On Sun, 1 Sep 2002, Sellam Ismail wrote: Uh. That assumes FAR more knowledge than I have. I understand the concept of printing terminals. I am aware of their existence. *That* is the starting point. Doc

On Sun, 1 Sep 2002, Sellam Ismail wrote: Sellam, at the risk of being a dick, do you have any references or not? Yes. I _haven't_ played with thermal printers. I _haven't_ played with acoustic couplers. I _haven't_ tried to connect a 300bps terminal to a console that expects 9600. I _have_ this thing wanting access to manuals. Just Because. I also _have_ plenty of obtuse, sarcastic jerks in my world already. Doc

On Mon, 2 Sep 2002, Sellam Ismail wrote: Thank you. quoted from you last reply: Assuming _you've_ ever seen one of these, that's deliberately and obviously obtuse. Not sarcastic? OK, my mistake. Doc

On Mon, 2 Sep 2002, Doc Shipley wrote: Sorry, I just never really saw these as particularly special, especially after I found my third one :) Now I have about 6, and the most special would be the model 765 with the bubble memory, and the 733 which is just damn cool looking: http://siconic.com/computers/ASR733-1.jpg I've got at least 5 of those. I'm open to trades :) The 745 is by far the most common. I never played with mine beyond plugging it in and typing a few characters. The modem should be easy to figure out. Set up a PC with a modem and some terminal software, set it for 300BPS and auto-answer. Better yet, get a PC running Linux stick a modem on it. The switches on the Silent 700 are fairly self-evident. Dial into your PC with a regular 2500 style phone (i.e. the common phones from days of yore, the handset being the type that will fit nicely into the acoustic coupler) and when you hear the carrier, stuff the handset into the AC and then switch the terminal into ORIGINATE mode. It should sync up and you'll be connected. Type and be jolly. Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org * Old computing resources for business and academia at www.VintageTech.com *

Sellam is right, that it is JUST a printing dumb terminal. And an Apple I is JUST a home microcomputer. But for many of us, the Silent 700 was an AWESOME device. For many of us, it was our very first exposure to any sort of PORTABLE computing. And not only was it portable, it was EASILY portable, lightweight, reliable, . . . It had acoustic cups, it printed, it would connect to damn near ANYTHING, it was the neatest thing, yet! Small caps was a disappointment for lower case, but it worked. 300 baud is no longer viable. Thermal paper with a coarse dot matrix doesn't compare to inkjet. But if I were to succomb to a craving to reagin my youth through reacquiring my past possessions, and finally getting all of the stuff that I had once lusted after, then getting back my silent 700 would have to be near the top of the list. Oh, if only that t'were all that were needed to make me young again! -- Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin(a)xenosoft.com

On Sun, 1 Sep 2002, Sellam Ismail wrote: Howzbout the lower case conversion? the jumper to connect/disconnect the modem from the terminal the pinout of the DA15 (which connects to both the modem and terminal and can be used with a jumper plug in lieu of the jumper) What do you do when the pirate takes all of your stuff in the maze? XYZZY PLUGH

Doc Shipley said: I've got one 700 (not sure of the model though) with an acoustic coupler and a direct connection. Never tried the acoustic coupler (I don't have anywhere to call at those speeds :) but I soldered a cable, got some cheap rolls of fax-paper, hooked it up to a unix box (hp300, NetBSD) and did some serious computing. It was a lot of fun :) I don't have any docs but I do have the cable pinouts somewhere, if you need them. -- jht

On Mon, Sep 02, 2002 at 01:38:02PM -0500, Doc Shipley wrote: I've only got classiccmp going back to ~2000 but google saved me: (courtesy of Neil Preston, usenet) Pin 9 - protective ground - terminal chassis pin 1 - Signal ground Printer - keyboard interface pins 11-15 Pin 14 - CR busy; from terminal; lpTTL high-true when printhead is lifted (for test only) Pin 15 - DTR from terminal; EIA level held ON when terminal is on line Pin 13 - XMTD from terminal; EIA level held to MARK state when no data is being transmitted Pin 12 - RCVD from external; Receive data; EIA level held to MARK state by external device when no data is to be printed. Pin 11 - CDET from external; CArrier detect; EIA level held ON by external device when data is to be received on pin 12. EIA communications interface Pins 2,3 8 Pin 2 - CARDET from terminal; Carrier detect; EIA level held ON by terminal when carrier is detected. Pin 8 - RCVDATA from terminal; Receive data; EIA level held to MARK state by terminal when no data is being received. Pin 3 - XMIT DATA from external device; Transmit data; EIA level held to MARK state by external device when no data is to be transmitted. Current loop interface pin 6 - RL1 Input side of receive data current loop when current loop option is installed; otherwise, 3.3K ohms to +5v Pin 7 - RL2; Return side of receive data current loop. as above Pin 5 - X1; Input side of transmit data current loop when option installed. Pin 4 - X2; Return side of transmit data current loop. Pin 10 - P12V - spare EIA level held ON when power is on (3.3K ohms to +12v My 700 has a loopback connector for the 15-pin interface, which is needed when using the acoustic modem: 2->11 3->13 8->12 -- jht

At 07:35 AM 9/4/02 -0700, you wrote: Armor-All? FWIW I've been told that ozone attacks the rubber, if so then you probably wnat to keep it away from anything that generates ozone (CRTs, monitors, TVs, laser printers) and perhaps seal it in a plastic bag. Joe