17 Jun
2005
17 Jun
'05
11:16 a.m.
You may want to compare your drive to the documentation on the
HP 88780 under bitsavers/pdf/hp/tape
I looked at one on an AS400 a long time ago, and IBM appeared
to have OEMed the drive from HP.
It is also 1600/6250 only, and 88780s are pretty rough on
sticky tapes, so don't try using it on anything irreplacable.
17 Jun
17 Jun
11:38 a.m.
At 10:16 AM 6/17/2005, Al Kossow wrote:
It is also 1600/6250 only, and 88780s are pretty rough
on
sticky tapes, so don't try using it on anything irreplacable.
Speaking of sticky tapes, and being a few years short of
personal opportunity as a tape operator, I recently read
that operators would rub a bit of nose oil on the sticky
or unreadable spot on the tape, and then it would read.
True story?
- John
12:34 p.m.
On Friday 17 June 2005 08:16, Al Kossow wrote:
You may want to compare your drive to the
documentation on the
HP 88780 under bitsavers/pdf/hp/tape
These 9 track SCSI tape drives (HP 88780) were AKA 7979A, 7980A, 7980XC/SX.
The were OEMed by a LOT of manufacturers, including IBM, Sun, Tandem, etc.
BTW: I downloaded the service and user manual from Al's site - and also found
more information (IIRC parts list) on the Sun website.
I've got two of them, one of which is shared between my DOS/Linux
PUTR/Teledisk/RT "universal" copy machine and my PDP 11/83. Once cleaned and
adjusted (if necessary) I have found them very reliable reading and writing
1600 and 6250 bpi tapes (neither of my drives support 800).
They are a bit aggravating if a program fails to "observe" EOT - and read
until the tape is totally on the take-up reel. You have slide the drive out,
open the cover, rethread the tape by hand, "rewind" manually past the EOT,
close it up and then power up and rewind.
Cheers,
Lyle
--
Lyle Bickley
Bickley Consulting West Inc.
Mountain View, CA
http://bickleywest.com
"Black holes are where God is dividing by zero"
9:12 p.m.
Al wrote:
You may want to compare your drive to the
documentation on the
HP 88780 under bitsavers/pdf/hp/tape
Lyle wrote:
These 9 track SCSI tape drives (HP 88780) were AKA
7979A, 7980A,
7980XC/SX.
The were OEMed by a LOT of manufacturers, including IBM, Sun, Tandem, etc.
Note that most of the OEM'd drives were nearly identical to the generic
HP drive. The IBM 9348, though, has an entirely different control
panel (not just different legends). I have no idea how much difference
there was to the innards.
Eric
12:42 p.m.
On Friday 17 June 2005 08:16, Al Kossow wrote:
It is also 1600/6250 only, and 88780s are pretty rough
on
sticky tapes, so don't try using it on anything irreplacable.
A couple of other thoughts on this drive - there are two modes of operation of
the drive - one of which is much more gentle to tapes. I've set up my drives
to always operate in the "safe" mode by default. If I am create a new tape
with good media, I modify the "default" to "normal" tape handling.
You will want to dump out the 75 or so parameters programmed into the drive
and write them down before you change them. Slightly painful - but a very
smart thing to do. Use the Service Manual for guidance on how to do this.
Lyle
--
Lyle Bickley
Bickley Consulting West Inc.
Mountain View, CA
http://bickleywest.com
"Black holes are where God is dividing by zero"
2:06 p.m.
On Fri, 17 Jun 2005, Lyle Bickley wrote:
You will want to dump out the 75 or so parameters
programmed into the drive
and write them down before you change them. Slightly painful - but a very
smart thing to do. Use the Service Manual for guidance on how to do this.
Oops. I guess I shouldn't have gone changing parameters nilly willy ;) I
think I played with the first few settings, not really thinking I would
fix it, but in just exploring the machine. I didn't realize these were
"important" :) People sometimes do strange things at 4am.
Hopefully there's a "restore to factory defaults" option somewhere ;)
--
Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival
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2:02 p.m.
On Fri, 17 Jun 2005, Al Kossow wrote:
You may want to compare your drive to the
documentation on the
HP 88780 under bitsavers/pdf/hp/tape
I looked at one on an AS400 a long time ago, and IBM appeared
to have OEMed the drive from HP.
It is also 1600/6250 only, and 88780s are pretty rough on
sticky tapes, so don't try using it on anything irreplacable.
Ok, cool, thanks. I checked in the IBM section but didn't find anything
of course. This little bit of trivia helps.
--
Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org
[ Old computing resources for business || Buy/Sell/Trade Vintage Computers ]
[ and academia at www.VintageTech.com || at http://marketplace.vintage.org ]
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