23 Nov
2005
23 Nov
'05
4:09 a.m.
Subject: Re: CP/M 2 - what's its legal status?
From: "Chuck Guzis" <cclist at sydex.com>
Date: Tue, 22 Nov 2005 21:37:58 -0800
To: cctalk at classiccmp.org
On 11/22/2005 at 9:18 PM Fred Cisin wrote:
Battery backup for the ram?
Allison
... just to add to the bad news,...
I've seen numerous TM100-4M drives that were labelled TM100-4 !
So, a visual inspection may be inadequate to identify it.
Vector Graphic was suprisingly stubborn about retaining the 100 tpi HS
format long after it had become pass?. I've had HS 100 tpi diskettes
from the Vector 4. I think Vector used some Micropolis drives and some
Tandon. They may have also used some MPI drives in the 100 tpi format.
What I can't explain are the small cables between the RAM cards in the
middle of the card cage and whatever the cards are at the rear.
Cheers,
Chuck 
23 Nov
23 Nov
10:25 a.m.
On 11/23/2005 at 7:09 AM Allison wrote:
>What I can't explain are the small cables
between the RAM cards in the
>middle of the card cage and whatever the cards are at the rear.
Battery backup for the ram?
I don't think so. Each little black cable goes to a different card at each
end.
If you look closely at the top view of the card cage, starting from the
front, you see what I would guess to be a hard/floppy controller, a RAM
card (note the positioning of the components that you can see and compare
them with the three cards in the middle), perhaps a CPU card, a couple of
empty slots, three more RAM cards and then three unidentified cards with
SSI chips (some sort of comms?). The front RAM card doesn't appear to have
the same small black cable attached. Perhaps bank switching of some sort?
Cheers,
Chuck
12:21 p.m.
New subject: CP/M 2 - what's its legal status? (Vector box cards)
On Wed, 23 Nov 2005, Chuck Guzis wrote:
Jackpot Chuck;
The three cards ahead of the RAM cards are FlashWriters - terminal
interface cards, basically. The Vector time slices through standalone
copies of the OS in separate memory cards, running multiple instances of
the single-user CP/M.
The single wire from the FlashWriter is BD_ENABLE.
The cards are:
FlashWriter
FlashWriter
FlashWriter
56k RAM board
56k RAM board
56k RAM board
Odd little wire divider (No clue whatefer)
ZCB (CPU board)
RAM board
Floppy & Hard disk controller
BitStreamer (out of picture)
The FlashWriter talks to a MindlessTerminal (vaguely proprietary
connection, but easy enough to mimic as I'm working on now). My ZCB has
RS-232 hanging off it, and a memory board next to it - which suggests to
me that it can run a serial console and another instance of an OS, but I
haven't tested this yet.
The BitStreamer is a serial & parallel port I/O host.
The thing is a pretty nifty set up, to be honest, I didn't know it was
nearly so cool ;)
>What I
can't explain are the small cables between the RAM cards in the
>middle of the card cage and whatever the cards are at the rear.
Battery backup for the ram?
I don't think so. Each little black cable goes to a different card at each
end.
If you look closely at the top view of the card cage, starting from the
front, you see what I would guess to be a hard/floppy controller, a RAM
card (note the positioning of the components that you can see and compare
them with the three cards in the middle), perhaps a CPU card, a couple of
empty slots, three more RAM cards and then three unidentified cards with
SSI chips (some sort of comms?). The front RAM card doesn't appear to have
the same small black cable attached. Perhaps bank switching of some sort? 
3:57 p.m.
New subject: Two Classiccmp stories on NPR
Two actual stories Today on NPR: All Things Considered
Story 2:
Person who moved from modern to Wordperfect
for DOS so as to remove the Internet distractions from his life.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5025301
Story 1:
Silicon Valley worker who keeps an HP3000 in his house
and is surviving jobless on a shoestring.
Choose your paths wisely,
Happy Thanksgiving
John A.
6:24 p.m.
New subject: CP/M 2 - what's its legal status? (Vector box cards)
On 11/23/2005 at 2:21 PM JP Hindin wrote:
The thing is a pretty nifty set up, to be honest, I
didn't know it was
nearly so cool ;)
Isn't this whole thing deja vu all over again--only 6 years later?
http://classiccmp.org/pipermail/cctalk/1999-May/127508.html
This was almost certainly an MP/M II system.
FWIW, if you're wondering about the Flashwriter cards, there's a MDM7
overlay for them wandering around on the web.
Cheers,
Chuck
28 Nov
28 Nov
2:39 p.m.
New subject: CP/M 2 - what's its legal status? (Vector box cards)
Back from break, finally. Apologies for delays in response.
(My first child, a son, was born a week ago... I'm up to my neck in "What
the hell have I gotten myself into?")
Now that is funny... I'm pretty sure Anthony was the name of the chap I
picked the Vector up from, and the serial number lines up - so I guess
thats the same machine.
The internet never forgets!
The documentation does not mention MP/M, I'm fairly certain that it runs
multiple copies of CP/M, as Mike Stein suggests.
The floppy drive is a Tandon unit, although I've yet to pry it out enough
to identify which model number. Thankfully some very helpful chaps around
have offered to line me up with appropriate CP/M boot disks (Gord & Mike
rock), so I'm a happy chappy for now.
The FlashWriter is a pretty clever piece of toy, and I'm fairly confident
I can build a terminal for it easily enough. The FlashWriter II rev 4 (as
I have) can spit out composite video with a jumper setting, and uses a
parallel ASCII keyboard, which I'm going to use a Ubicom SX20
microcontroller to translate between a PS/2 keyboard and such.
Thanks all for your help;
On Wed, 23 Nov 2005, Chuck Guzis wrote:
On 11/23/2005 at 2:21 PM JP Hindin wrote:
The thing is a pretty nifty set up, to be honest,
I didn't know it was
nearly so cool ;)
Isn't this whole thing deja vu all over again--only 6 years later?
http://classiccmp.org/pipermail/cctalk/1999-May/127508.html
This was almost certainly an MP/M II system.
FWIW, if you're wondering about the Flashwriter cards, there's a MDM7
overlay for them wandering around on the web.
Cheers,
Chuck
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