Anyone know where there's a good IBM program and/or doc archive that
goes back beyond last month? Really into the 80's Looking for original
PC stuff...
Thanks,
-Mike
At 09:48 05-02-98 -0500, William Donzelli <william(a)ans.net> wrote:
>> Sounds about right. 11A at 230V is 2.5 kVA, which will do 1.8kW at 0.7
power
>> factor (typical for a rectified mains power supply) with ease.
>>
>>> Still dumped alotta heat! :-) We got cheap electricity in this
town.$0.036
>>> per KWH vs. about $0.08 or more per KWH outside of the area.
>>
>> Even $0.08 is less than we pay (typically $0.11). But we can get dual
>> tariff systems which charge us the same peak rate and less than half
>> that off-peak for heating etc. But I digress.
>
>This sounds like a perfect time to get on my soapbox concerning big
>computers and electricity!
>
>Lets say you have this wonderful IBM mainframe and wish to use it. When
>you add up all of the DASDs, maybe a terminal or two, perhaps you end up
>with a 3 kW system. Now run that value thru your electric bill. I think
>that you will find that a night of hacking on your system will cost less
>than a ticket to a movie!
Certainly more _fun_ than some of the films that have been released for
sure! The wife will not agree though. But if one of us had a large old
S/360 or S/370 in our basements, the power consumption would financially
kill us (because of the water chillers for cooling, current consumption of
older technology electronics, etc.) I'd love to even _see_ a large S/360
and all its utilities.
>
>And I must admit that I am suprised that the CPU sucks so much. I suppose
>if some of the memory was taken out, it would be quite a bit less. My
>Sun-4/280 draws a hell of a bunch, but it has 32 megs of 41256 DRAMS,
>each one sucking a little bit. Just removing 24 megs from it drops the
>power consumption greatly.
Only one 8 Meg board installed. Maximum, IIRC, was 16 Mb storage. DASD was
probably used as workstation storage. Philip, can you confirm any of this
>from your sales literature? If you're interested, William, I can give you
the lineup of PC board modules in the CPU which I briefly talked about
earlier in the thread.
- Chris
-- --
=======================================================
Christian Fandt Phone: +716-661-1832 -Office
ACU-RITE INC. +716-488-1722 -Home
One Precision Way Fax: +716-661-1888 -Office fax
Jamestown, New York
14701-9699 USA email: cfandt(a)servtech.com
I had a trip down memory lane yesterday - I cleared a path to the filing
cabinet and got out my old IBM glossy leaflets. As well as things like
"IBM 3090 - the Base for Growth into the Nineties" I found a couple of
things on the 9370 series. I also found some stuff on PC graphics
platforms and 3270PCs (of which more in my next).
> At 12:30 03-02-98 -0500, William Donzelli <william(a)ans.net> wrote:
>>
>>Just because the sticker says 30 amps does not mean it will draw that
>>much! In general, those ratings are worst case (a fully blown system), and
>>includes some safety factor (as well as some surge).
>
> Oh I already knew that, William. A 30A breaker works out fine to handle the
> six 9332 DASD units (IBM's accronym for these type of hard disks for some
> of you other observers), 9345 tape drive, rack power controllers and the
> 9370-60 CPU.
Ah. A 9375. Despite my joke and William's response, a 9375 model 60
has the highest power consumption of any in my catalogue, at 1.8kW -
enough to heat a room, if not a house.
(FWIW DASD = Direct Access Storage Device)
If you are interested in operating systems, those listed for the model
60 were:
VM/SP
VSE/SP
IX/370 (The AIX you were asking about)
MVS (which won't run on the 9373 (model 20) or model 40.)
There were also integrated packages carrying their own environment based
on VM, which was then called VM/IS
> Can't recall exactly, but total draw was about 11 to 12 amps or so when I
Sounds about right. 11A at 230V is 2.5 kVA, which will do 1.8kW at 0.7 power
factor (typical for a rectified mains power supply) with ease.
Still dumped alotta heat! :-) We got cheap electricity in this town. $0.036
per KWH vs. about $0.08 or more per KWH outside of the area.
Even $0.08 is less than we pay (typically $0.11). But we can get dual
tariff systems which charge us the same peak rate and less than half
that off-peak for heating etc. But I digress.
Can't wait to work more with the system later this year if the wife has no
additional remodeling in the new house for me to do :-(
Have fun!
Philip.
> At 13:15 13-01-98 -0500, William Donzelli <william(a)ans.net> wrote:
>
>>> Me too! But I think a 4381, say or even a 9370, would be easier to work
>>> on.
>>
>>Getting a 9370 should not be a problem - they are dogs that really were
>>not sucessful. I have seen quite a few in the scrap yards (none suitable
>>for taking, however).
>
> I'll agree it's no problem. I got the old 9370 from my company setting at
> home. Paid an official $1 to act as a transfer of ownership. It's just
> barely a classic now. Obsolete as heck -not too long after we paid $200k+
> for it in '86/'87. Lot of Tylenol used to sooth aching back muscles when I
> dragged it home piece-by-piece. (Should have seen the wife look at me...)
Strange how people in different (geographical) areas find different
machines. In the [year + 2 vacations] I worked for IBM, I never saw a
9370 at all. It was released at about that time - I grabbed some
marketing leaflets which I believe I still have - and I thought it
looked an interesting system, but I never saw one :-(
> It's a dog, but nevertheless, something important in the line of S/370
> lineage which I literally rescued from the dumpster.
>
> Notably, it is said to be the first actual production unit sold. Don't
> exactly recall complete serial number, but it probably is first since it is
> something like xxx0001. Will get back to the list later with SN, etc. if
> anybody interested in confirming this.
Fun if true. Do find out!
> I need OS books (VSE, I think) and help in bringing her completely up.
> Xerox, I believe, kept the OS manuals since they did all the software
> maintenace under contract. IBM did hardware maintenance, of course. We used
> the Xerox Business Management System (XBMS) product to run our company. Have
> virtually all other hardware books and most periferal books safely at home.
>
> Heard that AIX could run on the 9370 under (I think) VM or something. Any
> AIX and VM OS's around that I could scrounge for this iron??
I'll have a look in my marketing bumf and see what IBM were offering.
Alas, I have little of a technical nature.
I'd think a 9370 ought to run Phoenix/MVT at least. Do any of our
Cambridge (UK) contingent want to have a go?
> Have tried to bring it up at home but, apparently, lack of certain
> periferals it expects to see hung off the terminal ports causes the IPL to
> quit before OS completely loads. Need a guru or present-day user to help
> figure this out.
You know, that sort of thing _might_ be in the marketing stuff (as in, a
complete system need consist only of...) since the main selling point
was the small size and no need of special machine room.
> Any of you folks willing to help me with this project later in the year???
Yes, but not physically, since I am unlikely to get to travel to the
States again in the near future! That said, I do have a voucher to
spend with Continental Airlines sometime...
> Wife and I just bought another house and will not be settled until
> summertime or later. I'm making provisions during my rewiring of the house
> to include a 30A double-pole breaker since the 9370 takes 230V, single
> phase. Will duct the air coming out of the CPU to heat the house instead of
> using the furnace (just kidding, but there's quite a few BTUs dumped outta
> the thing and could keep the house above freezing in the winter at least.)
30A at 230V is around 7kW - running continuously, that could keep a
small house quite warm. (Typical electrical domestic heating
installation in UK, four storage heaters rated at between 2kW and 4kW
each, heat up for 7 hours at night, release heat slowly during day -
equivalent of 3 to 4 kW continuously)
Will tell the list anything more on this machine if any interest.
Yes please.
Philip.
The only piece of useful information about the 3270PC displays I could
find yesterday was the resolution - 720 x 512 x 8 for the small
graphics display, which I am now fairly convinced was a 5272. I don't
know the scanning rates I'm afraid.
Larry, you can get text on it with only one of the 3270PC display
cards, which will indeed work in an XT.
I'm curious that 720 x 512 (or 800 x 512) was so uncommon - it seems a
logical (-ish) step up from 640 x 400.
I was going to go on at length here about the PGC (PGA) and its
display, since the marketing leaflet surprisingly gives a lot of info,
right down to the connector pinout. But Tony got there first.
Philip.
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Assuming that all this is right (and I have no way of knowing as I'm
using the 3270pc), I bet you could find VGA, EGA or CGA cards which
could run a 3270 mode or a 5272 mode if told. It's a question of
knowing what to ask and the software or firmware knowing. Someone had
to be dumb enough to include it.
Otherwise, what do you want for the 5272 $$?
-Mike
Lawrence Walker wrote:
>
> On 3 Feb 98 at 17:22, Philip.Belben(a)powertech.co.uk wrote:
>
> snip
> >
> > > I'm sure my 3270pc handles a "better" quality CGA. It just looks like
> > > EGA, thought it was... It was running a version of Norton Utes and it
> > > was just beautiful turquoise blue set and clear characters.
> > >
> > > I'd have to think this was better than CGA, especially since it took two
> > > coupled long cards to run the video...
> > >
> > > -Mike
> >
> > No, it isn't PGA. (Although most of the chips on the cards are likely
> > to be PGAs, in IBM custom metal cans, as I recall...)
> >
> > The IBM 5272, the 3270PC display, was a very nice monitor. I don't know
> > the pixel resolution, but I'd guess at 800 x 400. Unfortunately, AFAIK,
> > it only did 8 colours.
> >
> > The 3270PC display card did TEXT MODES ONLY - it was aimed at emulating
> > the 3279 terminal. You could buy two add-on cards for it that went in
> > the slots either side in the motherboard.
> >
> > 1. The PS card. This provided emulation of the Programmed Symbols
> > option on the 3279. Very nice graphics, but only as a terminal, not as
> > a PC (although presumably you could have written PC drivers for it...)
> >
> > 2. The APA card. This provided support of the All Points Addressable
> > modes of the CGA. These CGA modes were displayed in the top lefthand
> > corner of the screen. And the only 8 colours reduced the capability
> > somewhat as well.
> >
> > It looked very good, but AFAIK IBM never supported it properly. Pity.
> >
> snip
>
> > But your description of the 3270PC sounds like you've got only one of PS
> > and APA, alas.
> >
> > Hope this helps
> >
> > Philip.
> >
> I've had a 5272 -23 monitor stashed for some time. Was never able to
> get it working on an XT trying various standard cards and drivers,
> altho it did display jumbled-up color lines so I figured it must be
> the driver. IBM wouldn't/couldn't offer me any help.
> From the above, it appears that I would need a 3270pc display card
> and one of two add-on cards. If I was fortunate enough to find these
> would it work on an XT ?
>
> Also I pulled an IBM DM12n501 monitor out of a dumpster. No
> power cord , just a 15 pin female connector . I surmise it's some
> sort of dumb terminal. So before I dump it any idea on what it is ?
>
> ciao larry
> lwalkerN0spaM(a)interlog.com
>Does anyone know of a conversion utiliy which will convert files from a
>CP/M machine to Mac format? There is someone here willing to part with his
>Kaypro 4 but needs to convert his old files first.
No one's mentioned the problem that you'll also need to convert
the *data* once you've moved the *files*. Which word processor
created the files, and which contemporary word processor do you
hope to use them in? You may need to revive the original machine
or something similar in order to re-save the documents in ASCII.
Conversion programs might be available, but that might cost $$$.
Of course, you'll need to run 22Disk on a PC equipped with both
5 1/4 and 3 1/2 floppies, then move the files to a 3 1/2 PC disk, and
the Mac can read them as-is.
- John
Jefferson Computer Museum <http://www.threedee.com/jcm>
>"Slipsticker"?!? I thought I was the last one! C'mon -- who else here has
>his old slide rule _and_ still remembers how to use it?
>
>manney
Yo! Right here in my desk drawer. Used this one through High School
(graduated 1980). The teachers cut me some slack on the 3rd digit from time
to time.
>No, I do not have _my_ high school/college slide rule, which was a
>magnificent 12" yellow aluminum Pickett with a hard leather case and a belt
>loop. ...
>__________________________________________
>Kip Crosby engine(a)chac.org
Oooh, a pretty one. That's just like my "home system".
>I also use a E6B ... That one is in the plane as I'm absolutely certain
>it works as the calculator version of the E6B allways seems to need a
>new battery.
>
>Allison
Right - and it's fast, and the readout is visible in any lighting condition
in the cockpit (if you can't read an E6B, navigation is *not* your main
problem!) and you can drop it about as far as you want and it'll be OK. I
have never used an electronic E6B, for all those reasons.
> I know of some people with
>700+ units. Me, I have 30, including a 7 foot long Pickett classroom rule.
>
>Cheers
>Andrew
Wow...I didn't think this thread would lead to massive array parallel
processing *or* supercomputing...but you never know! ;-)
- Mark
>the eminent slipsticker Andrew Davie wrote:
<Snip>
"Slipsticker"?!? I thought I was the last one! C'mon -- who else here has
his old slide rule _and_ still remembers how to use it?
manney
Nickolas & everyone else on this thread:
Again, I _really_ disagree with this tip. It shouldn't make any difference as
to the name. I renamed the files to .dsk and it really didn't make any
difference at all, for me anyway. Just wanted to reiterate that myself and
many, many other users have not had this problem either.
My $.02
CORD COSLOR
Nickolas Marentes wrote:
> Thanks Paul! I will add this tip onto my Web Page. Could solve many
> people's problems.
>
> > I had some problems using the wonderful files I downloaded from
> > Nickolas' web page as well, initially. I was downloading the file under
> > MS-DOS, then renaming from *.zip to *.dsk, then porting it to the CoCo
> > using the emulator. Couldn't get it to dshrink in any format (ASCII
> > thru binary).
> >
> > Then it occurred to me that by renaming the file in MS-DOS, I was
> > slightly changing the contents (the first few bytes of the file, I
> > imagine), thus making it unuseable. The solution was to port it over
> > with the .ZIP extension as a binary executable, then rename it under
> > CoCo BASIC. Worked like a charm.
--
_________________________________________
| Cord G. Coslor : archive(a)navix.net |
| Deanna S. Wynn : deannasue(a)navix.net |
|-----------------------------------------|
| PO Box 308 - Peru, NE - 68421-0308 |
| (402) 872- 3272 |
|_________________________________________|
Ward (and others) wrote:
> > I keep an 8" floppy disk in the front of my store to amaze people ("Just
> > fold it twice and stick it in your drive...it holds a lot!")
> >
> > Just how much do (did?) they hold? (I'm sure there were different data
> > densities...just a range is all I want!)
>
> If I recall, when IBM first invented the things, they held right about
> 128k, single sided, single density. By the time I first dealt with them
> in the TRS-80 Model 2, they were packing 512k on a single-sided disk.
> Later, the Model 16/6000 Xenix systems were packing 1.25M on a double
> sided disk. Shortly after that, the format died in favor of 5.25HD.
Fair summary, except that I'd have said 'the format lives on in 5.25"
HD' - IBM introduced the HD 5.25 inch diskettes to behave as much as
possible like 8 inch ones, even though that meant different magnetic
properties of the oxide from conventional 5.25". And IBM had enough
clout that this displaced the existing 80 track formats right out of the
market. IBM PCs that have HD drives have an 8 inch disk controller
controlling them.
So in summary, an 8 inch disk holds as much as a 5.25 inch one, although
older formats held less...
Now, does anyone know how much a 14 inch floppy held? (it was 14, wasn't
it?) For that matter, who else has ever seen one?
We had a drive at IBM which was bigger than the PC it plugged into. The
disk (I only ever saw the one!) was in a white card envelope instead of
the conventional black plastic one, and the slot where the head went in
was along one of the diagonals, but otherwise I remember blank-all about
it.
Philip.
