If it uses standard chips (i.e. data sheets exist), then it can be reverse-engineered! OK, the 290x chips are not simple, but data sheets exist, so it should be possible to make an FPGA do the same thing. I knew there was a reason why I stuck to classic computers ;-) -tony

And any decent electronics hacker can interface electron-tube logic to modern-day logic with fairly minimal effort. I expect the analogous statement to be true 50 years from now. /~\ The ASCII der Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse(a)rodents.montreal.qc.ca / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B

On Thu, 15 Jan 2004, Vintage Computer Festival wrote: This (no more low-level tech hackers) might very well be a reality, yes, if the current trends keep up. Scaring thought... Thats why you should go out more, Sellam... and I know *just* the place where we should go (first) :) Next week, gotta go to court tonight and tomorrow :( --f -- Fred N. van Kempen, DEC (Digital Equipment Corporation) Collector/Archivist Visit the VAXlab Project at http://VAXlab.pdp11.nl/ Visit the Archives at http://www.pdp11.nl/ Email: waltje(a)pdp11.nl BUSSUM, THE NETHERLANDS / Mountain View, CA, USA

On Thu, 15 Jan 2004, Vintage Computer Festival wrote: Bah, and you didnt even call me. Well, they're working on that. Having talked to evil Arabs with funny political opinions probably didn't help my case... :) --f Visit the Archives at http://www.pdp11.nl/ Email: waltje(a)pdp11.nl BUSSUM, THE NETHERLANDS / Mountain View, CA, USA

I have trouble imagining any such scenario in which the issue of interfacing then-modern logic to 50-year-old logic even arises. Well, yes, but then the issue is even less relevant. :) /~\ The ASCII der Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse(a)rodents.montreal.qc.ca / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B

----- Original Message ----- From: "R. D. Davis" <rdd(a)rddavis.org> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk(a)classiccmp.org> Sent: Thursday, January 15, 2004 4:33 PM Subject: Re: Emulators of Classic Computers animals: & such How often does a home user clip thier 300Watt amplifiers these days? People buy tube amps because they are made in small quantities and are much more expensive so it must be better $$$$$$$

I'm reminded of someone I met briefly - years ago - who apparently not only had an all-firebottle audio setup, but for the power output stage was using radio-station power transmitting tubes - running class A. Could heat his house with it, but it was dead flat from DC clear up into the megahertz. Sounds like overkill to me, but if that's what he wants to splurge on, well, we here on classiccmp are not in much of a position to cast asparagus :-) As for differences between tube and transistor...personally, I've never heard a side-by-side comparison, and my ear is not good enough to hear differences over a time-separated comparison. I know people who have, though, and they tell me the differences are small but real (probably below your typical few-hundred-dollar home speaker's resolution, though); absent personal experience to the contrary, I see no reason to doubt their claims. /~\ The ASCII der Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse(a)rodents.montreal.qc.ca / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B

----- Original Message ----- From: "William Donzelli" <aw288(a)osfn.org> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk(a)classiccmp.org> Cc: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk(a)classiccmp.org> Sent: Thursday, January 15, 2004 10:06 PM Subject: Re: Emulators of Classic Computers In every hobby there is overkill, my 3 year old Technics SA-DX1040 works fine for me and its only 100W x 5 channels

----- Original Message ----- From: "R. D. Davis" <rdd(a)rddavis.org> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk(a)classiccmp.org> Sent: Friday, January 16, 2004 12:03 AM Subject: Re: Emulators of Classic Computers animals: & such It all depends on the level you listen to, the size of the room, and the sensitivity of your speakers. I got my system jammed in my bedroom (all 6 speakers including 120watt 12" sub) and there is no way I will turn it all the way up because it would be too loud. I think sensitivity of my speakers is around 90dB (1w at 1 meter) every 3 dB down you go you need 2x the power for the same loudness. I would guess that most listening I do (background noise as I type this)would only need 10Watts. Even when watching gladiator fight seens on DVD I have never heard any clipping even when played VERY loud. Then again the sub is doing most of the hard work. Put my same setup in a much larger room and you would probably need a bit more power and a higher powered sub. Oh and yea Tommy in dts surround is very cool to listed to, but not as good as Dark Side of the Moon in dts with the stereo cranked and the door shut (you can still hear it outside in the back yard).

Hi, William Donzelli <aw288(a)osfn.org> sadi: I regularly abuse my tube amp that way - but I'm a guitarist and I'm *supposed* to do that :-) You can't beat the smell of a hot ouput transformer and the sight of four 6L6s glowing red-hot! Anyway the Russians, Chinese and Indians still make the tubes, and in fact have been increasing production lately to meet demand. -- Cheers, Stan Barr stanb(a)dial.pipex.com The future was never like this!

Quothe Teo Zenios, from writings of Thu, Jan 15, 2004 at 04:45:28PM -0500: That depends upon whether that amp is delivering 300W RMS or 300W peak power. For most consumer-grade amps, and car audio, I'd suspect that 300W means the later. Of course, when sitting at stop lights, listen to how many people play their 1200W (snicker) car stereos at levels where they're clipping. Nah, they like the warm glow of the thermionic valves and the classic sound. :-) Besides, look at how many people are also building their own tube amps without spending a fortune. A small amp delivering under 15W RMS shouldn't cost much at all to build from some spare parts, and even a pair of 280 W RMS mono tube amps wouldn't cost all that much more to build than it would cost to buy a used Phase Linear 400, solid-state amp or a couple of used Crown DC-300A, solid-state, amps in excellent condition. -- Copyright (C) 2003 R. D. Davis The difference between humans & other animals: All Rights Reserved an unnatural belief that we're above Nature & rdd(a)rddavis.org 410-744-4900 her other creatures, using dogma to justify such http://www.rddavis.org beliefs and to justify much human cruelty.

Quothe ben franchuk, from writings of Thu, Jan 15, 2004 at 09:07:46PM -0700: True (much of the time, that is)... but I don't see how someone who spends $15,000+ for a fairly low-wattage tube amp is getting his money's worth when someone can spend a fraction of that for some new Hammond audio and power transformers, plus some new or NOS tubes, a recycled chasis (heck, even the case from a PC could be used. :-) ...now, there's a good use for old '386 PCs! ), an assortment of caps, chokes and resistors from one's spare parts collection, spare wire, solder, etc. Wow, that seems like a lot for only 4 watts per channel. It seems that, with new and spare parts, one could build one of those for much less (it wouldn't cost me anything, due to having the transformers, tubes, etc. here for building an amp of that size, scavenged from equipment that I obtained, very inexpensively, some time ago, for parts. For not too much more than that, I was thinking that one could build a much larger tube amp, over delivering 200W RMS... ok, well... I stand corrected; actually, just the Hammond iron alone is going to cost nearly US$600, plus a few hundred dollars more for new tubes. Still, it's a heck of a lot less expensive than what people are paying for assembled tube amplifiers... still, too expensive for me at this time. Is what you're building a class-A triode amp, by the way? Other good news... not sure if anyone else has heard it, but Western Electric plans on resuming the manufacture of not only the 300B tubes here in the U.S., but possibly other types of tubes as well. :-) After resuming the manufacture of 300B tubes a while back, they had to reloate their equipment, and production stopped in 2002). That's right, audio tube production in the U.S., hopefully in 2004! For more info: http://www.westernelectric.com/whatsnew.html Hmmm, wouldn't a PC chasis, some chicken-wire and some bailing twine have been far less expensive? :-) For that reason, I've gone back to spending more time on my far older hobbies of electronics and audio and less time with computers, except for the applications that I need to use them for. Somewhere around here, I think that I may have a book from the 1970's pertaining to building a computer from TTL... will have to look for it. I only recall Byte (an article by Steve Ciarcia?) having published an article about building a computer from chips, but I think it used a microprocessor... hopefully someone can prove me wrong about that. -- Copyright (C) 2003 R. D. Davis The difference between humans & other animals: All Rights Reserved an unnatural belief that we're above Nature & rdd(a)rddavis.org 410-744-4900 her other creatures, using dogma to justify such http://www.rddavis.org beliefs and to justify much human cruelty.

...and I forgot to mention the WE 308B tube... 250W (max) of plate dissipation, 210W class A, made right here in the U.S. ...that tube is the sort of thing that most people dream of and desire for their audio satisfaction... gonna have pleasant dreams tonight! Oohhh, just think of a pair of those babies running in class AB with suitable iron, each 13 inches of glowing delight. While it's one monster of a tube, it's got monster of a price as well, alas. Using 866A mercury rectifiers, with their purple glow, with those 308Bs would be cool! (just don't drop the 866As!) -- Copyright (C) 2003 R. D. Davis The difference between humans & other animals: All Rights Reserved an unnatural belief that we're above Nature & rdd(a)rddavis.org 410-744-4900 her other creatures, using dogma to justify such http://www.rddavis.org beliefs and to justify much human cruelty.

Then it's high time somebody produced a _real_ computer kit. As in a pile of standard logic chips (no microoprocessors, no programmed devices, no FPGAs, although I will allow RAM :-)).... Alas I knopw the feeling. I'm spending rather more time fiddling with other toys (classic cmaeras, for example) too... Steve Ciarcia's bomebrew computers (he did several -- I remember an 8088 system in 5 chips, a sort-of PC compatible, a Z8 board without even thinking about it) were based on microprocessors. But I do remember a Byte article on making a homebrew CPU (from TTL). I think it was called 'EGO', and hung off a Tandy 2000. -tony

Sean 'Captain Napalm' Conner wrote: But it was micro programed with EPROMS. Nice idea. Ben.

Tony Duel wrote: There were few articles in european "elektor" about a computer build completely out of 74xxx. Was beginning of the 70's, and was called (?) the 74-computer. Would love to see this articles again ... cheers

Jos Dreesen wrote: 181's were priced at $3.75 in 1979, But micros were coming on strong and wiped the home brew ttl micros aside. I know. I built a ttl 181 / 189 based cpu and junked it for the altair. Jim Davis,.

Somewhere I have a Radio Shack book, a simple introduction to computing. All I can remember about it is that it's landscape format, has a green cover, and is spiral-bound along the top edge. Anyway, it contains a schematic for a very simple processor built from TTL (IIRC). Simple, in that it has 16 locations of 8 bits for the program memory, each 8 bit word is a 4 bit opcode and a 4 bit data memory address IIRC. I ought to find said book and spend an enjoyable afternoon soldering it up... -tony

On Fri, 16 Jan 2004, Tony Duell wrote: There has been a series of articles in the Elektor magazine from mid'74 until 1975 with the title "Computer 74". It was a real CPU that was built with SN74xx TTL parts. The Funkschau magazine showed the principles of a simple four species electronic calculator with transistors, this was in the late 60's. Christian

R. D. Davis wrote: Aopen makes a P4 motherboard that contain a tube, Here's the link: http://english.aopen.com.tw/products/mb/ax4b-533tube.htm Jim Davis.

On Thu, 15 Jan 2004, Ron Hudson wrote: Oh yeah? Are you willing to put money down on this? http://www.longbets.org/ :) -- 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 ]

Quothe Ron Hudson, from writings of Thu, Jan 15, 2004 at 02:34:47PM -0800: Who in their right mind wants that? Screw that. I'd go back to using a manual typewriter and re-inking my own ribbons if necessary, if I can no longer get any of my older computers to function at that point. Perhaps we'd all better be stocking up on acid-free paper as well as computer parts for classic systems. Free? Hardly. There would be a price to pay somehow, whether through theft of intellectual property or taxes. -- Copyright (C) 2003 R. D. Davis The difference between humans & other animals: All Rights Reserved an unnatural belief that we're above Nature & rdd(a)rddavis.org 410-744-4900 her other creatures, using dogma to justify such http://www.rddavis.org beliefs and to justify much human cruelty.

On Thu, 2004-01-15 at 12:29, der Mouse wrote: Yes, it's not THAT hard, and tubes are very forgiving in their way (never mind slow enough) but the knowledge is increasingly arcane is my point, and approaches used are often wildly different, and that this will occur again and again. In fact, our past is probably easier to deal with than tomorrow's. Stuff before now was often built from 'standard parts',and that's less true today, and certainly more true for the current silicon crop. Mainly my point was it's not safe to assume tomorrows past will be like today's.

Don't be so sure about "minimal effort". What if electricity is no longer used in computers, and the photon based computer is all that matters? What if binary becomes a thing of the past, replaced by bitstreams of probabilities? Or neural net technology finally explodes? 50 years is a long way away...and a great deal can happen. Yes, I think you still will be able to replace yesterday's and todays chips 50 years from now. Maybe it will be as easy as just letting some tools read an old databook, and out of the oven comes a nice hot chip ready to go. Maybe it will be a royal pain in the backside, as well. We can not say. What I can be certain of is that 50 years down the road, people will be finding caches of the old parts, just as today we find caches of 50 year old parts. Just like today, with a little legwork, almost anything will be able to be found. William Donzelli aw288(a)osfn.org