6 Oct
2015
6 Oct
'15
5:12 p.m.
While we're on the subject of half-inch tape, the innards of a CDC
half-inch tape cleaner, item 281807671456. The seller was surprised to
find out that the thing was merely a tape cleaner and not a tape drive,
so he probably would like to see an offer. It appears to be complete,
but for the outer cabinet. Sellers says it powers up just fine.
Not mine, but cleaners don't come up too often, so I thought the list
might be interested.
--Chuck
6 Oct
6 Oct
5:16 p.m.
would this be a good thing for audio tapes ?
On Tue, Oct 6, 2015 at 7:12 PM, Chuck Guzis <cclist at sydex.com> wrote:
While we're on the subject of half-inch tape, the
innards of a CDC
half-inch tape cleaner, item 281807671456. The seller was surprised to
find out that the thing was merely a tape cleaner and not a tape drive, so
he probably would like to see an offer. It appears to be complete, but for
the outer cabinet. Sellers says it powers up just fine.
Not mine, but cleaners don't come up too often, so I thought the list
might be interested.
--Chuck
5:54 p.m.
find out that
the thing was merely a tape cleaner and not a tape
drive, so he probably would like to see an offer. It appears to be
complete, but for the outer cabinet. Sellers says it powers up just
fine.
>
> Not mine, but cleaners don't come up too often, so I thought the list
> might be interested.
6:26 p.m.
On 10/06/2015 05:54 PM, Ali wrote:
Just curious how does it work?
Pretty simple--basically, it draws the tape over a carbide or ceramic
blade and scrapes loose surface oxide off; pads wipe both sides of the
tape. Usually, you can program this to do multiple cycles, measure out
BOT/EOT placement, etc. Can be very handy at times--most data centers
had them.
Mine also has a vacuum system that draws the tape over a perforated
grating and collects the yuck. Fast and slow speeds.
--Chuck
7:43 p.m.
Pretty simple--basically, it draws the tape over a
carbide or ceramic
blade and scrapes loose surface oxide off; pads wipe both sides of the
Chuck,
Thanks for the explanation. So then you would use this on tape w/o data or w/ data that
does not need to be retained? I ask because scraping off loose carbide sounds like it may
cause problems with data integrity.
-Ali
7:58 p.m.
On 10/06/2015 07:43 PM, Ali wrote:
Thanks for the explanation. So then you would use this
on tape w/o
data or w/ data that does not need to be retained? I ask because
scraping off loose carbide sounds like it may cause problems with
data integrity.
There's not much that's typically scraped off. What you get is a
dirt-free smooth surface. Most data centers ran used tapes through a
cleaning machine before returning the tapes to the scratch pool.
But I've not found that a tape cleaner affects existing data in any way.
A step up is a recertifier that writes and reads back a pattern and
notes the bad spots. Usually done after a cleaning pass.
--Chuck
8:19 p.m.
A step up is a recertifier that writes and reads back
a pattern and
notes the bad spots. Usually done after a cleaning pass.
--Chuck
Well apparently you can still buy recertifiers for the low low price of $8K w/ warranty. I
guess if you are the CHM or recovery outfit like yours Chuck it makes sense. You can also
get a new cleaner w/ warranty for $2K.
Was this equipment ever cheap (i.e. when it was prevalent and in use daily)?
-Ali
11:24 p.m.
On 10/06/2015 08:19 PM, Ali wrote:
Well apparently you can still buy recertifiers for the
low low price
of $8K w/ warranty. I guess if you are the CHM or recovery outfit
like yours Chuck it makes sense. You can also get a new cleaner w/
warranty for $2K.
Was this equipment ever cheap (i.e. when it was prevalent and in use
daily)?
If you were running a data center with many thousands of tapes, a
recertifier was probably a money saver. Was it ever cheap? I doubt
it--but worth its weight in rhodium.
I picked my cleaner up govt. surplus--brand new; the only thing missing
was the bottle of Freon TF. Apparently you're not allowed to sell the
stuff anymore.
It wouldn't surprise me if the government still has a few squirreled away.
In my case, the blade is a triangular silicon carbide affair, so 3 sharp
edges available for use. If I couldn't find a replacement, I could
easily have one made up by any of the machine tool refurbishers--but I
doubt I'll ever get to that place.
As far as a recertifier--no need here; I'm about reading tapes, not
writing them. Once the data is retrieved, there's no need to read the
tape again.
However, I am still looking for a an 800 BPI NRZI-capable drive.
--Chuck
7 Oct
7 Oct
12:46 p.m.
On 2015-Oct-06, at 11:24 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote:
However, I am still looking for a an 800 BPI
NRZI-capable drive.
I have an HP 7970A - 9-track, 800BPI - with my HP 2116. I wrote monitor commands to
exercise it and do tape dumps from it.
They're uncommon compared to 1600 & > BPI drives, figured that was because the
800 standard was older and saw a shorter life before being superseded, but are such drives
that rare or hard to come by?
(I rather wished it was 1600 so I could read more-common tapes.)
12:56 p.m.
On Wed, Oct 7, 2015 at 12:46 PM, Brent Hilpert <hilpert at cs.ubc.ca> wrote:
I have an HP 7970A - 9-track, 800BPI - with my HP 2116. I wrote monitor commands to
exercise it and do tape dumps from it.
They're uncommon compared to 1600 & > BPI drives, figured that was because
the 800 standard was older and saw a shorter life before being superseded, but are such
drives that rare or hard to come by?
(I rather wished it was 1600 so I could read more-common tapes.)
I have an 800BPI 7970B in a 2113B rack system. I've never gotten
around to trying to get it up and running. Are they fairly reliable
drives to get going again? I don't have any other 800BPI drives to
write any tapes to read with it.
1:29 p.m.
New subject: HP & 800BPI / was Re: Tape cleaner on eBay
On 2015-Oct-07, at 12:56 PM, Glen Slick wrote:
On Wed, Oct 7, 2015 at 12:46 PM, Brent Hilpert
<hilpert at cs.ubc.ca> wrote:
Well, the unit here was in pretty good physical condition as received.
It had a cascading failure in the capstan driver but it was a fairly straightforward fix.
I think there was one sluggish/partially-seized pulley bearing (freed up with some oil).
Pretty rugged drives as you know. I wonder about the capstan rubber in the long term but I
think that's about the only thing to worry about on age alone.
I think bitsavers nowadays has manuals and schematics for the B version as you have, years
ago I had to do some reverse-engineering for the capstan repair.
This page is over ten years old and needs some updating, but FWIW:
http://www.cs.ubc.ca/~hilpert/e/HP21xx/HP2116CSys/index.html
Note the tape drive repair log page linked there.
I have an HP 7970A - 9-track, 800BPI - with my HP 2116. I wrote monitor commands to
exercise it and do tape dumps from it.
They're uncommon compared to 1600 & > BPI drives, figured that was because
the 800 standard was older and saw a shorter life before being superseded, but are such
drives that rare or hard to come by?
(I rather wished it was 1600 so I could read more-common tapes.)
I have an 800BPI 7970B in a 2113B rack system. I've never gotten
around to trying to get it up and running. Are they fairly reliable
drives to get going again? I don't have any other 800BPI drives to
write any tapes to read with it. 
6 Oct
6 Oct
8 p.m.
On 10/6/2015 9:43 PM, Ali wrote:
That's all assuming you can find blades and pads for such a machine.
- J.
Pretty
simple--basically, it draws the tape over a carbide or ceramic
blade and scrapes loose surface oxide off; pads wipe both sides of the
Chuck,
Thanks for the explanation. So then you would use this on tape w/o data or w/ data that
does not need to be retained? I ask because scraping off loose carbide sounds like it may
cause problems with data integrity.
-Ali
6:02 p.m.
On 10/06/2015 05:16 PM, Adrian Stoness wrote:
would this be a good thing for audio tapes ?
I don't see why not, providing your audio tapes have the same hub
dimensions. (I'm not that familiar with 1/2" audio tape). Does audio
tape also use BOT/EOT reflective markers?
Reminds of the day way back when, when dealers of budget white-box audio
tape would take used 1/2" computer tape and slit it down the middle. I
think "Shamrock" was one such brand (obviosly a takeoff on Herbert Orr's
"Irish" brand tape).
--Chuck
6:41 p.m.
Temping to tell a friend to buy it got a 20,000 tape collect that needs to
be digitized of rare opera recordings
On Tuesday, October 6, 2015, Chuck Guzis <cclist at sydex.com> wrote:
On 10/06/2015 05:16 PM, Adrian Stoness wrote:
would this be a good thing for audio tapes ?
I don't see why not, providing your audio tapes have the same hub
dimensions. (I'm not that familiar with 1/2" audio tape). Does audio tape
also use BOT/EOT reflective markers?
Reminds of the day way back when, when dealers of budget white-box audio
tape would take used 1/2" computer tape and slit it down the middle. I
think "Shamrock" was one such brand (obviosly a takeoff on Herbert Orr's
"Irish" brand tape).
--Chuck
3364
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cclist＠sydex.com -
cctalk＠fahimi.net -
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