6 Feb
2004
6 Feb
'04
12:39 p.m.
I snagged this for $20.... just for a nice trophy. Suprising no one else
bid on it...
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=3075270294&categ…
Anyway - thought it would look cool unfolded and hanging on the Machine
Room wall....
Cheers
John
6 Feb
6 Feb
2:24 p.m.
John, hopefully you are joking about using this card as "art". There are
many of us who could and would put it do good use in an active machine.
David.
-----Original Message-----
From: cctalk-bounces(a)classiccmp.org
[mailto:cctalk-bounces@classiccmp.org]On Behalf Of John Lawson
Sent: Friday, February 06, 2004 6:39 PM
To: cctalk(a)classiccmp.org
Subject: Dec core mem on eBay
I snagged this for $20.... just for a nice trophy. Suprising no one else
bid on it...
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=3075270294&categ…
sspagename=STRK%3AMEBWN%3AIT&rd=1
Anyway - thought it would look cool unfolded and hanging on the Machine
Room wall....
Cheers
John
3:03 p.m.
On Fri, 6 Feb 2004, David V. Corbin wrote:
John, hopefully you are joking about using this card
as "art". There are
many of us who could and would put it do good use in an active machine.
Yo Dave: Keep yer shirt on.
If you look at the pix on the ebay page, you will notice that this is only
half the system, and I contacted the seller (who I know) - it's all they
have. Its just the core planes and the switching logic. Its a 32KW
stack, BTW...
I have been active in this hobby for many years, have owned several very
rare systems and devices, and rescued and put back in service my share of
legacy computing machinery, software and docs and books. I give a lot of
volunteer time as well. I deplore folks who tear up computing history for
'art' if there's a good chance that a system could be 'saved'
otherwise.
There is a special place in Hell for one individual of my acquaintance,
who's "hobby" is collecting just the console panels from mainframes and
minis - the which Hobby he pursues with screwdriver and diagonal cutters.
He sees nothing wrong with that activity, BTW... ;{}
In this case - I'm not *destroying* the board, and anyway it's condition
is unknown - could already be electrical trash - I won't know until I get
it. But nonetheless, I intend to frame it, open, and hang it on the wall
in my machine room, Dave. I think it's beautiful, and I think it's enough
of a piece of computing history that various people might like to have a
look at real core memory. Our IT guy at work has been doing computers for
a living for quite a while, and he had no real idea what the word 'core'
actually meant....
Now, if it came to my attention that there was a specific, rare or
one-of-a-kind machine that could be restored to full operation but for the
board that I have - you can bet it would be in FedEx the next day to that
site, and I'd find another.
Anyway, DEC core stacks are not all that rare - two of the machines from
my last big collection had core memory. I want this one to be a display
piece in my personal collection... and so it shall be.
Cheerz
John
3:39 p.m.
John,
Glad to hear it, sorry if I jumped on you, but it had been a rough day, and
I recently lost a good shot at an acquisition to a person known for "kut and
scrap".
My apologies.
David.
-----Original Message-----
From: cctalk-bounces(a)classiccmp.org
[mailto:cctalk-bounces@classiccmp.org]On Behalf Of John Lawson
Sent: Friday, February 06, 2004 9:04 PM
To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts
Subject: RE: Dec core mem on eBay
On Fri, 6 Feb 2004, David V. Corbin wrote:
John, hopefully you are joking about using this card
as "art". There are
many of us who could and would put it do good use in an active machine.
Yo Dave: Keep yer shirt on.
If you look at the pix on the ebay page, you will notice that this is only
half the system, and I contacted the seller (who I know) - it's all they
have. Its just the core planes and the switching logic. Its a 32KW
stack, BTW...
I have been active in this hobby for many years, have owned several very
rare systems and devices, and rescued and put back in service my share of
legacy computing machinery, software and docs and books. I give a lot of
volunteer time as well. I deplore folks who tear up computing history for
'art' if there's a good chance that a system could be 'saved'
otherwise.
There is a special place in Hell for one individual of my acquaintance,
who's "hobby" is collecting just the console panels from mainframes and
minis - the which Hobby he pursues with screwdriver and diagonal cutters.
He sees nothing wrong with that activity, BTW... ;{}
In this case - I'm not *destroying* the board, and anyway it's condition
is unknown - could already be electrical trash - I won't know until I get
it. But nonetheless, I intend to frame it, open, and hang it on the wall
in my machine room, Dave. I think it's beautiful, and I think it's enough
of a piece of computing history that various people might like to have a
look at real core memory. Our IT guy at work has been doing computers for
a living for quite a while, and he had no real idea what the word 'core'
actually meant....
Now, if it came to my attention that there was a specific, rare or
one-of-a-kind machine that could be restored to full operation but for the
board that I have - you can bet it would be in FedEx the next day to that
site, and I'd find another.
Anyway, DEC core stacks are not all that rare - two of the machines from
my last big collection had core memory. I want this one to be a display
piece in my personal collection... and so it shall be.
Cheerz
John
3:54 p.m.
On Fri, 6 Feb 2004, David V. Corbin wrote:
John,
Glad to hear it, sorry if I jumped on you, but it had been a rough day, and
I recently lost a good shot at an acquisition to a person known for "kut and
scrap".
Well I know. There's an original ad for the Bendix G-15 (I had one
once...) on eBay that I stopped bidding on after it got above $20... but
the high bidder's 'me' page says he's a preservationist, so we'll
see.
And I've missed many things over the years... "Oh, we thought that was
junk."
For example - I work in the same building as a manufacturing company
with dozens of metal-working machines. I'm good friends with the foreman,
who has been an NC and CNC master machinist for many years. I was telling
him about my collection - and he said, "Hey - you don't want an old
Flexowriter or two...? they're up on the shelf in my old shop in Palo
Alto."
Well you can imagine my response. BUT:
Long story short... they were tossed in the dumpster in September of
last year to make room for an upgraded phone system....
YYYAAHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!! ;{ GRRRRR...
So it's part and parcel of our Hobby... just because *I* see a rack of
PDP11 stuff in a certain light doesn't necessarily map onto the
conciousness of the poor schmoe who has to get it out of the warehouse and
onto the loading dock and into the roll-off before the scrap company shows
up to haul all that old shit away...
And thanks for your well-meant concern! Without us, there'd be no
LGP-20s, Bendix G-15s, Apple Is.... left in the world.
Cheers
John
3:51 p.m.
Quoth John Lawson:
If you look at the pix on the ebay page, you will
notice that this is only
half the system, and I contacted the seller (who I know) - it's all they
have. Its just the core planes and the switching logic. Its a 32KW
stack, BTW...
32Kw x 18, and with ICs around the core planes... was this for a PDP-15,
or perhaps a PDP-9?
[...] nonetheless, I intend to frame it, open, and
hang it on the wall
in my machine room, Dave. I think it's beautiful, and I think it's enough
of a piece of computing history that various people might like to have a
look at real core memory. Our IT guy at work has been doing computers for
a living for quite a while, and he had no real idea what the word 'core'
actually meant....
Core memories are indeed beautiful. That is, until you have to find and
repair a bad connection on one... <cringe> ...well, okay, they're _still_
beautiful, but in an infinitely more frustrating sort of way. :)
I think it's amusing that there are computer people who have never seen or
worked with core memory. O'course, I also have coworkers who have never
owned a 33-1/3 record, and more recently coworkers who think the idea of a
telephone with a cord attached is antiquated. Damn. I _am_ getting old,
aren't I? :)
-O.-
...but then, I've never used a punch-card or a drum memory, so maybe I
_am_ young. :) :)
4:04 p.m.
-0.-
Speaking of vinyl...Do you have any 78s or even better 16s? (I have about
40 from 1955 and earlier!)
If you never dropped a box on unmarked, non-sequenced cards, you havent
lived!!!
===============================
John.
I know a person (local here on LI) who has 3x ASR-33, 1x ASR-43, 1x
Freiden Flexowriter (exact model unknown at this point).
All believed to be in working order.
The problem is that will only dig them out of storage for someone who will
take the entire lot. I have no interest in the Flexowriter (but would never
want to see one destroyed), and can really only use one of the ASR-33's. If
you would be interested in helping to split up the lot (he wants a fairly
high price, but if the quality is good....), please contact me off list.
==========================
David...
4:12 p.m.
If you never dropped a box on unmarked, non-sequenced
cards, you havent
lived!!!
If they are unmarked, there is no problem ;)
I'm a young 39, and I HAVE programmed on punched cards, both on an IBM 24 I
think it was, submitting programs to VM/CMS/HASP, and also on an HP2000C &
HP2000/Access :)
5:08 p.m.
>> If you never dropped a box on unmarked,
non-sequenced cards, you havent
>> lived!!!
>If they are unmarked, there is no problem ;)
I was not referring to un-punched cards, but rather to cards that contained
ordered data (such as program source without line numbers) which had not
been marked with a pen/pencil/crayon diagonally across the top of the deck.
Without the mark, sorting out the cards was virtually impossible. At least
with a diagonal mark each card would have a short line on the top edge.
Cards from the front of the deck would have the line on the left, cards from
the back on the right. This gave a quick method of getting the cards back
into order. A card that was out of sequence would show rather quickly when
the deck was re-assembled.
11:15 p.m.
In message <Pine.LNX.4.44.0402061834350.9788-100000(a)drizzle.com>
"O. Sharp" <ohh(a)drizzle.com> wrote:
...but then, I've never used a punch-card or a
drum memory, so maybe I
_am_ young. :) :)
Um. I'm probably a bit worse than that (depending on your
point of view) -
I've never seen an 8" floppy disc and I've never even seen - let alone
used - a papertape reader/punch. Seeing as it was more-or-less the only
reasonably-priced data storage format available at the time the 6502 was
released, I thought it would only be fair to let the 6502 have some form of
papertape storage. Guess I'm stuck with 3.5" floppy disks though :(
Later.
--
Phil. | Acorn Risc PC600 Mk3, SA202, 64MB, 6GB,
philpem(a)dsl.pipex.com | ViewFinder, 10BaseT Ethernet, 2-slice,
http://www.philpem.dsl.pipex.com/ | 48xCD, ARCINv6c IDE, SCSI
... Documentation is for people who can't read.
7 Feb
7 Feb
7:20 a.m.
On Fri, 6 Feb 2004, John Lawson wrote:
I have been active in this hobby for many years,
have owned several very
rare systems and devices, and rescued and put back in service my share of
legacy computing machinery, software and docs and books. I give a lot of
volunteer time as well. I deplore folks who tear up computing history for
'art' if there's a good chance that a system could be 'saved'
otherwise.
There is a special place in Hell for one individual of my acquaintance,
who's "hobby" is collecting just the console panels from mainframes and
minis - the which Hobby he pursues with screwdriver and diagonal cutters.
He sees nothing wrong with that activity, BTW... ;{}
Yep, I vouch for John here and back him up.
--
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 ]
7:13 a.m.
On Fri, 6 Feb 2004, John Lawson wrote:
I snagged this for $20.... just for a nice trophy.
Suprising no one else
bid on it...
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=3075270294&categ…
Anyway - thought it would look cool unfolded and hanging on the Machine
Room wall....
Bah. Core memory as a wall hanging is SO late-1990s :)
--
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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dvcorbin＠optonline.net -
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