16 Sep
2005
16 Sep
'05
1:18 p.m.
Howdy list,
I've just picked up a Computer Logics PCTD III 9-track tape drive ISA
adapter board. It has a 68-pin D-sub socket on the mounting bracket for
connection to a Pertec interface drive (I've got a brand new Fujitsu
M2444AC).
My problem is that I have no documentation or software at all for this
thing. I called Chi Corporation to see what they have for it and they said
that they've long since disposed of any information on the card. The only
thing that the guy at Chi could remember is that it doesn't work with faster
CPUs.
So I'm stuck for any information on this board. I'm looking for either copy
of software or technical documentation for the card. My intent is to write
either a Linux or XP driver for this thing and I'll be happy to share the
results of my work.
Can anyone help out?
Thanks much!
Chuck Guzis
Sydex, Inc.
17 Sep
17 Sep
2:43 a.m.
I have an ATC16:
http://www.idbcorp.com/atc16.html
Which seems to have been fairly popular. I can't find the software for
the card though. =( It's been quite some time since I used it.
However, there is a linux driver for this board that worked with some
realy old kernel. I've not tried to forward port it. Here's one mirror:
http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/linux/kernel/misc-cards/cipher.tar.gz
If anyone has the dos/windows atc-16 drivers or manual, I'd appreciate a
copy. I purchased them with the card. but that was around 1989 and I
can't find them now.
Chuck Guzis wrote:
Howdy list,
I've just picked up a Computer Logics PCTD III 9-track tape drive ISA
adapter board. It has a 68-pin D-sub socket on the mounting bracket for
connection to a Pertec interface drive (I've got a brand new Fujitsu
M2444AC).
My problem is that I have no documentation or software at all for this
thing. I called Chi Corporation to see what they have for it and they said
that they've long since disposed of any information on the card. The only
thing that the guy at Chi could remember is that it doesn't work with faster
CPUs.
So I'm stuck for any information on this board. I'm looking for either copy
of software or technical documentation for the card. My intent is to write
either a Linux or XP driver for this thing and I'll be happy to share the
results of my work.
Can anyone help out?
Thanks much!
Chuck Guzis
Sydex, Inc.
--
Tim Riker - http://Rikers.org/ - TimR at Debian.org
Embedded Linux Technologist - http://eLinux.org/
BZFlag maintainer - http://BZFlag.org/ - for fun!
12:42 p.m.
On 9/17/2005, Tim Riker wrote:
I have an ATC16:
http://www.idbcorp.com/atc16.html
Thanks, Tim--I'll have a peek.
Looks like a much better (but earlier) card than my Computer Logics PCTD. Has a bigger
FIFO, for one. The CL has a 512x9 AMD 7201 FIFO and while it fits into a 16 bit ISA
slot, uses only the IRQ lines from the "short side", so it's basically an 8
bit card. Has a Xilinx FPGA and a bunch 74HCT00 series glue on it, mostly buffers and
latches. 8 position unlabeled DIP switch--the tech guy at Chi said he thought it was to
set base I/O port address, but I think it also sets DMA and IRQ. 11 address lines are
connected, so there's no memory-mapped I/O either.
I wonder if mine will even handle the data rate from the Fujitsu M2444AC drive that
it's hooked to.
Thanks,
Chuck
18 Sep
18 Sep
1:58 a.m.
Chuck Guzis wrote:
On 9/17/2005, Tim Riker wrote:
IDB also makes a PCI card though I never used one of those. I could
stream over 600k/s from my M990 with the atc16. so this card held up
fine. That's as fast as the M990 would run. non-stop at 6250 bpi.
--
Tim Riker - http://Rikers.org/ - TimR at Debian.org
Embedded Linux Technologist - http://eLinux.org/
BZFlag maintainer - http://BZFlag.org/ - for fun!
I have an ATC16:
http://www.idbcorp.com/atc16.html
Thanks, Tim--I'll have a peek.
Looks like a much better (but earlier) card than my Computer Logics PCTD. Has a bigger
FIFO, for one. The CL has a 512x9 AMD 7201 FIFO and while it fits into a 16 bit ISA
slot, uses only the IRQ lines from the "short side", so it's basically an 8
bit card. Has a Xilinx FPGA and a bunch 74HCT00 series glue on it, mostly buffers and
latches. 8 position unlabeled DIP switch--the tech guy at Chi said he thought it was to
set base I/O port address, but I think it also sets DMA and IRQ. 11 address lines are
connected, so there's no memory-mapped I/O either.
I wonder if mine will even handle the data rate from the Fujitsu M2444AC drive that
it's hooked to. 
2:06 a.m.
On 9/18/05, Tim Riker <Tim at rikers.org> wrote:
IDB also makes a PCI card though I never used one of
those. I could
stream over 600k/s from my M990 with the atc16. so this card held up
fine. That's as fast as the M990 would run. non-stop at 6250 bpi.
Wow... that's a lot of bits... I never got a "modern" Cipher drive to
stream at 6250 on our old VAX. The TU80 was one thing, but never the
Cipher.
-ethan
2:25 a.m.
Ethan Dicks wrote:
On 9/18/05, Tim Riker <Tim at rikers.org>
wrote:
heh. Yeah. I was reading in a few hundred tapes at the time onto 386 and
486 systems. The trick was getting the harddrive subsystem to handle
writes at that speed. Just getting multiple gigabytes of storage on a PC
was a major challenge at the time.
When they all finished loading (days later) we backed them up to Exebyte
8500 8mm drives in a matter of hours.
1 5G tape held the (compressed) data from over 75 9-track tapes.
--
Tim Riker - http://Rikers.org/ - TimR at Debian.org
Embedded Linux Technologist - http://eLinux.org/
BZFlag maintainer - http://BZFlag.org/ - for fun!
IDB also makes a PCI card though I never used one
of those. I could
stream over 600k/s from my M990 with the atc16. so this card held up
fine. That's as fast as the M990 would run. non-stop at 6250 bpi.
Wow... that's a lot of bits... I never got a "modern" Cipher drive to
stream at 6250 on our old VAX. The TU80 was one thing, but never the
Cipher.
1:10 p.m.
IDB also makes a PCI card though I never used one of
those. I could
stream over 600k/s from my M990 with the atc16. so this card held up
fine. That's as fast as the M990 would run. non-stop at 6250 bpi.
I built up two versions of an unbuffered controller; the first using 74LS00
"glue" chips on an ISA proto board and the second, a PCI card using
82C55AC's (10 MHz 8255's); one for control and the other for data. The ISA board
could not keep up using DMA or programmed I/O with the Fujitsu, which was firing out data
a bit faster than 1 usec. per byte. The PCI board could just barely keep up (this was
using 32-bit code; I suspect that the board has a few too many wait states buried in the
FPGA used for interfacing).
The Fuji drive is of traditional reel-to-reel open construction, and while it has a
high-speed mode, I don't think it could be called a "streamer" in the sense
of the Cipher. It's built like a battleship and weighs probably close to 150 lbs.
If I can't make heads or tails of the Computer Logics board or obtain another board
with similar functionality, I'll probably move next to a dedicated microcontroller
(I've got a RabbitCore 2000 kit around here somewhere) and a USB 2.0 interface to the
PC.
Cheers,
Chuck
6878
days inactive
6880
days old
6 comments
4 participants
participants (4)
-
cclist＠sydex.com -
ethan.dicks＠gmail.com -
Tim＠Rikers.org -
tubastuff＠inbox.com