19 Jul
2010
19 Jul
'10
5:27 p.m.
On 7/19/10 7:16 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote:
Sweet! I will check that out. I've never seen a 606 in person.
The 92181 (a.k.a. CDC Keystone, a.k.a. DEC TU-80) is one of my
all-time favorite tape drives. Not vacuum-column, but still, an
ingenious and wonderful design. I've had three over the years, sold all
of them, have regretted it ever since. If anyone in the southeastern US
has one in need of a home..
-Dave
--
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL
Every
vacuum-column drive I've seen has used pressure sensors to
determine the position of the tape loops within the columns. Granted
I've not seen a HUGE variety of different drives, but...just sayin'.
Take a look at the bitsavers archive for the CDC 606 tape drive. 2
photosensors per column. (page 1-6). The 60x drives were marvels of
engineering and built like tanks.