New to System/36

alan at alanlee.org alan at alanlee.org
Sat Nov 10 12:59:48 CST 2018


Just picked up an IBM System/36 5362 last night.  It is in pretty good
physical condition with just a few minor scratches - other than needing
a thorough cleaning.  It has 2 60 MB hard disks in the unit.  Not sure
of the RAM capacity.  Missing the the mode hard key. 

A few of us tried to get it running tonight.  It came with a 3179
twin-ax terminal but no keyboard.  We connected the terminal via a
twinax cable direct from port 0 to the terminated Y adapter on the
terminal.  Never got any output on the terminal at any time other than
the fairly empty status line.  The S/36 front panel console light did
illuminate after we connected the terminal.  The key was locked to
Normal but we were able to by-pass it with a jumper to get it into
Service mode.  The media that came with it only had disk 1 of an SSP
release and we could not get that to IPL from floppy (mode 3 / panel
1000).  It stepped the head motor forward and back a couple times,
engaged the head, then immediately threw an error code. 

Any idea where I can get an SSP release for the S/36 5362 and how to
write it to 8" floppies?  Also where I might find a keyboard for the
terminal and what can be done if anything to gauge the health of the
hard drives? 

-Alan H.


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