23 Apr
2006
23 Apr
'06
7:08 a.m.
OK, still sifting through this big pile o' stuff from DoveBid :-)
Some of you may recall that the lot included a PEP301 16 MHz System
Controller and I didn't know what it was. Well, its an IEEE-488
system controller built as an interface card and software combination
for a 386 PC clone. Its all branded with Tektronix logos though: main
unit, monitor and keyboard. Although there were no seals, it appears
new in box with a full set of manuals and software diskettes.
The manuals are a stock set of manuals for PC clones of the era
(GW-BASIC, MS-DOS 3.3, owner's manual for the PC) and a manual for the
Tektronix HPIB software utilities. There is this little dinky
pamphlet sort of manual for the keyboard. People seem to be selling
that online for some reason as if you need help in figuring out a
standard 101-key IBM PC keyboard?
I'll be scanning the Tektronix manual and uploading at some point and
try to make some disk images of the non-standard software bits.
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline"-- code samples, sample chapter, FAQ:
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/>
Pilgrimage: Utah's annual demoparty
<http://pilgrimage.scene.org>
24 Apr
24 Apr
5:33 a.m.
Richard,
How big is the unit? I've seen a coule of older Tek GPIB controllers
that were about 1 foot square and an 1 1/2" thick and I'm wondering if
that's the same as what you have. Who's GPIB card does it use?
BTW I'll see what I can track down on the terminal KB.
Joe
At 08:08 AM 4/23/06 -0600, you wrote:
OK, still sifting through this big pile o' stuff
from DoveBid :-)
Some of you may recall that the lot included a PEP301 16 MHz System
Controller and I didn't know what it was. Well, its an IEEE-488
system controller built as an interface card and software combination
for a 386 PC clone. Its all branded with Tektronix logos though: main
unit, monitor and keyboard. Although there were no seals, it appears
new in box with a full set of manuals and software diskettes.
The manuals are a stock set of manuals for PC clones of the era
(GW-BASIC, MS-DOS 3.3, owner's manual for the PC) and a manual for the
Tektronix HPIB software utilities. There is this little dinky
pamphlet sort of manual for the keyboard. People seem to be selling
that online for some reason as if you need help in figuring out a
standard 101-key IBM PC keyboard?
I'll be scanning the Tektronix manual and uploading at some point and
try to make some disk images of the non-standard software bits.
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline"-- code samples, sample chapter, FAQ:
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/>
Pilgrimage: Utah's annual demoparty
<http://pilgrimage.scene.org>
10:23 a.m.
In article <3.0.6.16.20060424123323.405f32fc at pop-server.cfl.rr.com>,
"Joe R." <rigdonj at cfl.rr.com> writes:
How big is the unit?
Stock IBM PC 386 clone size desktop with a stock monitor and keyboard.
I've seen a coule of older Tek GPIB controllers
that were about 1 foot square and an 1 1/2" thick and I'm wondering if
that's the same as what you have.
It looks like a run-of-the-mill desktop 386 PC.
Who's GPIB card does it use?
I haven't cracked open the case to check, but the docs refer to it as
a PC2A card and some of the docs apparently contain National
Instrument information, so perhaps its an NI card. It appears that
the Tektronix value-add is all in the software. Frankly, though the
4041 appears easier to configure and program than the PC based one
does based on the docs. On the PC, things are spread out through a
variety of utilities instead of it being a complete end-to-end
environment provided by Tektronix.
However, that's just an impression from the documentation, not from
actually using the unit. For my purposes (setting up an IEEE-488 data
interchange path between Commodore 8050 dual floppy drives and a PC),
the PEP might be a better choice simply because its already housed in
a PC. With the 4041, I'd have to transfer files back to a PC
environment through the serial console port on the 4041.
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline"-- code samples, sample chapter, FAQ:
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/>
Pilgrimage: Utah's annual demoparty
<http://pilgrimage.scene.org>
9:57 a.m.
At 11:23 AM 4/24/06 -0600, you wrote:
In article <3.0.6.16.20060424123323.405f32fc at pop-server.cfl.rr.com>,
"Joe R." <rigdonj at cfl.rr.com> writes:
I strongly suspected that it was. They seem to be the most common by
far. I even have a GPIB interface manual and SW set from IBM for the IBM PC
and it's a copy of the NI stuff and uses a NI GPIB card. I know other
companies use the NI stuff as well.
It appears that
How big is the unit?
Stock IBM PC 386 clone size desktop with a stock monitor and keyboard.
I've seen a coule of older Tek GPIB
controllers
that were about 1 foot square and an 1 1/2" thick and I'm wondering if
that's the same as what you have.
It looks like a run-of-the-mill desktop 386 PC.
Who's GPIB card does it use?
I haven't cracked open the case to check, but the docs refer to it as
a PC2A card and some of the docs apparently contain National
Instrument information, so perhaps its an NI card. the Tektronix value-add is all in the software.
Frankly, though the
4041 appears easier to configure and program than the PC based one
does based on the docs. On the PC, things are spread out through a
variety of utilities instead of it being a complete end-to-end
environment provided by Tektronix.
However, that's just an impression from the documentation, not from
actually using the unit. For my purposes (setting up an IEEE-488 data
interchange path between Commodore 8050 dual floppy drives and a PC),
the PEP might be a better choice simply because its already housed in
a PC. With the 4041, I'd have to transfer files back to a PC
environment through the serial console port on the 4041.
IMO You're MUCH better off with the PC! You have a good display, a real
keyboard and a real data storage system. The 4041 was ok when PCs were big
and expensive but now they're cheaper than the 4041.
Joe
Joe
3:38 p.m.
In article <3.0.6.16.20060424165708.467f2d38 at pop-server.cfl.rr.com>,
"Joe R." <rigdonj at cfl.rr.com> writes:
IMO You're MUCH better off with the PC! You
have a good display, a real
keyboard and a real data storage system. The 4041 was ok when PCs were big
and expensive but now they're cheaper than the 4041.
But the 4041 has a certain retro coolness to it :-)
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline"-- code samples, sample chapter, FAQ:
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/>
Pilgrimage: Utah's annual demoparty
<http://pilgrimage.scene.org>
8:11 p.m.
> IMO You're MUCH better off with the PC! You
have a good display,
*snerk* You need a C&C warning on things like that!
Good display? The platform that drove XFree86's madness? Where you
*can't* just have a memory-mapped framebuffer? Where the situation is
so chaotic that user-land programs are doing their own bus enumeration
(!!) to deal with the mess?? Where half the displays available don't
even have documentation!?
I'm used to Suns. You start X, it maps the framebuffer and it all Just
Works. It's not software subtrefuge, either; I've looked at all the
relevant code, clear from building my own ddx layer in the X server all
the way to the mmap routine in the driver, and it really is as simple
as it sounds. I've tried on two different occasions to get X working
on peecee-family hardware, and the best I ever managed was 320x200.
> a real keyboard
Where did you find a real keyboard for a peecee? Or did you just do
the level-shifter thing and hang the real keyboard off a serial port?
/~\ The ASCII der Mouse
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X Against HTML mouse at rodents.montreal.qc.ca
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25 Apr
25 Apr
2:30 a.m.
At 11:11 PM 4/24/06 -0400, der Mouse wrote:
OK now go back and put the rest of the message back in. The part where
we were talking about a Tektronix 4041 and weather to use it's "display"
and "keyboard" or to use a PC as a terminal for it. Then go take a look at
<http://www.classiccmp.org/hp/Tektronix%204041/Tektronix%204041.jpg>* so
that you'll know what the hell you're talking about! You obviously have
never used a Tektronix 4041! It has a single line LED display and a FEW
keys on the front panel and that's it. No a PC isn't a CAD system with
oddles of display memory, frame buffers and a touch type keyboard but it
still beats the hell of what the 4041 uses!
FWIW yes there was a "real" programmer's keyboard that was made for the
4041. But try to find one!! I had one, I took me about five years of
dedicated searching to find it. I'd be willing to bet that no one on the
list has one. They are SCARCE! A friend of mine is a real Tektronix
collector and has probably 25 4041s but even he didn't have a keyboard till
I gave him mine.
*The display is hard to read in the picture ut it says "VER. 2.0 MEM-512K
". That's about the limit of what the display is capable of.
Joe
> IMO
You're MUCH better off with the PC! You have a good display,
*snerk* You need a C&C warning on things like that!
Good display? The platform that drove XFree86's madness? Where you
*can't* just have a memory-mapped framebuffer? Where the situation is
so chaotic that user-land programs are doing their own bus enumeration
(!!) to deal with the mess?? Where half the displays available don't
even have documentation!?
I'm used to Suns. You start X, it maps the framebuffer and it all Just
Works. It's not software subtrefuge, either; I've looked at all the
relevant code, clear from building my own ddx layer in the X server all
the way to the mmap routine in the driver, and it really is as simple
as it sounds. I've tried on two different occasions to get X working
on peecee-family hardware, and the best I ever managed was 320x200.
> a real keyboard
Where did you find a real keyboard for a peecee? Or did you just do
the level-shifter thing and hang the real keyboard off a serial port?
9:33 a.m.
In article <3.0.6.16.20060425093058.0fa736e6 at pop-server.cfl.rr.com>,
"Joe R." <rigdonj at cfl.rr.com> writes:
FWIW yes there was a "real"
programmer's keyboard that was made for the
4041. But try to find one!! I had one, I took me about five years of
dedicated searching to find it. I'd be willing to bet that no one on the
list has one. They are SCARCE! A friend of mine is a real Tektronix
collector and has probably 25 4041s but even he didn't have a keyboard till
I gave him mine.
Heh heh... I figured as much. That dev keyboard lookd pretty funky
too! All kinds of application-specific keys, obviously custom built
for Tektronix and probably the rarest piece of 4041 accoutrements that
you could get.
It looks to me like most people used the serial port with a terminal for
programming. That's what *I* was planning on doing to play with the 4041.
For my purposes of data interchange, the PEP301 is probably a better
match since it is a PC. I have ISA NICs for which I could probably
locate drivers so that I could exchange data over the net with it.
*The display is hard to read in the picture ut it
says "VER. 2.0 MEM-512K
". That's about the limit of what the display is capable of.
How's your DC100 tape drive in your unit? I haven't tested mine yet,
but since its NIB I have high hopes. I definately will need to probe
the rubber capstan wheels :-).
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline"-- code samples, sample chapter, FAQ:
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/>
Pilgrimage: Utah's annual demoparty
<http://pilgrimage.scene.org>
26 Apr
26 Apr
6:50 a.m.
At 10:33 AM 4/25/06 -0600, you wrote:
In article <3.0.6.16.20060425093058.0fa736e6 at pop-server.cfl.rr.com>,
"Joe R." <rigdonj at cfl.rr.com> writes:
Probably but the 4041 DDU is also rare. It's a Disk Drive Unit for the
4041 and looks very much like a 4041. It has a HH 5 1/4" floppy drive and a
Seagate ST-225 (IIRC) 20 hard drive both mounted vertically in it. I have
one of those that's complete except for the interface cable and a second
one that's been half torn apart by a scrap dealer. IIRC you need a 4041
with the DDU interface in it to use the DDU.
FWIW yes there was a "real"
programmer's keyboard that was made for the
4041. But try to find one!! I had one, I took me about five years of
dedicated searching to find it. I'd be willing to bet that no one on the
list has one. They are SCARCE! A friend of mine is a real Tektronix
collector and has probably 25 4041s but even he didn't have a keyboard till
I gave him mine.
Heh heh... I figured as much. That dev keyboard lookd pretty funky
too! All kinds of application-specific keys, obviously custom built
for Tektronix and probably the rarest piece of 4041 accoutrements that
you could get.
It looks to me like most people used the serial port with a terminal for
programming. That's what *I* was planning on doing to play with the 4041.
For my purposes of data interchange, the PEP301 is probably a better
match since it is a PC.
There's probably not much reason to talk to a 4041 unless you intend to
use it. And the only thing that it's good for is a GPIB controller. These
days it would be much simpler to just use a PC as a GPIB controller. NI
GPIB cards are easy to find, cheap, well documented and you can program
them in Assembly, C, Fortran, BASIC and (I think) Pascal.
I have ISA NICs for which I could probably
locate drivers so that I could exchange data over the
net with it.
I don't have that unit any more I'm not sure what condition it was in. I
THINK it looked ok but at the time I didn't have any factory tapes to test
it with. FWIW I gave all my 4041 stuff to a friend of mine that's a
Tektronix NUT. I never got around to doing anything serious with it and he
has PILES of Tektronix stuff and I figure I can always borrow the stuff
back if I need.
I haven't tested mine yet,
*The display is hard to read in the picture ut
it says "VER. 2.0 MEM-512K
". That's about the limit of what the display is capable of.
How's your DC100 tape drive in your unit? but since its NIB I have high hopes. I definately will
need to probe
the rubber capstan wheels :-).
In the HP's, it's OBVIOUS when they're bad!
joe
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline"-- code samples, sample chapter, FAQ:
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/>
Pilgrimage: Utah's annual demoparty
<http://pilgrimage.scene.org>
11:15 a.m.
In article <3.0.6.16.20060426135034.10a7c12c at pop-server.cfl.rr.com>,
"Joe R." <rigdonj at cfl.rr.com> writes:
There's probably not much reason to talk to a
4041 unless you intend to
use it. And the only thing that it's good for is a GPIB controller. These
days it would be much simpler to just use a PC as a GPIB controller. NI
GPIB cards are easy to find, cheap, well documented and you can program
them in Assembly, C, Fortran, BASIC and (I think) Pascal.
Yes, however, I have heard various amounts of success in using a PC
with an NI GPIB controller talking to the CBM 8050. Apparently it
depends on the card/driver combination you use. Some will work and
some won't.
In the HP's, it's OBVIOUS when they're
bad!
Yeah, in my 2648A with the dead capstan its a puddle of goop under the
pin!
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline"-- code samples, sample chapter, FAQ:
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/>
Pilgrimage: Utah's annual demoparty
<http://pilgrimage.scene.org>
12:32 p.m.
At 12:15 PM 4/26/06 -0600, you wrote:
:-/
Joe
In article <3.0.6.16.20060426135034.10a7c12c at pop-server.cfl.rr.com>,
"Joe R." <rigdonj at cfl.rr.com> writes:
Any idea what's not working? It looks to me like the NI GPIB stuff is
MUCH more configurable than the HP or Tektronix.
There's probably not much reason to talk
to a 4041 unless you intend to
use it. And the only thing that it's good for is a GPIB controller. These
days it would be much simpler to just use a PC as a GPIB controller. NI
GPIB cards are easy to find, cheap, well documented and you can program
them in Assembly, C, Fortran, BASIC and (I think) Pascal.
Yes, however, I have heard various amounts of success in using a PC
with an NI GPIB controller talking to the CBM 8050. Apparently it
depends on the card/driver combination you use. Some will work and
some won't. In the HP's, it's OBVIOUS when
they're bad!
Yeah, in my 2648A with the dead capstan its a puddle of goop under the
pin! --
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline"-- code samples, sample chapter, FAQ:
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/>
Pilgrimage: Utah's annual demoparty
<http://pilgrimage.scene.org>
5:53 p.m.
In article <3.0.6.16.20060426193243.0f6fb49c at pop-server.cfl.rr.com>,
"Joe R." <rigdonj at cfl.rr.com> writes:
I don't know the specifics; I haven't had any IEEE controllers until
recently. (I have a SPARC 5 with an HPIB interface and now the 4041
and the PEP 301.)
NI cards appear on ebay but I've been reluctant to buy one because of
the hit or miss results reported by others.
There was discussion of this on the cbm-hackers list about this.
<http://www.paradroid.net/cbm-hackers.html>
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline"-- code samples, sample chapter, FAQ:
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/>
Pilgrimage: Utah's annual demoparty
<http://pilgrimage.scene.org>
Yes, however, I
have heard various amounts of success in using a PC
with an NI GPIB controller talking to the CBM 8050. Apparently it
depends on the card/driver combination you use. Some will work and
some won't.
Any idea what's not working? It looks to me like the NI GPIB stuff is
MUCH more configurable than the HP or Tektronix.
6814
days inactive
6818
days old
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