15 Nov
2001
15 Nov
'01
7:45 a.m.
On Thu, 15 Nov 2001, Ernest wrote:
From what I've seen, the cards are not the
valuable part of the setup.
The Drive is. Like most of the old Apple II cards, the Xebec card is
fairly durable and will continue to work for years. The drive on the
other hand is not so durable, and of the six that have passed through
my hands, only two of them still worked.
I have a Sider ][ (20 megger) I bought second-hand in around 1989 that had
been used for about 3 years in a 24/7 BBS. It still works to this day.
It had better...I still have tons of files that I need to get off of it
before its eventual demise :)
I also have I think one other Sider ][ and two Siders (the 10 meg version)
as well as a B-Sider (the tape backup unit). I got one Sider from my old
high school computer science teacher when I bought his Apple //e setup,
which never worked. The other Sider was found at a thrift store and
works great. I've used it at the VCF a couple times for processing
registrations. The Sider ][ was found at a local electronics surplus
store and doesn't work.
All in all, I find them to be fairly durable.
Plus, it seems that as these old Apple II computers
are sold off, the
Xebec cards get separated from the drives and sold or given away, and
the drives are thrown out, etc. My experience with these setups is the
cards are not common but much easier to find than the drive. So if you
have the drive, you're well on your way.
Yes, many times I've opened an Apple ][ to find the Xebec controller
inside. Nobody thinks to pull the card and keep it with the drive, most
likely because they just don't know.
I should say that before you spend to much effort
looking for the
card, make sure that your drive works. To do this, plug it in, turn it
on, and make sure that the power light comes on and the drive spins
up. If the drive doesn't spin up, you could have a problem. If it
doesn't spin up, open the case and try switching the power connector
to the drive (there are two of them.) If it still doesn't work, then
you likely have a dead drive, which is fairly common.
I don't know what's in the Sider, but the Sider ][ has a standard Seagate
ST-225. If you can find a good ST-225 then all you need are the Sider
utilities to reformat the drive and you're golden.
The Xebec card is a SASI (not SCSI) controller, and to
the best of my
knowledge will only work with the Sider drive. That also means that if the
drive is dead, you'll have a difficult if not impossible time finding a
replacement drive for it. Also, make sure that you're drive has the
The interface is SASI, but see above. The drive is standard MFM (or would
that be RLL?)
terminator cap on one of the two plugs on the back. I
had to have one
custom made because mine was missing. Obviously, you'll also need the
connecting cable between the drive and the Xebec card.
The cable and terminator cap usually turn up missing as well.
Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org