24 Mar
2012
24 Mar
'12
6:12 a.m.
Does anyone have a scan of an RX50 manual?
I powered on the RX50 I just got, without a cable attaching it to the RQDX3
though. It flashes two red lights for a moment and then nothing happens, the
doors do not appear to be unlocked, or I don't remember how to open them. It
could be because I have not connected a cable, but I don't know. There are
two floppies in the drive at the moment too.
Thanks
Rob
24 Mar
24 Mar
6:34 a.m.
From: "Rob Jarratt" <robert.jarratt at ntlworld.com>
Sent: Saturday, March 24, 2012 11:12 AM
To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts"
<cctalk at classiccmp.org>
Subject: Anyone Have a DEC RX50 Manual?
Does anyone have a scan of an RX50 manual?
I powered on the RX50 I just got, without a cable attaching it to the
RQDX3
though. It flashes two red lights for a moment and then nothing happens,
the
doors do not appear to be unlocked, or I don't remember how to open them.
It
could be because I have not connected a cable, but I don't know. There are
two floppies in the drive at the moment too.
Thanks
Rob
As far as I know, there is no locking mechanism to prevent the opening
of the drive slots to access to floppy. I guess you know how that works.
The upper "door" flaps open in the upward direction, the lower "door"
flaps open in the downward direction.
I remember the drive ribbon cable to be nothing special. Plus you need
the standard 4-pin power supply cable to power the RX50.
I don't know the behavior of the RX50 if powered without ribbon cable.
I normally connect everything before powering up :-)
- Henk
5:10 p.m.
As far as I know, there is no locking mechanism to
prevent the opening
of the drive slots to access to floppy. I guess you know how that works.
The upper "door" flaps open in the upward direction, the lower
"door"
flaps open in the downward direction.
I remember the drive ribbon cable to be nothing special. Plus you need
the standard 4-pin power supply cable to power the RX50.
I don't know the behavior of the RX50 if powered without ribbon cable.
I normally connect everything before powering up :-)
I also seem to remember the disks are 400K single sided and go in the
drive in opposite direction so you need to remember the orientation of
the floppies.
I believe there are markings on DEC floppies and the drive to indicate
the correct way to insert them.
Just pull on the upper or bottom door from the center. It should pull open.
pax
--
Paxton Hoag
Astoria, OR
USA
5:20 p.m.
-----Original Message-----
From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk-
bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Paxton Hoag
Sent: 24 March 2012 21:10
To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts
Subject: Re: Anyone Have a DEC RX50 Manual?
drive
As far as I know, there is no locking mechanism
to prevent the opening
of the drive slots to access to floppy. I guess you know how that works.
The upper "door" flaps open in the upward direction, the lower
"door"
flaps open in the downward direction.
I remember the drive ribbon cable to be nothing special. Plus you need
the standard 4-pin power supply cable to power the RX50.
I don't know the behavior of the RX50 if powered without ribbon cable.
I normally connect everything before powering up :-)
I also seem to remember the disks are 400K single sided and go in the in opposite direction so you need to remember the
orientation of the
floppies.
I believe there are markings on DEC floppies and the drive to indicate the
correct way to insert them.
Just pull on the upper or bottom door from the center. It should pull
open.
pax
--
Paxton Hoag
Astoria, OR
USA
Thanks, yes, I was just being too delicate for fear of breaking something.
The doors open just fine.
5:23 p.m.
On 03/24/2012 05:10 PM, Paxton Hoag wrote:
I also seem to remember the disks are 400K single
sided and go in the
drive in opposite direction so you need to remember the orientation of
the floppies.
I believe there are markings on DEC floppies and the drive to indicate
the correct way to insert them.
Yes, there are little orange stickers on the DEC-branded floppies.
In any case, the top side of the disk goes toward the "outside" of
the drive in both cases.
-Dave
--
Dave McGuire, AK4HZ
New Kensington, PA
25 Mar
25 Mar
2:33 p.m.
I also seem to remember the disks are 400K single sided and go in the
The exact capacity depends on the format and encoding method. Each disk
is single-sided, 80 cylinders, soft sectored. It's similar ot a PC 360K
disk but with all 80 tracks on one side (A PC 360K disk is 40 cylinders, 2
hears, of course)
drive in opposite direction so you need to remember
the orientation of
the floppies.
Indeed. There are actually good emchancial reasons for this.
The mechanism is built o na metal chassis in the middle of the drive.
There's a disk hub on each side, the spindle motor lies horizontally at
the front, a belt links them all up. The head postioner stepper is at the
rear, it has a ledschre mechansim that moves a head carriage with the
head for each disk on it.
So for easy of head mounting ,the active surface of each disk is closest
to the midle of the drive. And that's the side without the label on the
disk. So the labels face outwards in both cases.
-tony
24 Mar
24 Mar
5:40 p.m.
From: "Paxton Hoag" <innfoclassics at gmail.com>
Sent: Saturday, March 24, 2012 10:10 PM
To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts"
<cctalk at classiccmp.org>
Subject: Re: Anyone Have a DEC RX50 Manual?
Yeah, I also remember that the floppies are 400 KB.
Regarding insertion orientation (up/down) is easy if you remember that
the drive motor (spindle) is *between* them. And the "bottom" side of
the floppy always goes onto the spindle.
Another "quirk" of the RX50 is that the head movement stuff is also
shared for both heads. So floppy-to-floppy copy can be slow because
the head has to reposition every time the access goes from one disk
to the other.
- Henk.
As far as I
know, there is no locking mechanism to prevent the opening
of the drive slots to access to floppy. I guess you know how that works.
The upper "door" flaps open in the upward direction, the lower
"door"
flaps open in the downward direction.
I remember the drive ribbon cable to be nothing special. Plus you need
the standard 4-pin power supply cable to power the RX50.
I don't know the behavior of the RX50 if powered without ribbon cable.
I normally connect everything before powering up :-)
I also seem to remember the disks are 400K single sided and go in the
drive in opposite direction so you need to remember the orientation of
the floppies.
I believe there are markings on DEC floppies and the drive to indicate
the correct way to insert them.
Just pull on the upper or bottom door from the center. It should pull
open.
pax
--
Paxton Hoag
Astoria, OR
USA 
7:07 p.m.
Henk Gooijen wrote about the RX50:
Another "quirk" of the RX50 is that the head
movement stuff is also
shared for both heads. So floppy-to-floppy copy can be slow because
the head has to reposition every time the access goes from one disk
to the other.
If you are doing a file copy, it can be inefficient. But it's
optimal
for track-at-a-time disk image copy, because for each track you only
have to position once, read the track from the source drive, and write
to the destination drive.
4506
days inactive
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ard＠p850ug1.demon.co.uk -
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innfoclassics＠gmail.com -
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