Reading HP2000 tapes

[Rick Bensene]

 Dan Veeneman via cctalk wrote:
> 
> I recently received the following request:
> 
>> I just recently found a (9 or 7 track?) tape of mine made on an
>> HP2000 (probably C, maybe F) in 1977 from a DUMP of two accounts.
>> I've had it for 40 years with nothing to process it.  Now I have
>> simh to process it on, but nothing to read it with.
> 
> Does anyone have experience and the ability to read such a tape?

..and Chuck responded:

>I can read 7-track as well as 9-track (800 NRZI, 1600 PE and 6250 GCR)
>tapes.  My output format is SIMH .TAP files.  Interpretation is up to you.

Once you get .TAP files, here's a link to the tools you need to extract the catalog directories, as well as decode the BASIC programs on the tape.   They work fantastic:

http://www.brouhaha.com/~eric/software/tsbutils/

Once you get the tape read and have a .tap image, please put it somewhere where Time Shared BASIC fans can download it and take a look at what's there.   If it's a HIBernate tape, could potentially be fired up under SimH and run just as it was the day the tape was made.

If it's a 9-Track tape, I do have ability to read them, but no 7-track capability.  I'm in Oregon.

-Rick
--
Rick Bensene
The Old Calculator Museum
http://oldcalculatormuseum.com