15 May
1998
15 May
'98
2:07 a.m.
At 01:29 15-05-98 +0100, Tony Duell <ard(a)p850ug1.demon.co.uk> wrote:
Exactly! I've rescued two of the past business computers from my company
before being dumpstered. First, in 1991, was a 1982-vintage Hewlett Packard
HP250/30 of which I only knew a tiny bit but have learned a bunch since.
This was by simply tearing it apart, studying it, cleaning out much dust
and junk as part of my restoration, reassembling and firing it up. No
documentation whatsoever except for a small Command Reference Guide found
in a desk drawer. I have a stack of hand-drawn schematics of the CPU board
and parts of other boards plus part of the address map, etc. just from
spending time at it.
Next in May, 1997 I got a 1987-vintage IBM 9370 which is still a work in
progress as we've been very busy with buying and moving into a new house.
At least I have all the documents except for the OS manuals which a third
party software support vendor kept. From those docs and from tinkering with
the hardware I have learned a respectable amount but have more to go yet.
Would like to find IBM CE docs on this machine and the HP.
--Chris
-- --
Christian Fandt, Electronic/Electrical Historian
Jamestown, NY USA
Member of Antique Wireless Association
URL: http://www.ggw.org/freenet/a/awa/
On 14 May 98 at 15:24, Allison J Parent wrote:
Hmmmm... I've often accepted and/or rescued machines that I know nothing
about, and then found out about them by looking at the insides, playing
with them, getting the tech manual and reading that, etc. And I'll agree
that having the actual machine is a lot better than just reading the Fine
Manual. It interests me why some one wants a particular
machine especially
since you do not seem to know much about it.
Well, I can't speak for the person you were replying to, but in my
case I'm often interested in machines I know little to nothing about
because I'm interested in learning about them. Although you can
learn a lot without one, it can help if you have one to explore.
But, what is curious here is that somebody has asked for a particular
machine _by name_, and doesn't seem to know that much about it. Odd...
Well, I am looking for a decent DEC PDP-series machine though I don't know
(yet!) a lot about them. I've programmed a couple of DEC machines in
assembler and Pascal during various studies at the local college. That is
somewhat important to be a little prepared but it doesn't amount to much
because I have had virtually no hands-on hardware fun yet. Now I want to
get one to preserve and actually learn more upon. I've not asked here on
the list yet for one that's available, but someday within the next year or
so I will ask if one doesn't show up nearby to me beforehand.
My curiosity at wanting to learn how things work, such as what I've
reported above, has served me very well. I would not have the engineering
job such as I have now nor the activity I have in the antique radio
collecting hobby if I was not so interested. Life would be a whole heap
more boring IMO.
David Williams - Computer Packrat
-tony