted by U8b (7414) on U4a, for head 0. That should > give you > some components to check. > Are you sure U4a drives Q6 and U4b drives Q7? Tracing the board shows them on Q7 and Q8. Yikes. Any chance you could scan the schematic and email it? 1bpp tiff, bmp or pcx would do. The higher the resoultion the better, but I could probably make due at 150dpi. You could even send it in seperate parts. I could then stitch them together. Making some preliminary measurements, it's beginning to look like a head problem. I am reluctant to actually load the heads until I have to. I still have not "cleaned" the top head thouroughly, although it seems clean examining it through a loop. I may just install a pair of known good drives in the machine and troubleshoot these two independantly. At least I would have matching drives in the machine until I can figure out what is wrong here. Thanks, Kelly

21 years, 3 months

2
1
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Windows Backup program?

by rigdonj＠cfl.rr.com

This past weekeend I found a ADIC 1200D DAT tape library in a scrap pile. It has a Sony DAT-2 tape drive with an autochanger and holds up to 12 tapes. I'm thinking of using it on my PC. Can anyone recommend a good (and cheap!) backup program that will work with Windows 98? Joe

21 years, 3 months

3
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DOS feature on formatting disk

by dwight.elvey＠amd.com

>From: "Dan Williams" <williams.dan(a)gmail.com> > >On Tue, 18 Jan 2005 10:16:11 -0800 (PST), Dwight K. Elvey ><dwight.elvey(a)amd.com> wrote: >> Hi Randy >> I've written special drivers for the floppies >> under DOS in the past so that isn't a real >> issue. I just wish it would work without me >> having to pull out the reference books to >> deal with it. >> It works incorrectly in both MSDOS and PCDOS. >> It is just annoying. The /u should mean just that, >> unconditionally format. >> Dwight >> > In MSDOS the /u doesn't actually mean unconditional in the normal >sense. It means do not save unformat information, it will still stop >if it gets errors. > >Dan > Hi Sure but what about not reading track 0 before formatting means it should abort the formatting without first doing a low level format of that track. It is just stupid. If I completely erase the track, it formats just fine. As Sellam says, it is just stupid design. Dwight

21 years, 3 months

2
1
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AMI Not

by Innfogra＠aol.com

This is not an AMI chip. It is from a small foundry in Canada that was the first second source for intel memory chips. I was informed of the name a couple years ago when I sold some of these on epay. But did not save it. Perhaps someone on the list knows. My 1101s were from 1973. I think the foundry only existed for about three years in the early 70s. Paxton Astoria, Oregon PS, If you want to part with any I am interested.

21 years, 3 months

2
1
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DOS feature on formatting disk

by cb＠mythtech.net

>I know. It's another one of those stupid things that MS did with DOS that >makes absolutely no sense. Just format the damn disk and report any >errors for the USER to decide. > >I once came across some program on the WWW that supposedly rehabilitates >such disks (most likely by doing an LLF on track 0) but unfortunately I >never bookmarked it. I used to run into this all the time. When you format a floppy for the Mac, DOS will then report the Track 0 error and refuse to reformat it. I always just formatted the disk for DOS on my Mac to get around the problem (and then got really irked when I was told "The mac is not compatible with anything else"... REALLY, not only can I read/write PC disks, but I could read/write all the PC users files long before any of them had tools to deal with Mac files!) -chris <http://www.mythtech.net>

21 years, 3 months

1
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DOS feature on formatting disk

by dwight.elvey＠amd.com

>From: "Dave Dunfield" <dave04a(a)dunfield.com> > >>I once came across some program on the WWW that supposedly rehabilitates >>such disks (most likely by doing an LLF on track 0) but unfortunately I >>never bookmarked it. > >When I was selling my software on diskette, I wrote my own tools for diskette >duplication, using a Victory autoloader - I also boiled-down the core functions >into a one-at-a-time disk command line duplicator that works with standard >floppy drives called XDISK. > >Like most disk-to-file copiers it will read a complete image of the floppy >track by track into a disk file - unlike most file-to-disk copiers, it >will low-level format, write, and verify each track in a single pass as it >writes the file back to a disk. It does not care *WHAT* is previously on the >disk, as the first command it issues on each track is "format track". > >This can be used to restore disks that DOS refuses to format due to problems >in track-0 (just write out a blank floppy image) - I can send it to you if >you like (runs under any version of DOS). > >Regards, >Dave >-- >dave04a (at) Dave Dunfield >dunfield (dot) Firmware development services & tools: www.dunfield.com >com Collector of vintage computing equipment: > http://www.parse.com/~ddunfield/museum/index.html > > > My only issue there is that I'm never sure how big to make the various gaps. Anyway, the strong magnet works, it is just a hassle. Dwight

21 years, 3 months

1
0
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DOS feature on formatting disk

by dwight.elvey＠amd.com

Hi Randy I've written special drivers for the floppies under DOS in the past so that isn't a real issue. I just wish it would work without me having to pull out the reference books to deal with it. It works incorrectly in both MSDOS and PCDOS. It is just annoying. The /u should mean just that, unconditionally format. Dwight >From: "Randy McLaughlin" <randy(a)s100-manuals.com> > >From: "Dwight K. Elvey" <dwight.elvey(a)amd.com> >> Hi >> DOS has an irritating feature when asked to format >> a disk. If track 0 is partially readable it will >> fail to format, even if you use the /u option. >> I've been moving data from one machine to another >> and the source machine has a flaky drive. It sometimes >> trashes track 0. >> I've found that the only way to get around this problem >> is to wipe the disk with a strong magnet. >> Why can't it just try to format first and then check >> track 0. Why must it fail to format because track 0 >> is partially readable when I specifically asked it >> to unconditionally format? >> Dwight > >Try picking up the format program from freedos/opendos and see if it does >the same. If needed it may be able to be modified. > > >Randy > > >

21 years, 3 months

3
2
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DOS feature on formatting disk

by dave04a＠dunfield.com

>I once came across some program on the WWW that supposedly rehabilitates >such disks (most likely by doing an LLF on track 0) but unfortunately I >never bookmarked it. When I was selling my software on diskette, I wrote my own tools for diskette duplication, using a Victory autoloader - I also boiled-down the core functions into a one-at-a-time disk command line duplicator that works with standard floppy drives called XDISK. Like most disk-to-file copiers it will read a complete image of the floppy track by track into a disk file - unlike most file-to-disk copiers, it will low-level format, write, and verify each track in a single pass as it writes the file back to a disk. It does not care *WHAT* is previously on the disk, as the first command it issues on each track is "format track". This can be used to restore disks that DOS refuses to format due to problems in track-0 (just write out a blank floppy image) - I can send it to you if you like (runs under any version of DOS). Regards, Dave -- dave04a (at) Dave Dunfield dunfield (dot) Firmware development services & tools: www.dunfield.com com Collector of vintage computing equipment: http://www.parse.com/~ddunfield/museum/index.html

21 years, 3 months

1
0
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Data recovery on Toshiba T3100 laptop

by r_a_feldman＠hotmail.com

A good MS-DOS program to use to transfer files off an old computer is Xport (search on Google for XPORT21). It includes a procedure to send itself over a serial line to the target computer, so you don't need to have a working floppy. It also includes instructions on wiring the cable. Bob Date: Sat, 15 Jan 2005 12:09:37 -0600 From: Jim Leonard <trixter(a)oldskool.org> Subject: Re: Data recovery on Toshiba T3100 laptop To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts <cctalk(a)classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <41E95C61.5000901(a)oldskool.org> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Tore S Bekkedal wrote: >I have a VGA monitor, no CGAs around, but I also have a 9-pin to 15-pin >male-male cable - but aren't the voltages different? Voltages aside, the technologies are completely different; it won't work. I would follow the "boot-a-floppy-and-transfer-via-kermit" method. Or use a DOS-based program like FastLynx or even the built-in transfer in DOS 6.x's intersvr/interlnk programs. -- Jim Leonard (trixter(a)oldskool.org) http://www.oldskool.org/ Want to help an ambitious games project? http://www.mobygames.com/ Or check out some trippy MindCandy at http://www.mindcandydvd.com/

21 years, 3 months

1
0
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Strange RK03 / RK05 clone with Plessey-controller

by pete＠dunnington.u-net.com

On Jan 18 2005, 17:40, Pierre Gebhardt wrote: > The most interesting thing: A Cipher disk drive Model: SF-1221 with a Plessey controller PN: 703340-101J. > A 50pin cable goes to some sort of Plessey converter, another 50pin cable from the converter to the cipher drive. [ ... ] > Moreover, I found a disk pack which goes with the drive: DEC 2200 BPI-12 > Is this a RK03 or RK05 pack ? AFAIK, an RK03 pack and an RK05 pack are completely interchangeable (someone please correct me if I'm wrong), and certainly have the same capacity and layout. The drives are different; RK03 drives were made by someone else (Diablo, IIRC) and rebadged by DEC, whereas the RK05 drives were actually made by DEC, and have a faster access time. If it helps, that Plessey part number is an RK05 controller. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York

21 years, 3 months

1
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HP gear available

by jwest＠classiccmp.org

I have a few empty chassis, except PS. I was saving these to try and get a few M series machines up in the shorter chassis, but my M series fixation has been satisfied via government auction so it's time to let these parts go. I'd just throw them in the trash as they are poor condition and mostly just empty chassis, but I hate to do that... (but one NICE part at the end of this list)... 1) HP 2108A cpu chassis. No M/B, just a chassis, power supply (dirty), backplanes, and crossover PCA. The power supply is the A style. Looks like a few boards are missing towards the front of the PS but that may be normal/optional, I'm not up on the A style power supply. Power supply functionality is unknown. This one includes a poor condition known dead 2108A front panel (but all switches are intact and solid). 2) HP 2108A cpu chassis. No M/B, just a chassis, power supply (dirty), backplanes, and crossover PCA. The power supply is the A style, all boards appear present. Power supply functionality is unknown. 3) HP 2108B cpu chassis. No M/B, just a chassis, power supply (known dead - B style), crossover PCA, memory backplane with broken slot, ok I/O backplane. Available immediately for free + shipping or it'll get pitched. Then, depending on which way I go with my dev cabinet as to form factors (2109 vs. 2113), I will have two chassis and power supplies and front panels (2109 or 2113) available to the list. All pristinely restored, cleaned, and tested... power supply scrubbed and refoamed, etc. and 4)... Also, I have one complete HP 21MX M-series machine (2108B) available immediately. That's the more rare M series, not the fairly common E series. It has been perfectly and carefully restored to mint cosmetics and full running condition - tested and completes all diags. I really need some cash to recoup my recent classic computer purchases so I was planning on going to ebay with this. However, I'll consider any unusually interesting trades. More to come! Jay West

21 years, 3 months

1
0
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Thurlby LA160 Logic analyser

by alan.needham＠HUMBERPOWER.CO.UK

Lee, a full user's manual is at http://www.cirrus.it/pdf/232_2942.PDF I am writing a VB6 prog to display a timing diagram from the RS232 dump as I can find NO-ONE that has got or ever had a copy of the LA-PC-Link software ! These things seem to proliferate on EBay but no-one seems to discuss them! (no-one is re-writing the ROM to provide some of the extended facilities ROM features ???) Are you (anybody?) still using an LA160 ? if so (or for more info :-) ) contact me on alan.needham_at_humberpower.co.uk

21 years, 3 months

1
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OT? Nickel Metal Hydrids

by mtapley＠swri.edu

At 18:58 -0600 1/17/05, Dwight wrote: >Hi > I thought I'd pass on some info about these batteries. >I received a laptop with a "dead" battery. The voltage >as read from a meter was "0" volts. I mean dead! >I first stuck it into the laptop but quickly noticed >the smell of hot resistors ( bad idea ). I second the "bad idea" notation. I have had one (count it) one failure on a heavily used Powerbook 3400 I've had as my primary computer since they first came out (about 6 years, extensive airline travel, etc.) That was when I took a discharged NiMH battery (had been on the shelf for 3-4 years), put it into the machine with the machine plugged in, and ran the battery-cycling program Apple offered for the 5300 and 3400. Battery started to charge (maybe 20 seconds), I pulled wall power (as instructed), machine went down hard with an ugly noise and stayed down until it got a new power supply board. I didn't see the old one, but I'm morally certain the escape of some magic smoke was involved. Since then I've been very very careful to deal with near-dead NiMH batteries using a non-critical piece of hardware, rather than a built-in charger. However, same laptop and same battery are still giving good service (my secondary machine, now) so I guess I second the below as well. > Moral of the story, don't give up on these batteries. >They are remarkably tough. Most NiCads batteries would >not recover from such a level. >Dwight > -- - Mark 210-522-6025, temporary cell 240-375-2995

21 years, 3 months

1
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VAX 6000-420 Available

by thoth2＠mac.com

Hello, world. Used to post here in another life when I was more actively collecting DEC equipment. Thought this would be a good place to start with this: I have a VAX 6000-420 with SF200 rack available for pick-up in Rhome, Texas (20-some miles north of Fort Worth). Acquired it a few years back and haven't done anything with it, so I figure I should pass it on to someone who has an interest in it. The system is in decent physical shape, some of the metal inside the SF200 rack has been bent a little, and if I remember correctly, one or two of the fingers in one of the card cages is broken. It has been stored in my father's house for the last couple of years. I have never powered it on, so I cannot tell you if it is in working condition or not. If anyone is interested, I can post pictures to my personal website. I would like to get rid of it, and I am sure my father would as well! There is no immediate hurry, however the sooner the better, I suppose. As for what I want for it, I'm not picky. DEC (especially PDP-11) stuff, SGI or Sun (especially SGI) equipment, or any old/odd/obscure workstation type equipment would be very nice. Older SGI IRIS stuff is high on my wish list, and my brother has been desperately searching for a PERQ workstation as of late. Anyway, if anyone is interested at all, email me personally and we can work something out. Thanks, -- Owen Robertson

21 years, 3 months

1
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Misc available for free

by gmanuel＠gmconsulting.net

To the owner of this equiptment. I know that you sent me a reply to this on the 17th but my wife was on my computer and I heard a whoops. LOL... She accidentally deleted your reply to me. Could you please resend it. Thank you very much, she had already cleared everything permanently by the time I got to her. LOL Thank you for your time and sorry for the inconvience, Greg Manuel -----Original Message----- From: GManuel (GMC) [mailto:gmanuel@gmconsulting.net] Sent: Monday, January 17, 2005 5:56 AM To: General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only Subject: RE: Misc available for free I would be interested in the Commodore 128 group and/or the Zip Drive group. Can you please tell me what shipping would be to the 19074 zipcode. You can email me direct at gmanuel at gmconsulting dot net. Thank you in advance for your time. Greg Manuel -----Original Message----- From: cctech-bounces(a)classiccmp.org [mailto:cctech-bounces@classiccmp.org]On Behalf Of Chad Fernandez Sent: Sunday, January 16, 2005 5:36 PM To: rescue(a)sunhelp.org; cctalk(a)classiccmp.org Subject: Misc available for free Hey all, Free, plus shipping. I have everything split into 5 groups. I don't want to split the groups up, as I don't want to be sending out 100 boxs in 100 different directions. -Commodore 128, good shape cosmetically, all cords, power supply etc, original box, but doesn't work. It would freeze up on me, and I lost interest. -Zip100 for PC's (parallel port), new---I opened it, but I can't get it to work on either of my machines. It may very well be fine, since I can't get a Micro Solutions to work on my machines either. -a box full of PC leftovers, a pair of earlier Pentium class chips, slot covers, bay covers, centronics scsi cables, internal 50 pin scsi cables, floppy cables, several fans, a small scsi drive, a small ide drive, Hayes Accura 336 modem, drive rails, blah blah blah..... -IBM AT motherboard, serial card, 8/16 bit VGA card, Adaptec 1542B scsi card, 8-bit ISA MFM ST11R HD controller, Unisys Personal Workstation 2 Multiple Port Board with splitter cable drivers and instructions. -USR Courier V Everything (older one), doesn't seem to work, but has instructions, power supply, and good shape cosmetically..... maybe you need a PS to fix one, or make it look better? Chad Fernandez Michigan, USA >>> FREE spam killer: http://eliminatespam.com * FREE PopUp Buster+: http://popupbuster.net >>> FREE spam killer: http://eliminatespam.com * FREE PopUp Buster+: http://popupbuster.net

21 years, 3 months

1
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Anyone recognize MK4116E ?

by dave04a＠dunfield.com

Hi tony, >Are there any other markings on them? I remember once seeing some Mostek >'chips' like these that had 2 off 4164s on top, and were essentially 128K >bit DRAMs (separate CAS signals to the 2 halves IIRC). Yes, they are Mostek - and I recall the stacked 4164's in the IBM AT - I just posted that they were 4116s, but thats due to bad bits in the organic memory array - you just reminded me that they were 4164's - allowing 512K on the 256K board - ahh the days of such huge capacity... >I wondef if you've found a 32K bit version made from 2 off 4116s. It does appear that this is what these things are ... IIRC, there was a similar stacked arrangement for SRAM chips in the Radio Shack (Kyocera) Model-100 - the "8k" device was actually 4 x 2k devices on a small carrier - problem was that they brought out the 4 selects instead of address lines, so you couldn't just put in an 8k device - I bought a third party RAM chip which had an 8k device on a small board with some diodes to generate a common select (the extra address lines must have been there as well, because there was no other logic on the board) - seemed a skunkwork design to me, however it never gave me trouble (in fact it's still working). What wonderful little things get created to fill in the "gaps" in available devices... Regards, Dave -- dave04a (at) Dave Dunfield dunfield (dot) Firmware development services & tools: www.dunfield.com com Collector of vintage computing equipment: http://www.parse.com/~ddunfield/museum/index.html

21 years, 3 months

1
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Anyone recognize MK4116E ?

by dave04a＠dunfield.com

At 17:16 17/01/2005 -0800, you wrote: >Dave wrote: >> about a dozen interesting looking chips, which are >> labled: MK4116E-3 > >That's the part number of the individual CLCC chips, not >the complete part. The complete part is an MK4332. This makes sense, and you are right, both parts are labled identically... I can't find a "whole device" part number. >> This appear to be a 9-pin DIP ceramic carrier with >18 pin Yes - I counted one side and failed to x2 before posting. >18 contact each, of which only 16 are used. Those are >plain old 16K DRAMs. > >> Anyone recognize these? My guess is some sort of RAM >> (dynamic)? Clearly not the same as a standard 4116 DRAM. > >Just two of them packaged together. So this is a 32k bit DRAM device? (which explains the 18 pins) - I don't recall running across such a beast before. Been through *LOTS* of 4116 16K DIP DRAMS, and an equally big number of 4164s over the years... Actually, now that I think of it, I do have a bag of the "doubled up" RAM chips from a IBM AT - these look like two 4116's stacked on top of each other - so these are just a variation of the same thing ...? >> anyone know what they were used in? > >Some PC clones. Some Apple IIIs. Various other stuff. Thanks. Dave -- dave04a (at) Dave Dunfield dunfield (dot) Firmware development services & tools: www.dunfield.com com Collector of vintage computing equipment: http://www.parse.com/~ddunfield/museum/index.html

21 years, 3 months

1
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AMI

by aw288＠osfn.org

I have a chip here, an 1101 marked "sample" with a datecode of 7103. Very likely it is a second sourced Intel 1101. The logo is a new one on me, and I think it may be a mutant AMI, but from my resources, I am just guessing. I dug up a 1970 AMI databook, and the logo does not match. The one on the book is the A over M next to I version, and the thing on the chip looks like five lines next to each other, with the first line being somewhat curved (sort of like a half-circle) and the last being a tad shorter with a dot over it. The standard mid 1970s AMI logo is simply A next to M next to I. Does anyone know if AMI tried a strange logo between the two known ones - perhaps one that matches my chip? Could this logo not be AMI? William Donzelli aw288(a)osfn.org

21 years, 3 months

1
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Nickel Metal Hydrids

by pete＠dunnington.u-net.com

On Jan 17 2005, 17:06, Paul Koning wrote: > >>>>> "shoppa" == shoppa classiccmp <shoppa_classiccmp(a)trailing-edge.com> writes: > shoppa> This raises a question for refurbishing older equipment: is > shoppa> it always OK to just drop a set of NiMH's in place of > shoppa> same-size NiCad's? Most of the "stupid" NiCad battery > shoppa> chargers were just 0.1C trickle chargers, but the "smart" > shoppa> ones that looked for the voltage rise at the end of charge of > shoppa> a NiCad may not see this with a NiMH pack. Anyone have any > shoppa> experience? > > I'm not sure that a trickle charger that works for NiCd is ok for > NiMH, and I am positive that a fast charger for the one will NOT work > right for the other. Each battery technology has its own charging > rules -- lead acid, NiCd, NiMH, and the various flavors of Lithium > battery are all different in very significant ways. Lead-acid, lithium, various others, and NiMH/NiCd certainly need very different charging regimes, but NiMH and NiCd are very similar to each other. The most important difference is that for a NiMH you should stop the charging when the voltage flattens out, and before it starts to fall again; for a NiCd you should stop when the voltage just starts to fall again. Of course, you shouldn't let them get too hot, and you shouldn't fast-charge very cold batteries either. Maxim do a couple of inexpensive chips (MAX712/MAX713) that take the hard work out of all that; used with a thermistor, they won't fast-charge cold cells until they warm up, and they won't fast-charge until the cell voltage rises above some threshold. I've used them but I've not put enough cycles through enough cells to see what the life is like. Interestingly, Maxim's data sheet indicates that the difference between detecting the voltage slope flattening and detecting the slight fall is less important to NiMH cells, especially when the charge rate is fairly *high*. That means for a lot of applications you could safely use an NiCd charger for NiMH cells, but vice-versa would leave you with slighly undercharged NiCds. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York

21 years, 3 months

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