15 Feb
2016
15 Feb
'16
2:32 a.m.
On Sun, 14 Feb 2016, Jay Jaeger wrote:
Looking at this manual for the 7970B / 7970E I see
that dual 7/9 track
heads did exist.
Yes, but only in read-only configurations.
Yours has a plate that claims it has option 127 (as
well as 6, 7, 12 and 23). The 127 implies a 9 track only head, but I
suggest you pull the head cover off to see if you can find a part
number. What the plate claims, and what the machine actually is can
I've added another picture of a closeup of the R/W head. In my opinion
it's a 9 track read-after-write head. The geometry and gaps are identical
to those of the adjacent 7970B 800bpi-only tape drive we have.
differ for all sorts of reasons. And the sticker is
coming off at the
edges as well - it may have been *moved* from one frame to another.
Wouldn't be the first time - particularly in a university setting.
I think it's the original sticker, the options listed on the manual
(hand-written by HP on the cover page) match, and the date codes (1971)
match, too.
Christian