18 Jun
1997
18 Jun
'97
11:38 p.m.
On Mon, 16 Jun 1997, Uncle Roger wrote:
At 11:50 PM 6/15/97 -0400, you wrote:
Uh, I beg to differ about the Victor 9000 being the first computer to use
variable speed disk drives, as my CBM 2040 dual drive unit from 1979 does
this.
That's how it gets 21 sectors on tracks 1 to 17, 20 sectors on tracks 18
to 24, 18 sectors on tracks 24 to 30, and 17 sectors on tracks 31 to 35.
AFAIK, all PET-era CBM drives do this, and the 1540 and 1541 drives do as
well.
As Chuck Peddle designed the PET for Commodore, it is not surprising that
he went on to use variable speed drives in his own company's machine.
So what exactly is a Victor 9000???
Just another PC clone?
Not a clone, but similar. Max RAM was 768K, came with a Floppy Drive as
standard (IIRC). Was the first computer to use variable speed disk drives
(as the early Mac's did as well.) Ran an early version of MS-DOS, I think. And, IIRC, it pre-dated the IBM PC.
I thought the Victor 9000 was from around 1982. There's a review of it,
and an interview with Chuck Peddle, in the November 1982 issue of BYTE.
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Uncle Roger "There is pleasure pure in being mad
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