30 Oct
2006
30 Oct
'06
3:18 p.m.
Ok so you do know different. Why is there so little
discussion of
these on the list?
There are VERY VERY few people that have such systems. I only know of at
most a dozen in the US, and most of them do not participate in on-line
discussions. A few rairly use email.
Is there a more appropriate list? Maybe as we all have
different
manufacturer's kit we have little to talk about, but we still face
Similar problems, thing like tracking down media, repairing peripherals, fault
finding logic, keeping the machine clean and stopping them rusting,
keeping the offline support stuff working - keypunches, Flexowriters,
Teletypes etc, though maybe that is not a problem for you as your
machine has a comms controller.
The Computer History Museum is formalizing the restoration process, now that
several machines have either been restored, or are in the process.
Surviving systems from before 1975 are very rare animals, esp mainframes,
since so many of them have been scrapped for precious metals. Sadly, there
is even less software that has survived. CHM didn't start seriously
collecting documentation nor software prior to the move to the West Coast in
the 90's. While they have an impressive collection of hardware, and a pretty
decent collection of US computer documentation now, the software holdings
pre 1975 are minimal.
I will be giving a talk at VCF this Saturday on the CHM software collection.
6:04 p.m.
There are VERY VERY few people that have such systems.
I only know of at
most a dozen in the US, and most of them do not participate in on-line
discussions. A few rairly use email.
Mainframe people also tend to be very introverted when it comes to
computers. Even on the IBM-MAIN list (a list for current IBM
mainframes), where a more than a few old timers are active, I tend to
get shooed away. Go away kid, you bother me...
> Is there a more appropriate list?
ClassicMainframes on yahoo, but it is next to dead.
Surviving systems from before 1975 are very rare
animals, esp mainframes,
since so many of them have been scrapped for precious metals.
I think for mainframes it is the machines *after* 1970 that are very
rare. They just were not saved. People had the good sense to save some
S/360s, but how many S/370s or 30xx series machines? The whole line of
20 years of IBM muscle computers is basically gone. The same is true
for the Burroughs and Univac machines of the same era. The only
mainframes of the era that did survive well are PDP-10s, and they are
pretty far from the basic definition of mainframe - they are more like
what we now call superminis.
--
Will
31 Oct
31 Oct
4:37 a.m.
Al Kossow wrote:
Surviving systems from before 1975 are very rare
animals, esp mainframes,
since so many of them have been scrapped for precious metals. Sadly, there
is even less software that has survived.
You know, I almost think that the UK picture is a little brighter in this
respect. Certainly there still seem to be healthy enough numbers of pre-1975
"desk sized" systems about (meaning that there are enough about for anyone who
has the necessary restoration skills to be able to have one). Finding them is
a little tricky, but they are there.
As for the mainframe picture - well, difficult to say. I expect there are
still one or two lurkers in private hands stashed away in barns and things,
and probably a handful more still in the basements of large companies.
CHM didn't start seriously
collecting documentation nor software prior to the move to the West Coast in
the 90's. While they have an impressive collection of hardware, and a pretty
decent collection of US computer documentation now, the software holdings
pre 1975 are minimal.
Again we're perhaps a bit better off there on the UK side of the pond, in that
we've done pretty well in securing the software to go with a lot of the
systems that we have. Our problem is a total lack of manpower, meaning that
the things that we do have aren't getting archived sufficiently (particularly
true of anything on magnetic media, but the same applies to paper tape too).
Unfortunately that can't change unless we get more volunteers.
Afraid I can't say what the UK Science Museum has in the way of software
archives; I've seen the hardware asset list but I don't know if an equivalent
for software even exists.
cheers
Jules
10:57 a.m.
Afraid I can't say what the UK Science Museum has
in the way of software
archives; I've seen the hardware asset list but I don't know if
an equivalent
for software even exists.
and as for other sources, the position with the ICT/ICL 1900 seems to be
that there is quite a bit about BUT it is not being made generally available
because of copyright problems.
Dave Holdsworth's work on saving George 3 (via software emulation of the
executive interface) seems to be operational but hard to find. Easiest
version to find was the one with the Algol68R compiler but Google currently
doesn't seem to know where it is.
Several other items did appear on http://www.fcs.eu.com/techlib/index.html
but are now "Not available yet - please try again soon" (and I didn't
manage
to grab everything when they were up) - same applies to the manuals (but I
got most of them). It is rumoured that a George 1/2 source tape exists - but
that nobody has the right version of GIN5 to assemble it. (memories of the
days when I kept a full source listing of G2 on my desk - complete with our
local modifications).
I have no idea whether any Operators Executive tapes exist - if they do I
hope they are complete as distributed: bootable at start of tape followed by
a complete source listing afterwards). I had a private project in mind to
"build" a 1900 on an FPGA - but if no Exec remains that would be pointless.
Andy
11:11 a.m.
New subject: HP 3000 Magnetic Tape
Hello, All...
I have a question... Does anyone here have the necessary hardware
and software to read a magnetic tape in HP 3000 Store Format? I believe
the machine writing it was using MPE 4.5 at the time, although I could
be off a bit on the number...
Peace,
Warren E. Wolfe
wizard at voyager.net
6:39 p.m.
Al Kossow wrote:
I would agree. I haev 3 or 4 pre-1975 Unibus PDP11s, a PDP8/e, a Philips
P850 and an HP9830 (along with a couple of 9100Bs, a couple of 9810s and
a 9820 if you count those as computers). I don't think any are _that_ rare...
Mainfreames are prohably another matter. I've not tried to collect those,
I certainly don't have the space for one.
-tony
Surviving systems from before 1975 are very rare
animals, esp mainframes,
since so many of them have been scrapped for precious metals. Sadly, there
is even less software that has survived.
You know, I almost think that the UK picture is a little brighter in this
respect. Certainly there still seem to be healthy enough numbers of pre-1975
"desk sized" systems about (meaning that there are enough about for anyone who
8:31 p.m.
ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) wrote:
I would agree. I haev 3 or 4 pre-1975 Unibus PDP11s, a
PDP8/e, a Philips
P850 and an HP9830 (along with a couple of 9100Bs, a couple of 9810s and
a 9820 if you count those as computers).
I can forsee a world where computers are being saved, but peripherals
and special-purpose machines (calculators, industrial controllers,
sequencers, etc.) are not.
Why?
Well, they aren't computers. And we're all here talking about computers.
And while there are museums of "science
and industry" they can only sample the automation that was happening
from the 1800's through the 20th century, often
having the control
system but none of the machinery, or the other way around. But
they
truly do set the context for the industry and people and machines.
And in the case of the peripherals, the computers aren't particularly
useful without them!
Private collectors fall into the same trap as the institutions
and museums, ending up with lots of CPU's but few of the necessary
peripherals.
Tim.
8:56 p.m.
In article <20061101013109.F0973BA4199 at mini-me.trailing-edge.com>,
shoppa_classiccmp at trailing-edge.com (Tim Shoppa) writes:
I can forsee a world where computers are being saved,
but peripherals
and special-purpose machines (calculators, industrial controllers,
sequencers, etc.) are not.
I agree, which is why I started collecting in two areas: serial
terminals and graphics boxes. "Graphics boxes" includes things like
dial boxes, button boxes and graphics tablets and even plotters.
However, I see things like large line printers and other such early
printing peripherals seem to be rare. They only seem to appear in
people's collections if they were part of a big bundle.
Any other peripheral collectors out there?
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html>
1 Nov
1 Nov
3:08 a.m.
On 1/11/06 01:56, "Richard" <legalize at xmission.com> wrote:
However, I see things like large line printers and
other such early
printing peripherals seem to be rare. They only seem to appear in
people's collections if they were part of a big bundle.
Any other peripheral collectors out there?
Yep, but only for items relating to my museum. The one thing I don't
actively pick up is printers because they're so generic. An exception is if
a particular printer was matched to or had to be used on a particular
machine.
--
Adrian/Witchy
Binary Dinosaurs creator/curator
Www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk - the UK's biggest private home computer
collection?
6:23 p.m.
Yep, but only for items relating to my museum. The one
thing I don't
actively pick up is printers because they're so generic. An exception is if
While I would agree that most later impact dot-matrix printers are of
little interest to me, there were some very odd machines out there that I
find fascinating. The Sanders printers that did up to 8 pases of the
printhead to produse very near letter quality output (one of the later
ones of those was build on a DIablo 630 chassis, and the output is very
much daisywheel quality, for all there's a 7 pin dot matrix head in
there). The Versatec V80 electrostatic printer is another odd beast -- it
builds up a charge image on special paper and then flows liquid toner
over it (yes, I have one, and not just beacuae it was one printer
supported on the PERQ).
-tony
7:23 p.m.
On 1 Nov 2006 at 23:23, Tony Duell wrote:
While I would agree that most later impact dot-matrix
printers are of
little interest to me, there were some very odd machines out there that I
find fascinating. The Sanders printers that did up to 8 pases of the
printhead to produse very near letter quality output (one of the later
ones of those was build on a DIablo 630 chassis, and the output is very
much daisywheel quality, for all there's a 7 pin dot matrix head in
there).
Like the printer in this thing:
http://www.sydex.com/durango/durango.html
Since it was pretty much Diablo people working on the printer in this
box, they knew about the Sanders work and developed their own
version, complete with downloadable and prop-spacing fonts. With a
film ribbon, it's very difficult to tell that a daisywheel didn't do
the printing. And you could print very large characters, unlike a
daisywheel. This one used a 9 wire printhead, however.
It uses a dedicated 8085 on a Multibus-sized PCB, along with the CRT
controller. A second PCB holds all of the printhead drivers on a
long heat sink, along with the drivers for the carriage motor (a 48v
Litton DC motor with optical position encoder).
For a time, management considered selling the printer as a stand-
alone unit and even built a prototype. But Japanese dot matrix
printers were making great strides and the project was dropped.
I suspect that the Japanese printer makers were pressed to come out
with a better product because of the need for higher print resolution
when printing Kanji characters.
Cheers,
Chuck
2 Nov
2 Nov
6:32 p.m.
On 1 Nov 2006 at 23:23, Tony Duell wrote:
A bit. That's not a Sanders 700, though...
AFAIK, all Sanders 700s were RO models, and didn't have a keyboard.
While I would agree that most later impact
dot-matrix printers are of
little interest to me, there were some very odd machines out there that I
find fascinating. The Sanders printers that did up to 8 pases of the
printhead to produse very near letter quality output (one of the later
ones of those was build on a DIablo 630 chassis, and the output is very
much daisywheel quality, for all there's a 7 pin dot matrix head in
there).
Like the printer in this thing:
http://www.sydex.com/durango/durango.html
Since it was pretty much Diablo people working on the printer in this
box, they knew about the Sanders work and developed their own
version, complete with downloadable and prop-spacing fonts. With a
That was the main deficiency of the Sanders 700. Fonts came on ROM
cartridges which plugged in in front of the carriage area. There was no
way to download them (although the hardware had the Wr/ line on one pin
of the cartridge slots, so a RAM cartridge would have been possible,
AFAIK the firmware didn't support it).
Still, it was an improvement on the older Sanders 12/7 (I have one of
those too). That machine had the fonts on EPROMs that you plugged into
one of the PCBs inside. Some ROM sockets took 2708s, some (3-rail) 2716s,
some 2732s. You pretty much had to order the font on the right type of
ERROM to fit whac sochets you had free...
film ribbon, it's very difficult to tell that a
daisywheel didn't do
the printing. And you could print very large characters, unlike a
daisywheel. This one used a 9 wire printhead, however.
The Sanders 700 electronics allowed for a 9 pin head -- I think that was
called a Sanders 900 printer. I don't have one, though.
It uses a dedicated 8085 on a Multibus-sized PCB, along with the CRT
controller. A second PCB holds all of the printhead drivers on a
The Sanders 700 has 3 microprocessors in it. A Z8 for character input. A
Z80 to format the lines, handle the fonts, etc. And another Z8 to control
the mechanism.
The main DRAM, hung off the Z80, is 9 bits wide. No, not 8 bits + parity,
but a full 9 bits. For a 9 pin head, of course.
The older 12/7 has just one Z80, but a lot of TTL + PROMs to drive the
printhead.
long heat sink, along with the drivers for the
carriage motor (a 48v
Litton DC motor with optical position encoder).
I can't rememebr what the Sanders 700 uses. I know the paper feed and
ribbon feed aare stepper motors, and I think the carriage feed is too.
Certainly the 12/7 has stepper motors for carriage feed and paper feed
(and an AC mains motor for ribbon feed).
-tony
1 Nov
1 Nov
8:53 p.m.
In article <m1GfPQZ-000IypC at p850ug1>,
ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) writes:
[...] The Versatec V80 electrostatic printer is
another odd beast -- it
builds up a charge image on special paper and then flows liquid toner
over it (yes, I have one, and not just beacuae it was one printer
supported on the PERQ).
Tektronix also made a very weird printer for its 40x0 graphics
terminals. The paper is silver-coated! For some of these weird
printers, the devices survive but its impossible to find media that
still works. The silver paper has a shelf life that makes me think my
partial roll is useless.
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html>
2 Nov
2 Nov
6:59 p.m.
Tektronix also made a very weird printer for its 40x0 graphics
terminals. The paper is silver-coated! For some of these weird
Silver, or silver compounds? I thought it was a photographic process,
using a 1-line CRT to expose the photographic paper.
printers, the devices survive but its impossible to
find media that
still works. The silver paper has a shelf life that makes me think my
partial roll is useless.
Indeeed. Thermal printers aren't too bad, since thermal fax paper
normally works (it certainly works in the HP9866). Well, unless it's an
HP7245 which used special sproketed thermal paper which seems to be
unobtainium...
-tony
9:25 p.m.
In article <m1GfmT7-000IypC at p850ug1>,
ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) writes:
The catalog describes it as "Standard Dry-Silver, 500 ft. per roll". See:
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/vintage/docs/tektronix/Tektronix%201982%2092.pdf>
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html>
Tektronix also
made a very weird printer for its 40x0 graphics
terminals. The paper is silver-coated! For some of these weird
Silver, or silver compounds? I thought it was a photographic process,
using a 1-line CRT to expose the photographic paper. 
10:35 p.m.
Tektronix also made a very weird printer for its 40x0 graphics
terminals. The paper is silver-coated! For some of these weird
Silver, or silver compounds? I thought it was a photographic process,
using a 1-line CRT to expose the photographic paper.
7 Nov
7 Nov
2:05 p.m.
Rumor has it that jwhitton may have mentioned these words:
Which leads me to wonder if anyone ever produced a
general purpose
oscillagraphic device for conventional printing use, as opposed to a plotter
or recorder?
It would depend on how you define "General Purpose." CompuGraphic had one
(the 8400 is the one I worked with) that used photo paper you had to
develop, but it was designed more for typography. If you define typographic
uses as "general purpose" than there was. If not, you prolly won't find any
because the photographic paper was quite expensive.
I'd wager that Linotype & others had similar systems, but I only worked
with the CompuGraphic back in the day.
Laterz,
Roger "Merch" Merchberger
--
Roger "Merch" Merchberger | "Profile, don't speculate."
SysAdmin, Iceberg Computers | Daniel J. Bernstein
zmerch at 30below.com |
6:06 p.m.
Yes.., I recall those. The cool part about them, *if*
I recall correctly, is
that the 'printing' was done by leading the individual light sources up to
the fixed print bar (which was full width) via fiber optics...., i.e., they
could obtain fine resolution without having to locate a mechanical device. I
can not for the life of me , recall how the light source(s) were controlled.
I thought it wsa a spexial 1-axis CRT with the deflection axis
perpendicual to the direction of paper movement.
Although the printer was noramlly used with a vector display, the printer
was really a raster device. It's possibke to read out the stored charge
image in a storage CRT, this was done by scanning an electron beam over
it. The horixontal deflection of the beam was syncronised to the
deflection of the beam in the printer's CRT, the vertical deflection of
the readout beam to the paper motion.
_Somewhere_ I have the service manual to one of these printers, but I
can't instantly put my hand on it.
Which leads me to wonder if anyone ever produced a general purpose
oscillagraphic device for conventional printing use, as opposed to a plotter
or recorder?
There have been, of coruse, many oscilloscope cameras over the years,
normally using a Polaroid film.
I have something called a Polaroid Videoprinter 4. Polaroid claim they
never made it, but anyway. What it consists of is a small CRT monitor (TV
rates, monochrome CRT), a wheel with R,G,B colour filters, a Polaroid
camera (SX70 film back + enlarger lens (which is, of course, designed to
be used at that sort of object/image distance) and a bit of electronics
to control it.
You feed in RGB video, it selects each in turn and feeds it to the
monitor wit hthe appropriate filter in the path between the CRT and lens.
After all 3 colours have been used, the print is ejected in the normal way.
I've heard of other, higher-resolution versions, I think Sigma Graphics
made one.
-tony
1 Nov
1 Nov
6:54 p.m.
And thusly were the wise words spake by Adrian Graham
On 1/11/06 01:56, "Richard" <legalize at xmission.com> wrote:
The printer for the Coleco Adam comes to mind...
Cheers,
Bryan
However, I see things like large line printers
and other such early
printing peripherals seem to be rare. They only seem to appear in
people's collections if they were part of a big bundle.
Any other peripheral collectors out there?
Yep, but only for items relating to my museum. The one thing I don't
actively pick up is printers because they're so generic. An exception is if
a particular printer was matched to or had to be used on a particular
machine.
2 Nov
2 Nov
3:51 a.m.
On 1/11/06 23:54, "Bryan Pope" <bpope at wordstock.com> wrote:
Correct, another example is the electrostatic Sinclair ZX Printer or the dot
matrix that matched the Apple Lisa, or the rebadged and repainted Epson
generic that was resold by Memotech to match their MTX series machines.....
--
Adrian/Witchy
Binary Dinosaurs creator/curator
Www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk - the UK's biggest private home computer
collection?
Yep, but only
for items relating to my museum. The one thing I don't
actively pick up is printers because they're so generic. An exception is if
a particular printer was matched to or had to be used on a particular
machine.
The printer for the Coleco Adam comes to mind... 
10:10 p.m.
Adrian Graham wrote:
Correct, another example is the electrostatic Sinclair
ZX Printer or the dot
matrix that matched the Apple Lisa
The ADMP? That later became the ImageWriter.
It was the same C. Itoh
printer as the ImageWriter, just with a parallel interface. The Lisa
could use either that, or the Imagewriter, so it's not all that rare a
printer. I believe the ADMP would also work with the Apple II's and
possibly the III's - basically anything that could use the ProFile
external hard drive should have been able to use the ADMP.
It's funny, but even Win2K has drivers for the C. Ithoh printer. I
suppose if you find one of the original ones and re-write it to match
the Lisa/Apple II parallel port, it would probably work (or vice versa.)
There was also a color inkjet printer for the Lisa by Canon I think -
unfortunately I can't find any information about its protocol, nor does
it have any drivers in common OS's.
5 Nov
5 Nov
6:20 p.m.
On 3/11/06 03:10, "Ray Arachelian" <ray at arachelian.com> wrote:
Adrian Graham wrote:
I mean this one:
http://www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk/scripts/picshow.php?image=lisa/apple-lisa-p
rinter.jpg
http://www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk/scripts/picshow2.php?image=/Museum/Adverts/
lisaadvert.jpg
Aka the DEC LA50, is this the same c.itoh printer you mean?
Correct, another example is the electrostatic
Sinclair ZX Printer or the dot
matrix that matched the Apple Lisa
The ADMP? That later became the ImageWriter.
It was the same C. Itoh
printer as the ImageWriter, just with a parallel interface. The Lisa There was also a color inkjet printer for the Lisa by
Canon I think -
unfortunately I can't find any information about its protocol, nor does
it have any drivers in common OS's.
This is interesting news, I've got pictures of Lisae with imagewriters and
that printer up there ^^^^ but no mention of an inkjet, I didn't know colour
inkjets were available at the time!
--
Adrian/Witchy
Binary Dinosaurs creator/curator
Www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk - the UK's biggest private home computer
collection?
8:25 p.m.
Yes, that is infact, the Apple Dot Matrix Printer (aka ADMP) which is
identical to the ImageWriter, except that it works over a VIA 6522
parallel port instead of the serial port that the ImageWriter uses.
They are all versions of the C. Itoh 8510. I'm not familiar with the
DEC LA50, but it's very likely that, it too, is a C. Itoh.
The Inkjet printer for the Lisa is the Canon PJ 1080A. I wish I had
some real docs for this printer, but I don't. Lisa's LisaDraw routines
(later rewritten in 68000 assembly and ported to the Mac and renamed as
QuickDraw) do support color, although its display is 1 bit black and white,
so, if you print a graphic that has color on this printer, you'll get color.
I believe these were 16 colors, so 4 bit.
There was also a Daisywheel printer for the Lisa too, which was very
interesting, since it supposedly could also print graphics too according
to the advertisements. I can imagine that it must have used a single
period character to poke dots, so it must have been super slow. I
couldn't find any real docs for it however.
Adrian Graham wrote:
On 3/11/06 03:10, "Ray Arachelian" <ray
at arachelian.com> wrote:
Adrian Graham wrote:
I mean this one:
http://www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk/scripts/picshow.php?image=lisa/apple-lisa-p
rinter.jpg
http://www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk/scripts/picshow2.php?image=/Museum/Adverts/
lisaadvert.jpg
Aka the DEC LA50, is this the same c.itoh printer you mean?
Correct, another example is the electrostatic
Sinclair ZX Printer or the dot
matrix that matched the Apple Lisa
The ADMP? That later became the ImageWriter. It was the same C. Itoh
printer as the ImageWriter, just with a parallel interface. The Lisa
There was also a color inkjet printer for the
Lisa by Canon I think -
unfortunately I can't find any information about its protocol, nor does
it have any drivers in common OS's.
This is interesting news, I've got pictures of Lisae with imagewriters and
that printer up there ^^^^ but no mention of an inkjet, I didn't know colour
inkjets were available at the time!
7 Nov
7 Nov
2:58 p.m.
On 6/11/06 01:25, "Ray Arachelian" <ray at arachelian.com> wrote:
They are all versions of the C. Itoh 8510. I'm
not familiar with the
DEC LA50, but it's very likely that, it too, is a C. Itoh.
It's identical to the ADMP only in DEC colours :) I don't have one and a
swift google image search turns up nothing, but just imagine a cream version
of the ADMP with a special DEC ROM and you're there. A note on the
Old-Computers.com site says the LA50 was made by NEC however, perhaps the
NEC one was C.Itoh too?
QuickDraw) do support color, although its display is 1
bit black and white,
so, if you print a graphic that has color on this printer, you'll get color.
I believe these were 16 colors, so 4 bit.
I've got a picture of that one somewhere but finding it quickly amongst all
my pictures might be difficult!
to the advertisements. I can imagine that it must
have used a single
period character to poke dots, so it must have been super slow. I
couldn't find any real docs for it however.
Time to dig my CDs out I think.....
--
Adrian/Witchy
Binary Dinosaurs creator/curator
Www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk - the UK's biggest private home computer
collection?
1 Nov
1 Nov
5:54 a.m.
Richard wrote:
However, I see things like large line printers and
other such early
printing peripherals seem to be rare. They only seem to appear in
people's collections if they were part of a big bundle.
Any other peripheral collectors out there?
My experience has generally been that they're no longer there and available to
be collected :( It seems like companies hoard the bits that they think might
be 'useful' somehow - things like CPUs and tape units - but generally toss the
rest (printers, terminals, and in a worrying number of cases documentation and
software too).
In other words, it's often too late and the peripherals have long gone.
cheers
Jules
6:11 p.m.
Any other peripheral collectors out there?
Sort-of. I like to run my machines with the original peripherals if at
all possible (not necessarily the ones that were originally used on that
particular CPU, but at least ones that would have been used on that type
of machine). So my minis tend to have the demountable 14" hard disks, for
example. I have a few HP printers and plotters for my HP 9000s and my
calculators. And so on.
There are some peripherals I've actively collected (in particular modem
with odd receiver circuits), but in general I just obtain them when I see
them.
-tony
31 Oct
31 Oct
9:04 p.m.
On 31 Oct 2006 at 20:31, Tim Shoppa wrote:
Private collectors fall into the same trap as the
institutions
and museums, ending up with lots of CPU's but few of the necessary
peripherals.
Bravo, Tim!
In my way of thinking, the LEAST important part of a system is the
CPU--heck, you can easily recreate that (or at leas a simulacrum)
using modern components.
But peripherals are a whole 'nuther smoke. Very difficult to
reproduce without expending large hunks of labor and money--and
essential to resurrecting the recorded media of bygone days. And
it's the peripherals that are the very devil to keep in working
order.
Heck, if you want to show folks a Spectrola 70 CPU, just keep the
empty cabinets and blinkenlights and stick a PeeCee inside with lots
of I/O lines to run the switches and lights. You'll have less grief
in the long run than if you had the real innards..
Bits are bits; they don't care how old the iron is.
After alll, it was the tape drives that defined a computer for
Hollywood for many years...
Cheers,
Chuck
9:54 p.m.
In article <45479038.22326.4735378C at cclist.sydex.com>,
"Chuck Guzis" <cclist at sydex.com> writes:
After alll, it was the tape drives that defined a
computer for
Hollywood for many years...
So far noone has responded to my earlier query in the affirmative:
Does anyone have enough tape drives that they can do the
multi-drive merge/sort tape algorithms described in Knuth's
Art of Computer Programming?
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html>
10:45 p.m.
Richard wrote:
In article <45479038.22326.4735378C at
cclist.sydex.com>,
"Chuck Guzis" <cclist at sydex.com> writes:
How many would that be?
Doc <-- mechanic, not programmer
After alll, it was the tape drives that defined a
computer for
Hollywood for many years...
So far noone has responded to my earlier query in the affirmative:
Does anyone have enough tape drives that they can do the
multi-drive merge/sort tape algorithms described in Knuth's
Art of Computer Programming? 
11 p.m.
On Tuesday 31 October 2006 22:45, Doc Shipley wrote:
Richard wrote:
Assuming it's the same as the one talked about on here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merge_sort
That's 4 drives. I could easily do that on DLT or 3480 media. :)
I've got enough 9-tracks to do that, but they're not all of the same
interface type, so it would be somewhat harder to do...
(3 IBM 3420's, 2 DEC TU81+'s, 2 SCSI 9 tracks, and a partridge..er..
Fujitsu M2444 PERTEC tape drive.)
I guess I could probably set up a VAX with two TU81+'s and the SCSI tape
drives...
Pat
--
Purdue University ITAP/RCAC --- http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/
The Computer Refuge --- http://computer-refuge.org
In article <45479038.22326.4735378C at
cclist.sydex.com>,
"Chuck Guzis" <cclist at sydex.com> writes:
How many would that be? After alll, it was the tape drives that defined a
computer for
Hollywood for many years...
So far noone has responded to my earlier query in the affirmative:
Does anyone have enough tape drives that they can do the
multi-drive merge/sort tape algorithms described in Knuth's
Art of Computer Programming?
1 Nov
1 Nov
12:18 a.m.
Patrick Finnegan wrote:
On Tuesday 31 October 2006 22:45, Doc Shipley wrote:
Hrrrm. I think I could do that on TZ30s. *shudder*
I know I could do it on SCSI DDS.
Richard wrote:
Assuming it's the same as the one talked about on here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merge_sort
That's 4 drives. I could easily do that on DLT or 3480 media. :) In article <45479038.22326.4735378C at
cclist.sydex.com>,
"Chuck Guzis" <cclist at sydex.com> writes:
How many would that be? After alll, it was the tape drives that defined a
computer for
Hollywood for many years...
So far noone has responded to my earlier query in the
affirmative:
Does anyone have enough tape drives that they can do the
multi-drive merge/sort tape algorithms described in Knuth's
Art of Computer Programming? I guess I could probably set up a VAX with two
TU81+'s and the SCSI tape
drives...
I could do that on the 11/84. Two TU80s and 2 TSZ07
Or cheat horribly and attach a bunch of TU58 emulators to a box with
multi-line serial board....
Doc
12:43 a.m.
On 31 Oct 2006 at 23:18, Doc Shipley wrote:
Or cheat horribly and attach a bunch of TU58
emulators to a box with
multi-line serial board....
...or just do it with some disk files.
When I first encountered really big (100MB+) hard disk storage, one
of the guys on my programming team was ecstatic because he thought he
could invent some really new and revolutionary sort using disk files--
after all, random access, unlike tape, takes little more time than
consecutive access (why did IBM ever call it "sequential"?) on a disk
file.
After about a month of fooling around with various ideas, he reported
that his balloon had been burst--a plain old balanced merge worked
about as well as anything.
Cheers,
Chuck
6:17 p.m.
Does anyone have enough tape drives that they can
do the
multi-drive merge/sort tape algorithms described in Knuth's
Art of Computer Programming?
How many would that be? 
31 Oct
31 Oct
11:31 p.m.
It was thus said that the Great Doc Shipley once stated:
Richard wrote:
How many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie Roll Tootsie
Pop? Let's find out ... one ... tw-hooo ... three <crunch>.
Oh, sorry.
Chapter 5.4.6: six tapes are used in the sample given in the section.
-spc (But the algorithm has been generalized for P tapes ... )
In article <45479038.22326.4735378C at
cclist.sydex.com>,
"Chuck Guzis" <cclist at sydex.com> writes:
How many would that be? After alll, it was the tape drives that defined a
computer for
Hollywood for many years...
So far noone has responded to my earlier query in the affirmative:
Does anyone have enough tape drives that they can do the
multi-drive merge/sort tape algorithms described in Knuth's
Art of Computer Programming?
1 Nov
1 Nov
1:17 p.m.
In article <4548186F.30908 at mdrconsult.com>,
Doc Shipley <doc at mdrconsult.com> writes:
Richard wrote:
I believe the example uses 6, but as mentioned the algorithm is
generalized to an arbitrary number of tape drives. Personally I think
to do it Hollywood style, you'd need at least 6 drives and it would be
even more impressive if you could get something like 12 drives all in
a row grinding away on it.
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html>
In article <45479038.22326.4735378C at
cclist.sydex.com>,
"Chuck Guzis" <cclist at sydex.com> writes:
How many would that be? After alll, it was the tape drives that defined a
computer for
Hollywood for many years...
So far noone has responded to my earlier query in the affirmative:
Does anyone have enough tape drives that they can do the
multi-drive merge/sort tape algorithms described in Knuth's
Art of Computer Programming? 
3:31 p.m.
Richard wrote:
I believe the example uses 6, but as mentioned the
algorithm is
generalized to an arbitrary number of tape drives. Personally I think
to do it Hollywood style, you'd need at least 6 drives and it would be
even more impressive if you could get something like 12 drives all in
a row grinding away on it.
Well a DEC TAPE I remember from the British TV series
"Connections".
That is Small Iron at work. :(
6:07 p.m.
Richard wrote:
I believe the example uses 6, but as mentioned the
algorithm is
generalized to an arbitrary number of tape drives. Personally I think
to do it Hollywood style, you'd need at least 6 drives and it would be
even more impressive if you could get something like 12 drives all in
a row grinding away on it.
To do it Hollywood style, you just need to make the tapes
move ... pause ... move ... pause ... (with nearby panel having
lots and lots of unlabeled lights flashing randomally)
Switches and knobs on the panel-of-lights are a plus.
You don't need to have it actually doing anything, just a
simple program to tick the drives every second or so (rewind
at end of tape and start over), and a rack of blinking Christmas
tree lights sitting nearby. You don't even need to sync the tape
drives to the lights, or worry that most of the lights blink
together.
6:15 p.m.
In article <454928A9.6040407 at srv.net>,
Kevin Handy <kth at srv.net> writes:
To do it Hollywood style, you just need to make the
tapes
move ... pause ... move ... pause ... (with nearby panel having
lots and lots of unlabeled lights flashing randomally)
Actually I think this is what happens normally when you run this
algorithm as it is designed to keep all the different drives moving
forward to merge the data onto destination drives. The point of the
algorithm is to avoid moving backwards on the tape, IIRC.
Switches and knobs on the panel-of-lights are a plus.
Cue the SAGE racks! Action!
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html>
6:36 p.m.
On 1 Nov 2006 at 16:15, Richard wrote:
> To do it Hollywood style, you just need to make
the tapes
> move ... pause ... move ... pause ... (with nearby panel having
> lots and lots of unlabeled lights flashing randomally)
Plowing through very short records (physical blocks) on an old drive
makes all sorts of interesting noise, too as the drive stops and
starts in the IRGs. I remember running a particular COBOL acceptance
test on CDC 607's that you could hear in the next county...
Cheers,
Chuck
11:31 a.m.
On Tue, 2006-10-31 at 19:54 -0700, Richard wrote:
Does anyone have enough tape drives that they can
do the
multi-drive merge/sort tape algorithms described in Knuth's
Art of Computer Programming?
That would be six, I believe. But, why? Just to say one did it?
In today's world, the way to implement the same algorithm would be to
use disk files; MUCH faster. With a TERABYTE of screaming fast disk
storage available for a desktop machine for about 500 pounds (around
$750 US) the REASON for a multi-tape sort has gone away. (Unless, of
course, one finds spinning tape reels exciting in themselves...)
Peace,
Warren E. Wolfe
wizard at voyager.net
11:54 a.m.
On Nov 1, 2006, at 9:31 AM, Warren Wolfe wrote:
That would be six, I believe. But, why? Just to
say one did it?
In today's world, the way to implement the same algorithm would be to
use disk files; MUCH faster. With a TERABYTE of screaming fast disk
storage available for a desktop machine for about 500 pounds (around
$750 US) the REASON for a multi-tape sort has gone away. (Unless, of
course, one finds spinning tape reels exciting in themselves...)
$750? You're getting ripped off.
Two SATA drives and a reasonable RAID controller can be had for $500
street in the US if you're willing to shop around. Considering single
750GB drives cost just under $350 in most major US markets, for
around $800 you can get two of them, an inexpensive RAID 0/1 capable
SATA controller, and have 1.5GB.
Hell, I carry a terabyte around with me now when I travel (a 500GB
Firewire drive, and a 500GB-equipped D-Link NAS box.. hey, I got to
have my movies and mp3s with me, right?).
As to WHY you'd want to do a sort onto tape, my To: field says this
is the classic computer mailing list. It sounds like a fun project
for somebody who as an old PDP (and the space for six tape drives) or
similar lying around. Heck, it might even make a fun programming
project to "emulate" it using a bitty box and some virtual "tape
drives". Lastly, it would make a great academic project for teaching.
My 2 cents. Unfortunately, it's in Canadian coin.
12:48 p.m.
On 1 Nov 2006 at 9:54, C Sullivan wrote:
As to WHY you'd want to do a sort onto tape, my
To: field says this
is the classic computer mailing list. It sounds like a fun project
for somebody who as an old PDP (and the space for six tape drives) or
similar lying around. Heck, it might even make a fun programming
project to "emulate" it using a bitty box and some virtual "tape
drives". Lastly, it would make a great academic project for teaching.
I suppose that if it was "performance art" that someone wanted to
create, the effect would be more spectacular if paper tape
punch/readers were used. No reason why it shouldn't work...AFAIK,
all of the access in the algorithms is write/read/rewind; no fancy
random skipping.
Cheers,
Chuck
1:37 p.m.
"Chuck Guzis" wrote:
On 1 Nov 2006 at 9:54, C Sullivan wrote:
Am I recalling correctly? I seem to remember watching the operators of
the (hmm. 370/158?) do that all the time. The would run a big
merge/sort and plop a lot of tapes in drives - I think we had at least
5, maybe more like 7-8 tape drives. Nice shiny vacuum column machines.
A joy to use and watch (course I never maintained them :-)
Originally we had something like a lowly 360/30 (this was in Wilmington
Del) but then a 370/158 was moved down from NYC. All of the databases
were on tape - disk was only used for temporary storage for a long time.
Later we got CICS and more on-line disk storage, and (yowza!) things like
source code control.
That place ran 24x7...
I'm having PL/1 flashbacks. ugg.
-brad
As to WHY you'd want to do a sort onto tape,
my To: field says this
is the classic computer mailing list. It sounds like a fun project
for somebody who as an old PDP (and the space for six tape drives) or
similar lying around. Heck, it might even make a fun programming
project to "emulate" it using a bitty box and some virtual "tape
drives". Lastly, it would make a great academic project for teaching.
I suppose that if it was "performance art" that someone wanted to
create, the effect would be more spectacular if paper tape
punch/readers were used. No reason why it shouldn't work...AFAIK,
all of the access in the algorithms is write/read/rewind; no fancy
random skipping.
3:41 p.m.
On 1 Nov 2006 at 13:37, Brad Parker wrote:
Originally we had something like a lowly 360/30 (this
was in Wilmington
Del) but then a 370/158 was moved down from NYC. All of the databases
were on tape - disk was only used for temporary storage for a long time.
Later we got CICS and more on-line disk storage, and (yowza!) things like
source code control.
729's on the model 30?
No matter how you cut it, sorting on tape beat sorting cards on unit
record equipment...
Cheers,
Chuck
2:29 p.m.
On Wed, 2006-11-01 at 09:54 -0700, C Sullivan wrote:
On Nov 1, 2006, at 9:31 AM, Warren Wolfe wrote:
Fine. I didn't check prices this week. Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea
maxima culpa.
That would be six, I believe. But, why?
Just to say one did it?
In today's world, the way to implement the same algorithm would be to
use disk files; MUCH faster. With a TERABYTE of screaming fast disk
storage available for a desktop machine for about 500 pounds (around
$750 US) the REASON for a multi-tape sort has gone away. (Unless, of
course, one finds spinning tape reels exciting in themselves...)
$750? You're getting ripped off. Hell, I carry a terabyte around with me now when I
travel (a 500GB
Firewire drive, and a 500GB-equipped D-Link NAS box.. hey, I got to
have my movies and mp3s with me, right?).
I don't know. For myself, I can usually get by with a subset of
them on my laptop. And, if the voices in my head ask for a specific
movie, I can take that along on DVD. I have a couple thousand DVDs, so
my motivation to pack hard drives with video is minimal. Your mileage
(ahem, 'kilometerage' may vary.)
As to WHY you'd want to do a sort onto tape, my
To: field says this
is the classic computer mailing list.
Oh, crap. Classic COMPUTERS? Where's the Judy Garland Fan Blog?
It sounds like a fun project for somebody who as an
old PDP
(and the space for six tape drives) or similar lying around.
Heck, it might even make a fun programming project to
"emulate" it using a bitty box and some virtual "tape
drives". Lastly, it would make a great academic project
for teaching.
All valid reasons to be interested, I'll grant you. Perhaps you
will grant ME that these various reasons require somewhat different
types of assistance, or at least a different tone of enthusiastic
grunting, if that is all that is required. A screwdriver to adjust head
azimuth is pointless if one simply wishes to emulate tapes on disk, eh?
(See, I speak your lingo. My name is not Wolfe for no reason.)
My 2 cents. Unfortunately, it's in Canadian coin.
Ah, that would explain it.
Peace,
Warren E. Wolfe
wizard at voyager.net
1:12 p.m.
In article <1162398718.6425.53.camel at linux.site>,
Warren Wolfe <wizard at voyager.net> writes:
On Tue, 2006-10-31 at 19:54 -0700, Richard wrote:
No, because having all those tape drives visibly spinning makes for
a familiar sight when it comes to old iron. People are *used* to "old
computers" looking like a large bank of spinning tape drives.
It boggles my mind why people think I am trying to perform "the
world's most efficient and timely sort" when I propose such a stunt.
If I wanted to do things efficiently and in a timely fashion, I
wouldn't use old hardware in the first place!
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html>
Does anyone have enough tape drives that they
can do the
multi-drive merge/sort tape algorithms described in Knuth's
Art of Computer Programming?
That would be six, I believe. But, why? Just to say one did it?
2:20 p.m.
On Wed, 2006-11-01 at 11:12 -0700, Richard wrote:
In article <1162398718.6425.53.camel at
linux.site>,
Warren Wolfe <wizard at voyager.net> writes:
Oh, okay. To me, "it looks cool" is a perfectly acceptable reason
to do it. But, if the aim was to sort some massive quantity of data, a
bit of technical assistance with the algorithm might be in order. As I
believe I mentioned before, laziness plays a factor in my decisions,
although I prefer the term "time management" for reasons which should be
obvious. I certainly am going to ASK if you want help with sorting data
before I offer you assistance.
But, don't think I don't approve of just wanting one's collection to
look good. For further effect, you might wish to mount (taking care to
allow for safety) some roman candles, to create that Irwin Allen effect,
should there ever be an infinite loop in one of your programs. The same
people who know that "old computers" consist of spinning tapes know that
programming errors start fires and cause explosions.
On Tue, 2006-10-31 at 19:54 -0700, Richard
wrote:
No, because having all those tape drives visibly spinning makes for
a familiar sight when it comes to old iron. People are *used* to "old
computers" looking like a large bank of spinning tape drives. Does anyone have enough tape drives that they
can do the
multi-drive merge/sort tape algorithms described in Knuth's
Art of Computer Programming?
That would be six, I believe. But, why? Just to say one did it? It boggles my mind why people think I am trying to
perform "the
world's most efficient and timely sort" when I propose such a stunt.
If I wanted to do things efficiently and in a timely fashion, I
wouldn't use old hardware in the first place!
Yep, that's a given, and I never thought you were trying to set any
records in your effort. It could be, though, that you were actually
intending to sort data that is on tape. It has happened -- I know, I
checked. <Grin>
For myself, I like to compare algorithms. There was a WONDERFUL DOS
program out there back in the early IBM PC days that took random data
(or data pre-sorted in various ways) and sorted it using various
algorithms, from bubble sort to heap sort to quicksort. The cool thing
was that all the retrieval and display code was identical, so one could
literally WATCH the data being sorted, and the time it took was affected
ONLY by the efficiency of the sorting algorithm. VERY instructional.
This program was called, unimaginatively, SORTDEMO. As computers got
faster, it became pointless, as ALL the sorts were over about the same
time they started, so one could no longer watch the data being
re-arranged. I just checked, and I still have that program. Maybe I'll
set up an old PC just to run it... it's sort of like a cyber-lava-lamp.
Peace,
Warren E. Wolfe
wizard at voyager.net
3:30 p.m.
In article <1162408830.6425.86.camel at linux.site>,
Warren Wolfe <wizard at voyager.net> writes:
For myself, I like to compare algorithms. There
was a WONDERFUL DOS
program out there back in the early IBM PC days that took random data
(or data pre-sorted in various ways) and sorted it using various
algorithms, from bubble sort to heap sort to quicksort. The cool thing
was that all the retrieval and display code was identical, so one could
literally WATCH the data being sorted, and the time it took was affected
ONLY by the efficiency of the sorting algorithm. VERY instructional.
This program was called, unimaginatively, SORTDEMO. As computers got
faster, it became pointless, as ALL the sorts were over about the same
time they started, so one could no longer watch the data being
re-arranged. I just checked, and I still have that program. Maybe I'll
set up an old PC just to run it... it's sort of like a cyber-lava-lamp.
What you describe with SORTDEMO is very valuable as an instructional
aid and has become a field of study in its own right. Google for
"algorithm visualization". At first it was a few people interested in
visualizing algorithms for instructional purposes or for interesting
experiments with their scientific visualization programs, but it has
become a field of study in its own right since the mid 90s. (Hey, it
qualifies for the ten year rule!)
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html>
7 Nov
7 Nov
3:36 p.m.
On Nov 1, 2006, at 2:20 PM, Warren Wolfe wrote:
For myself, I like to compare algorithms. There
was a
WONDERFUL DOS
program out there back in the early IBM PC days that took random data
(or data pre-sorted in various ways) and sorted it using various
algorithms, from bubble sort to heap sort to quicksort. The cool
thing
was that all the retrieval and display code was identical, so one
could
literally WATCH the data being sorted, and the time it took was
affected
ONLY by the efficiency of the sorting algorithm. VERY instructional.
This program was called, unimaginatively, SORTDEMO. As computers got
faster, it became pointless, as ALL the sorts were over about the same
time they started, so one could no longer watch the data being
re-arranged. I just checked, and I still have that program. Maybe
I'll
set up an old PC just to run it... it's sort of like a cyber-lava-
lamp.
Could you make that program available somewhere? I'd love to see
that.
-Dave
--
Dave McGuire
Cape Coral, FL
1 Nov
1 Nov
6:30 p.m.
On Tue, 2006-10-31 at 19:54 -0700, Richard wrote:
Am I reading the classic computers list or the modern PCs list?
The reason for implementing said algorithm (assuming I'm reading the
former) is (a) 'beause it's there' and (b) 'To preserve computer hardware,
software _and operating practices_ as far as possible' (as the
constitution for one old computer group I'm a mmeber of says in the
constitution) [emphasis mine].
-tony
Does anyone have enough tape drives that they
can do the
multi-drive merge/sort tape algorithms described in Knuth's
Art of Computer Programming?
That would be six, I believe. But, why? Just to say one did it?
In today's world, the way to implement the same algorithm would be to
use disk files; MUCH faster. With a TERABYTE of screaming fast disk
6:14 p.m.
Heck, if you want to show folks a Spectrola 70 CPU,
just keep the
empty cabinets and blinkenlights and stick a PeeCee inside with lots
I will pretend I didn't read that. Well, unless you can tell me how to
connect my Tekky 555 to the output of gate <foo> on the simulator
of I/O lines to run the switches and lights.
You'll have less grief
in the long run than if you had the real innards..
For the nth time, I have the tools, test gear, and documentation to
repair my classics. I don't have them for PCs. So a PC would cause me a
lot more problems than a classic. Period.
-tony
11 a.m.
Tim Shoppa wrote:
ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) wrote:
This may be true of the minority; I wouldn't know how to quantify
that. I do know that far more of my available cubic yardage is occupied
by storage peripherals and media than by system cabinets.
I also think that "private collectors subscribed to ClassicCmp" are
less likely to fall into that trap than collectors at large. We make
this point well and often.
Doc
I would agree. I haev 3 or 4 pre-1975 Unibus
PDP11s, a PDP8/e, a Philips
P850 and an HP9830 (along with a couple of 9100Bs, a couple of 9810s and
a 9820 if you count those as computers).
I can forsee a world where computers are being saved, but peripherals
and special-purpose machines (calculators, industrial controllers,
sequencers, etc.) are not.
Private collectors fall into the same trap as the institutions
and museums, ending up with lots of CPU's but few of the necessary
peripherals.
6:09 p.m.
ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) wrote:
As I haev said many times on this list, my main interest is electronics.
Not computing per se. Sure I like computers, but I regard them as being
ingenious digital [1] electronic systems which happen to be programmable.
[1] As yet Iv'e not obtained an analogue computer, unless you count some
of the servo systems in my hard drives, which IMHO are dedicated analogue
comptuers.
And so I can see as much beauty and interest in, say, the motor
controller of a plotter as in some CPUs. This is one reason I prefer the
old TTL-built machines -- there is little to investigate when you have a
few large ICs connected together, espeically when you don't have proper
data on them. There's a lot more interest to me in a few boads of simple
ICs -- gates, flip-flops, and the like -- which I can understand and
watch the signals on the inputs and outputs.
So yes, I collect peripherals, calculators, odd bits of control systems
[2] and so on. And of course processors
[2] I haev part (most?) of the control system from some kind of Xray
defraction system (no, I don't have the 'optics'). It's patchboard
programmable, uses DM160s as status indicators, etc. The papertape I/O
uses the punch and reader from a fride flexowriter, mounted on 19" rack
panels, and with their own motors. The printer is based on a Victor
Comptometer adding machine with solenoids over the keys. I am not sure
I'll ever use it, but it seemed worth rescuing...
-tony
I would agree. I haev 3 or 4 pre-1975 Unibus
PDP11s, a PDP8/e, a Philips
P850 and an HP9830 (along with a couple of 9100Bs, a couple of 9810s and
a 9820 if you count those as computers).
I can forsee a world where computers are being saved, but peripherals
and special-purpose machines (calculators, industrial controllers,
sequencers, etc.) are not.
Why?
Well, they aren't computers. And we're all here talking about computers. 
4:44 a.m.
Al Kossow wrote:
Surviving systems from before 1975 are very rare
animals, esp mainframes,
since so many of them have been scrapped for precious metals. Sadly, there
is even less software that has survived.
Now that you have the only purely German mainframe (TR-440), is there any
software with it, like BSM or PS440 or TEXAS etc.? Any software for the
Zuse machines?
Jules Richardson wrote:
You know, I almost think that the UK picture is a
little brighter in this
respect. Certainly there still seem to be healthy enough numbers of pre-1975
"desk sized" systems about (meaning that there are enough about for anyone
who has the necessary restoration skills to be able to have one). Finding
them is a little tricky, but they are there.
Well, we have two working LGP-30s, one from 1958, the second from 1963.
BTW they are the only two working in the world, the second one came to us
last year and includes the Calcomp plotter with interface box.
Christian
6552
days inactive
6560
days old
54 comments
24 participants
participants (24)
-
aek＠bitsavers.org -
andyh＠andyh-rayleigh.freeserve.co.uk -
ard＠p850ug1.demon.co.uk -
bfranchuk＠jetnet.ab.ca -
bpope＠wordstock.com -
brad＠heeltoe.com -
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