Need DEC BC80J-20 cable - test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

16 Jan 2014

...
 Ethan Dicks ethan.dicks at gmail.com 
Fri Jan 3 18:03:10 CST 2014 
...
 On Fri, Jan 3, 2014 at 5:57 PM, Charles
<charlesmorris800 at centurytel.net> wrote:
  Anyway I was thinking of just bending over and
paying the $57.50. Until I
 got to "standard 9-13 day shipping $15.00" and it goes up from there. 
Postage rates really went up a year ago.  I was shipping things 12-13
months ago, then *bam* double-digit increases.

  Perhaps I can locate some surplus multiple
twisted pair cable and carefully
 solder the ends to a header connector. There are 13(?) twisted pair
 differential signals and the rest are no-connects or grounds. As Henk
 pointed out, some of the trouble may be the 6' of unshielded ribbon cable
 (which is also smaller gauge than the twisted pairs)... 
6 feet?!?  I must have read 6 inches (or I had a dust spec on my
screen ;-)  That's a lot of unshielded cable to push those
differential signals side-by-side through.  My RL8A had 4 to 6
*inches* of flat cable going into the RL8A, then the BC80J to the
drive.

Most folks who collect DEC equipment have a few of the 40-pin shielded
cables.  They were used with so many devices.  If you don't have one
spare, those shouldn't be expensive to find and try out.

-ethan 
I attempted to order the BC80M from Pinnacle Micro. After several days
of "your order has been received" I got an email canceling the order
without explanation. The online chat was never answered. Finally after
several emails I found out they didn't have the cable in stock (and
they claim their inventory is only updated periodically). So much for
Pinnacle, I don't plan to order from them again any time soon.

Meanwhile, I explained to Continental Computers that my need for the
BC80J-20 was hobby/"vintage" and that I couldn't afford $145. They
offered to sell it to me for $75, still steep but more reasonable. So
I bought it. Put the shipping on my Fedex account.

Plugged it in, hooked up the RL02's... same failure is still there :(
(Fault lamp flashes when BOOT is toggled and the heads start to move,
then the drive goes back to Ready status). Time to start downloading
diagnostics via the console port!