Brian Brikon diskette drive tester
Steven Hirsch
snhirsch at gmail.com
Sun Nov 29 16:05:11 CST 2015
On Sat, 21 Nov 2015, Steven Hirsch wrote:
> I purchased one of these units on eBay and it seems to be working - modulo a
> few early-80s tantalum caps that went up in smoke.
>
> The tester relies on an attached printer to record test results, which are
> displayed only fleetingly on the front-panel display. Unfortunately it did
> not come with the printer and I cannot find any information on line.
>
> Does anyone have information on this? Is it serial? Parallel? The onnector
> is a 20-pin, 0.1" DIP header on the rear panel. The tester supplies printer
> power on a small 3-pin Molex connector.
>
> I can probably trace this out on the internal logic board, but thought
> perhaps another list member owns one of these and can elaborate.
>
> I'm also trying to find the manual appropriate to a base Model 723 tester.
> The one floating around on the net is for an upscale model (723-4M). While
> there are a number of similarities, I'm running into just enough behavioral
> difference to make it worth finding the correct docs. There's also a
> programming and setup "worksheet" document that has not surfaced anywhere.
Update: With a bit of patience I have figured out the printer interface.
It uses a parallel printer and presents the following pinout on the 20-pin
rear-panel header:
1 Gnd
2 n/c
3 +15V Reg
4 Gnd
5 D6
6 D5
7 D4
8 D3
9 D2
10 D1
11 D0
12 Gnd
13 Strobe* (Out)
14 Gnd
15 Gnd
16 Gnd
17 n/c
18 n/c
19 Busy (In)
20 Gnd
I have no idea why there's a +15 supply. Note the 7-bit interface.
Maybe someone will find this useful.
Steve
--
More information about the cctech
mailing list