19 Feb
2016
19 Feb
'16
3:22 p.m.
Just started working on mine - been a back-burnered project for a long
time. Unfortunately all the cables were cut when it was dismantled; I
was lucky to grab just the CPU.
Got it powered up ok - no drama there. I faked cables to the port on
the WCS which drives the console and hooked up my trust VT220 at 2400
baud. Nada. No self-test prompt; no ROM> prompt.
Maybe I've messed up the faked console cable; I'll check - already
tried obvious things like making sure Rx & Tx were crossed (it's a
three wire cable according to the schematics - Rx Tx Gnd; no flow
control). But I'd like to know more about the assorted LEDs on the CPU
boards; maybe there's a clue there if it's not getting far enough into
the self-test to display console output. There's a fair few LEDs on
the M8391. But the doc I've looked through on Bitsavers doesn't seem
to document their meanings and interpretations. Can anyone help on
that point?
Hopefully this link works:
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10208521465663997&l=867897c786
Thanks
Mike
http://www.corestore.org
'No greater love hath a man than he lay down his life for his brother.
Not for millions, not for glory, not for fame.
For one person, in the dark, where no one will ever know or see.'
19 Feb
19 Feb
4:07 p.m.
On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 12:22 PM, Mike Ross <tmfdmike at gmail.com> wrote:
Just started working on mine - been a back-burnered
project for a long
time. Unfortunately all the cables were cut when it was dismantled; I
was lucky to grab just the CPU.
Got it powered up ok - no drama there. I faked cables to the port on
the WCS which drives the console and hooked up my trust VT220 at 2400
baud. Nada. No self-test prompt; no ROM> prompt.
Maybe I've messed up the faked console cable; I'll check - already
tried obvious things like making sure Rx & Tx were crossed (it's a
three wire cable according to the schematics - Rx Tx Gnd; no flow
control). But I'd like to know more about the assorted LEDs on the CPU
boards; maybe there's a clue there if it's not getting far enough into
the self-test to display console output. There's a fair few LEDs on
the M8391. But the doc I've looked through on Bitsavers doesn't seem
to document their meanings and interpretations. Can anyone help on
that point?
Hopefully this link works:
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10208521465663997&l=867897c786
OK apparently link didn't work... here's the pic:
http://www.corestore.org/730boardsLEDs.jpg
See row of red LEDs on M8391? On power-up the leftmost LED lights and
goes out. Then the rightmost two LEDs light and stay on...
Mike
http://www.corestore.org
'No greater love hath a man than he lay down his life for his brother.
Not for millions, not for glory, not for fame.
For one person, in the dark, where no one will ever know or see.'
20 Feb
20 Feb
4:56 a.m.
See row of red LEDs on M8391? On power-up the leftmost LED lights and
goes out. Then the rightmost two LEDs light and stay on...
I can't remember exactly what mine does, but I do remember 2 LEDs at one
end being on when it settles down. So I think yours is probably OK.
Of course I don't know mine works, I need to get a working TU58 tape...
-tony
5:44 a.m.
On Sun, Feb 21, 2016 at 1:56 AM, tony duell <ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk> wrote:
That's good to know on the LEDs. Yes I checked the PSU first; three
red lights. The baud rate switches are set for 4800 - the default.
think I have the console cable correct - and just in case I buggered
the Rx/Tx I tried it with them swapped. Nothing. Never so much as a
garbage character on the terminal - and I know the terminal works ok!
Nothing funky in the settings there as far as I can see.
Anything you can tell me about the POST on your machine - the timing
- what appears on the console and when etc. - would be helpful.
I plan to use an Arduino-based TU58 emulator when the time comes =
although I would like real working TU58s too!
Mike
http://www.corestore.org
'No greater love hath a man than he lay down his life for his brother.
Not for millions, not for glory, not for fame.
For one person, in the dark, where no one will ever know or see.'
See row of red LEDs on M8391? On power-up the leftmost LED lights and
goes out. Then the rightmost two LEDs light and stay on...
I can't remember exactly what mine does, but I do remember 2 LEDs at one
end being on when it settles down. So I think yours is probably OK.
Of course I don't know mine works, I need to get a working TU58 tape...
6:46 a.m.
> Of course I don't know mine works, I need to
get a working TU58 tape...
Perhaps I should have been a bit clearer, it does pass the console POST,
then gives read errors on both drives (as there is no tape in them), then
gives the ROM> prompt. So mine is getting further than yours, but until
I have a working microcode tape, I don't know how much of the rest of
the machine is good.
That's good to know on the LEDs. Yes I checked the
PSU first; three
red lights. The baud rate switches are set for 4800 - the default.
OK... Sounds like your PSU is OK. But worth checking the voltages
just in case!
think I have the console cable correct - and just in
case I buggered
the Rx/Tx I tried it with them swapped. Nothing. Never so much as a
When I was routing the cables in my machine (as I was rack-mounting it,
I had to put the R80, RL02, console, remote diagnostics, TS05 and
DMF32 cables all in at once), I actually buzzed out a few non-ground
connections between connectors on the distibution panel and IC pins
on the right board (from the printset) just to be sure I hadn't got them
mixed up or turned over or anything. It might be worth just checking
that the RS232 chips on the WCS board do connect to the pins on the
terminal you think they go to.
I don't want to 'teach you to suck eggs' (especially since I think you've
been doing this longer than I have) but bitter experience has taught me
that checking 'the obvious' as you go along means you only have real
faults to trace.
Anything you can tell me about the POST on your
machine - the timing
- what appears on the console and when etc. - would be helpful.
I will turn mine on later to check. IIRC it prints the first 4 or so characters of
the header line, then pauses (RAM check I think), then the rest of the line,
then the device error messages with a short pause between them, then
the ROM> prompt (from which you can only enter ctrl-C to try to re-read the
tape). One of the manuals on bitsavers (I think it's the diagnostic manual)
explains this, and mine seems to do what the manual says.
Have you checked signals round the 8085 yet? Is it being held reset? Is it
clocking, accessing ROM, etc?
I plan to use an Arduino-based TU58 emulator when the
time comes =
although I would like real working TU58s too!
I am more interested in having an 'original' machine than a machine to
run VMS on :-). What I mean by that is that I do want to have the TU58
working, rather than some replacement for it. I have replaced the drive
pucks, in fact I've just been turning another pair for my standalone
TU58 (which I will use to write a console tape if I can ever find a good
cartridge). The console tape I have has dropouts, is shedding oxide,
etc. The read waveform looks horrible.
I have socketed the 8155 I/O chip in both TU58s (11/730 CPU and
standalone). If I pull it, I can ground pins on the socket to select
a drive, start the motor, control speed (normal or seeking), direction
etc. I can then use a 'scope on the output of a read amplfier or
a logic analyser around the data separator to see what is going
on. Just got to keep an eye on how far the tape has gone so I
can reverse it before it runs off the end.
If I was going to use a solid-state replacement for the tape I would
probably use the original controller board, put the 8155 on a
daughterboard plugged into the 8155 socket on the controller,
use the port pins of the 8155 to link to some kind of flash memory
device and re-write the 8085 firmware. At least then it would be partly
the original. Using a processor with more components than the rest of
the machine (perhaps I exagerate...) seems a bit silly.
-tony
8:26 a.m.
New subject: Australian CP/M era computers?
Can anyone help idenitfy these?
https://www.reddit.com/r/vintagecomputing/comments/46nse6/a_family_member_f…
- John
11:23 a.m.
[...]
red lights. The baud rate switches are set for 4800 -
the default.
Eh? There is no way to set it for 4800 baud (the installation manual,
printset, and my tests all agree on what baud rates are available).
How do you have the switches set?
Note that if switch 2 (of the DIP switch at location E47 on the WCS
board which is the one that controls the console baud rate) is closed
then the 8085 consol processor is held in a wait state. If you have done
this then of course you will get nothing on the terminal.
-tony
2:48 p.m.
On Sun, Feb 21, 2016 at 8:23 AM, tony duell <ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk> wrote:
[...]
Ugh I brain-typoed; of course I meant "2400 - the default"!
And one of the first thing I did was check for traces going to pins on
the WCS console connector; that's why I'm confident my wiring is OK.
But I will recheck switches.
I haven't got into scoping the 8085 yet; this is really a quick and
dirty sanity check: does it get the ROM> prompt? Yes... great - move
on. Status known. No... check obvious finger trouble... still dead?
Not good but status known... move on.
Mike
http://www.corestore.org
'No greater love hath a man than he lay down his life for his brother.
Not for millions, not for glory, not for fame.
For one person, in the dark, where no one will ever know or see.'
red lights. The baud rate switches are set for
4800 - the default.
Eh? There is no way to set it for 4800 baud (the installation manual,
printset, and my tests all agree on what baud rates are available).
How do you have the switches set?
Note that if switch 2 (of the DIP switch at location E47 on the WCS
board which is the one that controls the console baud rate) is closed
then the 8085 consol processor is held in a wait state. If you have done
this then of course you will get nothing on the terminal.
4:03 p.m.
On Sun, Feb 21, 2016 at 8:23 AM, tony duell <ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk> wrote:
[...]
I just double checked. 3 was open; 4 was closed. That's default 2400.
Switch 8 was also closed; I have no idea of its function. All other
switches were open.
I set ALL switches to open - including 3 & 8. 3 & 4 open gives 9600
baud. I have no idea what setting 8 open does - but it didn't change
behaviour. Still nothing on console. Grrrr.
I might just try all switches *closed* on the basis that maybe it was
wired wrong but... no doesn't make sense; the system would have been
operational when decommissioned; the switch settings as I received it
must be valid...
Mike
http://www.corestore.org
'No greater love hath a man than he lay down his life for his brother.
Not for millions, not for glory, not for fame.
For one person, in the dark, where no one will ever know or see.'
red lights. The baud rate switches are set for
4800 - the default.
Eh? There is no way to set it for 4800 baud (the installation manual,
printset, and my tests all agree on what baud rates are available).
How do you have the switches set? 
4:09 p.m.
On 2/20/2016 7:03 PM, Mike Ross wrote:
I might just try all switches *closed* on the basis
that maybe it was
wired wrong but... no doesn't make sense; the system would have been
operational when decommissioned; the switch settings as I received it
must be valid...
Make sure the switches are actually working. Often, they're not.
- J.
21 Feb
21 Feb
2:57 a.m.
Well I haven't figured out exactly what the problem was but I'm
embarrassed to report it was indeed serial comms finger trouble. I
could have sworn that VT220 was fine and the cable wired correctly...
but to cover all bases I tried it with a USB serial port on the Mac
that sits in the lab.
It worked.
First time.
CONV011
Bugger me.
http://www.corestore.org/730cons.png
OK next is console tape... I have around 100 TU58 tapes. On close
examination the collection contained ONE console tape... for an 11/750
of course! So I'll be reaching for an emulator. Looking back at a long
thread on vintage-computers last year it appears that tu58em had
timing issues and was unusable on 11/730 but is now patched and
working correctly... watch this space!
Thanks for all the pointers.
Mike
On Sun, Feb 21, 2016 at 1:09 PM, js at cimmeri.com <js at cimmeri.com> wrote:
On 2/20/2016 7:03 PM, Mike Ross wrote:
--
http://www.corestore.org
'No greater love hath a man than he lay down his life for his brother.
Not for millions, not for glory, not for fame.
For one person, in the dark, where no one will ever know or see.'
I might just try all switches *closed* on the basis that maybe it was
wired wrong but... no doesn't make sense; the system would have been
operational when decommissioned; the switch settings as I received it
must be valid...
Make sure the switches are actually working. Often, they're not.
- J.
6:27 a.m.
Well I haven't figured out exactly what the
problem was but I'm
embarrassed to report it was indeed serial comms finger trouble. I
I have found that those little in-line RS232 testers with 7 or so bicolour
LEDs monitoring the important signals are very useful when working on
a machine with a serial terminal. If you get flickering on the TxD or RxD
LEDs then it is sending something.
could have sworn that VT220 was fine and the cable
wired correctly...
but to cover all bases I tried it with a USB serial port on the Mac
that sits in the lab.
It worked.
First time.
CONV011
There should be a pause between the 'CONV0' and the '11' IIRC
You should then get 2 lines of read errors for DD1 and DD0 in that
order. If you get a 'Device Error' then the TU58 controller is not
responding at all, either it is not plugged in or it has serious problems.
Bugger me.
Well, I'd rather not :-)
examination the collection contained ONE console
tape... for an 11/750
I have 2 genuine 11/730 console tapes. Not that it does me any good, they
both have dropouts and are shedding oxide. The output of the read amplifier
in the TU58 is 'interesting' shall we say.
I am currently rebulding a standalone TU58. My aim is to somehow find a good
tape (the hard part) and then to dump an 11/730 console tape image to it. That
means writing some kind of program to talk to the TU58 (another hard part).
-tony
22 Feb
22 Feb
12:11 a.m.
(replies inline)
On Sun, Feb 21, 2016 at 9:27 AM, tony duell <ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk> wrote:
Yes and I usually use such; I have an assortment of things from inline
testers to breakout boxes to Tektronic analysers. But this hookup was
so simple and obvious nothing could go wrong.... (!)
Indeed that's how it comes up. Very short pause since I have most of
the memory out as part of potential gotcha elimination - and the last
two tests are memory tests IIRC; they take a little longer.
Well I haven't figured out exactly what the
problem was but I'm
embarrassed to report it was indeed serial comms finger trouble. I
I have found that those little in-line RS232 testers with 7 or so bicolour
LEDs monitoring the important signals are very useful when working on
a machine with a serial terminal. If you get flickering on the TxD or RxD
LEDs then it is sending something. could have
sworn that VT220 was fine and the cable wired correctly...
but to cover all bases I tried it with a USB serial port on the Mac
that sits in the lab.
It worked.
First time.
CONV011
There should be a pause between the 'CONV0' and the '11' IIRC You should then get 2 lines of read errors for DD1 and
DD0 in that
order. If you get a 'Device Error' then the TU58 controller is not
responding at all, either it is not plugged in or it has serious problems.
Yep that was shown in the link I gave. In text it's:
CONV011
?27 READ ERROR DD1
?27 READ ERROR DD0
ROM>^C
?27 READ ERROR DD1
?27 READ ERROR DD0
ROM>
I have 2 genuine 11/730 console tapes. Not that it
does me any good, they
both have dropouts and are shedding oxide. The output of the read amplifier
in the TU58 is 'interesting' shall we say.
I am currently rebulding a standalone TU58. My aim is to somehow find a good
tape (the hard part) and then to dump an 11/730 console tape image to it. That
means writing some kind of program to talk to the TU58 (another hard part).
I did wonder how one might go about writing a tape image to a physical
tape... I'm happy to get the thing loaded via the emulator for now -
but I'd like to get real working tapes eventually.
If it helps your 'hard part' I have at least a couple of brand new
TU58 tapes - still sealed in plastic wrap...
Mike
http://www.corestore.org
'No greater love hath a man than he lay down his life for his brother.
Not for millions, not for glory, not for fame.
For one person, in the dark, where no one will ever know or see.'
3:05 a.m.
I have found that those little in-line RS232 testers with 7 or so bicolour
LEDs monitoring the important signals are very useful when working on
a machine with a serial terminal. If you get flickering on the TxD or RxD
LEDs then it is sending something.
Yes and I usually use such; I have an assortment of things from inline
testers to breakout boxes to Tektronic analysers. But this hookup was so simple and obvious nothing could go wrong.... (!)
One of the laws of research is 'In any collection of data, that figure which is
obviously correct, beyond all need of checking, is the mistake' :-). It applies
to hardware too (as I have found out the hard way more times than I care
to remember!).
[...]
There should
be a pause between the 'CONV0' and the '11' IIRC
Indeed that's how it comes up. Very short pause since I have most of
the memory out as part of potential gotcha elimination - and the last
two tests are memory tests IIRC; they take a little longer. You should
then get 2 lines of read errors for DD1 and DD0 in that
order. If you get a 'Device Error' then the TU58 controller is not
responding at all, either it is not plugged in or it has serious problems.
Yep that was shown in the link I gave. In text it's:
CONV011
?27 READ ERROR DD1
?27 READ ERROR DD0
ROM>^C
?27 READ ERROR DD1
?27 READ ERROR DD0
ROM> > I have 2 genuine 11/730 console tapes. Not that
it does me any good, they
> both have dropouts and are shedding oxide. The output of the read amplifier
> in the TU58 is 'interesting' shall we say.
>
> I am currently rebulding a standalone TU58. My aim is to somehow find a good
> tape (the hard part) and then to dump an 11/730 console tape image to it. That
> means writing some kind of program to talk to the TU58 (another hard part).
I did wonder how one might go about writing a tape
image to a physical
tape... I'm happy to get the thing loaded via the emulator for now -
but I'd like to get real working tapes eventually.
Given that some of the TU58 emulators seem to need a PC or similar to run
them, I am certainly not going to go that route! Modifying the TU58 firmware
to let it access some kind of flash device or possibly making a micorcontroller
board is a last resort if I can't get any tapes to work.
If it helps your 'hard part' I have at least a couple of brand new
TU58 tapes - still sealed in plastic wrap...
Alas that doesn't mean much. I unwrapped a tape like that, it was the only
time I've had a belt break. The tape seems to fail with age and shed oxide.
The tapes are of course pre-formatted, but it may be possible to make a
formatter for totally blank tapes. At least the format is documented, and it
doesn't involve anything that can't be written by a normal head.
-tony
21 Feb
21 Feb
6:43 a.m.
On Sunday, February 21st, 2016 at 23:57:22 +1300, Mike
Ross wrote:
Well I haven't figured out exactly what the problem
was but I'm
embarrassed to report it was indeed serial comms finger trouble. I
could have sworn that VT220 was fine and the cable wired correctly...
but to cover all bases I tried it with a USB serial port on the Mac
that sits in the lab.
It worked.
First time.
CONV011
Bugger me.
http://www.corestore.org/730cons.png
OK next is console tape... I have around 100 TU58 tapes. On close
examination the collection contained ONE console tape... for an 11/750
of course! So I'll be reaching for an emulator. Looking back at a long
thread on vintage-computers last year it appears that tu58em had
timing issues and was unusable on 11/730 but is now patched and
working correctly... watch this space!
Thanks for all the pointers.
Mike
Check
On Sun, Feb 21, 2016 at 1:09 PM, js at cimmeri.com
<js at cimmeri.com> wrote:
>>On 2/20/2016 7:03 PM, Mike Ross wrote:
>
>
>>I might just try all switches *closed* on the basis that maybe it was
>>wired wrong but... no doesn't make sense; the system would have been
>>operational when decommissioned; the switch settings as I received it
>>must be valid...
>>
>>
>Make sure the switches are actually working. Often, they're not.
>
>- J.
> 
2:33 p.m.
On Feb 21, 2016, at 02:57 , Mike Ross <tmfdmike at
gmail.com> wrote:
Looking back at a long
thread on vintage-computers last year it appears that tu58em had
timing issues and was unusable on 11/730 but is now patched and
working correctly... watch this space!
As a recap, I made a fork of tu58em which adds -x/--vax flags to work around a timing
issue that I encountered when using it with my VAX-11/730:
https://github.com/NF6X/tu58em/tree/nf6x
I was running tu58em on a Mac. I don't know if the same timing issue is present when
running tu58em on other platforms. If you want to try my modified fork, make sure you pull
code from the nf6x branch instead of the master branch; the master branch contains the
unmodified tu58em code that I patched.
I also put up the console tape images I use:
https://github.com/NF6X/VAX-11-730-Console-v57
Next time I resume playing with my 11/730, I'll probably work on getting tu58em
working with it when running on a Raspberry Pi, so I won't need to have my VAX
tethered to a laptop.
In the more distant future, I also plan to make a dedicated TU58 emulator that clicks into
place in one of the tape drive slots and plugs into the original internal cables.
It'll be unobtrusive, and the UI will be the same as on an original drive (simply swap
an SD card instead of swapping a tape). I like originality, but my experience so far has
led me to utterly distrust TU58 tape cartridges. I might even design it to connect inline
between the VAX and the real TU58 drive, such that when either SD card slot is empty,
accesses to that unit will be forwarded to the corresponding real TU58 drive unit.
--
Mark J. Blair, NF6X <nf6x at nf6x.net>
http://www.nf6x.net/
2:41 p.m.
On Mon, Feb 22, 2016 at 11:33 AM, Mark J. Blair <nf6x at nf6x.net> wrote:
Thanks for that. Are you able to provide confirmed working details &
pinouts for the cable? IIRC it was just three wire; Rx/Tx/Gnd? Would
help if I could have confirmed working setup there.
http://www.corestore.org
'No greater love hath a man than he lay down his life for his brother.
Not for millions, not for glory, not for fame.
For one person, in the dark, where no one will ever know or see.'
On Feb 21, 2016, at 02:57 , Mike Ross
<tmfdmike at gmail.com> wrote:
Looking back at a long
thread on vintage-computers last year it appears that tu58em had
timing issues and was unusable on 11/730 but is now patched and
working correctly... watch this space!
As a recap, I made a fork of tu58em which adds -x/--vax flags to work around a timing
issue that I encountered when using it with my VAX-11/730:
https://github.com/NF6X/tu58em/tree/nf6x
I was running tu58em on a Mac. I don't know if the same timing issue is present when
running tu58em on other platforms. If you want to try my modified fork, make sure you pull
code from the nf6x branch instead of the master branch; the master branch contains the
unmodified tu58em code that I patched.
I also put up the console tape images I use:
https://github.com/NF6X/VAX-11-730-Console-v57
Next time I resume playing with my 11/730, I'll probably work on getting tu58em
working with it when running on a Raspberry Pi, so I won't need to have my VAX
tethered to a laptop.
In the more distant future, I also plan to make a dedicated TU58 emulator that clicks
into place in one of the tape drive slots and plugs into the original internal cables.
It'll be unobtrusive, and the UI will be the same as on an original drive (simply swap
an SD card instead of swapping a tape). I like originality, but my experience so far has
led me to utterly distrust TU58 tape cartridges. I might even design it to connect inline
between the VAX and the real TU58 drive, such that when either SD card slot is empty,
accesses to that unit will be forwarded to the corresponding real TU58 drive unit.
2:59 p.m.
On Feb 21, 2016, at 14:41 , Mike Ross <tmfdmike at
gmail.com> wrote:
Thanks for that. Are you able to provide confirmed working details &
pinouts for the cable? IIRC it was just three wire; Rx/Tx/Gnd? Would
help if I could have confirmed working setup there.
I'll need to dig inside my machine to verify the wiring; I'll try to remember to
do that sometime today. I'm pretty sure that it's a simple 3-wire connection at
38400 baud.
--
Mark J. Blair, NF6X <nf6x at nf6x.net>
http://www.nf6x.net/
4:14 p.m.
On Mon, Feb 22, 2016 at 11:59 AM, Mark J. Blair <nf6x at nf6x.net> wrote:
That's my understanding too - complicated by the fact that are two
Tx/Rx pairs for the two drives IIRC...
http://www.corestore.org
'No greater love hath a man than he lay down his life for his brother.
Not for millions, not for glory, not for fame.
For one person, in the dark, where no one will ever know or see.'
On Feb 21, 2016, at 14:41 , Mike Ross
<tmfdmike at gmail.com> wrote:
Thanks for that. Are you able to provide confirmed working details &
pinouts for the cable? IIRC it was just three wire; Rx/Tx/Gnd? Would
help if I could have confirmed working setup there.
I'll need to dig inside my machine to verify the wiring; I'll try to remember to
do that sometime today. I'm pretty sure that it's a simple 3-wire connection at
38400 baud.
6:26 p.m.
On Feb 21, 2016, at 16:14, Mike Ross <tmfdmike at
gmail.com> wrote:
On Mon, Feb 22, 2016 at 11:59 AM, Mark J. Blair <nf6x at nf6x.net> wrote:
That's my understanding too - complicated by the fact that are two
Tx/Rx pairs for the two drives IIRC...
I don't think that is the case. There is a single 3-wire UART interface between the
console and the TU58 drive controller board. The single drive controller board runs both
of the TU58-XA tape mechanisms.
--
Mark J. Blair, NF6X <nf6x at nf6x.net>
http://www.nf6x.net/
On Feb 21, 2016, at 14:41 , Mike Ross
<tmfdmike at gmail.com> wrote:
Thanks for that. Are you able to provide confirmed working details &
pinouts for the cable? IIRC it was just three wire; Rx/Tx/Gnd? Would
help if I could have confirmed working setup there.
I'll need to dig inside my machine to verify the wiring; I'll try to remember to
do that sometime today. I'm pretty sure that it's a simple 3-wire connection at
38400 baud.
2:50 a.m.
On Feb 21,
2016, at 14:41 , Mike Ross <tmfdmike at gmail.com> wrote:
Thanks for that. Are you able to provide confirmed working details &
pinouts for the cable? IIRC it was just three wire; Rx/Tx/Gnd? Would
help if I could have confirmed working setup there.
I'll need to dig inside my machine to verify the wiring; I'll try to remember to
do that sometime today. I'm pretty sure that it's a simple 3-wire connection
at 38400 baud.
7:28 a.m.
On Feb 22, 2016, at 02:50, tony duell <ard at
p850ug1.demon.co.uk> wrote:
The pinouts are the same, the printset of course gives details of the latter. It's
RS232 levels, TxD, RxD, Ground, and it is 38400 baud.
I didn't get around to examining the wiring in my VAX last night, but I determined the
wiring from the TU58 manual, anyway.
When I was debugging the connection between my VAX and tu58em on my Mac, I ended up buying
an old serial protocol analyzer. Notably, I specifically avoided one with the same type of
tape drive; I got one with a nice, reliable 3.5" floppy drive! ;)
--
Mark J. Blair, NF6X <nf6x at nf6x.net>
http://www.nf6x.net/
4:12 p.m.
Mark am I missing something or is there no make option for Linux in your
tweaked tu58em?
Mike
On Feb 23, 2016 4:28 AM, "Mark J. Blair" <nf6x at nf6x.net> wrote:
On Feb 22, 2016, at 02:50, tony duell <ard at
p850ug1.demon.co.uk> wrote:
The pinouts are the same, the printset of course gives details of the
latter.
It's
RS232 levels, TxD, RxD, Ground, and it is 38400
baud.
I didn't get around to examining the wiring in my VAX last night, but I
determined the wiring from the TU58 manual, anyway.
When I was debugging the connection between my VAX and tu58em on my Mac, I
ended up buying an old serial protocol analyzer. Notably, I specifically
avoided one with the same type of tape drive; I got one with a nice,
reliable 3.5" floppy drive! ;)
--
Mark J. Blair, NF6X <nf6x at nf6x.net>
http://www.nf6x.net/
6:35 p.m.
On Feb 22, 2016, at 16:12 , Mike Ross <tmfdmike at
gmail.com> wrote:
Mark am I missing something or is there no make option for Linux in your
tweaked tu58em?
I think you simply type "make" to build it on a unix-like system (e.g., Linux).
--
Mark J. Blair, NF6X <nf6x at nf6x.net>
http://www.nf6x.net/
6:40 p.m.
On Tue, Feb 23, 2016 at 3:35 PM, Mark J. Blair <nf6x at nf6x.net> wrote:
...which blows up immediately with large numbers of errors and
warnings when it gets to serial.c - looks like it's hardcoded for
Windows header files. No worries I'll puzzle it out; the main branch
tu58em builds cleanly with no issues on Linux.
Mike
http://www.corestore.org
'No greater love hath a man than he lay down his life for his brother.
Not for millions, not for glory, not for fame.
For one person, in the dark, where no one will ever know or see.'
On Feb 22, 2016, at 16:12 , Mike Ross
<tmfdmike at gmail.com> wrote:
Mark am I missing something or is there no make option for Linux in your
tweaked tu58em?
I think you simply type "make" to build it on a unix-like system (e.g., Linux).
6:41 p.m.
On Feb 22, 2016, at 18:35 , Mark J. Blair <nf6x at
nf6x.net> wrote:
Oops, I'm wrong.
Linux (untested with my patch):
make comm=unix
Mac:
make comm=mac
Windows (untested with my patch):
make comm=win
--
Mark J. Blair, NF6X <nf6x at nf6x.net>
http://www.nf6x.net/
On Feb 22, 2016, at 16:12 , Mike Ross
<tmfdmike at gmail.com> wrote:
Mark am I missing something or is there no make option for Linux in your
tweaked tu58em?
I think you simply type "make" to build it on a unix-like system (e.g., Linux).
21 Feb
21 Feb
11:09 p.m.
On Sun, Feb 21, 2016 at 5:33 PM, Mark J. Blair <nf6x at nf6x.net> wrote:
Mark,
Actually I do have a Mac within easy range of the 730. Could you do me
a favour and throw a prebuilt OSX binary somewhere I can grab it? I
have flaky internet in the workshop and this Mac isn't set up with
Xcode or any other dev environment...
Thanks
Mike
http://www.corestore.org
'No greater love hath a man than he lay down his life for his brother.
Not for millions, not for glory, not for fame.
For one person, in the dark, where no one will ever know or see.'
On Feb 21, 2016, at 02:57 , Mike Ross
<tmfdmike at gmail.com> wrote:
Looking back at a long
thread on vintage-computers last year it appears that tu58em had
timing issues and was unusable on 11/730 but is now patched and
working correctly... watch this space!
As a recap, I made a fork of tu58em which adds -x/--vax flags to work around a timing
issue that I encountered when using it with my VAX-11/730:
https://github.com/NF6X/tu58em/tree/nf6x
I was running tu58em on a Mac. I don't know if the same timing issue is present when
running tu58em on other platforms. If you want to try my modified fork, make sure you pull
code from the nf6x branch instead of the master branch; the master branch contains the
unmodified tu58em code that I patched.
22 Feb
22 Feb
7:14 a.m.
On Feb 21, 2016, at 23:09, Mike Ross <tmfdmike at
gmail.com> wrote:
Actually I do have a Mac within easy range of the 730. Could you do me
a favour and throw a prebuilt OSX binary somewhere I can grab it? I
have flaky internet in the workshop and this Mac isn't set up with
Xcode or any other dev environment...
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/29876211/tu58em.zip
--
Mark J. Blair, NF6X <nf6x at nf6x.net>
http://www.nf6x.net/
23 Feb
23 Feb
1:26 a.m.
On Mon, Feb 22, 2016 at 10:14 AM, Mark J. Blair <nf6x at nf6x.net> wrote:
Thanks Mark... I played with this. I built a 3-wire cable; I'm sure I
have it wired right because traffic happens - and if I disconnect, or
switch Rx/Tx, it just sits there.... but this is as far as it gets:
MikeUpstairs:~ Imac$ ./tu58 -s 38400 -p /dev/tty.usbserial -d -v -m -x
-r vax73058
info: unit 0 r file 'vax73058'
info: tu58 tape emulator v1.4j (NF6X fork)
info: (C) 2005-2014 Don North <ak6dn at mindspring.com>, (C) 1984 Dan
Ts'o <Rockefeller University>
info: serial port /dev/tty.usbserial at 38400 baud
info: MRSP mode enabled (NOT fully tested - use with caution)
info: TU58 emulation start
info: R restart, S toggle send init, V toggle verbose, D toggle debug, Q quit
info: emulator started
(I ctrl-c the VAX)
info: flag=0x00 last=0x00
info: <NULL> seen
info: flag=0x00 last=0x00
info: <NULL> seen
info: flag=0x04 last=0x00
info: <INIT> seen
info: flag=0x04 last=0x04
info: <INIT> seen
info: <INIT><INIT> seen, sending <CONT>
(?27 DEVICE ERROR on VAX)
(I ctrl-c the VAX again)
info: flag=0x00 last=0xFF
info: <NULL> seen
info: flag=0x00 last=0x00
info: <NULL> seen
info: flag=0x04 last=0x00
info: <INIT> seen
info: flag=0x04 last=0x04
info: <INIT> seen
info: <INIT><INIT> seen, sending <CONT>
(?27 DEVICE ERROR on VAX)
(repeat)
Can you spot me being stupid? Does my command line look sane re.
various options?
(I've trivially renamed the tape image file for faster typing
otherwise it's straight out of the box)
Mike
http://www.corestore.org
'No greater love hath a man than he lay down his life for his brother.
Not for millions, not for glory, not for fame.
For one person, in the dark, where no one will ever know or see.'
On Feb 21, 2016, at 23:09, Mike Ross <tmfdmike
at gmail.com> wrote:
Actually I do have a Mac within easy range of the 730. Could you do me
a favour and throw a prebuilt OSX binary somewhere I can grab it? I
have flaky internet in the workshop and this Mac isn't set up with
Xcode or any other dev environment...
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/29876211/tu58em.zip
24 Feb
24 Feb
3:43 a.m.
On Tue, Feb 23, 2016 at 4:26 AM, Mike Ross <tmfdmike at gmail.com> wrote:
On Mon, Feb 22, 2016 at 10:14 AM, Mark J. Blair
<nf6x at nf6x.net> wrote:
Thanks Mark... I played with this. I built a 3-wire cable; I'm sure I
have it wired right because traffic happens - and if I disconnect, or
switch Rx/Tx, it just sits there.... but this is as far as it gets:
MikeUpstairs:~ Imac$ ./tu58 -s 38400 -p /dev/tty.usbserial -d -v -m -x
-r vax73058
info: unit 0 r file 'vax73058'
info: tu58 tape emulator v1.4j (NF6X fork)
info: (C) 2005-2014 Don North <ak6dn at mindspring.com>, (C) 1984 Dan
Ts'o <Rockefeller University>
info: serial port /dev/tty.usbserial at 38400 baud
info: MRSP mode enabled (NOT fully tested - use with caution)
info: TU58 emulation start
info: R restart, S toggle send init, V toggle verbose, D toggle debug, Q quit
info: emulator started
(I ctrl-c the VAX)
info: flag=0x00 last=0x00
info: <NULL> seen
info: flag=0x00 last=0x00
info: <NULL> seen
info: flag=0x04 last=0x00
info: <INIT> seen
info: flag=0x04 last=0x04
info: <INIT> seen
info: <INIT><INIT> seen, sending <CONT>
(?27 DEVICE ERROR on VAX)
(I ctrl-c the VAX again)
info: flag=0x00 last=0xFF
info: <NULL> seen
info: flag=0x00 last=0x00
info: <NULL> seen
info: flag=0x04 last=0x00
info: <INIT> seen
info: flag=0x04 last=0x04
info: <INIT> seen
info: <INIT><INIT> seen, sending <CONT>
(?27 DEVICE ERROR on VAX)
(repeat)
Can you spot me being stupid? Does my command line look sane re.
various options?
(I've trivially renamed the tape image file for faster typing
otherwise it's straight out of the box)
Just for giggles I decided to try Bela Torok's Arduino-based emulator:
http://www.torok.info/computing/pdp11/tu58/
I whipped that up from bits tonight and got it working surprisingly
quickly. But the VAX still doesn't want to play; from the behaviour
and messages it's falling over at exactly the same place. The Arduino
serial console displays:
Continue after 2 INIT flags. online!
And VAX shows the now-familiar ?27 DEVICE ERROR...
Which looks a HELL of a lot like how tu58em is ending. So I don't
think the problem is with tu58em...
Is there anything I should be looking at on the VAX end here? Any
configuration or cabling details that could be screwing things up
before I drag the RS232 analyser out? I've tried changing the 'delay'
parameter on the Arduino to various values between 0 and 255 to no
avail - and I've tried a couple of different tape images in case I got
a bad one...
Mike
http://www.corestore.org
'No greater love hath a man than he lay down his life for his brother.
Not for millions, not for glory, not for fame.
For one person, in the dark, where no one will ever know or see.'
On Feb 21, 2016, at 23:09, Mike Ross <tmfdmike
at gmail.com> wrote:
Actually I do have a Mac within easy range of the 730. Could you do me
a favour and throw a prebuilt OSX binary somewhere I can grab it? I
have flaky internet in the workshop and this Mac isn't set up with
Xcode or any other dev environment...
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/29876211/tu58em.zip 
12:56 p.m.
On 2/24/2016 3:43 AM, Mike Ross wrote:
On Tue, Feb 23, 2016 at 4:26 AM, Mike Ross
<tmfdmike at gmail.com> wrote:
Why are you using MRSP mode (-m switch)? Do you know that is absolutely required?
On Mon, Feb 22, 2016 at 10:14 AM, Mark J. Blair
<nf6x at nf6x.net> wrote:
Thanks Mark... I played
with this. I built a 3-wire cable; I'm sure I
have it wired right because traffic happens - and if I disconnect, or
switch Rx/Tx, it just sits there.... but this is as far as it gets:
MikeUpstairs:~ Imac$ ./tu58 -s 38400 -p /dev/tty.usbserial -d -v -m -x
-r vax73058
info: unit 0 r file 'vax73058'
info: tu58 tape emulator v1.4j (NF6X fork)
info: (C) 2005-2014 Don North <ak6dn at mindspring.com>, (C) 1984 Dan
Ts'o <Rockefeller University>
info: serial port /dev/tty.usbserial at 38400 baud
info: MRSP mode enabled (NOT fully tested - use with caution)
info: TU58 emulation start
info: R restart, S toggle send init, V toggle verbose, D toggle debug, Q quit
info: emulator started
(I ctrl-c the VAX)
info: flag=0x00 last=0x00
info: <NULL> seen
info: flag=0x00 last=0x00
info: <NULL> seen
info: flag=0x04 last=0x00
info: <INIT> seen
info: flag=0x04 last=0x04
info: <INIT> seen
info: <INIT><INIT> seen, sending <CONT>
(?27 DEVICE ERROR on VAX)
(I ctrl-c the VAX again)
info: flag=0x00 last=0xFF
info: <NULL> seen
info: flag=0x00 last=0x00
info: <NULL> seen
info: flag=0x04 last=0x00
info: <INIT> seen
info: flag=0x04 last=0x04
info: <INIT> seen
info: <INIT><INIT> seen, sending <CONT>
(?27 DEVICE ERROR on VAX)
(repeat)
Can you spot me being stupid? Does my command line look sane re.
various options?
(I've trivially renamed the tape image file for faster typing
otherwise it's straight out of the box)
Just for giggles I decided to try Bela
Torok's Arduino-based emulator:
http://www.torok.info/computing/pdp11/tu58/
I whipped that up from bits tonight and got it working surprisingly
quickly. But the VAX still doesn't want to play; from the behaviour
and messages it's falling over at exactly the same place. The Arduino
serial console displays:
Continue after 2 INIT flags. online!
And VAX shows the now-familiar ?27 DEVICE ERROR...
Which looks a HELL of a lot like how tu58em is ending. So I don't
think the problem is with tu58em...
Is there anything I should be looking at on the VAX end here? Any
configuration or cabling details that could be screwing things up
before I drag the RS232 analyser out? I've tried changing the 'delay'
parameter on the Arduino to various values between 0 and 255 to no
avail - and I've tried a couple of different tape images in case I got
a bad one...
Mike
http://www.corestore.org
'No greater love hath a man than he lay down his life for his brother.
Not for millions, not for glory, not for fame.
For one person, in the dark, where no one will ever know or see.'
On Feb
21, 2016, at 23:09, Mike Ross <tmfdmike at gmail.com> wrote:
Actually I do have a Mac within easy range of the 730. Could you do me
a favour and throw a prebuilt OSX binary somewhere I can grab it? I
have flaky internet in the workshop and this Mac isn't set up with
Xcode or any other dev environment...
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/29876211/tu58em.zip
1:11 p.m.
On Thu, Feb 25, 2016 at 9:56 AM, Don North <north at alum.mit.edu> wrote:
On 2/24/2016 3:43 AM, Mike Ross wrote:
For VAX-11/730 console yes it is absolutely required as far as I know;
everything I've read about people using emulation there says that it
is.
Mike
http://www.corestore.org
'No greater love hath a man than he lay down his life for his brother.
Not for millions, not for glory, not for fame.
For one person, in the dark, where no one will ever know or see.'
On Tue, Feb 23, 2016 at 4:26 AM, Mike Ross <tmfdmike at gmail.com> wrote:
Why are you using MRSP mode (-m switch)? Do you know that is absolutely
required?
On Mon, Feb 22, 2016 at 10:14 AM, Mark J. Blair <nf6x at nf6x.net> wrote:
Just for giggles I decided to try Bela Torok's Arduino-based emulator:
http://www.torok.info/computing/pdp11/tu58/
I whipped that up from bits tonight and got it working surprisingly
quickly. But the VAX still doesn't want to play; from the behaviour
and messages it's falling over at exactly the same place. The Arduino
serial console displays:
Continue after 2 INIT flags. online!
And VAX shows the now-familiar ?27 DEVICE ERROR...
Which looks a HELL of a lot like how tu58em is ending. So I don't
think the problem is with tu58em...
Is there anything I should be looking at on the VAX end here? Any
configuration or cabling details that could be screwing things up
before I drag the RS232 analyser out? I've tried changing the 'delay'
parameter on the Arduino to various values between 0 and 255 to no
avail - and I've tried a couple of different tape images in case I got
a bad one...
Mike
http://www.corestore.org
'No greater love hath a man than he lay down his life for his brother.
Not for millions, not for glory, not for fame.
For one person, in the dark, where no one will ever know or see.'
>
> On Feb 21, 2016, at 23:09, Mike Ross <tmfdmike at gmail.com> wrote:
> Actually I do have a Mac within easy range of the 730. Could you do me
> a favour and throw a prebuilt OSX binary somewhere I can grab it? I
> have flaky internet in the workshop and this Mac isn't set up with
> Xcode or any other dev environment...
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/29876211/tu58em.zip
Thanks Mark... I played with this. I built a 3-wire cable; I'm sure I
have it wired right because traffic happens - and if I disconnect, or
switch Rx/Tx, it just sits there.... but this is as far as it gets:
MikeUpstairs:~ Imac$ ./tu58 -s 38400 -p /dev/tty.usbserial -d -v -m -x
-r vax73058
info: unit 0 r file 'vax73058'
info: tu58 tape emulator v1.4j (NF6X fork)
info: (C) 2005-2014 Don North <ak6dn at mindspring.com>, (C) 1984 Dan
Ts'o <Rockefeller University>
info: serial port /dev/tty.usbserial at 38400 baud
info: MRSP mode enabled (NOT fully tested - use with caution)
info: TU58 emulation start
info: R restart, S toggle send init, V toggle verbose, D toggle debug, Q
quit
info: emulator started
(I ctrl-c the VAX)
info: flag=0x00 last=0x00
info: <NULL> seen
info: flag=0x00 last=0x00
info: <NULL> seen
info: flag=0x04 last=0x00
info: <INIT> seen
info: flag=0x04 last=0x04
info: <INIT> seen
info: <INIT><INIT> seen, sending <CONT>
(?27 DEVICE ERROR on VAX)
(I ctrl-c the VAX again)
info: flag=0x00 last=0xFF
info: <NULL> seen
info: flag=0x00 last=0x00
info: <NULL> seen
info: flag=0x04 last=0x00
info: <INIT> seen
info: flag=0x04 last=0x04
info: <INIT> seen
info: <INIT><INIT> seen, sending <CONT>
(?27 DEVICE ERROR on VAX)
(repeat)
Can you spot me being stupid? Does my command line look sane re.
various options?
(I've trivially renamed the tape image file for faster typing
otherwise it's straight out of the box)
2:11 p.m.
On 2/24/2016 1:11 PM, Mike Ross wrote:
Yes it appears that is correct. Going back to this thread:
http://www.vcfed.org/forum/showthread.php?36113-Problems-using-tu58em-with-…
there was a whole lot of discussion on bringing up a '730 with TU58EM, and the
updates to it (to fix some time delays)
to support the TU58 device on the '730 with TU58EM.
I have since updated mainline TU58EM to version 1.4m to add Mark Blair's VAX 730
timing and background mode changes
(enable via -x and -b switches). Source and cygwin executable here:
https://github.com/AK6DN/tu58em
Functionally this should be the same as Mark's version 1.4j + his changes.
Don
Why are you
using MRSP mode (-m switch)? Do you know that is absolutely
required?
For VAX-11/730 console yes it is absolutely required as far as I know;
everything I've read about people using emulation there says that it
is.
Mike
21 Feb
21 Feb
6:17 a.m.
I just double checked. 3 was open; 4 was closed. That's default 2400.
OK...
Just to confirm, this is the DIP switch near the middle of the board, not the
one in one corner near the BERG plugs for the serial cables. The latter
is involved with the handshake lines for the remote diagnostic port.
Switch 8 was also closed; I have no idea of its
function. All other
switches were open.
No, the manuals are particularly bad on what these switches do. You can
deduce a bit from the printset, but without a listing of rhe console processor
firmare you can't be sure.
All closed is certainly wrong, the 8085 can't possibly run like that.
Sounds like the 8085 is not doing the right things, I think you wlll
have to check if it's getting a clock, if the reset pin is not asserted,
and what it is doing to memory, etc.
-tony
20 Feb
20 Feb
4:53 a.m.
Just started working on mine - been a back-burnered
project for a long
time. Unfortunately all the cables were cut when it was dismantled; I
was lucky to grab just the CPU.
I had to re-fit all the cables on mine (a painful job), but at least I had them
all, uncut.
Got it powered up ok - no drama there. I faked cables
to the port on
Are all 3 LEDs on the PSU distribution board (under the transparent cover
at the top rear of the PSU) glowing? If not, you have a PSU problem.
the WCS which drives the console and hooked up my
trust VT220 at 2400
baud. Nada. No self-test prompt; no ROM> prompt.
The oriignal console cable was a straight through ribbon cable with a header
socket (to fit the WCS board) at one end and a DB25 plug at the other. It plugs
into a filter module on the distibution panel, again straight through with a DB25
plug on the outside. This is wired as a DTE (terminal), you need a null modem
cable. Only pins 1,2,3,7 are used, the official cable (I had to make a copy of it)
wires 1 and 7 straght through, swaps 2 and 3 and swaps 6 and 20, but you don't
need the last pair.
Have you set the DIP switch on the WCS board correctly? You can certainly have 300,
1200,2400 or 9600 baud. IIRC some of the other switches do very odd things, so make
sure they are set as the manual says.
I assume you have checked you are plugged into the console port and not the
remote diagnostic port.
Maybe I've messed up the faked console cable;
I'll check - already
tried obvious things like making sure Rx & Tx were crossed (it's a
three wire cable according to the schematics - Rx Tx Gnd; no flow
control). But I'd like to know more about the assorted LEDs on the CPU
boards; maybe there's a clue there if it's not getting far enough into
the self-test to display console output. There's a fair few LEDs on
the M8391. But the doc I've looked through on Bitsavers doesn't seem
to document their meanings and interpretations. Can anyone help on
that point?
They're shown on page 208 of the printset on bitsavers. They display
the memory controller microcode address (nothing to do with the CPU
microcode, the memory controller has its own ROM firmware). I don't
think the memory controller is used by the console ROMs, so I doubt
if this is the problem.
Start by checking the power supply rails (if you haven't already done so),
then see if the 8085 console processor is running, and if it tries to access
the console serial chip.
-tony
3005
days inactive
3010
days old
35 comments
7 participants
participants (7)
-
ard＠p850ug1.demon.co.uk -
jfoust＠threedee.com -
jhfinedp3k＠compsys.to -
js＠cimmeri.com -
nf6x＠nf6x.net -
north＠alum.mit.edu -
tmfdmike＠gmail.com