10 May
2020
10 May
'20
3:59 p.m.
From: Stephen Buck
Looking for a pair of DEC RL02 drives, working or
otherwise, for a
PDP-11 restoration destined for a local computer museum
Well, there's this:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/264277971437
It's an RL01, not an RL02 as you were enquiring after, but RL02's are quite
rare now - and the price isn't bad.
Noel
10 May
10 May
4:05 p.m.
God, $140 is quite reasonable. I keep thinking of picking it up but then
I realize I can read my RL01's with my RL02's if needed, then move the
data to bigger disks.
But RL01's were great for running RT11 and other base operating systems.
C
On 5/10/2020 6:59 PM, Noel Chiappa via cctalk wrote:
From: Stephen
Buck
Looking for a pair of DEC RL02 drives, working or
otherwise, for a
PDP-11 restoration destined for a local computer museum
Well, there's this:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/264277971437
It's an RL01, not an RL02 as you were enquiring after, but RL02's are quite
rare now - and the price isn't bad.
Noel
5:37 p.m.
On Sun, May 10, 2020 at 7:05 PM Chris Zach via cctalk
<cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote:
God, $140 is quite reasonable.
Yes I think so too.
I keep thinking of picking it up but then
I realize I can read my RL01's with my RL02's if needed, then move the
data to bigger disks.
If you have the version of the RL02 that can be jumpered for either
RL01 or RL02 use, yes. I've seen people put switches on a plate under
the lid (over the old brush area) so that you dismount an RL02K, flip
the switches, mount an RL01K, then read it. One of the tricks is to
be sure to write-protect the RL01 pack in a modified RL02.
But RL01's were great for running RT11 and other
base operating systems.
Yep. I got an RL01 in 1985 to use with an RL8A and my PDP-8/a, then
it came in handy in 1987 when I got a gig where I needed my own PDP-11
to code at home and the RL01 was perfect for the boot volume (I
borrowed an RL02 from my boss for the customer data volume). Plenty
of room for the OS and my code.
Fantastic drives both.
-ethan
6:12 p.m.
If you have the version of the RL02 that can be
jumpered for either
RL01 or RL02 use, yes. I've seen people put switches on a plate under
the lid (over the old brush area) so that you dismount an RL02K, flip
the switches, mount an RL01K, then read it. One of the tricks is to
be sure to write-protect the RL01 pack in a modified RL02.
That is a good idea. A DPDT switch could flip to RL01 and engage the
write protect switch since I forget to do that. A lot.
Yep. I got an RL01 in 1985 to use with an RL8A and my
PDP-8/a, then
it came in handy in 1987 when I got a gig where I needed my own PDP-11
to code at home and the RL01 was perfect for the boot volume (I
borrowed an RL02 from my boss for the customer data volume). Plenty
of room for the OS and my code.
Same here. I ran a pdp11/03 at home in college and upgraded from RX01's
to an RL01. The speed was amazing and when I got a second one and an
11/23+ cpu I could run RSX11M and Decnet to connect to the school's
network.
Still they are a bit tempremental: My current pair of drives give a
different count of errors even though I have tuned the amps to proper
values on both of them. Bringing the value up more makes the errors go
down, maybe I should just crank em up.
But that will probably screw up writes. Hm.
6:52 p.m.
On Sun, May 10, 2020 at 9:12 PM Chris Zach <cz at alembic.crystel.com> wrote:
Indeed. I haven't done the mod myself (though I might in the near
future as I have a couple of RL01 packs to read out that are not near
my RL01 drive) but ISTR it may take more than one switch. Just throw
them all one way or the other and you should be fine.
Nice. Mine started out as an 11/23 (returned from a customer who
bought it from us about eight years previous). It came in a BA11-N
box with KDF11, memory, a DLV11J, and I think an LPV11. I had to buy
an RLV11 ($100 at the time) and I eventually got an RXV11 for cheap.
It was a fantastic single-user RT-11 development machine. The target
for my code was a $50,000 PDP-11/73 with a Fujitsu Eagle and 4MB of
RAM running TSX-11. I was always happy that I spent less than $500
outfitting myself to write programs for a machine that cost 100 times
as much.
If you have
the version of the RL02 that can be jumpered for either
RL01 or RL02 use, yes... write-protect the RL01 pack in a modified RL02.
That is a good idea. A DPDT switch could flip to RL01 and engage the
write protect switch since I forget to do that. A lot. ... in 1985...
PDP-11... the RL01 was perfect for the boot volume
Same here. I ran a pdp11/03 at home in college and upgraded from RX01's
to an RL01. The speed was amazing and when I got a second one and an
11/23+ cpu I could run RSX11M and Decnet to connect to the school's
network. Still they are a bit tempremental: My current pair of
drives give a
different count of errors even though I have tuned the amps to proper
values on both of them. Bringing the value up more makes the errors go
down, maybe I should just crank em up.
Hmm... That's something I've never had to fiddle with.
-ethan
11 May
11 May
5:18 a.m.
On 5/10/20 8:37 PM, Ethan Dicks via cctalk wrote:
On Sun, May 10, 2020 at 7:05 PM Chris Zach via cctalk
<cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote:
And when I think of how many of them I threw out because I couldn't
even give them away!!
bill
God, $140 is quite reasonable.
Yes I think so too.
10 May
10 May
4:12 p.m.
If you really want to fix an RL02 I have a pile of parts that equal a
RL02. Good spindle, power wires were eaten by mice, good electronics,
weird heads, good head servo system, good motor, etc.
That way I'll be forced to get the RL01. To fill the void in my life.
Where are you?
On 5/10/2020 6:59 PM, Noel Chiappa via cctalk wrote:
From: Stephen
Buck
Looking for a pair of DEC RL02 drives, working or
otherwise, for a
PDP-11 restoration destined for a local computer museum
Well, there's this:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/264277971437
It's an RL01, not an RL02 as you were enquiring after, but RL02's are quite
rare now - and the price isn't bad.
Noel
5:38 p.m.
On Sun, May 10, 2020 at 6:59 PM Noel Chiappa via cctalk
<cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote:
... but RL02's are quite rare now
Are they? Since I have had several of them since the 90s, I've never
tried to go buy more.
What's rare to me is RL01/RL02 absolute air filters. Finding a way to
repack the guts with new filter material would be fantastic.
-ethan
5:58 p.m.
I bought a pair of absolute filters for my RL02's. Good idea as one was
so plugged the heads could not fly.
C
On 5/10/2020 8:38 PM, Ethan Dicks via cctalk wrote:
On Sun, May 10, 2020 at 6:59 PM Noel Chiappa via
cctalk
<cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote:
... but RL02's are quite rare now
Are they? Since I have had several of them since the 90s, I've never
tried to go buy more.
What's rare to me is RL01/RL02 absolute air filters. Finding a way to
repack the guts with new filter material would be fantastic.
-ethan
1685
days inactive
1686
days old
8 comments
4 participants
participants (4)
-
bill.gunshannon＠hotmail.com -
cz＠alembic.crystel.com -
ethan.dicks＠gmail.com -
jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu