24 Feb
2021
24 Feb
'21
11:40 p.m.
On Wed, Feb 24, 2021 at 7:06 AM Chris Zach via cctalk <cctalk at classiccmp.org>
wrote:
Yes, the TM02 and TM03 formatters allowed MASSBUS to
connect to Pertec
drives, but I don't think you could run a tape drive and a disk drive on
the same MASSBUS channel anyway. Wonder why, technically the MASSBUS
cable is just an extension of the Unibus, so it shouldn't matter much
what combination of cables you used. Maybe they just wrote different
drivers or something.
There's nothing in the hardware that prevents it from being done, but DEC
OSes don't support it, and it's generally not a good idea. Tape activity
would block disk activity, because it doesn't have anything like modern
"tagged command queuing".