16 Oct
2012
16 Oct
'12
6:42 p.m.
In case you missed it on one of the web postings I would like to mention
that Andrew Lynch and I have just completed a prototype of a new 80386
Master/Slave CPU S-100 bus board. This exciting board is capable of reaching
up to12MHz in an S-100 system with an active terminated bus.
This is an ongoing project. It utilizes the 16 bit mode of the 80386 to
address the 16MG of RAM the S-100 bus is capable of addressing. A second
daughter board system with an overhead ribbon cable connector is planned to
for daughter board(s) to enlarge the RAM space up to the 4GB the CPU is
capable of addressing (using high density static and DRAM chips).
If you would like to read about this board please look here:-
http://s100computers.com/My%20System%20Pages/80386%20Board/80386%20CPU%20Boa
rd.htm
It is too early to accept "orders" for this board, but if you would like to
be kept in the loop as this board evolves keep an eye on the above page.
John Monahan Ph.D
e-mail: <mailto:monahan at vitasoft.org> monahan at vitasoft.org
Text: <mailto:monahan at txt.att.net> monahan at txt.att.net
17 Oct
17 Oct
5:17 a.m.
On 16 October 2012 23:42, John Monahan <monahan at vitasoft.org> wrote:
This is an ongoing project. It utilizes the 16 bit mode of the 80386 to
address the 16MG of RAM the S-100 bus is capable of addressing.
Just out of curiosity:
Wouldn't an 80386SX have avoided this restriction and been much easier?
--
Liam Proven ? Profile: http://lproven.livejournal.com/profile
Email: lproven at cix.co.uk ? GMail/G+/Twitter/Flickr/Facebook: lproven
MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? Skype/AIM/Yahoo/LinkedIn: liamproven
Tel: +44 20-8685-0498 ? Cell: +44 7939-087884
8:05 a.m.
On Oct 17, 2012, at 5:17, Liam Proven <lproven at gmail.com> wrote:
On 16 October 2012 23:42, John Monahan <monahan at
vitasoft.org> wrote:
To my recollection, the 386SX only came in surface-
mount packages. The N8VEM folks (including the S-100
group) have done a pretty good job of making sure all
their boards can be assembled with only through-hole
parts, which makes it a lot easier for novice solderers
with cheap irons.
- Dave
This is an ongoing project. It utilizes the 16 bit mode of the 80386 to
address the 16MG of RAM the S-100 bus is capable of addressing.
Just out of curiosity:
Wouldn't an 80386SX have avoided this restriction and been much easier?
10:10 a.m.
On 17 October 2012 13:05, David Riley <fraveydank at gmail.com> wrote:
On Oct 17, 2012, at 5:17, Liam Proven <lproven at
gmail.com> wrote:
I must admit, I hadn't considered this, but on consideration, I'm
pretty sure I saw socketed ones - if only because for a while,
replacing a 386SX with a 486SLC was a popular upgrade option.
WikiP seems to bear me out:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/80386SX#The_i386SX_variant
"The 386SX was packaged in a surface-mount QFP, and sometimes offered
in a socket to allow for an upgrade."
Yes, they were Quad Flat Package things, but QFPs came in a socketed
form sometimes - I fitted a few of them myself, even though I was/am
primarily a software guy.
--
Liam Proven ? Profile: http://lproven.livejournal.com/profile
Email: lproven at cix.co.uk ? GMail/G+/Twitter/Flickr/Facebook: lproven
MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? Skype/AIM/Yahoo/LinkedIn: liamproven
Tel: +44 20-8685-0498 ? Cell: +44 7939-087884
On 16 October 2012 23:42, John Monahan
<monahan at vitasoft.org> wrote:
To my recollection, the 386SX only came in surface-
mount packages. The N8VEM folks (including the S-100
group) have done a pretty good job of making sure all
their boards can be assembled with only through-hole
parts, which makes it a lot easier for novice solderers
with cheap irons.
This is an ongoing project. It utilizes the 16 bit mode of the 80386 to
address the 16MG of RAM the S-100 bus is capable of addressing.
Just out of curiosity:
Wouldn't an 80386SX have avoided this restriction and been much easier?
11:17 a.m.
On Oct 17, 2012, at 10:10 AM, Liam Proven wrote:
On 17 October 2012 13:05, David Riley <fraveydank
at gmail.com> wrote:
Are you perhaps talking about PLCCs? Square packages like a QFP,
but with J-leads that can be inserted into and removed from a
socket somewhat more easily? Those were certainly popular for a
number of devices, though I can't recall ever having seen a PLCC
386SX. I can't find any examples on eBay of a non-QFP one,
either. Not saying you're wrong, I'm just curious about what
form they'd take.
Is it possible that there was an upgrade PGA socket present on
386SX motherboards alongside the surface-mounted chip? I sure
see quite a few examples of what looks like that (possibly a
socket for a 387SX instead).
It strikes me that your original question may actually have been
about the 16 MB limit, in which case it's a limit of the S-100
bus and not the 386 in question. Their workaround to provide
more RAM is necessary for the extra eight address bits. The
386SX also has a 24-bit address bus, so if you wanted the full
4GB address range, you'd be out of luck anyway.
- Dave
To my recollection, the 386SX only came in
surface-
mount packages. The N8VEM folks (including the S-100
group) have done a pretty good job of making sure all
their boards can be assembled with only through-hole
parts, which makes it a lot easier for novice solderers
with cheap irons.
I must admit, I hadn't considered this, but on consideration, I'm
pretty sure I saw socketed ones - if only because for a while,
replacing a 386SX with a 486SLC was a popular upgrade option.
WikiP seems to bear me out:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/80386SX#The_i386SX_variant
"The 386SX was packaged in a surface-mount QFP, and sometimes offered
in a socket to allow for an upgrade."
Yes, they were Quad Flat Package things, but QFPs came in a socketed
form sometimes - I fitted a few of them myself, even though I was/am
primarily a software guy. 
11:47 a.m.
I'd write the same. Also, the AMD 386DX40 (there were no intel DX40,
only DX33) chips were presented in the same form at first (so you could buy
the motherboard without the [expensive] microprocessor and put a cheaper AMD
one), later soldered on the mainboard.
---
Enviado do meu Motorola PT550
Meu site: http://www.tabalabs.com.br
----- Original Message -----
From: "Al Kossow" <aek at bitsavers.org>
To: <cctalk at classiccmp.org>
Sent: Wednesday, October 17, 2012 12:37 PM
Subject: Re: An 80386 CPU S-100 Board
On 10/17/12 8:17 AM, David Riley wrote:
I'm just curious about what
form they'd take.
PGA PCB with a QFP soldered to the top.
Similar to the way BGA G3s were used by Apple
on Gossamer and Artemis with socketed CPUs.
12:18 p.m.
On Wed, 17 Oct 2012, David Riley wrote:
On Oct 17, 2012, at 10:10 AM, Liam Proven wrote:
> On 17 October 2012 13:05, David Riley <fraveydank at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> To my recollection, the 386SX only came in surface- mount packages.
>> The N8VEM folks (including the S-100 group) have done a pretty good
>> job of making sure all their boards can be assembled with only
>> through-hole parts, which makes it a lot easier for novice solderers
>> with cheap irons.
Despite how they look, QFPs are among some of the easiest surface mount
parts to fit. A 25W pencil iron with a small tip (~2mm) and some liquid
RMA flux will do the job. I've used irons with tips as large as 4mm for
this task when in a bind. Granted, I've been soldering for decades, but
still...SMT isn't /that/ hard...
IIRC, the i386DX is currently still available from Intel in a QFP package
and is marketed for embedded applications.
> Yes, they were Quad Flat Package things, but QFPs
came in a socketed
> form sometimes - I fitted a few of them myself, even though I was/am
> primarily a software guy.
It was also extremely common to see AMD 386DX QFP chips fitted onto a PGA
carrier board that could be plugged into a standard i386DX socket. I own a
bunch of these (and motherboards for them) which I plan to use for a
future multi-processor project. [That is, IF I can ever get my hands on
enough 40MHz 387DX math co-processors -- one guy on eBay has had them for
more than 10 years but his per unit price makes my project cost
prohibitive since I need at least a dozen of them.]
Is it possible that there was an upgrade PGA socket
present on 386SX
motherboards alongside the surface-mounted chip? I sure see quite a few
examples of what looks like that (possibly a socket for a 387SX
instead).
Such boards were very uncommon but they did exist. Just as there were some
"universal" motherboards with PGA sockets for both an i386DX /and/ an
i486DX, there were some motherboards with an on-board i386SX plus a PGA
socket for a i386DX (and a second PGA socket for an i387DX). There were
even boards with 4 PGA sockets, i386DX, i387DX, i486DX/SX, i487SX (I own
some examples of these boards). These "universal" motherboards were not
very common and were typically about 1-1/2x to 2x or more the price of a
normal motherboard. Many people who had these boards installed in their
white-box clone PCs never even took advantage of the extra upgradability
options.
The standard socket for an i387SX was a PLCC socket.
2:24 p.m.
On Oct 17, 2012, at 12:18 PM, Tothwolf wrote:
On Wed, 17 Oct 2012, David Riley wrote:
I suppose. I've had terrible luck with bridging, but I never
really kept at it long enough to get much good at soldering
fine-pitch parts. My wife got me a pretty decent iron as a
birthday present recently, though (I picked a good one!), so
I may be doing a bit more in the not-too-distant future (more
so if my QBUS board ever gets off the ground, because I don't
really feel like paying for assembly).
On Oct 17, 2012, at 10:10 AM, Liam Proven wrote:
> On 17 October 2012 13:05, David Riley <fraveydank at gmail.com> wrote:
>> To my recollection, the 386SX only came in surface- mount packages. The N8VEM
folks (including the S-100 group) have done a pretty good job of making sure all their
boards can be assembled with only through-hole parts, which makes it a lot easier for
novice solderers with cheap irons.
Despite how they look, QFPs are among some of the easiest surface mount parts to fit. A
25W pencil iron with a small tip (~2mm) and some liquid RMA flux will do the job. I've
used irons with tips as large as 4mm for this task when in a bind. Granted, I've been
soldering for decades, but still...SMT isn't /that/ hard... It was also extremely common to see AMD 386DX QFP
chips fitted onto a PGA carrier board that could be plugged into a standard i386DX socket.
I own a bunch of these (and motherboards for them) which I plan to use for a future
multi-processor project. [That is, IF I can ever get my hands on enough 40MHz 387DX math
co-processors -- one guy on eBay has had them for more than 10 years but his per unit
price makes my project cost prohibitive since I need at least a dozen of them.]
I had never seen them, but then I realized that I didn't start
building machines until the 486 era. SMT-on-a-carrier is
certainly a common paradigm; after all, it's basically what
flip-chip PGAs are on a different scale.
- Dave
7:55 p.m.
On 10/17/2012 11:24 AM, David Riley wrote:
I suppose. I've had terrible luck with bridging,
but I never
really kept at it long enough to get much good at soldering
fine-pitch parts. My wife got me a pretty decent iron as a
birthday present recently, though (I picked a good one!), so
I may be doing a bit more in the not-too-distant future (more
so if my QBUS board ever gets off the ground, because I don't
really feel like paying for assembly).
Speaking for myself only, soldering TQFP isn't terribly difficult--I
could almost solder an 0.8 mm lead pitch QFP without my glasses. 0.5 mm
for me requires a binocular loupe and careful checking with an
inspection microscope. But I've done a lot of it and had zero
casualties, much to my surprise.
What I find more of a problem are SMT transistors and other tiny
multi-lead components. It takes a fairly steady hand to get them just
right. For two-leaded components, you can just let the component find
its own place floating on two molten solder pads.
Hey, if I can do it, anyone can. I started with a 100W American Beauty
iron wiring point-to-point (lesson to be learned: Look before you
grab). PCB was a learning experience and SMT yet another one. I still
don't know the right way to handle BGA packages doing manual assembly,
so I steer clear of those.
FWIW, I've got a motherboard here (386 or 486--I don't remember) where a
QFP CPU is mounted on a carrier that plugs into a PGA socket. The thing
was purchased in that configuration.
--Chuck
8:12 p.m.
Only way I know of to handle BGA is doing solder reflow. This can be done with solder
paste and a hotplate, Sparkfun's website has info. The only hitch is that you can only
check if the joint is good by powering it up. Otherwise you need access to an x-ray
machine.
Sent from my iPhone
On 2012-10-17, at 7:55 PM, Chuck Guzis <cclist at sydex.com> wrote:
On 10/17/2012 11:24 AM, David Riley wrote:
I suppose. I've had terrible luck with
bridging, but I never
really kept at it long enough to get much good at soldering
fine-pitch parts. My wife got me a pretty decent iron as a
birthday present recently, though (I picked a good one!), so
I may be doing a bit more in the not-too-distant future (more
so if my QBUS board ever gets off the ground, because I don't
really feel like paying for assembly).
Speaking for myself only, soldering TQFP isn't terribly difficult--I could almost
solder an 0.8 mm lead pitch QFP without my glasses. 0.5 mm for me requires a binocular
loupe and careful checking with an inspection microscope. But I've done a lot of it
and had zero casualties, much to my surprise.
What I find more of a problem are SMT transistors and other tiny multi-lead components.
It takes a fairly steady hand to get them just right. For two-leaded components, you can
just let the component find its own place floating on two molten solder pads.
Hey, if I can do it, anyone can. I started with a 100W American Beauty iron wiring
point-to-point (lesson to be learned: Look before you grab). PCB was a learning
experience and SMT yet another one. I still don't know the right way to handle BGA
packages doing manual assembly, so I steer clear of those.
FWIW, I've got a motherboard here (386 or 486--I don't remember) where a QFP CPU
is mounted on a carrier that plugs into a PGA socket. The thing was purchased in that
configuration.
--Chuck
8:20 p.m.
On Wed, 17 Oct 2012, Paul Anderson wrote:
Only way I know of to handle BGA is doing solder
reflow. This can be
done with solder paste and a hotplate, Sparkfun's website has info. The
only hitch is that you can only check if the joint is good by powering
it up. Otherwise you need access to an x-ray machine.
I've often wondered if it's practical to build a tabletop x-ray machine
for this purpose. Any ideas how much one would cost?
--
David Griffith
dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu
A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text.
Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing?
A: Top-posting.
Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail?
8:29 p.m.
On 10/17/2012 08:20 PM, David Griffith wrote:
Not much point...I have a nearly-new commercial one, real-time
fluoroscope, not film, and I paid $100.00 for it. Keep an eye on the
surplus market.
-Dave
--
Dave McGuire, AK4HZ
New Kensington, PA
Only way I
know of to handle BGA is doing solder reflow. This can be
done with solder paste and a hotplate, Sparkfun's website has info.
The only hitch is that you can only check if the joint is good by
powering it up. Otherwise you need access to an x-ray machine.
I've often wondered if it's practical to build a tabletop x-ray machine
for this purpose. Any ideas how much one would cost?
9:21 p.m.
X-rays aren't terribly hard to produce, it's producing them safely that's the
trick. You might try hunting down a used dental x-ray machine on eBay, the ones I remember
seeing have gone for ~$500. Another idea is using scotch tape in a vacuum to make the
x-rays.
Sent from my iPhone
On 2012-10-17, at 8:20 PM, David Griffith <dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu> wrote:
On Wed, 17 Oct 2012, Paul Anderson wrote:
Only way I know of to handle BGA is doing solder
reflow. This can be done with solder paste and a hotplate, Sparkfun's website has
info. The only hitch is that you can only check if the joint is good by powering it up.
Otherwise you need access to an x-ray machine.
I've often wondered if it's practical to build a tabletop x-ray machine for this
purpose. Any ideas how much one would cost?
--
David Griffith
dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu
A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text.
Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing?
A: Top-posting.
Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail?
9:40 p.m.
New subject: X-ray machines, was Re: An 80386 CPU S-100 Board
On 10/17/2012 09:21 PM, Paul Anderson wrote:
X-rays aren't terribly hard to produce, it's
producing them safely
that's the trick. You might try hunting down a used dental x-ray
machine on eBay, the ones I remember seeing have gone for ~$500.
I do have a few of these as well, complete and functional. If anyone
is interested, please contact me off-list.
-Dave
--
Dave McGuire, AK4HZ
New Kensington, PA
5:50 p.m.
Peeling the tape creates triboluminescence. In a vacuum, this has enough energy to produce
x-rays. Video demonstrating it here:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=LQBjRF9mX1Y
Sent from my iPhone
On 2012-10-18, at 4:28 PM, ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) wrote:
Another idea
is using scotch tape in a vacuum to make the x-rays.
Come again? Other than outgas like mad,, what is that supposed to do?
-tony
8:39 p.m.
Tony Duell wrote:
Come again? Other than outgas like mad,, what is that
supposed to do?
Peeling scotch tape from the roll emits both visible light and X-rays.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/28/science/28xray.html?_r=0
21 Oct
21 Oct
3:34 p.m.
On Wed, 17 Oct 2012 21:21:12 -0400
Paul Anderson <wackyvorlon at me.com> wrote:
Another idea is using scotch tape in a vacuum to make
the x-rays.
Or an "old" beam tetrode:
http://www.danyk.wz.cz/rtg2_en.html
--
\end{Jochen}
\ref{http://www.unixag-kl.fh-kl.de/~jkunz/}
17 Oct
17 Oct
8:36 p.m.
On Oct 17, 2012, at 7:55 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote:
On 10/17/2012 11:24 AM, David Riley wrote:
Alas, all the QFPs I want to use for my current project are
0.5mm pitch. :-\ But my eyes aren't so bad. And I have an OK
iron now, which should do a fair sight better than my old 30W
Weller firestarter.
I've done 0.8mm QFP in the past, it just required a lot of
cleanup. I moved to a toaster oven for "production" (i.e.
greater than 5 piece) quantities, which worked well enough;
only a bridge every other board, which was easy to clean out.
I suppose. I've had terrible luck with
bridging, but I never
really kept at it long enough to get much good at soldering
fine-pitch parts. My wife got me a pretty decent iron as a
birthday present recently, though (I picked a good one!), so
I may be doing a bit more in the not-too-distant future (more
so if my QBUS board ever gets off the ground, because I don't
really feel like paying for assembly).
Speaking for myself only, soldering TQFP isn't terribly difficult--I could almost
solder an 0.8 mm lead pitch QFP without my glasses. 0.5 mm for me requires a binocular
loupe and careful checking with an inspection microscope. But I've done a lot of it
and had zero casualties, much to my surprise. What I find more of a problem are SMT transistors and
other tiny multi-lead components. It takes a fairly steady hand to get them just right.
For two-leaded components, you can just let the component find its own place floating on
two molten solder pads.
Discretes are something I'm OK with (transistor and other).
They can be a bit of a pain inasmuch as they tend to stick
to the iron for me (or, for 0402 discretes, to the tweezers),
but I've never destroyed one except for maybe a few resistor
arrays.
Hey, if I can do it, anyone can. I started with a
100W American Beauty iron wiring point-to-point (lesson to be learned: Look before you
grab). PCB was a learning experience and SMT yet another one. I still don't know the
right way to handle BGA packages doing manual assembly, so I steer clear of those.
I see a lot about hot air reflow machines, which can be
acquired for right around $100 from SparkFun. The videos
I've seen make it look very effective, and it's probably
the next major piece of equipment I'll invest in. For
the curious:
https://www.sparkfun.com/products/10706
For the moment on my projects, I'm avoiding BGAs because
I'd like to avoid paying for assembly and I don't have
a hot air reflow machine.
- Dave
18 Oct
18 Oct
5:56 p.m.
On Wed, Oct 17, 2012 at 8:36 PM, David Riley <fraveydank at gmail.com> wrote:
On Oct 17, 2012, at 7:55 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote:
I've done 0.5mm QFP manually with 100% success in the past (using the
flux-and-drag technique) but it's very, very nice to have
magnification for inspection for peace of mind.
I managed to score a *free* used Brazilian knockoff Zeiss stereo
microscope meant to be wall-mounted for a doctor's office and it's
been really, really nice (in the past, I've borrowed a dissection
microscope).
Mine came with the light pipe and external light source, but if it
gives me grief, I'll be building an LED ring.
One thing I _don't_ like about it: the focal length off the bottom of
the scope is 200mm. Yes. 200mm. Over 7". It means that I can
barely reach items in the focal plane when I'm staring down the
eyepieces. Fine for inspection. Not as fine for assembly. Optics
are *not* my forte (worst grade I got in any science class in college
was the physics class where optics were heavily featured), so I can
follow instructions and install anything but I'm not likely to be able
to calculate what needs to be changed.
I'm definitely on the cusp of needing magnification for this
fine-pitch work, so I'm happy I have this resource.
Oh... I mentioned it's a wall-mount. I didn't get the wall plate or
the arm, just the scope. I ended up hacking an office stool (with
telescoping base) and replacing the chair back with an adapter plate
so the scope mount fits into that and the subject sits on a wooden
plate where the chair user used to sit. It's portable and since the
chair was tossed out from upholstery wear, free!
-ethan
Speaking for myself only, soldering TQFP
isn't terribly difficult--I could almost solder an 0.8 mm lead pitch QFP without my
glasses. 0.5 mm for me requires a binocular loupe and careful checking with an inspection
microscope. But I've done a lot of it and had zero casualties, much to my surprise.
Alas, all the QFPs I want to use for my current project are
0.5mm pitch. :-\ But my eyes aren't so bad. And I have an OK
iron now, which should do a fair sight better than my old 30W
Weller firestarter. 
19 Oct
19 Oct
5:13 p.m.
New subject: Microscopes
I managed to score a *free* used Brazilian knockoff
Zeiss stereo
microscope meant to be wall-mounted for a doctor's office and it's
been really, really nice (in the past, I've borrowed a dissection
microscope).
Nice... A good stereo microscope is soemthing I intend getting sometime.
I did fid a little stero magnifier (a mini-microscope) made by Beck of
London for a few pounds in a charity shop. Of course it's now here :-)
Soem years ago a freidn of mine said he and an old microscope that he
didn;'t want. I was expecting at best a Russian thing (which, to be fair,
are quite reasoanble). I was amazed when he gave me a genuine Zeiss
microscope with 3 objectives in the turret. It needed a minor electrical
repair to the lamp PSU, but that was hardly a problem.
It's not stereo, thoug. It does have binocular eyepieces, but with a beam
splitter from one objective. SO it's less tiring to use than a single
eyepiece model, but you don't get 3D images. It's stil la very nice
instruemnt
-tony
20 Oct
20 Oct
1:22 p.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
I've been meaning to ask this. If you have a disk that can't be read in a drive,
is it possible to extract data using optical methods, i.e a microscope? How powerful would
the unit need to be?
2:35 p.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
Since the data is stored magnetically, I don't believe there's a microscope
technology that could do it.
--------
Paul Anderson -- VE3HOP
On 2012-10-20, at 1:22 PM, Chris Tofu <rampaginggreenhulk at yahoo.com> wrote:
I've been meaning to ask this. If you have a disk
that can't be read in a drive, is it possible to extract data using optical methods,
i.e a microscope? How powerful would the unit need to be?
3:01 p.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
On 10/20/2012 11:35 AM, Paul Anderson wrote:
Since the data is stored magnetically, I don't
believe there's a microscope technology that could do it.
--------
Paul Anderson -- VE3HOP
On 2012-10-20, at 1:22 PM, Chris Tofu <rampaginggreenhulk at yahoo.com> wrote:
> I've been meaning to ask this. If you have a disk that can't be read in a
drive, is it possible to extract data using optical methods, i.e a microscope? How
powerful would the unit need to be?
There was a material called Magna-see which
would deposit very small
particles on a magnet recording. It is mostly useful to alignment of
tape drive paths and optical inspection of the results of recordings there.
We used some on a 2311 (I think) platter from Microdata Marathon. The
drive was 2.5mb on 2 surfaces, or 1.2 on one. You could see the tracks
and some variation, and sectors, but probably not well enough to extract
data.
I've never used my Magnasee on a modern platter, but one needs to
remember that the recording on the drives I mention above was
longitudinal to the head path on the media, and now the recording is
vertical. I don't know with Magnasee if you would see any difference
between a 0 and a 1 with vertical recording. Regardless of the magnet
state, the same amount of Magnasee material would likely stick to a 0 or
1 cell.
The other sport would be looking at a recording developed by Magnasee,
and recall that there are encoding issues like NRZ, NRZI involved. Not
for the faint hearted to do with a microscope and a notepad.
3:19 p.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org wrote:
On 10/20/2012 11:35 AM, Paul Anderson wrote:
> Since the data is stored magnetically, I don't believe there's a
> microscope technology that could do it.
Current magnetic features are smaller than the wavelength of visible
light,
so the old magnetic fluid techniques won't work on a modern disk (I have
to admit that I could not define "modern" in this sense ... you'd
probably be
fine on an RA60 platter, I've no idea about a mid 1990s 1GB disk
though).
A magnetic force STM is what you want. Knowing this list the next post
will
be someone listing the ones they have on hand :-)
Antonio
3:23 p.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
On 10/20/2012 03:19 PM, arcarlini at iee.org wrote:
Current magnetic features are smaller than the
wavelength of visible
light,
so the old magnetic fluid techniques won't work on a modern disk (I have
to admit that I could not define "modern" in this sense ... you'd
probably be
fine on an RA60 platter, I've no idea about a mid 1990s 1GB disk
though).
A magnetic force STM is what you want. Knowing this list the next post
will
be someone listing the ones they have on hand :-)
I'm working on it, but I'm not quite there yet. ;)
-Dave
--
Dave McGuire, AK4HZ
New Kensington, PA
21 Oct
21 Oct
12:18 a.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
On Sat, 20 Oct 2012, jim s wrote:
state, the same amount of Magnasee material would
likely stick to a 0 or
1 cell.
The other sport would be looking at a recording developed by Magnasee,
and recall that there are encoding issues like NRZ, NRZI involved. Not
for the faint hearted to do with a microscope and a notepad.
Rather than '0' and '1' bits in NRZ or equivalent, you will have flux
transitions. you need to watch for those boundaries, as pulses, NOT on
or off in a cell position.
Deciphering a single track manually would be a major project. Do you have
a source for extraordinarily cheap labor?
20 Oct
20 Oct
10:51 p.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
Since the data is stored magnetically, I don't
believe there's a microscope $
Please don't use paragraph-length lines.
Compensating manually,
Since the data is stored magnetically, I don't
believe there's a
microscope technology that could do it.
Well, others have posted reasons why a visible-light microscope is
unlikely to help, possibly except for fairly old disks - and be very
tedious even then.
But it occurs to me that "data is stored magnetically" is not, by
itself, reason to think an optical microscope can't do it. It would
not surprise me a bit if magnetic domain orientation led to some kind
of reflected-visible-light anisotropy, depending of course on the
material and the orientations in question and such. After all, light
is an electromagnetic phenomenon, and, as such, could plausibly
interact with a magnetic field. (In particular, it would not surprise
me if there were polarization effects.)
/~\ The ASCII Mouse
\ / Ribbon Campaign
X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org
/ \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B
21 Oct
21 Oct
1:19 a.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
On a fairly modern hard drive, I seem to recall an article in a paper
describing the use of a STM for data recovery. As I recall, the rate
was VERY low--something like a kilobit per hour.
You'd die before you got a gigabyte.
--Chuck
3:25 a.m.
New subject: Corel computer???
http://retro.hackaday.com/Success/pics/17.jpg
News to me :oO
---
Enviado do meu Motorola PT550
Meu site: http://www.tabalabs.com.br
5:26 a.m.
New subject: Corel computer???
Ah, yes, the Netwinder - I never had one, but those seemed like nice
machines. IIRC fanless, supported by NetBSD, nice small and quiet. (I
think they use plain old IDE drives).
I remember driving by the offices fairly regularly when I was working
in Ottawa. Not in the (somewhat garish) main Corel building, but
closer to downtown, just south of the Queensway somewhere between Bank
and the Vanier Parkway...
Joachim
On Sun, Oct 21, 2012 at 9:25 AM, Alexandre Souza - Listas
<pu1bzz.listas at gmail.com> wrote:
http://retro.hackaday.com/Success/pics/17.jpg
News to me :oO
---
Enviado do meu Motorola PT550
Meu site: http://www.tabalabs.com.br
--
Joachim Thiemann :: http://jthiem.bitbucket.org ::
http://signalsprocessed.blogspot.com
5:46 a.m.
New subject: Corel computer???
check here for info
http://www.netwinder.org/faq.html
On 10/21/12, Alexandre Souza - Listas <pu1bzz.listas at gmail.com> wrote:
http://retro.hackaday.com/Success/pics/17.jpg
News to me :oO
---
Enviado do meu Motorola PT550
Meu site: http://www.tabalabs.com.br
1:37 p.m.
New subject: Corel computer???
On 10/21/2012 03:25 AM, Alexandre Souza - Listas wrote:
http://retro.hackaday.com/Success/pics/17.jpg
News to me :oO
Yup, I have a pair of these. I used one as a desktop machine for
awhile. Really neat little machines.
-Dave
--
Dave McGuire, AK4HZ
New Kensington, PA
4:08 p.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
On a fairly modern hard drive, I seem to recall an article in a paper
describing the use of a STM for data recovery. As I recall, the rate
was VERY low--something like a kilobit per hour.
You'd die before you got a gigabyte.
Even with the typical 'disk gigabyte' of 1e9 bytes, I get it as over 900
years...
-tony
22 Oct
22 Oct
6:22 p.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
From: Chuck Guzis <cclist at sydex.com>
On a fairly modern hard drive, I seem to recall an article in a paper describing the use
of a STM for data recovery.? As I recall, the rate was VERY low--something like a kilobit
per hour.
You'd die before you got a gigabyte.
--Chuck
C: I never should have used the word platters. I was talking about floppy disks mainly.
7:46 p.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
On 10/22/2012 03:22 PM, Chris Tofu wrote:
C: I never should have used the word platters. I was
talking about floppy disks mainly.
Then saying "floppy", "diskette" or similar would get your point
across.
Or you could use the term of art "cookie" if you wanted.
As I and others have said, you need to use a magnetic developer (I gave
a bunch of them) to make the domain walls visible. Even so, if there's
a media defect, that may not help you.
I've never really found any reason not to use the Catweasel for this
kind of thing. As with any other low-level tool (and the CW is VERY
low-level), knowing what you're doing is essential. The one thing a CW
gives you is a complete history of where the flux changes occur, which
means that you can add a missing one or remove an extraneous one. It
works very well, if you're up to writing your own recovery tools.
--Chuck
8:03 p.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
From: Chuck Guzis <cclist at sydex.com>
On 10/22/2012 03:22 PM, Chris Tofu wrote:
C: I never should have used the word platters. I was
talking about floppy disks mainly.
Then saying "floppy", "diskette" or similar would get your point
across.? Or you could use the term of art "cookie" if you wanted.
As I and others have said, you need to use a magnetic developer (I gave a bunch of them)
to make the domain walls visible.? Even so, if there's a media defect, that may not
help you.
I've never really found any reason not to use the Catweasel for this kind of thing.?
As with any other low-level tool (and the CW is VERY low-level), knowing what you're
doing is essential.? The one thing a CW gives you is a complete history of where the flux
changes occur, which means that you can add a missing one or remove an extraneous one.? It
works very well, if you're up to writing your own recovery tools.
C: Ok, but the Catweasel is no longer produced. And assuming I had one (preferably the
MKIV I supposed), would it be effective in reproducing data from *old* disks, say that
worked fine 1-5 years ago, but are just deteriorating due to basic age, or temperature
swings? Along w/the materials you described? It seems worth it to extract said data, even
if it requires a certain amount of *processing*.
?Is the Catweasel a difficult device to reproduce? How long can you expect a deteriorated
disk to last?
8:19 p.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
On Mon, 22 Oct 2012, Chris Tofu wrote:
C: Ok, but the Catweasel is no longer produced. And
assuming I had one
(preferably the MKIV I supposed), would it be effective in reproducing
data from *old* disks, say that worked fine 1-5 years ago, but are just
deteriorating due to basic age, or temperature swings?
A flux-transition board would let you copy all of the bits that are good,
without choking out on the sector or track? when one bit is bad.
Along w/the materials you described? It seems worth it
to extract said
data, even if it requires a certain amount of *processing*.
?Is the Catweasel a difficult device to reproduce?
The early "Option Board"s were discrete ICs. The switch to LSI may have
been more to do with discouraging competitors than anything else.
Are they that hard to find?
How long can you expect a deteriorated disk to last?
Wabash?
Dysan?
OLD diskettes last a lot longer than more recent ones.
8:35 p.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
________________________________
From: Fred Cisin <cisin at xenosoft.com>
?Is the Catweasel a difficult device to reproduce?
The early "Option Board"s were discrete ICs.? The switch to LSI may have
been more to do with discouraging competitors than anything else.
Are they that hard to find?
C: No, and in fact I have one. Was about to list it on ePay.
??? Now to find the s/w (yes I know it's on the web somewhere, I may even have it on a
h/d somewhere).
9:05 p.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
On 10/22/2012 05:19 PM, Fred Cisin wrote:
I'm running a batch of ZDOS 8" floppies written on a Zilog MCZ; all read
just fine. At least they seem to have lasted longer than the hardware
that produced them--or for that matter, human memory of the box.
--Chuck
How long can
you expect a deteriorated disk to last?
Wabash?
Dysan?
OLD diskettes last a lot longer than more recent ones. 
9:12 p.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
On 10/22/12 6:05 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote:
I'm running a batch of ZDOS 8" floppies
written on a Zilog MCZ; all read just fine. At least they seem to have lasted longer than
the hardware that produced them--or for that matter, human memory of
the box.
If there was any of the development system software in the pile, can it be released?
10:16 p.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
On 10/22/2012 06:12 PM, Al Kossow wrote:
On 10/22/12 6:05 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote:
Sorry Al, no development system disks, just customer data. Weird
format, though--132-byte sectors.
--Chuck
I'm running a batch of ZDOS 8" floppies
written on a Zilog MCZ; all
read just fine. At least they seem to have lasted longer than the
hardware that produced them--or for that matter, human memory of
the box.
If there was any of the development system software in the pile, can it
be released?
10:18 p.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
On 10/22/2012 06:12 PM, Al Kossow wrote:
If there was any of the development system software in
the pile, can it
be released?
As a matter of fact, I was just given the disks with the customer
knowing nothing about how or what produced them. I had to sort of suss
that out from clues I found. (Nothing as simple as "Zilog" on the disk,
BTW).
--Chuck
9:01 p.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
On 10/22/2012 05:03 PM, Chris Tofu wrote:
C: Ok, but the Catweasel is no longer produced. And
assuming I had
one (preferably the MKIV I supposed), would it be effective in
reproducing data from *old* disks, say that worked fine 1-5 years
ago, but are just deteriorating due to basic age, or temperature
swings? Along w/the materials you described? It seems worth it to
extract said data, even if it requires a certain amount of
*processing*. Is the Catweasel a difficult device to reproduce? How
long can you expect a deteriorated disk to last?
The Catweasel can be reproduced with just about any modern
microcontroller capable of addressing 128K of RAM (either the RAM is
on-chip or external). Just use the timer "capture" facility of the
chip and stash the lower 8 bits of every capture value in the RAM. The
rest is interfacing--use USB if you want. I've done it using something
as slow as an ATMEGA162 running at 16MHz (there was more than enough
speed to handle a 500Kbps high-density data stream).
The rest is programming and interfacing. There is really not much to
it. The last iteration of the Catweasel had some fancy features and a
selectable clock rate up to 56MHz, but basically it was the same idea as
the earliest ISA one (which may still be available in the US, at least).
People grouse because there wasn't much software written for the CW, but
that shouldn't be a problem if you know what you're doing.
--Chuck
21 Oct
21 Oct
12:14 a.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
On Sat, 20 Oct 2012, Paul Anderson wrote:
Since the data is stored magnetically, I don't
believe there's a
microscope technology that could do it.
"Disclosing fluid".
It used to be used in magnetic audio and video recording for making
"seamless" splices, by making the signal visible to be able to line up the
diagonal (helical) scan lines.
Monte made some of his own out of finely ground rust! I don't know what
he used as a medium, probably a light oil.
Floppy disks (48tpi and 96tpi) are 1/2mm or 1/4mm trqck to traqck spacing,
and that was very readily visible. Individual bits along a track will
require being able to resolve a bit better than 1/20 degree of rotational
position.
Way too tedious to manually examine the bits and manually decode them,
unless you have a source of extremely cheap labor, such as grad students
or third world workers.
If you can get a clear image, then the software involved to analyze the
flux transitions should be reaily do-able. Think polar coordinates,
incrementing rotation to get the raw flux transition stream of a track,
followed by software quite similar to what cat-weasel, disc-ferret, and/or
any other flux-transition board uses.
--
Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com
22 Oct
22 Oct
6:20 p.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
From: Fred Cisin <cisin at xenosoft.com>
If you can get a clear image, then the software involved to analyze the
flux transitions should be reaily do-able.? Think polar coordinates,
incrementing rotation to get the raw flux transition stream of a track,
followed by software quite similar to what cat-weasel, disc-ferret, and/or
any other flux-transition board uses.
C: So in the absence of optical means to disclose flux transitions, will anything else do
the trick? In my experience once a disk is rendered unreadable, putting it in another
drive or whatever resulted in no difference in results. Why I never obtained a catweasel.
And generally (overwhelmingly!) I don't even say "lessee what's on this
little disk here" and pull up a directory or whatever. Nuh uh, I go strait to trying
to image it.
7:36 p.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
On Mon, 22 Oct 2012, Chris Tofu wrote:
C: So in the absence of optical means to disclose flux
transitions, will
anything else do the trick? In my experience once a disk is rendered
unreadable, putting it in another drive or whatever resulted in no
difference in results. Why I never obtained a catweasel. And generally
(overwhelmingly!) I don't even say "lessee what's on this little disk
here" and pull up a directory or whatever. Nuh uh, I go strait to trying
to image it.
It depends on WHY it is "unreadable".
I have repaired some "parity" errors, and SOME "Sector Not Found"
errors
(a few bits out of whack in the sector header), using TE.EXE on the
Central Point Option Board (a predecessor of the CatWeasel and DicFerret)
Yes, repairs at that level are slow and tedious.
SOME aspects of that could be automated. TE identifies where it sees
"inaoppropriate" or "missing" clock bits. It would not be hard (no
more
than a few man-years of work) to go further and identify which of those
are in positions as to be probable deliberate (address marks), and for the
others to try the various combinations of possible repairs to see which,
if any, produce a track image that "meets standards".
Therefore, once the flux-transition stream from the flux-transition board
(catweasel, discferret, option board, OR Chris' Optical Flux Transition
Finder) has been processed to produce a FM, GCR, MFM, MMFM, etc. bit stream,
that additional error identification and correction code could fix some of
the flaws.
THEN the code to separate sectors.
THEN file system code to extract files.
I don't think that we are ready to try to do it real-time to make a
"mountable" optical magnetic floppy drive (not to be confused with
Magneto-Optical!), BUT, a project of resurrecting a damaged floppy
disk MIGHT BE possible.
--
Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com
8:03 p.m.
New subject: This is a VT180 right ?
Pretty sweet setup. I wish I was rich.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/221144219721
8:15 p.m.
New subject: This is a VT180 right ?
On 10/22/2012 08:03 PM, mc68010 wrote:
Pretty sweet setup. I wish I was rich.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/221144219721
It is in fact a VT180. VERY nice!! And not at all a bad price!
-Dave
--
Dave McGuire, AK4HZ
New Kensington, PA
23 Oct
23 Oct
12:17 a.m.
New subject: This is a VT180 right ?
On Mon, Oct 22, 2012 at 7:15 PM, Dave McGuire <mcguire at neurotica.com> wrote:
It is in fact a VT180. VERY nice!! And not at all a bad price!
Nice indeed. I guess I have bits of that system...a VT100 (minus the
crucial guts to make it a VT180,) the floppy unit and, most
interestingly to me, the modem. Does anyone know if that modem (DF03)
was ever sold to customers? The one I have is marked "DEC service
part only, not for resale" and, from what I could gather, was the
service tandem on an 11/780 box (I could be wrong on the model there
as it came from a large datacenter of multiple generations of DEC
equipment.)
Noting that the seller says he got the 180 setup from a DEC employee,
this theory isn't contradicted.
--
jht
12:50 a.m.
New subject: This is a VT180 right ?
In article <CAEfH1SFnKOpSMp04rwqUHqCBxWLYnd_9jEKedGqYRaWizGTHVQ at mail.gmail.com>,
Jason T <silent700 at gmail.com> writes:
Nice indeed. I guess I have bits of that system...a
VT100 (minus the
crucial guts to make it a VT180,)
The Computer Graphics Museum has a complete VT180 system with two dual
floppy drive units like the one pictured in the auction. The museum
doesn't have the printer or the modem shown, however.
--
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" free book
<http://tinyurl.com/d3d-pipeline>
The Computer Graphics Museum <http://computergraphicsmuseum.org>
The Terminals Wiki <http://terminals.classiccmp.org>
Legalize Adulthood! (my blog) <http://legalizeadulthood.wordpress.com>
4:52 a.m.
New subject: This is a VT180 right ?
On Mon, 22 Oct 2012, Richard wrote:
Jason T <silent700 at gmail.com> writes:
There are still some DF03's out there. I spotted one on eBay awhile back
that was listed for ~$30 with no takers. I have one on my shelf of modems
too, along with a DF129.
Nice indeed. I guess I have bits of that
system...a VT100 (minus the
crucial guts to make it a VT180,)
The Computer Graphics Museum has a complete VT180 system with two dual
floppy drive units like the one pictured in the auction. The museum
doesn't have the printer or the modem shown, however.
1:37 a.m.
New subject: This is a VT180 right ?
On 10/22/2012 9:17 PM, Jason T wrote:
Nice indeed. I guess I have bits of that system...a
VT100 (minus the
crucial guts to make it a VT180,) the floppy unit and, most
interestingly to me, the modem. Does anyone know if that modem (DF03)
was ever sold to customers? The one I have is marked "DEC service part
only, not for resale" and, from what I could gather, was the service
tandem on an 11/780 box (I could be wrong on the model there as it
came from a large datacenter of multiple generations of DEC
equipment.) Noting that the seller says he got the 180 setup from a
DEC employee, this theory isn't contradicted.
That modem is the best part to
me. Never seen one before. It's adorable.
It's like something you would buy at a gift shop after doing the DEC
factory tour. Press the buttons and the lid pops open you get candy.
11:06 a.m.
New subject: This is a VT180 right ?
On 10/23/2012 12:17 AM, Jason T wrote:
Oh yes, DF03s were definitely sold to customers. Heck, they were even
sold through retail stores (including the one I worked at as an
after-school job decades ago) that were DEC dealers.
-Dave
--
Dave McGuire, AK4HZ
New Kensington, PA
It is in fact a VT180. VERY nice!! And not at all a bad price!
Nice indeed. I guess I have bits of that system...a VT100 (minus the
crucial guts to make it a VT180,) the floppy unit and, most
interestingly to me, the modem. Does anyone know if that modem (DF03)
was ever sold to customers? The one I have is marked "DEC service
part only, not for resale" and, from what I could gather, was the
service tandem on an 11/780 box (I could be wrong on the model there
as it came from a large datacenter of multiple generations of DEC
equipment.)
Noting that the seller says he got the 180 setup from a DEC employee,
this theory isn't contradicted.
8:26 p.m.
New subject: This is a VT180 right ?
On Tue, Oct 23, 2012 at 10:06 AM, Dave McGuire <mcguire at neurotica.com> wrote:
Oh yes, DF03s were definitely sold to customers.
Heck, they were even
sold through retail stores (including the one I worked at as an
after-school job decades ago) that were DEC dealers.
Ah ok, then it's just mine specifically that is "property of DEC."
That makes it even cooler! :)
Good solid brick of a modem. Love the little silver buttons on it.
Trying to remember what other DEC products had those. I want to say
one of the DECtalk cards that fit into the rackmount cardcage (DTC03?)
8:42 p.m.
New subject: This is a VT180 right ?
On 10/23/2012 08:26 PM, Jason T wrote:
Yes. :) That was probably a "field service dial-in" modem.
Oh yes,
DF03s were definitely sold to customers. Heck, they were even
sold through retail stores (including the one I worked at as an
after-school job decades ago) that were DEC dealers.
Ah ok, then it's just mine specifically that is "property of DEC."
That makes it even cooler! :) Good solid brick of a modem. Love the little silver
buttons on it.
Trying to remember what other DEC products had those. I want to say
one of the DECtalk cards that fit into the rackmount cardcage (DTC03?)
I think so, yes.
The DF03 (and some later modems) were also packaged a bunch together
in a rack as modem arrays.
-Dave
--
Dave McGuire, AK4HZ
New Kensington, PA
7:18 a.m.
New subject: This is a VT180 right ?
On Mon, 22 Oct 2012, Dave McGuire wrote:
On 10/22/2012 08:03 PM, mc68010 wrote:
Looks like the one I gave away the other year... Some guy named Dave ended
up with it IIRC :-).
--
Pretty sweet setup. I wish I was rich.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/221144219721
It is in fact a VT180. VERY nice!! And not at all a bad price!
11:03 a.m.
New subject: This is a VT180 right ?
On 10/23/2012 07:18 AM, Steven Hirsch wrote:
Looks like the one I gave away the other year... Some guy named Dave
ended up with it IIRC :-).
Yes! Via Will and then Sridhar I think, right? Man that feels like
forever ago. :-)
I've finally gotten the paddle board, just a few months ago, and now I
need to find (or more likely make) a drive cable.
-Dave
--
Dave McGuire, AK4HZ
New Kensington, PA
Pretty sweet setup. I wish I was rich.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/221144219721
It is in fact a VT180. VERY nice!! And not at all a bad price! 
12:20 p.m.
New subject: This is a VT180 right ?
On 10/23/2012 11:03 AM, Dave McGuire wrote:
On 10/23/2012 07:18 AM, Steven Hirsch wrote:
Looks like the one I gave away the other year... Some guy
named Dave
ended up with it IIRC :-). Yes! Via Will and then Sridhar I think, right? Man
that feels like
forever ago. :-)
I've finally gotten the paddle board, just a few months ago, and now I
need to find (or more likely make) a drive cable.
-Dave
I may have one of those floating around.. Have to hunt for it.
I also have spares (vt180 boards, Vt100 boards, Vt125 board set)
for mine. Actually years ago (1985) I bought a box of VT180 boards
for $25 all good but none of the other kit. I use them standalone as
mods needed to make them run without the VT100 are trivial and
its a good 4mhz Z80 CP/M platform for project and things.
Allison
Pretty sweet setup. I wish I was rich.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/221144219721
It is in fact a VT180. VERY nice!! And
not at all a bad price!
25 Oct
25 Oct
2:20 a.m.
New subject: This is a VT180 right ?
On 10/23/2012 12:20 PM, Allison wrote:
That would be great!
I've
finally gotten the paddle board, just a few months ago, and now I
need to find (or more likely make) a drive cable.
I may have one of those floating around.. Have to hunt for it. I also have spares (vt180 boards, Vt100 boards, Vt125
board set)
for mine. Actually years ago (1985) I bought a box of VT180 boards
for $25 all good but none of the other kit. I use them standalone as
mods needed to make them run without the VT100 are trivial and
its a good 4mhz Z80 CP/M platform for project and things.
You've mentioned that big stack of them that you scored. Very nice!
I have one spare VT180 board; I didn't know it was that easy to run them
standalone, but I guess it makes sense as it's almost completely
self-contained as it is. I'd love to try that. Can you share the info?
-Dave
--
Dave McGuire, AK4HZ
New Kensington, PA
7:17 a.m.
New subject: This is a VT180 right ?
On 10/25/2012 02:20 AM, Dave McGuire wrote:
I'll have to dig that out. The biggest part of that is power,
5V3A, +12 at .2a, -12 at .1A that excludes the floppy.
Add +5 1A and +12 1A per floppy. The base system does
single sided 40 track so most any drive works.
The other signals are jumpering baud rate clock to the
console port (normally comes from VT100).
Three of the 4 ports need to have their signals brought to
connectors, they originate on the 16 pin socket.
The last one is POR (power on reset).
One note: the base rom set comes up and looks for the vt100
(does a query for device) and requires the normal VT100 response.
You should also find a print set.
Allison
On 10/23/2012 12:20 PM, Allison wrote:
That would be great!
Only about 10 boxes to
look in and shed storage.
I've finally gotten the paddle board, just a few months ago, and now I
need to find (or more likely make) a drive cable.
I may have one of those floating
around.. Have to hunt for it. I also have spares (vt180 boards, Vt100 boards,
Vt125 board set)
for mine. Actually years ago (1985) I bought a box of VT180 boards
for $25 all good but none of the other kit. I use them standalone as
mods needed to make them run without the VT100 are trivial and
its a good 4mhz Z80 CP/M platform for project and things.
You've mentioned
that big stack of them that you scored. Very nice!
I have one spare VT180 board; I didn't know it was that easy to run them
standalone, but I guess it makes sense as it's almost completely
self-contained as it is. I'd love to try that. Can you share the info? -Dave
22 Oct
22 Oct
8:25 p.m.
New subject: This is a VT180 right ?
At 5:03 PM -0700 10/22/12, mc68010 wrote:
Pretty sweet setup. I wish I was rich.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/221144219721
Wow! I'm not sure what it is, though I believe the LA75 is quite a
bit newer than the rest of it.
Zane
--
| Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator |
| healyzh at aracnet.com | OpenVMS Enthusiast |
| | Photographer |
+----------------------------------+----------------------------+
| My flickr Photostream |
| http://www.flickr.com/photos/33848088 at N03/ |
| My Photography Website |
| http://www.zanesphotography.com |
8:40 p.m.
New subject: This is a VT180 right ?
It is a VT180. The vt180 has two personalities. Its a dumb terminal when in vt100 mode,
and a computer system when in vt180 mode.
The vt18x series has a Zilog z80 (cpm) processor on board and could run CP/M programs.
Dual RX180s...neat.
Pres
Date: Mon, 22 Oct 2012 17:25:08 -0700
To: cctalk at classiccmp.org
From: healyzh at aracnet.com
Subject: Re: This is a VT180 right ?
At 5:03 PM -0700 10/22/12, mc68010 wrote:
Pretty sweet setup. I wish I was rich.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/221144219721
Wow! I'm not sure what it is, though I believe the LA75 is quite a
bit newer than the rest of it.
Zane
--
| Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator |
| healyzh at aracnet.com | OpenVMS Enthusiast |
| | Photographer |
+----------------------------------+----------------------------+
| My flickr Photostream |
| http://www.flickr.com/photos/33848088 at N03/ |
| My Photography Website |
| http://www.zanesphotography.com |
9:12 p.m.
New subject: This is a VT180 right ?
On 10/22/2012 08:25 PM, Zane H. Healy wrote:
At 5:03 PM -0700 10/22/12, mc68010 wrote:
It is indeed a Vt180 and there is only half the story there. Vt100 was
8085
the Vt180 board was Z80.
OS is CP/M V2.2.
The LA75 is about 1986 or about 5-6 years after the Vt180. It is newer
than the Vt180
though it will work well with it.
I have two of them one a genuine VT185 (VT100, VT125, V180).
Allison
Pretty sweet setup. I wish I was rich.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/221144219721
Wow! I'm not sure what it is, though I believe the LA75 is quite a
bit newer than the rest of it.
Zane
10:07 p.m.
New subject: This is a VT180 right ?
On 10/22/2012 09:38 PM, Eric Smith wrote:
The total VT180 used the base VT100 (or 103) terminal board with a
change in the paddle
board for interboard IO. the VT180 is a complete Z80, 64K, 4 serial
ports, 1793 FDC and
a few other things like a a real interrupt structure and heartbeat clock
(it's able to be run
stand alone with a few simple mods). Its one of the few CP/M systems
that actually runs
using interrupts for IO.
To make the above into the mythical Vt185 was to add the VT125 board set
and the hyper scarce
VT185 paddle board (the IO interface for the VT180 console, Vt125 and
vt100). I have that as I was
in the terminals and printing systems groupat DEC. This is why I have
two, a vanilla VT180 and the
185. I also have two modded Vt180 boards running standalone with any
terminal and one I souped
up to run at 6mhz and added two sided capability via wire and bios mods
for two side and 80 tracks
using 3.5" floppy (they fit the RX180 drive boxes using drive adaptor
plates 4 drives one box and
4x storage per drive 781KB).
When the Vt180 is in terminal mode, the Vt180 passes data from the VT100
to the VT180 terminal
port and of course the reverse.
The (ep)roms did two things diagnostics at the terminal level and the
VT180 level.
The paddle board does a few things, share baud generation and rate for
some of the ports on the
VT180 and it also brings up the terminal reset signal to the VT180. This
allows the VT100 setup
function to set all the ports and the terminal specifics as well.
The closest analogue is the Heath H19 terminal -> H89 computer.
Allison
allison wrote:
Actually the 8085 version of the VT100 as the VT103 and some VT100s that
got the same board.
Vt100 was 8085
Did they redesign it to use the 8085? All of them I've ever seen used
the 8080A.
the Vt180
board was Z80.
In addition to the terminal processor, which was still an 8080A.
23 Oct
23 Oct
1:43 a.m.
New subject: This is a VT180 right ?
It looks like a VT100 that has been upgraded to VT180.
The outer plastic cover on the chassis rear opening is missing.
I can't remember what was in the kit.
Either the new back chassis cover is missing along with a new VT180 logo or
they were not part of the kit. The old cover would not have had the correct
cutouts.
The line up is really nice. I have an LA75 and they work well.
The DF03 is also scarce. $300 is cheap!!!
Regards
?
Rod Smallwood
?
?
-----Original Message-----
From: cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctech-bounces at classiccmp.org]
On Behalf Of Zane H. Healy
Sent: 23 October 2012 01:25
To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts; General Discussion:
Subject: Re: This is a VT180 right ?
At 5:03 PM -0700 10/22/12, mc68010 wrote:
Pretty sweet setup. I wish I was rich.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/221144219721
Wow! I'm not sure what it is, though I believe the LA75 is quite a
bit newer than the rest of it.
Zane
--
| Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator |
| healyzh at aracnet.com | OpenVMS Enthusiast |
| | Photographer |
+----------------------------------+----------------------------+
| My flickr Photostream |
| http://www.flickr.com/photos/33848088 at N03/ |
| My Photography Website |
| http://www.zanesphotography.com |
20 Oct
20 Oct
2:36 p.m.
New subject: examing disk platters was Re: Microscopes
On 10/20/2012 10:22 AM, Chris Tofu wrote:
I've been meaning to ask this. If you have a disk
that can't be read
in a drive, is it possible to extract data using optical methods, i.e
a microscope? How powerful would the unit need to be?
(Please wrap long text lines!)
If the medium is of low-density, you'll need something to make the
domain walls visible, such as Magnasee, Kyread, Vistamag, QView etc.
Basically a colloidal iron suspension in volatile carrier. Using a
microscope to perform manual reading would be tedious beyond belief.
More appropriate would be a laser with optical pickup.
Usually, when any of the above are used, it's for gross issues, such as
bit crowding, alignment errors, etc. and not for data retrieval.
If you?e talking about modern high-density fixed disks, I don't know of
a visual way, but that? not to say that there isn't one--or that it's
even the preferred method.
--Chuck
2:13 p.m.
New subject: Microscopes
On Fri, Oct 19, 2012 at 10:13 PM, Tony Duell <ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk> wrote:
I have a couple of BAUSCH & LOMB stereo zoom microscopes
they have a .7 to 3 magnification in the body and 10 in the eyepiece
also an accessory is a concave lens that fits under the body so can
work further away
When I had it at work working as a clockmaker :-
http://www.archivist.info/cnc/works/P1010237.JPG
the accessory lens is in the rough at the front left
That one cost me 50 quid iirc
Excellent for hunting shorts on pcbs and looking under chips, hand
turning on a lathe etc
Dave Caroline
I managed to
score a *free* used Brazilian knockoff Zeiss stereo
microscope meant to be wall-mounted for a doctor's office and it's
been really, really nice (in the past, I've borrowed a dissection
microscope).
Nice... A good stereo microscope is soemthing I intend getting sometime.
I did fid a little stero magnifier (a mini-microscope) made by Beck of
London for a few pounds in a charity shop. Of course it's now here :-)
Soem years ago a freidn of mine said he and an old microscope that he
didn;'t want. I was expecting at best a Russian thing (which, to be fair,
are quite reasoanble). I was amazed when he gave me a genuine Zeiss
microscope with 3 objectives in the turret. It needed a minor electrical
repair to the lamp PSU, but that was hardly a problem.
17 Oct
17 Oct
8:49 p.m.
On 10/17/2012 5:55 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote:
Hey, if I can do it, anyone can. I started with a
100W American Beauty
iron wiring point-to-point (lesson to be learned: Look before you
grab). PCB was a learning experience and SMT yet another one. I still
don't know the right way to handle BGA packages doing manual assembly,
so I steer clear of those.
FWIW, I've got a motherboard here (386 or 486--I don't remember) where a
QFP CPU is mounted on a carrier that plugs into a PGA socket. The thing
was purchased in that configuration.
Back in the 80's, what cpu's were for S100 boards other than Z80's
,8080's and 8085's?
--Chuck
Ben.
18 Oct
18 Oct
7:18 p.m.
On 10/17/2012 6:58 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote:
On 10/17/2012 05:49 PM, ben wrote:
Any idea what CPU this guy would have ? 68000 ?
http://saltlakecity.craigslist.org/sys/3348054284.html
(in case it gets deleted)
1979 WICAT S100 Computer - excellant running condition $
(2) 256K Bytes RAM add on memory cards (756K Bytes total RAM)
(2) 8" floppy disks in separate chassis unit
(4) serial ports, coax cable ethernet connector
(2) unopened boxes of original IBM 8" floppy disks (20) disks total
(2) boxes of 8" floppy disks containing the APL and MCS OS
(2) Human Designed Systems 8kb memory APL Serial Terminals
Liberty Serial Terminal
Epson MX-80 printer (serial port) (not the best cosmetically but works)
Operating System : WICAT Multiuser Control System Operating System (MCS)
(looks like VMS)
Languages : The Computer Company APL Interpreter and PASCAL Compiler
Boxes of new and used serial connectors and rolls of new and used serial
ribbon cables
Serial printer buffer box with serial cabling
Serial connector break-out box
MCS OS and APL manuals
---
Multibus card cage - excellant working condition $
Build your dream multi-bus computer around this excellant working
condition plenty of boards of all kinds for this bus available on ebay
(8+) slots
Please contact for additional information
On 10/17/2012 5:55 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote:
Back in the 80's, what cpu's were for
S100 boards other than Z80's
,8080's and 8085's?
You name it. 68K, 8086, 8088, 32016. ISTR a 6502 S100 board... Was
there a Transputer board for S100?
--Chuck
9:23 p.m.
On 10/18/2012 04:18 PM, mc68010 wrote:
Any idea what CPU this guy would have ? 68000 ?
http://saltlakecity.craigslist.org/sys/3348054284.html
Given the software, I'd say 68K. Wicat also offered a system IIRC using
the WD Pascal Microengine, but the date on this says 68K and probably
1980, not 79.
And it is most definitely NOT S-100--Wicat used Multibus. Now there was
a bus you could find almost anything on.
--Chuck
9:32 p.m.
On 10/18/2012 6:23 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote:
On 10/18/2012 04:18 PM, mc68010 wrote:
I had wondered since he says he has a spare multibus backplane too.
Sounds like a cool system but, Utah is too far for me to drive and that
would cost a fortune to ship. He also doesn't say what he wants for it.
Probably too much.
Any idea what CPU this guy would have ? 68000 ?
http://saltlakecity.craigslist.org/sys/3348054284.html
Given the software, I'd say 68K. Wicat also offered a system IIRC
using the WD Pascal Microengine, but the date on this says 68K and
probably 1980, not 79.
And it is most definitely NOT S-100--Wicat used Multibus. Now there
was a bus you could find almost anything on.
--Chuck
17 Oct
17 Oct
10:38 p.m.
On Wed, 17 Oct 2012, ben wrote:
On 10/17/2012 5:55 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote:
I've sold a few M68k boards from CompuPro and retain one for my own use.
Such a board was used to make an M68k S100 machine running a port of Sys V
UNIX called TRICEP. I sold Al Kossow such a machine about a year ago.
Al, what's the status of that machine?
I've also found boards with 8088, 8086, 80186, 80286, and something from
National Semiconductor that I forget. I have an advertising flyer for an
80386 CPU board somewhere.
--
David Griffith
dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu
A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text.
Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing?
A: Top-posting.
Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail?
Hey, if I can do it, anyone can. I started with
a 100W American Beauty
iron wiring point-to-point (lesson to be learned: Look before you
grab). PCB was a learning experience and SMT yet another one. I still
don't know the right way to handle BGA packages doing manual assembly,
so I steer clear of those.
FWIW, I've got a motherboard here (386 or 486--I don't remember) where a
QFP CPU is mounted on a carrier that plugs into a PGA socket. The thing
was purchased in that configuration.
Back in the 80's, what cpu's were for S100 boards other than Z80's
,8080's
and 8085's?
18 Oct
18 Oct
5:04 a.m.
What I find more of a problem are SMT transistors and
other tiny
multi-lead components. It takes a fairly steady hand to get them just
right. For two-leaded components, you can just let the component find its
own place floating on two molten solder pads.
Tin one pad, solder it on this pad, solder other pads. It is as simple
as that
17 Oct
17 Oct
8:38 p.m.
On Wed, 17 Oct 2012, David Riley wrote:
Once I get access to the boxes that I have the boards stored in I'll see
if I can snap some photos. It may be awhile, however.
On Oct 17, 2012, at 12:18 PM, Tothwolf wrote:
When you get a bridge, clean the iron's tip of excess solder, apply a drop
of liquid rosin flux to the joints, and drag the iron down and away from
the component towards the ends of the leads. A narrow chisel or heel type
soldering tip helps, but the real key is the liquid RMA flux.
Despite how they look, QFPs are among some of the
easiest surface mount
parts to fit. A 25W pencil iron with a small tip (~2mm) and some liquid
RMA flux will do the job. I've used irons with tips as large as 4mm for
this task when in a bind. Granted, I've been soldering for decades, but
still...SMT isn't /that/ hard...
I suppose. I've had terrible luck with bridging, but I never really
kept at it long enough to get much good at soldering fine-pitch parts.
My wife got me a pretty decent iron as a birthday present recently,
though (I picked a good one!), so I may be doing a bit more in the
not-too-distant future (more so if my QBUS board ever gets off the
ground, because I don't really feel like paying for assembly). It was also
extremely common to see AMD 386DX QFP chips fitted onto a
PGA carrier board that could be plugged into a standard i386DX socket.
I own a bunch of these (and motherboards for them) which I plan to use
for a future multi-processor project. [That is, IF I can ever get my
hands on enough 40MHz 387DX math co-processors -- one guy on eBay has
had them for more than 10 years but his per unit price makes my project
cost prohibitive since I need at least a dozen of them.]
I had never seen them, but then I realized that I didn't start building
machines until the 486 era. SMT-on-a-carrier is certainly a common
paradigm; after all, it's basically what flip-chip PGAs are on a
different scale.
8:59 p.m.
On Oct 17, 2012, at 8:38 PM, Tothwolf wrote:
When you get a bridge, clean the iron's tip of
excess solder, apply a drop of liquid rosin flux to the joints, and drag the iron down and
away from the component towards the ends of the leads. A narrow chisel or heel type
soldering tip helps, but the real key is the liquid RMA flux.
The liquid flux helped a lot last time I was doing any real fine-
pitch soldering. Didn't have it before that, which was dumb. Oh
well, live and learn. Desoldering braid was the next best thing,
but it can be finicky (especially when you don't have a very high
power iron).
Once I get access to the boxes that I have the boards
stored in I'll see if I can snap some photos. It may be awhile, however.
I have a good idea of what it looks like, since I've used a number
of QFP parts on carriers like that. Would still be interesting
for historical purposes, though, I guess.
- Dave
18 Oct
18 Oct
12:49 a.m.
On Wed, 17 Oct 2012, David Riley wrote:
It is interesting to see how the boards continued to shrink in size too.
Towards the end of the PC era 80386, the smallest boards were barely much
larger than the space required to fit the ISA slots. Photos of some of
those "universal" type 386/486 motherboards that I mentioned might make
for far more interesting photos though.
On Oct 17, 2012, at 8:38 PM, Tothwolf wrote:
Desoldering braid really shouldn't require much extra heat. If it isn't
removing solder well, try adding some liquid flux to the braid. Unless you
have to stay "lead free", you might also consider reflowing the joint with
some good old 60/40 or 63/37.
When you get a bridge, clean the iron's tip
of excess solder, apply a
drop of liquid rosin flux to the joints, and drag the iron down and
away from the component towards the ends of the leads. A narrow chisel
or heel type soldering tip helps, but the real key is the liquid RMA
flux.
The liquid flux helped a lot last time I was doing any real fine- pitch
soldering. Didn't have it before that, which was dumb. Oh well, live
and learn. Desoldering braid was the next best thing, but it can be
finicky (especially when you don't have a very high power iron). Once I get
access to the boxes that I have the boards stored in I'll
see if I can snap some photos. It may be awhile, however.
I have a good idea of what it looks like, since I've used a number of
QFP parts on carriers like that. Would still be interesting for
historical purposes, though, I guess.
17 Oct
17 Oct
5:18 p.m.
On 17 October 2012 16:17, David Riley <fraveydank at gmail.com> wrote:
Are you perhaps talking about PLCCs? Square packages like a QFP,
but with J-leads that can be inserted into and removed from a
socket somewhat more easily?
I honestly don't know.
As I said, I am primarily a software guy, it's just that in most of my
support roles I've had to do a bit of hardware stuff as well. I am
happy to be the sort of board-swapper that Tony Duell holds in
contempt; I was usually being paid to achieve cost-effective results
ASAP, not to do a work of art.
So I was just going by what Wikipedia said, TBH!
Is it possible that there was an upgrade PGA socket
present on
386SX motherboards alongside the surface-mounted chip? I sure
see quite a few examples of what looks like that (possibly a
socket for a 387SX instead).
I've certainly seen and used sockets for a 387SX and they were much
like the 386SX shown on the WikiP link I gave, but with the pins
curled under rather than splayed out like in that soldered-in example.
OTOH I remember people doing things like fitting 486SLC chips onto the
Acorn RISC PC's PC 2nd processor card. :?)
It strikes me that your original question may actually
have been
about the 16 MB limit,
Well that was in part my point. I wouldn't know an S100 card if you
attempted to insert one into me, but when I read about...
in which case it's a limit of the S-100
bus and not the 386 in question.
... just that, the 16MB limit, then I thought "why not use the smaller
cheaper simpler version of the 386 that only *supports* 16MB and has
half as many legs to solder, half the bus width and so on." It seemed
an obvious question to me; if one is building an S100 computer, and
that means no more than 16MB, then use the easier chip that only
supports 16MB.
--
Liam Proven ? Profile: http://lproven.livejournal.com/profile
Email: lproven at cix.co.uk ? GMail/G+/Twitter/Flickr/Facebook: lproven
MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? Skype/AIM/Yahoo/LinkedIn: liamproven
Tel: +44 20-8685-0498 ? Cell: +44 7939-087884
9:08 p.m.
On Oct 17, 2012, at 5:18 PM, Liam Proven wrote:
Ah, yes. So: the S-100 bus only allows for 24 bits of address, but
many things you'd like to run on a 386 (BSD, etc) are happy to run
well beyond that. So, like the MicroVAX of yore (a VAX system which
ran on QBUS, which only had 22 address bits), they've opted to add
an alternate side bus for memory to allow for a full 32-bit address
space for RAM.
So yes, a 386SX would be a perfect match for S-100 in principle,
but if you wanted to take advantage of the 32-bit address space
of the 386, you might want to go with a DX and an alternate RAM
solution.
- Dave
in which case
it's a limit of the S-100
bus and not the 386 in question.
... just that, the 16MB limit, then I thought "why not use the smaller
cheaper simpler version of the 386 that only *supports* 16MB and has
half as many legs to solder, half the bus width and so on." It seemed
an obvious question to me; if one is building an S100 computer, and
that means no more than 16MB, then use the easier chip that only
supports 16MB.
9:42 p.m.
On 18 October 2012 02:08, David Riley <fraveydank at gmail.com> wrote:
On Oct 17, 2012, at 5:18 PM, Liam Proven wrote:
Ah, yes. So: the S-100 bus only allows for 24 bits of address, but
many things you'd like to run on a 386 (BSD, etc) are happy to run
well beyond that. So, like the MicroVAX of yore (a VAX system which
ran on QBUS, which only had 22 address bits), they've opted to add
an alternate side bus for memory to allow for a full 32-bit address
space for RAM.
So yes, a 386SX would be a perfect match for S-100 in principle,
but if you wanted to take advantage of the 32-bit address space
of the 386, you might want to go with a DX and an alternate RAM
solution.
Well, yes, I got that (although I didn't know that detail about VMS) -
it just seems a lot of extra work for a hobbyist project. But what do
I know about such things? Nothing, clearly!
TBH, in terms of low-end OSs that would work well on a 386, 16MB is a
lot. You could run Linux or NetBSD happily in that. Probably even
Linux 3.2 if carefully compiled.
As has already been discussed, implementing VGA on an S100 board is
non-trivial. The machine is not likely to be running Windows 2000, and
indeed, on a 26 year old CPU, it won't be running any full modern OS
whatsoever.
(Yes, the 80386 was 26y ago. 1986. Sheesh. I remember it being the big
new thing, the great white hope for the PC.)
--
Liam Proven ? Profile: http://lproven.livejournal.com/profile
Email: lproven at cix.co.uk ? GMail/G+/Twitter/Flickr/Facebook: lproven
MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? Skype/AIM/Yahoo/LinkedIn: liamproven
Tel: +44 20-8685-0498 ? Cell: +44 7939-087884
in which
case it's a limit of the S-100
bus and not the 386 in question.
... just that, the 16MB limit, then I thought "why not use the smaller
cheaper simpler version of the 386 that only *supports* 16MB and has
half as many legs to solder, half the bus width and so on." It seemed
an obvious question to me; if one is building an S100 computer, and
that means no more than 16MB, then use the easier chip that only
supports 16MB.
18 Oct
18 Oct
12:37 a.m.
On Thu, 18 Oct 2012, Liam Proven wrote:
Well, yes, I got that (although I didn't know that
detail about VMS) -
it just seems a lot of extra work for a hobbyist project. But what do I
know about such things? Nothing, clearly!
TBH, in terms of low-end OSs that would work well on a 386, 16MB is a
lot. You could run Linux or NetBSD happily in that. Probably even Linux
3.2 if carefully compiled.
As has already been discussed, implementing VGA on an S100 board is
non-trivial. The machine is not likely to be running Windows 2000, and
indeed, on a 26 year old CPU, it won't be running any full modern OS
whatsoever.
(Yes, the 80386 was 26y ago. 1986. Sheesh. I remember it being the big
new thing, the great white hope for the PC.)
Just think, if not for the 80386, we most likely wouldn't have Linux ;)
2:01 a.m.
On 10/17/2012 06:42 PM, Liam Proven wrote:
Well, yes, I got that (although I didn't know that
detail about VMS) -
it just seems a lot of extra work for a hobbyist project. But what do
I know about such things? Nothing, clearly!
TBH, in terms of low-end OSs that would work well on a 386, 16MB is a
lot. You could run Linux or NetBSD happily in that. Probably even
Linux 3.2 if carefully compiled.
Aw heck, just stick a Raspberry Pi on a blank S100 prototype card, hook
up the power and a few extension cables for keyboard and video and
you're in business--with 512MB of memory now. You might even be able to
emulate a 386 on an RP about as fast as a native 386.
Sort of like the "new" Commodore 64...
--Chuck
17 Oct
17 Oct
11:38 a.m.
On 10/17/2012 08:05 AM, David Riley wrote:
To my recollection, the 386SX only came in surface-
mount packages. The N8VEM folks (including the S-100
group) have done a pretty good job of making sure all
their boards can be assembled with only through-hole
parts, which makes it a lot easier for novice solderers
with cheap irons.
The 80386SX also came in a PLCC package, which can either be soldered
directly, or placed into a socket. PLCC sockets are either
surface-mount or through-hole. (I know you know this, this is for the
benefit of the less electronics-inclined among us)
-Dave
--
Dave McGuire, AK4HZ
New Kensington, PA
This is an ongoing project. It utilizes the 16 bit
mode of the 80386 to
address the 16MG of RAM the S-100 bus is capable of addressing.
Just out of curiosity:
Wouldn't an 80386SX have avoided this restriction and been much easier?
4322
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aek＠bitsavers.org -
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dave.thearchivist＠gmail.com -
dgriffi＠cs.csubak.edu -
eric＠brouhaha.com -
ethan.dicks＠gmail.com -
fraveydank＠gmail.com -
halarewich＠gmail.com -
healyzh＠aracnet.com -
jkunz＠unixag-kl.fh-kl.de -
joachim.thiemann＠gmail.com -
jws＠jwsss.com -
legalize＠xmission.com -
lproven＠gmail.com -
mc68010＠gmail.com -
mcguire＠neurotica.com -
monahan＠vitasoft.org -
mouse＠Rodents-Montreal.ORG -
pu1bzz.listas＠gmail.com -
rampaginggreenhulk＠yahoo.com -
rodsmallwood＠btconnect.com -
silent700＠gmail.com -
snhirsch＠gmail.com -
tothwolf＠concentric.net -
tpresence＠hotmail.com -
wackyvorlon＠me.com