13 Dec
2006
13 Dec
'06
9:34 p.m.
Does anyone have experience with one of these puppies? There's one
for dirt cheap on ebay right now, item 170059136469.
Its Big. Its Blue. Its Heavy.
Its IBM!
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html>
Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>
13 Dec
13 Dec
9:56 p.m.
Richard wrote:
Does anyone have experience with one of these puppies?
There's one
for dirt cheap on ebay right now, item 170059136469.
Its Big. Its Blue. Its Heavy.
Its IBM!
It looks like an excellent specimen. It's on the wrong coast, and too
large for my collection.
the big problem with IBM communications gear like this is that it only
runs with IBM licensed
software. The public domain versions of MVS an VM won't support it, and
Linux on the
mainframe does not either.
Also it probably is attached via channels, as evidenced by the cable
block on the lower
picture, which makes it a bit of a white elephant in todays data
centers, which have moved
to ESCON for the most part.
At one time, I think the 3705, a predecessor was a modified 370
processor with a very
nice front panel. This one lacks that to make it pretty, and probably
makes it a bit safer
from scrappers who hack out such things and sell them
alone.
Jim
10:21 p.m.
In article <4580BD45.9030807 at msm.umr.edu>,
jim stephens <jwstephens at msm.umr.edu> writes:
the big problem with IBM communications gear like this
is that it only
runs with IBM licensed
software. The public domain versions of MVS an VM won't support it, and
Linux on the
mainframe does not either.
... at least that's the situation as it stands today. Things can
always change sociologically and legally to make a different story
tomorrow. But if noone saves the hardware today, how can a different
legal story tomorrow make a difference?
On the rescue list, it was just stated that Cray is willing to extend
hobbyist licenses these days.
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html>
Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>
10:29 p.m.
jim stephens wrote:
Richard wrote:
I believe there's limited support for the 3725 in z/Linux.
Peace... Sridhar
Does anyone have experience with one of these
puppies? There's one
for dirt cheap on ebay right now, item 170059136469.
Its Big. Its Blue. Its Heavy.
Its IBM!
It looks like an excellent specimen. It's on the wrong coast, and too
large for my collection.
the big problem with IBM communications gear like this is that it only
runs with IBM licensed
software. The public domain versions of MVS an VM won't support it, and
Linux on the
mainframe does not either.
14 Dec
14 Dec
6:47 a.m.
Sridhar Ayengar wrote:
jim stephens wrote:
I believe there's limited support for the 3725 in z/Linux.
Peace... Sridhar
I thought that you had to have NCP support to run any 37x5 device.
I know hercules emulates the 2703, I think and allows emulated bisync
support, and that is not covered by licence, but NCP is.
sorry for the off topic boring drift of this.
There are other com controlers, a 3745 and also someone has a
hugely priced 2540 reader punch (19,995) (vendor is retrosoft)
as well as another vendor with a 3803 (Patrick are you sure yours
works?)
for Patrick, an his problem with his mainframe pile, are the LIC
software sets covered by strict license? I thought you could get
replacements and could request whatever you liked, though your
box was sold as a "coupling facility", it might be worth asking for
a regular LIC set.
For those who may encounter hardware by IBM in the wild, there
are 8" diskettes which were the firmware for a lot of the older devices,
or configuration diskettes. Newer systems which may have either
PS2/30's PS2/70's or laptops which control the systems have
software you load on said systems to in turn boot the IBM boxes.
Some scrappers swipe the PS/2's thinking they are all the same, and
you have a devil of a time replacing them, and frequently can't
get the LIC to reload them.
Jim
13 Dec
13 Dec
10:45 p.m.
At one time, I think the 3705, a predecessor was a
modified 370
processor with a very
nice front panel. This one lacks that to make it pretty, and probably
makes it a bit safer
from scrappers who hack out such things and sell them alone.
The 3705 uses that modular processor family (whose name escapes me
right now), rather than something from the 360 stable. The 3725 may as
well - it found places in all sorts of non-processor IBM gear.
I am looking for a 3705 panel, as my example has been stripped.
3725s are falling off the Earth quickly - this may be one of the last
to be seen for a while, and it would be nice if someone took it. 3745s
are also in steep decline.
--
Will
15 Dec
15 Dec
10:24 a.m.
New subject: bus/tag channels (Was: IBM 3725 Communications Controller)
On Wed, Dec 13, 2006 at 06:56:05PM -0800, jim stephens wrote:
Also it probably is attached via channels, as
evidenced by the cable block
on the lower picture, which makes it a bit of a white elephant in todays
data centers, which have moved to ESCON for the most part.
The current mainframe in the shop I work in has mostly FICON channels.
There's a few ESCON cards in there also. Believe it or not we still have
some bus/tag channel attached 3274s, 3174s, not to mention a 6262 printer
that's bus/tag. Bus/tag channels were not an option with our current
mainframe so we had to get some bus/tag converters. I think the bus/tag
converters are attached to ESCON channels. The 3274s and 3174s are
definitely on their way out. We just replaced the last of the printers they
were supporting. Yes, until recently we still had several 4224 printers in
service.
Kevin
http://www.RawFedDogs.net
http://www.WacoAgilityGroup.org
Bruceville, TX
Si hoc legere scis nimium eruditionis habes.
14 Dec
14 Dec
10:05 a.m.
In article <4580C46E.90007 at gmail.com>,
Sridhar Ayengar <ploopster at gmail.com> writes:
Richard wrote:
Me? I have one of those funky IBM ("we only talk to our own world")
terminals. If it were convenient for me to pickup, I would adopt this
puppy.
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html>
Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>
Does anyone have experience with one of these
puppies? There's one
for dirt cheap on ebay right now, item 170059136469.
Its Big. Its Blue. Its Heavy.
Its IBM!
What are you going to hook it to?
10:16 a.m.
Richard wrote:
In article <4580C46E.90007 at gmail.com>,
Sridhar Ayengar <ploopster at gmail.com> writes:
But which *machine* are you going to hook it to?
Peace... Sridhar
Richard wrote:
Me? I have one of those funky IBM ("we only talk to our own world")
terminals. If it were convenient for me to pickup, I would adopt this
puppy. Does anyone have experience with one of these
puppies? There's one
for dirt cheap on ebay right now, item 170059136469.
Its Big. Its Blue. Its Heavy.
Its IBM!
What are you going to hook it to?
10:28 a.m.
In article <45816AC8.1000204 at gmail.com>,
Sridhar Ayengar <ploopster at gmail.com> writes:
Richard wrote:
FIIK. But hey, its still useful for keeping your shed from blowing
away in a tornado.
As I said earlier, I have various pieces to which I have nothing to
attach on the other end. My feeling is that with items of a certain
rarity, if you are given the opportunity, perhaps only once, to rescue
the item then you should. Figure out what to hook up to it later. ;-)
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html>
Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>
In article <4580C46E.90007 at gmail.com>,
Sridhar Ayengar <ploopster at gmail.com> writes:
But which *machine* are you going to hook it to? Richard wrote:
Me? I have one of those funky IBM ("we only talk to our own world")
terminals. If it were convenient for me to pickup, I would adopt this
puppy. Its IBM!
What are you going to hook it to?
10:57 a.m.
On 12/14/06, Richard <legalize at xmission.com> wrote:
In article <45816AC8.1000204 at gmail.com>,
Sridhar Ayengar <ploopster at gmail.com> writes:
Imagine this hooked up to a PDP8! or an Imsai! now thats cookin.
Richard wrote:
FIIK. But hey, its still useful for keeping your shed from blowing
away in a tornado.
As I said earlier, I have various pieces to which I have nothing to
attach on the other end. My feeling is that with items of a certain
rarity, if you are given the opportunity, perhaps only once, to rescue
the item then you should. Figure out what to hook up to it later. ;-)
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html>
Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/> In article <4580C46E.90007 at gmail.com>,
Sridhar Ayengar <ploopster at gmail.com> writes:
But which *machine* are you going to hook it to? Richard wrote:
> Its IBM!
What are you going to hook it to?
Me? I have one of those funky IBM ("we only talk to our own world")
terminals. If it were convenient for me to pickup, I would adopt this
puppy. 
11:17 a.m.
On Thursday 14 December 2006 11:06, Sridhar Ayengar wrote:
Robert Ollerton wrote:
There's no reason you couldn't hook this to, say, the P/370 that was just
on eBay (and had a bus and tag port). That's smaller than even an 8/e.
Pat
--
Purdue University ITAP/RCAC --- http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/
The Computer Refuge --- http://computer-refuge.org
Imagine this hooked up to a PDP8! or an Imsai!
now thats cookin.
The machines that this hooks to are a lot larger than the largest
PDP-8. 8-)
11:35 a.m.
Patrick Finnegan wrote:
There's no reason you couldn't hook this to, say, the P/370 that was just
on eBay (and had a bus and tag port). That's smaller than even an 8/e.
Except that (if memory serves) this kind of coprocessing communications
aggregator would be able to pass more data than the P/370 has I/O bandwidth.
Anyway, I've seen many P/390 installations that are bigger than a PDP-8.
Peace... Sridhar
Imagine this hooked up to a PDP8! or an Imsai! now
thats cookin.
The machines that this hooks to are a lot larger than the largest
PDP-8. 8-) 
11:36 a.m.
New subject: Nixdorf BA80 Terminal and Quattro Computer
Hello. I am searching for one BA80 terminal to use with one Nixdorf Quattro,
or one cable to connect the Quattro computer to one PC serial port and access
it using one Terminal Emulation program (like Netterm or similar). Contact
off list if consider it good.
Thanks and Greetings
Sergio
2:53 p.m.
On Dec 14, 2006, at 10:28 AM, Richard wrote:
But which *machine* are you going to hook it to?
FIIK. But hey, its still useful for keeping your shed from blowing
away in a tornado.
HEY! That's a great idea. I lost a shed during Hurricane Charley!
-Dave
--
Dave McGuire
Cape Coral, FL
> Its IBM!
What are you going to hook it to?
Me? I have one of those funky IBM ("we only talk to our own world")
terminals. If it were convenient for me to pickup, I would adopt
this
puppy. 
5:15 a.m.
On 12/14/06, Richard <legalize at xmission.com> wrote:
Does anyone have experience with one of these puppies?
There's one
for dirt cheap on ebay right now, item 170059136469.
I know a _little_ bit about them (we used to have a 3705 on our 4331
at Software Results, c. 1984).
Its Big. Its Blue. Its Heavy.
It is all of that.
If I'm remembering correctly, the 37x5 controllers are SNA PU Type 4
devices (the CPU is a PU Type 5, and terminal controllers like the
3274 are PU Type 2s). They are Channel Attached to the CPU and,
essentially, aggregate lots of comparatively low-speed I/O channels
and hand data (or take it) in big chunks to (from) the CPU. You
might, for example, hook a 3274 terminal controller to a 3705 (as we
did) to deploy a quantity of 3270 terminals. You might also hang a
3780 bi-sync workstation or emulator off of a sync channel of the
37x5, as we did as well.
I really only ever knew about these boxes from their standpoint on the
SNA network. I've never had to fiddle with the hardware.
If you don't have a full-on IBM mainframe-class CPU, I can't see how
you'd be able to do anything with this sort of box.
-ethan
10:10 a.m.
In article <f4eb766f0612140215v1badc03v46eea711d0b4e26d at mail.gmail.com>,
"Ethan Dicks" <ethan.dicks at gmail.com> writes:
If you don't have a full-on IBM mainframe-class
CPU, I can't see how
you'd be able to do anything with this sort of box.
Am I the only one that acquires hardware for which I don't (yet) have
any useful way to hook it up? I mean, I've got graphics accelerators
for Sun/DEC/IBM workstations where I don't have the card that goes into
the host, or even a host to hook it into. I've got an HP graphics
generator and no oscilloscope to hook it up to. I've got dial boxes
and tablets and no machine to hook them to. Eventually I hope to fill
in the missing pieces, but given that the pieces I have already are
hard to obtain, that may be impossible.
I have an offer of an E&S Picture System II monitor. Not the whole
terminal, just the monitor. Sure, I'll take that.
What's so wrong about rescuing a piece of classic equipment for which
you don't currently have anything else that goes with it? Nothing in
my book.
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html>
Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>
2:52 p.m.
On Dec 14, 2006, at 10:10 AM, Richard wrote:
Am I the only one that acquires hardware for which I
don't (yet) have
any useful way to hook it up? I mean, I've got graphics accelerators
for Sun/DEC/IBM workstations where I don't have the card that goes
into
the host, or even a host to hook it into. I've got an HP graphics
generator and no oscilloscope to hook it up to. I've got dial boxes
and tablets and no machine to hook them to. Eventually I hope to fill
in the missing pieces, but given that the pieces I have already are
hard to obtain, that may be impossible.
I have an offer of an E&S Picture System II monitor. Not the whole
terminal, just the monitor. Sure, I'll take that.
What's so wrong about rescuing a piece of classic equipment for which
you don't currently have anything else that goes with it? Nothing in
my book.
I'm with you there. :)
-Dave
--
Dave McGuire
Cape Coral, FL
10:08 a.m.
I note that the seller has 108 negatives. Would never
purchase
anything from someone with so many negatives
With 12338 positives? Thats a 99.1 percent approval rating. Quite respectable.
One must remember that when an Ebay buyer gets this big, it is
extremely difficult to please all of the people all of the time. Stuff
slips thru cracks. People that the buyer employs screw up. Things get
lost in the mail. And, there are always a few soreheads out there,
too.
--
Will
4:28 p.m.
At 10:08 AM 12/14/2006 William Donzelli wrote:
If 108 people are unhappy enough to leave a negative I dont care what
the percentages are he's a crook
I note that the
seller has 108 negatives. Would never purchase
anything from someone with so many negatives
With 12338 positives? Thats a 99.1 percent approval rating. Quite respectable.
4:35 p.m.
In article <7.0.1.0.2.20061214162747.0602ec50 at yahoo.com>,
Gene Ehrich <ygehrich at yahoo.com> writes:
At 10:08 AM 12/14/2006 William Donzelli wrote:
>>I note that the seller has 108 negatives. Would never purchase
>>anything from someone with so many negatives
>
>With 12338 positives? Thats a 99.1 percent approval rating. Quite respectabl
e.
If 108 people are unhappy enough to leave a negative I dont care what
the percentages are he's a crook
Just out of curiosity, have you ever run a business where the
customers are pulled from the general public?
There's nothing you can do about people who are assholes all by
themselves and expect you to burgle turds from their ass and smile
while doing it in the name of "customer service".
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html>
Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>
6:02 p.m.
Just out of curiosity, have you ever run a business
where the
customers are pulled from the general public?
There's nothing you can do about people who are assholes all by
themselves and expect you to burgle turds from their ass and smile
while doing it in the name of "customer service".
Folks, here is a man that has his head screwed on straight.
--
Will
4:47 p.m.
Gene Ehrich wrote:
At 10:08 AM 12/14/2006 William Donzelli wrote:
If 108 people are unhappy enough to leave a negative I dont care what
the percentages are he's a crook
Uh-huh. Maybe you should *read* some of the negatives - things like
people bitching about how they can't use a camcorder they bought because
no battery or leads were supplied - even though it states this quite
clearly on the ad.
Or the guy who seems to speak no English and has left negative feedback
for all the two dozen sellers he's bought from...
Gordon
I note
that the seller has 108 negatives. Would never purchase
anything from someone with so many negatives
With 12338 positives? Thats a 99.1 percent approval rating. Quite
respectable.
10:20 a.m.
In article <7.0.1.0.2.20061214080047.014e0200 at yahoo.com>,
Gene Ehrich <ygehrich at yahoo.com> writes:
At 09:34 PM 12/13/2006 Richard wrote:
They also have 12,400 positives. I note that other people on this
list have purchased from this seller with positive comments, as
recently as yesterday.
So out of curiosity, I browsed through all their recent feedback and
looked at the negatives. All of them were from people with a feedback
score of less than 50 themselves, some of them complaining about
things like custom fees (why is this the seller's responsibility?) and
other such stuff like "it doesn't work" on an item whose description
says "repair or use for parts".
This seller looks like a reasonable person to me, even when the buyers
aren't.
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html>
Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>
Does anyone have experience with one of these
puppies? There's one
for dirt cheap on ebay right now, item 170059136469.
I note that the seller has 108 negatives. Would never purchase
anything from someone with so many negatives
6424
days inactive
6425
days old
29 comments
12 participants
participants (12)
-
ethan.dicks＠gmail.com -
gordon＠gjcp.net -
jwstephens＠msm.umr.edu -
Kevin＠RawFedDogs.net -
legalize＠xmission.com -
mcguire＠neurotica.com -
pat＠computer-refuge.org -
ploopster＠gmail.com -
rollerton＠gmail.com -
spedraja＠ono.com -
wdonzelli＠gmail.com -
ygehrich＠yahoo.com