9 Oct
2007
9 Oct
'07
9:32 p.m.
Check the dates on your OLS PSUs - some of the early ones were
defective and could catch fire. I would think that Boeing would have
had them swapped out, but if it's an older Onyx (R4400 at 200MHz or
below probably) it might have been pulled from service before the
recall.
10 Oct
10 Oct
9:42 a.m.
In article <d511943883aacf56cb97a0c95ea5e729 at valleyimplants.com>,
Scott Quinn <compoobah at valleyimplants.com> writes:
Check the dates on your OLS PSUs - some of the early
ones were
defective and could catch fire.
I love it when people toss out stuff like this without any specifics
(what dates?).
The way people constantly warn of this and that on this list makes
you afraid to plug anything in and ever turn it on, which is a waste.
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html>
Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>
9 Oct
9 Oct
4:36 p.m.
In article <d511943883aacf56cb97a0c95ea5e729 at valleyimplants.com>,
Scott Quinn <compoobah at valleyimplants.com> writes:
It doesn't day that to me at all..
What it says to me is 'there might be a problem. Look for signs of
overheating (discoloured PCBs/connectors), and when you first turn it on,
don't leave it unattended. Keep an eye on it, and if starts to smoke,
kill the power and investigate'
-tony
Check the dates on your OLS PSUs - some of the
early ones were
defective and could catch fire.
I love it when people toss out stuff like this without any specifics
(what dates?).
The way people constantly warn of this and that on this list makes
you afraid to plug anything in and ever turn it on, which is a waste. 
10 Oct
10 Oct
9:48 a.m.
On Wed, 10 Oct 2007, Richard wrote:
Actually, in Scott's defense, I found the same document already (some days
ago) and it does not give dates nor serial numbers for the OLS' in
question. It simply says to keep paperwork out of the Onyx (!) and should
you notice a funny smell shut it down immediately. I kid you not.
The unit is, as Richard knows, an Onyx 10k - so I believe it's new enough
not to be an issue.
JP
Check the
dates on your OLS PSUs - some of the early ones were
defective and could catch fire.
I love it when people toss out stuff like this without any specifics
(what dates?).
The way people constantly warn of this and that on this list makes
you afraid to plug anything in and ever turn it on, which is a waste.
10:13 a.m.
In article <Pine.LNX.4.44.0710101147590.11599-100000 at localhost.localdomain>,
JP Hindin <jplist2007 at kiwigeek.com> writes:
On Wed, 10 Oct 2007, Richard wrote:
Actually, in Scott's defense, I found the same document already (some days
ago) and it does not give dates nor serial numbers for the OLS' in
question. It simply says to keep paperwork out of the Onyx (!) and should
you notice a funny smell shut it down immediately. I kid you not.
My point is that if you listened to every dire warning on this list,
you'd never plug anything in and use it.
Warnings about this and that are tossed out regularly on this list,
along with the immediate counter-opinion that those warnings are
exaggerations that you needn't concern yourself with.
Given all the conflicting information and personal anecdotes that
people swear by ("turning on a VT100 will destructively read the
ROM") that others have not experienced, the conflicting warnings and
advice have lead me to the conclusion of just generally ignoring all
such warnings and advice from this list.
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html>
Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>
Check the
dates on your OLS PSUs - some of the early ones were
defective and could catch fire.
I love it when people toss out stuff like this without any specifics
(what dates?).
The way people constantly warn of this and that on this list makes
you afraid to plug anything in and ever turn it on, which is a waste. 
10:41 a.m.
My point is that if you listened to every dire warning
on this list,
you'd never plug anything in and use it.
Warnings about this and that are tossed out regularly on this list,
along with the immediate counter-opinion that those warnings are
exaggerations that you needn't concern yourself with.
You are getting dangerously close to one of the great revelations of
collecting life:
Most collectors do not do anything with their collections.
Nearly all of us are on this constant drive to get new items, chase
them down, acquire them - then put them in the pile. 5 percent of the
pile gets used and played with 95 percent of the time. The dire
warnings are mostly as solid as a souffle.
Cue the usual suspects to rebut.
--
Will
9 Oct
9 Oct
4:41 p.m.
Most collectors do not do anything with their collections.
Nearly all of us are on this constant drive to get new items, chase
them down, acquire them - then put them in the pile. 5 percent of the
pile gets used and played with 95 percent of the time. The dire
warnings are mostly as solid as a souffle.
Cue the usual suspects to rebut.
Assuming I'm one of the 'usual suspects' :-)
I won't contradict your statnement because, alas, it;s true. Many
collectors (the perjorative term for them over here is 'stamp collectors')
never power anything up, and in fact won't allow machines to be powered
up for fear of daamaging them.
And you're right. Even those (and I include myself here) who do run their
classics spend most the time working with a very small part of their
collection.
-tony
10 Oct
10 Oct
4:48 p.m.
New subject: Working with collections (was Re: SGI Onyx - Three Phase to Two Phase conversion)
And you're right. Even those (and I include
myself here) who do run
their classics spend most the time working with a very small part of
their collection.
Well, FSVO "very small" and "working with".
At last count I had somewhere between 60 and 70 computers. Only a few
of them are off-topic here, and even them, only by the 10-year rule,
which has been repeatedly said by our listowner to be but a rough
guideline.
I currently have 15 of them up and running. That's between 1/4 and
1/5, which seems a little large to be "a very small part". However, I
could rarely be said to be "working with" more than about four of them
at any given time, and even that much only if you count things like the
router that's forwarding packets or the NFS sever the diskless machine
is using as being machines I'm "working with".
/~\ The ASCII der Mouse
\ / Ribbon Campaign
X Against HTML mouse at rodents.montreal.qc.ca
/ \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B
11:33 a.m.
On Oct 10, 2007, at 1:41 PM, William Donzelli wrote:
I'll take that cue. I regularly use the PDP-8/m that lives on my
desk, as well as my Kaypro 10 (though its hard drive died last week,
sob). I don't use much of my other stuff lately due to thermal
restrictions, but that's easing off now.
-Dave
--
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL
Farewell Ophelia, 9/22/1991 - 7/25/2007
My point is
that if you listened to every dire warning on this list,
you'd never plug anything in and use it.
Warnings about this and that are tossed out regularly on this list,
along with the immediate counter-opinion that those warnings are
exaggerations that you needn't concern yourself with.
You are getting dangerously close to one of the great revelations of
collecting life:
Most collectors do not do anything with their collections.
Nearly all of us are on this constant drive to get new items, chase
them down, acquire them - then put them in the pile. 5 percent of the
pile gets used and played with 95 percent of the time. The dire
warnings are mostly as solid as a souffle.
Cue the usual suspects to rebut. 
6:44 p.m.
New subject: Unused Collections (was: Re: SGI Onyx - Three Phase to Two Phase conversion)
Hi,
You are getting dangerously close to one of the great
revelations of collecting life:
Most collectors do not do anything with their
collections.
Nearly all of us are on this constant drive to get new items,
chase them down, acquire them - then put them in the pile. 5
percent of the pile gets used and played with 95 percent of the
time....
Never a truer word said....
I used to use the majority of my collection on and off, back when it was
limited to around 10 machines. Once it grew larger than that, things became
problematical (at one point I had well over 60 machines!). More and more
machines got "mothballed" I ended up with a situation where I simply don't
have the space to actually set up *ANY* of them....despite having gotten rid
of some 15 machines so far this year (and only acquiring 2 or 3 new ones).
The thing is though, my interest in them is primarily in the hardware
anyway. Once I've stripped them down, repaired them and found out what
"makes them tick" my interest in them is pretty much over (though again,
I've not had the room to strip down/repair any of the machines I've
collected over the past 10 years or so, dammit).
TTFN - Pete.
11 Oct
11 Oct
4:31 a.m.
New subject: Unused Collections
Ensor wrote:
The thing is though, my interest in them is primarily
in the hardware
anyway. Once I've stripped them down, repaired them and found out what
"makes them tick" my interest in them is pretty much over
Yeah, that's about the size of it for me, too. My main interests these days are:
1) Collecting prototype machines, or things which saw production
runs in the tens,
2) Collecting systems containing software which never got
released to the world.
3) Collecting basket-case machines purely for restoration.
4) Collecting unusual or uncommon peripherals, boards etc. for
more common systems.
I like the 'detective' side of the hobby I suppose, and in trying to put
together bits of a jigsaw puzzle and come up with conclusions which would
otherwise have been lost in the mists of time.
Messing around with some high production volume system is always of less
interest though, and I figure if it's something that's common I could just
pick one up any time I wanted. Often the hardware I've got is incomplete or
buggy, or never really had any kind of code written for it, so there's no way
of really "using" the machines I have anyway.
So yes, I've got lots of stuff and most of it's "unused". But it still
carries
some importance to me personally - which I suspect is what drives most
collectors. What might seem like junk to one person is in some way special for
the collector, making them reluctant to part with it even if it doesn't get
used. Never underestimate the power of the "I'll never get another one of
those" mentality :-)
cheers
Jules
4:13 p.m.
New subject: Unused Collections (was: Re: SGI Onyx - Three Phase to Two Phase
The thing is though, my interest in them is primarily
in the hardware
anyway. Once I've stripped them down, repaired them and found out what
"makes them tick" my interest in them is pretty much over (though again,
YEs, me too. Once I've understood tha hardware to the lowest level
possible (to gate/trasnsitor level in many cases), and once I've repaired
the machine so that it can boot the OS, etc, I try it out for a bit and
then generally loose interest and go to investigate something else.
-tony
7:23 p.m.
New subject: Unused Collections (was: Re: SGI Onyx - Three Phase to Two Phase
YEs, me too. Once I've understood tha hardware to
the lowest level
possible (to gate/trasnsitor level in many cases), and once I've repaired
the machine so that it can boot the OS, etc, I try it out for a bit and
then generally loose interest and go to investigate something else.
Tick one for me. Hardware is what drives me hard :o) Love to mess with
that :o)
12 Oct
12 Oct
4:42 p.m.
New subject: Unused Collections
To all,
I agree mostly with this thread, I do collect, the thrill of building or
rebuilding,
maxing out a config. And I do use some of the machines I have, but I do not
have
that many, I think as compared to others. About 70% of my collection serve
only to satisfy my "pack rat" habit and are "on display" in my
finished
attic.
I do use some as "furniture" like an end table in order to justify keeping,
others serve as space heaters.
Dan
----- Original Message -----
From: "Ensor" <classiccmp at memory-alpha.org.uk>
To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts"
<cctalk at classiccmp.org>
Sent: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 9:44 PM
Subject: Unused Collections (was: Re: SGI Onyx - Three Phase to Two
Phaseconversion)
Hi,
became
You are getting dangerously close to one of the
great
revelations of collecting life:
Most collectors do not do anything with their
collections.
Nearly all of us are on this constant drive to get new items,
chase them down, acquire them - then put them in the pile. 5
percent of the pile gets used and played with 95 percent of the
time....
Never a truer word said....
I used to use the majority of my collection on and off, back when it was
limited to around 10 machines. Once it grew larger than that, things problematical (at one point I had well over 60
machines!). More and more
machines got "mothballed" I ended up with a situation where I simply don't
have the space to actually set up *ANY* of them....despite having gotten
rid
of some 15 machines so far this year (and only
acquiring 2 or 3 new ones).
The thing is though, my interest in them is primarily in the hardware
anyway. Once I've stripped them down, repaired them and found out what
"makes them tick" my interest in them is pretty much over (though again,
I've not had the room to strip down/repair any of the machines I've
collected over the past 10 years or so, dammit).
TTFN - Pete.
6282
days inactive
6284
days old
13 comments
11 participants
participants (11)
-
alexandre-listas＠e-secure.com.br -
ard＠p850ug1.demon.co.uk -
classiccmp＠memory-alpha.org.uk -
compoobah＠valleyimplants.com -
ddsnyder＠zoominternet.net -
jplist2007＠kiwigeek.com -
julesrichardsonuk＠yahoo.co.uk -
legalize＠xmission.com -
mcguire＠neurotica.com -
mouse＠Rodents.Montreal.QC.CA -
wdonzelli＠gmail.com