From zmerch-cctalk at 30below.com Mon Dec 1 00:40:39 2008 From: zmerch-cctalk at 30below.com (Roger Merchberger) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 01:40:39 -0500 Subject: Sun people and keyboards Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.2.20081201014033.04668fa0@mail.30below.com> Rumor has it that David Griffith may have mentioned these words: >Does anyone here have pull with Sun Microsystems or know someone who does? >I'm trying to get the right person jazzed up about the idea of a Type 7 >keyboard built like a Model M. I've already emailed clickykeyboards.com >about it and they'll do the engineering and design work for about $27k. A >Type 7 sells brand new for around $50. I'm sure people would be more than >willing to pay twice as much for a "Type 7m". How important are which features you want? If the "control key is in the right place" feature means a lot to you, you can have that now for only slightly more than Sun wants: http://pckeyboards.stores.yahoo.net/linux101.html Not sure if you can get these in USB, but a PS/2->USB adapter should fit the bill nicely. $70 (and I'll assume plus shipping.) They do have this layout with an integrated catstongue/j-stick/eraserhead/whateveryouwannacallit pointing device for $100. However, these don't have the "extra" keys down the left side of the keyboard. If that's what's most important to you, then that will indeed be exceptionally tough to find, IMHO. HTH, Roger "Merch" Merchberger -- Roger "Merch" Merchberger | "Profile, don't speculate." SysAdmin, Iceberg Computers | Daniel J. Bernstein zmerch at 30below.com | From zmerch-cctalk at 30below.com Mon Dec 1 00:49:19 2008 From: zmerch-cctalk at 30below.com (Roger Merchberger) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 01:49:19 -0500 Subject: Sun people and keyboards In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.2.20081201014558.013c2420@mail.30below.com> Rumor has it that David Griffith may have mentioned these words: >Does anyone here have pull with Sun Microsystems or know someone who does? >I'm trying to get the right person jazzed up about the idea of a Type 7 >keyboard built like a Model M. I've already emailed clickykeyboards.com >about it and they'll do the engineering and design work for about $27k. A >Type 7 sells brand new for around $50. I'm sure people would be more than >willing to pay twice as much for a "Type 7m". Hey, found a link on the same site that might get you closer, but you'd still prolly have to remap some things: http://pckeyboards.stores.yahoo.net/122keyterkey.html It's got function keys on the left and 2 rows of function keys - you could get this keyboard programmed in a *nix-like layout as well? This one is runs $100, it doesn't have a mouse option. Oh, and this sucker's really, *really* big. I used these on IBM terminals way back, and you'll need a big desk for this rascal. ;-) Just a thought, Roger "Merch" Merchberger -- Roger "Merch" Merchberger -- SysAdmin, Iceberg Computers _??_ zmerch at 30below.com (?||?) If at first you don't succeed, nuclear warhead _)(_ disarmament should *not* be your first career choice. From cclist at sydex.com Mon Dec 1 05:41:11 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 03:41:11 -0800 Subject: SGI O2 on Eugene, OR CL In-Reply-To: References: <49317C3E.20396.1EAB92D9@cclist.sydex.com>, <4931BD71.2732.1FAA5D5F@cclist.sydex.com>, Message-ID: <49335CD7.11014.6EA6F@cclist.sydex.com> On 30 Nov 2008 at 10:21, Zane H. Healy wrote: > I'm not interested as I have two O2's and OS CD's. The O2 is a nice > small example of SGI hardware, it's no real power house, but I've > been planning on turning one of mine into a MP3 Jukebox. Basically > I'd like to try hooking one up to the home stereo, and put a web > interface on it. Here's what the seller had to say: 200mhz r6000 cpu 36gb hd video capture card 512mg memory I will have to check on the media. Cheers, Chuck From afra at aurigae.demon.co.uk Mon Dec 1 07:23:23 2008 From: afra at aurigae.demon.co.uk (Phill Harvey-Smith) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 13:23:23 +0000 Subject: SGI O2 on Eugene, OR CL In-Reply-To: <49335CD7.11014.6EA6F@cclist.sydex.com> References: <49317C3E.20396.1EAB92D9@cclist.sydex.com>, <4931BD71.2732.1FAA5D5F@cclist.sydex.com>, <49335CD7.11014.6EA6F@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <20081201132323.0yx41ubyscg0o8wg@aurigae.demon.co.uk> Quoting Chuck Guzis : > On 30 Nov 2008 at 10:21, Zane H. Healy wrote: > 200mhz r6000 cpu 36gb hd video capture card 512mg memory I will have > to check on the media. I think that should be 200MHz R5000, don't think there is an R6000. Cheers, Phill. ---------------------------------------------------------------- This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program. From cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de Mon Dec 1 08:14:08 2008 From: cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de (Christian Corti) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2008 15:14:08 +0100 (CET) Subject: Hello Jay... are you there? In-Reply-To: <0f9101c9516d$5f3713e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <0f9101c9516d$5f3713e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: The question is still valid: where is Jay? I've tried to contact him via email but haven't got any response yet. His last post to this list was at the end of May. Christian From healyzh at aracnet.com Mon Dec 1 09:06:26 2008 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2008 07:06:26 -0800 Subject: SGI O2 on Eugene, OR CL In-Reply-To: <49335CD7.11014.6EA6F@cclist.sydex.com> References: <49317C3E.20396.1EAB92D9@cclist.sydex.com>, <4931BD71.2732.1FAA5D5F@cclist.sydex.com>, <49335CD7.11014.6EA6F@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: At 3:41 AM -0800 12/1/08, Chuck Guzis wrote: >Here's what the seller had to say: > >200mhz r6000 cpu 36gb hd video capture card 512mg memory I will have >to check on the media. If it really does have the full A/V card vs. just the audio card, then it's easily worth $75. The 36GB HD isn't bad either, but it only has half the max RAM. As has been pointed out that is no doubt a 200Mhz R5000 CPU (which is good as it means it isn't the really bad version of the two 180Mhz models, but not so good in that it isn't an R10000, or R12000). Still it's not really tempting to me, even though I don't heave a full A/V card, considering I already own a R5000 180Mhz (the really slow version), a R12000 270Mhz, and have other things I need more. Zane -- | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator | | healyzh at aracnet.com (primary) | OpenVMS Enthusiast | | MONK::HEALYZH (DECnet) | Classic Computer Collector | +----------------------------------+----------------------------+ | Empire of the Petal Throne and Traveller Role Playing, | | PDP-10 Emulation and Zane's Computer Museum. | | http://www.aracnet.com/~healyzh/ | From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Mon Dec 1 09:48:43 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2008 10:48:43 -0500 Subject: Screwheads, was: 5" floppy?. In-Reply-To: <492C7D38.1734.B2788E3@cclist.sydex.com> References: , <158BA5A9-0E1A-4285-A22B-A5DCC78A8314@neurotica.com> <492C7D38.1734.B2788E3@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: > On 26 Nov 2008 at 1:13, Dave McGuire wrote: > > > My two favorites are hex-head and Torx. But my nemesis is the > > flat-head screw. I'll take even Philips over flat-head screws > anytime. > > Dave, do you mean "flat head"? I know that I've got a bunch of > phillips flat-head screws in my hellbox. Flat blade? Those are not a problem if you use the right screwdriver. Unfortunately, you can't buy the right screwdriver at the hardware store, or from most tool suppliers (such as electronics tools shops). All they sell is wrong screwdrivers -- you can recognize them by the fact that the blade is tapered (wedge shaped). Those will "cam out" and damage the screw, if you need any significant torque. Correct screwdrivers can be found in one of two ways, depending on the size you need. For the small sizes, get watchmaker screwdrivers. For larger sizes, get gunsmith screwdrivers. Both have hardened tips, hollow ground so the point that fits in the slot of the screw has parallel sides, not tapered sides. With those you can work those screws without damaging them, even if they are quite tight. I have a nice set from Brownell's that I use all the time. For watchmaker screwdrivers, be sure to get the hardened ground ones. You can also find crummy ones, not just at Radio Shack but also at more expensive outlets like Jensen Tools. I think I got a set there branded "Moody" (?). The bad ones are plated, as opposed to having the blue-gray color of hardened tool steel, and their tip shape is only a loose approximation of the correct one. paul From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Mon Dec 1 09:52:22 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2008 10:52:22 -0500 Subject: Screwheads; was 5 floppy?. In-Reply-To: <492C6EEF.22398.AEFBE84@cclist.sydex.com> References: <79C192B51E1440A1A869DE1482E975A8@FLEXPC>, <492BC04E.27488.845A0CC@cclist.sydex.com>, <492C6EEF.22398.AEFBE84@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: > To engage a Torx or Robertson, the screwdriver bit must be fairly > precisely positioned so it enters the head. With a Phillips, one can > still engage the head successfully even if one starts off-center due > to the property that both the slot and bit are conical in profile-- > the bit will naturally tend to slide to center in the slot. > > The price you pay for this is that it's not easy to preload a driver > with a screw without some sort of clip or magnet arrangement. Torx > and Robertson-headed screws can be preloaded onto the bit which is > one of the reasons that manufacturers like them--which is also, why, > I suppose that square-drive drywall screws have largely replaced > phillips-head ones. I haven't seen that, though square drives are common for deck screws which look a lot like drywall screws. The trouble with Phillips heads is that the bit will "cam out" -- when you apply torque it pushes the screwdriver out of engagement. This is actually by design; the Phillips head was designed back before torque-limited screwdrivers, and the "cam out" property was intended as a slipshod way of torque limiting. Of course that was a century ago, and by now this "feature" is really just an old crock that no one likes. paul From tosteve at yahoo.com Mon Dec 1 13:16:25 2008 From: tosteve at yahoo.com (steven stengel) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2008 11:16:25 -0800 (PST) Subject: WANTED: someone to transfer IBM 5110 BASIC programs to modern PC Message-ID: <227361.78266.qm@web111301.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Hello, A gentleman from the East Coast contacted me to see if I can extract old BASIC programs from his IBM-5110 8-inch floppy disks. I have a working IBM-5120 with internal floppy drives, but the serial communications option is not installed in my system. I think the best I can do is LIST the programs and photograph the screen. Any other ideas? Anyone else with a serial port who can do it? Anyone with a spare communications card? Thanks- Steven Stengel From cclist at sydex.com Mon Dec 1 13:29:38 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 11:29:38 -0800 Subject: SGI O2 on Eugene, OR CL In-Reply-To: References: <49317C3E.20396.1EAB92D9@cclist.sydex.com>, <49335CD7.11014.6EA6F@cclist.sydex.com>, Message-ID: <4933CAA2.25536.4B9530@cclist.sydex.com> On 1 Dec 2008 at 7:06, Zane H. Healy wrote: > If it really does have the full A/V card vs. just the audio card, > then it's easily worth $75. The 36GB HD isn't bad either, but it > only has half the max RAM. As has been pointed out that is no doubt > a 200Mhz R5000 CPU (which is good as it means it isn't the really bad > version of the two 180Mhz models, but not so good in that it isn't an > R10000, or R12000). Okay, if there's no particular interest in this box, I'll let the matter drop. Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Mon Dec 1 12:34:57 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 10:34:57 -0800 Subject: Screwheads, was: 5" floppy?. In-Reply-To: References: , <492C7D38.1734.B2788E3@cclist.sydex.com>, Message-ID: <4933BDD1.6054.198498@cclist.sydex.com> On 1 Dec 2008 at 10:48, Paul Koning wrote: > Correct screwdrivers can be found in one of two ways, depending on the > size you need. For the small sizes, get watchmaker screwdrivers. For > larger sizes, get gunsmith screwdrivers. Both have hardened tips, > hollow ground so the point that fits in the slot of the screw has > parallel sides, not tapered sides. With those you can work those screws > without damaging them, even if they are quite tight. Another way to find larger HG sizes is to get a (good) set of power- drive bits that will fit a screwdriver socket handle. Although this has its problems with getting into tight spaces, sets of hollow- ground hardened power bits are comparatively easy to find. Cheers, Chuck From rborsuk at colourfull.com Mon Dec 1 13:40:00 2008 From: rborsuk at colourfull.com (Robert Borsuk) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2008 14:40:00 -0500 Subject: DEC Rainbow Message-ID: Hi All, Put my DEC Rainbow for auction on eBay for those who are interested. http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=300277777299 Rob From frustum at pacbell.net Mon Dec 1 13:42:46 2008 From: frustum at pacbell.net (Jim Battle) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 13:42:46 -0600 Subject: WANTED: someone to transfer IBM 5110 BASIC programs to modern PC In-Reply-To: <227361.78266.qm@web111301.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> References: <227361.78266.qm@web111301.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <49343E36.7080600@pacbell.net> steven stengel wrote: > Hello, > A gentleman from the East Coast contacted me to see if I can extract old BASIC programs from his IBM-5110 8-inch floppy disks. > > I have a working IBM-5120 with internal floppy drives, but the serial communications option is not installed in my system. > > I think the best I can do is LIST the programs and photograph the screen. > > Any other ideas? > Anyone else with a serial port who can do it? > Anyone with a spare communications card? how many programs do you need to convert? if it is more than one, probably the best bet is this: read the disks using a modern PC equipped with 8" drives, capturing the disk image with Dave Dunfield's IMD program. Then write a program on the PC which understands the disk and file structure, dumping out the program listing. From frustum at pacbell.net Mon Dec 1 13:42:46 2008 From: frustum at pacbell.net (Jim Battle) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 13:42:46 -0600 Subject: WANTED: someone to transfer IBM 5110 BASIC programs to modern PC In-Reply-To: <227361.78266.qm@web111301.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> References: <227361.78266.qm@web111301.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <49343E36.7080600@pacbell.net> steven stengel wrote: > Hello, > A gentleman from the East Coast contacted me to see if I can extract old BASIC programs from his IBM-5110 8-inch floppy disks. > > I have a working IBM-5120 with internal floppy drives, but the serial communications option is not installed in my system. > > I think the best I can do is LIST the programs and photograph the screen. > > Any other ideas? > Anyone else with a serial port who can do it? > Anyone with a spare communications card? how many programs do you need to convert? if it is more than one, probably the best bet is this: read the disks using a modern PC equipped with 8" drives, capturing the disk image with Dave Dunfield's IMD program. Then write a program on the PC which understands the disk and file structure, dumping out the program listing. From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Mon Dec 1 13:42:40 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2008 14:42:40 -0500 Subject: Screwheads, was: 5" floppy?. In-Reply-To: <4933BDD1.6054.198498@cclist.sydex.com> References: , <492C7D38.1734.B2788E3@cclist.sydex.com>, <4933BDD1.6054.198498@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: > > Correct screwdrivers can be found in one of two ways, depending on > the > > size you need. For the small sizes, get watchmaker screwdrivers. > For > > larger sizes, get gunsmith screwdrivers. Both have hardened tips, > > hollow ground so the point that fits in the slot of the screw has > > parallel sides, not tapered sides. With those you can work those > screws > > without damaging them, even if they are quite tight. > > Another way to find larger HG sizes is to get a (good) set of power- > drive bits that will fit a screwdriver socket handle. Although this > has its problems with getting into tight spaces, sets of hollow- > ground hardened power bits are comparatively easy to find. Good point. However, those (and hardware store flat bits in general) come only in a few sizes. You get a choice of width but not (as far as I have seen) a choice of thickness. By contrast, a decent gunsmith screwdriver set has a lot more widths, so you can more closely match the screw diameter, and it will also offer a given width in 3 to 6 thicknesses, so you can find the bit that is a nice snug fit for the screw head you're working on. It may be that slotted screws are well enough standardized that this is overkill, but I suspect not. Certainly not in guns, where the nonstandard is usual. :-) paul From cisin at xenosoft.com Mon Dec 1 14:14:58 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2008 12:14:58 -0800 (PST) Subject: WANTED: someone to transfer IBM 5110 BASIC programs to modern PC In-Reply-To: <227361.78266.qm@web111301.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> References: <227361.78266.qm@web111301.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20081201121349.J92537@shell.lmi.net> Did John Titor get all the way home before he realized that machines in 2036 can't read and write legacy floppy formats? -- Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Mon Dec 1 14:24:53 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 14:24:53 -0600 Subject: Screwheads, was: 5" floppy?. In-Reply-To: <4933BDD1.6054.198498@cclist.sydex.com> References: , <492C7D38.1734.B2788E3@cclist.sydex.com>, <4933BDD1.6054.198498@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <49344815.6070407@gmail.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 1 Dec 2008 at 10:48, Paul Koning wrote: > >> Correct screwdrivers can be found in one of two ways, depending on the >> size you need. For the small sizes, get watchmaker screwdrivers. For >> larger sizes, get gunsmith screwdrivers. Both have hardened tips, >> hollow ground so the point that fits in the slot of the screw has >> parallel sides, not tapered sides. With those you can work those screws >> without damaging them, even if they are quite tight. > > Another way to find larger HG sizes is to get a (good) set of power- > drive bits that will fit a screwdriver socket handle. > Although this > has its problems with getting into tight spaces, sets of hollow- > ground hardened power bits are comparatively easy to find. Yep, they certainly seem in plentiful supply. re. watchmaker's screwdrivers, I've had a lot of luck with the cheap ones from bargain stores to be honest. I bought a set many years ago in the UK, figuring I'd buy a 'proper' set ASAP - which I never did, and the cheap set's still going strong. Then I did the same thing in the US a few years ago, and those too have seen a lot of use with no appreciable wear (I did kill one of the flat-blades a while back, but that was down to user error :-) cheers Jules From bob at jfcl.com Mon Dec 1 15:19:35 2008 From: bob at jfcl.com (Bob Armstrong) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2008 13:19:35 -0800 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project Message-ID: <006401c953fa$8294a980$87bdfc80$@com> I and a couple of other people thought it would be fun to build our own stand alone video terminal. The prototype is a 3x5" PCB that is completely self contained - all you need to connect is a VGA monitor, a PS/2 keyboard, 12V power, and a RS-232 connection to a host computer of your choice. The idea is that you could easily stick one inside the case of an old VGA monitor, add a keyboard, and then have an ASCII terminal. No PC required :-) I did the hardware design and PC boards, and James Markevitch did the lion's share of the firmware, with help from David Betz, Ethan Dicks and Dave McGuire. The firmware is all open source, GPL licensed, and is managed as a Source Forge project. The microprocessors (yes, there are two used) are 8051 cores and the firmware for both is written mostly in C using the SDCC compiler. SDCC and the other development tools we're using are all FREE, mostly open source, and the primary MCU can be in system programmed using a regular PC and an ordinary serial connection. No expensive development tools or special hardware programmers are needed. Enough firmware finished now to be a functional VT220 clone - it can run EDT and vi already - but there's still lots to be done. We'd like to find a couple more people to join the development team and help us finish off version 1. In particular, some of the major things that still need doing include - Fonts (a VT220 has a surprisingly large number of DEC specific fonts) Serial EEPROM drivers for saving setup and configuration data Documentation, users manual and web pages (on SourceForge) and of course testing Some of the things we're thinking about working on after V1 is finished - Emulating other ASCII terminals (ADM, TeleVideo, Wyse, maybe more) Adding graphics (Tek 4006/4010/4014 emulation, ReGIS, maybe more) If you're interested, I have two more of the prototype PC boards that I can sell. And if you really want, you can always wire wrap your own without a PC board - the schematics are available as part of the project documentation. email me and let me know if you are interested in working on the project. Right now I'd prefer that the PC boards go to people who have the time to actually help out with the project in the short term, so if so if you'd just like to have one of the terminals but don't have time to help then please stand by. There'll be another announcement when we have one ready for release. Bob From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Mon Dec 1 15:28:07 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 15:28:07 -0600 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <006401c953fa$8294a980$87bdfc80$@com> References: <006401c953fa$8294a980$87bdfc80$@com> Message-ID: <493456E7.7000609@gmail.com> Bob Armstrong wrote: > I and a couple of other people thought it would be fun to build our own > stand alone video terminal. The prototype is a 3x5" PCB that is completely > self contained - all you need to connect is a VGA monitor, a PS/2 keyboard, > 12V power, and a RS-232 connection to a host computer of your choice. The > idea is that you could easily stick one inside the case of an old VGA > monitor, > add a keyboard, and then have an ASCII terminal. No PC required :-) Hmm, I don't suppose NTSC TV is good enough to offer 80x25 text on a TV set, is it? That'd be rather useful as a way of sneaking a terminal into the lounge :-) > Enough firmware finished now to be a functional VT220 clone Including vomit-inducing smooth scroll? :-) Nice work, anyway - I may well be interested in one when I eventually get all my kit shipped over here, depending on whether I bring my VT220 over or not. cheers Jules From cisin at xenosoft.com Mon Dec 1 16:00:57 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2008 14:00:57 -0800 (PST) Subject: WANTED: someone to transfer IBM 5110 BASIC programs to modern PC In-Reply-To: <49343E36.7080600@pacbell.net> References: <227361.78266.qm@web111301.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <49343E36.7080600@pacbell.net> Message-ID: <20081201135826.L97208@shell.lmi.net> On Mon, 1 Dec 2008, Jim Battle wrote: > how many programs do you need to convert? if it is more than one, probably the best bet > is this: > read the disks using a modern PC equipped with 8" drives, capturing the disk image with > Dave Dunfield's IMD program. Then write a program on the PC which understands the disk > and file structure, dumping out the program listing. Similarly, if the 5110 is in good working order, you could install a 1.2M 5.25" drive on it, copy the files, and then extract them at your leisure on an AT. or serial port transfer etc. Are those BASIC files stored as plain text, or are they tokenized? From IanK at vulcan.com Mon Dec 1 16:18:11 2008 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2008 14:18:11 -0800 Subject: Screwheads, was: 5" floppy?. In-Reply-To: References: , <492C7D38.1734.B2788E3@cclist.sydex.com>, <4933BDD1.6054.198498@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: Isn't it ironic that guns were one of the first beneficiaries of mass production techniques that allowed for interchangeable parts? > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Paul Koning > Sent: Monday, December 01, 2008 11:43 AM > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Subject: RE: Screwheads, was: 5" floppy?. > > > > Correct screwdrivers can be found in one of two ways, depending on > > the > > > size you need. For the small sizes, get watchmaker screwdrivers. > > For > > > larger sizes, get gunsmith screwdrivers. Both have hardened tips, > > > hollow ground so the point that fits in the slot of the screw has > > > parallel sides, not tapered sides. With those you can work those > > screws > > > without damaging them, even if they are quite tight. > > > > Another way to find larger HG sizes is to get a (good) set of power- > > drive bits that will fit a screwdriver socket handle. Although this > > has its problems with getting into tight spaces, sets of hollow- > > ground hardened power bits are comparatively easy to find. > > Good point. However, those (and hardware store flat bits in general) > come only in a few sizes. You get a choice of width but not (as far as > I have seen) a choice of thickness. By contrast, a decent gunsmith > screwdriver set has a lot more widths, so you can more closely match > the > screw diameter, and it will also offer a given width in 3 to 6 > thicknesses, so you can find the bit that is a nice snug fit for the > screw head you're working on. > > It may be that slotted screws are well enough standardized that this is > overkill, but I suspect not. Certainly not in guns, where the > nonstandard is usual. :-) > > paul > From legalize at xmission.com Mon Dec 1 16:46:13 2008 From: legalize at xmission.com (Richard) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 15:46:13 -0700 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: Your message of Mon, 01 Dec 2008 15:28:07 -0600. <493456E7.7000609@gmail.com> Message-ID: In article <493456E7.7000609 at gmail.com>, Jules Richardson writes: > Hmm, I don't suppose NTSC TV is good enough to offer 80x25 text on a TV set, > is it? I think the best you could get is 40x24 or even less without the fonts becoming a big mushy blur. ISTR that is why the Apple ][ and C=64 had such low text resolution -- so that ordinary NTSC monitors/TVs could be used. -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download Legalize Adulthood! From legalize at xmission.com Mon Dec 1 17:15:29 2008 From: legalize at xmission.com (Richard) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 16:15:29 -0700 Subject: AN/AYK-14 CDC flight computer on ebay Message-ID: item # 190270701510 -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download Legalize Adulthood! From aek at bitsavers.org Mon Dec 1 18:20:35 2008 From: aek at bitsavers.org (Al Kossow) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 16:20:35 -0800 Subject: AN/AYK-14 CDC flight computer on ebay Message-ID: <49347F53.9030304@bitsavers.org> http://www.janes.com/extracts/extract/jav/del03767.html DescriptionThe AN/AYK-14(V) is a high-performance general purpose computer with both 16-bit and 32-bit processing elements. It consists of a family of interchangeable processor, memory, power, enclosure and input/output modules that can be configured to meet specific price, performance and functionality needs for a wide range of applications. The AN/AYK-14(V) computer offers high performance and high reliability with a low life cycle cost, while meeting airborne MIL-E-5400, shipboard MIL-E-16400 and land MIL-E-4158 environments. It is the US Navy's standard airborne computer and is currently being used on a wide variety of military platforms by the US and its allies.The 16-bit version of the AN/AYK-14(V) is currently in its third generation, which is known as VHSIC AN/AYK-14(V). It provides performance of up to 20 Mips or more within a single enclosure and has a memory addressing capacity of 16 Mbytes. The VHSIC computer is fully compatible with software written for either of the prior generations. The instruction set is compatible with that of the AN/UYK-44 and AN/UYK-20 and is supported by the MTASS software development environment. Other 16-bit modules include 128 kbyte core memory, MIL-STD-1553A/B, NTDS, RS-232, Proteus, discrete Input/Output (I/O) and application specific I/O modules. --- Will be interesting to see what it goes for.. From cclist at sydex.com Mon Dec 1 17:35:33 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 15:35:33 -0800 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: References: >, Message-ID: <49340445.20989.12CBCC0@cclist.sydex.com> On 1 Dec 2008 at 15:46, Richard wrote: > I think the best you could get is 40x24 or even less without the fonts > becoming a big mushy blur. Going through a modulator or direct video input? With direct video, an NTSC TV can probably do 80x24. Of course, you don't get ginormous dots-per-character (7x7 is pretty typical), but you can do it. Why should this be any different from the NTSC-scan-frequency IBM CGA monitor? My first video monitor was a Zenith B&W portable (tube) hot-chassis TV that I won in a raffle and fed directly into the video amp from my SWTP TVT II modified to give 64x16. It looked fine, even if it was foolish on my part. Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Mon Dec 1 18:50:26 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 16:50:26 -0800 Subject: 70's view of Army Radar Installation (with computer gear) Message-ID: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com> I just ran across this page: http://cryptome.info/0001/loc/loc-images.htm It seems that LOC has been rather ham-handedly censoring some of its online historical content. Of particular interest is a shot of computer peripherals (printers, card readers, tape drives), all of which appear to be vintage CDC gear (military versions of the 512 printer, 65x tapes, 405 card readers...). I don't know what the mainframe behind this was, nor does it seem to be shown. Anyone have any idea? BTW, the TIFF images are 20MB each and very high quality--enough so that I could read the CRT displays and the notice of "Volley Ball" and "Hayride" on the bulletin board. Cheers, Chuck From ian_primus at yahoo.com Mon Dec 1 18:52:41 2008 From: ian_primus at yahoo.com (Mr Ian Primus) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2008 16:52:41 -0800 (PST) Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <49340445.20989.12CBCC0@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <526615.27920.qm@web52702.mail.re2.yahoo.com> --- On Mon, 12/1/08, Chuck Guzis wrote: > > I think the best you could get is 40x24 or even less > without the fonts > > becoming a big mushy blur. > > Going through a modulator or direct video input? With > direct video, > an NTSC TV can probably do 80x24. Of course, you don't > get ginormous > dots-per-character (7x7 is pretty typical), but you can do > it. Why > should this be any different from the NTSC-scan-frequency > IBM CGA > monitor? The primary difference here is the color decoding. You can get very legible, crisp, clean text on a CGA monitor, or a Commodore Amiga RGB monitor - both of which run at the standard NTSC rates. But in both cases, the set doesn't have to decode the color signals - they're separate. Most off-the-shelf TV sets and video monitors, even those with direct video input, will have a tough time giving clear 80 column text. Some of the better designed monitors, those meant specifically for computer use, such as the Apple color composite monitor - can produce good text. Others, such as a cheap color TV, won't work so well. A color picture tube is somewhat worse at providing a crisp monochrome text screen, due to it's phosphor design and the resolution limits thereof, but this is not the force that causes the fuzzy text. It's the color demodulation. Monochrome monitors will almost universally (except for the very low quality) give legible 80 column text. I've even gotten legible 80x25 text out of a $20 portable black and white 5" TV, although the contrast/brightness controls had to be just so. > My first video monitor was a Zenith B&W portable (tube) > hot-chassis > TV that I won in a raffle and fed directly into the video > amp from my > SWTP TVT II modified to give 64x16. It looked fine, even > if it was > foolish on my part. Hehe. Been there, done that, have the blown fuses to show for it. For a while, I was using a 19" tube type black and white TV that I'd modified as a monitor for an Apple IIe. It worked great, and 80 columns was very usable. The set was hot chassis, and since I didn't have an isolation transformer, I'd modified the power cord of the TV such that it could only be plugged in one way, so the chassis was on the "neutral" side. All was well until I moved the setup to a friends house to play some games and copy disks. In the process, I'd inadvertantly unplugged the power cord from the back of the TV (hehe, "This cabinet back is equipped with a safety interlock, do not defeat it's purpose. Remove cover completely for service"). Plug in, switch on, >piff!< tripped the breaker. After reversing (and marking) the cable, and resetting the breaker, everything worked fine. -Ian From jfoust at threedee.com Mon Dec 1 19:26:29 2008 From: jfoust at threedee.com (John Foust) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 19:26:29 -0600 Subject: Arcade games In-Reply-To: <309061929.6233971227977527402.JavaMail.root@mail01.panther link.uwm.edu> References: <1582433227.6233291227976982185.JavaMail.root@mail01.pantherlink.uwm.edu> <309061929.6233971227977527402.JavaMail.root@mail01.pantherlink.uwm.edu> Message-ID: <6.2.3.4.2.20081201192532.06fb6c60@mail.threedee.com> At 10:52 AM 11/29/2008, Martin Scott Goldberg wrote: >And yes, there's a longstanding collector and "in home" coin-op market, something we also cater to at the Midwest Gaming Classic event. Plenty of forums, web sites, etc. for the coin-op collecting scene as well. Google is your friend. ;) And as a happy visitor to the last two, I'll also say that this show has had a great side-show of classic-era consumer computers and rare peripherals, too. - John From jfoust at threedee.com Mon Dec 1 19:31:52 2008 From: jfoust at threedee.com (John Foust) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 19:31:52 -0600 Subject: 5" floppy?. In-Reply-To: References: <200811251523.KAA07125@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <6.2.3.4.2.20081201192703.06fac630@mail.threedee.com> At 12:27 PM 11/29/2008, Tony Duell wrote: >Those turn up on cheap domestic appliances over here. The only possile >reason for them is to make the device difficult to repair, something >which, not suprisingly, I disapprove of. I've seen them on the give-away kid's prizes at McDonald's. I'd guess the common thread here is "Made in China." It's got to have a name, though. I think it's just "triangle" (not tri-wing). http://shop3.outpost.com/product/4885740?site=sr:SEARCH:MAIN_RSLT_PG - John From wdonzelli at gmail.com Mon Dec 1 19:59:20 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2008 20:59:20 -0500 Subject: AN/AYK-14 CDC flight computer on ebay In-Reply-To: <49347F53.9030304@bitsavers.org> References: <49347F53.9030304@bitsavers.org> Message-ID: > Will be interesting to see what it goes for.. It should also be noted that the architecture is still in use. A couple weeks ago I was on AUSTIN in the Philly shipyard, and there was a really nice AN/UYK-20. Super nice, actually. But it had an ERDS tag on it, which basically says "keep your stinkin paws off". Someone should ask for a picture of the innards, to make sure it is not demilled. -- Will From rcini at optonline.net Mon Dec 1 20:20:16 2008 From: rcini at optonline.net (Richard A. Cini) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 21:20:16 -0500 Subject: AN/AYK-14 CDC flight computer on ebay In-Reply-To: Message-ID: If you search ebay for "an/ayk", two additional listings will show up, both for magazine advertisements, one from 1979 and one from 1982, presumably depicting the kind of hardware this box controlled. Here's some more data: AN/AYK-14 Type: Airborne general purpose computer. Description: The Control Data AYK-14 is the USN's standard aircraft computer and is described as being a microprogrammable device that is functionally partitioned into modules. It is reported to be able to accommodate up to 16 Input/Output (I/O) cards, five of which are smart and incorporate their own onboard controllers. Use of an expansion chassis allows for additional I/O ports and the device incorporates two memory busses to provide overlapping memory access. A PrePlanned Product Improvement (P3I) variant of the design was first delivered during 1987 and is described as featuring a new single card processor (which replaces three cards in the original configuration) that offers twice the processing power and eight times the memory of its predecessor. The new processor is also noted as incorporating a 16-bit central processor, a 32-bit math co-processor (designated as the Extended Arithmetic Unit), a cache memory and an extended instruction set. Control Data is also understood to have developed a plug-in Very High-Speed Integrated Circuit (VHSIC) processor module for use with the P3I AYK-14. This VHSIC insert incorporates a 64 k cache memory and is said to quadruple the device's processing power and `substantially' increase its memory. Deliveries of the plug-in VHSIC module began during 1991 and it is thought that all the USN's P3I AYK-14s will eventually be fitted with it. The following specifications relate to the P3I variant of the device. I/O: up to 16 Speed: up to 2.3 Mips Clock rate: 1 MHz Word length: 16 bits (can work on up to 32-bit data) Memory: 4 mwords (in 32 kword semiconductor or 64 kword core modules) Here's another neat link: http://vipclubmn.org/cp16bit.aspx This too: http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/policy/navy/ntsp/ANAYK-14_a.h tm On 12/1/08 8:59 PM, "William Donzelli" wrote: >> Will be interesting to see what it goes for.. > > It should also be noted that the architecture is still in use. A > couple weeks ago I was on AUSTIN in the Philly shipyard, and there was > a really nice AN/UYK-20. Super nice, actually. But it had an ERDS tag > on it, which basically says "keep your stinkin paws off". > > Someone should ask for a picture of the innards, to make sure it is > not demilled. > > -- > Will Rich -- Rich Cini Collector of Classic Computers Build Master and lead engineer, Altair32 Emulator http://www.altair32.com http://www.classiccmp.org/cini From cclist at sydex.com Mon Dec 1 22:10:22 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 20:10:22 -0800 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <526615.27920.qm@web52702.mail.re2.yahoo.com> References: <49340445.20989.12CBCC0@cclist.sydex.com>, <526615.27920.qm@web52702.mail.re2.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com> On 1 Dec 2008 at 16:52, Mr Ian Primus wrote: > Monochrome monitors will almost universally (except for the very low > quality) give legible 80 column text. I've even gotten legible 80x25 > text out of a $20 portable black and white 5" TV, although the > contrast/brightness controls had to be just so. Ah, thanks for the clarification. My mind was telling me that we were talking about a monochrome terminal (never used anything else, so I'm stuck like a fly in amber). If it's a simple monochrome monitor that you're after, there's a very simple one in one of the Atmel app notes that can be implemented in a single AVR ATMega8 micro. Cheers, Chuck From bobalan at sbcglobal.net Mon Dec 1 22:26:30 2008 From: bobalan at sbcglobal.net (Bob Rosenbloom) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 20:26:30 -0800 Subject: AN/AYK-14 CDC flight computer on ebay In-Reply-To: References: <49347F53.9030304@bitsavers.org> Message-ID: <4934B8F6.3030101@sbcglobal.net> William Donzelli wrote: >> Will be interesting to see what it goes for.. >> > > It should also be noted that the architecture is still in use. A > couple weeks ago I was on AUSTIN in the Philly shipyard, and there was > a really nice AN/UYK-20. Super nice, actually. But it had an ERDS tag > on it, which basically says "keep your stinkin paws off". > > Someone should ask for a picture of the innards, to make sure it is > not demilled. > > -- > Will > I bought one of these from govliquidation a few years ago. Mine was constructed with what looked like custom LSI IC's and DRAM. Date codes one the IC's were from the early 90's so they still being made then. Mine was demilled by having a hole drilled through the rear through all of the boards. Conveniently not shown on the photos. You could ask rialta to look inside, they have been helpful in the past. There's some information about them on tpub.com including the instruction set. Bob From ian_primus at yahoo.com Mon Dec 1 22:36:14 2008 From: ian_primus at yahoo.com (Mr Ian Primus) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2008 20:36:14 -0800 (PST) Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <741938.1798.qm@web52703.mail.re2.yahoo.com> --- On Mon, 12/1/08, Chuck Guzis wrote: > > Ah, thanks for the clarification. My mind was telling me > that we > were talking about a monochrome terminal (never used > anything else, > so I'm stuck like a fly in amber). > If it's a simple monochrome monitor that you're > after, there's a very > simple one in one of the Atmel app notes that can be > implemented in a > single AVR ATMega8 micro. That's what the original thread was about... It started out as an announcement of a very, very cool project to turn a standard PC VGA monitor and PS/2 keyboard into a functional RS-232 terminal. The question was raised as to why it couldn't use an NTSC monitor, and thus forked into a question about the suitability of NTSC displays and 80 column text... and here we are again. Fun with topic drift :) It's way too easy to start answering individual questions, and skew away from the original post. I'm really very excited about the original poster's project. While I certainally have enough terminals myself so as to not need another, I really like terminals, and I would be definitely interested in building one of these to follow along. I believe that the original decision of using PS/2 keyboards and VGA monitors is probably the best. While an NTSC display is more "vintage", it's also much, much easier to get suitable PC VGA displays than it would be to get a *good* NTSC display these days - and VGA displays are much better suited to text than the standard old video monitor. More stable, less flicker, sharper, and no doubt easier to interface modern stuffs to, especially if those modern stuffs want to do any sort of color. PS/2 keyboards are also a good choice. While not as "classic" as the parallel ASCII keyboard, they're much more available, and much more standardized. And, they're easy to interface to. I'm definitely going to check out this project, and if I have time, build one myself. I'm a wire-wrap and soldering iron kind of guy, a premade PCB would take half the fun out of it :) I really appreciate that this is designed around components that are within the realm of a solder-slinger like myself. I'm good with through-hole, I have an EPROM programmer. Never worked with CPLD's, and I don't know VHDL. Z80 assembler, on the other hand... -Ian From doc at mdrconsult.com Mon Dec 1 23:17:16 2008 From: doc at mdrconsult.com (Doc Shipley) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 23:17:16 -0600 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <741938.1798.qm@web52703.mail.re2.yahoo.com> References: <741938.1798.qm@web52703.mail.re2.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4934C4DC.9070400@mdrconsult.com> Mr Ian Primus wrote: > I'm definitely going to check out this project, and if I have time, build one myself. I'm a wire-wrap and soldering iron kind of guy, a premade PCB would take half the fun out of it :) I really appreciate that this is designed around components that are within the realm of a solder-slinger like myself. I'm good with through-hole, I have an EPROM programmer. Never worked with CPLD's, and I don't know VHDL. Z80 assembler, on the other hand... I'm stoked about it. I do a lot of service work on headless systems, and not having to haul a[n old] laptop around for a serial terminal will be a huge boon. There's a keyboard just about anywhere, and I envision a "production" model with, say, a 5" LCD in the case, running on batteries. Literally a shirt-pocket terminal. Doc P.S. - well, then there's still the cubic yard of cables, gender-changers, and pin/socket adapters I'll still need for compatibility. :\ From geneb at deltasoft.com Mon Dec 1 23:33:23 2008 From: geneb at deltasoft.com (Gene Buckle) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2008 21:33:23 -0800 (PST) Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <4934C4DC.9070400@mdrconsult.com> References: <741938.1798.qm@web52703.mail.re2.yahoo.com> <4934C4DC.9070400@mdrconsult.com> Message-ID: On Mon, 1 Dec 2008, Doc Shipley wrote: > P.S. - well, then there's still the cubic yard of cables, gender-changers, > and pin/socket adapters I'll still need for compatibility. :\ > What about adding male and female 25 and 9 pin connectors right on the board? :) g. -- Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007 http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind. From evan at snarc.net Mon Dec 1 23:33:24 2008 From: evan at snarc.net (Evan Koblentz) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 00:33:24 -0500 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <005401c9543f$8053acd0$0301a8c0@evan> >>> What about adding male and female 25 and 9 pin connectors right on the board? :) Bluetooth ;) From doc at mdrconsult.com Mon Dec 1 23:57:39 2008 From: doc at mdrconsult.com (Doc Shipley) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 23:57:39 -0600 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: References: <741938.1798.qm@web52703.mail.re2.yahoo.com> <4934C4DC.9070400@mdrconsult.com> Message-ID: <4934CE53.8040202@mdrconsult.com> Gene Buckle wrote: > On Mon, 1 Dec 2008, Doc Shipley wrote: > >> P.S. - well, then there's still the cubic yard of cables, >> gender-changers, and pin/socket adapters I'll still need for >> compatibility. :\ >> > What about adding male and female 25 and 9 pin connectors right on the > board? :) And Cisco RJ45 and Digi RJ45 and and and and Doc From pat at computer-refuge.org Tue Dec 2 00:53:01 2008 From: pat at computer-refuge.org (Patrick Finnegan) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 01:53:01 -0500 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <493456E7.7000609@gmail.com> References: <006401c953fa$8294a980$87bdfc80$@com> <493456E7.7000609@gmail.com> Message-ID: <200812020153.01666.pat@computer-refuge.org> On Monday 01 December 2008, Jules Richardson wrote: > Bob Armstrong wrote: > > I and a couple of other people thought it would be fun to build > > our own stand alone video terminal. The prototype is a 3x5" PCB > > that is completely self contained - all you need to connect is a > > VGA monitor, a PS/2 keyboard, 12V power, and a RS-232 connection to > > a host computer of your choice. The idea is that you could easily > > stick one inside the case of an old VGA monitor, > > add a keyboard, and then have an ASCII terminal. No PC required > > :-) > > Hmm, I don't suppose NTSC TV is good enough to offer 80x25 text on a > TV set, is it? That'd be rather useful as a way of sneaking a > terminal into the lounge :-) Probably not, but now that most people will probably have some sort of HDTV in their living room, you could always output 480P or 720P video to it through a Y/Pb/Pr "component" or HDMI-compatible output. I'm guessing that doing that will complicate the video display, though. > > Enough firmware finished now to be a functional VT220 clone > > Including vomit-inducing smooth scroll? :-) Hey, I like smooth scroll, my only complaint is that it's so slow. :) Pat -- Purdue University Research Computing --- http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/ The Computer Refuge --- http://computer-refuge.org From fu3.org at gmail.com Tue Dec 2 01:47:42 2008 From: fu3.org at gmail.com (ch) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 08:47:42 +0100 Subject: PDP-11 Zork Manual: Save $2,348.31 Message-ID: <310f50ab0812012347x3a219b16l25bf08a84954024d@mail.gmail.com> http://inventory.getlamp.com/2008/11/30/pdp-11-zork-manual-save-234831/ From jam at magic.com Tue Dec 2 01:55:15 2008 From: jam at magic.com (James A. Markevitch) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2008 23:55:15 -0800 (PST) Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project Message-ID: <200812020755.XAA15032@magellan.magic.com> > > Enough firmware finished now to be a functional VT220 clone > > Including vomit-inducing smooth scroll? :-) Yes, indeed. It turns out that this only took a remarkably small amount of code. I've always thought that smooth scrolling was pretty cool, but never wanted to actually use it. James Markevitch From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Tue Dec 2 02:02:40 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 21:02:40 +1300 Subject: PDP-11 Zork Manual: Save $2,348.31 In-Reply-To: <310f50ab0812012347x3a219b16l25bf08a84954024d@mail.gmail.com> References: <310f50ab0812012347x3a219b16l25bf08a84954024d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Tue, Dec 2, 2008 at 8:47 PM, ch wrote: > http://inventory.getlamp.com/2008/11/30/pdp-11-zork-manual-save-234831/ Wow! I have an original Personal Software manual and TRS-80 disc, but nothing for the PDP-11. As I've posted before, I saw "Starcross" on 8" floppy hanging on the wall of the local DEC store, c. 1981, but didn't own any DEC equipment, yet. Now if we can only get a glimpse at the image of the Infocom file server that came to light a few months ago. I'm sure there are some amazing source goodies on that. -ethan From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Tue Dec 2 02:08:51 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 21:08:51 +1300 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <4934C4DC.9070400@mdrconsult.com> References: <741938.1798.qm@web52703.mail.re2.yahoo.com> <4934C4DC.9070400@mdrconsult.com> Message-ID: On Tue, Dec 2, 2008 at 6:17 PM, Doc Shipley wrote: > I'm stoked about it. I do a lot of service work on headless systems, and > not having to haul a[n old] laptop around for a serial terminal will be a > huge boon. There's a keyboard just about anywhere, and I envision a > "production" model with, say, a 5" LCD in the case, running on batteries. > Literally a shirt-pocket terminal. If you know of a smallish VGA LCD, that'd be great. I myself have nothing smaller than about 12", larger than my Planar ELT-320 terminals. I like it because you can show up on site with just the pocket-sized box and a wall-wart, and use available resources (kb and monitor) rather than hauling them around. Also, as a bonus, it'll work with many KVMs for longer-term installations. -ethan From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Tue Dec 2 02:15:15 2008 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 00:15:15 -0800 (PST) Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: References: <741938.1798.qm@web52703.mail.re2.yahoo.com> <4934C4DC.9070400@mdrconsult.com> Message-ID: On Tue, 2 Dec 2008, Ethan Dicks wrote: > On Tue, Dec 2, 2008 at 6:17 PM, Doc Shipley wrote: > > I'm stoked about it. I do a lot of service work on headless systems, and > > not having to haul a[n old] laptop around for a serial terminal will be a > > huge boon. There's a keyboard just about anywhere, and I envision a > > "production" model with, say, a 5" LCD in the case, running on batteries. > > Literally a shirt-pocket terminal. > > If you know of a smallish VGA LCD, that'd be great. I myself have > nothing smaller than about 12", larger than my Planar ELT-320 > terminals. > > I like it because you can show up on site with just the pocket-sized > box and a wall-wart, and use available resources (kb and monitor) > rather than hauling them around. Also, as a bonus, it'll work with > many KVMs for longer-term installations. I seem to recall talking about this sort of thing around a year ago. -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Tue Dec 2 03:10:30 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 09:10:30 +0000 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: References: <741938.1798.qm@web52703.mail.re2.yahoo.com> <4934C4DC.9070400@mdrconsult.com> Message-ID: <4934FB86.4000909@gjcp.net> Gene Buckle wrote: > On Mon, 1 Dec 2008, Doc Shipley wrote: > >> P.S. - well, then there's still the cubic yard of cables, >> gender-changers, and pin/socket adapters I'll still need for >> compatibility. :\ >> > What about adding male and female 25 and 9 pin connectors right on the > board? :) Just a thought, but there's nothing to stop you having RS232 line drivers *and* receivers hooked to each pin, assuming you can make the drivers float. That way you can do your crossover patching in software ;-) Gordon From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Tue Dec 2 03:12:57 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 09:12:57 +0000 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: References: <741938.1798.qm@web52703.mail.re2.yahoo.com> <4934C4DC.9070400@mdrconsult.com> Message-ID: <4934FC19.2060803@gjcp.net> Ethan Dicks wrote: > On Tue, Dec 2, 2008 at 6:17 PM, Doc Shipley wrote: >> I'm stoked about it. I do a lot of service work on headless systems, and >> not having to haul a[n old] laptop around for a serial terminal will be a >> huge boon. There's a keyboard just about anywhere, and I envision a >> "production" model with, say, a 5" LCD in the case, running on batteries. >> Literally a shirt-pocket terminal. > > If you know of a smallish VGA LCD, that'd be great. I myself have > nothing smaller than about 12", larger than my Planar ELT-320 > terminals. At my last job (still looking, incidentally, so if you need a solder slinger, metal basher or server wrangler in NW Scotland, y'know...) we had a 9" portable LCD TV with composite, S-video and VGA inputs. No SCART, unfortunately. It was great for using as a shooting monitor and also for debugging headless Mac installations. Gordon From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Tue Dec 2 03:23:57 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 09:23:57 +0000 Subject: 70's view of Army Radar Installation (with computer gear) In-Reply-To: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com> References: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4934FEAD.4030602@gjcp.net> Chuck Guzis wrote: > I just ran across this page: > > http://cryptome.info/0001/loc/loc-images.htm > > It seems that LOC has been rather ham-handedly censoring some of its > online historical content. Of particular interest is a shot of > computer peripherals (printers, card readers, tape drives), all of > which appear to be vintage CDC gear (military versions of the 512 > printer, 65x tapes, 405 card readers...). I don't know what the > mainframe behind this was, nor does it seem to be shown. Anyone have > any idea? > > BTW, the TIFF images are 20MB each and very high quality--enough so > that I could read the CRT displays and the notice of "Volley Ball" > and "Hayride" on the bulletin board. Hrm, one of the displays reads 08 OCT 1992... Gordon From cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de Tue Dec 2 03:31:55 2008 From: cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de (Christian Corti) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 10:31:55 +0100 (CET) Subject: WANTED: someone to transfer IBM 5110 BASIC programs to modern PC In-Reply-To: <20081201135826.L97208@shell.lmi.net> References: <227361.78266.qm@web111301.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <49343E36.7080600@pacbell.net> <20081201135826.L97208@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: On Mon, 1 Dec 2008, Fred Cisin wrote: > Similarly, if the 5110 is in good working order, you could install a 1.2M > 5.25" drive on it, copy the files, and then extract them at your leisure > on an AT. Apparently you don't know the 5110/5120. You can't just connect a 5.25" drive to it. You may have a look at the 5114 MIM or the 5120 MIM (which partially contains the 5114 MIM), the latter is online on my site. > Are those BASIC files stored as plain text, or are they tokenized? They are tokenized. Christian From cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de Tue Dec 2 04:33:41 2008 From: cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de (Christian Corti) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 11:33:41 +0100 (CET) Subject: WANTED: someone to transfer IBM 5110 BASIC programs to modern PC In-Reply-To: <227361.78266.qm@web111301.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> References: <227361.78266.qm@web111301.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On Mon, 1 Dec 2008, steven stengel wrote: > A gentleman from the East Coast contacted me to see if I can extract old > BASIC programs from his IBM-5110 8-inch floppy disks. I have a working > IBM-5120 with internal floppy drives, but the serial communications > option is not installed in my system. > > I think the best I can do is LIST the programs and photograph the screen. > > Any other ideas? I have a 5110 with 5114 drive and also the Async. Communications Adapter. I have written a Kermit called KERM5110 so I can transfer single files to/from a PC. But this requires the Comms Adapter. Along with the IBM Async. card comes a cartridge/disk with a serial port "driver" (I think it's called SIO8BIT). With that you can SAVE directly to the serial port (e.g. to a paper tape punch or to a PC in capture mode). But I also have an 8" FDD attached to my multi media PC which handles FM and MFM. For this configuration I have written a DOS program to read/write/format/dump IBM 5110 diskettes and show/transfer individual files. I've put it on our FTP server, it's called ibmdisk.exe. So if you have an FM capable FDC and an 8" drive you may choose this options. BTW you need to SAVE SOURCE your 5110 BASIC programs in order to have them stored detokenized, i.e. in EBCDIC, e.g. SAVE "FILE1",SOURCE,D80 (or D40 for the right drive). > Anyone else with a serial port who can do it? Yes, but I'm in Germany. The simplest would be to create disk images with ImageDisk and send them to me in order to extract all the files in whatever format you like. Christian PS: I have a working 5110 emulator that runs under X and has both APL and BASIC (it uses the original ROS images). I will release it as soon as I have cleaned up the code. This will allow you to run the BASIC programs and have the printer output (text only) in a file. From nico at farumdata.dk Tue Dec 2 04:53:08 2008 From: nico at farumdata.dk (Nico de Jong) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 11:53:08 +0100 Subject: WANTED: someone to transfer IBM 5110 BASIC programs to modern PC References: <227361.78266.qm@web111301.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <7824D14E28C540D39186F6B2AD5CBC8C@udvikling> > On Mon, 1 Dec 2008, steven stengel wrote: >> A gentleman from the East Coast contacted me to see if I can extract old >> BASIC programs from his IBM-5110 8-inch floppy disks. I have a working >> IBM-5120 with internal floppy drives, but the serial communications >> option is not installed in my system. On my conversion system, I have a format called IBM 5520. It might be the same family, so if you have a non-critical disk with some data on it, I would be happy to try to convert it. However, I'm located in Denmark. Nico www.farumdata.dk -- Jeg beskyttes af den gratis SPAMfighter til privatbrugere. Den har indtil videre sparet mig for at f? 13 spam-mails. Betalende brugere f?r ikke denne besked i deres e-mails. Hent gratis SPAMfighter her: http://www.spamfighter.com/lda From david at cantrell.org.uk Tue Dec 2 05:30:29 2008 From: david at cantrell.org.uk (David Cantrell) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 11:30:29 +0000 Subject: 5" floppy?. In-Reply-To: <20081125002945.GB16104@thangorodrim.de> References: <550847.65805.qm@web52710.mail.re2.yahoo.com> <492AADA1.15935.414B1F1@cclist.sydex.com> <492B3F1C.1060309@gmail.com> <20081125002945.GB16104@thangorodrim.de> Message-ID: <20081202113029.GA31124@bytemark.barnyard.co.uk> On Tue, Nov 25, 2008 at 01:29:45AM +0100, Alexander Schreiber wrote: > There have been 3" floppies, IIRC used by some (Amstrad?) eletronic > typewriters. Also in Amstrad computers, and a few other minor 8-bit manufacturers. I believe that Hitachi also used them. After they stopped being used in normal computers, they were still used in some marine applications for a while, presumably because they were more physically robust than 3.5" floppies, and were stocked by some chandlers on the east coast of the UK for use in the North Sea fishing fleet. -- David Cantrell | Minister for Arbitrary Justice "The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary" -- H. L. Mencken From ian_primus at yahoo.com Tue Dec 2 06:26:31 2008 From: ian_primus at yahoo.com (Mr Ian Primus) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 04:26:31 -0800 (PST) Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <997576.24160.qm@web52701.mail.re2.yahoo.com> --- On Tue, 12/2/08, Ethan Dicks wrote: > > not having to haul a[n old] laptop around for a serial > terminal will be a > > huge boon. There's a keyboard just about > anywhere, and I envision a > > "production" model with, say, a 5" LCD > in the case, running on batteries. > > Literally a shirt-pocket terminal. > > If you know of a smallish VGA LCD, that'd be great. I > myself have > nothing smaller than about 12", larger than my Planar > ELT-320 > terminals. > > I like it because you can show up on site with just the > pocket-sized > box and a wall-wart, and use available resources (kb and > monitor) > rather than hauling them around. The great thing about a project like this, is that you can build it however you want. Another option would be to build it right onto a PS/2 keybord. Not necessarily _into_ because it'd be quite hard to make it all fit, but you could have it as a flat box affixed to the bottom of the keyboard itself. You could even have a rechargable battery for power (and, of course a power socket for a wall wart). Then, you could simply have one device - this thickened keyboard - and you can plug it right into any monitor and go. But, once again, here's the beauty of this project - build it however you like, build it into whatever you want. If I get around to building one, I'm probably going to have both male and female 25 pin connectors on the back, wired in parallel, as DTE. Add a second set of 25 pin connectors wired the other way (DCE) - eliminating the need for null modem adapters and gender changers. You could only use one plug at a time, but at least one of the four should work. Of course, it all depends on your tastes and what you need in your life - and wether you have more monitors or keyboards laying around. Myself, I seem to have more terminals laying around, but, it's sometimes a pain in the neck to get past their individual quirks. For example, I've been working on a project centered around a PC, and while it's VGA output and keyboard are busy being dedicated to the application I'm setting up, I have a terminal plugged in to edit files and issue commands, without having to quit out of the other app. I'm using a Televideo 921, which, while it has a termcap entry, it still doesn't work properly. None of the screen editors want to cooperate. I've found that if I lie and say it's an adm3a, it works, but then I lose other functionality (arrow keys stop working, occasional display glitches), but at least I can run vi. -Ian From bob at jfcl.com Tue Dec 2 07:14:05 2008 From: bob at jfcl.com (Bob Armstrong) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 05:14:05 -0800 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <741938.1798.qm@web52703.mail.re2.yahoo.com> References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com> <741938.1798.qm@web52703.mail.re2.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <002801c9547f$da78a810$8f69f830$@com> > Mr Ian Primus [ian_primus at yahoo.com] wrote: >While an NTSC display is more "vintage", ... The goal was never to be vintage hardware - only to be a useful accessory for vintage hardware, and easy for other hobbyists to build and copy. VGA monitors and PS/2 keyboards are cheap, about as common as dirt, and you can find them anywhere these days. They're about the only practical choice for such a project. Bob From bob at jfcl.com Tue Dec 2 07:16:26 2008 From: bob at jfcl.com (Bob Armstrong) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 05:16:26 -0800 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <4934C4DC.9070400@mdrconsult.com> References: <741938.1798.qm@web52703.mail.re2.yahoo.com> <4934C4DC.9070400@mdrconsult.com> Message-ID: <002901c95480$2e7d9920$8b78cb60$@com> > Doc Shipley (doc at mdrconsult.com) wrote: >and not having to haul a[n old] laptop around for a serial terminal will >be a huge boon. Another plus is that you can use it on a KVM switch, and mix your ASCII consoles with other PCs. Bob From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Tue Dec 2 07:41:27 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 13:41:27 +0000 Subject: 5" floppy?. In-Reply-To: <20081202113029.GA31124@bytemark.barnyard.co.uk> References: <550847.65805.qm@web52710.mail.re2.yahoo.com> <492AADA1.15935.414B1F1@cclist.sydex.com> <492B3F1C.1060309@gmail.com> <20081125002945.GB16104@thangorodrim.de> <20081202113029.GA31124@bytemark.barnyard.co.uk> Message-ID: <49353B07.8070705@gjcp.net> David Cantrell wrote: > On Tue, Nov 25, 2008 at 01:29:45AM +0100, Alexander Schreiber wrote: > >> There have been 3" floppies, IIRC used by some (Amstrad?) eletronic >> typewriters. > > Also in Amstrad computers, and a few other minor 8-bit manufacturers. I > believe that Hitachi also used them. > > After they stopped being used in normal computers, they were still used > in some marine applications for a while, presumably because they were > more physically robust than 3.5" floppies, and were stocked by some > chandlers on the east coast of the UK for use in the North Sea fishing > fleet. I used to repair Amstrads in the early 90s in a shop in Aberdeen. The PCW range found a lot of use on oil rigs and fishing boats, because they were cheap, fairly tough and could withstand extremely dirty power. If they'd just made them in a slightly more ruggedised case, they'd probably still be selling them. Gordon From vrs at msn.com Tue Dec 2 08:22:10 2008 From: vrs at msn.com (Vincent Slyngstad) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 06:22:10 -0800 Subject: PDP-11 Zork Manual: Save $2,348.31 References: <310f50ab0812012347x3a219b16l25bf08a84954024d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: From: "ch": Sent: Monday, December 01, 2008 11:47 PM > http://inventory.getlamp.com/2008/11/30/pdp-11-zork-manual-save-234831/ Cool! Did anyone else have trouble with this link? I get a message from Acrobat Reader (5.1.0) about how the file is damaged and cannot be repaired. (I was able to run pdf2ps on it, then print the postscript back to PDF to get a file that works, but is about 8X bigger than the original.) Vince From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Tue Dec 2 08:27:34 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 03:27:34 +1300 Subject: PDP-11 Zork Manual: Save $2,348.31 In-Reply-To: References: <310f50ab0812012347x3a219b16l25bf08a84954024d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Wed, Dec 3, 2008 at 3:22 AM, Vincent Slyngstad wrote: > From: "ch": > Sent: Monday, December 01, 2008 11:47 PM >> >> http://inventory.getlamp.com/2008/11/30/pdp-11-zork-manual-save-234831/ > > Cool! > > Did anyone else have trouble with this link? I get a message from Acrobat > Reader (5.1.0) about how the file is damaged and cannot be repaired. Nope. No problems on my end. Just in case you didn't get a good download, my file is 2004915 bytes, MD5 (Zork_PDP_11.pdf) = 293b73da33d74c9ea902b7356e75332b -ethan From vrs at msn.com Tue Dec 2 08:44:52 2008 From: vrs at msn.com (Vincent Slyngstad) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 06:44:52 -0800 Subject: PDP-11 Zork Manual: Save $2,348.31 References: <310f50ab0812012347x3a219b16l25bf08a84954024d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: From: "Ethan Dicks" Sent: Tuesday, December 02, 2008 6:27 AM > On Wed, Dec 3, 2008 at 3:22 AM, Vincent Slyngstad wrote: >> Did anyone else have trouble with this link? I get a message from >> Acrobat >> Reader (5.1.0) about how the file is damaged and cannot be repaired. > > Nope. No problems on my end. Just in case you didn't get a good > download, my file is 2004915 bytes, MD5 (Zork_PDP_11.pdf) = > 293b73da33d74c9ea902b7356e75332b Mine has the same size and MD5, so I guess it must be something about Reader 5.1.0. Maybe I'll get ambitious and try it downstairs with the newer (slower) version of Reader. Thanks! Vince From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Tue Dec 2 08:55:00 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 08:55:00 -0600 Subject: PDP-11 Zork Manual: Save $2,348.31 In-Reply-To: References: <310f50ab0812012347x3a219b16l25bf08a84954024d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <49354C44.9040303@gmail.com> Vincent Slyngstad wrote: > Mine has the same size and MD5, so I guess it must be something about > Reader 5.1.0. Maybe I'll get ambitious and try it downstairs with the > newer (slower) version of Reader. Seems to work fine here with kpdf - I thought I had Acrobat v5 on here too, but it looks like I ditched it (I definitely don't want to install a more recent version - too darn bloated!) From curt at atarimuseum.com Tue Dec 2 09:14:25 2008 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 10:14:25 -0500 Subject: 70's view of Army Radar Installation (with computer gear) In-Reply-To: <4934FEAD.4030602@gjcp.net> References: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com> <4934FEAD.4030602@gjcp.net> Message-ID: <493550D1.7090707@atarimuseum.com> Isn't the PAR still in active use? I assume the MSR's are all deactivated due to the ABM treaties and the fact that the Sprint/Nike systems have been superseded by the Patriot and newer missile defense systems. While we are all supposed to be "friends" - Glasnost had faded out and Russia is beginning to strengthen its nuclear arsenal again, plus China is on a massive military build up, so one would have to assume that the US Space Command would still have its active eyes and ears in operation on the outside chance of a Russian or Chinese missile attack... Curt Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote: > Chuck Guzis wrote: >> I just ran across this page: >> >> http://cryptome.info/0001/loc/loc-images.htm >> >> It seems that LOC has been rather ham-handedly censoring some of its >> online historical content. Of particular interest is a shot of >> computer peripherals (printers, card readers, tape drives), all of >> which appear to be vintage CDC gear (military versions of the 512 >> printer, 65x tapes, 405 card readers...). I don't know what the >> mainframe behind this was, nor does it seem to be shown. Anyone have >> any idea? >> >> BTW, the TIFF images are 20MB each and very high quality--enough so >> that I could read the CRT displays and the notice of "Volley Ball" >> and "Hayride" on the bulletin board. > > Hrm, one of the displays reads 08 OCT 1992... > > Gordon > From dgahling at hotmail.com Tue Dec 2 09:16:14 2008 From: dgahling at hotmail.com (Dan Gahlinger) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 10:16:14 -0500 Subject: PDP-11 Zork Manual: Save $2,348.31 In-Reply-To: <310f50ab0812012347x3a219b16l25bf08a84954024d@mail.gmail.com> References: <310f50ab0812012347x3a219b16l25bf08a84954024d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: This is awesome, so many memories of that game. The PDF worked fine here. I'm curious if anyone on the list has a copy of the Zork source code circa 1976? If nothing exists from that period, I have a copy from Vax/Vms of that era (in fortran), but I only have the printout, the dtext files did not survive One of the rumors about the version I have is that it was supposedly able to tell you exactly where errors were in the code (if you mis-entered it), by line and segment. I have printouts of various code from 1976, including Zork, Adventure, Trek5, Trek7, Castle, and Rogue. OCR'ing this stuff is a massive nightmare, as DEC line printer fonts are horrible. esp "0" vs "O", and I vs 1 vs l, even reading my eye is tough... Plus, some of it being pre fortran-77 and the vms weirdness of the time makes it next to impossible to transcode... Dan. > Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 08:47:42 +0100 > From: fu3.org at gmail.com > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: PDP-11 Zork Manual: Save $2,348.31 > > http://inventory.getlamp.com/2008/11/30/pdp-11-zork-manual-save-234831/ _________________________________________________________________ From healyzh at aracnet.com Tue Dec 2 09:20:58 2008 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 07:20:58 -0800 Subject: PDP-11 Zork Manual: Save $2,348.31 In-Reply-To: References: <310f50ab0812012347x3a219b16l25bf08a84954024d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: At 6:44 AM -0800 12/2/08, Vincent Slyngstad wrote: >Mine has the same size and MD5, so I guess it must be something about >Reader 5.1.0. Maybe I'll get ambitious and try it downstairs with the >newer (slower) version of Reader. Most likely the issue is the version you're using. It works just fine in Adobe Acrobat 8.1.3 Professional on my Mac. Now if someone could just find a disk image of the software! Zane -- | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator | | healyzh at aracnet.com (primary) | OpenVMS Enthusiast | | MONK::HEALYZH (DECnet) | Classic Computer Collector | +----------------------------------+----------------------------+ | Empire of the Petal Throne and Traveller Role Playing, | | PDP-10 Emulation and Zane's Computer Museum. | | http://www.aracnet.com/~healyzh/ | From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Tue Dec 2 09:24:01 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 04:24:01 +1300 Subject: PDP-11 Zork Manual: Save $2,348.31 In-Reply-To: References: <310f50ab0812012347x3a219b16l25bf08a84954024d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Wed, Dec 3, 2008 at 4:16 AM, Dan Gahlinger wrote: > > This is awesome, so many memories of that game. So true. > The PDF worked fine here. It sounds like a problem with ancient PDF readers. I'm using an up-to-date one and had no issues. > I'm curious if anyone on the list has a copy of the Zork source code circa 1976? > If nothing exists from that period, I have a copy from Vax/Vms of that era (in fortran), > but I only have the printout, the dtext files did not survive I may have ancient FORTRAN source, but Bob Supnik himself posted (on trailingedge) the real MDL sources he wrote the FORTRAN version from (his files are identical to the ones I was sent by one of the original Implementors in 1992, the ones I wrote ZDungeon in Inform 6 from). > One of the rumors about the version I have is that it was supposedly able to tell you > exactly where errors were in the code (if you mis-entered it), by line and segment. Hmm... I am unfamiliar with that "feature". > I have printouts of various code from 1976, > including Zork, Adventure, Trek5, Trek7, Castle, and Rogue. > > OCR'ing this stuff is a massive nightmare, as DEC line printer fonts are horrible. > esp "0" vs "O", and I vs 1 vs l, even reading my eye is tough... > > Plus, some of it being pre fortran-77 and the vms weirdness of the time makes it next to impossible to transcode... I think it would be strange for 1976-era FORTRAN to have VMSisms since that predates the 11/780, but I'm sure there could be plenty of DECisms from FORTRAN on RSTS/E or RSX-11. -ethan From frustum at pacbell.net Tue Dec 2 09:26:49 2008 From: frustum at pacbell.net (Jim Battle) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 09:26:49 -0600 Subject: WANTED: someone to transfer IBM 5110 BASIC programs to modern PC In-Reply-To: References: <227361.78266.qm@web111301.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <493553B9.4030201@pacbell.net> Christian Corti wrote: ... > PS: > I have a working 5110 emulator that runs under X and has both APL and > BASIC (it uses the original ROS images). I will release it as soon as I > have cleaned up the code. This will allow you to run the BASIC programs > and have the printer output (text only) in a file. Christian, that is great news! I knew you were working on it, but I didn't know you had resolved those last kinks. I know somebody (Richard?) volunteered to make a wxWidgets port of your emulator, but if that falls through, I might make the time to do it, if you don't object. It would help whomever does the port if during your code clean up you tried to keep the core emulation and the user interface aspects separate. For instance, it is OK for the GUI code to have intimate knowledge of the core emulator, but the core emulator shouldn't have any dependencies on X libraries. From dgahling at hotmail.com Tue Dec 2 09:38:05 2008 From: dgahling at hotmail.com (Dan Gahlinger) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 10:38:05 -0500 Subject: PDP-11 Zork Manual: Save $2,348.31 In-Reply-To: References: <310f50ab0812012347x3a219b16l25bf08a84954024d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: > > One of the rumors about the version I have is that it was supposedly able to tell you > > exactly where errors were in the code (if you mis-entered it), by line and segment. > > Hmm... I am unfamiliar with that "feature". It was just a rumor, I'm not sure if it was true or not, probably totally false. But the printout is about 6" thick... :) > > Plus, some of it being pre fortran-77 and the vms weirdness of the time makes it next to impossible to transcode... > > I think it would be strange for 1976-era FORTRAN to have VMSisms since > that predates the 11/780, but I'm sure there could be plenty of > DECisms from FORTRAN on RSTS/E or RSX-11. I like to blame DEC for everything :) There are weirdnesses in the fortran (from the 11/780) that don't translate well, or at all. a lot of issues from OCR, check http://trek7.sourceforge.net if you want to see some of my nightmares... Dan. _________________________________________________________________ From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Tue Dec 2 09:38:18 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 04:38:18 +1300 Subject: PDP-11 Zork Manual: Save $2,348.31 In-Reply-To: References: <310f50ab0812012347x3a219b16l25bf08a84954024d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Wed, Dec 3, 2008 at 4:20 AM, Zane H. Healy wrote: > Now if someone could just find a disk image of the software! Somewhere, I've seen _an_ original RT-11 app, but not Zork I - maybe Deadline or Starcross. Just the executable, not a disk image. I'd love to see one of those just to poke around on unallocated sectors. I've only recently learned how much cool stuff is on ancient Amiga Kickstart disks (the KS image file only occupies ~256K out of 880K, leaving plenty of space that wasn't zeroed before mastering). -ethan From IanK at vulcan.com Tue Dec 2 10:28:05 2008 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 08:28:05 -0800 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <997576.24160.qm@web52701.mail.re2.yahoo.com> References: , <997576.24160.qm@web52701.mail.re2.yahoo.com> Message-ID: ________________________________________ From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Mr Ian Primus [ian_primus at yahoo.com] Sent: Tuesday, December 02, 2008 4:26 AM To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Re: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project [snip] The great thing about a project like this, is that you can build it however you want. Another option would be to build it right onto a PS/2 keybord. Not necessarily _into_ because it'd be quite hard to make it all fit, but you could have it as a flat box affixed to the bottom of the keyboard itself. You could even have a rechargable battery for power (and, of course a power socket for a wall wart). Then, you could simply have one device - this thickened keyboard - and you can plug it right into any monitor and go. [snip] I have such a gadget, badged Data General. It's a keyboard with a wall wart, with a VGA port and an RJ45 on the rear edge. I haven't been able to find any documentation for it, but it does feed an image to a VGA monitor and its configuration menu is accessible. One of these days in my copious spare time, I'll scope out the RJ45 pins to figure out who is serial in, who is serial out. But my DEC VT420 and Wyse 50 work just fine, too, so there hasn't been any urgency.... -- Ian From cclist at sydex.com Tue Dec 2 12:40:19 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 10:40:19 -0800 Subject: 5" floppy?. In-Reply-To: <20081202113029.GA31124@bytemark.barnyard.co.uk> References: <550847.65805.qm@web52710.mail.re2.yahoo.com>, <20081125002945.GB16104@thangorodrim.de>, <20081202113029.GA31124@bytemark.barnyard.co.uk> Message-ID: <49351093.1551.262B147@cclist.sydex.com> On 2 Dec 2008 at 11:30, David Cantrell wrote: > After they stopped being used in normal computers, they were still used > in some marine applications for a while, presumably because they were > more physically robust than 3.5" floppies, and were stocked by some > chandlers on the east coast of the UK for use in the North Sea fishing > fleet. You must be referring to the media; the drives themselves were cheap tin cans. Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Tue Dec 2 12:58:25 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 10:58:25 -0800 Subject: 70's view of Army Radar Installation (with computer gear) In-Reply-To: <493550D1.7090707@atarimuseum.com> References: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com>, <4934FEAD.4030602@gjcp.net>, <493550D1.7090707@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <493514D1.22767.27337B0@cclist.sydex.com> On 2 Dec 2008 at 10:14, Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > Isn't the PAR still in active use? I assume the MSR's are all > deactivated due to the ABM treaties and the fact that the Sprint/Nike > systems have been superseded by the Patriot and newer missile defense > systems. There's a note on the page that correctly points out that (at least two) of the displays show a date of 08 Oct 1993. That the US would still have much of the equipment shown in the other photos still in service at that late date is mind-boggling. In 1993, where could one even find parts for a 405 card reader? I don't recognize the disk drives shown there with their militarized skins. Some sort of pack drive--the pack is too small to be an 844; maybe an 854? But everything shown that I can recognize is clearly early 70's vintage. If this stuff was simply mothballed, any equipment remaining and due to be surplused would be a vintage collector's treasure trove. Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Tue Dec 2 12:57:14 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 10:57:14 -0800 Subject: 70's view of Army Radar Installation (with computer gear) In-Reply-To: <493550D1.7090707@atarimuseum.com> References: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com>, <4934FEAD.4030602@gjcp.net>, <493550D1.7090707@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <4935148A.2520.27224C9@cclist.sydex.com> On 2 Dec 2008 at 10:14, Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > Isn't the PAR still in active use? I assume the MSR's are all > deactivated due to the ABM treaties and the fact that the Sprint/Nike > systems have been superseded by the Patriot and newer missile defense > systems. There's a note on the page that correctly points out that (at least two) of the displays show a date of 08 Oct 1993. That the US would still have much of the equipment shown in the other photos still in service at that late date is mind-boggling. In 1993, where could one even find parts for a 405 card reader? I don't recognize the disk drives shown there with their militarized skins. Some sort of pack drive--the pack is too small to be an 844; maybe an 854? But everything shown that I can recognize is clearly early 70's vintage. If this stuff was simply mothballed, any equipment remaining and due to be surplused would be a vintage collector's treasure trove. Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Tue Dec 2 11:47:23 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 09:47:23 -0800 Subject: PDP-11 Zork Manual: Save $2,348.31 In-Reply-To: References: <310f50ab0812012347x3a219b16l25bf08a84954024d@mail.gmail.com>, , Message-ID: <4935042B.2868.232329B@cclist.sydex.com> On 2 Dec 2008 at 7:20, Zane H. Healy wrote: > Most likely the issue is the version you're using. It works just > fine in Adobe Acrobat 8.1.3 Professional on my Mac. Smaller, faster Foxit reader works just fine--I haven't tried Ghostscript/Gsview. I don't even have Acrobat reader on my system. Cheers, Chuck From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Tue Dec 2 13:35:31 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 13:35:31 -0600 Subject: 70's view of Army Radar Installation (with computer gear) In-Reply-To: <493514D1.22767.27337B0@cclist.sydex.com> References: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com>, <4934FEAD.4030602@gjcp.net>, <493550D1.7090707@atarimuseum.com> <493514D1.22767.27337B0@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <49358E03.9050605@gmail.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: > That the US would > still have much of the equipment shown in the other photos still in > service at that late date is mind-boggling. In 1993, where could one > even find parts for a 405 card reader? We don't know that, but I suspect that the Government did - it wouldn't surprise me at all if they didn't have a huge stockpile of such equipment stashed someplace (and possibly still do). From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Tue Dec 2 13:47:54 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 14:47:54 -0500 Subject: 70's view of Army Radar Installation (with computer gear) In-Reply-To: <49358E03.9050605@gmail.com> References: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com>, <4934FEAD.4030602@gjcp.net>, <493550D1.7090707@atarimuseum.com><493514D1.22767.27337B0@cclist.sydex.com> <49358E03.9050605@gmail.com> Message-ID: > > That the US would > > still have much of the equipment shown in the other photos still in > > service at that late date is mind-boggling. In 1993, where could one > > even find parts for a 405 card reader? > > We don't know that, but I suspect that the Government did - it wouldn't > surprise me at all if they didn't have a huge stockpile of such > equipment > stashed someplace (and possibly still do). The last (that we know of) government Cyber was taken out of service in 2007. Admittedly that was a 8x0 series and, if it had a card reader, I doubt it was a 415, but still, it was a real live Cyber running real apps... (And, for that matter, NOS was maintained as late as 2000 -- there was a Y2K patch for it.) paul From cclist at sydex.com Tue Dec 2 13:48:47 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 11:48:47 -0800 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <002801c9547f$da78a810$8f69f830$@com> References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com>, <741938.1798.qm@web52703.mail.re2.yahoo.com>, <002801c9547f$da78a810$8f69f830$@com> Message-ID: <4935209F.7266.2A15CDC@cclist.sydex.com> On 2 Dec 2008 at 5:14, Bob Armstrong wrote: > The goal was never to be vintage hardware - only to be a useful accessory > for vintage hardware, and easy for other hobbyists to build and copy. VGA > monitors and PS/2 keyboards are cheap, about as common as dirt, and you can > find them anywhere these days. They're about the only practical choice for > such a project. As long as this isn't a "vintage" project, why not add a few useful bells and whistles? For example, one of the reasons that I like a PeeCee as a debugging terminal is because I can scroll back hundreds of lines to see what I did, or even save the particular segment long after it's occurred. The ability to set bookmarks and split-screen history with current output would be very useful. As would being able to freeze and save history across power cycles. The cost motivation that dictated the features of the original VT100/VT220 no longer apply. The cost difference between 128Kx8 and 512Kx8 SRAM, for example, is negligible today. Using a Z80 today would seem to be a quaint anachronism where there are so many fine (and power-miserly) microcontrollers available. But then, I find the little HP ePCs to come the closest (e.g. they take a keyboard and VGA display and are small) to what you're proposing. Replacing the hard disk in those things with flash makes for a very light pacakge. Pulling the CD-ROM drive out would make it lighter still. Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Tue Dec 2 13:56:05 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 11:56:05 -0800 Subject: Apologies In-Reply-To: <493514D1.22767.27337B0@cclist.sydex.com> References: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com>, <493550D1.7090707@atarimuseum.com>, <493514D1.22767.27337B0@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <49352255.1124.2A80EF8@cclist.sydex.com> All - Just moved to a new NIC and my email client has been having problems with it, resending outgoing mail that shouldn't be sent. Please accept my apology for this glitch. Problem is resolved. Sorry, Chuck From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Dec 2 13:59:17 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 11:59:17 -0800 (PST) Subject: WANTED: someone to transfer IBM 5110 BASIC programs to modern PC In-Reply-To: References: <227361.78266.qm@web111301.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <49343E36.7080600@pacbell.net> <20081201135826.L97208@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <20081202111503.V44510@shell.lmi.net> > > Similarly, if the 5110 is in good working order, you could install a 1.2M > > 5.25" drive on it, On Tue, 2 Dec 2008, Christian Corti wrote: > Apparently you don't know the 5110/5120. True > You can't just connect a 5.25" > drive to it. You may have a look at the 5114 MIM or the 5120 MIM (which > partially contains the 5114 MIM), the latter is online on my site. URL handy? I never said that it would be EASY, . . .(although I did erroneously imply practical) I've put 5.25" drives in a few machines that ran SA801 interface (with mixed results). I've never done it for a drive where I would have to build a logic board or interface. -- Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com From curt at atarimuseum.com Tue Dec 2 14:28:09 2008 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 15:28:09 -0500 Subject: 70's view of Army Radar Installation (with computer gear) In-Reply-To: <49358E03.9050605@gmail.com> References: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com>, <4934FEAD.4030602@gjcp.net>, <493550D1.7090707@atarimuseum.com> <493514D1.22767.27337B0@cclist.sydex.com> <49358E03.9050605@gmail.com> Message-ID: <49359A59.9070606@atarimuseum.com> Yeah, probably in storage costing $10 million a month storage fee's ;-) Next to the stash of $10,000 each toilet seats... Curt Jules Richardson wrote: > Chuck Guzis wrote: >> That the US would still have much of the equipment shown in the other >> photos still in service at that late date is mind-boggling. In 1993, >> where could one even find parts for a 405 card reader? > > We don't know that, but I suspect that the Government did - it > wouldn't surprise me at all if they didn't have a huge stockpile of > such equipment stashed someplace (and possibly still do). > > From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Tue Dec 2 14:34:45 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 14:34:45 -0600 Subject: 70's view of Army Radar Installation (with computer gear) In-Reply-To: References: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com>, <4934FEAD.4030602@gjcp.net>, <493550D1.7090707@atarimuseum.com><493514D1.22767.27337B0@cclist.sydex.com> <49358E03.9050605@gmail.com> Message-ID: <49359BE5.3090305@gmail.com> Paul Koning wrote: >>> That the US would >>> still have much of the equipment shown in the other photos still in >>> service at that late date is mind-boggling. In 1993, where could > one >>> even find parts for a 405 card reader? >> We don't know that, but I suspect that the Government did - it > wouldn't >> surprise me at all if they didn't have a huge stockpile of such >> equipment >> stashed someplace (and possibly still do). > > The last (that we know of) government Cyber was taken out of service in > 2007. That's taken out of service, though... I'd expect that they'd retain a large stockpile of spare parts too (possibly in the form of one or more entire machines) somewhere - which raises questions as to whether such a spares cache would necessarily get dumped at the same time as any in-service machines were... From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Tue Dec 2 14:38:07 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 14:38:07 -0600 Subject: 70's view of Army Radar Installation (with computer gear) In-Reply-To: <49359A59.9070606@atarimuseum.com> References: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com>, <4934FEAD.4030602@gjcp.net>, <493550D1.7090707@atarimuseum.com> <493514D1.22767.27337B0@cclist.sydex.com> <49358E03.9050605@gmail.com> <49359A59.9070606@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <49359CAF.4020007@gmail.com> Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > Yeah, probably in storage costing $10 million a month storage fee's > ;-) Next to the stash of $10,000 each toilet seats... I was more wondering if they got parked in a back-room somewhere because they were in the way, then someone eventually lost the key to the room, then everyone forgot what was in that room anyway... (Well, sometimes when it comes to Governments there does seem to be a big gulf between knowing what they have and knowing where it is!) ;-) From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Tue Dec 2 14:48:08 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 14:48:08 -0600 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <4935209F.7266.2A15CDC@cclist.sydex.com> References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com>, <741938.1798.qm@web52703.mail.re2.yahoo.com>, <002801c9547f$da78a810$8f69f830$@com> <4935209F.7266.2A15CDC@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <49359F08.5080606@gmail.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 2 Dec 2008 at 5:14, Bob Armstrong wrote: > For example, one of the reasons that I like a > PeeCee as a debugging terminal is because I can scroll back hundreds > of lines to see what I did, or even save the particular segment long > after it's occurred. The ability to set bookmarks and split-screen > history with current output would be very useful. As would being > able to freeze and save history across power cycles. Hmm, is the firmware for this held in something that can be reprogrammed via the serial port itself? That'd be pretty nifty if so, as people could (theoretically) incorporate whatever software features they wanted into the unit. > But then, I find the little HP ePCs to come the closest (e.g. they > take a keyboard and VGA display and are small) to what you're > proposing. I think I said elsewhere that I've always just used an old laptop, which has done the job well - but when I run out of RS232-equipped laptops I'd definitely consider this gadget (I think all my Gateway laptops died, but I've still got a working Thinkpad with Real Ports on it). cheers Jules From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Tue Dec 2 15:14:43 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 14:14:43 -0700 Subject: 70's view of Army Radar Installation (with computer gear) In-Reply-To: <49359A59.9070606@atarimuseum.com> References: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com>, <4934FEAD.4030602@gjcp.net>, <493550D1.7090707@atarimuseum.com> <493514D1.22767.27337B0@cclist.sydex.com> <49358E03.9050605@gmail.com> <49359A59.9070606@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <4935A543.60301@jetnet.ab.ca> Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > Yeah, probably in storage costing $10 million a month storage fee's > ;-) Next to the stash of $10,000 each toilet seats... > > Now that is right beside the hanger the UFO is stored in, correct. :) From curt at atarimuseum.com Tue Dec 2 15:19:49 2008 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 16:19:49 -0500 Subject: 70's view of Army Radar Installation (with computer gear) In-Reply-To: <49359CAF.4020007@gmail.com> References: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com>, <4934FEAD.4030602@gjcp.net>, <493550D1.7090707@atarimuseum.com> <493514D1.22767.27337B0@cclist.sydex.com> <49358E03.9050605@gmail.com> <49359A59.9070606@atarimuseum.com> <49359CAF.4020007@gmail.com> Message-ID: <4935A675.8060803@atarimuseum.com> Exactly - like just where the heck did they misplace that 1947 UFO ;-) Curt Jules Richardson wrote: > Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: >> Yeah, probably in storage costing $10 million a month storage fee's >> ;-) Next to the stash of $10,000 each toilet seats... > > I was more wondering if they got parked in a back-room somewhere > because they were in the way, then someone eventually lost the key to > the room, then everyone forgot what was in that room anyway... > > (Well, sometimes when it comes to Governments there does seem to be a > big gulf between knowing what they have and knowing where it is!) > > ;-) > From wdonzelli at gmail.com Tue Dec 2 15:27:04 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 16:27:04 -0500 Subject: 70's view of Army Radar Installation (with computer gear) In-Reply-To: References: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com> <4934FEAD.4030602@gjcp.net> <493550D1.7090707@atarimuseum.com> <493514D1.22767.27337B0@cclist.sydex.com> <49358E03.9050605@gmail.com> Message-ID: > The last (that we know of) government Cyber was taken out of service in > 2007. Admittedly that was a 8x0 series and, if it had a card reader, I > doubt it was a 415, but still, it was a real live Cyber running real > apps... (And, for that matter, NOS was maintained as late as 2000 -- > there was a Y2K patch for it.) Certainly there were a few Cybers still going in the early 2000s. This "last" one - was it a shipboard installation? If so, do you know which ship? -- Will From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Tue Dec 2 15:33:55 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 16:33:55 -0500 Subject: 70's view of Army Radar Installation (with computer gear) References: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com> <4934FEAD.4030602@gjcp.net> <493550D1.7090707@atarimuseum.com> <493514D1.22767.27337B0@cclist.sydex.com> <49358E03.9050605@gmail.com> Message-ID: <18741.43459.240130.151359@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> >>>>> "William" == William Donzelli writes: >> The last (that we know of) government Cyber was taken out of >> service in 2007. Admittedly that was a 8x0 series and, if it had >> a card reader, I doubt it was a 415, but still, it was a real live >> Cyber running real apps... (And, for that matter, NOS was >> maintained as late as 2000 -- there was a Y2K patch for it.) William> Certainly there were a few Cybers still going in the early William> 2000s. William> This "last" one - was it a shipboard installation? If so, do William> you know which ship? Nope. FAA OK City training, running PLATO (actually, CYBIS, same thing different name). paul From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Tue Dec 2 15:40:58 2008 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 21:40:58 +0000 (GMT) Subject: PDP-11 Zork Manual: Save $2,348.31 In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <377791.75789.qm@web23402.mail.ird.yahoo.com> It's funny you should mention that, as someone recently pointed me to this page: http://www.pagetable.com/?p=34 I haven't read it all yet, and it may be of interest to others here. Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk --- On Tue, 2/12/08, Ethan Dicks wrote: From: Ethan Dicks Subject: Re: PDP-11 Zork Manual: Save $2,348.31 To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Date: Tuesday, 2 December, 2008, 3:38 PM *>> snip <<* I've only recently learned how much cool stuff is on ancient Amiga Kickstart disks (the KS image file only occupies ~256K out of 880K, leaving plenty of space that wasn't zeroed before mastering). -ethan From mark at wickensonline.co.uk Tue Dec 2 15:42:51 2008 From: mark at wickensonline.co.uk (Mark Wickens) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 21:42:51 +0000 Subject: Anyone in the UK got a spare caddy for an RRD42 CDROM drive please? Message-ID: <4935ABDB.2070504@wickensonline.co.uk> Hi, I've got an RRD42 CDROM drive that requires a caddy to put the CDROM. Does anyone in the UK have one of these they could spare? Many thanks for the help, Mark. From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Dec 2 15:31:32 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 21:31:32 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <4934FB86.4000909@gjcp.net> from "Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ" at Dec 2, 8 09:10:30 am Message-ID: > Just a thought, but there's nothing to stop you having RS232 line > drivers *and* receivers hooked to each pin, assuming you can make the > drivers float. That way you can do your crossover patching in software ;-) I cna't think of a common RS232 driver that has a 3-state output. However, a terminal should only need TxD and RxD (if it _requires_ hardware handshake, then it's not going to work with an awful lot of things that work with a real VT220). In which case all you need to be able to do is swap over those 2 pins, taking a simple DPDT switch. Sometimes a simple solution exists :-) -tony From wdonzelli at gmail.com Tue Dec 2 15:47:59 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 16:47:59 -0500 Subject: 70's view of Army Radar Installation (with computer gear) In-Reply-To: <18741.43459.240130.151359@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> References: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com> <4934FEAD.4030602@gjcp.net> <493550D1.7090707@atarimuseum.com> <493514D1.22767.27337B0@cclist.sydex.com> <49358E03.9050605@gmail.com> <18741.43459.240130.151359@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> Message-ID: > Nope. FAA OK City training, running PLATO (actually, CYBIS, same > thing different name). Might the Navy still be running the Cyber on their missile tracker OBSERVATION ISLAND? As far as I know, that ship is still in service. -- Will From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Tue Dec 2 16:02:43 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 16:02:43 -0600 Subject: 70's view of Army Radar Installation (with computer gear) In-Reply-To: <4935A675.8060803@atarimuseum.com> References: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com>, <4934FEAD.4030602@gjcp.net>, <493550D1.7090707@atarimuseum.com> <493514D1.22767.27337B0@cclist.sydex.com> <49358E03.9050605@gmail.com> <49359A59.9070606@atarimuseum.com> <49359CAF.4020007@gmail.com> <4935A675.8060803@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <4935B083.7090009@gmail.com> Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > Exactly - like just where the heck did they misplace that 1947 UFO ;-) Probably buried under the pile of $10k toilet seats :-) From cclist at sydex.com Tue Dec 2 16:20:58 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 14:20:58 -0800 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: References: <4934FB86.4000909@gjcp.net> from "Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ" at Dec 2, 8 09:10:30 am, Message-ID: <4935444A.29967.32CB6FE@cclist.sydex.com> On 2 Dec 2008 at 21:31, Tony Duell wrote: > However, a terminal should only need TxD and RxD (if it _requires_ > hardware handshake, then it's not going to work with an awful lot of > things that work with a real VT220). In which case all you need to be > able to do is swap over those 2 pins, taking a simple DPDT switch. > Sometimes a simple solution exists :-) Why not simply use a made-for-the-purpose T-switch? Is turning a knob too difficult? Cheers, Chuck From tosteve at yahoo.com Tue Dec 2 16:27:10 2008 From: tosteve at yahoo.com (steven stengel) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 14:27:10 -0800 (PST) Subject: WANTED: someone to transfer IBM 5110 BASIC programs Message-ID: <481938.74698.qm@web111313.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Apparently, there are *150* diskettes to be read... It may be easier to send the computer to him... ....except that it weighs over 100 pounds. --- On Mon, 12/1/08, steven stengel wrote: > From: steven stengel > Subject: WANTED: someone to transfer IBM 5110 BASIC programs to modern PC > To: cctech at classiccmp.org > Date: Monday, December 1, 2008, 11:16 AM > Hello, > A gentleman from the East Coast contacted me to see if I > can extract old BASIC programs from his IBM-5110 8-inch > floppy disks. > > I have a working IBM-5120 with internal floppy drives, but > the serial communications option is not installed in my > system. > > I think the best I can do is LIST the programs and > photograph the screen. > > Any other ideas? > Anyone else with a serial port who can do it? > Anyone with a spare communications card? > > Thanks- > Steven Stengel From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Tue Dec 2 17:06:37 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 12:06:37 +1300 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <4935209F.7266.2A15CDC@cclist.sydex.com> References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com> <741938.1798.qm@web52703.mail.re2.yahoo.com> <002801c9547f$da78a810$8f69f830$@com> <4935209F.7266.2A15CDC@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: On Wed, Dec 3, 2008 at 8:48 AM, Chuck Guzis wrote: > As long as this isn't a "vintage" project, why not add a few useful > bells and whistles? For example, one of the reasons that I like a > PeeCee as a debugging terminal is because I can scroll back hundreds > of lines to see what I did, or even save the particular segment long > after it's occurred. The ability to set bookmarks and split-screen > history with current output would be very useful. As would being > able to freeze and save history across power cycles. Interesting ideas, but right now, we are trying just to get basic terminal functionality. > The cost motivation that dictated the features of the original > VT100/VT220 no longer apply. True. This project has other cost motivations. > The cost difference between 128Kx8 and > 512Kx8 SRAM, for example, is negligible today. For this project, the SRAM needs to be, IIRC, 70ns or faster to keep up with the CPU which is slinging bytes out an I/O port to bit-bash the video. The cost of a fast 256kbit SRAM is a bit more than a slower one, and I don't know how that compares to a 2Mbit SRAM. Another cost issue here is address pins - the VT-4 supports 32Kbytes in one socket, and can handle 64Kbytes with a second SRAM (the prototype has a second SRAM socket), but there aren't enough address bits available to do more. There's also the cost issue associated with board space. This is intended to be a small board with no surface-mount (hobby-level product, not a modern "you can't service this" product). Even adding a couple of more DIP spaces to latch address bits is a tricky prospect. The issue of more RAM was hashed over a few times amongst the firmware developers already, and I am reasonably certain that the VT-4 is not going to have wads of memory, just what it needs to display and scroll an 80x24 or 80x25 screen. > Using a Z80 today > would seem to be a quaint anachronism where there are so many fine > (and power-miserly) microcontrollers available. I don't know where Z80s came into this. The VT-4 uses a 30ish-MIPS microcontroller (to keep up with the demands of squirting out VGA video). The video is essentially software-generated, keeping the part count way down. Low part-count == low price. -ethan From cclist at sydex.com Tue Dec 2 15:42:32 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 13:42:32 -0800 Subject: 70's view of Army Radar Installation (with computer gear) In-Reply-To: References: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com>, <49358E03.9050605@gmail.com>, Message-ID: <49353B48.32484.3097A8B@cclist.sydex.com> On 2 Dec 2008 at 14:47, Paul Koning wrote: > The last (that we know of) government Cyber was taken out of service in > 2007. Admittedly that was a 8x0 series and, if it had a card reader, I > doubt it was a 415, but still, it was a real live Cyber running real > apps... (And, for that matter, NOS was maintained as late as 2000 -- > there was a Y2K patch for it.) What surprised me though were the 512 printers and 65x tape drives. By 1993, these had long been historic artifacts. Can't say much about the disk drives, but they're not 844s, but something earlier. Cheers, Chuck From aek at bitsavers.org Tue Dec 2 18:13:01 2008 From: aek at bitsavers.org (Al Kossow) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 16:13:01 -0800 Subject: IBM DemiDiskette Message-ID: <4935CF0D.8020807@bitsavers.org> If anyone is curious about what an IBM 4" floppy drive looks like, I just uploaded a picture and the patent for it to http://bitsavers.org/pdf/ibm/floppy http://www.weblog.com/comments.aspx?blogid=30290&postid=71765 4-inch floppy diskettes In the mid-80s, IBM developed a 4-inch floppy diskette, the Demidiskette. This program was driven by aggressive cost goals, but missed the pulse of the industry. The prospective users, both inside and outside IBM, preferred standardization to what by release time were small cost reductions, and were unwilling to retool packaging, interface chips and applications for a proprietary design. The product never appeared in the light of day, and IBM wrote off several hundred million dollars of development and manufacturing facility. CHM appears to have one http://www.computerhistory.org/collections/accession/X1140.93 Mismarked at 5 1/4" (grrrr..) And a disk http://www.computerhistory.org/collections/accession/102667528 From curt at atarimuseum.com Tue Dec 2 18:17:01 2008 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 19:17:01 -0500 Subject: IBM DemiDiskette In-Reply-To: <4935CF0D.8020807@bitsavers.org> References: <4935CF0D.8020807@bitsavers.org> Message-ID: <4935CFFD.3020306@atarimuseum.com> THATS COOL !!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Thanks for sharing Al. Curt Al Kossow wrote: > If anyone is curious about what an IBM 4" floppy drive looks like, I > just uploaded a picture > and the patent for it to http://bitsavers.org/pdf/ibm/floppy > > > > http://www.weblog.com/comments.aspx?blogid=30290&postid=71765 > > 4-inch floppy diskettes > > In the mid-80s, IBM developed a 4-inch floppy diskette, the > Demidiskette. This program was driven by aggressive cost goals, but > missed the pulse of the industry. The prospective users, both inside > and outside IBM, preferred standardization to what by release time > were small cost reductions, and were unwilling to retool packaging, > interface chips and applications for a proprietary design. The product > never appeared in the light of day, and IBM wrote off several hundred > million dollars of development and manufacturing facility. > > > CHM appears to have one > http://www.computerhistory.org/collections/accession/X1140.93 > > Mismarked at 5 1/4" (grrrr..) > > And a disk > > http://www.computerhistory.org/collections/accession/102667528 > > > From grant at stockly.com Tue Dec 2 18:24:18 2008 From: grant at stockly.com (Grant Stockly) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 15:24:18 -0900 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <997576.24160.qm@web52701.mail.re2.yahoo.com> References: <997576.24160.qm@web52701.mail.re2.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <0KB900IQ8YF5UA90@msgmmp-1.gci.net> How many characters wide and tall does it output? Does it use 640x480? Grant From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Dec 2 18:30:21 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 16:30:21 -0800 (PST) Subject: IBM DemiDiskette In-Reply-To: <4935CF0D.8020807@bitsavers.org> References: <4935CF0D.8020807@bitsavers.org> Message-ID: <20081202162844.P62294@shell.lmi.net> On Tue, 2 Dec 2008, Al Kossow wrote: > If anyone is curious about what an IBM 4" floppy drive looks like, I just uploaded a picture > and the patent for it to http://bitsavers.org/pdf/ibm/floppy I don't know whether it will actually help anybody, but IIRC, the samples that I saw at tradeshows looked like that, and the drive and media were labeled "Brown" and "Tabor". From sellam at vintagetech.com Tue Dec 2 18:32:42 2008 From: sellam at vintagetech.com (Sellam Ismail) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 16:32:42 -0800 (PST) Subject: Second request: Proteon P4100+ manuals Message-ID: I'm seeking a set of manuals for the Proteon P4100+ network bridge, but they need to be pre-1990. If you have a set for sale then please contact me as I am prepared to pay handsomely for them. Please contact me directly. Thanks! -- Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org [ Old computing resources for business || Buy/Sell/Trade Vintage Computers ] [ and academia at www.VintageTech.com || at http://marketplace.vintage.org ] From cclist at sydex.com Tue Dec 2 18:39:50 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 16:39:50 -0800 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com>, <4935209F.7266.2A15CDC@cclist.sydex.com>, Message-ID: <493564D6.18784.3ABCDF7@cclist.sydex.com> On 3 Dec 2008 at 12:06, Ethan Dicks wrote: > I don't know where Z80s came into this. The VT-4 uses a 30ish-MIPS > microcontroller (to keep up with the demands of squirting out VGA > video). The video is essentially software-generated, keeping the > part count way down. Low part-count == low price. Ah, I get confused a lot in these threads. Sort of something like the ATMega8 TV terminal, except with a faster dot clock and more RAM? Cheers, Chuck From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Tue Dec 2 18:48:09 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 13:48:09 +1300 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <493564D6.18784.3ABCDF7@cclist.sydex.com> References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com> <4935209F.7266.2A15CDC@cclist.sydex.com> <493564D6.18784.3ABCDF7@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: On Wed, Dec 3, 2008 at 1:39 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 3 Dec 2008 at 12:06, Ethan Dicks wrote: \> >> I don't know where Z80s came into this. The VT-4 uses a 30ish-MIPS >> microcontroller (to keep up with the demands of squirting out VGA >> video). The video is essentially software-generated, keeping the >> part count way down. Low part-count == low price. > > Ah, I get confused a lot in these threads. Sort of something like > the ATMega8 TV terminal, except with a faster dot clock and more RAM? Something like that, but with the target including close emulation of VT100/VT220 (successfully runs emacs/vi/EDT, modernish setup menus, etc.) A secondary goal is emulation of some common flavor of graphical terminal ,Tek, etc. Emphasis on through-hole design, and small form-factor. One thing, to answer another question in this thread, is that will only do 80-char-wide. The bandwidth of VGA over 640-pixels-wide exceeds what the CPU and memory can do. -ethan From bob at jfcl.com Tue Dec 2 19:00:37 2008 From: bob at jfcl.com (Bob Armstrong) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 17:00:37 -0800 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <0KB900IQ8YF5UA90@msgmmp-1.gci.net> References: <997576.24160.qm@web52701.mail.re2.yahoo.com> <0KB900IQ8YF5UA90@msgmmp-1.gci.net> Message-ID: <00af01c954e2$8e2f33d0$aa8d9b70$@com> >How many characters wide and tall does it output? Does it use 640x480? 640x400 at 70Hz. Using an 8x16 font, this gives an 80x25 text display. Bob From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Tue Dec 2 19:22:57 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 23:22:57 -0200 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com><4935209F.7266.2A15CDC@cclist.sydex.com><493564D6.18784.3ABCDF7@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <291101c954e5$c1a3ef00$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > Something like that, but with the target including close emulation of > VT100/VT220 (successfully runs emacs/vi/EDT, modernish setup menus, > etc.) A secondary goal is emulation of some common flavor of > graphical terminal ,Tek, etc. Emphasis on through-hole design, and > small form-factor. > One thing, to answer another question in this thread, is that will > only do 80-char-wide. The bandwidth of VGA over 640-pixels-wide > exceeds what the CPU and memory can do. Nothing a CPLD cannot create...what about that? From ploopster at gmail.com Tue Dec 2 19:31:26 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 20:31:26 -0500 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <200812020153.01666.pat@computer-refuge.org> References: <006401c953fa$8294a980$87bdfc80$@com> <493456E7.7000609@gmail.com> <200812020153.01666.pat@computer-refuge.org> Message-ID: <4935E16E.8050506@gmail.com> Patrick Finnegan wrote: >> Hmm, I don't suppose NTSC TV is good enough to offer 80x25 text on a >> TV set, is it? That'd be rather useful as a way of sneaking a >> terminal into the lounge :-) > > Probably not, but now that most people will probably have some sort of I've done it. It's chunky, but readable. Sans-serif fonts work best. Peace... Sridhar From ploopster at gmail.com Tue Dec 2 19:36:36 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 20:36:36 -0500 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <997576.24160.qm@web52701.mail.re2.yahoo.com> References: <997576.24160.qm@web52701.mail.re2.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4935E2A4.7050707@gmail.com> Mr Ian Primus wrote: > app. I'm using a Televideo 921, which, while it has a termcap entry, > it still doesn't work properly. None of the screen editors want to > cooperate. Can I assume that the line editors work properly? Peace... Sridhar From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Dec 2 19:40:21 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 17:40:21 -0800 (PST) Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <4935E16E.8050506@gmail.com> References: <006401c953fa$8294a980$87bdfc80$@com> <493456E7.7000609@gmail.com> <200812020153.01666.pat@computer-refuge.org> <4935E16E.8050506@gmail.com> Message-ID: <20081202173909.W64565@shell.lmi.net> > >> Hmm, I don't suppose NTSC TV is good enough to offer 80x25 text on a > >> TV set, is it? That'd be rather useful as a way of sneaking a > >> terminal into the lounge :-) > > Probably not, but now that most people will probably have some sort of On Tue, 2 Dec 2008, Sridhar Ayengar wrote: > I've done it. It's chunky, but readable. Sans-serif fonts work best. . . . and yet, the original CGA fonts had serifs! From eric at brouhaha.com Tue Dec 2 20:37:50 2008 From: eric at brouhaha.com (Eric Smith) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 18:37:50 -0800 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <49340445.20989.12CBCC0@cclist.sydex.com> References: >, <49340445.20989.12CBCC0@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4935F0FE.3050705@brouhaha.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: > Going through a modulator or direct video input? With direct video, > an NTSC TV can probably do 80x24. Maybe if it's a relatively late-model TV with a comb filter, though you're likely to get some smearing and artifacts even with that. NTSC TVs simply aren't designed for that much luminance resolution. On older NTSC TVs, there is a lowpass filter to remove the color carrier from the luminance, so even 40 column displays wind up fuzzy, and 80 column are completely unreadable. From eric at brouhaha.com Tue Dec 2 20:46:34 2008 From: eric at brouhaha.com (Eric Smith) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 18:46:34 -0800 Subject: WANTED: someone to transfer IBM 5110 BASIC programs to modern PC In-Reply-To: <20081201135826.L97208@shell.lmi.net> References: <227361.78266.qm@web111301.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <49343E36.7080600@pacbell.net> <20081201135826.L97208@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4935F30A.4090400@brouhaha.com> Fred Cisin wrote: > Similarly, if the 5110 is in good working order, you could install a > 1.2M 5.25" drive on it, copy the files, and then extract them at your leisure Possible, but slightly less easy that it sounds. IIRC, the 8-inch floppy drives used in the 5114 disk drives for the 5110 (and built into the 5120) are IBM 53FD drives, which do not have the same electrical interface as the industry-standard drives pioneered by Shugart. From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Tue Dec 2 20:47:41 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 19:47:41 -0700 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <006401c953fa$8294a980$87bdfc80$@com> References: <006401c953fa$8294a980$87bdfc80$@com> Message-ID: <4935F34D.5030100@jetnet.ab.ca> Bob Armstrong wrote: > I and a couple of other people thought it would be fun to build our own > stand alone video terminal. The prototype is a 3x5" PCB that is completely > self contained - all you need to connect is a VGA monitor, a PS/2 keyboard, > 12V power, and a RS-232 connection to a host computer of your choice. The > idea is that you could easily stick one inside the case of an old VGA > monitor, > add a keyboard, and then have an ASCII terminal. No PC required :-) > > How does well does it work with SCB6120? > Bob > PS: while the wrong list, Bob have many people finished the PDP/8 front panel PCB's? I don't plan to since I am going to scoff the switches for a 18 bit cpld cpu I am designing. From ragooman at comcast.net Tue Dec 2 21:40:23 2008 From: ragooman at comcast.net (Dan Roganti) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 22:40:23 -0500 Subject: 70's view of Army Radar Installation (with computer gear) In-Reply-To: References: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com> <4934FEAD.4030602@gjcp.net> <493550D1.7090707@atarimuseum.com> <493514D1.22767.27337B0@cclist.sydex.com> <49358E03.9050605@gmail.com> Message-ID: <4935FFA7.3050002@comcast.net> William Donzelli wrote: >> The last (that we know of) government Cyber was taken out of service in >> 2007. Admittedly that was a 8x0 series and, if it had a card reader, I >> doubt it was a 415, but still, it was a real live Cyber running real >> apps... (And, for that matter, NOS was maintained as late as 2000 -- >> there was a Y2K patch for it.) >> > > Certainly there were a few Cybers still going in the early 2000s. > > This "last" one - was it a shipboard installation? If so, do you know > which ship? > There's a complete installation from 1978 on 2 acres with two CDC Cyber 840 computers and almost two dozen SEL machines at Vandenberg AFB in support of WSMC. this is was built in accord with the SALT treaty of the 70's. My friend over there was still providing support through his company for this facility up until as recent as Sep until the contract expired, and never renewed. He mentioned they're going to scrap all the machines there. I would think that CHM would get their hands on something before going to the scrapper. There's a couple of photos he had sent me in the past here on my webpage. http://www2.applegate.org/~ragooman/computers_mini_gallery_tips.html =Dan [ Pittsburgh 250th --- http://www2.applegate.org/~ragooman/ ] From mbbrutman-cctalk at brutman.com Tue Dec 2 21:45:48 2008 From: mbbrutman-cctalk at brutman.com (Michael B. Brutman) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 21:45:48 -0600 Subject: IBM DemiDiskette In-Reply-To: <4935CF0D.8020807@bitsavers.org> References: <4935CF0D.8020807@bitsavers.org> Message-ID: <493600EC.1060209@brutman.com> Fun, I just looked at the patent for grins and noticed that I know one of the inventors listed on it. :-) From dave at mitton.com Tue Dec 2 21:58:20 2008 From: dave at mitton.com (Dave Mitton) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 22:58:20 -0500 Subject: PDP-11 Zork Manual: Save $2,348.31 In-Reply-To: <200812021801.mB2I0qvq023751@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812021801.mB2I0qvq023751@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <200812030351.mB33pQgS056720@keith.ezwind.net> On 12/2/2008 01:01 PM, cctech-request at classiccmp.org wrote: >Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 07:20:58 -0800 >From: "Zane H. Healy" >Subject: Re: PDP-11 Zork Manual: Save $2,348.31 > >... > >Now if someone could just find a disk image of the software! > >Zane FWIW: I have the following 8" Digital diskettes labeled as follows: 1) RT Adventure, Tasks 8/7/79, It has a slip of paper with the printed directory output The files are .DATs, .SAVs, and ATEXT.TXT 2) "New" Adventure Kit, RT Format, directory slip dated 9-Sep-83 The files show .FOR files these may be source 3) RT Dungeon, RX01 patched 4) RT Dungeon, RX02 5) RT Dungeon original, .DIR output files dated 11-Mar-78 to 19-Jan-79 No sources, but RT11 runtimes - this looks bootable 6) RT Dungeon original, #2, DTEXT.DAT (Rename to T.DAT for RX01 version) 7) Latest Dungeon 2/21/79, RSX-11M 8) Dungeon Disk 2, 2/21/79, RSX-11M 9,10,11) Dungeon OBJ 5/1/79, Files11, VOLID: DUNGEON [303,333] Disks 1,2,3 of 3 12) ZORK2,3 ??? (copy made on an original 1980 VMS V2.0 RXO1 UPG kit!) Two pages: 1) DUNGEON RELEASE NOTES: RT11 5 steps about the program and how to run it. 2) Fix infinite vampire bat loop in Dungeon V2.2 handwritten photocopy of how to patch RT11 and RSX11M Dungeon programs The back side of both have my Mill office mailstop on them. Evidently send via interoffice mail, likely from Supnik. Does someone in the Boston area still have a working 8" diskette drive?? Dave. From wdonzelli at gmail.com Tue Dec 2 22:40:05 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 23:40:05 -0500 Subject: VAXwheels Message-ID: Can someone with either a VAX 11/780 or, more preferably, a VAX 11/785, tell me what is involved with the wheels or casters? This Thursday we are getting a VAX 11/785, and we just found out it has no wheels. I have some caster sets that maybe I can bolt on, but I need to know what bolts to use, and if there are any issues (clearance above or below the chassis, for example). This VAX has apparently spent the last ten years of life doing nothing more than an RX01 controller, writing floppies. -- Will From mbg at world.std.com Tue Dec 2 23:16:54 2008 From: mbg at world.std.com (Megan Gentry) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 00:16:54 -0500 Subject: PDP-11 Zork Manual: Save $2,348.31 In-Reply-To: References: <310f50ab0812012347x3a219b16l25bf08a84954024d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <49361646.8000703@world.std.com> I recently received a number of Infocom games from the estate of an old friend from my RT-11 days who recently passed on. I have yet to inventory them, but the RX01/02 disks for the games along with much of the original packaging was there... Megan Gentry Former RT-11 Developer (helped Johnny Bilquist with RT-11 modules for ZEMU) Ethan Dicks wrote: > On Wed, Dec 3, 2008 at 4:20 AM, Zane H. Healy wrote: >> Now if someone could just find a disk image of the software! > > Somewhere, I've seen _an_ original RT-11 app, but not Zork I - maybe > Deadline or Starcross. Just the executable, not a disk image. I'd > love to see one of those just to poke around on unallocated sectors. > I've only recently learned how much cool stuff is on ancient Amiga > Kickstart disks (the KS image file only occupies ~256K out of 880K, > leaving plenty of space that wasn't zeroed before mastering). > > -ethan > From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Dec 3 00:35:39 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 01:35:39 -0500 Subject: Hard disk material In-Reply-To: <492C0B7C.5050703@gmail.com> References: <831740.92417.qm@web111512.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <492C0B7C.5050703@gmail.com> Message-ID: <52AD445B-2892-4DE5-A1C7-C6A1AE34376D@neurotica.com> On Nov 25, 2008, at 9:28 AM, Jules Richardson wrote: >>> (My brain wants to say it was "how to build a working digital >>> computer", but I could be wrong there). I wonder if anyone ever >>> actually built one that worked? :-) >> Your brain is not leading you astray. That's the book. Here's >> the PDF version: >> http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/paperClipComputer/ >> HowToBuildAWorkingDigitalComputer_Jun67.pdf > > That claim of some drums operating at 75,000rpm has to be a typo... > I can believe 7500 - but 75,000? Ouch! Yeah really...if that were to break loose, it'd probably go through a wall. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From zmerch at 30below.com Mon Dec 1 00:40:25 2008 From: zmerch at 30below.com (Roger Merchberger) Date: Mon, 01 Dec 2008 01:40:25 -0500 Subject: Sun people and keyboards In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.2.20081201013550.013c2180@mail.30below.com> Rumor has it that David Griffith may have mentioned these words: >Does anyone here have pull with Sun Microsystems or know someone who does? >I'm trying to get the right person jazzed up about the idea of a Type 7 >keyboard built like a Model M. I've already emailed clickykeyboards.com >about it and they'll do the engineering and design work for about $27k. A >Type 7 sells brand new for around $50. I'm sure people would be more than >willing to pay twice as much for a "Type 7m". How important are which features you want? If the "control key is in the right place" feature means a lot to you, you can have that now for only slightly more than Sun wants: http://pckeyboards.stores.yahoo.net/linux101.html Not sure if you can get these in USB, but a PS/2->USB adapter should fit the bill nicely. $70 (and I'll assume plus shipping.) They do have this layout with an integrated catstongue/j-stick/eraserhead/whateveryouwannacallit pointing device for $100. However, these don't have the "extra" keys down the left side of the keyboard. If that's what's most important to you, then that will indeed be exceptionally tough to find, IMHO. HTH, Roger "Merch" Merchberger -- Roger "Merch" Merchberger | Anarchy doesn't scale well. -- Me zmerch at 30below.com. | SysAdmin, Iceberg Computers From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Mon Dec 1 23:53:15 2008 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse) Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 00:53:15 -0500 (EST) Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: References: <741938.1798.qm@web52703.mail.re2.yahoo.com> <4934C4DC.9070400@mdrconsult.com> Message-ID: <200812020554.AAA19455@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> > What about adding male and female 25 and 9 pin connectors right on > the board? :) And a DPDT switch - or some logic to perform the same effect based on an SPST-driven input - to swap TxD and RxD? /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Wed Dec 3 01:07:25 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 00:07:25 -0700 Subject: Hard disk material - of topic Rocket Science In-Reply-To: <910803.53457.qm@web65503.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> References: <910803.53457.qm@web65503.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4936302D.3000600@jetnet.ab.ca> Chris M wrote: > if this was the case, the surfaces just needed to be plated, you can produce a uniform thickness by polishing. Some sort of contraption (a lathe?) would be necessary, but it's not rocket science I don't think. I was between jobs a number of years ago and applied at this place in Long Island that makes some sort of microchips. The silicon wafers needed to be made *uniform*, and they used some sort of polishing operation. I asked what was the tolerance, and the guy said .0001". I figured to myself he probably didn't really know what he was talking about and the tolerance was much tighter. Cast iron surface plates can be made uniform to .000025" (that's right, 25 millionths of an inch), but that's an entirely different operation, and in fact is done - by hand - w/a glorified chisel. > Carry on lads. I'm interested in learning more about this meself > For DIY rocket science :) buy some of the books below. http://www.lindsaybks.com/dgjp/djgbk/index.html " Build Your Own Metalworking Shop from Scrap ", is the best DIY books I have seen in along time. From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Dec 3 01:34:47 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 02:34:47 -0500 Subject: IDE <-> MFM In-Reply-To: <49306139.6020607@gmail.com> References: <49306139.6020607@gmail.com> Message-ID: <85FD92C3-A095-40C4-A220-CBB2139D3E12@neurotica.com> On Nov 28, 2008, at 4:23 PM, Sridhar Ayengar wrote: >> On Thu, 27 Nov 2008, Tony Duell wrote: >>> OK, but IDE bus interface cards do exist. Meaning cards that link >>> ISA >>> (or whatever) bus to an IDE drive. For ISA, it's little more than an >>> address decoder and buffers (I happen to be using one in this PC). >> Right, that's what I've called an IDE HBA (host-bus-adapter). > > You're mixing your terminology. A bus doesn't really come into > play here. Well sorta...the address, data, and control buses of an 8088! ;) (damn IDE/ATA is such a friggin' nasty kludge) -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Dec 3 01:44:52 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 02:44:52 -0500 Subject: Sun people and keyboards In-Reply-To: <11420.1228056509@mini> References: <11420.1228056509@mini> Message-ID: On Nov 30, 2008, at 9:48 AM, Brad Parker wrote: >> Does anyone here have pull with Sun Microsystems or know someone >> who does? >> I'm trying to get the right person jazzed up about the idea of a >> Type 7 >> keyboard built like a Model M. I've already emailed >> clickykeyboards.com >> about it and they'll do the engineering and design work for about >> $27k. A >> Type 7 sells brand new for around $50. I'm sure people would be >> more than >> willing to pay twice as much for a "Type 7m". > > Could you explain a little more? I got off the sun bus around type 4 > keyboards. > > What's special about a model 7? and whats a "Model M"? > > Back in the day I loved my sun keyboard, but it looked like this: > > http://flickr.com/photos/joeclark/2193465934/ > > i.e. with the control key in the correct place :-) Good heavens, "Weird OLD Sun keyboard"...That's a Type 5, damn new in my book. I still have my Type 2s...more than a decade older than that. They felt great, too. Those Type 5 keyboards, and their much nicer (IMO) predecessors, the Type 4, were available with the control key in both the right and the wrong places. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From bnansel at bigpond.net.au Wed Dec 3 01:53:45 2008 From: bnansel at bigpond.net.au (Robert Nansel) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 18:23:45 +1030 Subject: Hard disk material Message-ID: <04A23E5A-69F6-43FD-A638-4FAD6071DF24@bigpond.net.au> Wed Dec 3, 2008 bfranchuk wrote: > > take very light cuts. You would fabricate a cutter head > > that bolts in the same way as a R/W head. To take a cut, > > you just tweak the adjustment screw(s) and turn an > > additional "feed" screw to cut the track the right > > width. > > I'm guessing the bearings would be pretty light-duty. You'll never > get smoothness with a cutter. You'll need to either follow up w/ > grinding or lapping (or polishing?). It depends on the material of the drum, the RPM of the drum, depth of cut, and how sharp your cutter is. Lapping probably wouldn't hurt, but you don't want to be trying to take out gouges and scratches just by lapping. -Bobby From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Dec 3 02:08:03 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 03:08:03 -0500 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <291101c954e5$c1a3ef00$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com><4935209F.7266.2A15CDC@cclist.sydex.com><493564D6.18784.3ABCDF7@cclist.sydex.com> <291101c954e5$c1a3ef00$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <81E99AB5-1E41-42C7-AE88-B823566DCF36@neurotica.com> On Dec 2, 2008, at 8:22 PM, Alexandre Souza wrote: >> Something like that, but with the target including close emulation of >> VT100/VT220 (successfully runs emacs/vi/EDT, modernish setup menus, >> etc.) A secondary goal is emulation of some common flavor of >> graphical terminal ,Tek, etc. Emphasis on through-hole design, and >> small form-factor. >> One thing, to answer another question in this thread, is that will >> only do 80-char-wide. The bandwidth of VGA over 640-pixels-wide >> exceeds what the CPU and memory can do. > > Nothing a CPLD cannot create...what about that? Well, the hardware is already designed and working.. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de Wed Dec 3 04:00:11 2008 From: cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de (Christian Corti) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 11:00:11 +0100 (CET) Subject: WANTED: someone to transfer IBM 5110 BASIC programs to modern PC In-Reply-To: <20081202111503.V44510@shell.lmi.net> References: <227361.78266.qm@web111301.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <49343E36.7080600@pacbell.net> <20081201135826.L97208@shell.lmi.net> <20081202111503.V44510@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: On Tue, 2 Dec 2008, Fred Cisin wrote: >> You can't just connect a 5.25" >> drive to it. You may have a look at the 5114 MIM or the 5120 MIM (which >> partially contains the 5114 MIM), the latter is online on my site. > > URL handy? Oh, I forgot: ftp.informatik.uni-stuttgart.de/pub/cm/ibm5110 > I never said that it would be EASY, . . .(although I did erroneously imply > practical) Although it would be nice, it really isn't practical. One problem is that the diskette controller is external, i.e. within the 5114 case, and quite discrete (TTL and IBM sugar cubes). This controller does FM and MFM (i.e. 3740 and System/34 format) and is attached to the 5110 I/O bus. The 5110 "firmware" (the Executable ROS) talks in a very basic manner to the controller, like "turn the erase head on *now*" or "I'm writing address mark bytes now, so please modify the clock pattern accordingly". Timing is *very* critical, there are timing loops e.g. to delay turning the erase head off after the last byte has been written to disk. And the stepper control lines are controlled by software. Attaching a 5.25" drive to this controller would be practically impossible, alone because of the different erase gate delays or write currents. So without a 5114 (or a 5120 with internal drives) you need to make a controller that emulates the Diskette Interface Adapter Card accurately. The ROS I/O Supervisor routines are very unforgiving (I know that...) > I've put 5.25" drives in a few machines that ran SA801 interface (with > mixed results). I've never done it for a drive where I would have to > build a logic board or interface. Practically, you would need to create your own disk interface and I/O Supervisor routines (which you can load into RWS). Christian From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 05:08:44 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 00:08:44 +1300 Subject: cctech moderator on holidays Message-ID: Hi, All, Lawrence Wilkinson , one of the classiccmp moderators, asked me to post a quick note to the list that he is travelling around NZ and can't check the moderator queues as often as he does when he's home. This means that moderated messages will be delayed more than usual, and that if you are a member of cctalk _or_ cctech and post from an address you did not subscribe from, it will take him longer to spot those messages and release them. Unmoderated postings to cctalk sent from subscribed accounts should go through without Lawrence having to interact with them. I'm guessing, though, that nobody has heard from Jay himself in quite some time now. -ethan From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 05:57:35 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 00:57:35 +1300 Subject: Arcade games In-Reply-To: <49325E45.1050409@axeside.co.uk> References: <492B15E9.6010501@axeside.co.uk> <49325E45.1050409@axeside.co.uk> Message-ID: On Sun, Nov 30, 2008 at 10:35 PM, Philip Belben wrote: > Ethan provided a long, informative reply to my post: > >>> There's a shop in Coalville... >>> In the window this weekend were two machines that caught my eye: an >>> original Space Invaders... from 1978... 895 pounds; and a pinball >>> machine from 1979... 495 > Ah. Yes. In the US, prices may well be depressed by there being no coins > in common circulation above a quarter dollar. Indeed, though plenty of games (Space Invaders included, ISTR) can be set to require multiple quarters per credit. The "problem" is that so many games were one-coin-per-credit for so long that it's rather etched into the expectations of paying customers, no matter the purchase power difference between $0.25 in 1978 and 2008. Some games were $0.50 per play from day one; "Dragon's Lair" comes to mind. I know that one can be set for 3 credits for 5 coins or similar odd payment schemes meant to maximize revenue, but these days, the effect monetary inflation has had is to encourage large operators ("Dave and Busters" and other adult arcades) to go with swipe cards - that way they can have certain hours cost certain amounts or make it easy to play $20 because you don't feel the quarters going into the machine (taking the sting out of paying $0.75 for a game of pinball). > The slots on the front of the Space Invaders machine said "50p" on them - > that seems to be about 70 or 80 US cents at the moment. At your > calculation, 895 pounds would only take 1790 games to pay off the debt - > five games a day for a year - which is a much more attractive figure. Many > arcade games here now accept one pound coins, so if the owner did that > conversion, the game could pay for itself quicker still. Indeed. I did notice on my first trip to Europe (in 1985) that everywhere I went, video games cost substantially more to play than they did in the US. I would say that 5 games a day for a year wouldn't be attractive for an operator. Entirely coincidentally, since this thread started, I've started staying with a friend in NZ who happens to repair arcade games in Christchurch. His boss is the classic stingy operator ("it's all about the money, not the love"). I asked him about older games - he said they don't pay for the floor space. His clientele is mostly teenagers, not "aging hipsters", and largely Asian, given where in town the arcades are. A completely different demographic than a Dave and Busters in the States. He didn't have exact numbers to share with me, but my impression is that if a game isn't playing a lot more than 5 paid games an hour, it's pulled and something else is dropped in its place. > (FWIW our 50p coins got smaller in 1997, so there's a chance the coin > mechanism would need converting anyway.) Ah... good point. That hasn't happened in the US. At auction, machines with coin mechs sell more than ones without, but that's because the acceptance mech is a module that drops in - you can get mechs for US quarters, presumably Canadian quarters (high steel content, so the magnetic diverter has to be different), and several styles of tokens - popular at one point, but now supplanted largely by swipe cards. FWIW, my Gorf and Xenophobe cabinets have US quarter mechs. You can also buy these on the aftermarket for your MAME cabinet or for "real" games for your basement for that authentic feel - they are not cheap. >> I have a few games on my list I'd like to get... The time has somewhat >> passed to see games from the >> B&W 8080 and earlier era at auction on a regular basis... >> These are all older than Space Invaders. > > Interesting. IIRC Space Invaders spanned the BW/colour divide. Later games > had colour displays, but earlier ones had monochrome displays with strips of > colour filter over the screen. I don't know when the change came, or which > version this one is. Yes. Several of these games I'm interested in are the B&W tube with colored gels or half-silvered mirrors and painted artwork to spruce up the blocky mono graphics. In 1978, B&W was still common. By 1979 or 1981 at the latest, I'd think, color was more common. There are plenty of arcade machine sites on the web with timelines and dates, so it shouldn't be hard to find the transition using real-world examples. > Thanks, Ethan, for an interesting window onto a world I hardly know at all. You bet. There are plenty of others here who know lots more, so they are free to amend or supplant anything I've said from their own experiences, but I think what I've said covers a number of aspects of this genre. -ethan From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Wed Dec 3 05:53:01 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 06:53:01 -0500 Subject: PDP-11 Zork Manual: Save $2,348.31 In-Reply-To: <200812030351.mB33pQgS056720@keith.ezwind.net> References: <200812021801.mB2I0qvq023751@dewey.classiccmp.org> <200812030351.mB33pQgS056720@keith.ezwind.net> Message-ID: > FWIW: I have the following 8" Digital diskettes labeled as follows: > ... > Does someone in the Boston area still have a working 8" diskette > drive?? I assume John Wilson does, since he has stuff a lot more obscure than that... paul From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 06:28:32 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 01:28:32 +1300 Subject: PDP-11 Zork Manual: Save $2,348.31 In-Reply-To: <200812030351.mB33pQgS056720@keith.ezwind.net> References: <200812021801.mB2I0qvq023751@dewey.classiccmp.org> <200812030351.mB33pQgS056720@keith.ezwind.net> Message-ID: On Wed, Dec 3, 2008 at 4:58 PM, Dave Mitton wrote: > FWIW: I have the following 8" Digital diskettes labeled as follows: > > 1) RT Adventure, Tasks 8/7/79, It has a slip of paper with the printed > directory output . . . > 12) ZORK2,3 ??? (copy made on an original 1980 VMS V2.0 RXO1 UPG kit!) I'd be curious to see what's on #12. If this is Infocom's Zork2 and Zork3 for the PDP-11 (which they could be), I'm not expecting the game files themselves to be anything new and unknown. There's an old project around that allows you to patch any game file version to essentially any other, given a common game file as a starting point. The early days are quite well represented and the bugs analyzed in great detail. What I'm curious about is the Z-machine on that (those?) disks (i.e., not for any of Bob's FORTRAN versions). I know there is now a modern Z-machine for PDP-11, w/source, but I'm always curious about how the did things "back in the day". > The back side of both have my Mill office mailstop on them. > Evidently send via interoffice mail, likely from Supnik. Interesting. > Does someone in the Boston area still have a working 8" diskette drive?? To assist indirectly, it's not necessary to have that 8" drive on a PDP-11 to read RX01 disks. Someone with an 8" drive on a PC could help image the contents, too (the only issue I could think of might be with sector interleave). RX01s are "standard" IBM 37-mumble low-level formatted. RX02s, though, are a different thing entirely. One easy way to do that is a physical backup using a real RX02 or a clone (like a Data Systems drive) on a UNIX or VMS machine that can take an RX211 or RXV21. I'm sure it's possible to do it on an RT-11 box, but I'm not sure how I'd do that without looking it up first (disk copying is easy; not as sure about disk imaging). -ethan From alhartman at yahoo.com Wed Dec 3 06:59:19 2008 From: alhartman at yahoo.com (Al Hartman) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 04:59:19 -0800 (PST) Subject: Zebra Systems Videos... Message-ID: <884880.76936.qm@web55301.mail.re4.yahoo.com> In emptying the warehouse of Zebra Systems, we uncovered the original Betamax tapes of these two shows. I posted them on YouTube for your enjoyment. We also uncovered a load of books, tapes, and some TS-1000/1500/ZX-81 Hardware. We even found about 5 TS-1500 Computers that we'll be offering on eBay. But for now, enjoy these: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GtDG5cWmH8s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=awUonjY_jcs Al Hartman From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Wed Dec 3 07:13:26 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 11:13:26 -0200 Subject: 5" floppy?. References: <49247DA8.90603@bluewin.ch><53D8C7880037496B82A348F2611690EB@FLEXPC> <20081126015930.GG5578@n0jcf.net> Message-ID: <2c2301c95548$fbcc8260$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > I think there were a lot of typos in that article and the captions under > the pictures. When I first looked at it, one of the pictures showed > someone holding up a 9" floppy. I was going to send a link to that > just to keep the fun rolling on this thread... but when I went back > later in the day, the caption had been corrected to say 8". Dang. > That's no fun. It is an old floppy...it was 8" but nowadays it is 9", children grows... :) From ploopster at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 07:09:18 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 08:09:18 -0500 Subject: cctech moderator on holidays In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <493684FE.2040506@gmail.com> Ethan Dicks wrote: > I'm guessing, though, that nobody has heard from Jay himself in quite > some time now. I hope he's ok. Peace... Sridhar From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Wed Dec 3 07:25:10 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 11:25:10 -0200 Subject: SCSI identify command References: <492DC2FE.90107@bitsavers.org> <492DCCA2.3080508@gmail.com><492DDE46.7060600@blueskystudios.com> <492DE457.8050204@gmail.com> Message-ID: <2d2b01c9554a$bf6a5ed0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > My laserdisc player harks from 1986, incidentally, and even its SCSI data > interface has no Inquiry support - it was just too early, I suppose... SCSI LASERDISC?!?!?!?!?! I think there were only RS-232 Laserdiscs?! I'd love to have a serial-commanded laserdisc hehehe :o) From spectre at floodgap.com Wed Dec 3 07:35:19 2008 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 05:35:19 -0800 (PST) Subject: SCSI identify command In-Reply-To: <2d2b01c9554a$bf6a5ed0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> from Alexandre Souza at "Dec 3, 8 11:25:10 am" Message-ID: <200812031335.mB3DZJvH011060@floodgap.com> > > My laserdisc player harks from 1986, incidentally, and even its SCSI data > > interface has no Inquiry support - it was just too early, I suppose... > > SCSI LASERDISC?!?!?!?!?! I think there were only RS-232 Laserdiscs?! > > I'd love to have a serial-commanded laserdisc hehehe :o) I recently got an AG-LD30 with a serial interface, but I don't know the pinout. It's a 15-pin D female connector, like a PC joystick port or Mac monitor port. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- As a computer, I find your faith in technology amusing. -------------------- From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Wed Dec 3 07:50:50 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 11:50:50 -0200 Subject: IDE <-> MFM References: <49302259.8030705@bitsavers.org> <493048EC.2030108@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <2dfe01c9554e$6633f160$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > Head-switching would be a total pig unless you buffered all 8 (or 16) > heads at > once. 8us is not enough to ping an external IDE HDD (or say a CompactFlash > or > SD card) and read off an entire track of data... > I don't even know how you'd be able to lock a PLL against the write data > stream quickly enough not to make a hash of it. Most data separators (or > at > least the ones I've looked at) need a few bytes worth of encoded data to > lock > onto before the data window signal is actually valid... > I suppose you could do what the Catweasel does and save the time between > flux > transitions, but that opens up a whole other can of worms when you want to > write back to the disc... To emulate 10, 20, 30 MEGABYTES? It can be done with a few surplus RAM chips or a good PC memory stick! 386's used 32 megabytes of simple DRAM, you can get SRAM nowadays for next to nothing in surplus market. There are 2MB ram chips from texas, and they are not that expensive. Why not have a SD for backup and emulate ALL the drive in RAM? It will be **fast** and, when the operation finish, you can press a button (or use some kind of sensing in the computer) and backup the entire ram content to the SD card. For the used computer market, it would sell like cake. And the cake ISN'T a lie :o) [], Alexandre (humming 'still alive') (completely offtopic PS: Talkin'bout Portal, have you seen "A day in the life of a turret"? No? So have a little laugh: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uz5cl131KTk - This is one of the stupidiest and funniest thing I've ever saw :D) From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Wed Dec 3 07:52:11 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 11:52:11 -0200 Subject: Ideas on how to archive my CP/M files currently on 8" floppies References: <000c01c8ae32$0e267ba0$a903a8c0@andrewdesktop> <006501c951ba$672e1510$358a3f30$@net> Message-ID: <2dff01c9554e$667b81b0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > I was considering adding an IDE interface but I'm not sure my existing > media > is reliable enough to go through development without risking the loss of > more floppies. CF cards? From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 07:47:43 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 07:47:43 -0600 Subject: SCSI identify command In-Reply-To: <2d2b01c9554a$bf6a5ed0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <492DC2FE.90107@bitsavers.org> <492DCCA2.3080508@gmail.com><492DDE46.7060600@blueskystudios.com> <492DE457.8050204@gmail.com> <2d2b01c9554a$bf6a5ed0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <49368DFF.9060602@gmail.com> Alexandre Souza wrote: >> My laserdisc player harks from 1986, incidentally, and even its SCSI >> data interface has no Inquiry support - it was just too early, I >> suppose... > > SCSI LASERDISC?!?!?!?!?! I think there were only RS-232 Laserdiscs?! Yep, Philips VP-415, part of the Acorn/BBC Domesday system. It was a modified version of a different Philips player (VP-412 I believe) that had the addition of a genlock board and SCSI control logic in a 'slice' beneath the main player. It retained the RS-232 interface too, but that could only be used for player control - the SCSI interface let you also pull data from the discs into the controlling computer. I believe it's the only example of an LVROM drive ever produced; it was too big and expensive for home use, and within a few years LV was dying and CD was taking over anyway. The whole setup's impressive - I've got a nearly-complete copy of the service manual for the player (along with otherwise-complete docs), and the technology is pretty advanced for the day. Sadly the players themselves were let down by poor electronics build quality - the vast majority of them end up being faulty due to intermittent connections (there's around 20 separate PCBs in the machine) or bad solder joints. cheers Jules From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 07:57:24 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 02:57:24 +1300 Subject: Laserdisc interfaces (was Re: SCSI identify command Message-ID: On Thu, Dec 4, 2008 at 2:35 AM, Cameron Kaiser wrote: >> > My laserdisc player harks from 1986, incidentally, and even its SCSI data >> > interface has no Inquiry support - it was just too early, I suppose... >> >> SCSI LASERDISC?!?!?!?!?! I think there were only RS-232 Laserdiscs?! >> >> I'd love to have a serial-commanded laserdisc hehehe :o) I have a few - mostly to play Dragon's Lair and Space Ace (but I do have a couple of kiosk CAV discs as well). AmigaVision supports a variety of laser disc command sets, as a classic environment which could be simple and fun to explore such discs in. > I recently got an AG-LD30 with a serial interface, but I don't know the > pinout. It's a 15-pin D female connector, like a PC joystick port or Mac > monitor port. I think there's at least one Pioneer with a DA15 serial interface, but I have no idea if there's any sort of standard for them. If you can't find a manual for your AG-LD30, there's always the technique of tracing out the circuit manually. Ground should be easy, then it's a case of looking for, typically, a 1488/1489 pair and divining what your RxD and TxD are. It's probable that there's no handshaking, but I suppose there could be. Not knowing the command set could be a problem, though. Check out AmigaVision to see if it knows about your player. You could then sniff the command set with a serial analyzer. Generally speaking, the player should have commands for start, stop, and seek, at least, and perhaps lock/unlock, eject, and several more directives. When writing apps for a friendly environment, start, stop, and seek are probably the most important commands to figure out. -ethan From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 07:54:00 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 07:54:00 -0600 Subject: Triangle pseudo-Robertson screws [was Re: 5" floppy?.] In-Reply-To: <200811300354.WAA22676@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> References: <200811300354.WAA22676@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <49368F78.1040502@gmail.com> der Mouse wrote: >>> Actually, I once saw screws which looked a bit like Robertson (the >>> square-socket kind) but with a triangular, not square, socket. >> Those turn up on cheap domestic appliances over here. The only >> possile reason for them is to make the device difficult to repair, > > I disagree. There is also an argument for them in the form of > protecting consumers from the dangerous interiors of appliances. That's what glue and potting compound is for... (Hmm, bad memories of CBM and the +4 PSU... :-) The requirement for less-common tools just to keep two things fastened together is nuts IMHO - personally I just replace them with something more widespread whenever I come across them (and need to undo them - I don't go seeking these things out :-) cheers Jules From spectre at floodgap.com Wed Dec 3 08:03:18 2008 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 06:03:18 -0800 (PST) Subject: Laserdisc interfaces (was Re: SCSI identify command In-Reply-To: from Ethan Dicks at "Dec 4, 8 02:57:24 am" Message-ID: <200812031403.mB3E3IUk006664@floodgap.com> > >> I'd love to have a serial-commanded laserdisc hehehe :o) > > I have a few - mostly to play Dragon's Lair and Space Ace (but I do > have a couple of kiosk CAV discs as well). They actually made a DVD version of those which is surprisingly good! > > I recently got an AG-LD30 with a serial interface, but I don't know the > > pinout. It's a 15-pin D female connector, like a PC joystick port or Mac > > monitor port. > > I think there's at least one Pioneer with a DA15 serial interface, but > I have no idea if there's any sort of standard for them. This is actually a Panasonic. Does that change anything (probably not)? -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- If everyone is abnormal, then no one is. ----------------------------------- From bob at jfcl.com Wed Dec 3 08:22:05 2008 From: bob at jfcl.com (Bob Armstrong) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 06:22:05 -0800 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <4935F34D.5030100@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <006401c953fa$8294a980$87bdfc80$@com> <4935F34D.5030100@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <002201c95552$84c43460$8e4c9d20$@com> >How does well does it work with SCB6120? Haven't actually tried it yet, but the SBC6120 has a regular RS232 connection there's no reason why it wouldn't work. >PS: while the wrong list, Bob have many people finished the PDP/8 front panel >PCB's? I don't know - the majority of people who buy kits never write back to tell me what happened. Bob From curt at atarimuseum.com Wed Dec 3 08:41:26 2008 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 09:41:26 -0500 Subject: Arcade games In-Reply-To: References: <492B15E9.6010501@axeside.co.uk> <49325E45.1050409@axeside.co.uk> Message-ID: <49369A96.2080601@atarimuseum.com> Going with a coin credits on a card approach is a far more effective revenue generator as I've personally found. On the cruise lines, they have some very well stocked arcades and they use a crediting system where you purchase credit that is placed onto your sea-pass card (actually ALL services on cruise lines, with the exception of the casino's is strictly credited to the sea-pass cards, no cash is exchanged throughout the cruise for onboard purchases of goods, drinks, tours, etc...) Well, what I've noticed is you burn through those card credits playing video games in no time flat... when you don't physically have cash in hand to part with, its much easier to spend it. When you're down to that last dollar bill or handful of quarters in the arcades, your much more choosy about what games you'll play and when. I remember when I was a kid, we'd go to Time Out in the Staten Island Mall, it would be open till around 11pm or Midnight as it was right at the outside entrance to one section of the mall, and they'd gate off the rest of the way so you could only go into Time Out or across to Farrell's Ice Cream Palor next to it. Well, I remember getting down to the last .50cents in my pocket one weekend night, my friends and I went to the movies outside the Mall - the good old days when you had these small movie theatre's with only 1 or 2 screens, now the 12-16 screen places they have today. Then we'd go to either Time Out at the Mall or behind the Mall was the Twilight Zone arcade and pool hall... either way, down to that last .50 cents... Well, you'd need it to take the bus home, but damn, I just wanted to play some more video games, so I'd use those last two quarters, then borrow a dime to call home and ask my mom to come and pick us up "Mom, I accidentally used my bus money up and we have no way to get home..." Well, that worked once or twice, I remember my final "ooops" attempt ending in my mother telling me "tough, then walk home, maybe that'll help you remember not to spend your bus money next time" The Mall was like 10 miles away from home, took all night to get home, but that was the last time I tried pulling that stunt!!! Curt Ethan Dicks wrote: > On Sun, Nov 30, 2008 at 10:35 PM, Philip Belben wrote: > >> Ethan provided a long, informative reply to my post: >> >> >>>> There's a shop in Coalville... >>>> In the window this weekend were two machines that caught my eye: an >>>> original Space Invaders... from 1978... 895 pounds; and a pinball >>>> machine from 1979... 495 >>>> > > >> Ah. Yes. In the US, prices may well be depressed by there being no coins >> in common circulation above a quarter dollar. >> > > Indeed, though plenty of games (Space Invaders included, ISTR) can be > set to require multiple quarters per credit. The "problem" is that so > many games were one-coin-per-credit for so long that it's rather > etched into the expectations of paying customers, no matter the > purchase power difference between $0.25 in 1978 and 2008. Some games > were $0.50 per play from day one; "Dragon's Lair" comes to mind. I > know that one can be set for 3 credits for 5 coins or similar odd > payment schemes meant to maximize revenue, but these days, the effect > monetary inflation has had is to encourage large operators ("Dave and > Busters" and other adult arcades) to go with swipe cards - that way > they can have certain hours cost certain amounts or make it easy to > play $20 because you don't feel the quarters going into the machine > (taking the sting out of paying $0.75 for a game of pinball). > > >> The slots on the front of the Space Invaders machine said "50p" on them - >> that seems to be about 70 or 80 US cents at the moment. At your >> calculation, 895 pounds would only take 1790 games to pay off the debt - >> five games a day for a year - which is a much more attractive figure. Many >> arcade games here now accept one pound coins, so if the owner did that >> conversion, the game could pay for itself quicker still. >> > > Indeed. I did notice on my first trip to Europe (in 1985) that > everywhere I went, video games cost substantially more to play than > they did in the US. > > I would say that 5 games a day for a year wouldn't be attractive for > an operator. Entirely coincidentally, since this thread started, I've > started staying with a friend in NZ who happens to repair arcade games > in Christchurch. His boss is the classic stingy operator ("it's all > about the money, not the love"). I asked him about older games - he > said they don't pay for the floor space. His clientele is mostly > teenagers, not "aging hipsters", and largely Asian, given where in > town the arcades are. A completely different demographic than a Dave > and Busters in the States. He didn't have exact numbers to share with > me, but my impression is that if a game isn't playing a lot more than > 5 paid games an hour, it's pulled and something else is dropped in its > place. > > >> (FWIW our 50p coins got smaller in 1997, so there's a chance the coin >> mechanism would need converting anyway.) >> > > Ah... good point. That hasn't happened in the US. At auction, > machines with coin mechs sell more than ones without, but that's > because the acceptance mech is a module that drops in - you can get > mechs for US quarters, presumably Canadian quarters (high steel > content, so the magnetic diverter has to be different), and several > styles of tokens - popular at one point, but now supplanted largely by > swipe cards. FWIW, my Gorf and Xenophobe cabinets have US quarter > mechs. You can also buy these on the aftermarket for your MAME > cabinet or for "real" games for your basement for that authentic feel > - they are not cheap. > > >>> I have a few games on my list I'd like to get... The time has somewhat >>> passed to see games from the >>> B&W 8080 and earlier era at auction on a regular basis... >>> These are all older than Space Invaders. >>> >> Interesting. IIRC Space Invaders spanned the BW/colour divide. Later games >> had colour displays, but earlier ones had monochrome displays with strips of >> colour filter over the screen. I don't know when the change came, or which >> version this one is. >> > > Yes. Several of these games I'm interested in are the B&W tube with colored > gels or half-silvered mirrors and painted artwork to spruce up the blocky > mono graphics. In 1978, B&W was still common. By 1979 or 1981 at the > latest, I'd think, color was more common. There are plenty of arcade machine > sites on the web with timelines and dates, so it shouldn't be hard to find the > transition using real-world examples. > > >> Thanks, Ethan, for an interesting window onto a world I hardly know at all. >> > > You bet. There are plenty of others here who know lots more, so they are > free to amend or supplant anything I've said from their own experiences, but > I think what I've said covers a number of aspects of this genre. > > -ethan > > From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 08:36:53 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 08:36:53 -0600 Subject: Australian ex-DEC Director has large museum in his home In-Reply-To: <4931CB23.8010203@acc.umu.se> References: <4931CB23.8010203@acc.umu.se> Message-ID: <49369985.1030502@gmail.com> G?ran Axelsson wrote: > ... never mind. Picture 41 shows a similar device. It was an ultrasonic > delay line. How much could be stored in such a memory? That's something of a How long is a piece of string?" question (or in this case, wire). There are some brief calculations here: http://www.science.uva.nl/museum/delayline.html cheers Jules From curt at atarimuseum.com Wed Dec 3 08:50:18 2008 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 09:50:18 -0500 Subject: Zebra Systems Videos... In-Reply-To: <884880.76936.qm@web55301.mail.re4.yahoo.com> References: <884880.76936.qm@web55301.mail.re4.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <49369CAA.7070508@atarimuseum.com> I wasn't a Timex fan, and had no idea that there was a supporting company right there in Brooklyn, very cool... its a shame that those days are long gone, it was great seeing people doing stuff like that and supporting platforms with such enthusiasm. Well, hope you find more gems like that to share with all of us Al... Curt Al Hartman wrote: > In emptying the warehouse of Zebra Systems, we uncovered the original > Betamax tapes of these two shows. > > I posted them on YouTube for your enjoyment. > > We also uncovered a load of books, tapes, and some TS-1000/1500/ZX-81 > Hardware. > > We even found about 5 TS-1500 Computers that we'll be offering on eBay. > > But for now, enjoy these: > > http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GtDG5cWmH8s > > http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=awUonjY_jcs > > Al Hartman > > > From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 08:57:13 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 03:57:13 +1300 Subject: Laserdisc interfaces (was Re: SCSI identify command In-Reply-To: <200812031403.mB3E3IUk006664@floodgap.com> References: <200812031403.mB3E3IUk006664@floodgap.com> Message-ID: On Thu, Dec 4, 2008 at 3:03 AM, Cameron Kaiser wrote: >> >> I'd love to have a serial-commanded laserdisc hehehe :o) >> >> I have a few - mostly to play Dragon's Lair and Space Ace (but I do >> have a couple of kiosk CAV discs as well). > > They actually made a DVD version of those which is surprisingly good! Yes. I have one if not both. I was surprised how playable they are, but I got them for ripping (I already own the original SA and DL discs and the last-off-the-line DL disc with extra content) for Daphne. >> I have no idea if there's any sort of standard for them. > > This is actually a Panasonic. Does that change anything (probably not)? Not as far as I know, but it's easy to establish GND, so it should be easy to see if what you have is superficially the same as any models of Pioneer. I did a quick dig around and didn't see any manuals that were easy to download for Panasonic, but I'm sure they are out there somewhere. -ethan From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 09:01:33 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 04:01:33 +1300 Subject: Kit completion (was Re: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project) Message-ID: On Thu, Dec 4, 2008 at 3:22 AM, Bob Armstrong wrote: >>PS: while the wrong list, Bob have many people finished the PDP/8 front > panel PCB's? > > I don't know - the majority of people who buy kits never write back to > tell me what happened. I must be in the minority ;-) I not only write back, I frequently post pictures of my successes. -ethan From bob at jfcl.com Wed Dec 3 09:10:20 2008 From: bob at jfcl.com (Bob Armstrong) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 07:10:20 -0800 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <81E99AB5-1E41-42C7-AE88-B823566DCF36@neurotica.com> References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com><4935209F.7266.2A15CDC@cclist.sydex.com><493564D6.18784.3ABCDF7@cclist.sydex.com> <291101c954e5$c1a3ef00$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <81E99AB5-1E41-42C7-AE88-B823566DCF36@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <004001c95559$428f7d00$c7ae7700$@com> > Dave McGuire (mcguire at neurotica.com) wrote: > >>On Dec 2, 2008, at 8:22 PM, Alexandre Souza wrote: >> Nothing a CPLD cannot create...what about that? > > Well, the hardware is already designed and working.. I try to limit my gizmos to thru hole packages to make them easier for the hobbyist to assemble, and there just aren't any CPLDs available in thru hole packages that also have anywhere near enough logic to implement a whole CRTC. Bob From dbetz at xlisper.com Wed Dec 3 09:11:21 2008 From: dbetz at xlisper.com (David Betz) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 10:11:21 -0500 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <002201c95552$84c43460$8e4c9d20$@com> References: <006401c953fa$8294a980$87bdfc80$@com> <4935F34D.5030100@jetnet.ab.ca> <002201c95552$84c43460$8e4c9d20$@com> Message-ID: I've successfully built the SBC6120, the Life board and the ELF2K as well as the recent VT4 terminal. On Dec 3, 2008, at 9:22 AM, Bob Armstrong wrote: >> How does well does it work with SCB6120? > > Haven't actually tried it yet, but the SBC6120 has a regular RS232 > connection there's no reason why it wouldn't work. > >> PS: while the wrong list, Bob have many people finished the PDP/8 >> front > panel >> PCB's? > > I don't know - the majority of people who buy kits never write back > to > tell me what happened. > > Bob > From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Wed Dec 3 09:17:04 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 13:17:04 -0200 Subject: Laserdisc interfaces (was Re: SCSI identify command References: Message-ID: <2ea701c9555a$45fbd780$46fea8c0@DeskJara> >>> I'd love to have a serial-commanded laserdisc hehehe :o) > I have a few - mostly to play Dragon's Lair and Space Ace (but I do > have a couple of kiosk CAV discs as well). AmigaVision supports a > variety of laser disc command sets, as a classic environment which > could be simple and fun to explore such discs in. I have a Pioneer Laseractive, but never figured out how to control it serialy without the PC command module :( From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 09:27:10 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 04:27:10 +1300 Subject: Laserdisc interfaces (was Re: SCSI identify command In-Reply-To: <2ea701c9555a$45fbd780$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <2ea701c9555a$45fbd780$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: On Thu, Dec 4, 2008 at 4:17 AM, Alexandre Souza wrote: >>>> I'd love to have a serial-commanded laserdisc hehehe :o) >> >> I have a few - mostly to play Dragon's Lair and Space Ace (but I do >> have a couple of kiosk CAV discs as well). AmigaVision supports a >> variety of laser disc command sets, as a classic environment which >> could be simple and fun to explore such discs in. > > I have a Pioneer Laseractive, but never figured out how to control it > serialy without the PC command module :( Is that hardware that's missing from your player, or some sort of software package for your PC? -ethan From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 09:27:10 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 04:27:10 +1300 Subject: Laserdisc interfaces (was Re: SCSI identify command In-Reply-To: <2ea701c9555a$45fbd780$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <2ea701c9555a$45fbd780$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: On Thu, Dec 4, 2008 at 4:17 AM, Alexandre Souza wrote: >>>> I'd love to have a serial-commanded laserdisc hehehe :o) >> >> I have a few - mostly to play Dragon's Lair and Space Ace (but I do >> have a couple of kiosk CAV discs as well). AmigaVision supports a >> variety of laser disc command sets, as a classic environment which >> could be simple and fun to explore such discs in. > > I have a Pioneer Laseractive, but never figured out how to control it > serialy without the PC command module :( Is that hardware that's missing from your player, or some sort of software package for your PC? -ethan From dgahling at hotmail.com Wed Dec 3 09:39:41 2008 From: dgahling at hotmail.com (Dan Gahlinger) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 10:39:41 -0500 Subject: Laserdisc interfaces (was Re: SCSI identify command In-Reply-To: References: <2ea701c9555a$45fbd780$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: I have the original LD of "Cliffhanger" the arcade game, got it off fleabay, and a pioneer LD player, can't remember the model, I don't think I ever got the interface working. Then I found Daphne, and found an "emulation" for the LD player, along with someone who had done a lot of work to convert the LD to digital contents that Daphne could use. I've actually gotten that running and played a little bit, it works very well, but I find the controls exceedingly difficult. Then again, I haven't played Cliffhanger since it was in the arcade, that might account for much. Still my favorite game from arcade days though I have no idea about the legalities of sharing this stuff, but I figured since I owned the original, using the emulation was mostly ok, I have a legal right to the content... ah fun times... Dan. _________________________________________________________________ From rickb at bensene.com Wed Dec 3 10:30:55 2008 From: rickb at bensene.com (Rick Bensene) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 08:30:55 -0800 Subject: Delay Line Memory (Was: Australian ex-DEC Director has large museum in his home) In-Reply-To: <4931CB23.8010203@acc.umu.se> References: <4931CB23.8010203@acc.umu.se> Message-ID: > > Slideshow: > Picture 41 shows a similar device. It was an ultrasonic > delay line. How much could be stored in such a memory? > Delay lines were used a lot in early electronic calculators from the around 1963 through the early 1970's, by which time MOS integrated circuits (first shift registers, then RAM) took over. Delay lines were used extensively in early electronic calculators by Olivetti, Canon, Friden, and Sony, among others. Typically the delay line was used to store the working registers of the calculator, with the data continuously circulating through the delay line and the arithmetic/display logic. Most of the delay lines used in calculators were of the magnetostrictive type, which used thin tapes of nickel (which contract when subjected to a magnetic field), that impart torque twists into a special wire that served as the delay medium. This wire was strung in a spiral, with lengths ranging up to around 50 feet. Magnetostrictive transducers were affixed to each end of the wire, with one end being the transmitter, and the other the receiver. Capacity of the delay line was a function of the length of the loops of wire, and the data rate pushed through the delay line. In the Friden 130, the first production calculator to use a delay line, the delay line wire is about 50 feet long, and the delay is about 5ms, with 480 "bits" of information stored in the delay line. Typically, delay line memories in calculator implementations max out at around 1500 bits of storage. Programmable calculators, like the Monroe EPIC 2000/3000, the Olivetti Programma 101 and follow-on machines, and some Canon programmables had the highest capacity delay lines since the line needed to store both the working registers of the calculator, as well as the user's stored program. In the case of the Monroe EPIC 2000/3000, two delay lines were used (housed in the same enclosure), one for working register storage, and the other for program storage. Rick Bensene The Old Calculator Museum http://oldcalculatormuseum.com From uban at ubanproductions.com Wed Dec 3 10:37:39 2008 From: uban at ubanproductions.com (Tom Uban) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 10:37:39 -0600 Subject: Delay Line Memory (Was: Australian ex-DEC Director has large museum in his home) In-Reply-To: References: <4931CB23.8010203@acc.umu.se> Message-ID: <4936B5D3.4020900@ubanproductions.com> Rick Bensene wrote: > Delay lines were used a lot in early electronic calculators from the > around 1963 through the early 1970's, by which time MOS integrated > circuits (first shift registers, then RAM) took over. > > Delay lines were used extensively in early electronic calculators by > Olivetti, Canon, Friden, and Sony, among others. > Typically the delay line was used to store the working registers of the > calculator, with the data continuously circulating through the delay > line and the arithmetic/display logic. Most of the delay lines used in > calculators were of the magnetostrictive type, which used thin tapes of > nickel (which contract when subjected to a magnetic field), that impart > torque twists into a special wire that served as the delay medium. This > wire was strung in a spiral, with lengths ranging up to around 50 feet. > Magnetostrictive transducers were affixed to each end of the wire, with > one end being the transmitter, and the other the receiver. Capacity of > the delay line was a function of the length of the loops of wire, and > the data rate pushed through the delay line. In the Friden 130, the > first production calculator to use a delay line, the delay line wire is > about 50 feet long, and the delay is about 5ms, with 480 "bits" of > information stored in the delay line. Typically, delay line memories > in calculator implementations max out at around 1500 bits of storage. > Programmable calculators, like the Monroe EPIC 2000/3000, the Olivetti > Programma 101 and follow-on machines, and some Canon programmables had > the highest capacity delay lines since the line needed to store both the > working registers of the calculator, as well as the user's stored > program. In the case of the Monroe EPIC 2000/3000, two delay lines were > used (housed in the same enclosure), one for working register storage, > and the other for program storage. > Are delay lines of this type subject to errors induced by vibrations or shock? If so, would heavy handed typing on the calculator's keys cause problems? From pontus at update.uu.se Wed Dec 3 11:18:38 2008 From: pontus at update.uu.se (Pontus) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 18:18:38 +0100 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <4935F34D.5030100@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <006401c953fa$8294a980$87bdfc80$@com> <4935F34D.5030100@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <4936BF6E.7060906@update.uu.se> > PS: while the wrong list, Bob have many people finished the PDP/8 > front panel > PCB's? I don't plan to since I am going to scoff the switches for a 18 > bit cpld > cpu I am designing. > Does this mean you have a SBC6120 kit lying around. I could think of a few that would buy it from you :) Me included if you have the nice front panel. Also, closer related to the topic. I've just laid my hands on a Minec 1000, a pretty awesome terminal depicted here: http://flickr.com/photos/zachetus/535850501/ and described here: http://groups.google.fi/group/comp.terminals/msg/3c973de6e6e0be06 The form factor rocks! Any new terminal I would build would resemble the Minec as much as possible. Regards, Pontus. From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Wed Dec 3 11:19:43 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 15:19:43 -0200 Subject: Laserdisc interfaces (was Re: SCSI identify command References: <2ea701c9555a$45fbd780$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <2f8401c9556b$e0e0a490$46fea8c0@DeskJara> >> I have a Pioneer Laseractive, but never figured out how to control it >> serialy without the PC command module :( > Is that hardware that's missing from your player, or some sort of > software package for your PC? The laseractive is a laserdisc system with game modules. You have a Sega CD pack, a Pc Engine pack, a Karaoke pack and the rarest of all, the PC commander pack, where you had a serial port. Of course, you can find some schematics of the game packs, but nothing about the karaoke and pc modules. Maybe someday... :) From rickb at bensene.com Wed Dec 3 11:27:54 2008 From: rickb at bensene.com (Rick Bensene) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 09:27:54 -0800 Subject: Delay Line Memory (Was: Australian ex-DEC Director has large museum in his home) In-Reply-To: <4936B5D3.4020900@ubanproductions.com> References: <4931CB23.8010203@acc.umu.se> <4936B5D3.4020900@ubanproductions.com> Message-ID: > > Are delay lines of this type subject to errors induced by vibrations > or shock? If so, would heavy handed typing on the calculator's keys > cause problems? The delay line wires are well-isolated via silicone pads that damp out external vibration, and isolate the coils of wire from touching each other. Heavy-handed typing isn't going to cause any troubles, although a shock like lifting and dropping the machine (generally not a good thing for glass-based display elements like Nixie tubes or CRT's) could definitely induce errors. Ambient vibration typically wouldn't cause problems, such as use aboard a ship or vehicle, except in extreme conditions. For extreme environments, a calculator using magnetic core memory or flip-flops would have been a better choice. Rick Bensene The Old Calculator Museum http://oldcalculatormuseum.com From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Wed Dec 3 11:33:04 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 15:33:04 -0200 Subject: Sun people and keyboards References: Message-ID: <301101c9556d$4c1f0f70$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > Does anyone here have pull with Sun Microsystems or know someone who does? > I'm trying to get the right person jazzed up about the idea of a Type 7 > keyboard built like a Model M. I've already emailed clickykeyboards.com > about it and they'll do the engineering and design work for about $27k. A > Type 7 sells brand new for around $50. I'm sure people would be more than > willing to pay twice as much for a "Type 7m". Send me a sun with two keyboards and I'll create an adaptor to connect a type "M" to a sun, he he he Sorry not being able to help, but there is NO Sun thinghies near me :( From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Wed Dec 3 11:34:15 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 15:34:15 -0200 Subject: problem with listserv? References: <20081130125801.GA5784@n0jcf.net> Message-ID: <303001c9556d$7934cef0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Same here. Got some 250 messages today. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Chris Elmquist" To: "Classic Computer Tech" Sent: Sunday, November 30, 2008 10:58 AM Subject: problem with listserv? > Hmm... I've sent a number of things to this list which have not ever > shown up here. Curious if I can actually really post to the list...?? > > I also see that postings from others show up about 5 to 6 days after they > post them. For example, yesterday 11/29, I received gobs of postings > dated 11/24. There will be many days of silence and then all of a sudden > I'll get a bunch of them all at once, that many days behind. > > cje > > -- > Chris Elmquist > mailto:chrise at pobox.com > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG - http://www.avg.com Version: 8.0.176 / Virus Database: 270.9.13/1825 - Release Date: 2/12/2008 20:44 From evan at snarc.net Wed Dec 3 11:49:49 2008 From: evan at snarc.net (Evan Koblentz) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 12:49:49 -0500 Subject: Tragedy in our hobby: Jay West .... Message-ID: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> Hi all, Every few months Jay gets busy at work and disappears. That's been a regular cycle for several years, so personally I don't get too worried. However, I did start to wonder recently because he's been gone for longer than usual. Personally I last spoke with him at VCF West in 2007. Christian wrote >>> where is Jay? I've tried to contact him via email but haven't got any response yet. His last post to this list was at the end of May. Ethan aded >>> I'm guessing, though, that nobody has heard from Jay himself in quite some time now. Sridhard noted >>> I hope he's ok. So I decided to pick up the phone today even though Jay usually doesn't answer his phone, preferring email. Alas, I'm very sorry to report this tragic news to the list .... .... "Rumors of my death are greatly exaggerated." Jay had a very sturdy laugh (for a supposed cadaver) when I mentioned sending an email with the "tragedy" subject line. :-) He's just busy at work. As usual. - Evan From spectre at floodgap.com Wed Dec 3 11:53:39 2008 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 09:53:39 -0800 (PST) Subject: Tragedy in our hobby: Jay West .... In-Reply-To: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> from Evan Koblentz at "Dec 3, 8 12:49:49 pm" Message-ID: <200812031753.mB3HrdE1014902@floodgap.com> > Alas, I'm very sorry to report this tragic news to the list .... > > .... "Rumors of my death are greatly exaggerated." I am horrified to hear that and I wish his family all the best with his continued survival. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- LDA #TXT:JMP $AB1E:TXT .asc "just another c64 hacker":.byt 0d00 - ps: glad he's ok. From legalize at xmission.com Wed Dec 3 12:04:10 2008 From: legalize at xmission.com (Richard) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 11:04:10 -0700 Subject: Keyboard model # for Apollo DN 10000? Message-ID: Does anyone know the model number for a keyboard that goes with an Apollo DN10000? There's a sticker on the back side of the keyboard with a model number like 014555-001. Thanks! -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download Legalize Adulthood! From healyzh at aracnet.com Wed Dec 3 12:08:13 2008 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 10:08:13 -0800 (PST) Subject: Tragedy in our hobby: Jay West .... In-Reply-To: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> Message-ID: <200812031808.mB3I8DBg031640@onyx.spiritone.com> > Alas, I'm very sorry to report this tragic news to the list .... > > .... "Rumors of my death are greatly exaggerated." > > Jay had a very sturdy laugh (for a supposed cadaver) when I mentioned > sending an email with the "tragedy" subject line. :-) > > He's just busy at work. As usual. With the week I'm having, that subject line was decidedly unappreciated. Zane From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Wed Dec 3 12:07:21 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 16:07:21 -0200 Subject: WANTED: someone to transfer IBM 5110 BASIC programs to modern PC References: <227361.78266.qm@web111301.mail.gq1.yahoo.com><49343E36.7080600@pacbell.net><20081201135826.L97208@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <315101c95572$24322ab0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> >> Are those BASIC files stored as plain text, or are they tokenized? > They are tokenized. PC basic? It is compatible with MSX Basic :D From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Wed Dec 3 12:09:28 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 16:09:28 -0200 Subject: PDP-11 Zork Manual: Save $2,348.31 References: <310f50ab0812012347x3a219b16l25bf08a84954024d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <317e01c95572$58062440$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > Did anyone else have trouble with this link? I get a message from > Acrobat Reader (5.1.0) about how the file is damaged and cannot be > repaired. I'll not get surprised if someones come saying it is using Acrobat Reader 1.0... :oO From jos.mar at bluewin.ch Wed Dec 3 12:24:42 2008 From: jos.mar at bluewin.ch (Jos Dreesen / Marian Capel) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 19:24:42 +0100 Subject: Free ZX81 kits... In-Reply-To: <200812031808.mB3I8DBg031640@onyx.spiritone.com> References: <200812031808.mB3I8DBg031640@onyx.spiritone.com> Message-ID: <4936CEEA.4060904@bluewin.ch> Just found this gem on french "ordinosaures" list: http://zx81.ordi5.free.fr/paperkit/ZX81_PAPER_KIT.pdf Jos From cclist at sydex.com Wed Dec 3 12:26:11 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 10:26:11 -0800 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <004001c95559$428f7d00$c7ae7700$@com> References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com>, <81E99AB5-1E41-42C7-AE88-B823566DCF36@neurotica.com>, <004001c95559$428f7d00$c7ae7700$@com> Message-ID: <49365EC3.4537.2E6D4DB@cclist.sydex.com> On 3 Dec 2008 at 7:10, Bob Armstrong wrote: > I try to limit my gizmos to thru hole packages to make them easier for the > hobbyist to assemble, and there just aren't any CPLDs available in thru hole > packages that also have anywhere near enough logic to implement a whole > CRTC. There are inexpensive SMT to through-hole adapters available. While I wouldn't trust myself to carefully hand-solder a whole board full of SMT, the adpaters are fairly easy to do. Can one still get CPLDs in PLCC? Sockets for those are still throug- hole. Would one be large enough? 5 volt logic also seems to be poised to go the way of through-hole devices. But sometimes ya gotta do what ya gotta do. Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Wed Dec 3 12:32:45 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 10:32:45 -0800 Subject: Delay Line Memory (Was: Australian ex-DEC Director has large museum in his home) In-Reply-To: References: , <4936B5D3.4020900@ubanproductions.com>, Message-ID: <4936604D.8242.2ECD6C2@cclist.sydex.com> On 3 Dec 2008 at 9:27, Rick Bensene wrote: > The delay line wires are well-isolated via silicone pads that damp out > external vibration, and isolate the coils of wire from touching each > other. Heavy-handed typing isn't going to cause any troubles, although > a shock like lifting and dropping the machine (generally not a good > thing for glass-based display elements like Nixie tubes or CRT's) could > definitely induce errors. Ambient vibration typically wouldn't cause > problems, such as use aboard a ship or vehicle, except in extreme > conditions. For extreme environments, a calculator using magnetic core > memory or flip-flops would have been a better choice. Banging on the side of a PB250 was usually a way to create memory errors. But all in all, it was a very reliable machine for the day. Cheers, Chuck From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 12:28:13 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 12:28:13 -0600 Subject: Tragedy in our hobby: Jay West .... In-Reply-To: <200812031753.mB3HrdE1014902@floodgap.com> References: <200812031753.mB3HrdE1014902@floodgap.com> Message-ID: <4936CFBD.5010505@gmail.com> Cameron Kaiser wrote: >> Alas, I'm very sorry to report this tragic news to the list .... >> >> .... "Rumors of my death are greatly exaggerated." > > I am horrified to hear that and I wish his family all the best with his > continued survival. Enough of this OT madness! ps: glad he's ok pps: seconded From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Wed Dec 3 12:33:16 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 11:33:16 -0700 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <4936BF6E.7060906@update.uu.se> References: <006401c953fa$8294a980$87bdfc80$@com> <4935F34D.5030100@jetnet.ab.ca> <4936BF6E.7060906@update.uu.se> Message-ID: <4936D0EC.5050609@jetnet.ab.ca> Pontus wrote: >> PS: while the wrong list, Bob have many people finished the PDP/8 >> front panel >> PCB's? I don't plan to since I am going to scoff the switches for a 18 >> bit cpld >> cpu I am designing. >> >> > > Does this mean you have a SBC6120 kit lying around. I could think of a > few that would buy it from you :) Me included if you have the nice front > panel. > > No, I plan to keep the SBC6120 kit I have here. I just have not built the front panel kit since I started DIY - hi - fi valve amp project about 3 years ago. Upgrading to better audio is a real challenge for me as I only have beer budget, budget. Note even if you get the $16 tube amp PCB you still need $1,600 for a set of real speakers like I have found. See below for good audio speakers. http://www.decware.com/newsite/mainmenu.htm From cclist at sydex.com Wed Dec 3 12:37:02 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 10:37:02 -0800 Subject: IDE <-> MFM In-Reply-To: <17839.96258.qm@web65516.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> References: , <17839.96258.qm@web65516.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4936614E.2426.2F0C49E@cclist.sydex.com> On 28 Nov 2008 at 11:37, Chris M wrote: > what I had been thinking was shouldn't it be somewhat *easy* to make > an IDE drive into an MFM. Just strip off what you don't need! How do > you make an elephant...take a piece of stone and remove everything > that don't look like an elephant! And it's done! Given that modern IDE drives are designed for very different data rates (and a host of other things), even if one could tap into the read/write circuitry directly (with high integration, I'm not sure that this is even possible) there would be no assurance that it would work. Cheers, Chuck From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Wed Dec 3 12:42:16 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 11:42:16 -0700 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <49365EC3.4537.2E6D4DB@cclist.sydex.com> References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com>, <81E99AB5-1E41-42C7-AE88-B823566DCF36@neurotica.com>, <004001c95559$428f7d00$c7ae7700$@com> <49365EC3.4537.2E6D4DB@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4936D308.8060702@jetnet.ab.ca> Chuck Guzis wrote: > There are inexpensive SMT to through-hole adapters available. While > I wouldn't trust myself to carefully hand-solder a whole board full > of SMT, the adpaters are fairly easy to do. > > Can one still get CPLDs in PLCC? Sockets for those are still throug- > hole. Would one be large enough? > > Yes, and yes 5V power supply too. Get a Digi-key catalog for details. The old MMI pal design book, had a 300? buad terminal all 20 pin fuse pals ... no cpu. > 5 volt logic also seems to be poised to go the way of through-hole > devices. > > You are limited to 64 I/O pins with the Atmel CPLD's I am using - 84 pin plcc's. The big problem is none of the PCB design programs have a thu the hole plcc footprint that I know of. > But sometimes ya gotta do what ya gotta do. > > Cheers, > Chuck > From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Wed Dec 3 12:46:58 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 11:46:58 -0700 Subject: Free ZX81 kits... In-Reply-To: <4936CEEA.4060904@bluewin.ch> References: <200812031808.mB3I8DBg031640@onyx.spiritone.com> <4936CEEA.4060904@bluewin.ch> Message-ID: <4936D422.7030507@jetnet.ab.ca> Jos Dreesen / Marian Capel wrote: > Just found this gem on french "ordinosaures" list: > > http://zx81.ordi5.free.fr/paperkit/ZX81_PAPER_KIT.pdf > > > Jos > Still no subsitute for the real thing to keep your door open.... From spectre at floodgap.com Wed Dec 3 13:02:56 2008 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 11:02:56 -0800 (PST) Subject: Free ZX81 kits... In-Reply-To: <4936D422.7030507@jetnet.ab.ca> from "bfranchuk@jetnet.ab.ca" at "Dec 3, 8 11:46:58 am" Message-ID: <200812031902.mB3J2usP004978@floodgap.com> > > Just found this gem on french "ordinosaures" list: > > http://zx81.ordi5.free.fr/paperkit/ZX81_PAPER_KIT.pdf > Still no subsitute for the real thing to keep your door open.... Just ask Commodore. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- I, for one, welcome our new C64 overlords. -- John Floren ------------------ From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Wed Dec 3 13:05:51 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 14:05:51 -0500 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com> <81E99AB5-1E41-42C7-AE88-B823566DCF36@neurotica.com> <004001c95559$428f7d00$c7ae7700$@com> <49365EC3.4537.2E6D4DB@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <18742.55439.856418.356842@gargle.gargle.HOWL> >>>>> "Chuck" == Chuck Guzis writes: Chuck> There are inexpensive SMT to through-hole adapters available. Chuck> While I wouldn't trust myself to carefully hand-solder a whole Chuck> board full of SMT, the adpaters are fairly easy to do. Soldering SMT by hand (other than BGA of course) is no big deal. It's only slightly harder than through-hole. It does require suitable tools -- thin solder and a fine tip professional grade soldering iron. And it's a good idea to use liquid flux (a lesson I learned from a technician friend who used to assemble large SMT based boards by hand). I've assembled boards with 100 or so 0603 caps, and some 60-120 lead flatpack packages (0.65 mm pitch) this way. Take a bit of time and work carefully. Mine worked the first try. paul From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Wed Dec 3 13:13:00 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 12:13:00 -0700 Subject: Free ZX81 kits... In-Reply-To: <200812031902.mB3J2usP004978@floodgap.com> References: <200812031902.mB3J2usP004978@floodgap.com> Message-ID: <4936DA3C.1050702@jetnet.ab.ca> Cameron Kaiser wrote: > Just ask Commodore. > > Nope ... the UK had it first! From afra at aurigae.demon.co.uk Wed Dec 3 13:18:16 2008 From: afra at aurigae.demon.co.uk (Phill Harvey-Smith) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 19:18:16 +0000 Subject: Free ZX81 kits... In-Reply-To: <4936CEEA.4060904@bluewin.ch> References: <200812031808.mB3I8DBg031640@onyx.spiritone.com> <4936CEEA.4060904@bluewin.ch> Message-ID: <4936DB78.6030907@aurigae.demon.co.uk> Jos Dreesen / Marian Capel wrote: > Just found this gem on french "ordinosaures" list: > > http://zx81.ordi5.free.fr/paperkit/ZX81_PAPER_KIT.pdf Wonder how long it will be before one of these turns up on ebay as L@@K R at RE ! Phill. -- Phill Harvey-Smith, Programmer, Hardware hacker, and general eccentric ! "You can twist perceptions, but reality won't budge" -- Rush. From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Wed Dec 3 13:23:08 2008 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 11:23:08 -0800 Subject: Delay Line Memory (Was: Australian ex-DEC Director has large museumin his home) References: <4931CB23.8010203@acc.umu.se> Message-ID: <4936DC9B.C450CC40@cs.ubc.ca> Rick Bensene wrote: > > G?ran Axelsson wrote: > > > > Slideshow: > > > Picture 41 shows a similar device. It was an ultrasonic > > delay line. How much could be stored in such a memory? I've done a fairly detailed RE of the memory organisation of a couple of delay-line-based calculators. To throw in some more numbers to Rick's explanation, using the Monroe 925 NIXIE desktop calculator (torsion-mode delay-line) from 1970 as an example: The delay line provides for 317.5 bits of storage, across a delay of 635 uS. It is 5 ft, 14 inches (1.88 m) in length. Bits are injected into the line as 0.5 uS pulses within a 'bit slot' of 2 uS (500 KHz bit rate). Translating these values to length shows the bit pulse to occupy 0.058 inches (1.5 mm) in a slot 0.23 inches (6 mm) long, or a bit density of 51 bits/ft (169 bits/m). Calculating the propagation velocity gives 9700 ft/S (2960 m/S) or 6600 mph (10,700 Km/H). Another point, I expect, about shock sensitivity (particularly for the torsion-mode lines, not as applicable to compression-mode), is that external shocks are generally going to produce 'common-mode' vibrations in the delay elements, and so are not going to be picked up by the differential-mode transducers. From cclist at sydex.com Wed Dec 3 13:19:02 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 11:19:02 -0800 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <18742.55439.856418.356842@gargle.gargle.HOWL> References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com>, <18742.55439.856418.356842@gargle.gargle.HOWL> Message-ID: <49366B26.31460.31733F9@cclist.sydex.com> On 3 Dec 2008 at 14:05, Paul Koning wrote: > I've assembled boards with 100 or so 0603 caps, and some 60-120 lead > flatpack packages (0.65 mm pitch) this way. Take a bit of time and > work carefully. Mine worked the first try. Yeah, got the stuff, but my hands are no longer as steady as they used to be, nor my eyes as keen. At one time, I used to be able to wirewrap 0.100" boards without assistance. Now, it's a struggle using a 10 power loupe. I use adapters for things such as uCs and CPLDs and can do those right most of the time, but occasionally, I mess up and have to start all over again. Thank heavens for my Wood's metal desoldering trick or I would have made garbagge out of the adapter boards. Cheers, Chuck From aek at bitsavers.org Wed Dec 3 13:34:15 2008 From: aek at bitsavers.org (Al Kossow) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 11:34:15 -0800 Subject: Tragedy in our hobby: Jay West .... Message-ID: <4936DF37.5000507@bitsavers.org> > With the week I'm having, that subject line was decidedly unappreciated. I TOTALLY agree. I hope I have the opportunity to do something really shitty like this to you some day, Evan. From cisin at xenosoft.com Wed Dec 3 14:09:32 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 12:09:32 -0800 (PST) Subject: Hard disk material In-Reply-To: <52AD445B-2892-4DE5-A1C7-C6A1AE34376D@neurotica.com> References: <831740.92417.qm@web111512.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <492C0B7C.5050703@gmail.com> <52AD445B-2892-4DE5-A1C7-C6A1AE34376D@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <20081203120732.Q8848@shell.lmi.net> > > That claim of some drums operating at 75,000rpm has to be a typo... > > I can believe 7500 - but 75,000? Ouch! On Wed, 3 Dec 2008, Dave McGuire wrote: > Yeah really...if that were to break loose, it'd probably go > through a wall. I would guess several very thick walls. A "transmission girdle" (for containing loose flywheels) would be inadequate. From pat at computer-refuge.org Wed Dec 3 14:36:37 2008 From: pat at computer-refuge.org (Patrick Finnegan) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 15:36:37 -0500 Subject: cctech moderator on holidays In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <200812031536.37342.pat@computer-refuge.org> On Wednesday 03 December 2008, Ethan Dicks wrote: > I'm guessing, though, that nobody has heard from Jay himself in quite > some time now. He shows up on #classiccmp pretty much daily.. As evan noted, he's just been swamped with work from one of his clients for the past year or so. Pat -- Purdue University Research Computing --- http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/ The Computer Refuge --- http://computer-refuge.org From cisin at xenosoft.com Wed Dec 3 14:46:28 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 12:46:28 -0800 (PST) Subject: WANTED: someone to transfer IBM 5110 BASIC programs to modern PC In-Reply-To: <315101c95572$24322ab0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <227361.78266.qm@web111301.mail.gq1.yahoo.com><49343E36.7080600@pacbell.net><20081201135826.L97208@shell.lmi.net> <315101c95572$24322ab0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <20081203124302.E8848@shell.lmi.net> > >> Are those BASIC files stored as plain text, or are they tokenized? > > They are tokenized. On Wed, 3 Dec 2008, Alexandre Souza wrote: > PC basic? It is compatible with MSX Basic :D It would not be "PC BASIC", nor even a MICROS~1 BASIC. Even if it were, the tokenization is not standardized. When MICROS~1 CP/M BASIC went from V 4.51 to V5.0, the tokens changed. People had to run the old version, load, and resave in untokenized form. We, and many others, wrote routines to change the .BAS files, but it was still an annoyance. From evan at snarc.net Wed Dec 3 15:01:11 2008 From: evan at snarc.net (Evan Koblentz) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 16:01:11 -0500 Subject: cctech moderator on holidays In-Reply-To: <200812031536.37342.pat@computer-refuge.org> Message-ID: <000701c9558a$4711b380$0301a8c0@evan> >>> He shows up on #classiccmp pretty much daily... I think his IRC just logs in, I don't think he is actually there. >>> As evan noted, he's just been swamped with work from one of his clients for the past year or so. Some people apparently didn't see the humor in it. From cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de Wed Dec 3 15:22:44 2008 From: cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de (Christian Corti) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 22:22:44 +0100 (CET) Subject: WANTED: someone to transfer IBM 5110 BASIC programs to modern PC In-Reply-To: <315101c95572$24322ab0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <227361.78266.qm@web111301.mail.gq1.yahoo.com><49343E36.7080600@pacbell.net><20081201135826.L97208@shell.lmi.net> <315101c95572$24322ab0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: On Wed, 3 Dec 2008, Alexandre Souza wrote: >>> Are those BASIC files stored as plain text, or are they tokenized? >> They are tokenized. > > PC basic? It is compatible with MSX Basic :D Well, it's compatible with IBM BASIC (of the pre-IBM PC era of course). I think that most constructs can be found in the System/3 BASIC. In fact, the BASIC interpreter of the 5110 is written in System/3 code which is interpreted by a subset System/3 emulator written in PALM (the native 5110 processor) assembly. One feature of this BASIC is matrix operations. It took me a long time to actually prove that the 5110 BASIC is in System/3 code; the APL interpreter is System/360 code. BTW the /360 emulator supports quite a lot of features (not all, of course). I have partially disassembled the /3 and the /360 emulators and found out that there are hooks to execute own code from RWS! So in theory you can write /360 programs on the 5110, I just don't know how to do that yet. For the curious the file aplros.asm (the /360 emulator disassembly) is on the FTP server now. Christian From slawmaster at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 15:31:34 2008 From: slawmaster at gmail.com (John Floren) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 16:31:34 -0500 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <18742.55439.856418.356842@gargle.gargle.HOWL> References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com> <81E99AB5-1E41-42C7-AE88-B823566DCF36@neurotica.com> <004001c95559$428f7d00$c7ae7700$@com> <49365EC3.4537.2E6D4DB@cclist.sydex.com> <18742.55439.856418.356842@gargle.gargle.HOWL> Message-ID: <7d3530220812031331y10989621i67033f5d84b662b0@mail.gmail.com> On Wed, Dec 3, 2008 at 2:05 PM, Paul Koning wrote: >>>>>> "Chuck" == Chuck Guzis writes: > > Chuck> There are inexpensive SMT to through-hole adapters available. > Chuck> While I wouldn't trust myself to carefully hand-solder a whole > Chuck> board full of SMT, the adpaters are fairly easy to do. > > Soldering SMT by hand (other than BGA of course) is no big deal. It's > only slightly harder than through-hole. It does require suitable > tools -- thin solder and a fine tip professional grade soldering > iron. And it's a good idea to use liquid flux (a lesson I learned > from a technician friend who used to assemble large SMT based boards > by hand). > > I've assembled boards with 100 or so 0603 caps, and some 60-120 lead > flatpack packages (0.65 mm pitch) this way. Take a bit of time and > work carefully. Mine worked the first try. > > paul > > It was extremely easy for me to solder dozens of SMT boards on day one at one of my jobs, even though I had never done SMT before. However, that was with a wonderful Weller soldering station, extremely good solder, and flux to slather all over the board. If I were to try it as Joe Diskpack, with a $15 radio shack soldering iron and the included solder, I'd probably blob it to hell. The decision to do SMT depends on your intended consumers. Will they have a good station and a bottle of flux? If so, do it because SMT is great. If not, SMT is probably pretty evil. John -- Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn From pat at computer-refuge.org Wed Dec 3 15:38:01 2008 From: pat at computer-refuge.org (Patrick Finnegan) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 16:38:01 -0500 Subject: cctech moderator on holidays In-Reply-To: <000701c9558a$4711b380$0301a8c0@evan> References: <000701c9558a$4711b380$0301a8c0@evan> Message-ID: <200812031638.01994.pat@computer-refuge.org> On Wednesday 03 December 2008, Evan Koblentz wrote: > >>> He shows up on #classiccmp pretty much daily... > > I think his IRC just logs in, I don't think he is actually there. No, he is actually there every time I've seen him connect, unless he has a bot that talks to other people in the channel running on his machine, joining the channel at a different time each night. Pat -- Purdue University Research Computing --- http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/ The Computer Refuge --- http://computer-refuge.org From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 15:47:41 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 15:47:41 -0600 Subject: cctech moderator on holidays In-Reply-To: <200812031638.01994.pat@computer-refuge.org> References: <000701c9558a$4711b380$0301a8c0@evan> <200812031638.01994.pat@computer-refuge.org> Message-ID: <4936FE7D.8030008@gmail.com> Patrick Finnegan wrote: > unless he has > a bot that talks to other people in the channel running on his machine, > joining the channel at a different time each night. Why do you think he's been busy working on for the last year? :-) (isn't he a DEC fan, too? I can just imagine 'Sim Jay' for the -11) From halarewich at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 15:55:23 2008 From: halarewich at gmail.com (Chris Halarewich) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 13:55:23 -0800 Subject: #classiccmp irc Message-ID: <6d6501090812031355u75a434d6n38b1f3cff73a4c08@mail.gmail.com> Hey what is the cc irc address From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Wed Dec 3 16:06:48 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 22:06:48 +0000 Subject: Tragedy in our hobby: Jay West .... In-Reply-To: <4936CFBD.5010505@gmail.com> References: <200812031753.mB3HrdE1014902@floodgap.com> <4936CFBD.5010505@gmail.com> Message-ID: <493702F8.9000302@gjcp.net> Jules Richardson wrote: > Cameron Kaiser wrote: >>> Alas, I'm very sorry to report this tragic news to the list .... >>> >>> .... "Rumors of my death are greatly exaggerated." >> >> I am horrified to hear that and I wish his family all the best with his >> continued survival. > > Enough of this OT madness! > > ps: glad he's ok > Well if you'd ever bothered to idle in the IRC channel for weeks on end, you'd see he pops up when everyone else (those of us in GMT or an hour or two east) are in bed, says hello, then buggers off again... Gordon From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Wed Dec 3 16:07:31 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 22:07:31 +0000 Subject: #classiccmp irc In-Reply-To: <6d6501090812031355u75a434d6n38b1f3cff73a4c08@mail.gmail.com> References: <6d6501090812031355u75a434d6n38b1f3cff73a4c08@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <49370323.20506@gjcp.net> Chris Halarewich wrote: > Hey > what is the cc irc address > irc.freenode.net #classiccmp ;-) Gordon From brain at jbrain.com Wed Dec 3 16:36:21 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 16:36:21 -0600 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <7d3530220812031331y10989621i67033f5d84b662b0@mail.gmail.com> References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com> <81E99AB5-1E41-42C7-AE88-B823566DCF36@neurotica.com> <004001c95559$428f7d00$c7ae7700$@com> <49365EC3.4537.2E6D4DB@cclist.sydex.com> <18742.55439.856418.356842@gargle.gargle.HOWL> <7d3530220812031331y10989621i67033f5d84b662b0@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <493709E5.8040702@jbrain.com> John Floren wrote: > It was extremely easy for me to solder dozens of SMT boards on day one > at one of my jobs, even though I had never done SMT before. However, > that was with a wonderful Weller soldering station, extremely good > solder, and flux to slather all over the board. If I were to try it as > Joe Diskpack, with a $15 radio shack soldering iron and the included > solder, I'd probably blob it to hell. > I'll add my support for this statement. The combination of a good soldering station, liquid flux, and small solder is the difference between night and day. I would add solder wick in there as well. I cringe when I look at older projects that were created with my $15.00 Radio Shack pencil. I don't think I've done 0603s yet, but 0805s and 1206s are a breeze, as are 64TQFPs and we'll see how TSSOP14s are tonight, when I solder up some. > The decision to do SMT depends on your intended consumers. Will they > have a good station and a bottle of flux? If so, do it because SMT is > great. If not, SMT is probably pretty evil. > I'd also say that if there are some unavoidable SMT parts (newer uCs with larger footprints are only available in SMT), then you should consider making the project SMT (the end user will need to buckle down and get SMT equipment to solder up part of it, why not take advantage of SMT across the design? Some developers will sell a board with just the main SMT uC/CPLD/FPGA/etc. soldered, and the rest is through hole, which I suppose is an OK compromise. Of course, if the design is not a kit, then I vote SMT all the way. SMT makes things like this possible: www.jbrain.com/vicug/gallery/uIEC/ An entire CBM IEC compatible drive in 1.5" by 1.5" :-) Boards came today and parts should be here tonight, I hope. Jim From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 16:43:12 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 11:43:12 +1300 Subject: Wood's Metal (was Re: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project) Message-ID: On Thu, Dec 4, 2008 at 8:19 AM, Chuck Guzis wrote: > I use adapters for things such as uCs and CPLDs and can do those > right most of the time, but occasionally, I mess up and have to start > all over again. Thank heavens for my Wood's metal desoldering trick > or I would have made garbagge out of the adapter boards. I have a "ChipQuik" kit of some flux and a slug of something like Wood's Metal, presumably the trick you are talking about. I have yet to use it (it's just a free sample). The documentation seems straightorward, though. Does anyone on the list know where to get moderate quantities of Wood's or Field's Metal at reasonable cost? By moderate, I'm thinking of a small number of pounds (kgs). I don't have an immediate use for it, but in the next year or two, I'm considering building a RepRap or a Fab at Home and one of the things on the horizon is printing circuits with low-temp metal on top of printed plastic substrates. I'd like to see how much the metal is going to cost before I go down that route. -ethan From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Dec 3 16:46:38 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 17:46:38 -0500 Subject: Wood's Metal (was Re: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <3C6166D3-F1B9-4EC5-8F8E-81E4F6791F2A@neurotica.com> On Dec 3, 2008, at 5:43 PM, Ethan Dicks wrote: >> I use adapters for things such as uCs and CPLDs and can do those >> right most of the time, but occasionally, I mess up and have to start >> all over again. Thank heavens for my Wood's metal desoldering trick >> or I would have made garbagge out of the adapter boards. > > I have a "ChipQuik" kit of some flux and a slug of something like > Wood's Metal, presumably the trick you are talking about. I have yet > to use it (it's just a free sample). The documentation seems > straightorward, though. > > Does anyone on the list know where to get moderate quantities of > Wood's or Field's Metal at reasonable cost? By moderate, I'm > thinking of a small number of pounds (kgs). I don't have an immediate > use for it, but in the next year or two, I'm considering building a > RepRap or a Fab at Home and one of the things on the horizon is printing > circuits with low-temp metal on top of printed plastic substrates. > I'd like to see how much the metal is going to cost before I go down > that route. If memory serves, Wood's Metal is highly toxic. Please be careful. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From coredump at gifford.co.uk Wed Dec 3 17:15:38 2008 From: coredump at gifford.co.uk (John Honniball) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 23:15:38 +0000 Subject: Wood's Metal (was Re: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4937131A.1060606@gifford.co.uk> Ethan Dicks wrote: > Does anyone on the list know where to get moderate quantities of > Wood's or Field's Metal at reasonable cost? By moderate, I'm > thinking of a small number of pounds (kgs). In the UK, at least, you can get Field's Metal from MUTR: http://www.mutr.co.uk/index.php It's under "Modern Materials", then "Special Alloys & Ingots": http://www.mutr.co.uk/index.php?cPath=6_473 I've purchased stuff from them a few years ago (robot motors, I think it was), and been pleased with the service. Other than that, I have no commercial connection to the company. -- John Honniball coredump at gifford.co.uk From eric at brouhaha.com Wed Dec 3 17:19:47 2008 From: eric at brouhaha.com (Eric Smith) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 15:19:47 -0800 Subject: PDP-11 Zork Manual: Save $2,348.31 In-Reply-To: References: <310f50ab0812012347x3a219b16l25bf08a84954024d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <49371413.7070004@brouhaha.com> Ethan Dicks wrote: > I'd > love to see one of those just to poke around on unallocated sectors. > I've only recently learned how much cool stuff is on ancient Amiga > Kickstart disks (the KS image file only occupies ~256K out of 880K, > leaving plenty of space that wasn't zeroed before mastering). What goodies were in the leftover space? Around 1979, I bought a game for the Apple II, and discovered a few sectors of source code, apparently for the game, but not enough to be useful. From doc at mdrconsult.com Wed Dec 3 17:27:52 2008 From: doc at mdrconsult.com (Doc Shipley) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 17:27:52 -0600 Subject: Tragedy in our hobby: Jay West .... In-Reply-To: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> References: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> Message-ID: <493715F8.1020505@mdrconsult.com> Evan Koblentz wrote: > Hi all, > > Alas, I'm very sorry to report this tragic news to the list .... This is unconscionable. I don't have any idea how old you are or what kind of company you keep, but in *my* world, *genuine* tragic news of that kind is too common to be remotely funny. Doc From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 17:28:53 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 12:28:53 +1300 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <493709E5.8040702@jbrain.com> References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com> <81E99AB5-1E41-42C7-AE88-B823566DCF36@neurotica.com> <004001c95559$428f7d00$c7ae7700$@com> <49365EC3.4537.2E6D4DB@cclist.sydex.com> <18742.55439.856418.356842@gargle.gargle.HOWL> <7d3530220812031331y10989621i67033f5d84b662b0@mail.gmail.com> <493709E5.8040702@jbrain.com> Message-ID: On Thu, Dec 4, 2008 at 11:36 AM, Jim Brain wrote: > John Floren wrote: >> >> It was extremely easy for me to solder dozens of SMT boards on day one >> at one of my jobs, even though I had never done SMT before... > > I'll add my support for this statement. The combination of a good soldering > station, liquid flux, and small solder is the difference between night and > day.... > >> The decision to do SMT depends on your intended consumers. Will they >> have a good station and a bottle of flux? If so, do it because SMT is >> great. If not, SMT is probably pretty evil. I have done plenty of work with 1206 and 805-sized parts and a few 0.5mm-pitch QFPs (IOB6120, among other projects). I myself don't mind SMT, but I know that some kit builders shy away from it either because of lack of proper tools, lack of experience, or vision issues. I understand Bob's desire to stay with as much through-hole as possible, but it won't be long before that just isn't practical due what parts are out there. > I'd also say that if there are some unavoidable SMT parts (newer uCs with > larger footprints are only available in SMT), then you should consider > making the project SMT (the end user will need to buckle down and get SMT > equipment to solder up part of it, why not take advantage of SMT across the > design? Some developers will sell a board with just the main SMT > uC/CPLD/FPGA/etc. soldered, and the rest is through hole, which I suppose is > an OK compromise. I've seen those sorts of mixed projects, but never assembled one. > Of course, if the design is not a kit, then I vote SMT all the way. Sure. My personal preferences is for kits, SMT or no, but in large part that's because I have a large amount of resources to keep my costs down (I usually buy just a bare PCB or a bare PCB and a core set of difficult-to-find parts like CPU/MPUs if that's handy). I realize that I'm not representative of the majority of kit builders, but I'm happy when it's possible to just get the board. I also enjoy assembling them, something my friends have equated with buiding ships in bottles. > SMT makes things like this possible: > > www.jbrain.com/vicug/gallery/uIEC/ > > An entire CBM IEC compatible drive in 1.5" by 1.5" :-) > > Boards came today and parts should be here tonight, I hope. Very nice! I think I should see about getting one of those. -ethan From cclist at sydex.com Wed Dec 3 17:28:09 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 15:28:09 -0800 Subject: Wood's Metal (was Re: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project) In-Reply-To: <3C6166D3-F1B9-4EC5-8F8E-81E4F6791F2A@neurotica.com> References: , <3C6166D3-F1B9-4EC5-8F8E-81E4F6791F2A@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <4936A589.2142.3FB40E4@cclist.sydex.com> On 3 Dec 2008 at 17:46, Dave McGuire wrote: > If memory serves, Wood's Metal is highly toxic. Please be careful. Yes, WM contains some cadmium. Given the very moderate temperatures at which Wood's metal is used (< 100C), I treat it as hazmat in disposal (you don't want it in the landfill), but not in use. (Think of all of the bright cad-plated hardware on your vintage stuff!). My supply comes in the form of Cerrobend, a trade name for several alloys--I use the alloy that melts at 158F (70C). I didn't purchase it for the sole purpose of desoldering, but tried it as a result of reading through the "Chip Quik" literature and knowing what they were using. I use Cerrobend in my other hobby, musical instrument construction, as a filler for bending thinwall brass tubing. Works better than pitch in that respect, but not as well as lead. On the other hand it's less likely to give you severe burns or poisoning. If you have a friend who's a radiologist, it might be worth asking if you can get some at a bargain--normally, WM is about $20-30 per pound in ingots. Radiologists use it to form shields when performing radiation therapy. I make my WM into a coarse powder (with a rasp) which allows me to stuff it into tight spaces, such as under J-leaded SMT parts. A PAR- 38 spotlamp shone at the reverse side of the PCB provides sufficient heat to do the job. No traces get lifted, nor resist disturbed. Clean the excess off the board and part (a toothbrush works fine) and reflux before resoldering. Cheers, Chuck From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 17:50:12 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 12:50:12 +1300 Subject: Wood's Metal (was Re: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project) In-Reply-To: <3C6166D3-F1B9-4EC5-8F8E-81E4F6791F2A@neurotica.com> References: <3C6166D3-F1B9-4EC5-8F8E-81E4F6791F2A@neurotica.com> Message-ID: On Thu, Dec 4, 2008 at 11:46 AM, Dave McGuire wrote: > If memory serves, Wood's Metal is highly toxic. Please be careful. Yeah - I think most uses have gone over to Field's Metal - similar properties, but not toxic. -ethan From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Dec 3 14:08:55 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 20:08:55 +0000 (GMT) Subject: IDE <-> MFM In-Reply-To: <17839.96258.qm@web65516.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> from "Chris M" at Nov 28, 8 11:37:17 am Message-ID: > > what I had been thinking was shouldn't it be somewhat *easy* to make > an IDE drive into an MFM. Just strip off what you don't need! How do you > make an elephant...take a piece of stone and remove everything that > don't look like an elephant! And it's done! Well, it would be _if_ a modern IDE drive still consisted of a WD1003 + a simple nead drive. The problem is that it doesn't. All the drive has to do is look to saftware as if it was a WD1003 + a simple hard drive. The software interface assumes things like the same number of sectors/track, etc. But the hardware might well not do that at all. Provided the drive can accept a cylinder/head/sector number and return a buffer full of bytes, the software will be happy. The fact that sectors that (to softwre) appear to be on th same culinder in reality aren't doesn't matter. But it sure does matter if you want to bypass the built-in controller. There is then the issue that the signals you want to access may only exist inside (cusatom) ICs. Not the easist thing to connect to. And the fact that you won't get real technical information on an iDE drive. That's the only part of my PC that I don't have scheamtics for. I tried just aout every manufacturer about 10 years ago, none would supply them, I douvt that's changed. And the ICs on the sort of drive I was looking at seemd to consist of a (mask-programmed) microcontroller, an SRAM (presumably a data buffer at least in part), a little glue, some recognisable analogue bits, at least one large digital ASIC and at least one analogue ASIC. Not conducive to being modified. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Dec 3 14:16:18 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 20:16:18 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Triangle pseudo-Robertson screws [was Re: 5" floppy?.] In-Reply-To: <200811300354.WAA22676@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> from "der Mouse" at Nov 29, 8 10:47:36 pm Message-ID: > > >> Actually, I once saw screws which looked a bit like Robertson (the > >> square-socket kind) but with a triangular, not square, socket. > > Those turn up on cheap domestic appliances over here. The only > > possile reason for them is to make the device difficult to repair, > > I disagree. There is also an argument for them in the form of > protecting consumers from the dangerous interiors of appliances. And I'll disagree with the disagreement :-). I don't believe you should protect people from their own actions. If they want to get electrocuted, that's their business. The _real_ problem is that the person (if he lives) or his relatives then sues the manufacturer. The sooner such lawsuits are sent where they belong the better! This is a particularly sore point with me as it's often used as a reason not to sell me spare parts and/or a service manual Of course you and I know I am more likely to do a safe repair if I have the exact spare part than if I have to guess characteristics and find something that 'should work'. I am more likely to do a safe repair if I have the service manual. But alas by not helping me the manufactuer can't be sued if I do something silly, so he's not going to provide parts/information. > Of course, depending on the appliance, this may not actually be a valid > argument. But if there's mains voltage present, it's an argument with > some force to it. (While you and I may be competent to fix things, and > competent to avoid hurting ourselves even in cases where we aren't able > to fix, most small-appliance consumers are neither. Worse, many of > them incorrectly think they are.) I've got plenty of things (not computer-related) that are more than 50 years old. None of them have any non-standard screws holding them together. Many of them contain mains and/or higher voltages. Live chassis (AC/DC) power supplies in valve radios and TVs were common. And yet I don't believe everybody who owned such a device ended up killing themselves trying to repair it. > > Not that I think such screws are a good idea; like you, I come down > opposing them. Just pointing out that your "only possi[b]le reason" > actually isn't. > > An Allen wrench of the right size should work. The one device I ran I've not found one that will fit well enough not to slip (and I have a pretty complete set of imperial and metric sizes). -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Dec 3 16:18:53 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 22:18:53 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <4935444A.29967.32CB6FE@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Dec 2, 8 02:20:58 pm Message-ID: > > On 2 Dec 2008 at 21:31, Tony Duell wrote: > > > However, a terminal should only need TxD and RxD (if it _requires_ > > hardware handshake, then it's not going to work with an awful lot of > > things that work with a real VT220). In which case all you need to be > > able to do is swap over those 2 pins, taking a simple DPDT switch. > > Sometimes a simple solution exists :-) > > Why not simply use a made-for-the-purpose T-switch? Is turning a > knob too difficult? Err, isn't that what I was suggesting. A simple double-pole changeover switch with the fixed contacts cross-connected so as to swap TxD and RxD. Finding a ready-wired switch is probably a lot harder than soldering in those 2 links. -tony From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 17:52:34 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 12:52:34 +1300 Subject: Wood's Metal (was Re: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project) In-Reply-To: <4937131A.1060606@gifford.co.uk> References: <4937131A.1060606@gifford.co.uk> Message-ID: On Thu, Dec 4, 2008 at 12:15 PM, John Honniball wrote: > In the UK, at least, you can get Field's Metal from MUTR: > > http://www.mutr.co.uk/index.php > > It's under "Modern Materials", then "Special Alloys & Ingots": > > http://www.mutr.co.uk/index.php?cPath=6_473 Hmm... seems that Indium has gotten quite dear lately. :-/ -ethan From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 18:03:54 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 13:03:54 +1300 Subject: cctech moderator on holidays In-Reply-To: <200812031536.37342.pat@computer-refuge.org> References: <200812031536.37342.pat@computer-refuge.org> Message-ID: On Thu, Dec 4, 2008 at 9:36 AM, Patrick Finnegan wrote: > On Wednesday 03 December 2008, Ethan Dicks wrote: >> I'm guessing, though, that nobody has heard from Jay himself in quite >> some time now. > > He shows up on #classiccmp pretty much daily.. As evan noted, he's just > been swamped with work from one of his clients for the past year or so. Ah. I had no idea. With my timezone and recent satelite schedule, IRC has been pretty much not useful for me for quite a while. Good to hear he's around somewhere. -ethan From cclist at sydex.com Wed Dec 3 18:23:03 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 16:23:03 -0800 Subject: Triangle pseudo-Robertson screws [was Re: 5" floppy?.] In-Reply-To: References: <200811300354.WAA22676@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> from "der Mouse" at Nov 29, 8 10:47:36 pm, Message-ID: <4936B267.6745.42D804C@cclist.sydex.com> On 3 Dec 2008 at 20:16, Tony Duell wrote: > And I'll disagree with the disagreement :-). I don't believe you should > protect people from their own actions. If they want to get electrocuted, > that's their business. The _real_ problem is that the person (if he > lives) or his relatives then sues the manufacturer. The sooner such > lawsuits are sent where they belong the better! Well, if we really wanted to protect people from their own actions, we'd get rid of wall sockets with 120/220 volts on them. After all, any idiot can jam a couple of paperclips into the thing and do himself in. We should limit these to about 10 volts and 50 ma... And for heavean's sake, make sure that people can't get their hands on anything but very small quantites of dangerous substances such as gasoline! Cheers, Chuck From bshannon at tiac.net Wed Dec 3 18:31:04 2008 From: bshannon at tiac.net (Bob Shannon) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 19:31:04 -0500 Subject: OT: Numitron clocks for sale. References: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com><4934FEAD.4030602@gjcp.net> <493550D1.7090707@atarimuseum.com><493514D1.22767.27337B0@cclist.sydex.com><49358E03.9050605@gmail.com> <18741.43459.240130.151359@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> Message-ID: on eBay (Eeek!) eBay item number 200282170878 Disclaimer - I am afficiated with this sale. I designed and built these clocks. From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 18:45:18 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 13:45:18 +1300 Subject: OT: Numitron clocks for sale. In-Reply-To: References: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com> <4934FEAD.4030602@gjcp.net> <493550D1.7090707@atarimuseum.com> <493514D1.22767.27337B0@cclist.sydex.com> <49358E03.9050605@gmail.com> <18741.43459.240130.151359@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> Message-ID: On Thu, Dec 4, 2008 at 1:31 PM, Bob Shannon wrote: > on eBay (Eeek!) > > eBay item number 200282170878 > > Disclaimer - I am afficiated with this sale. I designed and built these > clocks. Very nice. I don't think I've run across numatrons before. -ethan From ploopster at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 18:46:21 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 19:46:21 -0500 Subject: Wood's Metal (was Re: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project) In-Reply-To: <3C6166D3-F1B9-4EC5-8F8E-81E4F6791F2A@neurotica.com> References: <3C6166D3-F1B9-4EC5-8F8E-81E4F6791F2A@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <4937285D.70402@gmail.com> Dave McGuire wrote: > If memory serves, Wood's Metal is highly toxic. Please be careful. Too many people in this hobby are lax with their handling of lead vapor, for that matter. Peace... Sridhar From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 19:17:07 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 19:17:07 -0600 Subject: IDE <-> MFM In-Reply-To: <17839.96258.qm@web65516.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> References: <17839.96258.qm@web65516.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <49372F93.5010201@gmail.com> Chris M wrote: > what I had been thinking was shouldn't it be somewhat *easy* to make an IDE > drive into an MFM. Just strip off what you don't need! ISTR there's still quite a bit of logic on a ST506/412 drive (I think the manual's kicking around on Bitsavers and contains schematics) - and I'd assume that the analogue circuitry has to be pretty closely matched the the heads used by the HDA (and that the heads on a more modern IDE drive have different characteristics to those on an older ST506/412 drive) > How do you make an > elephant...take a piece of stone and remove everything that don't look like > an elephant! And it's done! Heh - it's more like taking a hippo apart and then adding the bits which turn it into an elephant, though... cheers Jules From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Wed Dec 3 19:22:45 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 23:22:45 -0200 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com><81E99AB5-1E41-42C7-AE88-B823566DCF36@neurotica.com><004001c95559$428f7d00$c7ae7700$@com><49365EC3.4537.2E6D4DB@cclist.sydex.com><18742.55439.856418.356842@gargle.gargle.HOWL><7d3530220812031331y10989621i67033f5d84b662b0@mail.gmail.com><493709E5.8040702@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <340801c955ae$e8ac3480$46fea8c0@DeskJara> >> SMT makes things like this possible: >> www.jbrain.com/vicug/gallery/uIEC/ >> An entire CBM IEC compatible drive in 1.5" by 1.5" :-) WOW! **VERY** nice! How do you select one of the 23500 floppy images? :oD From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Wed Dec 3 19:26:51 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 23:26:51 -0200 Subject: Triangle pseudo-Robertson screws [was Re: 5" floppy?.] References: Message-ID: <343301c955af$8ccca770$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > And I'll disagree with the disagreement :-). I don't believe you should > protect people from their own actions. If they want to get electrocuted, > that's their business. The _real_ problem is that the person (if he > lives) or his relatives then sues the manufacturer. The sooner such > lawsuits are sent where they belong the better! But that is what happens everyday. I **do believe** people should be allowed to do drugs, and they should be free, given by the government. It is up to you to die crazy, or keep a healthy life. Of course, anyone caught doing nasty things drugged should be killed :) BUT...The government takes care of you as if you were a child and it were your mother. Ah, I don't do drugs. Don't like drugs. But I do believe in the right of each person kill yourself in the way he/she wants :) > I've got plenty of things (not computer-related) that are more than 50 > years old. None of them have any non-standard screws holding them > together. Many of them contain mains and/or higher voltages. Live chassis > (AC/DC) power supplies in valve radios and TVs were common. And yet I > don't believe everybody who owned such a device ended up killing > themselves trying to repair it. Yesterday they even incluided schematics inside of it...It was VERY common in TV Sets... From healyzh at aracnet.com Wed Dec 3 19:38:24 2008 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 17:38:24 -0800 (PST) Subject: uIEC In-Reply-To: <340801c955ae$e8ac3480$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <200812040138.mB41cOAC028073@onyx.spiritone.com> > > >> SMT makes things like this possible: > >> www.jbrain.com/vicug/gallery/uIEC/ > >> An entire CBM IEC compatible drive in 1.5" by 1.5" :-) > > WOW! **VERY** nice! How do you select one of the 23500 floppy images? > :oD > http://www.portcommodore.com/uiecreview.php Jim, Are you selling this as a pre-built item, or a kit? I have the "MMC Replay", but it sounds like this handles D64 files far better than the "MMC Replay" (at least on NTSC systems). I gather you can run multipart games from D64 images from this with no problem, and no need for physical floppies? I'm especially interested since this will work on a VIC-20, Plus/4, C-64, or C128! It appears to be just what I need (an I'm scared to say I think I need at least two if the price is right). Also can I use a "MMC Replay" with the uIEC in the same system? So that I could have the other features of the "MMC Replay" such as the Ethernet port. Zane From brain at jbrain.com Wed Dec 3 19:42:57 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 19:42:57 -0600 Subject: uIEC (Was: Re: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project) In-Reply-To: <340801c955ae$e8ac3480$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com><81E99AB5-1E41-42C7-AE88-B823566DCF36@neurotica.com><004001c95559$428f7d00$c7ae7700$@com><49365EC3.4537.2E6D4DB@cclist.sydex.com><18742.55439.856418.356842@gargle.gargle.HOWL><7d3530220812031331y10989621i67033f5d84b662b0@mail.gmail.com><493709E5.8040702@jbrain.com> <340801c955ae$e8ac3480$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <493735A1.80003@jbrain.com> Alexandre Souza wrote: >>> SMT makes things like this possible: >>> www.jbrain.com/vicug/gallery/uIEC/ >>> An entire CBM IEC compatible drive in 1.5" by 1.5" :-) > > WOW! **VERY** nice! How do you select one of the 23500 floppy > images? :oD You "cd" into an image :-) open 15,10,15,"cd:myimage.d64":close15 When you want to go back: open15,10,15,"cd<-":close15:rem use the CBM backarrow key or open15,10,15,"cd//":close15 The unit uses CMD-style directory conventions. Of course, those who use their machine to any extent use a DOS Wedge, so the above is: @cd:myimage.d64 and so on. Parts came tonight, so I am soldering one up now. I hope to take a working unit to the World of Commodore this weekend in Toronto. Jim -- Jim Brain, Brain Innovations (X) brain at jbrain.com Dabbling in WWW, Embedded Systems, Old CBM computers, and Good Times! Home: http://www.jbrain.com From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Wed Dec 3 19:56:15 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 20:56:15 -0500 Subject: Wood's Metal (was Re: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project) In-Reply-To: <4936A589.2142.3FB40E4@cclist.sydex.com> References: , <3C6166D3-F1B9-4EC5-8F8E-81E4F6791F2A@neurotica.com> <4936A589.2142.3FB40E4@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: > ... > My supply comes in the form of Cerrobend, a trade name for several > alloys--I use the alloy that melts at 158F (70C). I didn't purchase > it for the sole purpose of desoldering, but tried it as a result of > reading through the "Chip Quik" literature and knowing what they were > using... That reminds me of another low melting point alloy with interesting properties: Cerrosafe. I don't know if there are other suppliers, but one is Brownells (Montezuma, Iowa, a famous supplier of gunsmithing tools and supplies). If I remember right, it has the property of essentially zero change in volume at the transition from solid to molten, which means you can use it to take an accurately sized measure of some hollow object (like a barrel). paul From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 19:59:36 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 19:59:36 -0600 Subject: #classiccmp irc In-Reply-To: <49370323.20506@gjcp.net> References: <6d6501090812031355u75a434d6n38b1f3cff73a4c08@mail.gmail.com> <49370323.20506@gjcp.net> Message-ID: <49373988.5080908@gmail.com> Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote: > Chris Halarewich wrote: >> Hey >> what is the cc irc address >> > > irc.freenode.net #classiccmp ;-) Ooh - now bookmarked for future reference (or whatever the heck the terminology is!) Seems like a typical irc channel; a metric buttload of people in there and nobody saying anything :-) cheers Jules From spectre at floodgap.com Wed Dec 3 20:14:41 2008 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 18:14:41 -0800 (PST) Subject: uIEC In-Reply-To: <200812040138.mB41cOAC028073@onyx.spiritone.com> from "Zane H. Healy" at "Dec 3, 8 05:38:24 pm" Message-ID: <200812040214.mB42Eflt012260@floodgap.com> > Are you selling this as a pre-built item, or a kit? I have the "MMC > Replay", but it sounds like this handles D64 files far better than the "MMC > Replay" (at least on NTSC systems). It does. I use this much more than my MMC Replay, which is now sitting idle. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- Of course, what I really want is total world domination. -- Linus Torvalds - From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Wed Dec 3 20:45:27 2008 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 18:45:27 -0800 Subject: OT: Numitron clocks for sale. References: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com> <4934FEAD.4030602@gjcp.net> <493550D1.7090707@atarimuseum.com> <493514D1.22767.27337B0@cclist.sydex.com> <49358E03.9050605@gmail.com> <18741.43459.240130.151359@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> Message-ID: <49374448.DE31E514@cs.ubc.ca> Ethan Dicks wrote: > > On Thu, Dec 4, 2008 at 1:31 PM, Bob Shannon wrote: > > on eBay (Eeek!) > > > > eBay item number 200282170878 > > > > Disclaimer - I am afficiated with this sale. I designed and built these > > clocks. > > Very nice. I don't think I've run across numatrons before. My understanding of the history is that RCA originally produced a single-envelope incandescent 7-segment display device they called the "Numitron" around 1969/70 (RCA Part #: DR2000), in a vacuum-tube style envelope with a standard 9-pin miniature-tube base. The Numitron is described and shown in the book "RCA Solid-State Hobby Circuits Manual" (Printed Sep 1970). (The book includes several circuits, such as a clock, utilising them. Most of the circuitry is discrete transistor logic, except for the use of an early 7-seg decoder-driver IC, the CD2500E.) The Numitron is referred to as being "recently developed". Other phrasing leads one to believe that "Numitron" was an RCA trademark. I suspect the name went the way of "Kleenex" and came to be applied more generally as other manuacturers produced similar devices or copies. I believe the more-prevalent 7-seg incandescent displays in a rectangular-envelope form factor (with DIP-IC pins to fit in standard IC sockets) followed shortly thereafter from other manufacturers. These are often referred to as "Minitrons", although, again, I believe that was actually one manufacturer's tradename. There are variations in size and pinout between different manufacturers in this style as well. From joachim.thiemann at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 20:47:12 2008 From: joachim.thiemann at gmail.com (Joachim Thiemann) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 21:47:12 -0500 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <340801c955ae$e8ac3480$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com> <81E99AB5-1E41-42C7-AE88-B823566DCF36@neurotica.com> <004001c95559$428f7d00$c7ae7700$@com> <49365EC3.4537.2E6D4DB@cclist.sydex.com> <18742.55439.856418.356842@gargle.gargle.HOWL> <7d3530220812031331y10989621i67033f5d84b662b0@mail.gmail.com> <493709E5.8040702@jbrain.com> <340801c955ae$e8ac3480$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <4affc5e0812031847l2641ada8g9cbd47aa61128794@mail.gmail.com> On Wed, Dec 3, 2008 at 8:22 PM, Alexandre Souza wrote: >>> SMT makes things like this possible: >>> www.jbrain.com/vicug/gallery/uIEC/ >>> An entire CBM IEC compatible drive in 1.5" by 1.5" :-) > > WOW! **VERY** nice! How do you select one of the 23500 floppy images? :oD I'm with Alexandre and Ethan: That is _cool_, where can I get one? :-) Joe. -- Joachim Thiemann :: http://www.tsp.ece.mcgill.ca/~jthiem From joachim.thiemann at gmail.com Wed Dec 3 20:47:12 2008 From: joachim.thiemann at gmail.com (Joachim Thiemann) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 21:47:12 -0500 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <340801c955ae$e8ac3480$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com> <81E99AB5-1E41-42C7-AE88-B823566DCF36@neurotica.com> <004001c95559$428f7d00$c7ae7700$@com> <49365EC3.4537.2E6D4DB@cclist.sydex.com> <18742.55439.856418.356842@gargle.gargle.HOWL> <7d3530220812031331y10989621i67033f5d84b662b0@mail.gmail.com> <493709E5.8040702@jbrain.com> <340801c955ae$e8ac3480$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <4affc5e0812031847l2641ada8g9cbd47aa61128794@mail.gmail.com> On Wed, Dec 3, 2008 at 8:22 PM, Alexandre Souza wrote: >>> SMT makes things like this possible: >>> www.jbrain.com/vicug/gallery/uIEC/ >>> An entire CBM IEC compatible drive in 1.5" by 1.5" :-) > > WOW! **VERY** nice! How do you select one of the 23500 floppy images? :oD I'm with Alexandre and Ethan: That is _cool_, where can I get one? :-) Joe. -- Joachim Thiemann :: http://www.tsp.ece.mcgill.ca/~jthiem From steven.alan.canning at verizon.net Wed Dec 3 20:55:12 2008 From: steven.alan.canning at verizon.net (Scanning) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 18:55:12 -0800 Subject: Tragedy in our hobby: Jay West .... References: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> Message-ID: <000901c955bb$ba78e420$0201a8c0@hal9000> Damn !! I had already sent the bereavement card !! Sadest regards, Steven > Hi all, > > Every few months Jay gets busy at work and disappears. That's been a > regular cycle for several years, so personally I don't get too worried. > However, I did start to wonder recently because he's been gone for longer > than usual. Personally I last spoke with him at VCF West in 2007. > > Christian wrote >>> where is Jay? I've tried to contact him via email but > haven't got any response yet. His last post to this list was at the end of > May. > > Ethan aded >>> I'm guessing, though, that nobody has heard from Jay himself > in quite some time now. > > Sridhard noted >>> I hope he's ok. > > So I decided to pick up the phone today even though Jay usually doesn't > answer his phone, preferring email. > > Alas, I'm very sorry to report this tragic news to the list .... > > .... "Rumors of my death are greatly exaggerated." > > Jay had a very sturdy laugh (for a supposed cadaver) when I mentioned > sending an email with the "tragedy" subject line. :-) > > He's just busy at work. As usual. > > - Evan From brain at jbrain.com Wed Dec 3 22:07:47 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 22:07:47 -0600 Subject: uIEC In-Reply-To: <200812040138.mB41cOAC028073@onyx.spiritone.com> References: <200812040138.mB41cOAC028073@onyx.spiritone.com> Message-ID: <49375793.5030706@jbrain.com> Zane H. Healy wrote: >>>> SMT makes things like this possible: >>>> www.jbrain.com/vicug/gallery/uIEC/ >>>> An entire CBM IEC compatible drive in 1.5" by 1.5" :-) >>>> >> WOW! **VERY** nice! How do you select one of the 23500 floppy images? >> :oD >> >> > > http://www.portcommodore.com/uiecreview.php > > Jim, > Are you selling this as a pre-built item, or a kit? I have the "MMC > Pre-built item. $50.00 for the SD version, $75.00 for the IDE+CF version. > Replay" (at least on NTSC systems). I gather you can run multipart games > from D64 images from this with no problem, and no need for physical > There's always things to improve, but yes, multi-part, multi-side games work (there are two switches you can use to go "forward" and "back" in a list of images) > floppies? I'm especially interested since this will work on a VIC-20, > Plus/4, C-64, or C128! It appears to be just what I need (an I'm scared to > That is my philosophy. I want to build items that are not just C64-specific. The IDE+CF version will sprout support for IEEE-488 when I have time to build the prototype and write the firmware. > say I think I need at least two if the price is right). > Well, you'll have to judge that for yourself, but I have tried to price them to where folks can feel pretty good about the purchase. > Also can I use a "MMC Replay" with the uIEC in the same system? So that I > I don't see why not, though I have not tested it. uIEC is a standard IEC device, and I think MMC Replay allows such devices to be used. Jim From brain at jbrain.com Wed Dec 3 22:13:55 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 22:13:55 -0600 Subject: uIEC In-Reply-To: <200812040214.mB42Eflt012260@floodgap.com> References: <200812040214.mB42Eflt012260@floodgap.com> Message-ID: <49375903.2020503@jbrain.com> The unit has some "future" proofing built into it, since it can upgrade itself. When new functionality is developed, the owner simply copies the new firmware to a CF (or SD) card and reboots the device. The device bootloader will scan for the new code, and program itself with the new code if found. All versions have the feature. And, I spent a few extra bucks and used a 128kB AVR on the unit. Since the code is now 51K, I have plenty of room for new functionality (D81 images, "mounting" images under partition numbers, etc.). Well, the SD version is soldered up, and I can talk to the CPU. It looks like it recognizes the SD card, so I just need to test the IEC routines and tweak a few things. I did realize I forgot to order 2.2uF 0805 caps for the unit, so I'll have to think of something for the 20 board I have on hand. The size is not so critical, I do not think, as it's just a smoothing cap for the LDO 3V3 regulator. Maybe, I can cheat and use 10uFs for the 20 units and get away with it... Jim -- Jim Brain, Brain Innovations (X) brain at jbrain.com Dabbling in WWW, Embedded Systems, Old CBM computers, and Good Times! Home: http://www.jbrain.com From spectre at floodgap.com Wed Dec 3 22:19:34 2008 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 20:19:34 -0800 (PST) Subject: uIEC In-Reply-To: <49375903.2020503@jbrain.com> from Jim Brain at "Dec 3, 8 10:13:55 pm" Message-ID: <200812040419.mB44JYZE014816@floodgap.com> > bucks and used a 128kB AVR on the unit. Since the code is now 51K, I > have plenty of room for new functionality (D81 images, "mounting" images > under partition numbers, etc.). ... Epyx FastLoad support ... ;-) -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- We only pretend to have standards. -- Unknown producer, ABC-TV ------------- From brain at jbrain.com Wed Dec 3 22:25:25 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 22:25:25 -0600 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <4affc5e0812031847l2641ada8g9cbd47aa61128794@mail.gmail.com> References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com> <81E99AB5-1E41-42C7-AE88-B823566DCF36@neurotica.com> <004001c95559$428f7d00$c7ae7700$@com> <49365EC3.4537.2E6D4DB@cclist.sydex.com> <18742.55439.856418.356842@gargle.gargle.HOWL> <7d3530220812031331y10989621i67033f5d84b662b0@mail.gmail.com> <493709E5.8040702@jbrain.com> <340801c955ae$e8ac3480$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <4affc5e0812031847l2641ada8g9cbd47aa61128794@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <49375BB5.3070408@jbrain.com> Joachim Thiemann wrote: > On Wed, Dec 3, 2008 at 8:22 PM, Alexandre Souza > wrote: > >>>> SMT makes things like this possible: >>>> www.jbrain.com/vicug/gallery/uIEC/ >>>> An entire CBM IEC compatible drive in 1.5" by 1.5" :-) >>>> >> WOW! **VERY** nice! How do you select one of the 23500 floppy images? :oD >> > > I'm with Alexandre and Ethan: That is _cool_, where can I get one? :-) > > Joe. > > Well, I don't want to overstep my bounds on the list, so just email me with which one you want and I'll let you know when a unit is ready (I will have quantities available soon, but I do them in batches) The two versions: uIEC/SD: The 1.5" board. It uses the same firmware as the larger board, but it supports SD only and is designed for embedding into designs. It's $50.00. Hopefully, 20 units will be available at World of COmmodore this weekend, and 100 more will be available end of the year. uIEC/IDE+CF: The larger board. This unit can talk ot CF cards, IDE drives, or both. It has expansion options for later enhancements (I'm preparing a small add on board that will provide a USB link to a Windows/Mac/Linux/etc. PC and an option to use SD cards and a Real time clock. Later, I hope to add IEEE-488 support to this unit. $75.00 for the base unit. I should have a dozen or so at WoC and 30 more a few weeks later. uIEC/CF: Similar to uIEC/SD, but CF-only. I am out of this design, and contemplating whether to run more. Most folks prefer the SD unit, but I might run a batch of these since they use many of the same parts as the uIEC/IDE+CF $5.00 ships in the US, and $15 ships international. If folks find it interesting, I think the story of how the unit came to exist are rather interesting and I am proud of it, even though I had to swallow my pride a lot. It involves open source, multi-continent collaboration, and other things possibly of interest to the list. Dunno. Oh, and the plans and firmware is under GPL (v2), so you are free to develop/build your own. Jim -- Jim Brain, Brain Innovations (X) brain at jbrain.com Dabbling in WWW, Embedded Systems, Old CBM computers, and Good Times! Home: http://www.jbrain.com From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Dec 3 22:40:07 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 23:40:07 -0500 Subject: OT: Numitron clocks for sale. In-Reply-To: References: <493415D2.19677.1714A52@cclist.sydex.com><4934FEAD.4030602@gjcp.net> <493550D1.7090707@atarimuseum.com><493514D1.22767.27337B0@cclist.sydex.com><49358E03.9050605@gmail.com> <18741.43459.240130.151359@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> Message-ID: <40C5F69A-2C26-410E-9059-39DE6D37302F@neurotica.com> On Dec 3, 2008, at 7:31 PM, Bob Shannon wrote: > on eBay (Eeek!) > > eBay item number 200282170878 > > Disclaimer - I am afficiated with this sale. I designed and built > these clocks. Nice work! -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From brain at jbrain.com Wed Dec 3 22:52:55 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 22:52:55 -0600 Subject: uIEC In-Reply-To: <200812040419.mB44JYZE014816@floodgap.com> References: <200812040419.mB44JYZE014816@floodgap.com> Message-ID: <49376227.7050204@jbrain.com> Cameron Kaiser wrote: >> bucks and used a 128kB AVR on the unit. Since the code is now 51K, I >> have plenty of room for new functionality (D81 images, "mounting" images >> under partition numbers, etc.). >> > > ... Epyx FastLoad support ... ;-) > > I think I could probably swing that... Let me dig out my FL cart. Jim From spectre at floodgap.com Wed Dec 3 22:58:41 2008 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 20:58:41 -0800 (PST) Subject: uIEC In-Reply-To: <49376227.7050204@jbrain.com> from Jim Brain at "Dec 3, 8 10:52:55 pm" Message-ID: <200812040458.mB44wfgo016614@floodgap.com> > > > bucks and used a 128kB AVR on the unit. Since the code is now 51K, I > > > have plenty of room for new functionality (D81 images, "mounting" images > > > under partition numbers, etc.). > > ... Epyx FastLoad support ... ;-) > I think I could probably swing that... Let me dig out my FL cart. Seriously, I would be really appreciative. FLs are so cheap to buy and portable that I have many more FastLoad systems than, say, JiffyDOS (let alone other speeders). It's still the cheapest cart you can get and it's insanely easy to find. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- Corruptisima republica plurimae leges. -- Tacitus -------------------------- From cclist at sydex.com Wed Dec 3 23:47:05 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 21:47:05 -0800 Subject: Wood's Metal (was Re: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project) In-Reply-To: References: , <4936A589.2142.3FB40E4@cclist.sydex.com>, Message-ID: <4936FE59.16755.5564B2D@cclist.sydex.com> On 3 Dec 2008 at 20:56, Paul Koning wrote: > That reminds me of another low melting point alloy with interesting > properties: Cerrosafe. I don't know if there are other suppliers, but > one is Brownells (Montezuma, Iowa, a famous supplier of gunsmithing > tools and supplies). If I remember right, it has the property of > essentially zero change in volume at the transition from solid to > molten, which means you can use it to take an accurately sized measure > of some hollow object (like a barrel). The way Cerro metals describes the stuff is that it shrinks as it hardens and then expands to the original molding size as it cools further. So you can pour it into a chamber, let it solidify a bit, then remove it and let it cool to room temperature and have a perfect model of the chamber. Sounds like very handy stuff. If cadmium scares you, there are two low-temp alloys without it-- Cerrolow 136 and Cerrolow 174. Low temp alloys appear to be available in the UK from Bendalloy: http://www.bendalloy.co.uk/ Cheers, Chuck From brain at jbrain.com Wed Dec 3 23:48:03 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Wed, 03 Dec 2008 23:48:03 -0600 Subject: uIEC In-Reply-To: <200812040458.mB44wfgo016614@floodgap.com> References: <200812040458.mB44wfgo016614@floodgap.com> Message-ID: <49376F13.4010609@jbrain.com> Cameron Kaiser wrote: > Seriously, I would be really appreciative. FLs are so cheap to buy and > portable that I have many more FastLoad systems than, say, JiffyDOS (let > alone other speeders). It's still the cheapest cart you can get and it's > insanely easy to find. > Well, the hard part is deciphering the FL protocol, so let me get through WoC and I'll see if anything useful comes up on the analyzer. Yay! uIEC/SD is alive! Off to WoC I go. Jim -- Jim Brain, Brain Innovations (X) brain at jbrain.com Dabbling in WWW, Embedded Systems, Old CBM computers, and Good Times! Home: http://www.jbrain.com From toresbe at ifi.uio.no Thu Dec 4 00:00:04 2008 From: toresbe at ifi.uio.no (Tore Sinding Bekkedal) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 07:00:04 +0100 Subject: #classiccmp irc In-Reply-To: <49373988.5080908@gmail.com> References: <6d6501090812031355u75a434d6n38b1f3cff73a4c08@mail.gmail.com> <49370323.20506@gjcp.net> <49373988.5080908@gmail.com> Message-ID: <493771E4.9020108@ifi.uio.no> Jules Richardson wrote: > Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote: >> Chris Halarewich wrote: >>> Hey >>> what is the cc irc address >> irc.freenode.net #classiccmp ;-) > Ooh - now bookmarked for future reference (or whatever the heck the > terminology is!) > > Seems like a typical irc channel; a metric buttload of people in there > and nobody saying anything :-) > I don't know what your nick is/was, but there was quite a lot of activity both before and after your mail, and a bunch of new people dropped in during the hours after your mail. It's quite an active channel, so I think you just happened to drop in during a lull in activity. I know the type of channel you're referring to, but #classiccmp isn't one of those at all. There are Europeans and Americans in the channel so the activity seems to be relatively well spread-out in the day, too. -Tore :) From mark at wickensonline.co.uk Thu Dec 4 05:41:27 2008 From: mark at wickensonline.co.uk (Mark Wickens) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 11:41:27 +0000 Subject: UK DEC Meeting in North West, Autumn 2009 - expression of interest please Message-ID: <4937C1E7.9020108@wickensonline.co.uk> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 Hi, Well, I've been banding this idea around to a few fellow DECheads in the UK, and thought it was about time I moved on to stage 2. I am thinking about organising a meeting for people interested in the line of computers created by Digital Equipment Corporation. It is likely that the meeting will be autumn next year, and would be run over a Saturday and Sunday in Windermere, Cumbria, UK. This is in the very early stages of planning, and I'm initially looking to get an idea of numbers who might be interested. This is to ensure that I can organise the event without loss. In terms of numbers I would be looking for between 10 and 20 people to exhibit computers, and then another up to maybe 50 people as non-exhibitors. I'm sure we could get some interesting speakers involved. Cost is likely to be in the order of GBP 10 for the two days, although we can discuss the option of providing catering if there is interest. I would be looking for firm commitment to buy a ticket say 3 months in advance. So in the first instance, could anyone interested email me at: mark at wickensonline dot co dot uk. By emailing you agree for me to keep your email address on file so that I can inform you of any progress. Please feel free to make suggestions either on this mailing list or direct by email. Kind regards, Mark Wickens -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.9 (GNU/Linux) Comment: Using GnuPG with SUSE - http://enigmail.mozdev.org iEYEARECAAYFAkk3wecACgkQR0vMj/mgdjaeAQCgoiTAk9YqL9PJIbiXFpJxpJgg 8skAoMSCQ0cgLUB6xMiFXxgpSnMmw30J =wa/6 -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- From nico at farumdata.dk Thu Dec 4 05:32:43 2008 From: nico at farumdata.dk (Nico de Jong) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 12:32:43 +0100 Subject: MFM controller Message-ID: <360E3B1AB0E6420B8697A86C05E079F9@udvikling> Available for postage from Denmark : Longshine LCS-6210D Supports 2 MFM ST506/ST412 drives Pulled from XT compatible No floppies Max. 16 heads and 1024 cylinders Nico -- Jeg beskyttes af den gratis SPAMfighter til privatbrugere. Den har indtil videre sparet mig for at f? 14 spam-mails. Betalende brugere f?r ikke denne besked i deres e-mails. Hent gratis SPAMfighter her: http://www.spamfighter.com/lda From nico at farumdata.dk Thu Dec 4 06:28:10 2008 From: nico at farumdata.dk (Nico de Jong) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 13:28:10 +0100 Subject: MFM disk Message-ID: Further to my earlier mail : MFM disk Epson model HMD-720, 20 MB, ST412 interface. The disk was pulled years ago, so the status is unknown. Nico From bob at theadamsons.co.uk Thu Dec 4 08:40:48 2008 From: bob at theadamsons.co.uk (Bob Adamson) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 14:40:48 -0000 Subject: New home sought for a PDP-11 In-Reply-To: <200812030651.mB36oaHH034609@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812030651.mB36oaHH034609@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <1DA071CB012A475B90CBD513D0F0309A@D4BZH92J> Hi Gordon, I mailed you off list but no reply hence this posting. I'm interested in your pdp11 if you still have it available. I have a couple of pdp8s but I'd rather like a small 11 also. Like many on here I was once a DEC systems manager and I've a soft spot for these older machines. I live not so far away in Fife by the way. Bob -------------------- > Message: 20 > Date: Tue, 25 Nov 2008 20:28:48 +0000 > From: Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ > Subject: New home sought for a PDP-11 > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > > Message-ID: <492C6000.6020609 at gjcp.net> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed > > Hi all, > I've come to the conclusion that it's time my PDP11/73 went to a new > home. Not a terribly easy decision to make, but I just don't have space > to even get to it to switch it on just now and I'd rather see someone > else get some use out of it. > > Anyway, here's the spec: > > > PDP11/73 in a large Baydel cabinet with a 40M-ish MFM drive > RX02 floppies > 2 x RL02 plus a spare RL02 > 2 x CIT101 terminals > VT520 terminal > VT220 terminal > LA36, spare ribbons and paper > spare boards including 11/03 bits, a couple of opto-isolated I/O boards > and some ADC boards > DEQNA > about a dozen RL02 packs > large box of RX02 disks > RT-11 V5.2 manuals > > Pick up in Glasgow. You'll need a van, although not a very big one, to > shift it. A large estate car would be too small unless you broke the > rack down into panels - a PITA, I've done it before though. > > Mail me on- or off-list if you're interested. > > Gordon > > ********************* > From alhartman at yahoo.com Thu Dec 4 08:53:34 2008 From: alhartman at yahoo.com (Al Hartman) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 09:53:34 -0500 Subject: Free ZX81 kits... In-Reply-To: <200812032245.mB3MjZ8H062391@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812032245.mB3MjZ8H062391@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <4937EEEE.8070204@yahoo.com> If you saw the number of bad units we just dumpstered at the Zebra Systems warehouse, you'd blanch. I quipped to Stewart that we had a dumpster full of perfectly good door stops.... LOL! Not to mention Monitor wedges (I used to use a broken unit to wedge my Monochrome Monitor to the right angle). The sheer computing power in all those trashed units just started to approach my cell phone. LOL! Al From robo58 at optonline.net Thu Dec 4 10:03:11 2008 From: robo58 at optonline.net (ROBO5.8) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 11:03:11 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <20081124113652.A53673@shell.lmi.net> References: <00ae01c94e49$070b4cd0$1521e670$@net> <20081124113652.A53673@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <002c01c95629$ce98d460$6bca7d20$@net> Hi Folks, It's been interesting taking out my old CP/M stuff and getting it operational again. My system uses an 8bit TTL Keytronics Capacitive Sense keyboard. It was operational for about an hour and then it quit. It turns out that the keyboard uses little sponge pads to hold the capacitive disks and they have biodegraded into dust. So I went looking for an old 8b TTL replacement keyboard. So far no luck. I also looked for a black box solution that would take an AT or PS/2 keyboard and convert it to a parallel port output. So far no luck. So let me turn to the experts and ask for advice and suggestions. Please advise Robo From wh.sudbrink at verizon.net Thu Dec 4 10:24:52 2008 From: wh.sudbrink at verizon.net (Bill Sudbrink) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 11:24:52 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <002c01c95629$ce98d460$6bca7d20$@net> Message-ID: ROBO5.8 wrote: > It turns out that the keyboard uses little sponge pads to hold the > capacitive disks and they have biodegraded into dust. Google for Sol keyboard repair... Look at Jim Battle's site: http://www.sol20.org/ In the keyboard section. If you find some other keyboard, I'll buy your "dead" keyboard and fix it myself. I have a project I could use it on. Bill From curt at atarimuseum.com Thu Dec 4 10:26:02 2008 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 11:26:02 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <002c01c95629$ce98d460$6bca7d20$@net> References: <00ae01c94e49$070b4cd0$1521e670$@net> <20081124113652.A53673@shell.lmi.net> <002c01c95629$ce98d460$6bca7d20$@net> Message-ID: <4938049A.4050409@atarimuseum.com> Here is a PS2 to Serial Converter: http://www.electronickeyboards.com/keyboard-encoder.html I know you mentioned Parallel, but this may be a good starting point... Curt ROBO5.8 wrote: > Hi Folks, > > It's been interesting taking out my old CP/M stuff and getting it > operational again. > > My system uses an 8bit TTL Keytronics Capacitive Sense keyboard. It was > operational for about an hour and then it quit. > > It turns out that the keyboard uses little sponge pads to hold the > capacitive disks and they have biodegraded into dust. > > So I went looking for an old 8b TTL replacement keyboard. So far no luck. > > I also looked for a black box solution that would take an AT or PS/2 > keyboard and convert it to a parallel port output. So far no luck. > > So let me turn to the experts and ask for advice and suggestions. > > Please advise > Robo > > > From curt at atarimuseum.com Thu Dec 4 10:32:44 2008 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 11:32:44 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <002c01c95629$ce98d460$6bca7d20$@net> References: <00ae01c94e49$070b4cd0$1521e670$@net> <20081124113652.A53673@shell.lmi.net> <002c01c95629$ce98d460$6bca7d20$@net> Message-ID: <4938062C.8040802@atarimuseum.com> Here is another solution: http://www.swtpc.com/mholley/CT_1024/KBD5_Assembly.pdf Look at page 6 for the parts list, you could build your own PIO encoder board, you'll have to do some digging around for a 2376 keyboard encoder, but places like netcomponents.com and freetradezone.com are great sources for obsolete IC's Curt ROBO5.8 wrote: > Hi Folks, > > It's been interesting taking out my old CP/M stuff and getting it > operational again. > > My system uses an 8bit TTL Keytronics Capacitive Sense keyboard. It was > operational for about an hour and then it quit. > > It turns out that the keyboard uses little sponge pads to hold the > capacitive disks and they have biodegraded into dust. > > So I went looking for an old 8b TTL replacement keyboard. So far no luck. > > I also looked for a black box solution that would take an AT or PS/2 > keyboard and convert it to a parallel port output. So far no luck. > > So let me turn to the experts and ask for advice and suggestions. > > Please advise > Robo > > > From jplist2008 at kiwigeek.com Thu Dec 4 11:31:12 2008 From: jplist2008 at kiwigeek.com (JP Hindin) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 11:31:12 -0600 (CST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <002c01c95629$ce98d460$6bca7d20$@net> Message-ID: On Thu, 4 Dec 2008, ROBO5.8 wrote: > It's been interesting taking out my old CP/M stuff and getting it > operational again. > > My system uses an 8bit TTL Keytronics Capacitive Sense keyboard. It was > operational for about an hour and then it quit. > > So I went looking for an old 8b TTL replacement keyboard. So far no luck. > > I also looked for a black box solution that would take an AT or PS/2 > keyboard and convert it to a parallel port output. So far no luck. Jim Brain has a microcontroller setup for doing this. I use it to convert a PS/2 keyboard to parallel ASCII for my Vector Graphics machine. His microcontroller solution outputs both parallel and serial output simultaneously, so you can use either. Drop Jim an eMail. I can vouch that the thing works a charm. (In my case he just blew in the software into a ATMEGA8 and I built the circuit myself, with copious help from him and other friends). But he's an extremely skilled builder in his own right and would undoubtedly put it together for you at a very reasonable price. His eMail address is: j brain AT brain DOT com Replace AT and DOT as appropriate, and remove all spaces, including the one between j and brain. - JP From rtellason at verizon.net Thu Dec 4 13:14:15 2008 From: rtellason at verizon.net (Roy J. Tellason) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 14:14:15 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <002c01c95629$ce98d460$6bca7d20$@net> References: <20081124113652.A53673@shell.lmi.net> <002c01c95629$ce98d460$6bca7d20$@net> Message-ID: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net> On Thursday 04 December 2008 11:03:11 am ROBO5.8 wrote: > Hi Folks, > > It's been interesting taking out my old CP/M stuff and getting it > operational again. > > My system uses an 8bit TTL Keytronics Capacitive Sense keyboard. It was > operational for about an hour and then it quit. > > It turns out that the keyboard uses little sponge pads to hold the > capacitive disks and they have biodegraded into dust. > > So I went looking for an old 8b TTL replacement keyboard. So far no luck. > > I also looked for a black box solution that would take an AT or PS/2 > keyboard and convert it to a parallel port output. So far no luck. Steve Ciarcia had an article in Byte way back when with some project in it that used a typical peecee keyboard as an input device but that converted that to some sort of parallel signals, it wasn't very complicated. Sorry I can't remember what specific project that was offhand... I've had idle thoughts from time to time about building one of those and sticking an EPROM between the outputs of that circuit and the device to be driven, to convert the scan codes that you get to ASCII or whatever. Maybe one of these days I'll get that particular round tuit. :-) -- Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters" - Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James M Dakin From cisin at xenosoft.com Thu Dec 4 13:24:49 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 11:24:49 -0800 (PST) Subject: Tragedy in our hobby: Jay West .... In-Reply-To: <000901c955bb$ba78e420$0201a8c0@hal9000> References: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> <000901c955bb$ba78e420$0201a8c0@hal9000> Message-ID: <20081204112304.M66565@shell.lmi.net> On Wed, 3 Dec 2008, Scanning wrote: > Damn !! I had already sent the bereavement card !! > Sadest regards, Steven OK, everybody, send him back his computers. Evan, Is there any chance that you can tell us that Don Maslin's passing was also a joke? From cisin at xenosoft.com Thu Dec 4 13:49:29 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 11:49:29 -0800 (PST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <002c01c95629$ce98d460$6bca7d20$@net> References: <00ae01c94e49$070b4cd0$1521e670$@net> <20081124113652.A53673@shell.lmi.net> <002c01c95629$ce98d460$6bca7d20$@net> Message-ID: <20081204114453.H66565@shell.lmi.net> On Thu, 4 Dec 2008, ROBO5.8 wrote: > I also looked for a black box solution that would take an AT or PS/2 > keyboard and convert it to a parallel port output. So far no luck. > So let me turn to the experts and ask for advice and suggestions. > Please advise Instead, you are getting OUR advice. The cheapest black box to take an AT or PS/2 keyboard and output parallel is an AT. Trivial programming. It can also function as an ASCII terminal for those CP/M machines that go that way. From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Thu Dec 4 13:52:14 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 17:52:14 -0200 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) References: <00ae01c94e49$070b4cd0$1521e670$@net><20081124113652.A53673@shell.lmi.net><002c01c95629$ce98d460$6bca7d20$@net> <20081204114453.H66565@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <073101c95649$d7088170$46fea8c0@DeskJara> >> I also looked for a black box solution that would take an AT or PS/2 >> keyboard and convert it to a parallel port output. So far no luck. >> So let me turn to the experts and ask for advice and suggestions. >> Please advise This is a **very** simple task for a microcontroller. Can you give me more details in what kind of interface you need? From ploopster at gmail.com Thu Dec 4 13:54:35 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 14:54:35 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <20081204114453.H66565@shell.lmi.net> References: <00ae01c94e49$070b4cd0$1521e670$@net> <20081124113652.A53673@shell.lmi.net> <002c01c95629$ce98d460$6bca7d20$@net> <20081204114453.H66565@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4938357B.5050408@gmail.com> Fred Cisin wrote: > On Thu, 4 Dec 2008, ROBO5.8 wrote: >> I also looked for a black box solution that would take an AT or PS/2 >> keyboard and convert it to a parallel port output. So far no luck. >> So let me turn to the experts and ask for advice and suggestions. >> Please advise > > Instead, you are getting OUR advice. > > The cheapest black box to take an AT or PS/2 keyboard and output parallel > is an AT. Trivial programming. Something appeals to me about using an i8042 to perform this task. Peace... Sridhar From cclist at sydex.com Thu Dec 4 13:59:21 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 11:59:21 -0800 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net> References: , <002c01c95629$ce98d460$6bca7d20$@net>, <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net> Message-ID: <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> On 4 Dec 2008 at 14:14, Roy J. Tellason wrote: > I've had idle thoughts from time to time about building one of those and > sticking an EPROM between the outputs of that circuit and the device to be > driven, to convert the scan codes that you get to ASCII or whatever. Maybe > one of these days I'll get that particular round tuit. :-) Why bother? AVRs and PICs are cheap and easy to work with (in particular, an AVR with SPI can be programmed with little more than a parallel port and a handful of resistors). Code for handling AT- style keyboards abounds. One DIP--that's all that it takes. I can see the motivation to do something "the vintage way", but even the 5170 uses a uC to interface to the keyboard. If you wanted to go "vintage', an 8048 or 8051-family uC would do the trick. Cheers, Chuck From ics65 at sbcglobal.net Thu Dec 4 14:09:09 2008 From: ics65 at sbcglobal.net (George Wiegand) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 15:09:09 -0500 Subject: DG Disk Drive on GL Message-ID: <004301c9564c$2c1051a0$83d0da45@efficienfhlqu9> Just wondering if anyone on the list won the Data General 6045 Disk Drive that was on the GL in Columbus, Ohio, recently? Just want to know if it went to a good home or if someone won the lot for the other items that were included. From toby at coreware.co.uk Thu Dec 4 14:27:59 2008 From: toby at coreware.co.uk (Tobias Russell) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 20:27:59 +0000 Subject: Making an RT-11 TU58 Image Message-ID: <1228422479.6411.125.camel@spasmo> Hi, I've just managed to get a TU58 emulator compiled up and running under Linux and confirmed its working by booting Will Kranz's XXDP images (http://www.fpns.net/willy/pdp11/tu58-emu.htm) I'd now like to get an RT-11 TU58 image so I can run a boot into a real operating system on my disk-less -11s. Whats the best way to go about making a suitable image? I have a working RT11 v5 setup under SIMH. Is it possible to make a suitable image via this? One thought is to make a RX01 boot image and but with a TU58 boot block and then use this on the emulator. Thanks, Toby -- This message has been scanned for viruses and dangerous content by MailScanner, and is believed to be clean. From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Dec 4 12:54:37 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 18:54:37 +0000 (GMT) Subject: IDE <-> MFM In-Reply-To: <49372F93.5010201@gmail.com> from "Jules Richardson" at Dec 3, 8 07:17:07 pm Message-ID: > > Chris M wrote: > > what I had been thinking was shouldn't it be somewhat *easy* to make an IDE > > drive into an MFM. Just strip off what you don't need! > > ISTR there's still quite a bit of logic on a ST506/412 drive (I think the > manual's kicking around on Bitsavers and contains schematics) - and I'd assume There's a fair amount of circuitry, but it's quite simple in fuction, and splits into several separate blocks. It's basically similar to a floppy dirve in that you have : Spindle motor (get the disk turning at the right speed -- unlike a 5.25"/3.5"/3" floppy drive, a hard disk turns all the timem, there's no motor_on/ signal no the interface connector) Head positon. On older/simpler drives this is a stepper motor, later ones ahve a voice coil postioner and have conisderably more complex circuitry. Often, even in the stepper motor positioned drives this is based round a microcontroller Index pulse. On the original ST412, this was a proximity sensor that detected a magetic 'flag' on the spndle motor, this 'flag' being balanced by a non-magetic one oposite it. Write : The normal differential write driver driven from a toggle flip-flop clocked by the wtite data pin. Proaly some kind of write current control (either driven from the RWC/ pin on the connector or automatically from the positioner control circuit) Head switch. Again similar to a floppy, a diode-based switch Read : Normal differential read amplifiers followed by a comparator and the nn a pulse generator. If you compare the circitry to that of an old-ish floppy drive (TM100 or similar), you'll see that although the component values change (the hard drive works at a muuch higher data rate), the circuiry is very similar in concept. The one dead IDE drive I pulled apart used a voice coil positioner. There was no separate servo head AFIAK, presumably this thing used an embedded servo system. Which means you can't write just where you like on the platter, you mustn't overwrite theservo bursts. Obviously the internal 'IDE' controller enofrces this, but you couldn't simply feed an ST412 type of bitstream to the heads. As I said, the electronics was built round a few ASICs. It would be very difficult to modify. As a more prcatical issue, I thought the idea of this project was to be able to use a more modern drive with machines that expected an ST412 kind of interface. If you have to modify the IDE drive, then presumaly it would only work with that particualr model of IDE drive (and maybe only one version of it). This hardly seems a Good Thing, I susepct finding the 'right' type of IDE drive (== the one that the original desiger hacked about iowth to make it have an ST412 interface) would be harder than finding an ST412. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Dec 4 13:02:58 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 19:02:58 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Triangle pseudo-Robertson screws [was Re: 5" floppy?.] In-Reply-To: <343301c955af$8ccca770$46fea8c0@DeskJara> from "Alexandre Souza" at Dec 3, 8 11:26:51 pm Message-ID: > > > And I'll disagree with the disagreement :-). I don't believe you should > > protect people from their own actions. If they want to get electrocuted, > > that's their business. The _real_ problem is that the person (if he > > lives) or his relatives then sues the manufacturer. The sooner such > > lawsuits are sent where they belong the better! > > But that is what happens everyday. I **do believe** people should be > allowed to do drugs, and they should be free, given by the government. It is I dont;' see why they should be free, but other than that I agree with you. I have never taken (illegal) drugs, I never intend to. But I do feel I hae the right to do whatever I like to myself and my property provided it doesn't adversely affect others. > up to you to die crazy, or keep a healthy life. Of course, anyone caught > doing nasty things drugged should be killed :) BUT...The government takes > care of you as if you were a child and it were your mother. Yes, and it's rapdily gettign on my nerves! Waht the health-n-safety idiots don't seem to realise is that the damage to my health caused by the frustration and stress from not being able to get (service manual, spare part, sensible chemiocals, etc) is almost certainly greater than the damage to my health that these things would cause. > > I've got plenty of things (not computer-related) that are more than 50 > > years old. None of them have any non-standard screws holding them > > together. Many of them contain mains and/or higher voltages. Live chassis > > (AC/DC) power supplies in valve radios and TVs were common. And yet I > > don't believe everybody who owned such a device ended up killing > > themselves trying to repair it. > > Yesterday they even incluided schematics inside of it...It was VERY > common in TV Sets... I remember the user manual for one of my FM radio tuners. The first page tells you how to tune it correctly (how to interpret the tuning indicator, etc). The next secion covers RF and IF alingment (It requires a double-beam 'scope and an accurate RF signal generator, things that were not at all commonly owned at the time. But it still gives them). Then photographs of the chassis. Then parts lists. And finally a schematic. For all it's valved with 300V HT (B+), there are no stupid safety warnings. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Dec 4 14:46:11 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 20:46:11 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <002c01c95629$ce98d460$6bca7d20$@net> from "ROBO5.8" at Dec 4, 8 11:03:11 am Message-ID: > > Hi Folks, > > It's been interesting taking out my old CP/M stuff and getting it > operational again. > > My system uses an 8bit TTL Keytronics Capacitive Sense keyboard. It was > operational for about an hour and then it quit. > > It turns out that the keyboard uses little sponge pads to hold the > capacitive disks and they have biodegraded into dust. I've seen the pads for say on Ebay. Fitting them is quite easy, and this might be the easiest solution. > > So I went looking for an old 8b TTL replacement keyboard. So far no luck. > > I also looked for a black box solution that would take an AT or PS/2 > keyboard and convert it to a parallel port output. So far no luck. I beelive raeady-made products like that exist, but the one I looked at was not cheap. It's a fairly simple task for a microcontroller, I suspect there's at least one such project on the web, but you might not wat to get programing and soldering. Alternatively, it's not small, but how about using an older laptop? Write a simple program to read characters from the keyboard and blast them out of the parallel printer port, giving a suitable strobe pulse. You couldn't use the normal printer driver (which would expect a handshake from the printer), but since the port is entriely software driven, you can prodcue the required signals using software. That should at least do for testing. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Dec 4 15:09:46 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 21:09:46 +0000 (GMT) Subject: HP13264 Data Link Interface Message-ID: Does anyone know anything about the HP13264 Data Link Interface, or the network (?) it was connected to? It's mentioned in passing in the documentation for the HP98268 comms card, and I've just bought one. Let me describe ehat I've discovered so far. Physically it's a plastic box of the same design as used for many other HP intefaces (like the 82164 HPIL-RS232 interface). 2 cables come out of it. One ends in a 50 pin Microribbon plug, which is the HP 'RS232' port connector. The other is a figure-of-8 cable ending in a strange 6-contact plug that I'll describe more later. On top are 2 LEDs marked 'Link' and 'Transmit'. Inside there's a PCB containg a few standard chips, some passives, and 2 optoisolators (one single, one dual). It draws power -- +5V, +12V, -12V from the HP RS232 port (power lines were provided on this connector). The only RS232 signals used are TxD, RxD and RTTS (which is strapped to CTS). The last is used as a transmit enable. There's an isolated PSU on the PCB, driven by a 555 astable. It provides 6.7V to the circuity on the 'network side' of the optoisolators. The TxD and RTS signals are bufferd to TTL levels (1489 chip), and fed into the dual optoisolator. The RTS signal also drives the 'Transmit' LED. On the other side of the optoisolators, they go to 4011 NAND gates, which drive 4 transitors as a full-H driver. These drive the netowrk cable (there are 3 siganls on this cable -- Sh (Shield) which is connected to the ground of the isolated PSU, and +, - which are driven by this full-H circuit). The network cable is monitoed by a 311 comparator. Its output drives the remaining optoisolator, the output of which is buffered to RS232 levels (1488) and then drives the RxD signal to the computer. This optoisolator also drives a circuit that controls the 'Link' LED, such that a '1' on the network cable flashes said LED. If the network cable is in a steady state (no matter what state), the LED is off. Note that the receiver is always enabled, a computer monitors its own trasmission. Presumably that's used for collision detection. There are 2 3-way terminal blocks on the PCB for the cable to the network connector. Corresponding terminals are linked by PCB tracks. The cable is a figure-of-8 thing with each part being a screend (twisted?) pair. Obviously the inners go to the '+' and '-' terminals on the PCB. This cable ends in a connector that's a bit like an overgrown microribbon connector without the outer hosuing, but with only 6 contacts. There's a picture of the interface and this connector on the Austrralian HP museum site. The 'business end' looks a bit like this : - | | -==--==--==-- | | | -==--==--==-- | | | - Where == is a contact area (6 in all) That would be looking at the face of the socket, which must have a 'T' shapped cutout in it to allow the plug to go in. I assume there are6 contact springs in the socekt to connect otther cotnact areas on the plug. Now, corresponding cotacts on the 2 sides of the plug are connected together. But not directly inside the plug, but rather from one side of the plug, up one of thr pairs of the figure-of-8 cable, then via PCB tracks to the corresponding wire in the other pair, back down the cable, and to the contact on the other side of the plug. This means that the figure of 8 cable won't appears as a 'stub' on the main cable. I would guess that the socket has contacts that touch when the plug is removed, thus completing the connections I've just mentioend. This looks a bit likea French teleohone socket, but I'd heard that this was normally an 8 pin device, withe the other contacts on the 'head of the T (right hand part of my diagram). Whether I could use such a socket andwhether it would need modification I don't know. I also don't know if such sockets nroammly short corresponding contacts on the 2 sides if no plug is connected (as I mentioned in the last paragraph, this would be desireable here). So, does anyone know anything about this device? What was it used for? What was it used with? What was the socket? Protocol? Any manuals/docs o the web (a google search found nothing useful)? Thanks in advance for any help -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Dec 4 15:17:30 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 21:17:30 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Dec 4, 8 11:59:21 am Message-ID: > > On 4 Dec 2008 at 14:14, Roy J. Tellason wrote: > > > I've had idle thoughts from time to time about building one of those and > > sticking an EPROM between the outputs of that circuit and the device to be > > driven, to convert the scan codes that you get to ASCII or whatever. Maybe > > one of these days I'll get that particular round tuit. :-) > > Why bother? AVRs and PICs are cheap and easy to work with (in I cna think of one good reason why _I'd_ bother : I prefer to think in terms of AND gates, flip-flops and shift registers to assembly language. I find it easier to debug a board of logic than a program. And I'd findit simpy more fun to sodler and wire-wrap than to type. This makes no sense commerically, I agree. If I was going to make this as a product, or part of one, I'd use a microcontroller. Period. But classic computign is a _hobby_ for me, and darn it, I get to do it the way I enjoy. And if that means a board of TTL chips. that's my business. -tony From jos.mar at bluewin.ch Thu Dec 4 15:19:32 2008 From: jos.mar at bluewin.ch (Jos Dreesen / Marian Capel) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 22:19:32 +0100 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <4938049A.4050409@atarimuseum.com> References: <00ae01c94e49$070b4cd0$1521e670$@net> <20081124113652.A53673@shell.lmi.net> <002c01c95629$ce98d460$6bca7d20$@net> <4938049A.4050409@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <49384964.8030503@bluewin.ch> The real solution would be a source of fresh foam pads.... I could use a few sets. Jos From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Thu Dec 4 15:21:38 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 19:21:38 -0200 Subject: The drift of a knowledge-based societ to a gadget-value-based society. Was:Re: Triangle pseudo-Robertson screws [was Re: 5" floppy?.] References: Message-ID: <08fa01c95656$54f63e90$46fea8c0@DeskJara> >> Yesterday they even incluided schematics inside of it...It was VERY >> common in TV Sets... > I remember the user manual for one of my FM radio tuners. The first page > tells you how to tune it correctly (how to interpret the tuning indicator, > etc). The next secion covers RF and IF alingment (It requires a > double-beam 'scope and an accurate RF signal generator, things that were > not at all commonly owned at the time. But it still gives them). Then > photographs of the chassis. Then parts lists. And finally a schematic. > For all it's valved with 300V HT (B+), there are no stupid safety > warnings. I'm no North-American, but I'll tell what I think that is wrong: America (and other parts of world) are drifting from a knowledge-based society to a my-gadget-is-more-expensive-than-yours society. I've heard stories of - Scouts - People who were incentivated to become a ham radio operator - People who had mechanics and woodworking classes on the school - Many do-it-yourself magazines and books - home-made devices (very complicated ones. Now I hear stories of: - New cellular phones - New MPxxxxx devices - New netbooks - New gadgets - New expensive things - Not being able to DIY I think the clever society is getting burned down as we know it :( Sad, Alexandre From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Thu Dec 4 15:16:34 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 15:16:34 -0600 Subject: #classiccmp irc In-Reply-To: <493771E4.9020108@ifi.uio.no> References: <6d6501090812031355u75a434d6n38b1f3cff73a4c08@mail.gmail.com> <49370323.20506@gjcp.net> <49373988.5080908@gmail.com> <493771E4.9020108@ifi.uio.no> Message-ID: <493848B2.1060409@gmail.com> Tore Sinding Bekkedal wrote: > It's quite an active channel, so I think you just happened to drop in > during a lull in activity. I know the type of channel you're referring > to, but #classiccmp isn't one of those at all. There are Europeans and > Americans in the channel so the activity seems to be relatively well > spread-out in the day, too. Yeah, I've been lurking - and it seems quiet whenever I've got a free five minutes and busy when I'm not at the machine ;-) cheers J. From curt at atarimuseum.com Thu Dec 4 15:26:40 2008 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 16:26:40 -0500 Subject: Making an RT-11 TU58 Image In-Reply-To: <1228422479.6411.125.camel@spasmo> References: <1228422479.6411.125.camel@spasmo> Message-ID: <49384B10.1070506@atarimuseum.com> I've got a large box of TU-58's with boot up and diags for a Vax 11/750, any out there want to make archives of them or has that already been done? Curt Tobias Russell wrote: > Hi, > > I've just managed to get a TU58 emulator compiled up and running under > Linux and confirmed its working by booting Will Kranz's XXDP images > (http://www.fpns.net/willy/pdp11/tu58-emu.htm) > > I'd now like to get an RT-11 TU58 image so I can run a boot into a real > operating system on my disk-less -11s. Whats the best way to go about > making a suitable image? > > I have a working RT11 v5 setup under SIMH. Is it possible to make a > suitable image via this? One thought is to make a RX01 boot image and > but with a TU58 boot block and then use this on the emulator. > > Thanks, > Toby > > > From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Thu Dec 4 15:37:21 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 19:37:21 -0200 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) References: Message-ID: <095501c95658$9fc776d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > I cna think of one good reason why _I'd_ bother : > I prefer to think in terms of AND gates, flip-flops and shift registers > to assembly language. I find it easier to debug a board of logic than a > program. And I'd findit simpy more fun to sodler and wire-wrap than to > type. > This makes no sense commerically, I agree. If I was going to make this as > a product, or part of one, I'd use a microcontroller. Period. But classic > computign is a _hobby_ for me, and darn it, I get to do it the way I > enjoy. And if that means a board of TTL chips. that's my business. Tony, it MAY be possible, but I'm hard pressed to NOT believe in a PS/2 to parallel converter using only TTL chips...it CAN be done, but would use TONS of TTLs :( From wh.sudbrink at verizon.net Thu Dec 4 15:42:04 2008 From: wh.sudbrink at verizon.net (Bill Sudbrink) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 16:42:04 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <49384964.8030503@bluewin.ch> Message-ID: Jos Dreesen / Marian wrote: > The real solution would be a source of fresh foam pads.... > I could use a few sets. They are easily self manufactured. As long as you aren't picky about the keyboard "feel" any foam will do. I use a sharpened tube that fits into my IDC crimper along with a small piece of wood as a punch for the mylar and foam. I reuse the existing rigid plastic disks... the old foam and adhesive easily rubs off. It takes me about 1 minute per key. Bill From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Thu Dec 4 15:35:50 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 15:35:50 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <49384D36.9040302@gmail.com> Tony Duell wrote: >> On 4 Dec 2008 at 14:14, Roy J. Tellason wrote: >> >>> I've had idle thoughts from time to time about building one of those and >>> sticking an EPROM between the outputs of that circuit and the device to be >>> driven, to convert the scan codes that you get to ASCII or whatever. Maybe >>> one of these days I'll get that particular round tuit. :-) >> Why bother? AVRs and PICs are cheap and easy to work with (in > > I cna think of one good reason why _I'd_ bother : > > I prefer to think in terms of AND gates, flip-flops and shift registers > to assembly language. I find it easier to debug a board of logic than a > program. And I'd findit simpy more fun to sodler and wire-wrap than to type. It's weird, that... I suspect I could rustle up something 'traditional' around a Z80/6502, ROM, RAM and some decoding - but my brain just doesn't cope well with single-chip 'black boxes' such as PIC-based widgets. I really don't know why! From aek at bitsavers.org Thu Dec 4 16:23:22 2008 From: aek at bitsavers.org (Al Kossow) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 14:23:22 -0800 Subject: The drift of a knowledge-based societ to a gadget-value-based society. Message-ID: <4938585A.9020008@bitsavers.org> > I think the clever society is getting burned down as we know it Clever is now content, not the tool. Computers and other electronic devices, and the communications infrastructure are a given. The invention now is what can be done with this hardware, which is now generally too complicated to build yourself, and as a result has just moved up a level. Even software tools are now pretty much taken for granted. You just program to fill in holes in the already existing tool space. This shift pretty much defines what I see coming out of people fresh out of college now, and most things dot-com and forward. From cclist at sydex.com Thu Dec 4 16:22:49 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 14:22:49 -0800 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <49384D36.9040302@gmail.com> References: , <49384D36.9040302@gmail.com> Message-ID: <4937E7B9.16402.E4FA0A@cclist.sydex.com> On 4 Dec 2008 at 15:35, Jules Richardson wrote: > It's weird, that... I suspect I could rustle up something 'traditional' around > a Z80/6502, ROM, RAM and some decoding - but my brain just doesn't cope well > with single-chip 'black boxes' such as PIC-based widgets. I really don't know why! That really is weird. The instruction set on a PIC dates back to 1975. The AVR is about as primitive. The MSP430 is more PDP-11-ish. One minor gripe that I have is that the uC community seems to put up with really lame assembly-language tools, insisting on using C instead. Many are Harvard architecture( not the MSP430), which calls for some re-thinking, but otherwise they're no different at the core from any other microprocessor. Maybe that's where my attitude is similar to Tony's--I still love to write a nice clean piece of assembly code. Yes, I can do it in C, but there's something more satisfying working closer to the architecture. Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Thu Dec 4 16:01:29 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 14:01:29 -0800 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Dec 4, 8 11:59:21 am, Message-ID: <4937E2B9.20740.D173C0@cclist.sydex.com> On 4 Dec 2008 at 21:17, Tony Duell wrote: > This makes no sense commerically, I agree. If I was going to make this as > a product, or part of one, I'd use a microcontroller. Period. But classic > computign is a _hobby_ for me, and darn it, I get to do it the way I > enjoy. And if that means a board of TTL chips. that's my business. Perhaps a good place to start would be to replace that pesky uC in the keyboard itself with a bunch of TTL--if you could still get the result inside the enclosure. This is very similar to the engineers who resisted using LSI (then) ICs. I recall having a long conversation with an engineer who was designing a serial interface (nothing special) for an existing mini. I pointed out that there were MOS UARTs available that would do the job just fine, but he inisted on designing his own UART using some flavor (DCTL, ECL?) of SSI--and taking 6 months to do it at company expense. Before that, there were those who mistrusted ICs and prefered to roll their own using discretes. When I was working instrumentation in the steel mills, there were many who distrustred transistors and insisted on the the reliability of vacuum tubes. The beat just goes on... Cheers, Chuck From RichA at vulcan.com Thu Dec 4 16:57:35 2008 From: RichA at vulcan.com (Rich Alderson) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 14:57:35 -0800 Subject: UK DEC Meeting in North West, Autumn 2009 - expression of interest please In-Reply-To: <4937C1E7.9020108@wickensonline.co.uk> References: <4937C1E7.9020108@wickensonline.co.uk> Message-ID: From: Mark Wickens Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2008 3:41 AM > I am thinking about organising a meeting for people interested in the > line of computers created by Digital Equipment Corporation. ^^^^ ITYM "lines". I count 6 architectures sold before 1980. Rich Alderson Server Engineer, PDPplanet Project Vulcan, Inc. 505 5th Avenue S, Suite 900 Seattle, WA 98104 mailto:RichA at vulcan.com (206) 342-2239 (206) 465-2916 cell From frustum at pacbell.net Thu Dec 4 16:58:02 2008 From: frustum at pacbell.net (Jim Battle) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 16:58:02 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <4937E2B9.20740.D173C0@cclist.sydex.com> References: <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Dec 4, 8 11:59:21 am, <4937E2B9.20740.D173C0@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4938607A.5040400@pacbell.net> Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 4 Dec 2008 at 21:17, Tony Duell wrote: > ... > This is very similar to the engineers who resisted using LSI (then) > ICs. I recall having a long conversation with an engineer who was > designing a serial interface (nothing special) for an existing mini. > I pointed out that there were MOS UARTs available that would do the > job just fine, but he inisted on designing his own UART using some > flavor (DCTL, ECL?) of SSI--and taking 6 months to do it at company > expense. A friend and former coworker was at Atari coin-op in its heydays, right out of Berkeley. I met him about 1991, and at the time he still had the 1978 atari design mentality, but was trying to adapt. The video game machines didn't require pushing the limits of technology in terms of hardware design, so their approach was to use lots of the cheapest TTL they could find. I realize there are pc board, assembly, test, and reliability issues that offset the short term view of six 15 cent parts vs one $1.25 part, but that isn't how they saw it. From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Thu Dec 4 17:23:14 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 23:23:14 +0000 Subject: New home sought for a PDP-11 In-Reply-To: <1DA071CB012A475B90CBD513D0F0309A@D4BZH92J> References: <200812030651.mB36oaHH034609@dewey.classiccmp.org> <1DA071CB012A475B90CBD513D0F0309A@D4BZH92J> Message-ID: <49386662.5090509@gjcp.net> Bob Adamson wrote: > > Hi Gordon, I mailed you off list but no reply hence this posting. > I'm interested in your pdp11 if you still have it available. > I have a couple of pdp8s but I'd rather like a small 11 also. Like many on > here I was once a DEC systems manager and I've a soft spot for these older > machines. > I live not so far away in Fife by the way. > > Bob > Argh, I've just found your original post in my spam dir! I wish I'd known - there's a chap coming up from Sussex in a couple of weeks to pick it up. Anyway, it's all been spoken for. I could have shifted about eight PDP-11s... I'll drop you a mail off-list - I might have a lead on a couple more. Gordon From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Thu Dec 4 17:50:58 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 17:50:58 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <4937E7B9.16402.E4FA0A@cclist.sydex.com> References: , <49384D36.9040302@gmail.com> <4937E7B9.16402.E4FA0A@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <49386CE2.9000000@gmail.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 4 Dec 2008 at 15:35, Jules Richardson wrote: > >> It's weird, that... I suspect I could rustle up something 'traditional' around >> a Z80/6502, ROM, RAM and some decoding - but my brain just doesn't cope well >> with single-chip 'black boxes' such as PIC-based widgets. I really don't know why! > > That really is weird. The instruction set on a PIC dates back to > 1975. The AVR is about as primitive. I wonder if it's a visualisation thing - when the components are separate I can more readily think of what's going on, as opposed to a single-chip solution. Still weird, though, I agree :-) > Maybe that's where my attitude is similar to Tony's--I still love to > write a nice clean piece of assembly code. Yes, I can do it in C, > but there's something more satisfying working closer to the > architecture. I definitely miss assembly - I haven't done any in far too long; and you're right, it's a lot more satisfying than C. Not that I really mind C either, though - I'll either use that or Java over any other language... cheers Jules From lynchaj at yahoo.com Thu Dec 4 18:09:01 2008 From: lynchaj at yahoo.com (Andrew Lynch) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 19:09:01 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) Message-ID: <710FFF3AA06644B499F6CEF9A43607D0@andrewdesktop> Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) ROBO5.8 robo58 at optonline.net Thu Dec 4 10:03:11 CST 2008 * Previous message: Free ZX81 kits... * Next message: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) * Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ] [ subject ] [ author ] ________________________________ Hi Folks, It's been interesting taking out my old CP/M stuff and getting it operational again. My system uses an 8bit TTL Keytronics Capacitive Sense keyboard. It was operational for about an hour and then it quit. It turns out that the keyboard uses little sponge pads to hold the capacitive disks and they have biodegraded into dust. So I went looking for an old 8b TTL replacement keyboard. So far no luck. I also looked for a black box solution that would take an AT or PS/2 keyboard and convert it to a parallel port output. So far no luck. So let me turn to the experts and ask for advice and suggestions. Please advise Robo -----REPLY----- Hi! I feel your pain on trying to obtain parallel ASCII keyboards. They are not easy to find and sometimes when you do they are not compatible or require extensive modifications to work. My suggestion is to use a PIC (16F628) to implement a simple serial to parallel converter. I did this to with a PIC to convert a spare broken KayPro II keyboard (300 bps serial) to 8 bit parallel with strobe for use with a Vector Graphic FlashWriter II parallel keyboard interface. The same could be done with an XT or AT (PS/2) keyboard although a bit more complex. The software source code examples available on the internet. One of the N8VEM builders (James) just did a project to add a AT (PS/2) keyboard to the N8VEM SBC so that might be a good place to start for a source code example. Thanks and have a nice day! Andrew Lynch From aek at bitsavers.org Thu Dec 4 18:22:08 2008 From: aek at bitsavers.org (Al Kossow) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 16:22:08 -0800 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) Message-ID: <49387430.7070602@bitsavers.org> > It turns out that the keyboard uses little sponge pads to hold the > capacitive disks and they have biodegraded into dust. The correct answer is replace the pads, not the keyboard. From wdonzelli at gmail.com Thu Dec 4 21:41:01 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 22:41:01 -0500 Subject: Tragedy in our hobby: Jay West .... In-Reply-To: <493715F8.1020505@mdrconsult.com> References: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> <493715F8.1020505@mdrconsult.com> Message-ID: > This is unconscionable. > > I don't have any idea how old you are or what kind of company you keep, > but in *my* world, *genuine* tragic news of that kind is too common to be > remotely funny. I found the joke in very bad taste. Some of us are involved with hobbies that, because of the general old age of the constituency, have more than a few notices of people that have passed. In the world of old radio collecting, not a month goes buy without an email notice of a death, some of which are friends. Evan, you may want to consider an onlist apology. -- Will From wdonzelli at gmail.com Thu Dec 4 21:47:05 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 22:47:05 -0500 Subject: VAXdoors Message-ID: RCS picked up the ex-Sikorski VAX-11/785 today, and much to our delight, the cabinet does indeed still have wheels. It, however, does not have doors. By any chance, do any people out there have a set of doors (front and back) for the larger DEC corporate cabinet? Closer to New England would be a plus. Thanks! -- Will From jzg22 at drexel.edu Thu Dec 4 21:56:30 2008 From: jzg22 at drexel.edu (Jonathan Gevaryahu) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 22:56:30 -0500 Subject: one more qume dt8 related question Message-ID: <4938A66E.5050301@drexel.edu> The Qume DT8 I have has only the HL line cut on the programmable shunt block at 1E. This doesn't match any configuration shown in the usage or service manual. Also, it has the SS trace (between U3E and U3D) cut. This trace is not explained anywhere in the user or service manual except that it is shown to exist. The schematic at the end of the latest rev manual at bitsavers shows that it has something to do with whether head 0 or head 1 is selected (or perhaps loaded) in regards to the READY and INDEX signals on the shugart interface. Does anyone know exactly what it is supposed to do? I got lost in all the logic. Thanks, -- Jonathan Gevaryahu jgevaryahu(@t)hotmail(d0t)com jzg22(@t)drexel(d0t)edu From chrise at pobox.com Wed Dec 3 07:19:57 2008 From: chrise at pobox.com (Chris Elmquist) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 07:19:57 -0600 Subject: Mohawk Data Sciences paper tape reader? In-Reply-To: <4930C83B.27131.1BEC5623@cclist.sydex.com> References: <20081125044125.GC5578@n0jcf.net> <4930C83B.27131.1BEC5623@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <20081203131957.GI5784@n0jcf.net> On Saturday (11/29/2008 at 04:42AM -0800), Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 24 Nov 2008 at 22:41, Chris Elmquist wrote: > > > It came out of a Control Data maintanance console for the Star-100, which > > sadly, as a kid, I parted out. All I have left is the cool aluminum > > suitcase that it was built in... and this paper tape reader. > > The maintenance console, not the Star-100, right? That'd be a big > job even for an ambitious kid. Ha! ya.. although, we probably could have gotten at a -100 too if we asked. I grew up with Neil Lincoln's kids and we spent a lot of time at ADL (Advanced Design Lab) in Arden Hills. I later worked for Neil at ETA. Lots of history there. Neil of course was the architect for Star-100, CY203, CY205 and ETA10. > All I can say is that I remember the suitcase tape readers; they were > used to load code onto the drum of the MCU; they may have also been > used to load CPU microcode. They probably also had uses for running > diagnostic code on the stations. > > They were also used for doing things like loading up firmware on tape > controllers and the like in non-Star applications. I'd be surprised > if any documentation survived on them, but maybe some CE squirreled > some away. I suppose. Clearly they grabbed some off-the-shelf tape reader at the time and put it into this box. It's not a complicated piece of gear and I can surely trace wires to make it work. I just thought it would be cool to have some authentic info on it if it still existed. Of course I don't want to think about having torn the entire maintanence console to pieces but, I guess I did other fun stuff with the parts along the way. Chris -- Chris Elmquist mailto:chrise at pobox.com From chrise at pobox.com Wed Dec 3 07:22:59 2008 From: chrise at pobox.com (Chris Elmquist) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 07:22:59 -0600 Subject: OKI M3732L-20RS ram datasheet? In-Reply-To: <49313933.6040108@dunnington.plus.com> References: <20081128214136.GB5578@n0jcf.net> <49313933.6040108@dunnington.plus.com> Message-ID: <20081203132259.GJ5784@n0jcf.net> On Saturday (11/29/2008 at 12:44PM +0000), Pete Turnbull wrote: > On 28/11/2008 21:41, Chris Elmquist wrote: >> Does anyone have a datasheet for these parts? > >> Although, by the part number alone, one might suspect they are a >> 32Kx1 device possibly... > > I don't have a datasheet but I found several equivalences in a Toshiba 1982 > databook. MSM37xx designates MOS DRAM, MSM21xx is MOS static RAM, MSM51xx > is CMOS SRAM, and MSM27xx is EPROM. I found the more of the same in an NEC > databook, but of all the memory databooks I've got, the 1982 Toshiba is the > only one listing any MSM37xx devices. > > OKI MSM3764-xx is an exact equivalent of a 4164, and the 2-digit suffix > gives the speed in tens of ns. I'd guess that an MSM3732-20 is 32Kx1, > 200ns access time, and likely consists of an MSM3764 with one half disabled > or dysfunctional. If so, the 'RS' may signify which half works. Thank you Peter. That pretty much confirms my suspicions. Can't for the life of me remember what piece of gear would have used them. Must have been some memory expansion board for a PC that I had at one time. That's all I can figure... Chris -- Chris Elmquist mailto:chrise at pobox.com From kathy.galvin at advantageic.com Wed Dec 3 13:32:38 2008 From: kathy.galvin at advantageic.com (Kathy Galvin) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 14:32:38 -0500 Subject: Sony MP-F52W-00D needed Message-ID: <002501c9557d$e80849a0$b818dce0$@galvin@advantageic.com> Hello Did you find the drive you were looking for SONY MP-F52W-00D I have qty 10 of them. Make me a offer on all 10 Email: Kathy at advantageic.com Phone: 978-568-0899 ask for Kathy From chrism3667 at yahoo.com Wed Dec 3 18:32:15 2008 From: chrism3667 at yahoo.com (Chris M) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 16:32:15 -0800 (PST) Subject: Hard disk material - of topic Rocket Science In-Reply-To: <4936302D.3000600@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <765806.84529.qm@web65510.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> lost my copy of "the Metal Lathe" ~10 years ago. The best way to learn about machinery is learn how to build one! No, I haven't undertaken such a project, but know enough to modify existing designs at least. You just need to hunt and peck to find the right *tricks* to do what you want to do though. Especially w/this stuff. --- On Wed, 12/3/08, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca > Subject: Re: Hard disk material - of topic Rocket Science > To: "On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > Date: Wednesday, December 3, 2008, 2:07 AM > Chris M wrote: > > if this was the case, the surfaces just needed to be > plated, you can produce a uniform thickness by polishing. > Some sort of contraption (a lathe?) would be necessary, but > it's not rocket science I don't think. I was between > jobs a number of years ago and applied at this place in Long > Island that makes some sort of microchips. The silicon > wafers needed to be made *uniform*, and they used some sort > of polishing operation. I asked what was the tolerance, and > the guy said .0001". I figured to myself he probably > didn't really know what he was talking about and the > tolerance was much tighter. Cast iron surface plates can be > made uniform to .000025" (that's right, 25 > millionths of an inch), but that's an entirely different > operation, and in fact is done - by hand - w/a glorified > chisel. > > Carry on lads. I'm interested in learning more > about this meself > > > For DIY rocket science :) buy some of the books below. > http://www.lindsaybks.com/dgjp/djgbk/index.html > " Build Your Own Metalworking Shop from Scrap ", > is the best DIY books I have seen > in along time. From jws at jwsss.com Wed Dec 3 01:52:18 2008 From: jws at jwsss.com (jim s) Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2008 23:52:18 -0800 Subject: Australian ex-DEC ... Magnetic Delay line memory In-Reply-To: <4931CB23.8010203@acc.umu.se> References: <4931CB23.8010203@acc.umu.se> Message-ID: <49363AB2.5020308@jwsss.com> If it was similar to the one in the Friden 130, then it would be able to store 4 registers of decimal numbers, since the 130 had a 4 stack register. It had 13 digits, don't recall and used a 5 bit (pulse) format for each number. That would suggest that there are 4 x 13 x 5 or about 195 bits. The site below has a good article on the Friden 132, but doesn't show the Friden's delay line, which is mounted flat on the bottom of the calculator below all the electronics. I don't know if the site's owner is on this list, but there is a lot of good information on the Friden on the site w/o having to have one or tear yours up to look at the guts. Jim http://www.oldcalculatormuseum.com/friden132.html G?ran Axelsson wrote: > > ... never mind. Picture 41 shows a similar device. It was an > ultrasonic delay line. How much could be stored in such a memory? > > /G?ran > > > From chrism3667 at yahoo.com Wed Dec 3 18:36:34 2008 From: chrism3667 at yahoo.com (Chris M) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 16:36:34 -0800 (PST) Subject: IDE <-> MFM In-Reply-To: <4936614E.2426.2F0C49E@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <280037.15748.qm@web65516.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> the read/write heads themselves couldn't be made to run at lower speeds, for instance? Something in the mechanism and materials disallows this? --- On Wed, 12/3/08, Chuck Guzis wrote: > From: Chuck Guzis > Subject: Re: IDE <-> MFM > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > Date: Wednesday, December 3, 2008, 1:37 PM > On 28 Nov 2008 at 11:37, Chris M wrote: > > > what I had been thinking was shouldn't it be > somewhat *easy* to make > > an IDE drive into an MFM. Just strip off what you > don't need! How do > > you make an elephant...take a piece of stone and > remove everything > > that don't look like an elephant! And it's > done! > > Given that modern IDE drives are designed for very > different data > rates (and a host of other things), even if one could tap > into the > read/write circuitry directly (with high integration, > I'm not sure > that this is even possible) there would be no assurance > that it would > work. > > Cheers, > Chuck From chrism3667 at yahoo.com Wed Dec 3 19:40:04 2008 From: chrism3667 at yahoo.com (Chris M) Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 17:40:04 -0800 (PST) Subject: IDE <-> MFM In-Reply-To: <49372F93.5010201@gmail.com> Message-ID: <432162.73419.qm@web65508.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> --- On Wed, 12/3/08, Jules Richardson wrote: > Heh - it's more like taking a hippo apart and then > adding the bits which turn it into an elephant, though... > > cheers > > Jules So wouldn't that amount to a hippophant? Or would it be an elephotamous? From jeffj at panix.com Thu Dec 4 03:11:45 2008 From: jeffj at panix.com (Jeff Jonas) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 04:11:45 -0500 (EST) Subject: Laserdisc interfaces In-Reply-To: <200812031801.mB3I1Gv1049982@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812031801.mB3I1Gv1049982@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: > I think there's at least one Pioneer with a DA15 serial interface, but > I have no idea if there's any sort of standard for them. I think I used to have a Pioneer LDV1000 with a proprietory parallel interface using a small Centronix-style connector. I scrapped it because the power supply was blown, and I got an RS232 interfaced one that plays CAV and CLV with barcode scanner, etc. I just touched the adapter box in my storage unit that converted the parallel interface to RS232 and I have the manuals ... somewhere :-( From charlesleecourtney at yahoo.com Thu Dec 4 11:30:34 2008 From: charlesleecourtney at yahoo.com (Lee Courtney) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 09:30:34 -0800 (PST) Subject: Cute Use of Vintage Equipment in UK Car Ad In-Reply-To: <456680.14707.qm@web52712.mail.re2.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <220431.82927.qm@web35303.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Vax 750, Digital disc, HP tape drive other gear...enjoy. http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=rTthvxpzNDM Lee Courtney Menlo Park, CA From chrise at pobox.com Thu Dec 4 14:23:07 2008 From: chrise at pobox.com (Chris Elmquist) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 14:23:07 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <20081204114453.H66565@shell.lmi.net> References: <00ae01c94e49$070b4cd0$1521e670$@net> <20081124113652.A53673@shell.lmi.net> <002c01c95629$ce98d460$6bca7d20$@net> <20081204114453.H66565@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <20081204202307.GO11755@n0jcf.net> On Thursday (12/04/2008 at 11:49AM -0800), Fred Cisin wrote: > On Thu, 4 Dec 2008, ROBO5.8 wrote: > > I also looked for a black box solution that would take an AT or PS/2 > > keyboard and convert it to a parallel port output. So far no luck. > > So let me turn to the experts and ask for advice and suggestions. > > Please advise > > Instead, you are getting OUR advice. > > The cheapest black box to take an AT or PS/2 keyboard and output parallel > is an AT. Trivial programming. > > It can also function as an ASCII terminal for those CP/M machines that go > that way. This might get you pretty close... shouldn't be too hard to hook an 8-bit serial in, parallel out shift register to this guy's code and get your parallel output that way. http://www.trash.net/~luethi/microchip/projects/keyboard/v1xx/keyboard_v1xx.html -- Chris Elmquist mailto:chrise at pobox.com From chrise at pobox.com Thu Dec 4 14:28:18 2008 From: chrise at pobox.com (Chris Elmquist) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 14:28:18 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <20081204202307.GO11755@n0jcf.net> References: <00ae01c94e49$070b4cd0$1521e670$@net> <20081124113652.A53673@shell.lmi.net> <002c01c95629$ce98d460$6bca7d20$@net> <20081204114453.H66565@shell.lmi.net> <20081204202307.GO11755@n0jcf.net> Message-ID: <20081204202818.GP11755@n0jcf.net> On Thursday (12/04/2008 at 02:23PM -0600), Chris Elmquist wrote: > On Thursday (12/04/2008 at 11:49AM -0800), Fred Cisin wrote: > > On Thu, 4 Dec 2008, ROBO5.8 wrote: > > > I also looked for a black box solution that would take an AT or PS/2 > > > keyboard and convert it to a parallel port output. So far no luck. > > > So let me turn to the experts and ask for advice and suggestions. > > > Please advise > > > > Instead, you are getting OUR advice. > > > > The cheapest black box to take an AT or PS/2 keyboard and output parallel > > is an AT. Trivial programming. > > > > It can also function as an ASCII terminal for those CP/M machines that go > > that way. > > This might get you pretty close... shouldn't be too hard to hook an > 8-bit serial in, parallel out shift register to this guy's code and get > your parallel output that way. > > http://www.trash.net/~luethi/microchip/projects/keyboard/v1xx/keyboard_v1xx.html Actually, probably don't even have to add the SR. There's enough pins on the PIC to get there. In his v2, he hooked up an LCD... http://www.trash.net/~luethi/microchip/projects/keyboard/v2xx/keyboard_v2xx.html -- Chris Elmquist mailto:chrise at pobox.com From philip at axeside.co.uk Thu Dec 4 14:31:26 2008 From: philip at axeside.co.uk (Philip Belben) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 20:31:26 +0000 Subject: IBM DemiDiskette In-Reply-To: <4935CF0D.8020807@bitsavers.org> References: <4935CF0D.8020807@bitsavers.org> Message-ID: <49383E1E.4030209@axeside.co.uk> Al Kossow wrote: > If anyone is curious about what an IBM 4" floppy drive looks like, I > just uploaded a picture > and the patent for it to http://bitsavers.org/pdf/ibm/floppy Interesting. A hard plastic envelope, like the later sub-5.25" formats; and the window for the head on the diagonal like the 14" diskette I mentioned the other day. Presumably putting the head window on the diagonal like that means you can get the head closer to the edge of the disk, and make better use of the surface. Anyone else know about this? Like, why so few diskette formats did this? Philip. From philip at axeside.co.uk Thu Dec 4 14:33:53 2008 From: philip at axeside.co.uk (Philip Belben) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 20:33:53 +0000 Subject: Hard disk material In-Reply-To: <2C196763-3E92-47CD-A12F-098566617D34@microspot.co.uk> References: <200811242324.mAONO9aN092609@dewey.classiccmp.org> <2C196763-3E92-47CD-A12F-098566617D34@microspot.co.uk> Message-ID: <49383EB1.5010100@axeside.co.uk> Roger Holmes wrote: > After many experiments they found they could not beat the human hand > applying a magnetisable compound like a potter making a pot. Sounds very > low tech but apparently it works, and I have drums which have not been > touched since manufacture and they still work 46 years on. Of course for > you, low tech could be a bonus as it means low cost. Maybe your local > educational establishment has a skilled potter who could do a great job > for a reasonable price, or just for interest. My mother is a potter, although she hasn't done it professionally since before I was born. She was fascinated when I told her of this. I don't thisnk she could manage this for you, though :-( Philip. From philip at axeside.co.uk Thu Dec 4 14:47:22 2008 From: philip at axeside.co.uk (Philip Belben) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 20:47:22 +0000 Subject: Arcade games In-Reply-To: <4931F08E.5020908@brouhaha.com> References: <778197.42695.qm@web23403.mail.ird.yahoo.com> <4931F08E.5020908@brouhaha.com> Message-ID: <493841DA.5060507@axeside.co.uk> Eric Smith wrote: > Andrew Burton wrote: >> I hope someone preserved the Space Invaders song > The one by Uncle Vic? It's not hard to find. "He's hooked, he's > hooked, his brain is cooked!" That doesn't sound right. Those words don't fit what I remember of the tune's rhythm, so I must be thinking of a different song. The song I remember was a background music staple in the early 1980s. I always assumed it had been written to promote the game, since the impression I got was of something warning of the coming menace, and urging you to go and fight it off. But my memory is very fuzzy here - I may be way out. (FWIW some years ago I attended a seminar at the Huddersfield Festival on writing music for steel bands. It was mentioned that one of the popular layouts for steel pan drums is known as "Invaders" after the band that introduced it. But I'm definitely not thinking of that!) Philip. From philip at axeside.co.uk Thu Dec 4 14:53:55 2008 From: philip at axeside.co.uk (Philip Belben) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 20:53:55 +0000 Subject: Arcade games In-Reply-To: <158d01c9526a$25a4fb30$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <492B15E9.6010501@axeside.co.uk> <158d01c9526a$25a4fb30$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <49384363.3000104@axeside.co.uk> Martin Scott Goldberg wrote: > Philip - that's a little high for the current market. Maybe five > years ago that'd be correct, but now Space Invaders is around > US$500-700. Alexandre Souza presented the opposite opinion: > I'll resume it: They were cheap. I'd not sell a space invaders in > pristine condiition for less than $2000 :o) Well it wasn't pristine, but it was in good condition for 30 years old! > take a look at ebay! :D Considering the silly prices seen there for some of the classic computers we collect, I didn't think it would give me a very balanced view :-) I had another look in the window on Monday night, and I noticed that the machine was called "The Invaders" rather than "Space Invaders". Oh, and the Gottlieb pinball table was a game called "Totem", with a Native American theme. I don't know if that has any significance. Philip. From stephen.johns at hp.com Thu Dec 4 16:57:42 2008 From: stephen.johns at hp.com (Johns, Stephen) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 22:57:42 +0000 Subject: WTD: MPF-I/88 documentation Message-ID: <8C5EBB71D1D0C84EBCA94B49814AEE6C74AB71A752@GVW0671EXC.americas.hpqcorp.net> Still need the MPF I/88 Manual? From stephen.johns at hp.com Thu Dec 4 17:02:39 2008 From: stephen.johns at hp.com (Johns, Stephen) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 23:02:39 +0000 Subject: WTD: MPF-I/88 documentation Message-ID: <8C5EBB71D1D0C84EBCA94B49814AEE6C74AB71A757@GVW0671EXC.americas.hpqcorp.net> Do you have a scanner yet? I could use copies of the schems and code ;-) From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Thu Dec 4 22:08:19 2008 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 20:08:19 -0800 Subject: Hall-effect keyboard query / was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) References: <00ae01c94e49$070b4cd0$1521e670$@net> <20081124113652.A53673@shell.lmi.net> <002c01c95629$ce98d460$6bca7d20$@net> Message-ID: <4938A933.AEA339AA@cs.ubc.ca> With all this talk of old keyboards, I figured it was time to pull out one that I've had kicking around for awhile but hadn't assessed as yet. It's a very-ASCII keyboard (control codes are labeled on the keys) using Hall-effect keyswitches: MICRO SWITCH Freeport, Illinois 61SW12-2 SW-10405 date-stamp: 75/49 (1975) (Would the MICRO SWITCH indicate this was from Honeywell?) It appears there are two outputs from each keyswitch which go through a connection matrix to feed a 28-pin LSI encoder IC: AMI SW20416 7423N The IC would appear to take a 2-of-12 input code and convert it to ASCII output (actually 9 output lines not including the strobe, I can figure them out later). 0V and +5V are identifiable from other circuitry on the board (two 946 DTL ICs), but there is one other pin on the LSI IC which presumably is a MOS supply voltage. The question is: does this keyboard sound familiar to anybody and would someone know what the 'other' voltage for the keyboard/encoder IC is. Connection to the keyboard is via a 24-pin PCB edge connector, pin-A is 0V, pin-1 is +5V, pin-B is the unknown (supply) to the IC. It's likely -12V or -15V, and it's a very obscure question but I just thought I'd ask before powering it up. Very nice, solid-feeling basic ASCII keyboard, stainless-steel metalwork, double-injected keytops, in good condition, just missing one of the SHIFT keytops. Presumably came out of some ASCII terminal. From evan at snarc.net Thu Dec 4 23:05:30 2008 From: evan at snarc.net (Evan Koblentz) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 00:05:30 -0500 Subject: Tragedy in our hobby: Jay West .... In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <001401c95697$198c8620$0301a8c0@evan> >>> Evan, you may want to consider an onlist apology. Okay. Considering ..... Considered ... Ummm, no. Some people didn't find it amusing. That's their right. We all have different senses of humor. Other people DID think it was funny, including our intrepid list owner himself, a few people who posted in reply, and one guy who sent me a private email suggesting that the non-amused people should get a grip. To everyone who wrote something along the lines of, "How dare you, I know someone who died!" .... Here's some WORSE news .... You're going to die someday, too. So will I. So will Jay (hopefully not before the server fills up again). My advice is, lighten up and enjoy life while you can. It was a simple joke. Turn on CNN; there are better things to get anxious about. Finally, to those who questioned my age, character, maturity, and social circle: I will not defend any of that, because plenty of cc'talkers know me off-list and will unconditionally vouch for me if asked. P.s. - Will, I hope to see you at the MARCH party this weekend. :) Speaking of which, if anyone from cctalk is NOT a member of MARCH ("Mid-Atlantic Retro Computing Hobbyists," a.k.a. the VCF East guys) and wants to check us out, this Satuday is a good time to do so. We're having an ultra-informal swap meet and holiday party in "south-central" New Jersey. Email me off-list for details. From eric940 at gmail.com Thu Dec 4 23:21:11 2008 From: eric940 at gmail.com (eric) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 21:21:11 -0800 Subject: [Sorta/Probably OT] Gmail "Terminal" theme Message-ID: For those Gmail users out there: Click "Settings" / "Themes" and choose the _Terminal_ theme. It gives you a (kind of) cool terminal looking theme within a web browser when logged in to you Gmail. I know: many purists out there use Pine, Elm, and the like... but there are a few that need to use browsers when reading email for whatever reason (myself included) on occasion. I just enjoy seeing the green font/black background scenario on my monitor whenever possible :-) OK, back to Topic related issues. From rickb at bensene.com Thu Dec 4 23:29:01 2008 From: rickb at bensene.com (Rick Bensene) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 21:29:01 -0800 Subject: Australian ex-DEC ... Magnetic Delay line memory In-Reply-To: <49363AB2.5020308@jwsss.com> References: <4931CB23.8010203@acc.umu.se> <49363AB2.5020308@jwsss.com> Message-ID: Jim S. wrote: > If it was similar to the one in the Friden 130, then it would be able > to store 4 registers of decimal numbers, since the 130 had a 4 stack > register. It had 13 digits, don't recall and used a 5 bit (pulse) > format for each number. That would suggest that there are 4 x 13 x 5 > or about 195 bits. The delay line in the 130 and 132 store 480 'bits', but the representation is somewhat unusual. Each digit is allocated a slot of time on the delay line, and the digit is represented by zero to nine pulses within the timeslot. The 'five bit' representation is used in the four (or three on later versions of the 130/132) counters that make up the arithmetic unit of these machines. The delay line (as previously posted) is 50 ft. long (coiled up), and has a delay of approximately 5 milliseconds. Exhibit on the Friden 130: http://oldcalculatormuseum.com/friden130.html . In this exhibit there is a block diagram of the 130 that clearly shows the unique architecture of the machine. It is really quite an elegant design, the brainchild of Robert Ragen, Friden's chief electronic calculator architect. The 130 actually has a total of six "registers" that are stored on the stack. There are the four stack registers, one store/recall memory register (not displayed), and another not-displayed temporary register. > > The site below has a good article on the Friden 132, but doesn't show > the Friden's delay line, which is mounted flat on the bottom of the > calculator below all the electronics. I'll be posting a photo of the delay line in the Friden 130 exhibit shortly. I just got my hands on a "display" delay line that has been opened up. Just need to take a photo and post it. > > I don't know if the site's owner is on this list, but there is a lot of > good information on the Friden on the site w/o having to have one or > tear yours up to look at the guts. I'm on the list, and an avid reader, and sometimes poster. Rick Bensene The Old Calculator Museum http://oldcalculatormuseum.com From cclist at sydex.com Thu Dec 4 23:30:17 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 21:30:17 -0800 Subject: IDE <-> MFM In-Reply-To: <280037.15748.qm@web65516.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> References: <4936614E.2426.2F0C49E@cclist.sydex.com>, <280037.15748.qm@web65516.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <49384BE9.24179.FC819@cclist.sydex.com> On 3 Dec 2008 at 16:36, Chris M wrote: > the read/write heads themselves couldn't be made to run at lower > speeds, for instance? Something in the mechanism and materials > disallows this? Condider that on modern drives, R/W circuitry isn't all that simple. You might have GMR heads, certainly have PRML read processing. The other concern is that the heads and associated circuitry are likely optimized for the denisty and recording mode. You're in analog country, buckaroo, and things aren't digitally simple any more. Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Fri Dec 5 00:08:30 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 22:08:30 -0800 Subject: Hall-effect keyboard query / was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <4938A933.AEA339AA@cs.ubc.ca> References: , <4938A933.AEA339AA@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: <493854DE.11355.32C31E@cclist.sydex.com> On 4 Dec 2008 at 20:08, Brent Hilpert wrote: > With all this talk of old keyboards, I figured it was time to pull out one that > I've had kicking around for awhile but hadn't assessed as yet. It's a > very-ASCII keyboard (control codes are labeled on the keys) using Hall-effect keyswitches: > MICRO SWITCH > Freeport, Illinois > 61SW12-2 > SW-10405 > date-stamp: 75/49 (1975) > (Would the MICRO SWITCH indicate this was from Honeywell?) I don't know that Honeywell tinkered much with the Freeport operation in 1975. I've got a couple of keyboards similar to yours from 1977, but with different encoder IC's (outputs something like "scan codes"). A lot of the encoders of the time were custom mask- programmed items. Micro Switch made keyboards for a *lot* of firms. Cheers, Chuck From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Fri Dec 5 00:21:36 2008 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 22:21:36 -0800 Subject: Hall-effect keyboard query / was Re: Sources for 8b TTLkeyboards (Keytronics) References: , <4938A933.AEA339AA@cs.ubc.ca> <493854DE.11355.32C31E@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4938C870.5B2EE064@cs.ubc.ca> Chuck Guzis wrote: > > On 4 Dec 2008 at 20:08, Brent Hilpert wrote: > > > With all this talk of old keyboards, I figured it was time to pull out one that > > I've had kicking around for awhile but hadn't assessed as yet. It's a > > very-ASCII keyboard (control codes are labeled on the keys) using Hall-effect keyswitches: > > MICRO SWITCH > > Freeport, Illinois > > 61SW12-2 > > SW-10405 > > date-stamp: 75/49 (1975) > > (Would the MICRO SWITCH indicate this was from Honeywell?) > > I don't know that Honeywell tinkered much with the Freeport operation > in 1975. I've got a couple of keyboards similar to yours from 1977, > but with different encoder IC's (outputs something like "scan > codes"). A lot of the encoders of the time were custom mask- > programmed items. > > Micro Switch made keyboards for a *lot* of firms. Put another way, was Micro Switch (the company) a spin-off or subsidiary of Honeywell? Some web references seem to imply an association in the development of integrated Hall-effect sensors in the late-60s with Honeywell, but there is some confusion in there regarding Honeywell and their earlier (1940s) development of simple mechanical microswitches. (I'm just not familiar with Micro Switch as a company.) From cclist at sydex.com Fri Dec 5 00:35:22 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2008 22:35:22 -0800 Subject: Hall-effect keyboard query / was Re: Sources for 8b TTLkeyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <4938C870.5B2EE064@cs.ubc.ca> References: , <4938C870.5B2EE064@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: <49385B2A.10867.4B5D84@cclist.sydex.com> On 4 Dec 2008 at 22:21, Brent Hilpert wrote: > Put another way, was Micro Switch (the company) a spin-off or subsidiary of > Honeywell? Some web references seem to imply an association in the development > of integrated Hall-effect sensors in the late-60s with Honeywell, but there is > some confusion in there regarding Honeywell and their earlier (1940s) > development of simple mechanical microswitches. > (I'm just not familiar with Micro Switch as a company.) Micro Switch was founded in 1932 and acquired by Honeywell in 1950. Cherry, for a long time a "work alike" of Micro Switch (when it came to snap switches) was founded in 1953 and was another big source of keyboards (still is). Cheers, Chuck From dkelvey at hotmail.com Fri Dec 5 00:53:02 2008 From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 22:53:02 -0800 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <49384964.8030503@bluewin.ch> References: <00ae01c94e49$070b4cd0$1521e670$@net> <20081124113652.A53673@shell.lmi.net> <002c01c95629$ce98d460$6bca7d20$@net> <4938049A.4050409@atarimuseum.com> <49384964.8030503@bluewin.ch> Message-ID: > Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2008 22:19:32 +0100 > From: jos.mar at bluewin.ch > To: > Subject: Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) > > > The real solution would be a source of fresh foam pads.... > I could use a few sets. > > > Jos Hi My guess is that you could use poly foam sheets to create the pads. Unlike the original foam, the poly would last a lifetime. Just a little time and some scissors. Dwight _________________________________________________________________ Suspicious message? There?s an alert for that. http://windowslive.com/Explore/hotmail?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_hotmail_acq_broad2_122008 From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Fri Dec 5 01:47:08 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 20:47:08 +1300 Subject: [Sorta/Probably OT] Gmail "Terminal" theme In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Fri, Dec 5, 2008 at 6:21 PM, eric wrote: > For those Gmail users out there: > > Click "Settings" / "Themes" and choose the _Terminal_ theme. > > It gives you a (kind of) cool terminal looking theme within a web > browser when logged in to you Gmail. Hmm... interesting. > I know: many purists out there use Pine, Elm, and the like... but > there are a few that need to use browsers when reading email for > whatever reason (myself included) on occasion. > > I just enjoy seeing the green font/black background scenario on my > monitor whenever possible :-) I'd say it looks more like a BBS to me than any sort of command-line client, but then I put a lot of time in on real VT100s with white or amber phosphor and substantially less time on terminals with green phosphor. It's cute, but I can see it getting annoying after not so much time. I may have to pull this out to annoy _others_, though (I've lost track of how many folks asked me why I was using "DOS" when I had multiple term windows open on a Linux box). -ethan From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Fri Dec 5 02:58:39 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 08:58:39 +0000 Subject: Tragedy in our hobby: Jay West .... In-Reply-To: <001401c95697$198c8620$0301a8c0@evan> References: <001401c95697$198c8620$0301a8c0@evan> Message-ID: <4938ED3F.4080605@gjcp.net> Evan Koblentz wrote: >>>> Evan, you may want to consider an onlist apology. > > Okay. Considering ..... Considered ... Ummm, no. > > Some people didn't find it amusing. That's their right. We all have > different senses of humor. I'll remind you of that next time you go off on one of your rants about the usual things that set you off ;-) For the record, I thought it was in pretty poor taste, but I've got better things to do than complain about it. Gordon From mark at wickensonline.co.uk Fri Dec 5 03:23:41 2008 From: mark at wickensonline.co.uk (Mark Wickens) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 09:23:41 +0000 Subject: UK DEC Meeting in North West, Autumn 2009 - expression of interest please In-Reply-To: References: <4937C1E7.9020108@wickensonline.co.uk> Message-ID: <4938F31D.8090508@wickensonline.co.uk> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 Rich Alderson wrote: > From: Mark Wickens > Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2008 3:41 AM > >> I am thinking about organising a meeting for people interested in the >> line of computers created by Digital Equipment Corporation. > ^^^^ > > ITYM "lines". I count 6 architectures sold before 1980. > > > Rich Alderson > Server Engineer, PDPplanet Project > Vulcan, Inc. > 505 5th Avenue S, Suite 900 > Seattle, WA 98104 > > mailto:RichA at vulcan.com > (206) 342-2239 > (206) 465-2916 cell > Conceded - I'm hoping to enlighten my somewhat VAX-centric viewpoint of the more 'mature' gear. Mark. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.9 (GNU/Linux) Comment: Using GnuPG with SUSE - http://enigmail.mozdev.org iEYEARECAAYFAkk48x0ACgkQR0vMj/mgdjbDdACfSvPG7S76LvjhWsNuCuCOBn4q MhAAn11Y6F9KakkbXPQb6zjlu5XOBExV =KIY5 -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Fri Dec 5 04:12:44 2008 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 10:12:44 +0000 Subject: Reading an MFM hard drive with a floppy disc analyser Message-ID: <4938FE9C.5000505@philpem.me.uk> I've just been thinking about the problem of imaging/copying MFM hard discs... I've run the numbers, and this seems right to me, but I'd appreciate a sanity check. Let's say you have an ST-412 drive you want to read. You've also got a Catweasel or something like it, that has somehow had an extra bunch of I/O lines added to it (to control the head select lines, etc. on the HDD). An ST-412 rotates at 3600 RPM. That's (3600/60)=60 revolutions per second, or 1/60 = 16.66(recurring) milliseconds per revolution. The drive's data rate is 5 megabits per second, but could be lower (or indeed higher). But the spec says 5Mbps, and for the sake of argument I'm going to stick with that... (5Mbps/1000) = 5Kbits per millisecond. 5Kbits * 16.667 = 83.35 kilobits per track, absolute maximum. A Catweasel records the data from a disc by measuring the time between flux transitions. If we assume every data bit on the disc is a "1" (MFM coding "01") then you'd need to store at most 90,000 timing samples per disc track. So hypothetically, if your "Catweasel or something like it" had 128Ksamples worth of buffer RAM, and enough I/O lines to drive the HDD, you could read an MFM hard drive track-by-track and copy it onto another drive of the same type? Do my calculations look right? With 304 cylinders and 4 heads, that works out to 304 * 4 * 83.35 = 101353.6 Kbits, which does seem awfully low to me... Thanks, -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From classiccmp at vintage-computer.com Fri Dec 5 08:17:44 2008 From: classiccmp at vintage-computer.com (Erik Klein) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 06:17:44 -0800 Subject: Cute Use of Vintage Equipment in UK Car Ad In-Reply-To: <220431.82927.qm@web35303.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: -----Original Message----- From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Lee Courtney Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2008 9:31 AM To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Cute Use of Vintage Equipment in UK Car Ad Vax 750, Digital disc, HP tape drive other gear...enjoy. http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=rTthvxpzNDM I'd still never buy a Renault. . . :P ----- Erik Klein www.vintage-computer.com www.vintage-computer.com/vcforum - The Vintage Computer Forums marketplace.vintage-computer.com - The Vintage Computer and Gaming Marketplace From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Fri Dec 5 08:20:23 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 08:20:23 -0600 Subject: Reading an MFM hard drive with a floppy disc analyser In-Reply-To: <4938FE9C.5000505@philpem.me.uk> References: <4938FE9C.5000505@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <493938A7.4060605@gmail.com> Philip Pemberton wrote: > I've just been thinking about the problem of imaging/copying MFM hard > discs... I've run the numbers, and this seems right to me, but I'd > appreciate a sanity check. I'm on the wrong side of coffee for this, but... > Let's say you have an ST-412 drive you want to read. You've also got a > Catweasel or something like it, that has somehow had an extra bunch of > I/O lines added to it (to control the head select lines, etc. on the HDD). Well, extra lines isn't a big deal I suppose - heck, you could even do that bit 'manually' and read platters one at a time, flipping a switch between each pass. > An ST-412 rotates at 3600 RPM. That's (3600/60)=60 revolutions per > second, or 1/60 = 16.66(recurring) milliseconds per revolution. OK (I think I ran some numbers on this here on the list a couple of years ago, but it's probably quicker to just reply now than dig the message out :-) > The drive's data rate is 5 megabits per second, but could be lower (or > indeed higher). But the spec says 5Mbps, and for the sake of argument > I'm going to stick with that... > > (5Mbps/1000) = 5Kbits per millisecond. > > 5Kbits * 16.667 = 83.35 kilobits per track, absolute maximum. Well, run some figures as a sanity-check... say 256*8 bits per sector, 32 sectors/track on a formatted ST506 - 32 x 256 x 8 = 64Kb of actual data per track. 83.35 seems sensible as some kind of theoretical maximum, given storage of sector headers and the like. > A Catweasel records the data from a disc by measuring the time between > flux transitions. I'm not sure what sort of granularity is needed, though - presumably the CW uses counters geared toward expected floppy rates, so most likely can't represent timing gaps accurately enough for hard disk speeds? > So hypothetically, if your "Catweasel or something like it" had > 128Ksamples worth of buffer RAM, and enough I/O lines to drive the HDD, > you could read an MFM hard drive track-by-track and copy it onto another > drive of the same type? I'm not sure about copying - but I think you could at least extract the data via software, which is still a vital step forward. > Do my calculations look right? > With 304 cylinders and 4 heads, that works out to 304 * 4 * 83.35 = > 101353.6 Kbits, which does seem awfully low to me... 101353.6 Kb is approx 98Mb, or approx 12MB - so that seems not unreasonable. However, remember that's *sample count*, not total storage. So, what's an upper boundary on bits per sample? I suppose you could have an entire track with just one sample on it right at the end, so your upper boundary is the 16.67ms figure. More typically though samples are going to occur *far* more frequently - so to cope with all possible situations you (in theory) need a very large sample length (which in 99.9999% of cases is going to contain a lot of 0s in the upper bits!) Some possible approaches I can see: 1) Just have an absolutely colossal buffer with a large number of bits per sample 2) Use the first bit (or bits) of each sample as a flag to indicate the resolution of the following sample data (essentially toss away lower bits for lengthy samples) 3) Use the first bit (or bits) of each sample to indicate the bit-length of the following sample data, 4) Have a short-length sample resolution geared toward 'ordinary' data and flag any tracks causing sample timer overflows as being damaged. Personally ISTR looking at the second and third options - the third is probably the better of the two, but needs a bit more intelligence (and at the time I was wondering if I could do this in pure logic without a CPU). I'm not sure what approach the CW takes (but at floppy rates the amount of buffer needed is a lot smaller, so maybe it just gets away with a fixed sample size and large enough buffer). The fourth option is just yuck - I'd really want an exact (as possible) copy of what's on the drive, even if it's utter garbage. For some reason when I looked at this I think I believed I could get away with 9 bits per sample including a flag bit dictating two different sample resolutions (i.e. somewhere around 1Mb of buffer) - unfortunately all my notes on this are stuck in storage right now though (plus ideally I'd go for a microcontroller approach with a variable sample length I think) Recreating the data onto another drive is a different matter, of course - but I've always been more interested in salvaging existing data onto more modern media for analysis. cheers Jules From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Fri Dec 5 08:25:03 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 08:25:03 -0600 Subject: Tragedy in our hobby: Jay West .... In-Reply-To: References: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> <493715F8.1020505@mdrconsult.com> Message-ID: <493939BF.9090901@gmail.com> William Donzelli wrote: > Evan, you may want to consider an onlist apology. The way I look at it, he ran it by Jay first, who found it amusing - if it hadn't been for that, I might have been pissed :-) From curt at atarimuseum.com Fri Dec 5 09:49:32 2008 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 10:49:32 -0500 Subject: Tragedy in our hobby: Jay West .... In-Reply-To: <493939BF.9090901@gmail.com> References: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> <493715F8.1020505@mdrconsult.com> <493939BF.9090901@gmail.com> Message-ID: <49394D8C.6020800@atarimuseum.com> I have to agree with Will on this... Evan's a great guy and I like him a lot. The joke was in poor taste however. A lot of good friends I've know for 20 years from the hobby have passed on and I personally this summer almost joined them as I had a tough fight with a very aggressive heart infection that required 2 separate major open heart surgeries and 2 sets of replacement valves, a new aortic root and stem and the rebuilding of one of my inner walls of my heart. So life and death mean a lot more to me now. Kidding around about someone's demise - not funny. Evan - your still a great guy, always gonna like ya.... but if you do that again, next time I'm down your way I'm going to drive right over your Miata (aka speed bump) with my Hummer ;-) Curt Jules Richardson wrote: > William Donzelli wrote: >> Evan, you may want to consider an onlist apology. > > The way I look at it, he ran it by Jay first, who found it amusing - > if it hadn't been for that, I might have been pissed :-) > > > From wh.sudbrink at verizon.net Fri Dec 5 09:58:23 2008 From: wh.sudbrink at verizon.net (Bill Sudbrink) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 10:58:23 -0500 Subject: Tragedy in our hobby: Jay West .... In-Reply-To: <49394D8C.6020800@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > Evan - your still a great guy, always gonna like ya.... but if you do > that again, next time I'm down your way I'm going to drive right over > your Miata (aka speed bump) with my Hummer ;-) Now, _THAT_ is funny!!! From wdonzelli at gmail.com Fri Dec 5 10:50:31 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 11:50:31 -0500 Subject: Tragedy in our hobby: Jay West .... In-Reply-To: <4938ED3F.4080605@gjcp.net> References: <001401c95697$198c8620$0301a8c0@evan> <4938ED3F.4080605@gjcp.net> Message-ID: > For the record, I thought it was in pretty poor taste, but I've got better > things to do than complain about it. I was not going to comment either, chalking it up to a bad decision on his part, but just a few hours after the whole mess I actually did receive a email with sad news. That is what triggered my reaction. There is one less I will see when I make my annual West Coast trip in May. -- Will From mcguire at neurotica.com Fri Dec 5 10:58:12 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 11:58:12 -0500 Subject: [Sorta/Probably OT] Gmail "Terminal" theme In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <951C96A2-BF91-4A47-AE20-47136240C1FB@neurotica.com> On Dec 5, 2008, at 2:47 AM, Ethan Dicks wrote: > I may have to pull this out to annoy _others_, though (I've lost track > of how many folks asked me why I was using "DOS" when I had multiple > term windows open on a Linux box). Good heavens. I make it a point to avoid associating with such people. My life is much happier that way. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Fri Dec 5 11:08:09 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 06:08:09 +1300 Subject: [Sorta/Probably OT] Gmail "Terminal" theme In-Reply-To: <951C96A2-BF91-4A47-AE20-47136240C1FB@neurotica.com> References: <951C96A2-BF91-4A47-AE20-47136240C1FB@neurotica.com> Message-ID: On Sat, Dec 6, 2008 at 5:58 AM, Dave McGuire wrote: > On Dec 5, 2008, at 2:47 AM, Ethan Dicks wrote: >> >> I may have to pull this out to annoy _others_, though (I've lost track >> of how many folks asked me why I was using "DOS" when I had multiple >> term windows open on a Linux box). > > Good heavens. > > I make it a point to avoid associating with such people. My life is much > happier that way. These were not IT folks, they were folks in entirely non-IT roles at the South Pole. One was an electrician who keeps the generators working that supply power to our drilling rig for the installation phase of our experiment - someone I _do_ want to associate with for his particular expertise. These people just happened to come by my desk to ask me something and saw multiple shell windows open, and the only environment _they_ had ever seen was DOS. They were representative of the general public, not of someone who would be in my department at work. -ethan From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Fri Dec 5 11:08:09 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 06:08:09 +1300 Subject: [Sorta/Probably OT] Gmail "Terminal" theme In-Reply-To: <951C96A2-BF91-4A47-AE20-47136240C1FB@neurotica.com> References: <951C96A2-BF91-4A47-AE20-47136240C1FB@neurotica.com> Message-ID: On Sat, Dec 6, 2008 at 5:58 AM, Dave McGuire wrote: > On Dec 5, 2008, at 2:47 AM, Ethan Dicks wrote: >> >> I may have to pull this out to annoy _others_, though (I've lost track >> of how many folks asked me why I was using "DOS" when I had multiple >> term windows open on a Linux box). > > Good heavens. > > I make it a point to avoid associating with such people. My life is much > happier that way. These were not IT folks, they were folks in entirely non-IT roles at the South Pole. One was an electrician who keeps the generators working that supply power to our drilling rig for the installation phase of our experiment - someone I _do_ want to associate with for his particular expertise. These people just happened to come by my desk to ask me something and saw multiple shell windows open, and the only environment _they_ had ever seen was DOS. They were representative of the general public, not of someone who would be in my department at work. -ethan From ray at arachelian.com Fri Dec 5 11:30:13 2008 From: ray at arachelian.com (Ray Arachelian) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 12:30:13 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <49396525.3070308@arachelian.com> I've used double sided foam tape + aluminum foil (yes the kind used for food) with a bit of scotch tape over the foil to prevent shorting in repairing Lisa keyboards. Worked just nicely once they were cut to the right circular shape. Yes, the key feel was off after that, but livable. http://lisafaq.sunder.net/lisafaq-hw-kb_repair.html Bill Sudbrink wrote: > Jos Dreesen / Marian wrote: > >> The real solution would be a source of fresh foam pads.... >> I could use a few sets. >> > > They are easily self manufactured. As long as > you aren't picky about the keyboard "feel" any foam will do. > I use a sharpened tube that fits into my IDC crimper along > with a small piece of wood as a punch for the mylar and foam. > I reuse the existing rigid plastic disks... the old foam and > adhesive easily rubs off. It takes me about 1 minute per > key. > From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Fri Dec 5 12:32:07 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 18:32:07 +0000 Subject: Cute Use of Vintage Equipment in UK Car Ad In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <493973A7.1080605@gjcp.net> Erik Klein wrote: > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] > On Behalf Of Lee Courtney > Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2008 9:31 AM > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Subject: Cute Use of Vintage Equipment in UK Car Ad > > > Vax 750, Digital disc, HP tape drive other gear...enjoy. > > http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=rTthvxpzNDM > > > I'd still never buy a Renault. . . :P I'd buy a Renault 4, or maybe a Renault 5 GT Turbo (ah, fond memories of rolling sideways through a hedge with the engine on fire pretty much every weekend). But they don't make them any more. Gordon From cisin at xenosoft.com Fri Dec 5 12:34:26 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 10:34:26 -0800 (PST) Subject: Tragedy in our hobby: Jay West .... In-Reply-To: <49394D8C.6020800@atarimuseum.com> References: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> <493715F8.1020505@mdrconsult.com> <493939BF.9090901@gmail.com> <49394D8C.6020800@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <20081205102809.J29140@shell.lmi.net> > Evan - your still a great guy, always gonna like ya.... but if you do > that again, next time I'm down your way I'm going to drive right over > your Miata (aka speed bump) with my Hummer ;-) After which it would be necessary to send an announcement to the list. What would be the reaction? Should we do a few test runs to see? Jay might not be happy about such an auto-related post. So you should probably NOT use your Hummer; drop a Vax on him, instead. From IanK at vulcan.com Fri Dec 5 12:50:48 2008 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 10:50:48 -0800 Subject: Tragedy in our hobby: Jay West .... In-Reply-To: <20081205102809.J29140@shell.lmi.net> References: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> <493715F8.1020505@mdrconsult.com> <493939BF.9090901@gmail.com> <49394D8C.6020800@atarimuseum.com> <20081205102809.J29140@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: No, not a VAX! Those are valuable! How about a pallet of "Vista-ready" PCs instead? :-) > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Fred Cisin > Sent: Friday, December 05, 2008 10:34 AM > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Subject: Re: Tragedy in our hobby: Jay West .... > > > Evan - your still a great guy, always gonna like ya.... but if you do > > that again, next time I'm down your way I'm going to drive right over > > your Miata (aka speed bump) with my Hummer ;-) > > > After which it would be necessary to send an announcement to the list. > What would be the reaction? > Should we do a few test runs to see? > Jay might not be happy about such an auto-related post. So you should > probably NOT use your Hummer; drop a Vax on him, instead. From cisin at xenosoft.com Fri Dec 5 13:11:47 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 11:11:47 -0800 (PST) Subject: Bad reporting in our hobby: In-Reply-To: References: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> <493715F8.1020505@mdrconsult.com> <493939BF.9090901@gmail.com> <49394D8C.6020800@atarimuseum.com> <20081205102809.J29140@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <20081205110806.E29140@shell.lmi.net> > No, not a VAX! Those are valuable! Would it actually damage the VAX? > How about a pallet of "Vista-ready" PCs instead? :-) No matter how you feel about what he has done, he deserves more respect than THAT! From healyzh at aracnet.com Fri Dec 5 13:15:47 2008 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 11:15:47 -0800 (PST) Subject: Bad reporting in our hobby: In-Reply-To: <20081205110806.E29140@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <200812051915.mB5JFlup004572@onyx.spiritone.com> > > No, not a VAX! Those are valuable! > > Would it actually damage the VAX? Would you want to risk it? I wouldn't. > > How about a pallet of "Vista-ready" PCs instead? :-) > > No matter how you feel about what he has done, > he deserves more respect than THAT! More importantly those PC's could be given new life by installing Linux on them. Just drop a case of MS Vista on him. Zane From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Fri Dec 5 13:14:56 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 12:14:56 -0700 Subject: Bad reporting in our hobby: In-Reply-To: <20081205110806.E29140@shell.lmi.net> References: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> <493715F8.1020505@mdrconsult.com> <493939BF.9090901@gmail.com> <49394D8C.6020800@atarimuseum.com> <20081205102809.J29140@shell.lmi.net> <20081205110806.E29140@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <49397DB0.3000102@jetnet.ab.ca> Fred Cisin wrote: >> No, not a VAX! Those are valuable! >> > > Would it actually damage the VAX? > > > >> How about a pallet of "Vista-ready" PCs instead? :-) >> > > No matter how you feel about what he has done, > he deserves more respect than THAT! > > You are right ... um 2.1 DOS ready XT's instead, :) While OT the age is right. From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Fri Dec 5 13:53:50 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 13:53:50 -0600 Subject: Cute Use of Vintage Equipment in UK Car Ad In-Reply-To: <493973A7.1080605@gjcp.net> References: <493973A7.1080605@gjcp.net> Message-ID: <493986CE.2040609@gmail.com> Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote: >> I'd still never buy a Renault. . . :P > > I'd buy a Renault 4, or maybe a Renault 5 GT Turbo (ah, fond memories of > rolling sideways through a hedge with the engine on fire pretty much > every weekend). Yeah, those were fun. Heck, even the non-turbo ones still were (albeit at a slower pace) - although also good for blown engines, holes in fuel tanks and broken suspension (and for crashing headlong into trees, but that's another story :-) From rtellason at verizon.net Fri Dec 5 14:06:39 2008 From: rtellason at verizon.net (Roy J. Tellason) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 15:06:39 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net> <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net> On Thursday 04 December 2008 02:59:21 pm Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 4 Dec 2008 at 14:14, Roy J. Tellason wrote: > > I've had idle thoughts from time to time about building one of those and > > sticking an EPROM between the outputs of that circuit and the device to > > be driven, to convert the scan codes that you get to ASCII or whatever. > > Maybe one of these days I'll get that particular round tuit. :-) > > Why bother? AVRs and PICs are cheap and easy to work with (in > particular, an AVR with SPI can be programmed with little more than a > parallel port and a handful of resistors). Code for handling AT- > style keyboards abounds. One DIP--that's all that it takes. Because I don't know a darn thing about any of that current stuff? This was only a couple or three logic parts, from what I can remember, not all that much... > I can see the motivation to do something "the vintage way", but even > the 5170 uses a uC to interface to the keyboard. If you wanted to go > "vintage', an 8048 or 8051-family uC would do the trick. I remember seeing those on some old (XT-class?) MBs, for handling the keyboard interface, but don't know much about programming those, either. I just haven't gotten around to messing with them yet. -- Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters" - Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James M Dakin From brain at jbrain.com Fri Dec 5 15:09:43 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 15:09:43 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net> References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net> <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> <200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net> Message-ID: <49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> Roy J. Tellason wrote: >> Why bother? AVRs and PICs are cheap and easy to work with (in >> particular, an AVR with SPI can be programmed with little more than a >> parallel port and a handful of resistors). Code for handling AT- >> style keyboards abounds. One DIP--that's all that it takes. >> > > Because I don't know a darn thing about any of that current stuff? > > This was only a couple or three logic parts, from what I can remember, not > all that much... > Not to weigh in on one side or the other, but I have prewritten routines in AVR C that will scan up to a 16x8 matrix and output PS/2 codes. In the other direction, I have prewrriten routines to accept incoming PS/2 data and output either RS232 or parallel ASCII codes, with support to trigger an IRQ on keypress. My code runs on an ATMEGA8, which is a 28 .300" DIP unit or a ATMEGA16/32, which is a 40 pin .600 DIP. Jim From oldcpu2 at rogerwilco.org Fri Dec 5 15:12:37 2008 From: oldcpu2 at rogerwilco.org (J Blaser) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 14:12:37 -0700 Subject: Making an RT-11 TU58 Image In-Reply-To: <200812050011.mB50Bnng087740@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812050011.mB50Bnng087740@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <49399945.70702@rogerwilco.org> On Thu, 04 Dec 2008 20:27:59 Tobias Russell said: > I've just managed to get a TU58 emulator compiled up > and running under Linux and confirmed its working by > booting Will Kranz's XXDP images > (http://www.fpns.net/willy/pdp11/tu58-emu.htm) I use Will's emulator under MSDOS and works great for me too! With my first PDP-11, this was the only means I had for backing up a handful of RL02 disk carts... > > I'd now like to get an RT-11 TU58 image so I can run > a boot into a real operating system on my disk-less > -11s. Whats the best way to go about making a suitable > image? > > I have a working RT11 v5 setup under SIMH. Is it > possible to make a suitable image via this? One > thought is to make a RX01 boot image and but with a > TU58 boot block and then use this on the emulator. Yes, it's quite easy. You can build an RX image, or as hinted at above, you can create an entire RL02-sized image and use it with the TU58 driver (DD). It turns out that RT11's DD driver only cares about size of the media when it *writes*, but it can read any properly initialized media of any size. As you suggest, using SIMH, mount up a blank 'disk' of whatever variety you want (RX01 would be fine, but a little small for working with RT11 easily, I'd suggest an RL01 or RL02), and initialize it, copy over the files you want, and just as you say, do a COPY/BOOT with the TU58 driver (DD), such as: .COPY/BOOT:DD DL0:RT11SJ.SYS DL0: to put the TU58 driver in the boot block of a RL0x. At this point you'll need to physically cable your Linux box running the TU58 emulator and the PDP-11 with a simple null-modem cable. When you fire up the PDP-11 hardware, you'll have to enter the TU58 bootstrap (which Will gives in his emulator documentation). At that point you should be home free. It won't be fast, but it will certainly function fine. If you do create a non-TU58-sized virtual disk image, you'll want to again refer to Will's docs where he gives you a patch to the DD.SYS driver, setting the number of blocks allowed. This will allow you to read and write to a larger (than standard TU58) disk image. Good luck! - Jared From oldcpu2 at rogerwilco.org Fri Dec 5 15:31:43 2008 From: oldcpu2 at rogerwilco.org (J Blaser) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 14:31:43 -0700 Subject: Making an RT-11 TU58 Image In-Reply-To: <200812050011.mB50Bnng087740@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812050011.mB50Bnng087740@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <49399DBF.6000706@rogerwilco.org> On Thu, 04 Dec 2008 16:26:40 -0500, "Curt @ Atari Museum" said: > I've got a large box of TU-58's with boot up and diags > for a Vax 11/750, any out there want to make archives > of them or has that already been done? Definitely want to help!!! I'm always looking out for this kind of thing. My 11/750[1] came with a handful of TU58 carts and I've still got the TU58 drive fixture that I cobbled up to my PDP-11 to make images. I'd be more than happy to image what you have. I've located a few (maybe 10 or so) 11/750 diag cart images in the past, but I'm still looking for that "full set" of standard 11/750 diag tapes. If you have them (or, even if not) I'm game for imaging what you've got. I'm in Utah, so there's probably some shipping involved, but I'd probably be able to cover charges both ways to help with getting these imaged. How big is that "large box" you've got? ;-) - Jared [1] After a year I'm still struggling with bringing my 11/750's 5V power supply back to life. Tony A., look for me to come begging some help, probably after the holidays. From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Fri Dec 5 15:53:49 2008 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 13:53:49 -0800 (PST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net> <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> <200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net> <49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> Message-ID: On Fri, 5 Dec 2008, Jim Brain wrote: > Roy J. Tellason wrote: > >> Why bother? AVRs and PICs are cheap and easy to work with (in > >> particular, an AVR with SPI can be programmed with little more than a > >> parallel port and a handful of resistors). Code for handling AT- > >> style keyboards abounds. One DIP--that's all that it takes. > >> > > > > Because I don't know a darn thing about any of that current stuff? > > > > This was only a couple or three logic parts, from what I can remember, not > > all that much... > > > Not to weigh in on one side or the other, but I have prewritten routines > in AVR C that will scan up to a 16x8 matrix and output PS/2 codes. In > the other direction, I have prewrriten routines to accept incoming PS/2 > data and output either RS232 or parallel ASCII codes, with support to > trigger an IRQ on keypress. My code runs on an ATMEGA8, which is a 28 > .300" DIP unit or a ATMEGA16/32, which is a 40 pin .600 DIP. This made me start wondering about going a couple steps farther. Consider a replacement board for the controller found in a Model M keyboard which is a drop-in replacement that turns the thing into a USB keyboard. -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Fri Dec 5 16:04:37 2008 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 22:04:37 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Cute Use of Vintage Equipment in UK Car Ad In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <965512.32244.qm@web23407.mail.ird.yahoo.com> That's pretty cool and reminds me that I saw an Altair 8800 in last weeks episode of The IT Crowd (episode 2,series 3). I didn't see the C= PET that was in series 1 & 2, but someone else assures me it's still there. Episode 3 is about to start on channel 4 (UK) now You can find the link to watch it online, via 4OD (4 On Demand), on this page... http://www.channel4.com/entertainment/tv/microsites/I/itcrowd/ ... but only if you use Internet Explorer 6 or 7 :( Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk --- On Fri, 5/12/08, Erik Klein wrote: From: Erik Klein Subject: RE: Cute Use of Vintage Equipment in UK Car Ad To: "'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts'" Date: Friday, 5 December, 2008, 2:17 PM -----Original Message----- From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Lee Courtney Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2008 9:31 AM To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Cute Use of Vintage Equipment in UK Car Ad Vax 750, Digital disc, HP tape drive other gear...enjoy. http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=rTthvxpzNDM I'd still never buy a Renault. . . :P ----- Erik Klein www.vintage-computer.com www.vintage-computer.com/vcforum - The Vintage Computer Forums marketplace.vintage-computer.com - The Vintage Computer and Gaming Marketplace From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Dec 5 15:53:35 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 21:53:35 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <095501c95658$9fc776d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> from "Alexandre Souza" at Dec 4, 8 07:37:21 pm Message-ID: > Tony, it MAY be possible, but I'm hard pressed to NOT believe in a PS/2 It's certainly possible. After all you can build a processor using only TTL chip, that was done many, many, times. Rememebr that the 74xxx TTL family does include some small RAMs and fusible link PROMs :-) So you could build a processor with data storage (RAM) and program memory (PROM). And surely you agree the interface is possible using a processor. > to parallel converter using only TTL chips...it CAN be done, but would use > TONS of TTLs :( I've not tried to do it, but I'd guess it could be done in under 100 pacakages,, no problem. The interface is not that complicated after all. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Dec 5 15:57:06 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 21:57:06 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <4937E2B9.20740.D173C0@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Dec 4, 8 02:01:29 pm Message-ID: > > On 4 Dec 2008 at 21:17, Tony Duell wrote: > > > > This makes no sense commerically, I agree. If I was going to make this as > > a product, or part of one, I'd use a microcontroller. Period. But classic > > computign is a _hobby_ for me, and darn it, I get to do it the way I > > enjoy. And if that means a board of TTL chips. that's my business. > > Perhaps a good place to start would be to replace that pesky uC in > the keyboard itself with a bunch of TTL--if you could still get the > result inside the enclosure. I thought the idea was to use any PS/2 keyboard, in which case having to modify that ws a bad idsea. But yes, you could remove the intenral electronics from the keyboard and be left with a matrix of switches. Encoding that to ASCII is a very standard problem which has been solved many times (and using TTL). Whgy does it have to fit in the keyboard enclosure? The PS/2 -> 8 bit parallel interface is an external unit, surely? In which case the switc_matrix->8 bit interface can be too, linked with a bit of ribbon cable to the keyboard matrix. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Dec 5 15:59:33 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 21:59:33 +0000 (GMT) Subject: The drift of a knowledge-based societ to a gadget-value-based In-Reply-To: <4938585A.9020008@bitsavers.org> from "Al Kossow" at Dec 4, 8 02:23:22 pm Message-ID: > > > I think the clever society is getting burned down as we know it > > Clever is now content, not the tool. > > Computers and other electronic devices, and the communications > infrastructure are a given. The invention now is what can be done Well, if you truely believe that the current PCs and communications devices are the best that will ever be possible, then I somewhat pity you. I certainly don't. IMHO there could be better devices in the future. Which means there have to be poople to design those better devices. And those people had better understand how they work, -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Dec 5 16:01:40 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 22:01:40 +0000 (GMT) Subject: WTD: MPF-I/88 documentation In-Reply-To: <8C5EBB71D1D0C84EBCA94B49814AEE6C74AB71A757@GVW0671EXC.americas.hpqcorp.net> from "Johns, Stephen" at Dec 4, 8 11:02:39 pm Message-ID: > > Do you have a scanner yet? > I could use copies of the schems and code ;-) Is this aimed at me? I don't have a scanner, nnd I don';t have anything to connect it to. I do have the MPF 1/88 documentation (all 3 books) -- the monitor source lising is one book and would be far too much to copy IMHO. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Dec 5 15:49:59 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 21:49:59 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <49384D36.9040302@gmail.com> from "Jules Richardson" at Dec 4, 8 03:35:50 pm Message-ID: > It's weird, that... I suspect I could rustle up something > 'traditional' around > a Z80/6502, ROM, RAM and some decoding - but my brain just doesn't cope well > with single-chip 'black boxes' such as PIC-based widgets. I really > don't know why! My problem with single-chip microcontrolelrs (PICs, etc) is trying to debug the firmware. If I have external program memory, I can hang a logic analyser off said memory's address bus and see just what the firmware is doing. But there's no way to really trace the code running in a PIC. OK, you can add instructions to set/reset 'spare' port pins at particular points in the code and see if/when those change. But it's nowhere near as convenient as being able to trace the code. I can't afford the real ICE units for the PIC, etc. And please don't suggest the simulator. I've never found a simulator that (a) I trust and (b) allows me to correctly simulate all the exernal hardware I have hanging off the microcontroller. -tony From maurice.smulders at gmail.com Fri Dec 5 16:27:26 2008 From: maurice.smulders at gmail.com (maurice smulders) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 15:27:26 -0700 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: <49384D36.9040302@gmail.com> Message-ID: <7d9403580812051427v2d4750deta5fee5d0288dfd29@mail.gmail.com> Hello, Atmel has an appnote for their AVRs to decode a PS/2 keyboard... http://www.atmel.com/dyn/products/app_notes.asp?family_id=607 *AVR313: Interfacing the PCAT Keyboard* Kind regards, Maurice From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Fri Dec 5 16:26:50 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 20:26:50 -0200 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) References: Message-ID: <03c901c95728$aa8808c0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > My problem with single-chip microcontrolelrs (PICs, etc) is trying to > debug the firmware. If I have external program memory, I can hang a logic > analyser off said memory's address bus and see just what the firmware is > doing. But there's no way to really trace the code running in a PIC. Yes, you have. It is called ICD2. And of course, you can use a MCS-51 with external ROM/RAM. Why not? > I can't afford the real ICE units for the PIC, etc. Sure you can. Have you searched for it? You cand do a In-Circuit-Debugger for less than $20 > And please don't suggest the simulator. I've never found a simulator that > (a) I trust and (b) allows me to correctly simulate all the exernal > hardware I have hanging off the microcontroller. Sure. From teoz at neo.rr.com Fri Dec 5 16:35:40 2008 From: teoz at neo.rr.com (Teo Zenios) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 17:35:40 -0500 Subject: The drift of a knowledge-based societ to a gadget-value-based References: Message-ID: ----- Original Message ----- From: "Tony Duell" To: Sent: Friday, December 05, 2008 4:59 PM Subject: Re: The drift of a knowledge-based societ to a gadget-value-based > IMHO there could be better devices in the future. Which means there have > to be poople to design those better devices. And those people had better > understand how they work, > > -tony The more we advance the more the tools we use do most of the work and the less designers need to know about what they are designing. All I see is devices that have more storage and more CPU speed so you can cram more software features into them, not exactly whole new designs using different concepts, materials, form factors, and unique thinking. You used to get more crazy stuff when one person pretty much designed everything, now that people use the same design tools and things are done in groups you tend to get the same old but slightly different. Very little general research is done anymore, and that's where people and companies used to get their ideas for new things from. TZ From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Fri Dec 5 17:12:00 2008 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 23:12:00 +0000 Subject: Reading an MFM hard drive with a floppy disc analyser In-Reply-To: <493938A7.4060605@gmail.com> References: <4938FE9C.5000505@philpem.me.uk> <493938A7.4060605@gmail.com> Message-ID: <4939B540.402@philpem.me.uk> Jules Richardson wrote: > Well, extra lines isn't a big deal I suppose - heck, you could even do > that bit 'manually' and read platters one at a time, flipping a switch > between each pass. True, though the hardware I'm actually thinking of using is my USB hack-and-bodge floppy reader. FPGA, PICmicro, and a few buffers/level translators. The discrete FDD I/O stage is gone though -- mainly because in an overvoltage condition, it's highly likely the 74LS14 input buffer would get deep-fried... Thus rendering the "slightly more rugged" output drivers utterly pointless. I've kept to the original spec for the connector though -- a 40-pin IDC with the first 34 pins forming a Shugart-compatible interface, and the last 6 defined as user I/O (each pin configurable as either input or output, all open-collector). > Well, run some figures as a sanity-check... say 256*8 bits per sector, > 32 sectors/track on a formatted ST506 - 32 x 256 x 8 = 64Kb of actual > data per track. > > 83.35 seems sensible as some kind of theoretical maximum, given storage > of sector headers and the like. And MFM is basically one flux transition per (data) bit guaranteed, meaning 83.35kbps isn't actually that strange a figure. > I'm not sure what sort of granularity is needed, though - presumably the > CW uses counters geared toward expected floppy rates, so most likely > can't represent timing gaps accurately enough for hard disk speeds? The read clock on a CW is about 8MHz or so, if memory serves. Effectively that's ~16 clocks per bit cell time (at 500kbps MFM that is). The hardware I'm building up is going to sample at 20 or 40MHz (software selectable), which is 40 (or 80) clocks per bitcell on 500k MFM, or 4 (or 8) on 5Mbps MFM... Adding another sampling rate to the hardware probably wouldn't be that hard -- add another input to the clock-mux and either add a PLL multiplier to the logic (there are four on an Altera Cyclone II 2C20) or another TTL oscillator to the PCB. >> Do my calculations look right? >> With 304 cylinders and 4 heads, that works out to 304 * 4 * 83.35 = >> 101353.6 Kbits, which does seem awfully low to me... > > 101353.6 Kb is approx 98Mb, or approx 12MB - so that seems not > unreasonable. > > However, remember that's *sample count*, not total storage. True. An FDI file containing the sample data isn't likely to be /that/ much bigger though. But it'll take a bloody age transferring that much data over USB2 Full Speed (1.2Mbps peak). > So, what's an upper boundary on bits per sample? I suppose you could > have an entire track with just one sample on it right at the end, so > your upper boundary is the 16.67ms figure. MFM is a (1,3)RLL code. That means you can have a minimum of 1 and a maximum of 3 empty bit cells between flux transitions. Best-case is a stream of 1s, which is NT - NT - NT... (1 no-transition period between each transition) Worst-case is a repeating 1-0 bit stream which is NT-NN - NT-NN.. (3 no-transition periods between each transition) You can also have 2 no-transition periods separating a pair of transitions -- that's a 1-0-0 sequence: NT-NN-TN - NT-NN-TN... > More typically though samples are going to occur *far* more frequently - > so to cope with all possible situations you (in theory) need a very > large sample length (which in 99.9999% of cases is going to contain a > lot of 0s in the upper bits!) The RAM I'm using is 4Mbit -- i.e. 512Kbyte, but mapped into 16-bit words. So you have 262144 16-bit words. One status bit (for the index pulse) leaves 15 bits for the counter. The counter is rigged to lock at 0x7FFF instead of rolling back to 0 (which saves a bit). 15 bit counter = span of 0 to 32767 counts. 40MHz = 25ns per count 25ns * 32767 = 819175 ns = 819.175 us Hmm, for floppy discs you'd have to slow it down a bit (possibly to 20MHz, which would be 1638.35 us, or about 1.6 milliseconds), but for MFM (and RLL?) hard drives this should be more than enough. > Some possible approaches I can see: > > 1) Just have an absolutely colossal buffer with a large number of bits > per sample SRAM is relatively expensive though. SDRAM isn't, but then you have to deal with refreshing and other "fun" things like that. > 2) Use the first bit (or bits) of each sample as a flag to indicate the > resolution of the following sample data (essentially toss away lower > bits for lengthy samples) Hmm, use the top 2 bits to specify the timing resolution, and the rest as a timing value. Drop between 0 and 3 bits depending on how far over 14 bits your count has gone... That's going on my "try this" list. > Personally ISTR looking at the second and third options - the third is > probably the better of the two, but needs a bit more intelligence (and > at the time I was wondering if I could do this in pure logic without a > CPU). I'm not sure what approach the CW takes (but at floppy rates the > amount of buffer needed is a lot smaller, so maybe it just gets away > with a fixed sample size and large enough buffer). It's a 7-bit counter bolted onto a 128Ksample RAM buffer. The top bit stores the state of the index pulse at the time the transition was stored, and the lower 7 bits store the timing value. > For some reason when I looked at this I think I believed I could get > away with 9 bits per sample including a flag bit dictating two different > sample resolutions (i.e. somewhere around 1Mb of buffer) - unfortunately > all my notes on this are stuck in storage right now though (plus ideally > I'd go for a microcontroller approach with a variable sample length I > think) Ultimately it depends on what you're sampling. A 3.5" DSDD floppy, sampled at 7.08MHz ends up with few samples above ~64 counts (IIRC, my density graphs are on the laptop, which is switched off). Based on that, 7 bits would probably be fine up to 14MHz, 8 bits up to 28MHz. Assuming, of course, that the disc is "perfectly" formatted. As in, the entire track is MFM. > Recreating the data onto another drive is a different matter, of course > - but I've always been more interested in salvaging existing data onto > more modern media for analysis. Half the problem is that the timing is going to get progressively worse the further down the line you go. Kinda like what happens when you dub an audio tape. By the time you've gotten to the point of having a 3rd- or 4th-generation copy, the audio is almost completely masked by the background hiss. Thanks, -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Fri Dec 5 17:09:16 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 17:09:16 -0600 Subject: The drift of a knowledge-based societ to a gadget-value-based In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4939B49C.1060801@gmail.com> Tony Duell wrote: >> > I think the clever society is getting burned down as we know it >> >> Clever is now content, not the tool. >> >> Computers and other electronic devices, and the communications >> infrastructure are a given. The invention now is what can be done > > Well, if you truely believe that the current PCs and communications > devices are the best that will ever be possible, then I somewhat pity > you. I certainly don't. I was going to type a huge message about this, but I'll try and keep it short... I suspect things are at the best we'll get, unless there's a radical change in the way products are designed and the consumer shops for them. The problem right now is with the consumer, who is dazzled by feature lists and shops according to face-value. Until people demand better (more serviceable, longer-lived, reliable, well-built and well-designed) products *and are willing to pay the higher initial costs for them* then we're going to be stuck with a society that thinks mediocrity is the norm. That change *might* be somewhat forced in an increasingly-populated, resource-starved planet, but it still needs people to demand better rather than demanding cheaper. (And all of this is OT, and we know Jay is alive and well, so maybe I'll just head for the bunker now :-) cheers Jules From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Fri Dec 5 17:15:31 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 17:15:31 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4939B613.8050105@gmail.com> Tony Duell wrote: >> Tony, it MAY be possible, but I'm hard pressed to NOT believe in a PS/2 > > It's certainly possible. After all you can build a processor using only > TTL chip, that was done many, many, times. Rememebr that the 74xxx TTL > family does include some small RAMs and fusible link PROMs :-) So you > could build a processor with data storage (RAM) and program memory > (PROM). And surely you agree the interface is possible using a processor. That's just... sick. Beautifully sick :-) Now, for the next challenge, could it be done without the PROM and RAM ICs? Gut-feeling is maybe something based around feeding scan codes into a giant shift register and comparing that to some hard-wired lookup table on the PCB (in effect a ROM, just without the IC) might be possible. Clock the relevant data in parallel out of the 'ROM' and... From ats at offog.org Fri Dec 5 17:36:08 2008 From: ats at offog.org (Adam Sampson) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 23:36:08 +0000 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: (David Griffith's message of "Fri\, 5 Dec 2008 13\:53\:49 -0800 \(PST\)") References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net> <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> <200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net> <49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> Message-ID: David Griffith writes: > Consider a replacement board for the controller found in a Model M > keyboard which is a drop-in replacement that turns the thing into a > USB keyboard. You could suggest this to Unicomp -- they must already be making one for their USB Model Ms, so perhaps they'd be willing to sell the board separately. I'd buy a couple. -- Adam Sampson From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Fri Dec 5 17:55:12 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 17:55:12 -0600 Subject: Cute Use of Vintage Equipment in UK Car Ad In-Reply-To: <965512.32244.qm@web23407.mail.ird.yahoo.com> References: <965512.32244.qm@web23407.mail.ird.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4939BF60.5070006@gmail.com> Andrew Burton wrote: > That's pretty cool and reminds me that I saw an Altair 8800 in last weeks > episode of The IT Crowd (episode 2,series 3). Aha - I know where that came from. I won't say more in case I end up stealing his thunder (I think he's subscribed to this list) :-) > You can find the link to watch it online, via 4OD (4 On Demand), on this > page... ... but not under Linux, sadly (and more than likely not in non-UK areas, too). Can anyone grab a copy of the relevant bits and stick 'em someplace? I'd be interested to see them (apparently my old well-travelled Nascom was loaned out to the production crew, too, so may have been used - it'd be kind of amusing to see it on TV :-) cheers Jules From frustum at pacbell.net Fri Dec 5 18:03:45 2008 From: frustum at pacbell.net (Jim Battle) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 18:03:45 -0600 Subject: Reading an MFM hard drive with a floppy disc analyser In-Reply-To: <4939B540.402@philpem.me.uk> References: <4938FE9C.5000505@philpem.me.uk> <493938A7.4060605@gmail.com> <4939B540.402@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <4939C161.7010401@pacbell.net> Philip Pemberton wrote: ... > > The read clock on a CW is about 8MHz or so, if memory serves. > Effectively that's ~16 clocks per bit cell time (at 500kbps MFM that > is). The hardware I'm building up is going to sample at 20 or 40MHz > (software selectable), which is 40 (or 80) clocks per bitcell on 500k > MFM, or 4 (or 8) on 5Mbps MFM... Quoting the catweasel manual: To set the clockspeed with the CatOption register, reset the memory counter to 0 by writing 0 to the CatAbort register. Writing 0 to CatOption will set the clock rate to 14Mhz. Writing 128 (0x80) to CatOption will set the clock rate to 28Mhz, and writing 192 (0xc0) to CatOption will set the clock speed to 56Mhz (to be precise, 56.644Mhz). > But it'll take a bloody age transferring that much data over USB2 Full > Speed (1.2Mbps peak). what? USB1 was 12 Mbps peak. USB2 is 480 Mbps peak. (b=bit) From eric940 at gmail.com Fri Dec 5 18:37:48 2008 From: eric940 at gmail.com (eric) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 16:37:48 -0800 Subject: [Sorta/Probably OT] Gmail "Terminal" theme In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: > I'd say it looks more like a BBS to me than any sort of command-line > client, but then I put a lot of time in on real VT100s with white or > amber phosphor and substantially less time on terminals with green > phosphor. > > It's cute, but I can see it getting annoying after not so much time. Yeah, on both points -- now that I've used it for a couple days. A bit of a novelty at first, but then ... However, back around the late 70s/early 80s, I recall hooking up some no name terminals with green screens. But I do see the BBS flavor in it too. > I may have to pull this out to annoy _others_, though (I've lost track > of how many folks asked me why I was using "DOS" when I had multiple > term windows open on a Linux box). Heh. From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Fri Dec 5 18:43:49 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 18:43:49 -0600 Subject: Reading an MFM hard drive with a floppy disc analyser In-Reply-To: <4939B540.402@philpem.me.uk> References: <4938FE9C.5000505@philpem.me.uk> <493938A7.4060605@gmail.com> <4939B540.402@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <4939CAC5.60801@gmail.com> Philip Pemberton wrote: > Jules Richardson wrote: >> Well, extra lines isn't a big deal I suppose - heck, you could even do >> that bit 'manually' and read platters one at a time, flipping a switch >> between each pass. > > True, though the hardware I'm actually thinking of using is my USB > hack-and-bodge floppy reader. FPGA, PICmicro, and a few buffers/level > translators. OK, so you can probably throw something in there to switch heads via software, presumably? >> Well, run some figures as a sanity-check... say 256*8 bits per sector, >> 32 sectors/track on a formatted ST506 - 32 x 256 x 8 = 64Kb of actual >> data per track. >> >> 83.35 seems sensible as some kind of theoretical maximum, given >> storage of sector headers and the like. > > And MFM is basically one flux transition per (data) bit guaranteed, > meaning 83.35kbps isn't actually that strange a figure. Yeah. I think your calculations were right, anyhow... >> 101353.6 Kb is approx 98Mb, or approx 12MB - so that seems not >> unreasonable. >> >> However, remember that's *sample count*, not total storage. > > True. An FDI file containing the sample data isn't likely to be /that/ > much bigger though. No; the raw data file size is manageable I think - it's just the buffer size that needs to be reasonably big. > But it'll take a bloody age transferring that much data over USB2 Full > Speed (1.2Mbps peak). I think I did once put in a request for a SCSI version ;) >> So, what's an upper boundary on bits per sample? I suppose you could >> have an entire track with just one sample on it right at the end, so >> your upper boundary is the 16.67ms figure. > > MFM is a (1,3)RLL code. That means you can have a minimum of 1 and a > maximum of 3 empty bit cells between flux transitions. Yeah, but that's for complete data, is it not? I'm not sure what happens if given a damaged drive - given that ST506/412 is dumb, presumably it just blindly spits out what it finds on the disk surface? It'd be nice to be able to capture whatever the drive throws at this device, in the hope of making some sense out of (or 'beyond') damaged sections in software later. If the track data has 'holes' then the device needs to be able to record the length of those holes in order to portray what's on the disk accurately. >> More typically though samples are going to occur *far* more frequently >> - so to cope with all possible situations you (in theory) need a very >> large sample length (which in 99.9999% of cases is going to contain a >> lot of 0s in the upper bits!) > > [lots of numbers] I'll look at those later - it's too noisy to concentrate round here right now :-) >> 1) Just have an absolutely colossal buffer with a large number of bits >> per sample > > SRAM is relatively expensive though. SDRAM isn't, but then you have to > deal with refreshing and other "fun" things like that. Yeah, I came to that conclusion way back when, too. > Hmm, use the top 2 bits to specify the timing resolution, and the rest > as a timing value. Drop between 0 and 3 bits depending on how far over > 14 bits your count has gone... > > That's going on my "try this" list. It should work, I think, subject to not throwing too much away. >> For some reason when I looked at this I think I believed I could get >> away with 9 bits per sample including a flag bit dictating two >> different sample resolutions (i.e. somewhere around 1Mb of buffer) - >> unfortunately all my notes on this are stuck in storage right now >> though (plus ideally I'd go for a microcontroller approach with a >> variable sample length I think) > > Ultimately it depends on what you're sampling. A 3.5" DSDD floppy, > sampled at 7.08MHz ends up with few samples above ~64 counts (IIRC, my > density graphs are on the laptop, which is switched off). Based on that, > 7 bits would probably be fine up to 14MHz, 8 bits up to 28MHz. > > Assuming, of course, that the disc is "perfectly" formatted. As in, the > entire track is MFM. Uh huh. There's not necessarily a guarantee on that for a damaged drive, I fear (and few STxxx drives seem to exist without at least a few defects) I can't remember if my 9 bits per sample (including flag bit) was just for MFM, or if I figured it'd work for RLL, too (or ten bits if recording with each sample whether there's an index pulse or not - I think I'd dreamed up a way of doing that separately so as to not encroach on buffer size (but it's more complex to do so). >> Recreating the data onto another drive is a different matter, of >> course - but I've always been more interested in salvaging existing >> data onto more modern media for analysis. > > Half the problem is that the timing is going to get progressively worse > the further down the line you go. Kinda like what happens when you dub > an audio tape. By the time you've gotten to the point of having a 3rd- > or 4th-generation copy, the audio is almost completely masked by the > background hiss. Yeah. I think what needs to happen is that you sample a drive, essentially turn it back into data bytes in software on a host machine, bung some sector header voodoo around it, and *then* spit it back to the destination drive using this device... For now, I'm more worried about ailing STxxx drives and getting data off them (and making sense of it) - writing back is more of a secondary issue (but is probably an extra 10% logic on this device to support writes, I suspect). Aside: I'm not sure if it's beneficial having a number of buffers and reading/writing multiple head data in parallel? I worry about running STxxx drives for longer than necessary :-) Probably not viable just from a RAM cost point of view, though... cheers Jules From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Fri Dec 5 20:07:06 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 15:07:06 +1300 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <49396525.3070308@arachelian.com> References: <49396525.3070308@arachelian.com> Message-ID: On Sat, Dec 6, 2008 at 6:30 AM, Ray Arachelian wrote: > I've used double sided foam tape + aluminum foil (yes the kind used for > food) with a bit of scotch tape over the foil to prevent shorting in > repairing Lisa keyboards. Worked just nicely once they were cut to the > right circular shape. Yes, the key feel was off after that, but livable. > > http://lisafaq.sunder.net/lisafaq-hw-kb_repair.html I'm sure the foam response is different (different density if nothing else), but after reading your experiences, I'd be inclined to work with aluminum tape. It is literally a roll of aluminum foil, pre-glued, wax-paper-backed. I've used it quite successfully to make grounding strips on workbenches (just screw a wire to one end and run it to a ground bar via largish resistor). It's at least as thick as household aluminum foil, and the glue is quite tacky - more tacky than the glues I've seen on double-sided foam tape. Just a thought for another material that might be easier to work with than household foil, though what you used is arguably about the cheapest stuff you could find to do the job. If you've had any difficulties working with it, consider the aluminum tape. -ethan From aek at bitsavers.org Fri Dec 5 20:30:10 2008 From: aek at bitsavers.org (Al Kossow) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 18:30:10 -0800 Subject: Reading an MFM hard drive with a floppy disc analyser Message-ID: <4939E3B2.4010707@bitsavers.org> > Aside: I'm not sure if it's beneficial having a number of buffers and > reading/writing multiple head data in parallel? This came up in one of the threads about the topic of either simulating Massbus or HP 790x disk, I think. The problem was the controller timed out if the head-head switching time wasn't fast enough. From jlobocki at gmail.com Fri Dec 5 11:27:06 2008 From: jlobocki at gmail.com (joe lobocki) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 11:27:06 -0600 Subject: [Sorta/Probably OT] Gmail "Terminal" theme In-Reply-To: References: <951C96A2-BF91-4A47-AE20-47136240C1FB@neurotica.com> Message-ID: i like it! don't know how long I'll use it for though On Fri, Dec 5, 2008 at 11:08 AM, Ethan Dicks wrote: > On Sat, Dec 6, 2008 at 5:58 AM, Dave McGuire > wrote: > > On Dec 5, 2008, at 2:47 AM, Ethan Dicks wrote: > >> > >> I may have to pull this out to annoy _others_, though (I've lost track > >> of how many folks asked me why I was using "DOS" when I had multiple > >> term windows open on a Linux box). > > > > Good heavens. > > > > I make it a point to avoid associating with such people. My life is > much > > happier that way. > > These were not IT folks, they were folks in entirely non-IT roles at > the South Pole. One was an electrician who keeps the generators > working that supply power to our drilling rig for the installation > phase of our experiment - someone I _do_ want to associate with for > his particular expertise. > > These people just happened to come by my desk to ask me something and > saw multiple shell windows open, and the only environment _they_ had > ever seen was DOS. They were representative of the general public, > not of someone who would be in my department at work. > > -ethan > From chrism3667 at yahoo.com Fri Dec 5 14:40:43 2008 From: chrism3667 at yahoo.com (Chris M) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 12:40:43 -0800 (PST) Subject: Sony MP-F52W-00D needed In-Reply-To: <002501c9557d$e80849a0$b818dce0$@galvin@advantageic.com> Message-ID: <937472.23031.qm@web65511.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> what is this unit for? If that *someone* isn't interested in all 10, I could be, given someone tells me what it's for. I'm getting my hands on some SONY equipment and I'm a little nervous you see! --- On Wed, 12/3/08, Kathy Galvin wrote: > From: Kathy Galvin > Subject: Sony MP-F52W-00D needed > To: cctech at classiccmp.org > Date: Wednesday, December 3, 2008, 2:32 PM > Hello > > Did you find the drive you were looking for > > SONY MP-F52W-00D I have qty 10 of them. > > Make me a offer on all 10 > > > > Email: Kathy at advantageic.com > > Phone: 978-568-0899 ask for Kathy From chrism3667 at yahoo.com Fri Dec 5 14:50:58 2008 From: chrism3667 at yahoo.com (Chris M) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 12:50:58 -0800 (PST) Subject: Hard disk material In-Reply-To: <49383EB1.5010100@axeside.co.uk> Message-ID: <70755.24649.qm@web65516.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> so no one on this list has any information on how magnetizable compounds are applied since the 80's say? --- On Thu, 12/4/08, Philip Belben wrote: > From: Philip Belben > Subject: Re: Hard disk material > To: "On-Topic Posts Only" > Date: Thursday, December 4, 2008, 3:33 PM > Roger Holmes wrote: > > > After many experiments they found they could not beat > the human hand applying a magnetisable compound like a > potter making a pot. Sounds very low tech but apparently it > works, and I have drums which have not been touched since > manufacture and they still work 46 years on. Of course for > you, low tech could be a bonus as it means low cost. Maybe > your local educational establishment has a skilled potter > who could do a great job for a reasonable price, or just for > interest. > > My mother is a potter, although she hasn't done it > professionally since before I was born. She was fascinated > when I told her of this. I don't thisnk she could > manage this for you, though :-( > > Philip. From dwight at svdc-imap00.amd.com Fri Dec 5 17:04:59 2008 From: dwight at svdc-imap00.amd.com (Dwight Elvey) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 15:04:59 -0800 Subject: Cat manuals Message-ID: <200812052304.PAA11485@svdc-imap00.amd.com> Hi Al I forgot to mention that the Technical manual seems to be missing page 93. This is the same as I have. It might be interesting to make a trip to the Stanford library and see if they have this page in their copy. I'm not sure when I'd be able to do that. Looking at the manual, there doesn't seem to be any context missing but a single page section could have been missed. For non-students and non-graduates, one is limited to 3 sessions a year at the special collections section of the library. One still has to reserve the document a few days in advance. If you are interested in researching other documents from Jef's collection or anything else in there vast collection, I can point you to their information. I wonder if the CHM might already have some special arrangement with the Standford library on shared information for research purposes. Jeff left quite a bit of stuff related to early Apple days. Dwight From ggs at shiresoft.com Fri Dec 5 21:03:46 2008 From: ggs at shiresoft.com (Guy Sotomayor) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 19:03:46 -0800 Subject: Bad reporting in our hobby: In-Reply-To: <20081205110806.E29140@shell.lmi.net> References: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> <493715F8.1020505@mdrconsult.com> <493939BF.9090901@gmail.com> <49394D8C.6020800@atarimuseum.com> <20081205102809.J29140@shell.lmi.net> <20081205110806.E29140@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <3673121A-D110-490F-82FD-80474267C27E@shiresoft.com> On Dec 5, 2008, at 11:11 AM, Fred Cisin wrote: >> No, not a VAX! Those are valuable! > > Would it actually damage the VAX? Probably not. I dropped an 11/780 off the lift gate of a truck once (not on purpose). The lift gate was about 3' off the ground when the VAX decided it wanted off (I wasn't going to go with it)! It made a dent in the ground. The VAX got some scratches but was otherwise fine. TTFN - Guy From IanK at vulcan.com Fri Dec 5 21:22:29 2008 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 19:22:29 -0800 Subject: Bad reporting in our hobby: In-Reply-To: <3673121A-D110-490F-82FD-80474267C27E@shiresoft.com> References: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> <493715F8.1020505@mdrconsult.com> <493939BF.9090901@gmail.com> <49394D8C.6020800@atarimuseum.com> <20081205102809.J29140@shell.lmi.net> <20081205110806.E29140@shell.lmi.net>, <3673121A-D110-490F-82FD-80474267C27E@shiresoft.com> Message-ID: Yeah, but move it from one floor of a building to another and you'd best reseat all the boards. Ironic, isn't it? -- Ian PS: my comment was mostly about the relative values of a VAX, a Miata and a Hummer. I don't own a Miata or a Hummer, but I have multiple VAXen.... ________________________________________ From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Guy Sotomayor [ggs at shiresoft.com] Sent: Friday, December 05, 2008 7:03 PM To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Re: Bad reporting in our hobby: On Dec 5, 2008, at 11:11 AM, Fred Cisin wrote: >> No, not a VAX! Those are valuable! > > Would it actually damage the VAX? Probably not. I dropped an 11/780 off the lift gate of a truck once (not on purpose). The lift gate was about 3' off the ground when the VAX decided it wanted off (I wasn't going to go with it)! It made a dent in the ground. The VAX got some scratches but was otherwise fine. TTFN - Guy From cisin at xenosoft.com Fri Dec 5 21:38:39 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 19:38:39 -0800 (PST) Subject: Bad reporting in our hobby: In-Reply-To: <3673121A-D110-490F-82FD-80474267C27E@shiresoft.com> References: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> <493715F8.1020505@mdrconsult.com> <493939BF.9090901@gmail.com> <49394D8C.6020800@atarimuseum.com> <20081205102809.J29140@shell.lmi.net> <20081205110806.E29140@shell.lmi.net> <3673121A-D110-490F-82FD-80474267C27E@shiresoft.com> Message-ID: <20081205192858.E49477@shell.lmi.net> > > Would it actually damage the VAX? > > Probably not. I dropped an 11/780 off the lift gate of a truck once > (not on purpose). The lift gate was about 3' off the ground when the > VAX decided it wanted off (I wasn't going to go with it)! It made a > dent in the ground. The VAX got some scratches but was otherwise fine. Warning: Never anger somebody enough to scratch a VAX. From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Fri Dec 5 21:45:14 2008 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 19:45:14 -0800 (PST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net> <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> <200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net> <49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> Message-ID: On Fri, 5 Dec 2008, Adam Sampson wrote: > David Griffith writes: > > > Consider a replacement board for the controller found in a Model M > > keyboard which is a drop-in replacement that turns the thing into a > > USB keyboard. > > You could suggest this to Unicomp -- they must already be making one for > their USB Model Ms, so perhaps they'd be willing to sell the board > separately. I'd buy a couple. Based on what I see at their website, it seems that their Model M is inferior to the Old Reliable part number 1391401. This suggests that whatever USB controller board they're using, it won't fit in the older boards. Furthermore, according to Wikipedia, none of the keyboards currently made by Unicomp have detachable cables. The PCB I'm rolling around in my head would. One thing I'm unclear about with this idea is how to store the program. Are there any single chip OTP microcontrollers that use fuse type memory as opposed to flash, UV, or some other sort that eventually goes bad? -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? From glen.slick at gmail.com Fri Dec 5 23:35:17 2008 From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 21:35:17 -0800 Subject: HP Integral PC 82971A EPROM/ROM module - anyone have docs? Message-ID: <1e1fc3e90812052135r1a95c932vf83d536d8a6073f9@mail.gmail.com> Anyone have docs on the 82971A EPROM/ROM module for the HP Integral PC? Anyone have one of these that they have in use for some purpose? I rediscovered one of these while cleaning up some piles of stuff. I'm curious if there is anything interesting that can be done with one of these. From dkelvey at hotmail.com Fri Dec 5 23:41:56 2008 From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 21:41:56 -0800 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net> <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> <200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net> <49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> Message-ID: > From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu---snip--- > > One thing I'm unclear about with this idea is how to store the program.> Are there any single chip OTP microcontrollers that use fuse type memory> as opposed to flash, UV, or some other sort that eventually goes bad?> Hi I don't know what you have against UV. I have EPROMs that are from 1973 that still hold their data. The fuse types are no more reliable than the UV types. Dwight _________________________________________________________________ You live life online. So we put Windows on the web. http://clk.atdmt.com/MRT/go/127032869/direct/01/ From bobalan at sbcglobal.net Sat Dec 6 00:34:44 2008 From: bobalan at sbcglobal.net (Bob Rosenbloom) Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2008 22:34:44 -0800 Subject: LA120 Decwriters on govliq In-Reply-To: <49373988.5080908@gmail.com> References: <6d6501090812031355u75a434d6n38b1f3cff73a4c08@mail.gmail.com> <49370323.20506@gjcp.net> <49373988.5080908@gmail.com> Message-ID: <493A1D04.9070806@sbcglobal.net> Saw these on govliquidation.com http://cgi.govliquidation.com/auction/view?id=2070645&convertTo=USD Bob From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Sat Dec 6 00:38:23 2008 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 22:38:23 -0800 (PST) Subject: LA120 Decwriters on govliq In-Reply-To: <493A1D04.9070806@sbcglobal.net> References: <6d6501090812031355u75a434d6n38b1f3cff73a4c08@mail.gmail.com> <49370323.20506@gjcp.net> <49373988.5080908@gmail.com> <493A1D04.9070806@sbcglobal.net> Message-ID: On Fri, 5 Dec 2008, Bob Rosenbloom wrote: > Saw these on govliquidation.com > > http://cgi.govliquidation.com/auction/view?id=2070645&convertTo=USD Mmmm... Anyone want to go for the lot and split it up? -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Sat Dec 6 03:08:27 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 07:08:27 -0200 Subject: Bad reporting in our hobby: References: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan><493715F8.1020505@mdrconsult.com><493939BF.9090901@gmail.com> <49394D8C.6020800@atarimuseum.com><20081205102809.J29140@shell.lmi.net><20081205110806.E29140@shell.lmi.net><3673121A-D110-490F-82FD-80474267C27E@shiresoft.com> <20081205192858.E49477@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <04f301c95782$5029ee20$46fea8c0@DeskJara> >> > Would it actually damage the VAX? >> Probably not. I dropped an 11/780 off the lift gate of a truck once >> (not on purpose). The lift gate was about 3' off the ground when the >> VAX decided it wanted off (I wasn't going to go with it)! It made a >> dent in the ground. The VAX got some scratches but was otherwise fine. > Warning: Never anger somebody enough to scratch a VAX. The VAX should be praised! PRAISE THE VAX! Because him is all the reign of (insert expletive here) power comsumption and weight! From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Sat Dec 6 03:52:03 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Sat, 06 Dec 2008 09:52:03 +0000 Subject: Bad reporting in our hobby: In-Reply-To: References: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> <493715F8.1020505@mdrconsult.com> <493939BF.9090901@gmail.com> <49394D8C.6020800@atarimuseum.com> <20081205102809.J29140@shell.lmi.net> <20081205110806.E29140@shell.lmi.net>, <3673121A-D110-490F-82FD-80474267C27E@shiresoft.com> Message-ID: <493A4B43.8050707@gjcp.net> Ian King wrote: > Yeah, but move it from one floor of a building to another and you'd best reseat all the boards. Ironic, isn't it? -- Ian > > PS: my comment was mostly about the relative values of a VAX, a Miata and a Hummer. I don't own a Miata or a Hummer, but I have multiple VAXen.... Hideously off-topic, but you are aware that you pretty much can't insure a Hummer in the UK, because it fails just about every safety test out there? One vehicle inspector I spoke to said that if you saw one stopped at traffic lights and kicked the front bumper *really* hard, you'd probably kill all the occupants. Just sayin'... (Maybe you could fit a Miata engine to your VAX) (Sorry Jay) Gordon From hp-fix at xs4all.nl Sat Dec 6 05:05:31 2008 From: hp-fix at xs4all.nl (Rik Bos) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 12:05:31 +0100 Subject: HP Integral PC 82971A EPROM/ROM module - anyone have docs? In-Reply-To: <1e1fc3e90812052135r1a95c932vf83d536d8a6073f9@mail.gmail.com> References: <1e1fc3e90812052135r1a95c932vf83d536d8a6073f9@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: > -----Oorspronkelijk bericht----- > Van: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org > [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] Namens Glen Slick > Verzonden: zaterdag 6 december 2008 6:35 > Aan: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Onderwerp: HP Integral PC 82971A EPROM/ROM module - anyone have docs? > > Anyone have docs on the 82971A EPROM/ROM module for the HP > Integral PC? > > Anyone have one of these that they have in use for some purpose? > > I rediscovered one of these while cleaning up some piles of stuff. > I'm curious if there is anything interesting that can be done > with one of these. > Not the docs but the software rom/eprom tools you can find here : http://hpmuseum.net/display_item.php?sw=200 You can use the eprom board as filesystem for all kinds of progs and data. If your not going to use/keep it I'm interested. -Rik From glen.slick at gmail.com Sat Dec 6 08:07:36 2008 From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 06:07:36 -0800 Subject: HP Integral PC 82971A EPROM/ROM module - anyone have docs? In-Reply-To: References: <1e1fc3e90812052135r1a95c932vf83d536d8a6073f9@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1e1fc3e90812060607v4de0f12bl70310380094e9476@mail.gmail.com> On Sat, Dec 6, 2008 at 3:05 AM, Rik Bos wrote: > > Not the docs but the software rom/eprom tools you can find here : > http://hpmuseum.net/display_item.php?sw=200 > > You can use the eprom board as filesystem for all kinds of progs and data. > If your not going to use/keep it I'm interested. > I'm not sure if the 82971A EPROM/ROM module I have works. If I knew how to configure the DIP switches and what kinds of EPROMs it supports I'd see if I could get it to work. It has 28-pin sockets so maybe it supports 27C256 and/or 27C512 EPROMs? From curt at atarimuseum.com Sat Dec 6 09:00:09 2008 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Sat, 06 Dec 2008 10:00:09 -0500 Subject: Bad reporting in our hobby: In-Reply-To: <493A4B43.8050707@gjcp.net> References: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> <493715F8.1020505@mdrconsult.com> <493939BF.9090901@gmail.com> <49394D8C.6020800@atarimuseum.com> <20081205102809.J29140@shell.lmi.net> <20081205110806.E29140@shell.lmi.net>, <3673121A-D110-490F-82FD-80474267C27E@shiresoft.com> <493A4B43.8050707@gjcp.net> Message-ID: <493A9379.6040407@atarimuseum.com> Really? I'm unaware of the differences in the UK model, but the US model has a 3/8" thick shaped steel bumper on the front and back, none of that "cover it over with a piece of flimsy plastic cosmetic bumper crap that cracks and caves in if you look at a car bumper the wrong way" it also has a 5/8" thick skid plate underneath - very important so as not to damage the undercarriage when going over another vehicle ;-) Here is a pic from VCF East 4.0 in the parking lot outside of Infoage... I nudged up to about 1/4 of an inch to Evan's car for the picture. http://www.atarimuseum.com/downloads/h2vsmiata.jpg Curt Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote: > Ian King wrote: >> Yeah, but move it from one floor of a building to another and you'd >> best reseat all the boards. Ironic, isn't it? -- Ian >> >> PS: my comment was mostly about the relative values of a VAX, a Miata >> and a Hummer. I don't own a Miata or a Hummer, but I have multiple >> VAXen.... > > Hideously off-topic, but you are aware that you pretty much can't > insure a Hummer in the UK, because it fails just about every safety > test out there? One vehicle inspector I spoke to said that if you saw > one stopped at traffic lights and kicked the front bumper *really* > hard, you'd probably kill all the occupants. > > Just sayin'... > > (Maybe you could fit a Miata engine to your VAX) > > (Sorry Jay) > Gordon > From wh.sudbrink at verizon.net Sat Dec 6 09:04:25 2008 From: wh.sudbrink at verizon.net (Bill Sudbrink) Date: Sat, 06 Dec 2008 10:04:25 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Ethan Dicks wrote: > > On Sat, Dec 6, 2008 at 6:30 AM, Ray Arachelian > wrote: > > I've used double sided foam tape + aluminum foil > > (yes the kind used for food) with a bit of scotch > > tape over the foil to prevent shorting in repairing > > Lisa keyboards. Worked just nicely once they were > > cut to the right circular shape. Yes, the key feel > > was off after that, but livable. > > > > http://lisafaq.sunder.net/lisafaq-hw-kb_repair.html > > I'm sure the foam response is different (different > density if nothing else), but after reading your > experiences, I'd be inclined to work with aluminum tape. > It is literally a roll of aluminum foil, pre-glued, > wax-paper-backed. I've used it quite successfully to make > grounding strips on workbenches (just screw a wire to one > end and run it to a ground bar via largish resistor). It's > at least as thick as household aluminum foil, and the glue > is quite tacky - more tacky than the glues I've seen on > double-sided foam tape. > > Just a thought for another material that might be easier to > work with than household foil, though what you used is > arguably about the cheapest stuff you could find to do the > job. If you've had any difficulties working with it, > consider the aluminum tape. > If find that old Mylar party balloons (wikipedia says that they are not in fact Mylar but metalized nylon film) used with the foam (mounting) tape (the kind with adhesive on both sides of the foam) gets good results. Note that the strength of the adhesive isn't really important as far as I can tell... usage of the keyboard constantly reinforces the bond. The other advantage of the balloons is that they are already plastic coated on one side, no requirement to overtape it. Bill From ploopster at gmail.com Sat Dec 6 09:17:58 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Sat, 06 Dec 2008 10:17:58 -0500 Subject: Bad reporting in our hobby: In-Reply-To: <04f301c95782$5029ee20$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan><493715F8.1020505@mdrconsult.com><493939BF.9090901@gmail.com> <49394D8C.6020800@atarimuseum.com><20081205102809.J29140@shell.lmi.net><20081205110806.E29140@shell.lmi.net><3673121A-D110-490F-82FD-80474267C27E@shiresoft.com> <20081205192858.E49477@shell.lmi.net> <04f301c95782$5029ee20$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <493A97A6.3020100@gmail.com> Alexandre Souza wrote: >>> > Would it actually damage the VAX? >>> Probably not. I dropped an 11/780 off the lift gate of a truck once >>> (not on purpose). The lift gate was about 3' off the ground when the >>> VAX decided it wanted off (I wasn't going to go with it)! It made a >>> dent in the ground. The VAX got some scratches but was otherwise fine. >> Warning: Never anger somebody enough to scratch a VAX. > > The VAX should be praised! > PRAISE THE VAX! Because him is all the reign of (insert expletive > here) power comsumption and weight! Bull. My ES/9021 outweighs and out-power-consumes pretty much any VAX. Peace... Sridhar From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Sat Dec 6 09:41:10 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Sat, 06 Dec 2008 09:41:10 -0600 Subject: Bad reporting in our hobby: In-Reply-To: <493A9379.6040407@atarimuseum.com> References: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> <493715F8.1020505@mdrconsult.com> <493939BF.9090901@gmail.com> <49394D8C.6020800@atarimuseum.com> <20081205102809.J29140@shell.lmi.net> <20081205110806.E29140@shell.lmi.net>, <3673121A-D110-490F-82FD-80474267C27E@shiresoft.com> <493A4B43.8050707@gjcp.net> <493A9379.6040407@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <493A9D16.1050703@gmail.com> Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > Really? I'm unaware of the differences in the UK model, but the US > model has a 3/8" thick shaped steel bumper on the front and back, none > of that "cover it over with a piece of flimsy plastic cosmetic bumper > crap that cracks and caves in if you look at a car bumper the wrong > way" it also has a 5/8" thick skid plate underneath - very important > so as not to damage the undercarriage when going over another vehicle ;-) Building something like a tank is not the optimum way of protecting the occupants in a crash. In an accident, the most squishy bits tend to fare the worse - and guess what they are? :-) From caveguy at sbcglobal.net Sat Dec 6 09:53:29 2008 From: caveguy at sbcglobal.net (Bob Bradlee) Date: Sat, 06 Dec 2008 10:53:29 -0500 Subject: Bad reporting in our hobby: In-Reply-To: <493A9379.6040407@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <200812061553.mB6FrUkZ095520@keith.ezwind.net> They should outlaw those assault vehicle ! No civilian needs a motorized battering ram that big in a civilized world. I bet it holds more than an acceptable amount of highly explosive fuel to improve its impact potential, while at the same time funding terrorists somewhere somehow. If road defense or protection from random road rage is the goal, than dump that modern windows based battering ram and get a nice clasic jeep and a [semi, automatic] weapon before it is too late. Bartlett makes a nice 50 cal that will stop anything on the road with a nice [head, block] shot if you insist on a modern solution to the problem :-) In keeping with the classic tone of this group, my I suggest a nice Willys more like the one pictured here. http://tinyurl.com/588k77 aka http://postcardbob.com/gallery/view_photo.php?set_albumName=GML2007&id=Rat_patrol_jeep Back under my rock ..... The other Bob On Sat, 06 Dec 2008 10:00:09 -0500, Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: >Really? I'm unaware of the differences in the UK model, but the US >model has a 3/8" thick shaped steel bumper on the front and back, none >of that "cover it over with a piece of flimsy plastic cosmetic bumper >crap that cracks and caves in if you look at a car bumper the wrong >way" it also has a 5/8" thick skid plate underneath - very important >so as not to damage the undercarriage when going over another vehicle ;-) From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Sat Dec 6 10:00:51 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Sat, 06 Dec 2008 10:00:51 -0600 Subject: Reading an MFM hard drive with a floppy disc analyser In-Reply-To: <4939E3B2.4010707@bitsavers.org> References: <4939E3B2.4010707@bitsavers.org> Message-ID: <493AA1B3.90404@gmail.com> Al Kossow wrote: > > Aside: I'm not sure if it's beneficial having a number of buffers and > > reading/writing multiple head data in parallel? > > This came up in one of the threads about the topic of either simulating > Massbus or HP 790x disk, I think. > > The problem was the controller timed out if the head-head > switching time wasn't fast enough. We're back on talking about interfacing to a drive though, not emulating that drive, so I don't *think* there should be any theoretical issue with reading or writing head-at-a-time or multiple heads in parallel. In practical terms though, anything which can speed up data acquisition is probably a good thing. cheers Jules From hp-fix at xs4all.nl Sat Dec 6 10:11:36 2008 From: hp-fix at xs4all.nl (Rik Bos) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 17:11:36 +0100 Subject: HP Integral PC 82971A EPROM/ROM module - anyone have docs? In-Reply-To: <1e1fc3e90812060607v4de0f12bl70310380094e9476@mail.gmail.com> References: <1e1fc3e90812052135r1a95c932vf83d536d8a6073f9@mail.gmail.com> <1e1fc3e90812060607v4de0f12bl70310380094e9476@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <304F82CDB81E46D987416126FD03F872@xp1800> > -----Oorspronkelijk bericht----- > Van: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org > [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] Namens Glen Slick > Verzonden: zaterdag 6 december 2008 15:08 > Aan: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Onderwerp: Re: HP Integral PC 82971A EPROM/ROM module - > anyone have docs? > > On Sat, Dec 6, 2008 at 3:05 AM, Rik Bos wrote: > > > > Not the docs but the software rom/eprom tools you can find here : > > http://hpmuseum.net/display_item.php?sw=200 > > > > You can use the eprom board as filesystem for all kinds of > progs and data. > > If your not going to use/keep it I'm interested. > > > > I'm not sure if the 82971A EPROM/ROM module I have works. If > I knew how to configure the DIP switches and what kinds of > EPROMs it supports I'd see if I could get it to work. > > It has 28-pin sockets so maybe it supports 27C256 and/or > 27C512 EPROMs? > I think due to its age it will support 27256 eprom's the design is from begin 80'th. On the museum site you can find the schematics drawn by Tony. He reverse engineered the Integral and some modules, the drawing of the RAM-module explanes the pinout of the memory controller. That should make it possible to figure out the connections to the eproms. The software always contains some manual pages. And I think you have to look for the 'installing peripherals manual' for the integral HP-UX (V1.0 or V5.0) -Rik From hachti at hachti.de Sat Dec 6 10:23:54 2008 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Sat, 06 Dec 2008 17:23:54 +0100 Subject: Omnibus core memory compatibility? Message-ID: <493AA71A.6040506@hachti.de> Hi folks, I have the following stuff: G104 X/Y drivers G227 Sense/Inhibit G619A 4K core stack The 4K stack is broken and lost forever. But I have a spare G646C "4K or 8" Stack sitting around. I *think* it has 8K. Does anyone know if I could use that stack with the rest of the package, using only 4K of the memory? Does anyone have schematics for the 8K core system? In my documentation I have only information about the 4K system. On Doug Jones' module list, there are mentioned 4K and 8K sense/inhibit boards. And there are mentioned X/Y driver boards, without 4K or 8K written on them. I would like to know how DEC expanded the core. Doubling X or Y lines would be the easiest. But why should that result in different sense/inhibit circuitry? The sense/inhibit connections look quite similar on both of my stacks... Or does everything change? Thanks for clarification :-) And if someone has a spare 4K stack, please contact me! The same for 8K sense/inhibit and X/Y drivers. Best wishes, Philipp :-) From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Sat Dec 6 11:07:02 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Sat, 06 Dec 2008 10:07:02 -0700 Subject: Bad reporting in our hobby: In-Reply-To: <493A9D16.1050703@gmail.com> References: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> <493715F8.1020505@mdrconsult.com> <493939BF.9090901@gmail.com> <49394D8C.6020800@atarimuseum.com> <20081205102809.J29140@shell.lmi.net> <20081205110806.E29140@shell.lmi.net>, <3673121A-D110-490F-82FD-80474267C27E@shiresoft.com> <493A4B43.8050707@gjcp.net> <493A9379.6040407@atarimuseum.com> <493A9D16.1050703@gmail.com> Message-ID: <493AB136.5000602@jetnet.ab.ca> Jules Richardson wrote: > Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: >> Really? I'm unaware of the differences in the UK model, but the US >> model has a 3/8" thick shaped steel bumper on the front and back, >> none of that "cover it over with a piece of flimsy plastic cosmetic >> bumper crap that cracks and caves in if you look at a car bumper the >> wrong way" it also has a 5/8" thick skid plate underneath - very >> important so as not to damage the undercarriage when going over >> another vehicle ;-) > > Building something like a tank is not the optimum way of protecting > the occupants in a crash. In an accident, the most squishy bits tend > to fare the worse - and guess what they are? :-) > Boobs .... From pete at dunnington.plus.com Sat Dec 6 11:11:18 2008 From: pete at dunnington.plus.com (Pete Turnbull) Date: Sat, 06 Dec 2008 17:11:18 +0000 Subject: Omnibus core memory compatibility? In-Reply-To: <493AA71A.6040506@hachti.de> References: <493AA71A.6040506@hachti.de> Message-ID: <493AB236.6040609@dunnington.plus.com> On 06/12/2008 16:23, Philipp Hachtmann wrote: > G104 X/Y drivers > G227 Sense/Inhibit > G619A 4K core stack > > The 4K stack is broken and lost forever. > > But I have a spare G646C "4K or 8" Stack sitting around. > I *think* it has 8K. There should be a sticker, usually a white paper DEC sticker but sometimes a silvery sticker, on the back, with a DEC part number. 8Kx12 stacks say H212 or H212A. > Does anyone know if I could use that stack with the rest of the package, > using only 4K of the memory? > > Does anyone have schematics for the 8K core system? In my documentation > I have only information about the 4K system. I don't know if you can use that stack with the 4K drivers and sense/inhibit card, but the print set with schematics for the 8K system (MM8-EJ) is on David Gesswein's site and mirrored at Highgate. So is the one for the 4K (MM8-E), which seems to include MM8-EJ diagrams. http://www.pdp8online.com/pdp8cgi/query_docs/view.pl?id=243 You could compare the top connections to the 4K schematics. I'd be interested to know myself. The notes on the 8K schematic list compatibilities that don't include the 4K drivers etc, but that may only be because you wouldn't get the full 8K with 4K drivers or sense/inhibit controllers. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Dec 6 12:22:35 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 18:22:35 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <03c901c95728$aa8808c0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> from "Alexandre Souza" at Dec 5, 8 08:26:50 pm Message-ID: > > > My problem with single-chip microcontrolelrs (PICs, etc) is trying to > > debug the firmware. If I have external program memory, I can hang a logic > > analyser off said memory's address bus and see just what the firmware is > > doing. But there's no way to really trace the code running in a PIC. > > Yes, you have. It is called ICD2. And of course, you can use a MCS-51 > with external ROM/RAM. Why not? If you use an external program memory device, then it ceases to be a single-chip microcontroller :-). > > > I can't afford the real ICE units for the PIC, etc. > > Sure you can. Have you searched for it? You cand do a > In-Circuit-Debugger for less than $20 And what are the 'host' requirements for this device? Presumably something I don't own, so I'd have to add the cost of the host machine and probably some proprietry OS. And the equipment needed to maintain that host. As I said, I can't afford it. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Dec 6 12:25:43 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 18:25:43 +0000 (GMT) Subject: The drift of a knowledge-based societ to a gadget-value-based In-Reply-To: from "Teo Zenios" at Dec 5, 8 05:35:40 pm Message-ID: > The more we advance the more the tools we use do most of the work and the > less designers need to know about what they are designing. In general I refuse to sue any tool (hardware or software) that I don't fully understand. IMHO using tools you don't understand leads to poor design, designs that fail under odd circumstances, and so on. This is one reason I stick to my classics. I understand those. I know how they'll behave (which is often _NOT_ how the documentation says they will behave), so I can trust what they are doing. > Very little general research is done anymore, and that's where people and > companies used to get their ideas for new things from. This is a separate moan of mine. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Dec 6 12:37:37 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 18:37:37 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <4939B613.8050105@gmail.com> from "Jules Richardson" at Dec 5, 8 05:15:31 pm Message-ID: > > Tony Duell wrote: > >> Tony, it MAY be possible, but I'm hard pressed to NOT believe in a PS/2 > > > > It's certainly possible. After all you can build a processor using only > > TTL chip, that was done many, many, times. Rememebr that the 74xxx TTL > > family does include some small RAMs and fusible link PROMs :-) So you > > could build a processor with data storage (RAM) and program memory > > (PROM). And surely you agree the interface is possible using a processor. > > That's just... sick. Beautifully sick :-) Why? There's an interesting parallel with the design of desktop calculators (one of my interests, probably on-topic). Some companies built them of essentially random logic. Others, HP in particular, made a processor, and added firmware to make it behave as a calcuator. I find the second design considerably more interesting. [As an aside, HP made a 16-bit bit serial processor in around 100 TTL chips including 9 PROMs (7 for microcode, 2 for the ALU, which was implemented as a loookup table). This was used in the 98x0 family, and is quite an interesting design). > > Now, for the next challenge, could it be done without the PROM and RAM ICs? Of course. You cam make anything from 7400s (NAND gates) if you have anough of them :-) > Gut-feeling is maybe something based around feeding scan codes into a giant > shift register and comparing that to some hard-wired lookup table on the PCB > (in effect a ROM, just without the IC) might be possible. Clock the relevant > data in parallel out of the 'ROM' and... A ROM can be considered to be an address decoder (for each combination of the address inputs, one output of this decoder is asseted), followed by a matrix of OR gates. The idea is that for each data output you OR together those address decoder outputs that correspond to addresses that have a '1' in that position of the word. So you could, in theory, use TTL decoders ('138, '154, etc) and NAND (those decoders have active-low outputs) the appropiate outputs of those together to make a ROM. [An aside again. The address decoder is a matrix of AND gates that AND different combinatiuons of address inputs and their inverses. So PROM consists of a fixed AND matrix follwed by a programmable OR matrix. If you have programmable AND matirx (you get to determine which inputs and/or their inverses get ANDed toegtehr to make each output of the first part of the chip) foillwoed by a fixed OR matrix (but the outputs of those AND gate are ORed together in a way determined by the IC manufactuer), then you have the classic PAL architecture. Some early PLAs (82S100, etc) let you progam both matrices, but there weren't enough AND terms 'in the middle' to let you make evey possible circuit with the given number of inputs and outputs] Of course you can make RAM by having D-types to store the bits, an decoder to decode the address on writing and clock the data into the appropriate D-types and multipelxers to select a particular word of D-types for reading. I actually did this once when I needed a high-speed (I was using F TTL) 8-byte RAM with separate read and write address inputs. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Dec 6 12:43:46 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 18:43:46 +0000 (GMT) Subject: HP Integral PC 82971A EPROM/ROM module - anyone have docs? In-Reply-To: <1e1fc3e90812052135r1a95c932vf83d536d8a6073f9@mail.gmail.com> from "Glen Slick" at Dec 5, 8 09:35:17 pm Message-ID: > > Anyone have docs on the 82971A EPROM/ROM module for the HP Integral PC? I have such a board. I have an uofficial hand-drawn schematic that's available in the usual way. I;ve also deduced the function of the DIP switches, and include that information below. HP82971 ROM/EPROM Module (for Integral PC) DIP switch settings -------------------------------------------------------------- S1 1-4 : Set card address (Off = logic 1) 1 : A19 2 : A20 3 : A21 4 : A22 S1 5-6 : Select wheter A20 is used to select the card : Exactly 1 of 5,6 must be on 5 On, 6 Off : A20 not used (S1(2) ignored) 5 Off, 6 On : A20 used S1 7-8 : Select wheter A19 is used to select the card : Exactly 1 of 7,8 must be on 7 On, 8 Off : A19 not used (S1(1) ignored) 7 Off, 8 On : A19 used S2 1-2 : Select use of ROM pin 22 Exactly 1 of 1,2 must be on 1 on, 2 off : Pin 22 gets A17 (pin is A16) 1 off, 2 onn : Pin 22 grounded (pin is OE/) S2 3-5 : Select bit 0 of ROM select decoder Exactly 1 of 3,4,5 must be on 3 : A16 4 : A17 5 : A18 S2 6-8 : Select bit 1 of ROM select decoder Exactly 1 of 6,7,8 must be on 6 : A19 7 : A18 8 : A17 S3 1-2 : Select use of ROM pin 1 Exactly one of 1,2 must be on 1 on, 2 off : Pin 1 gets +5V (pin is Vpp) 1 off, 2 on : Pin 1 gets A16 (pin is A15) S3 3-5 : Select pit 2 of ROM select decode Exactly 1 of 3,4,5 must be on 3 : A20 4 : A19 6 : A18 S3 6 : Not used S3 7,8 : Select timing Exactly 1 of 7,8 must be on 7 on, 8 off : DTACK after 300 ns 7 off, 8 on : DTACK after 200 ms Sensible combinations 512K Card 1M Card 2M Card ---------------------------------- 32K ROM 64K RPM 128K ROM S1 5 Off Off On S1 6 On On Off S1 7 Off On On S1 8 On Off Off S2 1 Off Off On S2 2 On On Off S2 3 On Off Off S2 4 Off On Off S2 5 Off Off On S2 6 Off Off On S2 7 Off On Off S2 8 On Off Off S3 1 On Off Off S3 2 Off On On S3 3 Off Off On S3 4 Off On Off S3 5 On Off Off > > Anyone have one of these that they have in use for some purpose? Unfortunately the slots in both my Integrals are full of more useful PCBs, do this one is sitting on the shelf. I beleive there's software on the Australian site to burn files into EPROMs which are then plugged into this board. I've not tried it yet. -tony From glen.slick at gmail.com Sat Dec 6 13:25:04 2008 From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 11:25:04 -0800 Subject: HP Integral PC 82971A EPROM/ROM module - anyone have docs? In-Reply-To: References: <1e1fc3e90812052135r1a95c932vf83d536d8a6073f9@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1e1fc3e90812061125q22e529a0w2293095003f6b712@mail.gmail.com> Thanks Tony, that should be enough info for me to see if I can get the card to work. So the card will take both 27C256 and 27C512. I have enough 27C256 on hand to stuff the board with those. What is the HP marked IC 1820-2311? Is that the address comparator? I will have to create the EPROM tools disk and then take a look at what info and tools are there. -Glen From schoedel at kw.igs.net Sat Dec 6 13:32:10 2008 From: schoedel at kw.igs.net (Kevin Schoedel) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 14:32:10 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net> <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> <200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net> <49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> Message-ID: >This made me start wondering about going a couple steps farther. Consider >a replacement board for the controller found in a Model M keyboard which >is a drop-in replacement that turns the thing into a USB keyboard. Why hack up a perfectly good keyboard when you can buy a PS/2-to-USB translator for pocket change? -- Kevin Schoedel VA3TCS From schoedel at kw.igs.net Sat Dec 6 13:33:21 2008 From: schoedel at kw.igs.net (Kevin Schoedel) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 14:33:21 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: >> > I can't afford the real ICE units for the PIC, etc. >> >> Sure you can. Have you searched for it? You cand do a >> In-Circuit-Debugger for less than $20 > >And what are the 'host' requirements for this device? Presumably >something I don't own, so I'd have to add the cost of the host machine >and probably some proprietry OS. And the equipment needed to maintain >that host. As I said, I can't afford it. I don't know PIC, but for the AVR equivalent the host requirements are an RS-232 port and the ability to run gdb. -- Kevin Schoedel VA3TCS From nico at farumdata.dk Sat Dec 6 13:47:38 2008 From: nico at farumdata.dk (Nico de Jong) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 20:47:38 +0100 Subject: Micros I Message-ID: <968FEB61C0F44CED8C9B7913017F90B7@udvikling> Hello all While doing a "minor" clean-up, I found "A guide to the construction and use of the Micros I", first revision, juni 1978. The company was located in Twickenham, Middlesex It contains full diagrams, BIOS listning, parts list, character generator details, etc. Anyone interested, or should I bin it ? Nico From cisin at xenosoft.com Sat Dec 6 14:07:31 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 12:07:31 -0800 (PST) Subject: Bad reporting in our hobby: In-Reply-To: <493A97A6.3020100@gmail.com> References: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan><493715F8.1020505@mdrconsult.com><493939BF.9090901@gmail.com> <49394D8C.6020800@atarimuseum.com><20081205102809.J29140@shell.lmi.net><20081205110806.E29140@shell.lmi.net><3673121A-D110-490F-82FD-80474267C27E@shiresoft.com> <20081205192858.E49477@shell.lmi.net> <04f301c95782$5029ee20$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <493A97A6.3020100@gmail.com> Message-ID: <20081206120003.U78665@shell.lmi.net> > > The VAX should be praised! > > PRAISE THE VAX! Because him is all the reign of (insert expletive > > here) power comsumption and weight! > On Sat, 6 Dec 2008, Sridhar Ayengar wrote: > Bull. My ES/9021 outweighs and out-power-consumes pretty much any VAX. Well, it becomes a theoretical question, since Evan, although unrepentent, has been adequately warned, and is surely never going to make that mistake enough additional times to warrant having BOTH a VAX AND an ES/9021 being dropped on him. From cisin at xenosoft.com Sat Dec 6 14:10:56 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 12:10:56 -0800 (PST) Subject: Bad reporting in our hobby: In-Reply-To: <200812061553.mB6FrUkZ095520@keith.ezwind.net> References: <200812061553.mB6FrUkZ095520@keith.ezwind.net> Message-ID: <20081206120742.K78665@shell.lmi.net> On Sat, 6 Dec 2008, Bob Bradlee wrote: > In keeping with the classic tone of this group, > my I suggest a nice Willys more like the one pictured here. The last Willys that I had was an FC170. It had a 4 x 9 foot box that would haul an amazing amount of classic comupter gear. From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Dec 6 14:08:27 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 20:08:27 +0000 (GMT) Subject: HP Integral PC 82971A EPROM/ROM module - anyone have docs? In-Reply-To: <1e1fc3e90812061125q22e529a0w2293095003f6b712@mail.gmail.com> from "Glen Slick" at Dec 6, 8 11:25:04 am Message-ID: > > Thanks Tony, that should be enough info for me to see if I can get the > card to work. So the card will take both 27C256 and 27C512. I have yes, but all the (EP)ROMs need to be of the same type > enough 27C256 on hand to stuff the board with those. > > What is the HP marked IC 1820-2311? Is that the address comparator? Yes. It's a 25LS2521, which is much the same thing as a 74LS688 (same pinout). An 8 bit identity comaprator, here used to enable the card for the approrpatie states of the high-order address lines. > > I will have to create the EPROM tools disk and then take a look at > what info and tools are there. Let me (us) know how you get on. I've never tried it. -tony From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Sat Dec 6 15:21:38 2008 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 13:21:38 -0800 (PST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net> <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> <200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net> <49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> Message-ID: On Sat, 6 Dec 2008, Kevin Schoedel wrote: > >This made me start wondering about going a couple steps farther. Consider > >a replacement board for the controller found in a Model M keyboard which > >is a drop-in replacement that turns the thing into a USB keyboard. > > Why hack up a perfectly good keyboard when you can buy a PS/2-to-USB > translator for pocket change? I want the USB interface to be internal. -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Sat Dec 6 15:58:53 2008 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Sat, 06 Dec 2008 13:58:53 -0800 Subject: Omnibus core memory compatibility? References: <493AA71A.6040506@hachti.de> Message-ID: <493AF59D.ADB6DB0E@cs.ubc.ca> Philipp Hachtmann wrote: > > I have the following stuff: > > G104 X/Y drivers > G227 Sense/Inhibit > G619A 4K core stack > > The 4K stack is broken and lost forever. > > But I have a spare G646C "4K or 8" Stack sitting around. > I *think* it has 8K. > > Does anyone know if I could use that stack with the rest of the package, > using only 4K of the memory? > > Does anyone have schematics for the 8K core system? In my documentation > I have only information about the 4K system. > > On Doug Jones' module list, there are mentioned 4K and 8K sense/inhibit > boards. And there are mentioned X/Y driver boards, without 4K or 8K > written on them. > I would like to know how DEC expanded the core. Doubling X or Y lines > would be the easiest. But why should that result in different > sense/inhibit circuitry? The sense/inhibit connections look quite > similar on both of my stacks... > Or does everything change? > > Thanks for clarification :-) > > And if someone has a spare 4K stack, please contact me! > > The same for 8K sense/inhibit and X/Y drivers. There was a technique called "anti-coincident addressing" that permitted the address space to be doubled without additional X/Y/inhibit drivers or sense amplifiers. All that was required was a little additional logic in the address decoding/selection and the additional cores. See http://www.cs.ubc.ca/~hilpert/e/coremem/index.html#anticoincidence . I'm not familiar with the DEC boardsets you're referring to but it's conceivable this technique was used to produce a 4K/8K combination boardset in some form. From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Sat Dec 6 16:17:03 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Sat, 06 Dec 2008 22:17:03 +0000 Subject: Bad reporting in our hobby: In-Reply-To: <493A9379.6040407@atarimuseum.com> References: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> <493715F8.1020505@mdrconsult.com> <493939BF.9090901@gmail.com> <49394D8C.6020800@atarimuseum.com> <20081205102809.J29140@shell.lmi.net> <20081205110806.E29140@shell.lmi.net>, <3673121A-D110-490F-82FD-80474267C27E@shiresoft.com> <493A4B43.8050707@gjcp.net> <493A9379.6040407@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <493AF9DF.3080305@gjcp.net> Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > Really? I'm unaware of the differences in the UK model, but the US > model has a 3/8" thick shaped steel bumper on the front and back, none > of that "cover it over with a piece of flimsy plastic cosmetic bumper > crap that cracks and caves in if you look at a car bumper the wrong > way" it also has a 5/8" thick skid plate underneath - very important > so as not to damage the undercarriage when going over another vehicle ;-) Precisely. In even a very low-speed shunt, all the force is transmitted to the soft squashy people inside. You end up with dead people with no visible injuries, and no recognisable internal organs. Never mind that they're made out of crappy flimsy metal - my first experience of a Hummer H2 was watching the front half being winched onto a low loader, while the paramedics hosed what was left of the rear seat passengers out of the back half a couple of hundred yards away. The police were taking the details of the people in the Renault Megane that had hit it amidships... Gordon From mbbrutman-cctalk at brutman.com Sat Dec 6 16:35:49 2008 From: mbbrutman-cctalk at brutman.com (Michael B. Brutman) Date: Sat, 06 Dec 2008 16:35:49 -0600 Subject: Plug-n-Play for vintage machines? In-Reply-To: References: <200811171919.OAA11347@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> from "der Mouse" at Nov 17, 8 02:15:04 pm Message-ID: <493AFE45.1000703@brutman.com> Here is a technique to consider .. I have some Dallas clock chips (1216E) that are designed to work under a ROM chip. By definition it can't have any side effects on the ROM chip that it is hiding underneath. The Dallas trick is to get the programmer to 'wiggle' the address lines with a known pattern before trying to talk to the clock chip. The sequence is long enough such that it will probably never be encounted as part of normal addressing for code reading the ROM. Once the magic sequence is recognized, the clock chip intercepts reads to the ROM chip, and also interprets further wiggling of the address lines as a write operation. If you use a technique like this you can get by without adding any extra hardware. Mike From curt at atarimuseum.com Sat Dec 6 17:50:35 2008 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Sat, 06 Dec 2008 18:50:35 -0500 Subject: Bad reporting in our hobby: In-Reply-To: <200812061553.mB6FrUkZ095520@keith.ezwind.net> References: <200812061553.mB6FrUkZ095520@keith.ezwind.net> Message-ID: <493B0FCB.1040309@atarimuseum.com> True, but I need to protect a VAX or an Arcade machine that I'm transporting - plus of course, have nice leather setting, in-seat DVD entertainment and XM-Radio ;-) Though the 50 cal accessory sounds like a nice add-on though! :-) Curt Bob Bradlee wrote: > They should outlaw those assault vehicle ! > No civilian needs a motorized battering ram that big in a civilized world. > I bet it holds more than an acceptable amount of highly explosive fuel to improve its impact potential, > while at the same time funding terrorists somewhere somehow. > > If road defense or protection from random road rage is the goal, > than dump that modern windows based battering ram and get a nice clasic jeep and a [semi, automatic] > weapon before it is too late. > > Bartlett makes a nice 50 cal that will stop anything on the road with a nice [head, block] shot if you insist > on a modern solution to the problem :-) > > In keeping with the classic tone of this group, > my I suggest a nice Willys more like the one pictured here. > > http://tinyurl.com/588k77 > aka http://postcardbob.com/gallery/view_photo.php?set_albumName=GML2007&id=Rat_patrol_jeep > > Back under my rock ..... > The other Bob > > On Sat, 06 Dec 2008 10:00:09 -0500, Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > > >> Really? I'm unaware of the differences in the UK model, but the US >> model has a 3/8" thick shaped steel bumper on the front and back, none >> of that "cover it over with a piece of flimsy plastic cosmetic bumper >> crap that cracks and caves in if you look at a car bumper the wrong >> way" it also has a 5/8" thick skid plate underneath - very important >> so as not to damage the undercarriage when going over another vehicle ;-) >> > > > > > From cclist at sydex.com Sat Dec 6 18:05:19 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sat, 06 Dec 2008 16:05:19 -0800 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: , Message-ID: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> On 6 Dec 2008 at 14:33, Kevin Schoedel wrote: > I don't know PIC, but for the AVR equivalent the host requirements are an > RS-232 port and the ability to run gdb. Later PICs have on-chip breakpoint debug communication via ICD (a 3- wire interface)--and there is the ability to run ICE4000. There is at least one AVR open-source debug package that operates through the SPI programming interface--using the same tool to program and debug. Programming hardware for either AVR or PIC is insanely simple and there's plenty of open-source or GNU software to handle it. Even if you purchase a PIC or AVR programmer, you're probably talking less than $20. Compared to the price of admission fee for, say, FPGA, it's a real bargain. I believe that one can even purchase a USB "stick" for about $20 for the TI MSP430 that includes not only the uC, but a USB programming and debugging interface. It just can't get any easier. But my saying this isn't going to convince anyone who's dead set against the idea. Cheers, Chuck From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Sat Dec 6 20:13:03 2008 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 02:13:03 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Triangle pseudo-Robertson screws [was Re: 5" floppy?.] In-Reply-To: <200811300354.WAA22676@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <848495.15439.qm@web23403.mail.ird.yahoo.com> It's funny you should say that. Earlier in that week (Monday 24th Nov.) a colleague at work decided to try and fix something on one of our analytical machines which was broken. It was something that noone at the lab was trained to do (infact noone I know knows anything about electronics, other than simple PC mobo stuff) and he decided to do it anyway. He was using some pliers with a rubber handle holding a connector and accidentally connected with something (I wasn't actually watching him at the time) almost electrocuting himself. I believe it would only have been 110V, but the machine itself has breakers on which noone had checked to see were off. Suffice to say, management had a stern word with him and a Health & Safety email was sent around the lab. For the record, we aren't officially allowed to change fuses at work - even though we have done it at home loads of times. It's certainly not the safest place to work, that's for sure. Only a couple of months back we lost power for half a day, as the UPS system melted down! Management were rumoured to have ran away from the unit as large arcs of electricity were coming from it. Anyway, I get your point. I joined this list prior to going inside my Dreamcast and Amiga as I knew I needed some electrics advice first. The fact that this turned out to be such a benefit (electrically and computerwise) was a bonus :) Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk --- On Sun, 30/11/08, der Mouse wrote: From: der Mouse Subject: Triangle pseudo-Robertson screws [was Re: 5" floppy?.] To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Date: Sunday, 30 November, 2008, 3:47 AM >> Actually, I once saw screws which looked a bit like Robertson (the >> square-socket kind) but with a triangular, not square, socket. > Those turn up on cheap domestic appliances over here. The only > possile reason for them is to make the device difficult to repair, I disagree. There is also an argument for them in the form of protecting consumers from the dangerous interiors of appliances. Of course, depending on the appliance, this may not actually be a valid argument. But if there's mains voltage present, it's an argument with some force to it. (While you and I may be competent to fix things, and competent to avoid hurting ourselves even in cases where we aren't able to fix, most small-appliance consumers are neither. Worse, many of them incorrectly think they are.) From pat at computer-refuge.org Sat Dec 6 21:05:12 2008 From: pat at computer-refuge.org (Patrick Finnegan) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 22:05:12 -0500 Subject: Bad reporting in our hobby: In-Reply-To: References: <000a01c9556f$8b4ab670$0301a8c0@evan> <3673121A-D110-490F-82FD-80474267C27E@shiresoft.com> Message-ID: <200812062205.12282.pat@computer-refuge.org> On Friday 05 December 2008, Ian King wrote: > Yeah, but move it from one floor of a building to another and you'd > best reseat all the boards. Ironic, isn't it? -- Ian Actually, the last time I was having problems with my VAX (shortly before this year's VCF/MW), I moved it to the VCF, and powered it up... Apparently, the jostling re-seated the boards enough to make it work again. Pat > > PS: my comment was mostly about the relative values of a VAX, a Miata > and a Hummer. I don't own a Miata or a Hummer, but I have multiple > VAXen.... VAXes may be less common, but in they certainly aren't worth as much (monetarily) as most cars these days. Anything more than a few k$ from a reseller for pretty much any model you can find readily would really suprise me. Pat > ________________________________________ > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] > On Behalf Of Guy Sotomayor [ggs at shiresoft.com] Sent: Friday, December > 05, 2008 7:03 PM > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Subject: Re: Bad reporting in our hobby: > > On Dec 5, 2008, at 11:11 AM, Fred Cisin wrote: > >> No, not a VAX! Those are valuable! > > > > Would it actually damage the VAX? > > Probably not. I dropped an 11/780 off the lift gate of a truck once > (not on purpose). The lift gate was about 3' off the ground when the > VAX decided it wanted off (I wasn't going to go with it)! It made a > dent in the ground. The VAX got some scratches but was otherwise > fine. > > TTFN - Guy -- Purdue University Research Computing --- http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/ The Computer Refuge --- http://computer-refuge.org From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Sun Dec 7 05:48:45 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Sun, 07 Dec 2008 11:48:45 +0000 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net> <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> <200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net> <49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <493BB81D.8020300@gjcp.net> David Griffith wrote: > On Sat, 6 Dec 2008, Kevin Schoedel wrote: > >>> This made me start wondering about going a couple steps farther. Consider >>> a replacement board for the controller found in a Model M keyboard which >>> is a drop-in replacement that turns the thing into a USB keyboard. >> Why hack up a perfectly good keyboard when you can buy a PS/2-to-USB >> translator for pocket change? > > I want the USB interface to be internal. > What happens when you want to use your Model M on a machine with a PS/2 interface, again? :-p Gordon From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Sun Dec 7 08:35:24 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 12:35:24 -0200 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) References: Message-ID: <07d201c95879$136df470$46fea8c0@DeskJara> >> Sure you can. Have you searched for it? You cand do a >> In-Circuit-Debugger for less than $20 > And what are the 'host' requirements for this device? Presumably > something I don't own, so I'd have to add the cost of the host machine > and probably some proprietry OS. And the equipment needed to maintain > that host. As I said, I can't afford it. Tony, I'll be very harsh on that: I see nothing wrong in using PCs and Windows. These are tools, not a religious oppinion. I bought it, it works. What is the matter? I think this talk of "proprietary OS" has come too far away from reality. You have tools that costed much more than a PC with windows, and I believe you don't have source code of the programs, OS and BIOS/Microcode/whatever of your VAX. I'm not up to nor against microsoft. Windows for me is a tool, and it just works. I paid a price to use a tool and I'm using that to earn money. And, in the spirit of the "free OS", you can always write a tool for whatever you use. Ah, you're not up to that? So bad...you get what you pay for :) BTW, there are ICD programs for linux. Maybe if you could use google to take a look on the microcontroller scene on linux you'd have lots of info. Greetz :) Alexandre From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Sun Dec 7 08:42:34 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 12:42:34 -0200 Subject: Arcade games References: <492B15E9.6010501@axeside.co.uk> <49325E45.1050409@axeside.co.uk> <49369A96.2080601@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <085d01c9587a$2d7fbb90$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > Well, that worked once or twice, I remember my final "ooops" attempt > ending in my mother telling me "tough, then walk home, maybe that'll > help you remember not to spend your bus money next time" The Mall was > like 10 miles away from home, took all night to get home, but that was > the last time I tried pulling that stunt!!! I'll reply again when I stop laughthing :oD Alexandre :o) From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Sun Dec 7 08:43:28 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 12:43:28 -0200 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com><4935209F.7266.2A15CDC@cclist.sydex.com><493564D6.18784.3ABCDF7@cclist.sydex.com> <291101c954e5$c1a3ef00$46fea8c0@DeskJara><81E99AB5-1E41-42C7-AE88-B823566DCF36@neurotica.com> <004001c95559$428f7d00$c7ae7700$@com> Message-ID: <08a401c9587a$5ad85070$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > I try to limit my gizmos to thru hole packages to make them easier for > the > hobbyist to assemble, and there just aren't any CPLDs available in thru > hole > packages that also have anywhere near enough logic to implement a whole > CRTC. Yes, they are! :o) The chip may not be TH, but the sockets are :) I have thru-hole sockets for thing up to PLCC-84. Why not use that? From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Sun Dec 7 08:46:36 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 12:46:36 -0200 Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project References: <006401c953fa$8294a980$87bdfc80$@com><4935F34D.5030100@jetnet.ab.ca> <4936BF6E.7060906@update.uu.se> Message-ID: <090d01c9587a$ad71a390$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > Also, closer related to the topic. I've just laid my hands on a Minec > 1000, a pretty awesome terminal depicted here: Hmmm...Now I remember...HP-95LX / 100LX / 200LX / 1000CX are CHEAP PC-XTs running at 7 MHz that you can use in your pocket...and has a serial interface :) I even have one myself! :D From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Sun Dec 7 08:53:53 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 12:53:53 -0200 Subject: uIEC (Was: Re: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project) References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com><81E99AB5-1E41-42C7-AE88-B823566DCF36@neurotica.com><004001c95559$428f7d00$c7ae7700$@com><49365EC3.4537.2E6D4DB@cclist.sydex.com><18742.55439.856418.356842@gargle.gargle.HOWL><7d3530220812031331y10989621i67033f5d84b662b0@mail.gmail.com><493709E5.8040702@jbrain.com> <340801c955ae$e8ac3480$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <493735A1.80003@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <099901c9587b$affaa2f0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > I hope to take a working unit to the World of Commodore this weekend in > Toronto. I'm **very** amazed. I have a SX-64 with a broken keyboard (which I'm planning in doing something to make it work, even if I have to create a PS/2-to-SX-64-converter) which would love to have one of these :D :D :D I want to play silkworm!!! :oD From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Sun Dec 7 09:00:19 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 13:00:19 -0200 Subject: Arcade games References: <492B15E9.6010501@axeside.co.uk><158d01c9526a$25a4fb30$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <49384363.3000104@axeside.co.uk> Message-ID: <0a6501c9587c$a405ead0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > Oh, and the Gottlieb pinball table was a game called "Totem", with a > Native American theme. I don't know if that has any significance. I had one of these, and the brazilian version "Sherokee" made by Rovamet in Sao Paulo. You can take a look at that in my page: http://www.tabajara-labs.com.br Look for pinball-taito and you'll find a sub-site with too much pinball info - all brazilian pinballs :) From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Sun Dec 7 09:02:14 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 13:02:14 -0200 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) References: <00ae01c94e49$070b4cd0$1521e670$@net> <20081124113652.A53673@shell.lmi.net> <002c01c95629$ce98d460$6bca7d20$@net><4938049A.4050409@atarimuseum.com> <49384964.8030503@bluewin.ch> Message-ID: <0a8301c9587c$f2c697a0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > The real solution would be a source of fresh foam pads.... > I could use a few sets. Easy for us: Go to any shop who sell leather tools and buy a "hole puncher". It is a stick with a hole in one side, and a sharp border. You use that with a hammer to create round roles in leather. Buy one with the INTERNAL size of the foam pads you want. Now you just need to find some scrap foam and a table of wood. You can cut as many foam pads as you want :o) hope that helps Alexandre From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Sun Dec 7 09:06:08 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 13:06:08 -0200 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) References: <49384D36.9040302@gmail.com> Message-ID: <0a8d01c9587d$67aa7370$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > It's weird, that... I suspect I could rustle up something 'traditional' > around > a Z80/6502, ROM, RAM and some decoding - but my brain just doesn't cope > well > with single-chip 'black boxes' such as PIC-based widgets. I really don't > know why! Jules, I work developing hardware for a living, and I'll tell you something: If you are used to Z80, you'll have a hard time using a PIC. But an AVR will be easy to you to swallow. When I began with microcontrollers, I used 8751. It was a more-or-less easy transition, since they just looked like any intel assembly you are used to. BUT when progress came, and I had to use a PIC, I spent **MONTHS** trying to swallow the different approach of PICs. I was saved when I found the AVR that is easier to program and prototype. One of the many things that appeals to me is that a 74'244 and a parallel port is all you need to program ANY of the AVR lineup in circuit (and even debug it using JTAG) and every program you make is a 5-minute-work to convert from a higher AVR to a lower one. Take a look at the ATMEGA 32, you'll have lots of fun with that. Alexandre From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Sun Dec 7 09:06:46 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 13:06:46 -0200 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) References: , <49384D36.9040302@gmail.com> <4937E7B9.16402.E4FA0A@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <0ab601c9587d$8e68a9f0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > One minor gripe that I have is that the uC community seems to put up > with really lame assembly-language tools, insisting on using C > instead. Many are Harvard architecture( not the MSP430), which calls Lame? Try AVR Studio and call THAT lame! :oO From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Sun Dec 7 09:11:52 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 13:11:52 -0200 Subject: [Sorta/Probably OT] Gmail "Terminal" theme References: Message-ID: <0b0201c9587e$30bd0f70$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > For those Gmail users out there: > Click "Settings" / "Themes" and choose the _Terminal_ theme. > It gives you a (kind of) cool terminal looking theme within a web > browser when logged in to you Gmail. huauhauhauhauhauhauhauhauhauha LOVED THAT! :D From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Sun Dec 7 10:31:50 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Sun, 07 Dec 2008 10:31:50 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493BB81D.8020300@gjcp.net> References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net> <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> <200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net> <49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> <493BB81D.8020300@gjcp.net> Message-ID: <493BFA76.60402@gmail.com> Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote: > David Griffith wrote: >> On Sat, 6 Dec 2008, Kevin Schoedel wrote: >> >>>> This made me start wondering about going a couple steps farther. >>>> Consider >>>> a replacement board for the controller found in a Model M keyboard >>>> which >>>> is a drop-in replacement that turns the thing into a USB keyboard. >>> Why hack up a perfectly good keyboard when you can buy a PS/2-to-USB >>> translator for pocket change? >> >> I want the USB interface to be internal. >> > > What happens when you want to use your Model M on a machine with a PS/2 > interface, again? :-p You plug it into your USB-to-PS/2 translator? ;) I suppose a PS/2-to-USB translator internal to the keyboard *might* be possible, but with the retention of the usual PS/2 + AT socket on the back - that way the keyboard would be really versatile. But then I've just reacquainted myself with a Model M (thanks, Brian!) and I suspect there's not the free space inside to do it (I've not had the case apart to poke around inside) I need to buy a PS/2-to-USB translator for use with the above keyboard, so I may well shop around for the smallest that I can find and see if this is possible... (mind you, a genuine vintage Model M may well be pushing things as far as power requirements already) cheers Jules From cclist at sydex.com Sun Dec 7 11:22:51 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sun, 07 Dec 2008 09:22:51 -0800 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <0ab601c9587d$8e68a9f0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: , <0ab601c9587d$8e68a9f0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <493B95EB.2158.1ACD15@cclist.sydex.com> On 7 Dec 2008 at 13:06, Alexandre Souza wrote: > > One minor gripe that I have is that the uC community seems to put up > > with really lame assembly-language tools, insisting on using C > > instead. Many are Harvard architecture( not the MSP430), which calls > > Lame? Try AVR Studio and call THAT lame! :oO That's precisely what I call lame. An assembler with clumsy syntax that forces one to define constants as: .EQU Name = Value Terrible macro facilities. No strong typing or ways to form local variables. One can't even access the name of the label field in a macro invocation. I could compile a long list of deficiencies. There were far better assemblers in the 1960s, running on far more limited hardware. Perhaps the people who wrote the AVR assembler never had to code much in assembly. One might have argued in the beginning that these were only microcontrollers capable of running only a very small program, so what did it matter. But that's no longer true, which only demonstrates the limited vision of whoever wrote the development toolkit. I care less about an IDE than I do about the tools which comprise it. Give me an assembler which has at least the capabilities of, say, MASM 5.0 or S/360 assembler and I won't feel that I'm too limited by the tools. Of course, since AVR has an "official" assembler, improvments on the syntax and features are considered to be "nonstandard". So we code with a hood tied over our heads and curse the darkness. I know the standard answer--I've seen it on the AVR forums--use C. I think that's a cop-out. I can write C just fine, but I enjoy writing a well-crafted piece of assembly. Giving me a rusty screwdriver and a dull hatchet as a toolkit is shameful. Cheers, Chuck From hoelscher-kirchbrak at freenet.de Sun Dec 7 12:25:49 2008 From: hoelscher-kirchbrak at freenet.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?H=F6lscher?=) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 19:25:49 +0100 Subject: RSTS/E problem Message-ID: Hi, after installing and SYSGENing of RSTS/E V9.6 I get the following error: Beginning RSTS/E system startup... 88.12.07 12:10 Installing monitor overlays 88.12.07 12:10 Mounting disks 88.12.07 12:10 Assigning logical names 88.12.07 12:10 Starting error logging ?ERRINT - ?No room for user on device at Line 1265 88.12.07 12:10 Setting system characteristics 07-Dec-88 12:10 PM Installing run-time systems and libraries 07-Dec-88 12:10 PM Setting terminal characteristics 07-Dec-88 12:10 PM Defining system commands 07-Dec-88 12:10 PM Setting printer characteristics 07-Dec-88 12:10 PM Starting spoolers ?Unable to start Print/Batch Services ?No room for additional jobs Could anyone please give me advice/hints? Regards, Ulli From mcguire at neurotica.com Sun Dec 7 12:56:01 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 13:56:01 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <4938062C.8040802@atarimuseum.com> References: <00ae01c94e49$070b4cd0$1521e670$@net> <20081124113652.A53673@shell.lmi.net> <002c01c95629$ce98d460$6bca7d20$@net> <4938062C.8040802@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: On Dec 4, 2008, at 11:32 AM, Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > Here is another solution: > > http://www.swtpc.com/mholley/CT_1024/KBD5_Assembly.pdf > > Look at page 6 for the parts list, you could build your own PIO > encoder board, you'll have to do some digging around for a 2376 > keyboard encoder, but places like netcomponents.com and > freetradezone.com are great sources for obsolete IC's I should have a few 2376s here, if someone needs them I'll look. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sun Dec 7 12:44:29 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 18:44:29 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Dec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm Message-ID: > > On 6 Dec 2008 at 14:33, Kevin Schoedel wrote: > > > I don't know PIC, but for the AVR equivalent the host requirements are an > > RS-232 port and the ability to run gdb. > > Later PICs have on-chip breakpoint debug communication via ICD (a 3- > wire interface)--and there is the ability to run ICE4000. > > There is at least one AVR open-source debug package that operates > through the SPI programming interface--using the same tool to program > and debug. Can you program and debug either or both of these chips without propietary hardware or software. In other words, is documentation for the following availalbe (without signing an NDA, etc ) 1) How to send/receive words to the chip (what lines to wiggle and how, what voltages to apply, etc) 2) The binary instruction set 3) THe debugging commands/responses Could I, if I wanted, make the programmer and write the software from scratch? > I believe that one can even purchase a USB "stick" for about $20 for > the TI MSP430 that includes not only the uC, but a USB programming > and debugging interface. It just can't get any easier. Hmmm.... That's not too useful if you don't have a single machine that supports USB... -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sun Dec 7 12:56:47 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 18:56:47 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <07d201c95879$136df470$46fea8c0@DeskJara> from "Alexandre Souza" at Dec 7, 8 12:35:24 pm Message-ID: > Tony, I'll be very harsh on that: I see nothing wrong in using PCs and > Windows. These are tools, not a religious oppinion. I bought it, it works. > What is the matter? The p[roblem is that (a) I can't afford it, (b) I can't afford to maintain it, and (c) if/when it stops working, I haven't a clue how to fix it. > > I think this talk of "proprietary OS" has come too far away from > reality. You have tools that costed much more than a PC with windows, and I Indeed I do. My lathe, for example. But that came with full exploded diagrams and parts lists (oh, and a wiring diagram for the motor starter box). I understand how that works. And while I certainly don't have the skill to make many of the parts myself, I am capable of seeing which one/ones are defective, I am capable of measuing run-out, etc and I am capable of buying the right spares form the makers. > believe you don't have source code of the programs, OS and > BIOS/Microcode/whatever of your VAX. I do for the PDP11s. I have an Ancient Unix source license, I have the microcode sources in the printset, I have the boot ROM sources and even scheamtics (it's a diode matrix ROM, I actually have schematics showing which diodes are fitted for various bootstraps). I do, mostly, for the HP98x0. I have schematics. I have an annotated source lising for the CPU microcode. I have the patents which give much, if not all, of the firmware source I do for this PC. I have the schematics for everything apart from the hard disk. I have the BIOS soruces. And of course I have the linux source > I'm not up to nor against microsoft. Windows for me is a tool, and it > just works. I paid a price to use a tool and I'm using that to earn money. For me a tool has to work, and it has to be pleasant to use. If it isn't, I use something else. And the few times I've used Windows, I've found it to be extremely unreliable. I also have an aversion to using things I can't fix when they go wrong. Becuase they tend to go wrong at the most inconenient moment. > And, in the spirit of the "free OS", you can always write a tool for > whatever you use. Ah, you're not up to that? So bad...you get what you pay > for :) Well, at one time manufactuers of programmable chips were very bad about providing full documentation on how to program them. I have yet to find a completely 'open' FPGA or CPLD -- meaning a device where I can get, without signing an NDA or similar, full specification on how to send bits to the device (what pins to wiggle and how, what are the critical timings, what voltages to apply, etc) and also how to turn my design into those bits. Microcontrollers do tend to be more open (the PICs that I've used were fully documented), but I am not sure if this ICD system is. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sun Dec 7 12:59:05 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 18:59:05 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project In-Reply-To: <090d01c9587a$ad71a390$46fea8c0@DeskJara> from "Alexandre Souza" at Dec 7, 8 12:46:36 pm Message-ID: > Hmmm...Now I remember...HP-95LX / 100LX / 200LX / 1000CX are CHEAP > PC-XTs running at 7 MHz that you can use in your pocket...and has a serial > interface :) I even have one myself! :D THey also have kermit in ROM, Xmodem (I think) and plain ASCII capture and upload. Oh, and a reasonable text editor. The 95 just has TxD and RxD on the serial port, the 100 (and later machines) have the flow control lines as well IIRC. -tony From mcguire at neurotica.com Sun Dec 7 13:19:03 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 14:19:03 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <6F8D0928-A19C-4F2B-9721-2A5972B0EBEC@neurotica.com> On Dec 7, 2008, at 1:44 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >>> I don't know PIC, but for the AVR equivalent the host >>> requirements are an >>> RS-232 port and the ability to run gdb. >> >> Later PICs have on-chip breakpoint debug communication via ICD (a 3- >> wire interface)--and there is the ability to run ICE4000. >> >> There is at least one AVR open-source debug package that operates >> through the SPI programming interface--using the same tool to program >> and debug. > > Can you program and debug either or both of these chips without > propietary hardware or software. In other words, is documentation > for the > following availalbe (without signing an NDA, etc ) > > 1) How to send/receive words to the chip (what lines to wiggle and > how, > what voltages to apply, etc) > > 2) The binary instruction set > > 3) THe debugging commands/responses > > Could I, if I wanted, make the programmer and write the software from > scratch? (just jumping in) You can for PICs, most mcs51 variants, most ARM implementations...and probably AVR as well, but I've not used them myself so I can't say for sure. With all respect, modern microcontrollers are not as inaccessible and closed-down as you think. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Sun Dec 7 13:20:02 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 17:20:02 -0200 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) References: Message-ID: <0d2001c958a0$da9354b0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > Can you program and debug either or both of these chips without > propietary hardware or software. In other words, is documentation for the > following availalbe (without signing an NDA, etc ) Yes. Everything avaiable. From mcguire at neurotica.com Sun Dec 7 13:22:19 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 14:22:19 -0500 Subject: Making an RT-11 TU58 Image In-Reply-To: <49384B10.1070506@atarimuseum.com> References: <1228422479.6411.125.camel@spasmo> <49384B10.1070506@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <54E406F6-34E5-469E-AFEB-0503A2433463@neurotica.com> On Dec 4, 2008, at 4:26 PM, Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > I've got a large box of TU-58's with boot up and diags for a Vax > 11/750, any out there want to make archives of them or has that > already been done? Please don't let them go to far away. I just got an 11/750 (thanks Pat!), and while I have a set of tapes, I've not yet gone through them to see what's there. I did just get the correct tubing to fix the gooey TU58 roller though, and have performed a "smoke test" on the machine, so I hope to be able to fire it up "for real" soon. Ahh, the 11/750. Such personality in that machine! And great memories for me, from when I was a sysadmin on one of those and a pair of MicroVAX-3600s (all running VMS) years ago. I am so very happy to have this machine here. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Sun Dec 7 13:27:51 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 17:27:51 -0200 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) References: Message-ID: <0d2601c958a2$1e0fada0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > The p[roblem is that (a) I can't afford it, (b) I can't afford to > maintain it, and (c) if/when it stops working, I haven't a clue how to > fix it. You can have a windows PC with windows for free, just look around :) And I'm not talking about pirated software :) > Indeed I do. My lathe, for example. But that came with full exploded > diagrams and parts lists (oh, and a wiring diagram for the motor starter > box). I understand how that works. And while I certainly don't have the > skill to make many of the parts myself, I am capable of seeing which > one/ones are defective, I am capable of measuing run-out, etc and I am > capable of buying the right spares form the makers. Why you would need that with windows? Everything I use just works, why would that stop work? > For me a tool has to work, and it has to be pleasant to use. If it isn't, > I use something else. And the few times I've used Windows, I've found it > to be extremely unreliable. That is something I find to be VERY funny. I think I'm one of the only people in universe that has a stable windows. My windows installation NEVER breaks. I have no trouble with that. Period. But: - I know how it works sufficiently not to install things that will make that uninstable - I have a good antivirus, this is the first program I install when I boot windows at first time - I have a set of services to disable - I use process explorer to see what is running and disable uneeded programs/services - I don't instal dubious programs (e.g.: I know what I'm running) - I have an ORIGINAL copy of windows - I NEVER EVER EVER install windows updates, automatic or manual - I NEVER EVER EVER let outlook express download images or open automatically attachments - I NEVER EVER EVER let MSN open automatically anything, run things I don't know or install "emoticon packs" Tony, trust me. I have a WORKABLE and PLEASURE TO USE copy of windows XP. Of course I have now a sizeable machine (Core 2 quad, 4GB RAM, Geforce 8600, 22" LCD) but it worked just as well with my old athlon 1800/512 ram. It is a matter of KNOWING what you do with your windows. > I also have an aversion to using things I can't fix when they go wrong. > Becuase they tend to go wrong at the most inconenient moment. Make it work well and it will never go wrong. Trust me. > Well, at one time manufactuers of programmable chips were very bad about > providing full documentation on how to program them. I have yet to find a > completely 'open' FPGA or CPLD -- meaning a device where I can get, > without signing an NDA or similar, full specification on how to send bits > to the device (what pins to wiggle and how, what are the critical > timings, what voltages to apply, etc) and also how to turn my design into > those bits. Microcontrollers do tend to be more open (the PICs that I've > used were fully documented), but I am not sure if this ICD system is. And it is still this way. No FPGA or CPLD open docs. But take a look at www.atmel.com and see for yourself how it works. Greetings Alexandre, your fan :) From bear at typewritten.org Sun Dec 7 13:34:14 2008 From: bear at typewritten.org (r.stricklin) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 11:34:14 -0800 Subject: Keyboard model # for Apollo DN 10000? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <41AFB782-88D4-4C79-BA5C-9658E979D8DD@typewritten.org> On Dec 3, 2008, at 10:04 AM, Richard wrote: > Does anyone know the model number for a keyboard that goes with an > Apollo DN10000? There's a sticker on the back side of the keyboard > with a model number like 014555-001. I do not believe there is anything special about the DN10000 keyboard, compared with other Apollo keyboards using the DIN plug. ok bear From cclist at sydex.com Sun Dec 7 13:42:25 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sun, 07 Dec 2008 11:42:25 -0800 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Dec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, Message-ID: <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> On 7 Dec 2008 at 18:44, Tony Duell wrote: > Can you program and debug either or both of these chips without > propietary hardware or software. In other words, is documentation for the > following availalbe (without signing an NDA, etc ) Absolutely. Many of the tools are open-source, royalty-free, running on a variety of OS platforms. The chips themselves are documented to a fare-thee-well. For example, the ATMega8 user's manual runs to over 300 pages (PDF downloadable for free) and it doesn't even discuss the instruction set--that's in the "AVR family" manual. > 1) How to send/receive words to the chip (what lines to wiggle and how, > what voltages to apply, etc) > > 2) The binary instruction set > > 3) THe debugging commands/responses Yes, all of that, provided that you're working with a chip that has onboard breakpoint capabilities (not all do). When checking out a new circuit, I use a little debugger that I wrote myself for the AVR that communicates over an RS-232C serial port (I had to add a MAX202 to provide EIA voltage levels). It allows me to twiddle bits on various ports and on-chip devices to see what happens. It took me about 2 days to learn the instruction set and write the debugger. It worked on the 2nd try. Even if you're reduced to "cut and try", programming is usually very fast and can be done in-circuit. > Could I, if I wanted, make the programmer and write the software from > scratch? Many people in fact, do just that. Here, for example, is one parallel-port in-circuit programmer for the AVR: http://wiredworld.tripod.com/tronics/atmel_isp.html It is by no means the simplest, requiring one 74HCT245 to work. If you want to write your own programming software, the manual documents the protocol. Similar devices and documentation exist for the PIC uCs. uCs are simple, cheap and ubiquitous. They're even "vintage." It's just plain silly to eschew them. Ceers, Chuck From toby at coreware.co.uk Sun Dec 7 13:57:12 2008 From: toby at coreware.co.uk (Tobias Russell) Date: Sun, 07 Dec 2008 19:57:12 +0000 Subject: Making an RT-11 TU58 Image In-Reply-To: <54E406F6-34E5-469E-AFEB-0503A2433463@neurotica.com> References: <1228422479.6411.125.camel@spasmo> <49384B10.1070506@atarimuseum.com> <54E406F6-34E5-469E-AFEB-0503A2433463@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <1228679832.6411.153.camel@spasmo> > I did just get the correct tubing to fix the gooey TU58 roller > though, and have performed a "smoke test" on the machine, so I hope > to be able to fire it up "for real" soon. > Out of interest what did you use to replace the roller and where did you get it from? I have a TU58 and both rollers have become brittle and cracked so I need to replace them. Any advice on a replacement would be very useful! Thanks, Toby -- This message has been scanned for viruses and dangerous content by MailScanner, and is believed to be clean. From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Sun Dec 7 13:58:01 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Mon, 8 Dec 2008 08:58:01 +1300 Subject: Making an RT-11 TU58 Image In-Reply-To: <54E406F6-34E5-469E-AFEB-0503A2433463@neurotica.com> References: <1228422479.6411.125.camel@spasmo> <49384B10.1070506@atarimuseum.com> <54E406F6-34E5-469E-AFEB-0503A2433463@neurotica.com> Message-ID: On Mon, Dec 8, 2008 at 8:22 AM, Dave McGuire wrote: > On Dec 4, 2008, at 4:26 PM, Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: >> >> I've got a large box of TU-58's with boot up and diags for a Vax 11/750, >> any out there want to make archives of them or has that already been done? > > Please don't let them go to far away. I just got an 11/750 (thanks Pat!), > and while I have a set of tapes, I've not yet gone through them to see > what's there. I'm also interested in any tape images for the 11/750. I haven't fired mine up in years, but more discussion on the list about them will certainly motivate me to do so. I often muse about what to do about disk, though. The last time I powered an 11/750 up, it had an SI9900 w/two SMD disks, and a UDA50 w/RA81. I kinda don't mind the 800-1000W of the CPU, but three 14" disks get expensive to keep turning (as I've posted before - nearly a gig of storage on this machine *20 years ago* - all bought new in the early-to-mid 1980s for around $50,000) > I did just get the correct tubing to fix the gooey TU58 roller though, and > have performed a "smoke test" on the machine, so I hope to be able to fire > it up "for real" soon. Cool. > Ahh, the 11/750. Such personality in that machine! And great memories for > me, from when I was a sysadmin on one of those and a pair of MicroVAX-3600s > (all running VMS) years ago. I am so very happy to have this machine here. Agreed. My first experiences with VMS and UNIX was on my 11/750 in 1984. I was quite happy to be able to save it when the company closed ten years later. In our heyday, we had dozens of users on this box, and it was quite responsive as long as we didn't have too many people sitting around idle in MASS-11 and VMS MAIL (those were our highest memory-using apps - more than about 20 users in them, idle or not, and we started paging and swapping). After the company went through a couple of rounds of downsizing, there would be frequent times that there were only 3 active users on the machine - it was downright peppy then. Even into the mid-1990s, it was a nice single-user machine. The only other machine we had that could touch it was a MicroVAX-II, but that was less fun as a software development platform because despite a CPU that was easily 50% faster, and 12.5% more memory, the disk performance difference between Qbus MFM disk (RD53/RQDX3) and MASSBUS disk really came out during compiles. At some point I'm going to have to finish my plans to mount a 5.25" disk of some type (ESDI, SMD, SDI...) inside a 11/750 for a single-cabinet system. At its maximum extent, ours spanned 5 cabinets full-time (CPU, TU80+BA11, SI9900+SMD disk+BA11, TU78, 80-port patch rack), and occasionally reached out to an RA81 on our 8200 via the B-port (so we could back the drive up and move massive amounts of files quickly) Nice, but more space than I have at home (and I couldn't recreate the original configuration now since the TU78 was not rescued with the CPU, way back when). Dave, if you have any 11/750 questions, I'll do my best to help. Since it was my introduction to the VAX, I've always had a place in my heart for them and I love to see them still kicking. -ethan From toby at coreware.co.uk Sun Dec 7 14:02:32 2008 From: toby at coreware.co.uk (Tobias Russell) Date: Sun, 07 Dec 2008 20:02:32 +0000 Subject: Making an RT-11 TU58 Image In-Reply-To: <49399945.70702@rogerwilco.org> References: <200812050011.mB50Bnng087740@dewey.classiccmp.org> <49399945.70702@rogerwilco.org> Message-ID: <1228680152.6411.159.camel@spasmo> Thanks for the advice. I've made an RL02 sized TU58 image and copied in the modded DW.SYS driver from Wills site (I wrote up an explanation of what I have did here if anyone else wants to give it a go http://www.pdp11.co.uk/2008/12/07/building-an-rt-11-tape-for-a-tu58-emulator/) Will try booting it tomorrow but I think it should be fine. Toby > > > > I'd now like to get an RT-11 TU58 image so I can run > > a boot into a real operating system on my disk-less > > -11s. Whats the best way to go about making a suitable > > image? > > > > I have a working RT11 v5 setup under SIMH. Is it > > possible to make a suitable image via this? One > > thought is to make a RX01 boot image and but with a > > TU58 boot block and then use this on the emulator. > > > Yes, it's quite easy. You can build an RX image, or > as hinted at above, you can create an entire RL02-sized > image and use it with the TU58 driver (DD). It turns > out that RT11's DD driver only cares about size of the > media when it *writes*, but it can read any properly > initialized media of any size. > As you suggest, using SIMH, mount up a blank 'disk' of > whatever variety you want (RX01 would be fine, but a > little small for working with RT11 easily, I'd suggest > an RL01 or RL02), and initialize it, copy over the > files you want, and just as you say, do a COPY/BOOT > with the TU58 driver (DD), such as: > > .COPY/BOOT:DD DL0:RT11SJ.SYS DL0: > > to put the TU58 driver in the boot block of a RL0x. > > At this point you'll need to physically cable your > Linux box running the TU58 emulator and the PDP-11 > with a simple null-modem cable. > > When you fire up the PDP-11 hardware, you'll have to > enter the TU58 bootstrap (which Will gives in his > emulator documentation). At that point you should be > home free. It won't be fast, but it will certainly > function fine. > > If you do create a non-TU58-sized virtual disk image, > you'll want to again refer to Will's docs where he > gives you a patch to the DD.SYS driver, setting the > number of blocks allowed. This will allow you to read > and write to a larger (than standard TU58) disk image. > > Good luck! > > - Jared > > -- This message has been scanned for viruses and dangerous content by MailScanner, and is believed to be clean. From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Sun Dec 7 14:04:35 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Mon, 8 Dec 2008 09:04:35 +1300 Subject: Making an RT-11 TU58 Image In-Reply-To: <1228679832.6411.153.camel@spasmo> References: <1228422479.6411.125.camel@spasmo> <49384B10.1070506@atarimuseum.com> <54E406F6-34E5-469E-AFEB-0503A2433463@neurotica.com> <1228679832.6411.153.camel@spasmo> Message-ID: On Mon, Dec 8, 2008 at 8:57 AM, Tobias Russell wrote: >> I did just get the correct tubing to fix the gooey TU58 roller >> though, and have performed a "smoke test" on the machine, so I hope >> to be able to fire it up "for real" soon. >> > Out of interest what did you use to replace the roller and where did you > get it from? I have a TU58 and both rollers have become brittle and > cracked so I need to replace them. Any advice on a replacement would be > very useful! Tygon tubing from the hardware store. There's been plenty of discussion over the years about it as a suitable replacement. One foot of it will refurb many drives. One of the standard off-the-shelf sizes (7/8"? 3/4"?) is just right. You have to remove all the brittle (or gooey) rubber from the spindle then cut a small slice of tubing to about the same size - make sure it's wide enough that the tape won't fall off an edge - then just slip it on. I don't think you'll need any adhesive, but if you have any obvious slippage, one drop of cyanoacrilate (superglue) should take care of that and be easy enough to remove later. I've had to do this to all my drives, but I did it 10 years ago, so excuse me if I've forgotten to mention any specific problems or pitfalls. A search of the list archives will probably reveal any such details. -ethan From bob at theadamsons.co.uk Sun Dec 7 14:48:47 2008 From: bob at theadamsons.co.uk (Bob Adamson) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 20:48:47 -0000 Subject: UK DEC Meeting in North West, Autumn 2009 - expression of interest please (Mark Wickens) In-Reply-To: <200812071801.mB7I0niY034389@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812071801.mB7I0niY034389@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <778F4B0AE95647ADA6596080C98CBED2@D4BZH92J> > From: Mark Wickens > Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2008 3:41 AM > > I am thinking about organising a meeting for people interested in the > line of computers created by Digital Equipment Corporation. I'm interested in pdp8/pdp11 lines. From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Sun Dec 7 14:55:25 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Sun, 07 Dec 2008 20:55:25 +0000 Subject: UK DEC Meeting in North West, Autumn 2009 - expression of interest please (Mark Wickens) In-Reply-To: <778F4B0AE95647ADA6596080C98CBED2@D4BZH92J> References: <200812071801.mB7I0niY034389@dewey.classiccmp.org> <778F4B0AE95647ADA6596080C98CBED2@D4BZH92J> Message-ID: <493C383D.3030607@gjcp.net> Bob Adamson wrote: >> From: Mark Wickens >> Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2008 3:41 AM >> >> I am thinking about organising a meeting for people interested in the >> line of computers created by Digital Equipment Corporation. > > I'm interested in pdp8/pdp11 lines. > I'm interested. How far north and west? It's probably south east for me ;-) Gordon From nico at farumdata.dk Sun Dec 7 14:58:22 2008 From: nico at farumdata.dk (Nico de Jong) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 21:58:22 +0100 Subject: Paging Al Kossow Message-ID: <3C680E96BCC6449ABEF40466ED7E9378@udvikling> A long time ago, we talked about diagrams for the Qualstar 3412. For some reason or another, they were never sent. Are you still interested? Nico From mark at wickensonline.co.uk Sun Dec 7 15:42:13 2008 From: mark at wickensonline.co.uk (Mark Wickens) Date: Sun, 07 Dec 2008 21:42:13 +0000 Subject: UK DEC Meeting in North West, Autumn 2009 - expression of interest please (Mark Wickens) In-Reply-To: <493C383D.3030607@gjcp.net> References: <200812071801.mB7I0niY034389@dewey.classiccmp.org> <778F4B0AE95647ADA6596080C98CBED2@D4BZH92J> <493C383D.3030607@gjcp.net> Message-ID: <493C4335.7020206@wickensonline.co.uk> Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote: > Bob Adamson wrote: >>> From: Mark Wickens >>> Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2008 3:41 AM >>> >>> I am thinking about organising a meeting for people interested in the >>> line of computers created by Digital Equipment Corporation. >> >> I'm interested in pdp8/pdp11 lines. >> > > I'm interested. How far north and west? It's probably south east for > me ;-) > > Gordon > Hi Gordon, I live in Windermere, so it will probably be there, although the National Museum of Computing at Bletchley Park are keen to host it, and they do have some wonderful toys ;) I'll let you know when I've made up my mind! Regards, Mark. From mark at wickensonline.co.uk Sun Dec 7 15:42:52 2008 From: mark at wickensonline.co.uk (Mark Wickens) Date: Sun, 07 Dec 2008 21:42:52 +0000 Subject: UK DEC Meeting in North West, Autumn 2009 - expression of interest please (Mark Wickens) In-Reply-To: <778F4B0AE95647ADA6596080C98CBED2@D4BZH92J> References: <200812071801.mB7I0niY034389@dewey.classiccmp.org> <778F4B0AE95647ADA6596080C98CBED2@D4BZH92J> Message-ID: <493C435C.40906@wickensonline.co.uk> Bob Adamson wrote: >> From: Mark Wickens >> Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2008 3:41 AM >> >> I am thinking about organising a meeting for people interested in the >> line of computers created by Digital Equipment Corporation. >> > > I'm interested in pdp8/pdp11 lines. > > > Hi Bob, I'll add you to the list, and get back to you when things have firmed up a bit. Regards, Mark. From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sun Dec 7 14:14:39 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 20:14:39 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <0d2601c958a2$1e0fada0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> from "Alexandre Souza" at Dec 7, 8 05:27:51 pm Message-ID: > > > The p[roblem is that (a) I can't afford it, (b) I can't afford to > > maintain it, and (c) if/when it stops working, I haven't a clue how to > > fix it. > > You can have a windows PC with windows for free, just look around :) And > I'm not talking about pirated software :) All I can say is that I've never seen one. > > Why you would need that with windows? Everything I use just works, why > would that stop work? I haev yet to find any electrical or mechanical device which doesn't fail sometime. And when it does, I need to repair it. OK, asusming thr hardware doesn't fail, the software should carry on behaving the same way. I say 'should' because my experience of Windows is that it is not predicaable. It does not do the same thing for the same inputs every time. But if I get a result other than the one I am expecting, how do I track down what the problem really is? Given schemaitcs and OS source it's at least possible (I have used both to track down problems in computers in the past). Without them it would seem to e alomsot inpossible, > > > For me a tool has to work, and it has to be pleasant to use. If it isn't, > > I use something else. And the few times I've used Windows, I've found it > > to be extremely unreliable. > > That is something I find to be VERY funny. > > I think I'm one of the only people in universe that has a stable > windows. My windows installation NEVER breaks. I have no trouble with that. > Period. But: I think you're extremely lucky. > - I don't instal dubious programs (e.g.: I know what I'm running) How d you know if a program is 'dubious'? > Tony, trust me. I have a WORKABLE and PLEASURE TO USE copy of windows I as much as any GUI can be a 'pleasure to use' :-) > XP. Of course I have now a sizeable machine (Core 2 quad, 4GB RAM, Geforce > 8600, 22" LCD) but it worked just as well with my old athlon 1800/512 ram. > It is a matter of KNOWING what you do with your windows. And this is the sort of machine I am going to get for free? > > > I also have an aversion to using things I can't fix when they go wrong. > > Becuase they tend to go wrong at the most inconenient moment. > > Make it work well and it will never go wrong. Trust me. Hmmm. What, no capacitors to dry up? No EPROMs or flash memories to develop bit-rot? No hard disks to have head crashes? No monitor backlight cold-cathode tubes to fail? No dry joints? etc, etc, etc. You amaze me. > > > Well, at one time manufactuers of programmable chips were very bad about > > providing full documentation on how to program them. I have yet to find a > > completely 'open' FPGA or CPLD -- meaning a device where I can get, > > without signing an NDA or similar, full specification on how to send bits > > to the device (what pins to wiggle and how, what are the critical > > timings, what voltages to apply, etc) and also how to turn my design into > > those bits. Microcontrollers do tend to be more open (the PICs that I've > > used were fully documented), but I am not sure if this ICD system is. > > And it is still this way. No FPGA or CPLD open docs. But take a look at I beelive that the Xilinx XC6000 family was going to be 100% documented. But it was a strange architecture, and either only existed for a short time, or was never released (probably the former). I certainly never managed to get a device. > www.atmel.com and see for yourself how it works. I will do... -tony From ama at ugr.es Sun Dec 7 16:04:12 2008 From: ama at ugr.es (Angel Martin Alganza) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 23:04:12 +0100 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <0d2601c958a2$1e0fada0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <0d2601c958a2$1e0fada0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <20081207220412.GJ31191@darwin.ugr.es> On Sun, Dec 07, 2008 at 05:27:51PM -0200, Alexandre Souza wrote: > I think I'm one of the only people in universe that has a stable > windows. My windows installation NEVER breaks. I have no trouble > with that. Period. But: > - I know how it works sufficiently not to install things that > will make that uninstable > - I have a good antivirus, this is the first program I install > when I boot windows at first time > - I have a set of services to disable > - I use process explorer to see what is running and disable > uneeded programs/services > - I don't instal dubious programs (e.g.: I know what I'm running) > - I have an ORIGINAL copy of windows > - I NEVER EVER EVER install windows updates, automatic or manual > - I NEVER EVER EVER let outlook express download images or open > automatically attachments > - I NEVER EVER EVER let MSN open automatically anything, run > things I don't know or install "emoticon packs" > > Tony, trust me. I have a WORKABLE and PLEASURE TO USE copy of > windows XP. Of course I have now a sizeable machine (Core 2 quad, > 4GB RAM, Geforce 8600, 22" LCD) but it worked just as well with my > old athlon 1800/512 ram. It is a matter of KNOWING what you do with > your windows. That is simply and absolutely ridiculous. Having such a powerful beast with so many absurd restrictions to get it to somehow work is outrageous. Such powerful boxes are to do intensive calculations on servers running real operating systems, or to just do gaming using the aberrant wannabe operating system. Working (reliably and comfortably, as Tony and many of us want) and Windowing are not compatible. :-) Regards, ?ngel From jim at g1jbg.co.uk Sun Dec 7 16:54:47 2008 From: jim at g1jbg.co.uk (Jim Beacon) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 22:54:47 -0000 Subject: UK DEC Meeting in North West, Autumn 2009 - expression of interest please References: <4937C1E7.9020108@wickensonline.co.uk> Message-ID: <3CC3289506B8403083787475D9451CF5@XPBOX> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Mark Wickens" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2008 11:41 AM Subject: UK DEC Meeting in North West, Autumn 2009 - expression of interest please > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- > Hash: SHA1 > > Hi, > > Well, I've been banding this idea around to a few fellow DECheads in the > UK, and thought it was about time I moved on to stage 2. > > I am thinking about organising a meeting for people interested in the > line of computers created by Digital Equipment Corporation. It is likely > that the meeting will be autumn next year, and would be run over a > Saturday and Sunday in Windermere, Cumbria, UK. > > This is in the very early stages of planning, and I'm initially looking > to get an idea of numbers who might be interested. This is to ensure > that I can organise the event without loss. In terms of numbers I would > be looking for between 10 and 20 people to exhibit computers, and then > another up to maybe 50 people as non-exhibitors. I'm sure we could get > some interesting speakers involved. > > Cost is likely to be in the order of GBP 10 for the two days, although > we can discuss the option of providing catering if there is interest. I > would be looking for firm commitment to buy a ticket say 3 months in > advance. > > So in the first instance, could anyone interested email me at: mark at > wickensonline dot co dot uk. By emailing you agree for me to keep your > email address on file so that I can inform you of any progress. > > Please feel free to make suggestions either on this mailing list or > direct by email. > > Kind regards, Mark Wickens Hi Mark, I may be persuaded to put some of my machines in the car and head North! There are currently the following lurking around here: 11/23+ 11/03 11/53 11/73 (several) 11/23+ OEM 11/84 11/45 uVAX11 VAXstsion 3100 and assorted disk and tape units Jim. From mloewen at cpumagic.scol.pa.us Sun Dec 7 16:55:14 2008 From: mloewen at cpumagic.scol.pa.us (Mike Loewen) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 17:55:14 -0500 (EST) Subject: Tektronix 608 manual In-Reply-To: <7d9403580812051427v2d4750deta5fee5d0288dfd29@mail.gmail.com> References: <49384D36.9040302@gmail.com> <7d9403580812051427v2d4750deta5fee5d0288dfd29@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: Maybe a long shot, but does anyone here have the service manual for a Tektronix 608 monitor? Mine is wired for 220VAC and I need to rewire it for 120VAC (US). Mike Loewen mloewen at cpumagic.scol.pa.us Old Technology http://sturgeon.css.psu.edu/~mloewen/Oldtech/ From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Sun Dec 7 17:00:43 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Sun, 07 Dec 2008 23:00:43 +0000 Subject: UK DEC Meeting in North West, Autumn 2009 - expression of interest please (Mark Wickens) In-Reply-To: <493C4335.7020206@wickensonline.co.uk> References: <200812071801.mB7I0niY034389@dewey.classiccmp.org> <778F4B0AE95647ADA6596080C98CBED2@D4BZH92J> <493C383D.3030607@gjcp.net> <493C4335.7020206@wickensonline.co.uk> Message-ID: <493C559B.3050804@gjcp.net> Mark Wickens wrote: > Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote: >> Bob Adamson wrote: >>>> From: Mark Wickens >>>> Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2008 3:41 AM >>>> >>>> I am thinking about organising a meeting for people interested in the >>>> line of computers created by Digital Equipment Corporation. >>> >>> I'm interested in pdp8/pdp11 lines. >>> >> >> I'm interested. How far north and west? It's probably south east for >> me ;-) >> >> Gordon >> > Hi Gordon, > > I live in Windermere, so it will probably be there, although the > National Museum of Computing at Bletchley Park are keen to host it, and > they do have some wonderful toys ;) Hmm, Windermere isn't too bad - a couple of hours in the car from Glasgow. Bletchley is a bit of a trek, though... Gordon From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Sun Dec 7 17:26:04 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Sun, 07 Dec 2008 23:26:04 +0000 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <493C5B8C.7010309@gjcp.net> Tony Duell wrote: >> On 6 Dec 2008 at 14:33, Kevin Schoedel wrote: >> >>> I don't know PIC, but for the AVR equivalent the host requirements are an >>> RS-232 port and the ability to run gdb. >> Later PICs have on-chip breakpoint debug communication via ICD (a 3- >> wire interface)--and there is the ability to run ICE4000. >> >> There is at least one AVR open-source debug package that operates >> through the SPI programming interface--using the same tool to program >> and debug. > > Can you program and debug either or both of these chips without > propietary hardware or software. In other words, is documentation for the > following availalbe (without signing an NDA, etc ) > > 1) How to send/receive words to the chip (what lines to wiggle and how, > what voltages to apply, etc) > > 2) The binary instruction set > > 3) THe debugging commands/responses AVR will quite happily send you several kilos of dead trees detailing all this and more, if you ask them. I find that since I'm generally carrying several kilos of laptop already, the PDF editions will suffice. > Could I, if I wanted, make the programmer and write the software from > scratch? Since avr-gcc and avrdude are already available under the GPL and fully documented, there's no real need to reinvent that particular wheel. In short - if you wanted to program an AVR the "oldskool EPROM" way by setting lines by hand and toggling VPP with a push switch, you could (and I have seen this done!). It may be slightly more worth your time and effort to learn how to use the existing tools ;-) Gordon From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Sun Dec 7 17:29:24 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Sun, 07 Dec 2008 23:29:24 +0000 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <0a8d01c9587d$67aa7370$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <49384D36.9040302@gmail.com> <0a8d01c9587d$67aa7370$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <493C5C54.4040704@gjcp.net> Alexandre Souza wrote: >> It's weird, that... I suspect I could rustle up something >> 'traditional' around >> a Z80/6502, ROM, RAM and some decoding - but my brain just doesn't >> cope well >> with single-chip 'black boxes' such as PIC-based widgets. I really >> don't know why! > > Jules, I work developing hardware for a living, and I'll tell you > something: If you are used to Z80, you'll have a hard time using a PIC. > But an AVR will be easy to you to swallow. The PIC is one I always found interesting, in that it's generally easier to program in assembler than C... Gordon From brain at jbrain.com Sun Dec 7 17:31:33 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Sun, 07 Dec 2008 17:31:33 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <7d9403580812051427v2d4750deta5fee5d0288dfd29@mail.gmail.com> References: <49384D36.9040302@gmail.com> <7d9403580812051427v2d4750deta5fee5d0288dfd29@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <493C5CD5.2000700@jbrain.com> maurice smulders wrote: > Hello, > > Atmel has an appnote for their AVRs to decode a PS/2 keyboard... > > http://www.atmel.com/dyn/products/app_notes.asp?family_id=607 > > *AVR313: Interfacing the PCAT Keyboard* > > Kind regards, > > Maurice > True, but that code is somewhat simplistic implementaiton, and does not cover things like communication back to the PS/2 keyboard controllerr, etc. I had to implement those pieces in order to run the LEDs. Jim -- Jim Brain, Brain Innovations (X) brain at jbrain.com Dabbling in WWW, Embedded Systems, Old CBM computers, and Good Times! Home: http://www.jbrain.com From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Sun Dec 7 17:32:40 2008 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Sun, 07 Dec 2008 23:32:40 +0000 Subject: Reading an MFM hard drive with a floppy disc analyser In-Reply-To: <4939CAC5.60801@gmail.com> References: <4938FE9C.5000505@philpem.me.uk> <493938A7.4060605@gmail.com> <4939B540.402@philpem.me.uk> <4939CAC5.60801@gmail.com> Message-ID: <493C5D18.40005@philpem.me.uk> Jules Richardson wrote: >> True, though the hardware I'm actually thinking of using is my USB >> hack-and-bodge floppy reader. FPGA, PICmicro, and a few buffers/level >> translators. > > OK, so you can probably throw something in there to switch heads via > software, presumably? That's what the User I/O port is for :) Six pins on the "extended Shugart" port, and (maybe) another eight (plus 5V and ground) on a separate 10-pin connector. >> True. An FDI file containing the sample data isn't likely to be /that/ >> much bigger though. > > No; the raw data file size is manageable I think - it's just the buffer > size that needs to be reasonably big. Well given that the average hard drive size these days seems to be about 500GB, and even a CD-R will store 700MB, 100MB per image isn't that unreasonable. It might take a while to process the data, though. >> But it'll take a bloody age transferring that much data over USB2 Full >> Speed (1.2Mbps peak). > > I think I did once put in a request for a SCSI version ;) Urgh, I got the figure wrong. Pretend that decimal point isn't there.. USB2 Low Speed is 1.5Mbps, Full Speed is 12Mbps, High Speed is 480Mbps. Of course if I'd said MBps (i.e. megabytes per second), it would have been almost right as well... :) In any case, you're probably looking at a megabyte or so per second, which isn't too bad. If we assume we're reading a floppy disc, the most you'll get on a track is (IIRC) about 120,000 flux transitions. If we say the drive is spinning at 360RPM, that's about 0.17 seconds to actually read the track, followed by roughly the same again to transfer the data to the PC. Being pessimistic, we're talking about half a second per track. That's 40 seconds per side, or 80 seconds for all 80 tracks, both sides. If we think ST506 at 3600RPM and 5Mbps, it'll probably be a little quicker, but probably not much better than a quarter-second per track. >> MFM is a (1,3)RLL code. That means you can have a minimum of 1 and a >> maximum of 3 empty bit cells between flux transitions. > > Yeah, but that's for complete data, is it not? I'm not sure what happens > if given a damaged drive - given that ST506/412 is dumb, presumably it > just blindly spits out what it finds on the disk surface? I'd expect so -- an ST506 type drive is basically a motor, speed controller, and head amplifier on a PCB, attached to a HDA. Basically the same type of hardware you'd find on the average floppy drive PCB. > It'd be nice > to be able to capture whatever the drive throws at this device, in the > hope of making some sense out of (or 'beyond') damaged sections in > software later. If the track data has 'holes' then the device needs to > be able to record the length of those holes in order to portray what's > on the disk accurately. Good point.. every ST506 drive is going to have one or two (minimum, usually about 10-20 IME) permanent media errors. The reader hardware is going to need some way of dealing with these errors, even if that's just stepping the resolution down and storing a less-accurate measurement of the dead-time. >> SRAM is relatively expensive though. SDRAM isn't, but then you have to >> deal with refreshing and other "fun" things like that. > > Yeah, I came to that conclusion way back when, too. I suppose the alternative would be to use an off-the-shelf SDRAM controller, and then buffer the writes inside the FPGA. If you're writing sequentially, then you leave the SDRAM in "burst" mode and just keep writing. Do a partial refresh every so often, and > Yeah. I think what needs to happen is that you sample a drive, > essentially turn it back into data bytes in software on a host machine, > bung some sector header voodoo around it, and *then* spit it back to the > destination drive using this device... Well, if you can decode the data then it's probably fair to assume you can re-encode it as well... That leaves you with three images -- the raw disc image (say, a .FDI file), the extracted sector data (an .IMA file if we're talking PC floppies, .ADF for Amiga, etc.) and the re-encoded data (another .FDI file). If you split the software up, you can go from FDI -> ADF and play with the ADF on an emulator, change something on the disc image, then go from ADF -> FDI again and write it back. For bonus points, you could save the read speed from stage 1, use it to adjust the data rate for the binary -> MFM conversion, and you can modify copy-protected discs while leaving speed-based protection schemes alone (RNC Copylock, Speedlok, etc.) > For now, I'm more worried about ailing STxxx drives and getting data off > them (and making sense of it) - writing back is more of a secondary > issue (but is probably an extra 10% logic on this device to support > writes, I suspect). Already done that, it's a finite state machine with index-pulse detection hardware. Makes dealing with hard-sectored floppies a little easier. > Aside: I'm not sure if it's beneficial having a number of buffers and > reading/writing multiple head data in parallel? I worry about running > STxxx drives for longer than necessary :-) Probably not viable just from > a RAM cost point of view, though... Well, the idea was that you'd do two or three reads of each track at once, meaning that you could use some form of "majority-voting" scheme to figure out what the data was before it got scrambled. This would be pretty good for discs where the adhesive that binds the ferrite/whatever to the mylar disc had weakened -- you may only get one shot at reading it, so make it count. I'd still consider the ultimate to be some form of non-contact disc drive, but that would involve custom-made FDD heads and other such "fun". Thanks, -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From cclist at sydex.com Sun Dec 7 17:47:41 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sun, 07 Dec 2008 15:47:41 -0800 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493C5C54.4040704@gjcp.net> References: , <0a8d01c9587d$67aa7370$46fea8c0@DeskJara>, <493C5C54.4040704@gjcp.net> Message-ID: <493BF01D.24770.17B1D58@cclist.sydex.com> On 7 Dec 2008 at 23:29, Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote: > > Jules, I work developing hardware for a living, and I'll tell you > > something: If you are used to Z80, you'll have a hard time using a PIC. > > But an AVR will be easy to you to swallow. > > The PIC is one I always found interesting, in that it's generally easier > to program in assembler than C... Eh, there's not a lot of difference. The AVR's more orthogonal in use of registers than the PIC (which seems to run almost everything through W), but the AVR's got its own peculiarities. I'm just starting with the TI MSP430 and I like it a lot. Von Neumann archicture, instead of Harvard. 16 general-purpose registers with a simple 2-address instruction set that operates on words or bytes. R0 is PC, R1 is SP, R2 is status. Indexed and autoincrement addressing modes are available. If you're used to traditional architectures, this one's very easy to learn. But it's got its drawbacks also--upper-level AVRs allow for external memory, but the 430 seems to be architecturally limited to no more than 10K of RAM and 60K of program ROM, which should be sufficient for most tasks. Very low power 3.3v operation; not available in 5v versions. Cheers, Chuck From brain at jbrain.com Sun Dec 7 17:56:00 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Sun, 07 Dec 2008 17:56:00 -0600 Subject: uIEC (Was: Re: Open source, stand alone, ASCII terminal project) In-Reply-To: <099901c9587b$affaa2f0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <493444AE.24369.22854AD@cclist.sydex.com><81E99AB5-1E41-42C7-AE88-B823566DCF36@neurotica.com><004001c95559$428f7d00$c7ae7700$@com><49365EC3.4537.2E6D4DB@cclist.sydex.com><18742.55439.856418.356842@gargle.gargle.HOWL><7d3530220812031331y10989621i67033f5d84b662b0@mail.gmail.com><493709E5.8040702@jbrain.com> <340801c955ae$e8ac3480$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <493735A1.80003@jbrain.com> <099901c9587b$affaa2f0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <493C6290.4010202@jbrain.com> Alexandre Souza wrote: >> I hope to take a working unit to the World of Commodore this weekend in >> Toronto. > > I'm **very** amazed. I have a SX-64 with a broken keyboard (which > I'm planning in doing something to make it work, even if I have to > create a PS/2-to-SX-64-converter) which would love to have one of > these :D :D :D I want to play silkworm!!! :oD Well, there's another project I made: www.jbrain.com/vicug/gallery/c=key/ That does exactly that. It's where the source I earlier mentioned came from. JP Hindin can speak for the utility of the PS/2 routines, as I made him a PS/2->ASCII converter IC out of a MEGA8. I've been hard at work over the weekend demoing at WoC, so I am just now catching up. Please forgive me if I metioned something someone has alreayd mentioned. * I have paid nothing for my AVR programmer. It's a free utility (avrdude) that runs on Windows and Linux, a DB25, a 74LS244, 2 diodes, a cap, and some wire (and a perfboard). I am sure when the pics for WoC come online, someone took a picture of it, it was plugged into my laptop all day at the show. I probably will soon invest in a USB programmer, but avrdude supports those as well. * to get started in AVR, I spent $10.00 (for a couple of 40 pin ATMEGA16s). GCC was/is free, as is/was the programmer. That was my deciding factor over the PIC line, though I have nothing against the PIC. * ASM was not a singificant concern for me. While I would never want to discourage someone from building a PS/2 converter out of discrete TTL (as someone noted, you can do ANYTHING with enough NAND gates), I think it boils down to the focus area. If the PS/2 interface is the end in itself, and TTL is the preferred solution, it's the medium one should choose. But, if it's the means to the end, I'm less convinced it's the right solution. While it might be more "authentic", I worry about the project completion. If you need a PS/2 interface to run a vintage computer, it would seem to me the focus is in getting the computer running and ready to show. If so, using a uC can allow you to focus on that first. Then, later on, if you feel the uC solution is too "unrealistic", it seems better to replace it at that point with a more authentic solution. If one designs the interface correctly, one should be able to replace the "temporary solution" with a more permanent one without making any other changes. However, on the other hand, if someone has to go through the effort of designing and testing the TTL PS/2 interface, I worry that they will lose interest and the overall project will be forever incomplete. uC's allow me to make my projects "auto-updateable". When there is a new uIEC firmware available, folks can load the new code on their CF/SD cards, reboot the unit, and it updates automxatically. This gives me, the project owners, a sense of comfort that I can ship units to people who can use them now, without worrying so much a bout possible bugs. I find, with things like C=Key and uIEC, people get the big kick out of the new attached to the old. They are less interested in how the magic happens. For me, I can concentrate on the ends, not the means. At least in the CBM arena, there is ample precedent: CBM printers and many printer interfaces used 8051s and other uC solutions, even back in the day. It was very common to find a non 6502 CPU in a CBM printer interface. because CBM sourced the mechanisms from other companies and just had the stock electronics modified enough to support the IEC protocol. It stands to reason that the printer manufacturer would continue to use a favored CU/uC. -- Jim Brain, Brain Innovations (X) brain at jbrain.com Dabbling in WWW, Embedded Systems, Old CBM computers, and Good Times! Home: http://www.jbrain.com From brain at jbrain.com Sun Dec 7 18:07:33 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Sun, 07 Dec 2008 18:07:33 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Dec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <493C6545.8040106@jbrain.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: > Absolutely. Many of the tools are open-source, royalty-free, running > on a variety of OS platforms. The chips themselves are documented to > a fare-thee-well. For example, the ATMega8 user's manual runs to > over 300 pages (PDF downloadable for free) and it doesn't even > discuss the instruction set--that's in the "AVR family" manual. > As a tech junkie, I love the datasheets for the AVR uCs. I save them local as reference works, and use them all the time. I think the PIC is verbosely documented as well. As someone else noted, I prefer the AVR architecture to the PIC, but some people swear by the PIC line. THey do offer a mutlitude of different options Jim From brain at jbrain.com Sun Dec 7 18:21:14 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Sun, 07 Dec 2008 18:21:14 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <20081207220412.GJ31191@darwin.ugr.es> References: <0d2601c958a2$1e0fada0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081207220412.GJ31191@darwin.ugr.es> Message-ID: <493C687A.5000009@jbrain.com> Angel Martin Alganza wrote: > That is simply and absolutely ridiculous. Having such a powerful > beast with so many absurd restrictions to get it to somehow work is > outrageous. Such powerful boxes are to do intensive calculations on > servers running real operating systems, or to just do gaming using the > aberrant wannabe operating system. Working (reliably and comfortably, > as Tony and many of us want) and Windowing are not compatible. :-) > I'll back Alex up here. I use Windows and it holds my "life" on it. By that, I mean I have everything I need on the unit, and I use it for work, for hobby, for correspondence, etc. It gets put into hibernation mode many times a day, switches from 1 to 2 monitor setups, etc. It is rock stable. I don't have quite the laundry list that Alex notes. I install updates, I run apps from untrusted sources in a VM first, I did disable some unneeded things (MSN, for example) long ago, but I don't use Task Manager for anything, and I use it just like most folks. It's a hard worked, and a very dear laptop. I do use Firefox and THunderbird, so as to avoid many of the virus trigger points (Firefox/Thunderbird give me a better view of where the hyperlinks are really taking me when I click on them. I program AVRs, view all my reference documentation, do my board schematics and layouts, compile my source code, edit my code, correspond with folks, edit my documentation, watch movies, comvert movies for my media player, etc. It's such a useful part of my toolbox, I won't go many places without it. As I type this, it's sitting on my JottoDesk in the truck hooked into Verizon Internet via a cellular air card bouncing around while we drive through lower MI back from Toronto. I don't know if "pleasure" is the right word, but I find it's a nice tool that allows me to concentrate on other things. I don't "manage" it all that often, but I do take care of it. I'd do the same things with my Linux box, so it's less the OS and more the setup and diligence. I will agree that Windows gives one more options to undermine the stability of the OS, but it cna be a stable and useful OS. Mind you, I'm talking about XP. If we're discussing Vista, I'll back Angel and Tony up. I have it here, but it does not appear to allow folks to concentrate on other things. From brain at jbrain.com Sun Dec 7 18:26:57 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Sun, 07 Dec 2008 18:26:57 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493C5C54.4040704@gjcp.net> References: <49384D36.9040302@gmail.com> <0a8d01c9587d$67aa7370$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <493C5C54.4040704@gjcp.net> Message-ID: <493C69D1.9070107@jbrain.com> Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote: > > The PIC is one I always found interesting, in that it's generally > easier to program in assembler than C... > > Gordon I'll concur on the latter part. I guess I find it interesting in that some people can get it to do great things, but I'm not that good. I guess I'm an AVR bigot, as I always recommend AVRs for designs. Jim -- Jim Brain, Brain Innovations (X) brain at jbrain.com Dabbling in WWW, Embedded Systems, Old CBM computers, and Good Times! Home: http://www.jbrain.com From doug at stillhq.com Sun Dec 7 20:12:45 2008 From: doug at stillhq.com (Doug Jackson) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 13:12:45 +1100 Subject: Machine reliability - was: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <200812072327.mB7NRd98043992@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812072327.mB7NRd98043992@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <493C829D.60906@stillhq.com> Message: 22 Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 23:04:12 +0100 From: Angel Martin Alganza Subject: Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Message-ID: <20081207220412.GJ31191 at darwin.ugr.es> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 On Sun, Dec 07, 2008 at 05:27:51PM -0200, Alexandre Souza wrote: > > I think I'm one of the only people in universe that has a stable > > windows. My windows installation NEVER breaks. I have no trouble > > with that. Period. But: > > - I know how it works sufficiently not to install things that > > will make that uninstable > > - I have a good antivirus, this is the first program I install > > when I boot windows at first time > > - I have a set of services to disable > > - I use process explorer to see what is running and disable > > uneeded programs/services > > - I don't instal dubious programs (e.g.: I know what I'm running) > > - I have an ORIGINAL copy of windows > > - I NEVER EVER EVER install windows updates, automatic or manual > > - I NEVER EVER EVER let outlook express download images or open > > automatically attachments > > - I NEVER EVER EVER let MSN open automatically anything, run > > things I don't know or install "emoticon packs" > > > > Tony, trust me. I have a WORKABLE and PLEASURE TO USE copy of > > windows XP. Of course I have now a sizeable machine (Core 2 quad, > > 4GB RAM, Geforce 8600, 22" LCD) but it worked just as well with my > > old athlon 1800/512 ram. It is a matter of KNOWING what you do with > > your windows. > >That is simply and absolutely ridiculous. Having such a powerful >beast with so many absurd restrictions to get it to somehow work is >outrageous. Such powerful boxes are to do intensive calculations on >servers running real operating systems, or to just do gaming using the >aberrant wannabe operating system. Working (reliably and comfortably, >as Tony and many of us want) and Windowing are not compatible. :-) I thought I would chime in at this point. In the Mid 80's, my College had a perfectly functional PDP11 system. It used provided support for RSTS-E, was well appreciated, reliable, and the workhorse for all of the computing programs throughout the school. The machine was in the computer room, its front panel was out in the open, and nobody did anything bad to it. the most malicious piece of software that was run was a program that I wrote that output human readable character patterns sideways on paper tape. In about 1988 (or so), the powers that be decided to replace it with a Prime computer. All of a sudden, the student body was not very happy about the replacement. The Unix like operating system didn't look like RSTS-E, the terminals were HORRIBLE (They took away our beloved VT52's), the editor EMACS, was not very friendly at all. All of our code was GONE! Agreed that the machine was Bigger (tm), Faster (tm), More Functional (tm), than the PDP we had, but the user experience was woeful. Needles to say, that the student body decided that they had to find ways to break the thing. Malicious software was created, the machine was regularly halted from the front panel, and reliability went through the floor. Eventually, they made a physical cage for the machine to reside in that even the longest broom handle couldn't manipulate the front panel switches !! At least the reboots stopped. What am I trying to say here... You can get faster hardware, but if it is operated in a HOSTILE environment, then you will have a bad time. To a point, I agree with the snapshot concept of not installing arbitrary software, and leaving an environment in a working state. If you are patient, you *can* get a windows machine to operate reliably. But the *last* thing you do is to install yet another random upgrade for yet another piece of software without careful testing. The windows concept simply does not translate to the classic computer environment. There is no way that I can impact the operating system of my CP/M system by simply running a terminal program (unless I specifically perform a download). Likewise, there is no concept of downloading a device driver that hasn't been tested on any of my PDP11 machines. The machine base was simply too small and too well controlled. The modern environment is radically different, there are hundreds of manufacturers of cards and motherboards, and other hardware, and millions of equipment combinations possible. And, there is the dreaded concept of BACKWARDS COMPATABILITY. Woe is me, as a manufacturer, I have to support arcane cards in systems where they simply may not work.... (Could somebody please explain why having an ISA bus slot in a PCI system was a good idea!) In summary - you can have a 'powerful beast' and have it work. you just have to adopt a 'professional' attitude to running it, and not download arbitrary software willy nilly. How do you do that when the modern browsers are designed to download and execute arbitrary code??? By not doing that! Just my 0.02 worth. Doug From RichA at vulcan.com Sun Dec 7 23:11:32 2008 From: RichA at vulcan.com (Rich Alderson) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 21:11:32 -0800 Subject: What should an old lady do with an Osborne? Message-ID: I work with much bigger, and usually much older, things than luggable personal computers, so when a lady in my museology certificate class came up to me to ask whether we would be interested in her friend's Osborne, I had to say "No." She then asked me if I knew where her friend could donate such a system; I told her I had no real idea, and that I would ask around. So I'm asking the assembled multitudes: What should an old lady do with an Osborne? Honestly, my only thought is to put it on That Auction Site(TM) and see what market forces say, but that's too scary for a non-computer person, I would think. Thanks, Rich Rich Alderson Server Engineer, PDPplanet Project Vulcan, Inc. 505 5th Avenue S, Suite 900 Seattle, WA 98104 mailto:RichA at vulcan.com (206) 342-2239 (206) 465-2916 cell From cclist at sydex.com Sun Dec 7 23:20:52 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sun, 07 Dec 2008 21:20:52 -0800 Subject: What should an old lady do with an Osborne? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <493C3E34.2032.2AC2471@cclist.sydex.com> On 7 Dec 2008 at 21:11, Rich Alderson wrote: > So I'm asking the assembled multitudes: What should an old lady do with an > Osborne? Honestly, my only thought is to put it on That Auction Site(TM) and > see what market forces say, but that's too scary for a non-computer person, I > would think. One could post it on the "Vintage Computer Forum": http://www.vintage-computer.com/vcforum/ A bit more targeted and perhaps the clientele is a bit more honest than putting it up for auction on That Site. Cheers, Chuck From jos.mar at bluewin.ch Sun Dec 7 23:46:15 2008 From: jos.mar at bluewin.ch (Jos Dreesen / Marian Capel) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 06:46:15 +0100 Subject: ETH Lilith Emulator available Message-ID: <493CB4A7.9000804@bluewin.ch> Emulith, my ETH Lilith emulator, is ready for download at : ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Emulith Emulith is a register-level emulation, in C & X11-xlib, of the Lilith hardware. Documentation, sourcecode and two diskimages are supplied, I will try to offer some more in the future. You will need a reasonably fast PC running Linux and having at least 1280x1024 resolution. First feedback I got shows that it also runs on OS-X ( altough I would like to know how he mapped three buttons onto one....) Enjoy, Jos Dreesen Warning : server sits on a basic ADSL line. From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Mon Dec 8 00:58:11 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Mon, 8 Dec 2008 19:58:11 +1300 Subject: ETH Lilith Emulator available In-Reply-To: <493CB4A7.9000804@bluewin.ch> References: <493CB4A7.9000804@bluewin.ch> Message-ID: On 12/8/08, Jos Dreesen / Marian Capel wrote: > > Emulith, my ETH Lilith emulator, is ready for download at : > > ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Emulith . . . > First feedback I got shows that it also runs on OS-X ( altough I would like > to know how he mapped three buttons onto one....) You can plug a scroll mouse into a Mac, giving you left, right, and middle (wheel press). They work just like a 3-button mouse on any UNIX system. You don't _have_ to use an Apple mouse. Cut and paste can be funny, though... sometimes I have to use Command-C/Command-V, sometimes I can cut/paste like with X - seems to be partially application dependent. -ethan From nico at farumdata.dk Mon Dec 8 05:26:57 2008 From: nico at farumdata.dk (Nico de Jong) Date: Mon, 8 Dec 2008 12:26:57 +0100 Subject: ECMA-34 Message-ID: <45A4C3E5DD924D39B8D15ED20F54AD0D@udvikling> Still cleaning-up. I found some Philips cassette drives, using digital cassettes similar to audio cassettes. Every cassette accomodates about 250K. The format used is ECMA-34, IIRC. Size : 9" deep, 5" wide and 4" high One drive is loaded horizontally (think of the Exabyte 8505 etc), and the other like the old Exabyte 8200. The rubber bands are dired out / pulverized Any interest ? Nico From nico at farumdata.dk Mon Dec 8 05:33:06 2008 From: nico at farumdata.dk (Nico de Jong) Date: Mon, 8 Dec 2008 12:33:06 +0100 Subject: Philips PTS 6000 Message-ID: <5A7055014FA3490F8915EAD7FC29DCC9@udvikling> I also found a small VDU, model PTS 6387, 220-240 VAC. This one takes RS-232. The screen is 6". IIRC, it writes 12 x 40 characters Overall size : 10" W x 9" deep x 6" high (excl. feet). Free for P&P from Denmark Nico From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Mon Dec 8 06:00:10 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Mon, 8 Dec 2008 07:00:10 -0500 Subject: RSTS/E problem In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Either you specified too low a value for max jobs (2?) or you don't have any swap space. Remember that RSTS requires swap space for each job; it isn't willing to allow a job to exist just because there's memory for it, it insists that it has to be able to swap it out. paul > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of H?lscher > Sent: Sunday, December 07, 2008 1:26 PM > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: RSTS/E problem > > Hi, > > after installing and SYSGENing of RSTS/E V9.6 I get the following > error: > > Beginning RSTS/E system startup... > 88.12.07 12:10 Installing monitor overlays > 88.12.07 12:10 Mounting disks > 88.12.07 12:10 Assigning logical names > 88.12.07 12:10 Starting error logging > ?ERRINT - ?No room for user on device at Line 1265 > 88.12.07 12:10 Setting system characteristics > 07-Dec-88 12:10 PM Installing run-time systems and libraries > 07-Dec-88 12:10 PM Setting terminal characteristics > 07-Dec-88 12:10 PM Defining system commands > 07-Dec-88 12:10 PM Setting printer characteristics > 07-Dec-88 12:10 PM Starting spoolers > ?Unable to start Print/Batch Services > ?No room for additional jobs > > Could anyone please give me advice/hints? > > Regards, > > Ulli From mbbrutman-cctalk at brutman.com Mon Dec 8 08:07:21 2008 From: mbbrutman-cctalk at brutman.com (Michael B. Brutman) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 08:07:21 -0600 Subject: What should an old lady do with an Osborne? In-Reply-To: <493C3E34.2032.2AC2471@cclist.sydex.com> References: <493C3E34.2032.2AC2471@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <493D2A19.9050703@brutman.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: > One could post it on the "Vintage Computer Forum": > > http://www.vintage-computer.com/vcforum/ > > A bit more targeted and perhaps the clientele is a bit more honest > than putting it up for auction on That Site. > > Cheers, > Chuck > > Better yet, post it for sale directly on the auction part of the web site: http://marketplace.vintage-computer.com/ Mike From frustum at pacbell.net Mon Dec 8 08:35:39 2008 From: frustum at pacbell.net (Jim Battle) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 08:35:39 -0600 Subject: jCquard -- make modern punched cards Message-ID: <493D30BB.9010206@pacbell.net> http://www.outstandingelephant.com/jcquard/ (quote) jCquard is a generally useless JavaScript library that you will probably (hopefully?) never need to use ? unless you are the nostalgic type, you like to roll with the old-schoolers, or you are convinced that the end is near and soon all we?ll have left are stacks of punch cards with which to rebuild the entirety of our culture. (endquote) The program produces a image of a punched card given an input string. The biggest problem that I can see is the text printed along the top is a crisp CRT font. They should have digitized the character set from a real punched card. From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Mon Dec 8 09:00:17 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 09:00:17 -0600 Subject: UK DEC Meeting in North West, Autumn 2009 - expression of interest please (Mark Wickens) In-Reply-To: <493C559B.3050804@gjcp.net> References: <200812071801.mB7I0niY034389@dewey.classiccmp.org> <778F4B0AE95647ADA6596080C98CBED2@D4BZH92J> <493C383D.3030607@gjcp.net> <493C4335.7020206@wickensonline.co.uk> <493C559B.3050804@gjcp.net> Message-ID: <493D3681.5010801@gmail.com> Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote: > Hmm, Windermere isn't too bad - a couple of hours in the car from > Glasgow. Bletchley is a bit of a trek, though... Talk to us nicely so you get to kip atop a row of warm DEC cabinets... ;-) From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Mon Dec 8 09:05:14 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 09:05:14 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493C5CD5.2000700@jbrain.com> References: <49384D36.9040302@gmail.com> <7d9403580812051427v2d4750deta5fee5d0288dfd29@mail.gmail.com> <493C5CD5.2000700@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <493D37AA.2090104@gmail.com> Jim Brain wrote: >> *AVR313: Interfacing the PCAT Keyboard* >> >> Kind regards, >> >> Maurice >> > True, but that code is somewhat simplistic implementaiton, and does not > cover things like communication back to the PS/2 keyboard controllerr, > etc. I had to implement those pieces in order to run the LEDs. Bah, real PC keyboards don't have LEDs! :-) Jules (more than happy with his 'new' Model M) From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Mon Dec 8 10:22:49 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 10:22:49 -0600 Subject: Reading an MFM hard drive with a floppy disc analyser In-Reply-To: <493C5D18.40005@philpem.me.uk> References: <4938FE9C.5000505@philpem.me.uk> <493938A7.4060605@gmail.com> <4939B540.402@philpem.me.uk> <4939CAC5.60801@gmail.com> <493C5D18.40005@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <493D49D9.6020800@gmail.com> Philip Pemberton wrote: > Jules Richardson wrote: >>> True, though the hardware I'm actually thinking of using is my USB >>> hack-and-bodge floppy reader. FPGA, PICmicro, and a few buffers/level >>> translators. >> >> OK, so you can probably throw something in there to switch heads via >> software, presumably? > > That's what the User I/O port is for :) :-) >>> True. An FDI file containing the sample data isn't likely to be >>> /that/ much bigger though. >> >> No; the raw data file size is manageable I think - it's just the >> buffer size that needs to be reasonably big. > > Well given that the average hard drive size these days seems to be about > 500GB, and even a CD-R will store 700MB, 100MB per image isn't that > unreasonable. Well, I've got various hard disk byte-level 'raw' backups kicking around in the 40-1024MB region; the increased size of a flux-transition image wouldn't really make a significant amount of difference to the cost of storage. > It might take a while to process the data, though. I really don't know - maybe some of the resident Catweasel experts can comment there. I suppose to 'understand' an image we wouldn't be doing anything in software that the drive controller doesn't normally do in hardware. > Urgh, I got the figure wrong. Pretend that decimal point isn't there.. USB2 > Low Speed is 1.5Mbps, Full Speed is 12Mbps, High Speed is 480Mbps. Of > course if I'd said MBps (i.e. megabytes per second), it would have been > almost right as well... :) > > In any case, you're probably looking at a megabyte or so per second, > which isn't too bad. To be honest, the quicker the better - but I wouldn't be upset if it took an hour or two to grab a drive image. Some of the dumps I have were transferred at 9600 baud serial... > If we assume we're reading a floppy disc, the most you'll get on a track > is (IIRC) about 120,000 flux transitions. If we say the drive is > spinning at 360RPM, that's about 0.17 seconds to actually read the > track, followed by roughly the same again to transfer the data to the PC. > > Being pessimistic, we're talking about half a second per track. That's > 40 seconds per side, or 80 seconds for all 80 tracks, both sides. > > If we think ST506 at 3600RPM and 5Mbps, it'll probably be a little > quicker, but probably not much better than a quarter-second per track. Can you read from the buffer and transfer to the PC at the same time as you're populating the buffer by reading from the drive? Or is what you have essentially a single microcontroller? One of the things I was trying to achieve when I was looking at doing this in pure TTL was a degree of parallelism - because the device doesn't attempt to understand the drive's data stream (that's done later on the host PC), it can't benefit from re-seek or re-read attempts anyway, so there's no requirement to ever pause buffer fill and try again. >>> MFM is a (1,3)RLL code. That means you can have a minimum of 1 and a >>> maximum of 3 empty bit cells between flux transitions. >> >> Yeah, but that's for complete data, is it not? I'm not sure what >> happens if given a damaged drive - given that ST506/412 is dumb, >> presumably it just blindly spits out what it finds on the disk surface? > > I'd expect so -- an ST506 type drive is basically a motor, speed > controller, > and head amplifier on a PCB, attached to a HDA. Basically the same type of > hardware you'd find on the average floppy drive PCB. Uh huh. So I do think that theoretically you could have a transition time the length of the track. No likely, but possible. In the middle of that extreme and 'normal data' there may well be transition times that are quite high, so they do need to be recorded (so that you can hopefully recover sectors of a damaged track beyond the bad spot) >> It'd be nice >> to be able to capture whatever the drive throws at this device, in the >> hope of making some sense out of (or 'beyond') damaged sections in >> software later. If the track data has 'holes' then the device needs to >> be able to record the length of those holes in order to portray what's >> on the disk accurately. > > Good point.. every ST506 drive is going to have one or two (minimum, > usually about 10-20 IME) permanent media errors. For sure - or worse. I've still recovered useful data from drives that have been 80% bad - sometimes it's worth it. > The reader hardware is going to need > some way of dealing with these errors, even if that's just stepping the > resolution down and storing a less-accurate measurement of the dead-time. Hmm, so you're proposing that the reader actually tries to understand the storage mechanism? I was thinking that it was a dumb device, basically copying the transitions that it sees to the host PC - and it was the software on the PC which actually does the decoding (and potentially requests re-read attempts at a later date). >>> SRAM is relatively expensive though. SDRAM isn't, but then you have >>> to deal with refreshing and other "fun" things like that. >> >> Yeah, I came to that conclusion way back when, too. > > I suppose the alternative would be to use an off-the-shelf SDRAM > controller, and then buffer the writes inside the FPGA. Part of me still thinks that the 'elegant' solution to this is perhaps a PCI card which bridges a 'raw' STxxx interface to an off-the-shelf compact PC motherboard. Use the PC's memory for buffer (and refresh, of course), boot a cut-down OS from a CF card (and use the CF card for temporary image storage), and potentially allow the user to make use of whatever interface to the 'outside world' that they wished (personally I'd likely use Ethernet, run a FTP server & telnet control interface on the machine etc.) However, a) I'm not sure if PCI is actually fast enough for what's needed (i.e. the system could sample into memory from a drive quickly enough), and b) that we have anyone 'on-tap' who knows how to build a PCI card anyway... :-) > Well, if you can decode the data then it's probably fair to assume you > can re-encode it as well... True. >> Aside: I'm not sure if it's beneficial having a number of buffers and >> reading/writing multiple head data in parallel? I worry about running >> STxxx drives for longer than necessary :-) Probably not viable just >> from a RAM cost point of view, though... > > Well, the idea was that you'd do two or three reads of each track at > once, meaning that you could use some form of "majority-voting" scheme > to figure out what the data was before it got scrambled. That was a complete brain-fart on my part, and I was momentarily thinking that STxxx gives you data from all heads at once in parallel, which would maybe make reading into multiple buffers a good idea. It doesn't, of course, and you select a specific head and get that head only's data as the output stream... > This would be pretty good for discs where the adhesive that binds the > ferrite/whatever to the mylar disc had weakened -- you may only get one > shot at reading it, so make it count. Yeah, that could work, subject to enough buffer space. (Incidentally you've now got me worried about how much precomp affects the timing of all of this, or that clock bits are supposed to be in the middle of a bit cell with 'normal' data at the start. I suppose it doesn't matter if the sampling resolution is high enough) > I'd still consider the ultimate to be some form of non-contact disc > drive, but that would involve custom-made FDD heads and other such "fun". Well for hard disks they're all flying heads anyway... My ultimate would be something which recorded the signal at a more analogue level I think, for potential cleaning up in software later (rather than using a digital interface which can't perform an intelligent analysis of the data stream). I think it's do-able for a floppy drive, and probably without a lot of modification to a donor drive itself. (I've mused before on here about running the entire drive in a bath of something which might reduce friction and the chances of damage due to contamination - it'd be interesting purely from an experimentation point of view, but I'm not sure if it'd ever be possible to prove that it actually helped) cheers Jules From cclist at sydex.com Mon Dec 8 10:55:07 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 08:55:07 -0800 Subject: What should an old lady do with an Osborne? In-Reply-To: <493D2A19.9050703@brutman.com> References: , <493C3E34.2032.2AC2471@cclist.sydex.com>, <493D2A19.9050703@brutman.com> Message-ID: <493CE0EB.9166.527BF78@cclist.sydex.com> On 8 Dec 2008 at 8:07, Michael B. Brutman wrote: > Better yet, post it for sale directly on the auction part of the web site: > > http://marketplace.vintage-computer.com/ > Good idea, but I'd probably post it in both locations. I suspect that not one in 50 VCF posters checks the marketplace section (if they even are aware of it) more than once per month. Are entries in the marketplace automatically posted to the forum? Cheers, Chuck From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Mon Dec 8 11:26:18 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 11:26:18 -0600 Subject: What should an old lady do with an Osborne? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <493D58BA.2060902@gmail.com> Rich Alderson wrote: > So I'm asking the assembled multitudes: What should an old lady do with an > Osborne? Honestly, my only thought is to put it on That Auction Site(TM) and > see what market forces say, but that's too scary for a non-computer person, I > would think. Hmm. 'donate' implies she's not looking for monetary gain. Freecycle it, or advertise it on a local newsgroup. Subject of course to there being no museums in the area who might want it. If she wants hard cash for it and timescales aren't so important, VCM it. Use That Site as a last resort... (my experience has been that most older or 'non-computer' folk don't care about the money side, and are more keen for an item to go to a good home. They also invariably don't want to screw around with shipping, so local pickup's a plus) cheers Jules From rtellason at verizon.net Mon Dec 8 12:16:22 2008 From: rtellason at verizon.net (Roy J. Tellason) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 13:16:22 -0500 Subject: What should an old lady do with an Osborne? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <200812081316.22545.rtellason@verizon.net> On Monday 08 December 2008 12:11:32 am Rich Alderson wrote: > I work with much bigger, and usually much older, things than luggable > personal computers, so when a lady in my museology certificate class came > up to me to ask whether we would be interested in her friend's Osborne, I > had to say "No." She then asked me if I knew where her friend could donate > such a system; I told her I had no real idea, and that I would ask around. > > So I'm asking the assembled multitudes: What should an old lady do with an > Osborne? Honestly, my only thought is to put it on That Auction Site(TM) > and see what market forces say, but that's too scary for a non-computer > person, I would think. I might be interested, if it's got a Screen-Pac in it (look for an RCA connector installed on the front panel, usually in the lower right corner). No? A double density adapter would be nice too. If it's an Exec or a Vixen I'd definitely be interested. -- Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters" - Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James M Dakin From jzg22 at drexel.edu Mon Dec 8 12:36:27 2008 From: jzg22 at drexel.edu (Jonathan Gevaryahu) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 13:36:27 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <200812070911.mB79Buvk029642@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812070911.mB79Buvk029642@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <493D692B.4010603@drexel.edu> ROBO5.8 wrote: >Hi Folks, > >It's been interesting taking out my old CP/M stuff and getting it >operational again. > >My system uses an 8bit TTL Keytronics Capacitive Sense keyboard. It was >operational for about an hour and then it quit. > >It turns out that the keyboard uses little sponge pads to hold the >capacitive disks and they have biodegraded into dust. > >So I went looking for an old 8b TTL replacement keyboard. So far no luck. > >I also looked for a black box solution that would take an AT or PS/2 >keyboard and convert it to a parallel port output. So far no luck. > >So let me turn to the experts and ask for advice and suggestions. > >Please advise >Robo I have to deal with the same problem, but I read somewhere that its possible to repair the existing keyboard by replacing the disintegrated foam with doublesided-sticky 3m grey 'exterior?' mounting foam of approproate thickness, and that's what I'm attempting. Better IMHO to repair the old rare keyboards than replace with something new but 'incorrect' for a given system, though a new keyboard can be a temporary solution until the old one is fixed. You basically take keyboard apart, remove all the conductive discs but don't throw them away, scrape the remains of the foam off the bottom of the key plungers (can use goo-gone to help with this too), punch new foam disks from 3m grey mounting foam, clean off the old conductive paper discs (also can use goo-gone to help here), carefully apply discs to foam, and stick new foam+old discs back onto each key plunger. Apparently you should use a qtip with a small bit of goo-gone around the edge of each new foam disc to prevent the top and bottom from sticking together and 'pillowing' the foam disc. It may be easier to first stick the conductive discs to the foam and use the disc as a guide for punching the foam, that way it will always be exactly 'on register'. The trouble is you need to buy a punch to punch the foam into discs of the same (or slightly narrower) size as the shiny conductive paper discs are (or have it shave a small bit off the edges off of the conductive discs, if they're a tiny bit smaller it shouldn't hurt anything I'd think). I have not done this yet, and am not sure where to buy an appropriate punch (art supply store didn't have it). If any of the aluminized-paper contact discs are 'beyond repair', I have NO idea how to replace those. Aluminum foil MIGHT work, but it doesn't sound like a good solution because its TOO conductive, I think. I have 4 keyboards that need fixing in this way: one keytronic kb3270pc (1986 firmware) four victor 9000 US-type keyboards (manufactured by keytronic) Fortunately (unlike the old digital group keyboard keytronic made with its completely insane #-shaped contact pads) I believe all 4 keyboards use the same diameter paper contact circles and foam, so I should only need one punch. -- Jonathan Gevaryahu jgevaryahu(@t)hotmail(d0t)com jzg22(@t)drexel(d0t)edu From tiggerlasv at aim.com Mon Dec 8 12:40:14 2008 From: tiggerlasv at aim.com (tiggerlasv at aim.com) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 13:40:14 -0500 Subject: RSTS/E problem Message-ID: <8CB277B8B343A38-13F4-54C@MBLK-M06.sysops.aol.com> > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk- > bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of H?lscher > Sent: Sunday, December 07, 2008 1:26 PM > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: RSTS/E problem > > Hi, > > after installing and SYSGENing of RSTS/E V9.6 I get the following > error: > >? Beginning RSTS/E system startup... > 88.12.07? 12:10????? Installing monitor overlays > 88.12.07? 12:10????? Mounting disks > 88.12.07? 12:10????? Assigning logical names > 88.12.07? 12:10????? Starting error logging > ?ERRINT - ?No room for user on device at Line? 1265 > 88.12.07? 12:10????? Setting system characteristics > 07-Dec-88 12:10 PM?? Installing run-time systems and libraries > 07-Dec-88 12:10 PM?? Setting terminal characteristics > 07-Dec-88 12:10 PM?? Defining system commands > 07-Dec-88 12:10 PM?? Setting printer characteristics > 07-Dec-88 12:10 PM?? Starting spoolers > ?Unable to start Print/Batch Services > ?No room for additional jobs That problem can occur for a number of reasons: 1.)?? You still have SYSGEN as the currently installed .SIL ?????? (Try "INSTALL RSTS", or whatever the name of the monitor was that you sysgen'd, ????????at the Option: ??prompt) 2.)?? You don't have SWAP.SYS set to a large enough size. ?????C2 (Use the FILE option of REFRESH, and change the size of SWAP.SYS to at least 256 or 512. ??????? Later, if you need more swap space, you can use system commands to add another swap file.) 3.)????You didn't specify a?high enough JOBMAX when you did your?sysgen. T ????????????? From cclist at sydex.com Mon Dec 8 12:52:09 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 10:52:09 -0800 Subject: What should an old lady do with an Osborne? In-Reply-To: <493D58BA.2060902@gmail.com> References: , <493D58BA.2060902@gmail.com> Message-ID: <493CFC59.23508.592E4CA@cclist.sydex.com> On 8 Dec 2008 at 11:26, Jules Richardson wrote: > Hmm. 'donate' implies she's not looking for monetary gain. Freecycle it, or > advertise it on a local newsgroup. Subject of course to there being no museums > in the area who might want it. A lot of stuff on VCF goes for "what it costs to ship". Hopes of donating to a museum probably isn't going to get any takers as these aren't particularly rare. "Donating" to a thrift will most likely see this kind of thing go to the scrappers in some areas. Cheers, Chuck From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Dec 8 13:18:06 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 8 Dec 2008 19:18:06 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493C5B8C.7010309@gjcp.net> from "Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ" at Dec 7, 8 11:26:04 pm Message-ID: > AVR will quite happily send you several kilos of dead trees detailing > all this and more, if you ask them. I find that since I'm generally Right :-). When I have some spare time, I'll contact them... > carrying several kilos of laptop already, the PDF editions will suffice. I much prefer the dead-tree version of documentation, and having got a slow connection and a slow printer, it's not really practical for me to download and print 300 page documents... I feel there's a business oportunity for someone to set up a company that will print a document from the web (at a certain cost per page) and post it out. I don't know of any such organisation in the UK, the local internet cafe charges, IIRC, \pounds 1.00 per page printing, which is hardly useful for large documents. > > > Could I, if I wanted, make the programmer and write the software from > > scratch? > > Since avr-gcc and avrdude are already available under the GPL and fully > documented, there's no real need to reinvent that particular wheel. Oh, OK.... > > In short - if you wanted to program an AVR the "oldskool EPROM" way by > setting lines by hand and toggling VPP with a push switch, you could > (and I have seen this done!). It may be slightly more worth your time > and effort to learn how to use the existing tools ;-) Well, I am not going to write a C compiler from scratch. But certainly for some of the simpler tools I've found it quicker in the past to write my own versions. -tony From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Mon Dec 8 14:55:10 2008 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 20:55:10 +0000 Subject: Reading an MFM hard drive with a floppy disc analyser In-Reply-To: <493D49D9.6020800@gmail.com> References: <4938FE9C.5000505@philpem.me.uk> <493938A7.4060605@gmail.com> <4939B540.402@philpem.me.uk> <4939CAC5.60801@gmail.com> <493C5D18.40005@philpem.me.uk> <493D49D9.6020800@gmail.com> Message-ID: <493D89AE.7050905@philpem.me.uk> Jules Richardson wrote: > > It might take a while to process the data, though. > > I really don't know - maybe some of the resident Catweasel experts can > comment there. I suppose to 'understand' an image we wouldn't be doing > anything in software that the drive controller doesn't normally do in > hardware. I suppose ultimately it's going to depend on the speed of the machine that's analysing the data, and the efficiency of the algorithm... > To be honest, the quicker the better - but I wouldn't be upset if it > took an hour or two to grab a drive image. Some of the dumps I have were > transferred at 9600 baud serial... 3600RPM = 60 revolutions per second. 1 revolution = 16.667 milliseconds 306 data tracks * 4 heads = 1224 tracks total (ST412) 1224 tracks * 16.667ms = 20 seconds, excluding transfer time If we assume T_transfer = 100ms/track (to be pessimistic)... 100ms * 1224 tracks = 122.4 seconds = ~2 minutes Assuming no read retries, and a head switching time of zero (and an infinitely fast hard drive to store the image on), that's a theoretical minimum of 142.4 seconds. I wouldn't expect it to be that fast, but ~15 minutes is probably a reasonable estimate. > Can you read from the buffer and transfer to the PC at the same time as > you're populating the buffer by reading from the drive? No, it's a single-ported RAM. Either the MCU can control it, or the FPGA can. One option would be to add a second SRAM chip, which could be rigged as a ping-pong buffer (while track N is being downloaded, track N+1 is being read). > Or is what you > have essentially a single microcontroller? No, it's a PIC18F4550 "USB-Enabled 8-bit Microcontroller" bolted onto an Altera Cyclone II 2C20 FPGA. The FPGA handles everything on the disc interface side -- reading and writing data, setting/querying control lines and so forth. The PIC effectively acts as a USB-to-high-speed-parallel bridge for the Cyclone. The intention is to run it at 48MHz (12MIPS) and run the parallel interface at 12MHz (Fosc/4, the fastest possible speed). > One of the things I was > trying to achieve when I was looking at doing this in pure TTL was a > degree of parallelism - because the device doesn't attempt to understand > the drive's data stream (that's done later on the host PC), it can't > benefit from re-seek or re-read attempts anyway, so there's no > requirement to ever pause buffer fill and try again. The FPGA logic I'm using doesn't make any attempt to decode the bitstream, unless the MFM sync-word detector is enabled. In that case, it won't record anything until a specified sync-word is detected in the bitstream. If the bitstream isn't MFM it probably won't ever start (and after a few seconds the PC will probably time out). > Uh huh. So I do think that theoretically you could have a transition > time the length of the track. No likely, but possible. In the middle of > that extreme and 'normal data' there may well be transition times that > are quite high, so they do need to be recorded (so that you can > hopefully recover sectors of a damaged track beyond the bad spot) Thing is, the AGC on the head amplifier will probably start boosting the gain if it doesn't see any transitions in, say, 1/32 of a revolution. If that happens, then you'll get a nice stream of garbage (more likely spurious transitions inserted than transitions missed). The only way I can think of to get around that would be to remove the head-amp and bolt on an analogue amplifier, sample the whole track at (say) 20 megasamples per second, then drag the data into a PC and analyse it. I wonder if you could use some tricks from modern hard discs -- PRML and the like -- to recover data from blocks where the magnetic transitions are indistinct. > For sure - or worse. I've still recovered useful data from drives that > have been 80% bad - sometimes it's worth it. True. I had an 8.4GB Maxtor that was almost completely dead. Chucked it in the freezer, and nearly all of it was unreadable... except my mailspool. The loss of a few weeks of work (which was backed up) was pretty minor compared to the loss of five years of e-mail :) >> The reader hardware is going to need >> some way of dealing with these errors, even if that's just stepping the >> resolution down and storing a less-accurate measurement of the dead-time. > > Hmm, so you're proposing that the reader actually tries to understand > the storage mechanism? I was thinking that it was a dumb device, > basically copying the transitions that it sees to the host PC - and it > was the software on the PC which actually does the decoding (and > potentially requests re-read attempts at a later date). No, I'm not proposing that at all -- my goal is to create a generic reader/writer and do all the decoding work in software. "It slices, it dices, it makes coffee, it feeds the cat!* (* Subject to software availability)" :) > However, a) I'm not sure if PCI is actually fast enough for what's > needed (i.e. the system could sample into memory from a drive quickly > enough), and b) that we have anyone 'on-tap' who knows how to build a > PCI card anyway... :-) I was going to say "but a PCI device can't take over the bus", then I realised you've got DMA and bus-mastering to play with... So you could allocate a block of RAM, and have the FDD controller write bytes (or 32-bit DWORDs) straight to RAM. That's probably worth looking into, but I know very little about PCI device design... >> I'd still consider the ultimate to be some form of non-contact disc >> drive, but that would involve custom-made FDD heads and other such "fun". > > Well for hard disks they're all flying heads anyway... Only while the disc platters are spinning, AIUI... > My ultimate would be something which recorded the signal at a more > analogue level I think, for potential cleaning up in software later > (rather than using a digital interface which can't perform an > intelligent analysis of the data stream). I think it's do-able for a > floppy drive, and probably without a lot of modification to a donor > drive itself. True. If you can live with read-only, it would be a head amplifier and an A/D converter. The Commodore 1541 schematics (and the older CBM drive manuals.. 1540?) might be a good reference -- IIRC some of those used discrete amplifier circuitry instead of an all-in-one head amplifier/threshold detector IC. > (I've mused before on here about running the entire drive in a bath of > something which might reduce friction and the chances of damage due to > contamination - it'd be interesting purely from an experimentation point > of view, but I'm not sure if it'd ever be possible to prove that it > actually helped) Sounds like a nice idea, but I'd be somewhat worried about the effects of whatever chemical you're using on the motor, and its effect on the head/disc distance. I'd be inclined to think it would do more harm than good... -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Mon Dec 8 15:04:36 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 15:04:36 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <493D8BE4.1060304@gmail.com> Tony Duell wrote: > I feel there's a business oportunity for someone to set up a company that > will print a document from the web (at a certain cost per page) and post > it out. I don't know of any such organisation in the UK, the local > internet cafe charges, IIRC, \pounds 1.00 per page printing, which is > hardly useful for large documents. For sure. Various places will let you upload documents for printing, but I'm not sure if I've seen one that will then mail the result out to you - they offer the upload as a data transfer convenience, but still expect you to collect the printed material in person. (Although I always used to use the Copy Centre in Milton near Cambridge - now called Labute it seems - and they were always very flexible with customer needs, so may well be happy to do this if asked) > Well, I am not going to write a C compiler from scratch. But certainly > for some of the simpler tools I've found it quicker in the past to write > my own versions. I've done that, too - sometimes it's quicker to write your own than find an equivalent tool, understand the documentation, verify that it does what you need etc. cheers Jules From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Dec 8 15:46:53 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 8 Dec 2008 16:46:53 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Dec 8, 2008, at 2:18 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >> carrying several kilos of laptop already, the PDF editions will >> suffice. > > I much prefer the dead-tree version of documentation, and having got a > slow connection and a slow printer, it's not really practical for > me to > download and print 300 page documents... There's NO substitute for a serious printer. [Dave hugs his beloved HP 8100DN] > I feel there's a business oportunity for someone to set up a > company that > will print a document from the web (at a certain cost per page) and > post > it out. I don't know of any such organisation in the UK, the local > internet cafe charges, IIRC, \pounds 1.00 per page printing, which is > hardly useful for large documents. There are several such services on this side of the pond. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Mon Dec 8 15:39:15 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 15:39:15 -0600 Subject: Reading an MFM hard drive with a floppy disc analyser In-Reply-To: <493D89AE.7050905@philpem.me.uk> References: <4938FE9C.5000505@philpem.me.uk> <493938A7.4060605@gmail.com> <4939B540.402@philpem.me.uk> <4939CAC5.60801@gmail.com> <493C5D18.40005@philpem.me.uk> <493D49D9.6020800@gmail.com> <493D89AE.7050905@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <493D9403.1060009@gmail.com> Philip Pemberton wrote: > Jules Richardson wrote: >> > It might take a while to process the data, though. >> >> I really don't know - maybe some of the resident Catweasel experts can >> comment there. I suppose to 'understand' an image we wouldn't be doing >> anything in software that the drive controller doesn't normally do in >> hardware. > > I suppose ultimately it's going to depend on the speed of the machine > that's analysing the data, and the efficiency of the algorithm... Yep. But I'm not sure that it's really rocket science - assuming that you know what encoding format the data's actually in, which is probably the more difficult part. Coping with errors might be interesting in some cases. > Assuming no read retries, and a head switching time of zero (and an > infinitely fast hard drive to store the image on), that's a theoretical > minimum of 142.4 seconds. > > I wouldn't expect it to be that fast, but ~15 minutes is probably a > reasonable estimate. Well that'd do, I guess. Heck, that's hardly enough time for the electronics to get up to working temp :-) But yeah, in the order of 15 mins is probably realistic - I think it normally used to take about that to 'clone' a drive. >> Can you read from the buffer and transfer to the PC at the same time >> as you're populating the buffer by reading from the drive? > > No, it's a single-ported RAM. Either the MCU can control it, or the FPGA > can. > > One option would be to add a second SRAM chip, which could be rigged as > a ping-pong buffer (while track N is being downloaded, track N+1 is > being read). Hmm, well you could potentially use several SRAM ICs and couple them to different buses as/when needed, but at the end of the day perhaps it's just not worth the complexity. >> Uh huh. So I do think that theoretically you could have a transition >> time the length of the track. No likely, but possible. In the middle >> of that extreme and 'normal data' there may well be transition times >> that are quite high, so they do need to be recorded (so that you can >> hopefully recover sectors of a damaged track beyond the bad spot) > > Thing is, the AGC on the head amplifier will probably start boosting the > gain if it doesn't see any transitions in, say, 1/32 of a revolution. If > that happens, then you'll get a nice stream of garbage (more likely > spurious transitions inserted than transitions missed). Hmm, true. I suppose anything's possible though, without knowing the internals of every STxxx drive ever made :-) > The only way I can think of to get around that would be to remove the > head-amp and bolt on an analogue amplifier I'm not sure how easy it is to tap into that kind of thing on a lot of drives, though. Possibly best left for real emergencies on a case-by-case basis... >> Hmm, so you're proposing that the reader actually tries to understand >> the storage mechanism? I was thinking that it was a dumb device, >> basically copying the transitions that it sees to the host PC - and it >> was the software on the PC which actually does the decoding (and >> potentially requests re-read attempts at a later date). > > No, I'm not proposing that at all -- my goal is to create a generic > reader/writer and do all the decoding work in software. OK. > "It slices, it > dices, it makes coffee, it feeds the cat!* (* Subject to software > availability)" :) We have four cats here, and they eat a phenomenal amount - I'm not sure that your device could keep up. :-) > That's probably worth looking into, but I know very little about PCI > device design... Ditto. Back in the day I wanted to get away from the internal card approach - but these days it's possible to get a tiny, cheap motherboard and should be relatively easy to build a networkable "external device" that's a complete compact PC in its own right. >> Well for hard disks they're all flying heads anyway... > > Only while the disc platters are spinning, AIUI... Yep. >> My ultimate would be something which recorded the signal at a more >> analogue level I think, for potential cleaning up in software later >> (rather than using a digital interface which can't perform an >> intelligent analysis of the data stream). I think it's do-able for a >> floppy drive, and probably without a lot of modification to a donor >> drive itself. > > True. If you can live with read-only, it would be a head amplifier and > an A/D converter. The Commodore 1541 schematics (and the older CBM drive > manuals.. 1540?) might be a good reference -- IIRC some of those used > discrete amplifier circuitry instead of an all-in-one head > amplifier/threshold detector IC. I think I've got some Tandon and Epson drive schematics kicking around and they used separate stages. But tapping into the head signal on a floppy drive is a darn sight easier than a hard disk... >> (I've mused before on here about running the entire drive in a bath of >> something which might reduce friction and the chances of damage due to >> contamination - it'd be interesting purely from an experimentation >> point of view, but I'm not sure if it'd ever be possible to prove that >> it actually helped) > > Sounds like a nice idea, but I'd be somewhat worried about the effects > of whatever chemical you're using on the motor, and its effect on the > head/disc distance. Yeah, I got around to thinking about moving the motors elsewhere - but you're right about the head gap. I suspect it just plain won't work, but speculation's always interesting :-) cheers Jules From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Mon Dec 8 17:03:07 2008 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 23:03:07 +0000 Subject: Reading an MFM hard drive with a floppy disc analyser In-Reply-To: <493D9403.1060009@gmail.com> References: <4938FE9C.5000505@philpem.me.uk> <493938A7.4060605@gmail.com> <4939B540.402@philpem.me.uk> <4939CAC5.60801@gmail.com> <493C5D18.40005@philpem.me.uk> <493D49D9.6020800@gmail.com> <493D89AE.7050905@philpem.me.uk> <493D9403.1060009@gmail.com> Message-ID: <493DA7AB.7020607@philpem.me.uk> Jules Richardson wrote: > Yep. But I'm not sure that it's really rocket science - assuming that > you know what encoding format the data's actually in, which is probably > the more difficult part. Coping with errors might be interesting in some > cases. It isn't. The hardest part is converting from timing data back to an MFM bitstream or binary data. You need to either handle changes in drive speed in real time (i.e. track the read speed and continually adjust the 1t, 1.5t and 2t timing values) or do something similar to disk2fdi -- preprocess the data and figure out a set of thresholds that work, assuming the disc is in good shape. >> I wouldn't expect it to be that fast, but ~15 minutes is probably a >> reasonable estimate. > > Well that'd do, I guess. Heck, that's hardly enough time for the > electronics to get up to working temp :-) But yeah, in the order of 15 > mins is probably realistic - I think it normally used to take about that > to 'clone' a drive. Mmm, there's just a bit of a difference between "what the math says" and "what Murphy allows". > Hmm, well you could potentially use several SRAM ICs and couple them to > different buses as/when needed, but at the end of the day perhaps it's > just not worth the complexity. The added board space is a bigger concern... >> Thing is, the AGC on the head amplifier will probably start boosting >> the gain if it doesn't see any transitions in, say, 1/32 of a >> revolution. If that happens, then you'll get a nice stream of garbage >> (more likely spurious transitions inserted than transitions missed). > > Hmm, true. I suppose anything's possible though, without knowing the > internals of every STxxx drive ever made :-) I still harbour a hatred for ST506 drives. Although mainly directed at the Kalok 20MB piles-o'-crap. I actually got banned from the school computer lab many years ago for allegedly destroying the hard drive in an Acorn A440. Said drive being a 20MB Kalok thing that was shaky at the best of times. I was dragged out of class for half a day to help the "IT expert" (actually Just Another Teacher [tm]) fix it. Most of that time was spent staring at !HForm's soak-test screen and writing down all the errors, on IT Expert's orders. One every two sectors IIRC. "Make sure you don't get ANY of the numbers wrong! You have to re-enter them when it actually formats the drive!" >> The only way I can think of to get around that would be to remove the >> head-amp and bolt on an analogue amplifier > > I'm not sure how easy it is to tap into that kind of thing on a lot of > drives, though. Possibly best left for real emergencies on a > case-by-case basis... It's "find a clean-room" territory. The head preamps are usually mounted near the heads, often on the actuator arms themselves. On floppy drives, you get a screwdriver and a soldering iron. Suppose you could make a replacement logic board if you liked, but that's too much like hard work IMO :) >> "It slices, it dices, it makes coffee, it feeds the cat!* (* Subject >> to software availability)" :) > > We have four cats here, and they eat a phenomenal amount - I'm not sure > that your device could keep up. :-) Two chinchillas here (soon to be three). It's all fun and games until one of them tries to get under the sink and ends up getting soaked... Oh, food. A handful of pellets, a handful of fresh hay and a fresh bottle of water every 24 hours. Not hard, just expensive :) >> That's probably worth looking into, but I know very little about PCI >> device design... > > Ditto. Back in the day I wanted to get away from the internal card > approach - but these days it's possible to get a tiny, cheap motherboard > and should be relatively easy to build a networkable "external device" > that's a complete compact PC in its own right. The problem with PCI is licensing -- you need a PCI Vendor ID, which you get by joining PCI-SIG, signing the patent licenses and so forth. The damage? ?4k per year last time I checked. Or you move to China, open a factory and pick a number at random and pray it doesn't clash with someone else's ID. Or pick one that isn't on the Linux PCI Vendor ID list... USB is open-licensed -- AIUI, it's a case of "do what you like as long as you buy a Vendor ID and don't use the USB logo". The VIDs were $2000 last time I checked, but a lot of IC manufacturers will sub-licence individual PIDs in their VID block to their customers. Or you ignore the USB-IF and pick a nice, random number that isn't on the Linux USB VID list. > I think I've got some Tandon and Epson drive schematics kicking around > and they used separate stages. But tapping into the head signal on a > floppy drive is a darn sight easier than a hard disk... Mainly because the manuals for floppy drives tend to include schematics... The ST412/506 OEM manual doesn't. Woooooo, black magic inside! > Yeah, I got around to thinking about moving the motors elsewhere - but > you're right about the head gap. I suspect it just plain won't work, but > speculation's always interesting :-) Many a good idea has been born of idle speculation and what-ifs. -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Mon Dec 8 17:18:14 2008 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 23:18:14 +0000 Subject: Reading an MFM hard drive with a floppy disc analyser In-Reply-To: <493DA7AB.7020607@philpem.me.uk> References: <4938FE9C.5000505@philpem.me.uk> <493938A7.4060605@gmail.com> <4939B540.402@philpem.me.uk> <4939CAC5.60801@gmail.com> <493C5D18.40005@philpem.me.uk> <493D49D9.6020800@gmail.com> <493D89AE.7050905@philpem.me.uk> <493D9403.1060009@gmail.com> <493DA7AB.7020607@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <493DAB36.3060907@philpem.me.uk> Philip Pemberton wrote: > The problem with PCI is licensing -- you need a PCI Vendor ID, which you > get by joining PCI-SIG, signing the patent licenses and so forth. The > damage? ?4k per year last time I checked. OK, I really should check my facts before I open my big trap. PCI-SIG won't issue a Vendor ID unless you're a member. That costs $3000 per year. > USB is open-licensed -- AIUI, it's a case of "do what you like as long > as you buy a Vendor ID and don't use the USB logo". The VIDs were $2000 > last time I checked, but a lot of IC manufacturers will sub-licence > individual PIDs in their VID block to their customers. Might as well correct this too.. $2000 for either a Vendor ID on its own (the $2k is an "administration fee"), or a VID and a two-year Trademark License. No idea if the VID lapses when the trademark license expires, the website isn't exactly clear on that. But anyway, this sort of thing is OT for classiccmp... -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From cclist at sydex.com Mon Dec 8 13:01:50 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 11:01:50 -0800 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493D692B.4010603@drexel.edu> References: <200812070911.mB79Buvk029642@dewey.classiccmp.org>, <493D692B.4010603@drexel.edu> Message-ID: <493CFE9E.168.59BC32D@cclist.sydex.com> On 8 Dec 2008 at 13:36, Jonathan Gevaryahu wrote: > The trouble is you need to buy a punch to punch the foam into discs of > the same (or slightly narrower) size as the shiny conductive paper > discs are (or have it shave a small bit off the edges off of the > conductive discs, if they're a tiny bit smaller it shouldn't hurt > anything I'd think). I have not done this yet, and am not sure where > to buy an appropriate punch (art supply store didn't have it). A piece of thinwall metal tubing with the edge sharpened often works well as a soft-materials punch. Use with a soft wood block as backing and tap with a mallet. Leather craft stores also carry punch sets--and they're also on ebay (e.g. item 270313626700). As with many Chinese tools, a little work after you receive it, such as sharpening to a really sharp edge will go a long way toward better results. I use a similar punch to cut felt and cork washers. There's no reason that it wouldn't work on foam. Cheers, Chuck From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Mon Dec 8 17:45:12 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 17:45:12 -0600 Subject: Reading an MFM hard drive with a floppy disc analyser In-Reply-To: <493DA7AB.7020607@philpem.me.uk> References: <4938FE9C.5000505@philpem.me.uk> <493938A7.4060605@gmail.com> <4939B540.402@philpem.me.uk> <4939CAC5.60801@gmail.com> <493C5D18.40005@philpem.me.uk> <493D49D9.6020800@gmail.com> <493D89AE.7050905@philpem.me.uk> <493D9403.1060009@gmail.com> <493DA7AB.7020607@philpem.me.uk> Message-ID: <493DB188.6010406@gmail.com> Philip Pemberton wrote: > Jules Richardson wrote: >> Yep. But I'm not sure that it's really rocket science - assuming that >> you know what encoding format the data's actually in, which is >> probably the more difficult part. Coping with errors might be >> interesting in some cases. > > It isn't. The hardest part is converting from timing data back to an MFM > bitstream or binary data. You need to either handle changes in drive > speed in real time (i.e. track the read speed and continually adjust the > 1t, 1.5t and 2t timing values) or do something similar to disk2fdi -- > preprocess the data and figure out a set of thresholds that work, > assuming the disc is in good shape. Well presumably it doesn't vary *that* much, even on a flakey old drive...? > Mmm, there's just a bit of a difference between "what the math says" and > "what Murphy allows". Heh, yeah... > The added board space is a bigger concern... bah, stack one board atop the other with a bus between 'em ;) > I actually got banned from the school computer lab many years ago for > allegedly destroying the hard drive in an Acorn A440. Said drive being a > 20MB Kalok thing that was shaky at the best of times. I was dragged out > of class for half a day to help the "IT expert" (actually Just Another > Teacher [tm]) fix it. Most of that time was spent staring at !HForm's > soak-test screen and writing down all the errors, on IT Expert's orders. > One every two sectors IIRC. > > "Make sure you don't get ANY of the numbers wrong! You have to re-enter > them when it actually formats the drive!" I think in that situation I would have deliberately inverted the numbers before handing the data over :-) I'm not sure I ever had a Kalok drive, even in any of my Acorn stuff. My loathing's reserved for the BASF units that Torch commonly used... >> I'm not sure how easy it is to tap into that kind of thing on a lot of >> drives, though. Possibly best left for real emergencies on a >> case-by-case basis... > > It's "find a clean-room" territory. The head preamps are usually mounted > near the heads, often on the actuator arms themselves. Well, in a non-clean-room environment I've pulled the complete head stack out of a drive and put it back in again with surprising success (said stack was jammed solid with debris, so removing it to clean it all out was the only way). Figured I had nothing to lose, and was surprised when the drive sprang into life (and I got about 80-90% of the data back - and some of what I lost was probably as a result of damage already sustained by the debris flying around the innards of the drive) > Oh, food. A handful of pellets, a handful of fresh hay and a fresh > bottle of water every 24 hours. Not hard, just expensive :) I hear ya. Ours spend half their time outdoors, and at this time of year I suppose they need to eat a lot. We've got a couple of dogs too - but then they all make nice little portable space heaters :-) >>> That's probably worth looking into, but I know very little about PCI >>> device design... >> >> Ditto. Back in the day I wanted to get away from the internal card >> approach - but these days it's possible to get a tiny, cheap >> motherboard and should be relatively easy to build a networkable >> "external device" that's a complete compact PC in its own right. > > The problem with PCI is licensing -- you need a PCI Vendor ID, which you > get by joining PCI-SIG, signing the patent licenses and so forth. The > damage? ?4k per year last time I checked. Is that like Ethernet, though, where in theory you could just make up an ID if in a closed environment, providing it didn't conflict with anything else - or is there no 'hobbyist/prototype' ID set aside for this kind of thing? (I suppose in a real Big Brother scenario, the people issuing the IDs would be the same people as those who sold the ICs necessary to talk to the bus...) > Or you move to China, open a factory and pick a number at random and > pray it doesn't clash with someone else's ID. Or pick one that isn't on > the Linux PCI Vendor ID list... Grr, read entire message before typing reply, Jules... :-) I'd say stuff it and make something up, assuming this is always going to be a hobbyist thing rather than a serious commercial venture. Preferably make it read from a ROM or other non-hard-coded system... >> I think I've got some Tandon and Epson drive schematics kicking around >> and they used separate stages. But tapping into the head signal on a >> floppy drive is a darn sight easier than a hard disk... > > Mainly because the manuals for floppy drives tend to include > schematics... The ST412/506 OEM manual doesn't. No, but the service manual (with schematics) is on Bitsavers. I don't think many of the other vendors ever took that approach, though (I don't recall seeing any, actually, but I'm sure there must have been one or two). > Many a good idea has been born of idle speculation and what-ifs. ... and of beer. From martinm at allwest.net Mon Dec 8 18:31:40 2008 From: martinm at allwest.net (Martin Marshall) Date: Mon, 8 Dec 2008 17:31:40 -0700 Subject: Scrapping NCR 3430's and Wyse 286 Boards Message-ID: I'm scrapping two NCR / ATT 3430 servers (MCA bus). If anyone wants the whole machines, they are free for pickup in Evanston, Wyoming (82930) or parts are available for shipping cost (and beer money, if the taker wants to be generous). Both servers are Pentium 60's with two processor boards per box. I also have some boards for a Wyse 286 (I think). There are two processor boards, one disk controller board, one video card and one serial / parallel board. Free for shipping. Email me directly. My address is "martinm" at the domain "allwest.net". Thank you, Martin Marshall From brain at jbrain.com Mon Dec 8 18:35:51 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 18:35:51 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <493DBD67.9030404@jbrain.com> Tony Duell wrote: > Well, I am not going to write a C compiler from scratch. But certainly > for some of the simpler tools I've found it quicker in the past to write > my own versions. > I'm curious as to why one would do that? Is it really quicker to design, implement, test, maintain, support something on your own rather than use a pretested application/utility? Jim From glen.slick at gmail.com Mon Dec 8 18:42:58 2008 From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick) Date: Mon, 8 Dec 2008 16:42:58 -0800 Subject: HP Integral PC 82971A EPROM/ROM module - anyone have docs? In-Reply-To: References: <1e1fc3e90812061125q22e529a0w2293095003f6b712@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1e1fc3e90812081642x7d3ca5d5iebba1cfeb997a988@mail.gmail.com> On Sat, Dec 6, 2008 at 12:08 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > > Let me (us) know how you get on. I've never tried it. > Tony, with your notes on the 82971A EPROM/ROM Module switch settings I was able to do a demonstration test of the one I have. I used (15x) 27C256 EPROMs and built the ROM image to start at 1MB (0x100000) so I set the switch settings like this: S1: ON,off,ON,ON,off,ON,off,ON S2: off,ON,ON,off,off,off,off,ON S3:ON,off,off,off,ON,off,off,ON I used merge_rom with the switches "-b100000 -c8000 -s70000" and built a 448KB ROM image with some of the HP-UX commands {cat, chmod, cp, csh, ls, mkdir, more, mv, pwd, rm, rmdir, sh, vi} and had about 11KB to spare. The set of files to merge into the ROM images were specified in a romrc file I created, along with the .init file from the Rtools disc which must do something magic. Then I used split_rom to create the 15x 27C256 EPROM images {lo0 - lo6, hi0 - hi6}, then use msdoscp to copy those image files to MS-DOS formatted floppy, then used my EPROM programmer PC to burn the 15x EPROMs. The first time I tried the EPROM module in the IPC I got a ROM checksum error message so I used verify_rom to compare the ROM in memory against the ROM image and found what EPROM corresponded to the mismatches. That turned out to be user error while programming that EPROM so I programmed another and tried again and then verify_rom successfully compared ROM in memory against the ROM image. So the end result of this demonstration is that I can boot the IPC without an HP-IB hard drive attached and have a dozen HP-UX commands on hand without swapping floppies. Maybe it would be more useful to put BASIC or some other utilities in the EPROM module for the occasions when the IPC might be used without the HP-IB hard drive attached. I'll repeat this experiment with 27C512 EPROMs when I get a handful of those in a few days. It would still be nice to find a copy of "HP82970A EPROM/ROM Software Development Tools Users Guide" for reference. -Glen EPROM/ROM Software Development Tools ************************************ Release 5.0 (c) Copyright 1986, Hewlett-Packard Co. This disc contains the tools needed to place applications in ROM for the Integral Personal Computer. Brief descriptions of the files found on this disc are: /Rtools Rtools.env - alternative environment that places /Rtools in PATH dump_rom - examines contents of physical ROMs in IPC ld_mod - program used by merge_rom to make ROM executable code merge_rom - creates logical ROM images prog_rom - transfers files to serial PROM programmer split_rom - creates IC images from logical ROM image verify_rom - compares a logical ROM image with physical ROMs view_rom - views the contents of a physical ROM image Installation note : If you are copying these programs to a hard disc, then you need to copy all of the above programs to the hard disc (including ld_mod). Copy the programs to a directory where you normally install executable programs. /Rtools/example1 7x10 - font used in example1 EPROM Autost - Autost file placed in example1 EPROM prog_am512 - command file to burn 512K bit ICs from AMD (AM27512DC) prog_i256 - command file to burn 256K bit EPROMs in DATAIO29B prog_i512 - command file to burn 512K bit EPROMS in DATAIO 29B pre_Iform - command file for Intel format transfer to DATAIO 29B pre_Mform - command file for Motorola format xfer to DATAIO 29B romrc - configuration file for merge_rom set_font - set_font program to be placed in EPROM status - status program to be placed in EPROM time_of_day - time_of_day program to be placed in EPROM /Rtools/example2 .init - program needed to be included in logical ROM image Autost - Autost script for example2 EPROMs romrc - ROM configuration file for merge_rom set_win.c - C source code for set_win to be made ROM executable For detailed information about these programs refer to your HP82970A EPROM/ROM Software Development Tools Users Guide. See the Appendix to this document for a tutorial in using these tools. Usage merge_rom: merge_rom -[bdfosv] merge_rom merges files into a logical ROM disc image command line options: -b[hex_number] defines base address of the physical ROM -c[hex_number] defines the number of bytes per IC -f[file_name] names the configuration file for this ROM image -o[filename] defines name of the logical ROM image file -s[hex_number] defines the size of the ROM in bytes -v sets verbose mode -V displays the Version number of this program Defaults are: -b defaults to 0x80000 -c defaults to 0x10000 -f defaults to romrc -o defaults to ROM -s defaults to 0x80000 From healyzh at aracnet.com Mon Dec 8 18:45:09 2008 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Mon, 8 Dec 2008 16:45:09 -0800 (PST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493DBD67.9030404@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <200812090045.mB90j9df010342@onyx.spiritone.com> > I'm curious as to why one would do that? Is it really quicker to > design, implement, test, maintain, support something on your own rather > than use a pretested application/utility? > > Jim At times, yes. Can you guess what I'm doing this week? :-( Sometimes there are real advantages to rolling your own. You know what it does, you have full control over the data, and if you're a good enough programmer, it does exactly what you want. Other times the reasons boil down to $$$'s. Zane From pontus at update.uu.se Mon Dec 8 18:46:21 2008 From: pontus at update.uu.se (Pontus) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 01:46:21 +0100 Subject: UK DEC Meeting in North West, Autumn 2009 - expression of interest please (Mark Wickens) In-Reply-To: <493C4335.7020206@wickensonline.co.uk> References: <200812071801.mB7I0niY034389@dewey.classiccmp.org> <778F4B0AE95647ADA6596080C98CBED2@D4BZH92J> <493C383D.3030607@gjcp.net> <493C4335.7020206@wickensonline.co.uk> Message-ID: <493DBFDD.5090305@update.uu.se> > Hi Gordon, > > I live in Windermere, so it will probably be there, although the > National Museum of Computing at Bletchley Park are keen to host it, > and they do have some wonderful toys ;) > > I'll let you know when I've made up my mind! > > Regards, Mark. If the turn up is good and it is in Bletchley Park, I would definitely haul my behind from Sweden to meet some fellow DEC-geeks and see the Park. /P From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Mon Dec 8 18:42:09 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 18:42:09 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493DBD67.9030404@jbrain.com> References: <493DBD67.9030404@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <493DBEE1.3010906@gmail.com> Jim Brain wrote: > Is it really quicker to > design, implement, test, maintain, support something on your own rather > than use a pretested application/utility? Yes, in some circumstances - particularly for 'in house' tools... From brain at jbrain.com Mon Dec 8 18:57:13 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 18:57:13 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <200812090045.mB90j9df010342@onyx.spiritone.com> References: <200812090045.mB90j9df010342@onyx.spiritone.com> Message-ID: <493DC269.5040708@jbrain.com> Zane H. Healy wrote: >> I'm curious as to why one would do that? Is it really quicker to >> design, implement, test, maintain, support something on your own rather >> than use a pretested application/utility? >> >> Jim >> > > Sometimes there are real advantages to rolling your own. You know what it > does, you have full control over the data, and if you're a good enough > programmer, it does exactly what you want. Other times the reasons boil > down to $$$'s. > I can see the academic nature of rolling your own, and I can see the money aspect. However, if the existing solution is open source, I think the latter reason disappears. I suppose the former is still valid, though Jim From keithvz at verizon.net Mon Dec 8 23:11:01 2008 From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 00:11:01 -0500 Subject: Brian Brikon 723/4M-QT floppy drive tester documentation Message-ID: <493DFDE5.6000209@verizon.net> I've just purchased a Brian Instruments Brikon 723/4M-QT floppy drive tester. I've wanted one of these for quite some time, and was pretty happy to find one on ebay for $20+$23 s/h. Anyone have a manual? Anyone know what the difference would be from 723B vs 723/4M-QT ?? What's the 4M part? The QT? Any info would be helpful! Thanks Keith From dkelvey at hotmail.com Tue Dec 9 00:38:34 2008 From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey) Date: Mon, 8 Dec 2008 22:38:34 -0800 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <200812090045.mB90j9df010342@onyx.spiritone.com> References: <493DBD67.9030404@jbrain.com> <200812090045.mB90j9df010342@onyx.spiritone.com> Message-ID: > From: healyzh at aracnet.com > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Date: Mon, 8 Dec 2008 16:45:09 -0800 > Subject: Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) > >> I'm curious as to why one would do that? Is it really quicker to >> design, implement, test, maintain, support something on your own rather >> than use a pretested application/utility? >> >> Jim > > At times, yes. Can you guess what I'm doing this week? :-( > > Sometimes there are real advantages to rolling your own. You know what it > does, you have full control over the data, and if you're a good enough > programmer, it does exactly what you want. Other times the reasons boil > down to $$$'s. > > Zane > Hi I often write my own assemblers. These are quite easy to write so it usually means a few days looking at the data books and one or two evenings to write the assembler. Of course, I've written a few so it is mostly just modifying previous code. I write it in Forth so it is by nature it's a macro assembler. Over the years, I've gotten used to using single pass assemblers so it keeps them simple. Once one realizes that one doesn't have to write code in the same order as the memory in the system, the need for multipass goes away. Add a few macros to deal with flow structures ( like if else then ) and one can create good code. The reason I'd do this rather than use the manufactures assembler is that theirs rarely has the quality of macros I can create and requires a lot of extra learning. While I'm writing the assembler, I get to understand better things like the addressing modes that I'd have had to learn anyway. The last thing is that in many cases, the manufactures assembler only runs in windows with a mouse. I like to script things. I like to combine various elements of file management and revision maintainance in the scripts with my assembly. This is a pain to do with a mouse as my input. It also seems that most every tool I've used from vendors always has some limitations or bug that I have to find a way to work around. Dwight _________________________________________________________________ Send e-mail anywhere. No map, no compass. http://windowslive.com/Explore/hotmail?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_hotmail_acq_anywhere_122008 From toby at coreware.co.uk Tue Dec 9 02:36:24 2008 From: toby at coreware.co.uk (Tobias Russell) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 08:36:24 +0000 Subject: UK DEC Meeting in North West, Autumn 2009 - expression of interest please (Mark Wickens) In-Reply-To: <493DBFDD.5090305@update.uu.se> References: <200812071801.mB7I0niY034389@dewey.classiccmp.org> <778F4B0AE95647ADA6596080C98CBED2@D4BZH92J> <493C383D.3030607@gjcp.net> <493C4335.7020206@wickensonline.co.uk> <493DBFDD.5090305@update.uu.se> Message-ID: <1228811784.23074.14.camel@spasmo> I too would definitely turn up with a selection of my machines if it is in Bletchley. If Windermere I would do my best to attend but probably minus the bigger machines as I don't fancy the long drive with half a tonne of kit in the back. Thanks, Toby On Tue, 2008-12-09 at 01:46 +0100, Pontus wrote: > > Hi Gordon, > > > > I live in Windermere, so it will probably be there, although the > > National Museum of Computing at Bletchley Park are keen to host it, > > and they do have some wonderful toys ;) > > > > I'll let you know when I've made up my mind! > > > > Regards, Mark. > > If the turn up is good and it is in Bletchley Park, I would definitely > haul my behind from Sweden to meet some fellow DEC-geeks and see the Park. > > /P > -- This message has been scanned for viruses and dangerous content by MailScanner, and is believed to be clean. From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Sat Dec 6 00:19:50 2008 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 01:19:50 -0500 (EST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net> <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> <200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net> <49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <200812060619.BAA03337@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> > One thing I'm unclear about with this idea is how to store the > program. Are there any single chip OTP microcontrollers that use > fuse type memory as opposed to flash, UV, or some other sort that > eventually goes bad? Don't fusible-link PROMs go bad too? ISTR something about the metal vapour recondensing and growing whiskers.... /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From jeffj at panix.com Sat Dec 6 04:23:48 2008 From: jeffj at panix.com (Jeff Jonas) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 05:23:48 -0500 (EST) Subject: trying to use AT&T VFD display module Message-ID: I salvaged several AT&T/Lucent/Avaya D401A Digital Display Modules, apparently from a Definity phone system. The label says D401A AT&T 89338 series 1 The module has 8 touch-buttons and LEDS and an Itron DC 405A2 VFD (one line of 40 characters, each char a 5x7 matrix) I'd like to use the entire module since it has a microcontroller and power supply, but I have no clue as to the interface. Any help would be appreciated, starting with pinout. I really need the internal programming document with all the commands :-( I'm trying to strike a balance between researching the device to use completely "as is" vs. salvaging entire assemblies vs. salvaging just bare parts. Sometimes it's easier to just redesign it and salvage as many subassemblies as possible than taking the time to reverse engineer the entire gadget :-( Googling around found: "This digital display module ... adds a large easy to read 40 character display to the top of the 7405D or 7434D voice terminals. AT&T/Lucent systems compatible with this module are Definity G1, G2, G3, ECS and ..." Thanks in advance -- Jeffrey Jonas jeffj-at-panix-dot-com From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Sun Dec 7 15:47:25 2008 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 16:47:25 -0500 (EST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <0d2601c958a2$1e0fada0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <0d2601c958a2$1e0fada0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <200812072152.QAA22128@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> > I have a WORKABLE and PLEASURE TO USE copy of windows XP. How did you get it out of reverse video? That's always been one of my biggest problems with Windows - even after getting it most of the way there, there are constantly other things that surprise me with big bright areas, or end up displaying white-on-white or black-on-black. (People blather about "just like paper", but fail to notice that, even in reversre video, it *isn't* like paper - computer displays are self-luminant while paper is purely reflective.) Or are you someone who finds reverse video a pleasure to use? I certainly can't stand it for any significant length of time. I even find reverse-video modelines in my editor a bit much sometimes. /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Sun Dec 7 15:53:04 2008 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse) Date: Sun, 7 Dec 2008 16:53:04 -0500 (EST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Dec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> > For example, the ATMega8 user's manual runs to over 300 pages (PDF > downloadable for free) Sigh. You'd think if they actually wanted to make the documentation _usable_, they'd make it plain text. Apparently glitz wins out over usability once again. > and it doesn't even discuss the instruction set--that's in the "AVR > family" manual. Hm, I was recently looking for single-chip computers, and discarded the atmega stuff because the documentation digikey pointed me at didn't have an instruction-set section. (I ended up with Freescale's MC68HC908QY4.) Perhaps I should revisit them - do you happen to have a pointer to the instruction set documentation handy? (I perhaps could find it, eventually, but the Web searches that appear to be everybody else's - and in particular companies' - idea of easy-to-find information are difficult and unpleasant, not to mention often nonfunctional, for me. If you have it handy, that'd save me some grubbing around.) I assume they're more of those damned PDFs, meaning hours spent extracting the information from them into a form that's actually usable, but that's an overhead cost I'm willing to invest for a good microcontroller-style computer. (And more tree-killing, but that's going to be true no matter what form the doc takes.) /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From jos.dreesen at bluewin.ch Sun Dec 7 23:41:49 2008 From: jos.dreesen at bluewin.ch (Jos Dreesen) Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 06:41:49 +0100 Subject: ETH Lilith emulator available. Message-ID: <493CB39D.4000500@bluewin.ch> Emulith, my ETH Lilith emulator, is ready for download at : ftp://jdreesen.dyndns.org/ftp/Emulith Emulith is a register-level emulation, in C & X11-xlib, of the Lilith hardware. Documentation, sourcecode and two diskimages are supplied, I will try to offer some more in the future. You will need a reasonably fast PC running Linux and having at least 1280x1024 resolution. First feedback I got shows that it also runs on OS-X ( altough I would like to know how he mapped three buttons onto one....) Enjoy, Jos Dreesen Warning : server sits on a basic ADSL line. From James.Paul at colibrys.com Mon Dec 8 11:02:37 2008 From: James.Paul at colibrys.com (PAUL James) Date: Mon, 8 Dec 2008 11:02:37 -0600 Subject: WTD: MPF-I/88 documentation Message-ID: Tony, Do you still have the documentation that goes with the MPF-I/88 computer trainer? If so, I know you said you didn't have a scanner, but how about taking the manuals a Kinko's or Office Depot / Office Max, and see if they can copy it. I would be willing to pay for a copy of this documentation. Please advise. Thanks and Regards, Jim From al.southern at gmail.com Mon Dec 8 12:34:19 2008 From: al.southern at gmail.com (Al Southern) Date: Mon, 8 Dec 2008 13:34:19 -0500 Subject: [HeathKit] HERO Robots for sale Message-ID: <858204080812081034x732ada5cx8e68e7069c05b067@mail.gmail.com> Hi, saw the following post, Are the robots still available for purchase? Alex 313-647-1314 Bradley Booth wrote: >* Hello, *>* I have two Hero 1 Robots that would be good for parts. They suffered *>* at the hands of middle school children. Brad * Are they complete, other than not working? Peace... Sridhar From julianskidmore at yahoo.com Mon Dec 8 19:06:02 2008 From: julianskidmore at yahoo.com (Julian Skidmore) Date: Mon, 8 Dec 2008 17:06:02 -0800 (PST) Subject: ETH Lilith Emulator available Message-ID: <251772.97501.qm@web37101.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Hi Jos, Well done! At last I've been able to run EmuLith on my 17" G5 iMac under Panther. No idea how it compares with the original performance, but after recompiling with O2 it runs fairly quickly. Here's my comments: 1. Well, first, a big congrats!!!! 2. Why is it white on black when all the photos show black on white? 3. I used Sara to write HelloWorld.MOD, but Couldn't compile it (Disk5.IMG). It complains about missing InOut (though InOut.OBJ is there). Compiler runs though :-D 4. 768x592 seems to be partially implemented, it'd be nice to fully implement it; though I'll try and run it on my external display. (I get around my inadequate display by pressing RETURN ;-) ) I presume the microcode is different for the smaller display, but the OS and libraries are almost the same, since I guess the 4:3 Liliths were still used when the 7:9 ones appeared. 5. Lara wouldn't run, problem with DiskWindows. Your user-base is increasing in leaps and bounds :-D -cheers from julz @P From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Mon Dec 8 20:04:54 2008 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse) Date: Mon, 8 Dec 2008 21:04:54 -0500 (EST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493DBD67.9030404@jbrain.com> References: <493DBD67.9030404@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <200812090213.VAA12857@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> > I'm curious as to why one would do that? Is it really quicker to > design, implement, test, maintain, support something on your own > rather than use a pretested application/utility? Rather than determine the existence of, locate, fetch, discover it won't build, find an alternative to, fetch, bludgeon into building, test, maintain, and support? That's more like my usual experience. Yes. Often. For small things, almost "usually". At least for me. But then, I'm good at software. (Programming and debugging are my two biggest talents.) /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Tue Dec 9 04:45:29 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 10:45:29 +0000 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Dec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <493E4C49.5010102@gjcp.net> der Mouse wrote: >> For example, the ATMega8 user's manual runs to over 300 pages (PDF >> downloadable for free) > > Sigh. You'd think if they actually wanted to make the documentation > _usable_, they'd make it plain text. Apparently glitz wins out over > usability once again. I don't see any way of making a usable plain-text manual. How would you get the diagrams to work? Little ASCII-art squiggles? This is actually what PDF is *designed* for. Gordon From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Tue Dec 9 05:27:21 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 09:27:21 -0200 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net><4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com><200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net><49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <1ba201c959f1$1dcec3d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > This made me start wondering about going a couple steps farther. Consider > a replacement board for the controller found in a Model M keyboard which > is a drop-in replacement that turns the thing into a USB keyboard. With PS/2-to-usb converters avaiable for $3? Why??? From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Tue Dec 9 05:32:20 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 09:32:20 -0200 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) References: , <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <1c8201c959f1$e10f5a80$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > than $20. Compared to the price of admission fee for, say, FPGA, > it's a real bargain. You can program xilinx and altera FPGAs for less than $20 if you have a parallel port. Do a search on "byteblaster" and be happy :) From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Tue Dec 9 05:36:07 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 09:36:07 -0200 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) References: <0d2601c958a2$1e0fada0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <200812072152.QAA22128@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <1ce501c959f2$7e9c9b00$46fea8c0@DeskJara> >> I have a WORKABLE and PLEASURE TO USE copy of windows XP. > How did you get it out of reverse video? That's always been one of my Reverse video?!?!?! Well, I just configure the program to use black as background and green (I do love terminals :D) as foreground :o) From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Tue Dec 9 05:41:37 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 09:41:37 -0200 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" atDec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > Sigh. You'd think if they actually wanted to make the documentation > _usable_, they'd make it plain text. Apparently glitz wins out over > usability once again. PDFs are _usable_ enough. Things change and progress. How would you include drawings on ASCII? Using ASCII ART?!?! Wake up, 2008 is now! :oD > MC68HC908QY4.) Perhaps I should revisit them - do you happen to have a > pointer to the instruction set documentation handy? (I perhaps could > find it, eventually, but the Web searches that appear to be everybody > else's - and in particular companies' - idea of easy-to-find Heloo-ooow? :oD www.atmel.com - microcontrollers, atmel 8-bit risc, docs, http://www.atmel.com/dyn/resources/prod_documents/doc0856.pdf > grubbing around.) I assume they're more of those damned PDFs, meaning > hours spent extracting the information from them into a form that's > actually usable, but that's an overhead cost I'm willing to invest for ?!? I just load it and read...What else is needed? :oO From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Tue Dec 9 07:17:04 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 07:17:04 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <200812090213.VAA12857@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> References: <493DBD67.9030404@jbrain.com> <200812090213.VAA12857@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <493E6FD0.30000@gmail.com> der Mouse wrote: > discover it won't build, Yeah, I didn't mention that, but that's a real big deal, particularly when the dependency chain is both huge and not required by anything else on your system. From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Tue Dec 9 07:23:25 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 07:23:25 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493E4C49.5010102@gjcp.net> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Dec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <493E4C49.5010102@gjcp.net> Message-ID: <493E714D.6080102@gmail.com> Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote: > der Mouse wrote: >>> For example, the ATMega8 user's manual runs to over 300 pages (PDF >>> downloadable for free) >> >> Sigh. You'd think if they actually wanted to make the documentation >> _usable_, they'd make it plain text. Apparently glitz wins out over >> usability once again. > > I don't see any way of making a usable plain-text manual. How would you > get the diagrams to work? Little ASCII-art squiggles? > > This is actually what PDF is *designed* for. For sure - but 300MB seems excessive, even with a lot of diagrams. I suspect they employed someone who either didn't know about or didn't care about optimising file sizes. I don't care for PDF much, mainly because it gets so misused - but it is the only thing possible for jobs like this (unless people decide to use proprietary formats). It's just a shame that Adobe have bloated their reader out so much (but thankfully much smaller and faster free alternatives seem to exist for now) cheers Jules From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Tue Dec 9 07:27:28 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 07:27:28 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <200812072152.QAA22128@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> References: <0d2601c958a2$1e0fada0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <200812072152.QAA22128@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <493E7240.7000504@gmail.com> der Mouse wrote: >> I have a WORKABLE and PLEASURE TO USE copy of windows XP. > > How did you get it out of reverse video? Mono display and a little inverter on the video signal? :-) (I'm actually curious as to how that'd look, now) I remember spending quite some time tweaking Windows 3.11 to essentially give reverse video - and there were *still* plenty of times where things showed up with bright areas. From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Tue Dec 9 07:38:52 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 07:38:52 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <1ba201c959f1$1dcec3d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net><4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com><200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net><49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> <1ba201c959f1$1dcec3d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <493E74EC.2060003@gmail.com> Alexandre Souza wrote: >> This made me start wondering about going a couple steps farther. >> Consider >> a replacement board for the controller found in a Model M keyboard which >> is a drop-in replacement that turns the thing into a USB keyboard. > > With PS/2-to-usb converters avaiable for $3? Why??? Hmm, all the ones I've been finding are in the $20 range, modulo a couple which are much cheaper but which claim to be for specific keyboard vendors (I'd assume they rely on specific OS/vendor drivers, rather than adhering to some kind of "USB keyboard standard") From cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de Tue Dec 9 08:58:35 2008 From: cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de (Christian Corti) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 15:58:35 +0100 (CET) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493E74EC.2060003@gmail.com> References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net><4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com><200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net><49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> <1ba201c959f1$1dcec3d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <493E74EC.2060003@gmail.com> Message-ID: On Tue, 9 Dec 2008, Jules Richardson wrote: > Alexandre Souza wrote: >> With PS/2-to-usb converters avaiable for $3? Why??? > > Hmm, all the ones I've been finding are in the $20 range, modulo a couple > which are much cheaper but which claim to be for specific keyboard vendors > (I'd assume they rely on specific OS/vendor drivers, rather than adhering to > some kind of "USB keyboard standard") ?!? My PS/2-to-USB converter did cost 2.23 EUR and has two cables at the end, one for the PS/2 keyboard and one for the PS/2 mouse. And yes, it works perfectly well with an IBM 1391403 kbd. Christian PS: And the converter has become cheaper, it now costs 1,10 EUR incl. VAT. From cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de Tue Dec 9 09:06:28 2008 From: cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de (Christian Corti) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 16:06:28 +0100 (CET) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493E714D.6080102@gmail.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Dec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <493E4C49.5010102@gjcp.net> <493E714D.6080102@gmail.com> Message-ID: On Tue, 9 Dec 2008, Jules Richardson wrote: > For sure - but 300MB seems excessive, even with a lot of diagrams. I suspect The AVR manuals are about 3MB each (the ATmega32 manual has 3247406 bytes), the instruction set manual has 703303 bytes. Christian From joachim.thiemann at gmail.com Tue Dec 9 08:59:25 2008 From: joachim.thiemann at gmail.com (Joachim Thiemann) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 09:59:25 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493E74EC.2060003@gmail.com> References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net> <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> <200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net> <49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> <1ba201c959f1$1dcec3d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <493E74EC.2060003@gmail.com> Message-ID: <4affc5e0812090659n55e0caddp86d38116d69d7e4b@mail.gmail.com> On Tue, Dec 9, 2008 at 8:38 AM, Jules Richardson wrote: > Alexandre Souza wrote: >> With PS/2-to-usb converters avaiable for $3? Why??? > > Hmm, all the ones I've been finding are in the $20 range, modulo a couple > which are much cheaper but which claim to be for specific keyboard vendors > (I'd assume they rely on specific OS/vendor drivers, rather than adhering to > some kind of "USB keyboard standard") I always thought the cheap keyboard-specific PS/2-USB adapters (that usually came with keyboards) are simple wiring jobs (give or take a resistor) which get detected by the keyboard chip - it then switches from USB to PS/2 mode. It's cheap, only adding a bit of firmware to the keyboard. (Pretty sure mice did this, too) -- Joachim Thiemann :: http://www.tsp.ece.mcgill.ca/~jthiem From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Tue Dec 9 09:38:25 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 09:38:25 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <4affc5e0812090659n55e0caddp86d38116d69d7e4b@mail.gmail.com> References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net> <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> <200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net> <49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> <1ba201c959f1$1dcec3d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <493E74EC.2060003@gmail.com> <4affc5e0812090659n55e0caddp86d38116d69d7e4b@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <493E90F1.9010801@gmail.com> Joachim Thiemann wrote: > On Tue, Dec 9, 2008 at 8:38 AM, Jules Richardson > wrote: >> Alexandre Souza wrote: >>> With PS/2-to-usb converters avaiable for $3? Why??? >> Hmm, all the ones I've been finding are in the $20 range, modulo a couple >> which are much cheaper but which claim to be for specific keyboard vendors >> (I'd assume they rely on specific OS/vendor drivers, rather than adhering to >> some kind of "USB keyboard standard") > > I always thought the cheap keyboard-specific PS/2-USB adapters (that > usually came with keyboards) are simple wiring jobs (give or take a > resistor) which get detected by the keyboard chip - it then switches > from USB to PS/2 mode. It's cheap, only adding a bit of firmware to > the keyboard. (Pretty sure mice did this, too) Hmm, that would make sense - subject for the keyboard supporting any kind of 'USB mode'; there must have been quite a few years where PS/2 keyboards existed but there was just no concept of a "USB keyboard". There must presumably be a USB keyboard protocol standard though (otherwise every USB-connected keyboard out there would need proprietary drivers) - so I assume that the more expensive PS/2-USB adapters really do interpret the PS/2 protocol and convert it to such a standard, and are primarily designed for keyboards which aren't natively USB-aware... (so, in the case of my Model M keyboard, I need one of these expensive 'intelligent' adapters, rather than a 'dumb' one) cheers Jules From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Tue Dec 9 09:39:17 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 09:39:17 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Dec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <493E4C49.5010102@gjcp.net> <493E714D.6080102@gmail.com> Message-ID: <493E9125.2010803@gmail.com> Christian Corti wrote: > On Tue, 9 Dec 2008, Jules Richardson wrote: >> For sure - but 300MB seems excessive, even with a lot of diagrams. I >> suspect > > The AVR manuals are about 3MB each (the ATmega32 manual has 3247406 > bytes), the instruction set manual has 703303 bytes. Duh. My pre-coffee brain read '300 pages ' as '300MB' this morning - sorry :-) From IanK at vulcan.com Tue Dec 9 10:14:49 2008 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 08:14:49 -0800 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493E9125.2010803@gmail.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Dec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <493E4C49.5010102@gjcp.net> <493E714D.6080102@gmail.com> , <493E9125.2010803@gmail.com> Message-ID: Once again, we see the dangers of approaching the keyboard without appropriate caffeination. ________________________________________ From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Jules Richardson [jules.richardson99 at gmail.com] Sent: Tuesday, December 09, 2008 7:39 AM To: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) Christian Corti wrote: > On Tue, 9 Dec 2008, Jules Richardson wrote: >> For sure - but 300MB seems excessive, even with a lot of diagrams. I >> suspect > > The AVR manuals are about 3MB each (the ATmega32 manual has 3247406 > bytes), the instruction set manual has 703303 bytes. Duh. My pre-coffee brain read '300 pages ' as '300MB' this morning - sorry :-) From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Tue Dec 9 11:26:39 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 17:26:39 +0000 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493E9125.2010803@gmail.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Dec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <493E4C49.5010102@gjcp.net> <493E714D.6080102@gmail.com> <493E9125.2010803@gmail.com> Message-ID: <493EAA4F.6080301@gjcp.net> Jules Richardson wrote: > Christian Corti wrote: >> On Tue, 9 Dec 2008, Jules Richardson wrote: >>> For sure - but 300MB seems excessive, even with a lot of diagrams. I >>> suspect >> >> The AVR manuals are about 3MB each (the ATmega32 manual has 3247406 >> bytes), the instruction set manual has 703303 bytes. > > Duh. My pre-coffee brain read '300 pages ' as '300MB' this morning - > sorry :-) If it was plain text it probably *would* be about 300MB... Gordon From glen.slick at gmail.com Tue Dec 9 11:47:35 2008 From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 09:47:35 -0800 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493E90F1.9010801@gmail.com> References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net> <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> <200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net> <49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> <1ba201c959f1$1dcec3d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <493E74EC.2060003@gmail.com> <4affc5e0812090659n55e0caddp86d38116d69d7e4b@mail.gmail.com> <493E90F1.9010801@gmail.com> Message-ID: <1e1fc3e90812090947n7c5b8e1ci6a213c34c7b482fc@mail.gmail.com> On Tue, Dec 9, 2008 at 7:38 AM, Jules Richardson wrote: > > There must presumably be a USB keyboard protocol standard though (otherwise > every USB-connected keyboard out there would need proprietary drivers) - so > I assume that the more expensive PS/2-USB adapters really do interpret the > PS/2 protocol and convert it to such a standard, and are primarily designed > for keyboards which aren't natively USB-aware... > USB keyboards and mice are HID (Human Interface Device) devices and there is a standard specification for these devices. The active PS/2-USB adapters appear to the host to be a standard HID which unknown to the host speaks PS/2 to the keyboard and/or mouse. http://www.usb.org/developers/hidpage/ http://www.usb.org/developers/devclass_docs/HID1_11.pdf These specs are hard to understand but the actual device firmware implementation isn't hard. From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Dec 9 12:19:29 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 13:19:29 -0500 Subject: Tektronix 608 manual In-Reply-To: References: <49384D36.9040302@gmail.com> <7d9403580812051427v2d4750deta5fee5d0288dfd29@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <441F7C79-301E-4C66-B5C2-613CDCC2DFB6@neurotica.com> On Dec 7, 2008, at 5:55 PM, Mike Loewen wrote: > Maybe a long shot, but does anyone here have the service manual > for a Tektronix 608 monitor? Mine is wired for 220VAC and I need > to rewire it for 120VAC (US). I have the docs for the Tek 607; any idea if they're similar enough? I can see about scanning the relevant pages. Let me know if that'd be helpful. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mloewen at cpumagic.scol.pa.us Tue Dec 9 12:27:04 2008 From: mloewen at cpumagic.scol.pa.us (Mike Loewen) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 13:27:04 -0500 (EST) Subject: Tektronix 608 manual In-Reply-To: <441F7C79-301E-4C66-B5C2-613CDCC2DFB6@neurotica.com> References: <49384D36.9040302@gmail.com> <7d9403580812051427v2d4750deta5fee5d0288dfd29@mail.gmail.com> <441F7C79-301E-4C66-B5C2-613CDCC2DFB6@neurotica.com> Message-ID: On Tue, 9 Dec 2008, Dave McGuire wrote: > On Dec 7, 2008, at 5:55 PM, Mike Loewen wrote: >> Maybe a long shot, but does anyone here have the service manual for a >> Tektronix 608 monitor? Mine is wired for 220VAC and I need to rewire it >> for 120VAC (US). > > I have the docs for the Tek 607; any idea if they're similar enough? I can > see about scanning the relevant pages. Let me know if that'd be helpful. Someone off the list sent me a copy for the 608, thanks. Mike Loewen mloewen at cpumagic.scol.pa.us Old Technology http://sturgeon.css.psu.edu/~mloewen/Oldtech/ From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Tue Dec 9 12:33:59 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 12:33:59 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <1e1fc3e90812090947n7c5b8e1ci6a213c34c7b482fc@mail.gmail.com> References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net> <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> <200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net> <49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> <1ba201c959f1$1dcec3d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <493E74EC.2060003@gmail.com> <4affc5e0812090659n55e0caddp86d38116d69d7e4b@mail.gmail.com> <493E90F1.9010801@gmail.com> <1e1fc3e90812090947n7c5b8e1ci6a213c34c7b482fc@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <493EBA17.4080705@gmail.com> Glen Slick wrote: > USB keyboards and mice are HID (Human Interface Device) devices and > there is a standard specification for these devices. The active > PS/2-USB adapters appear to the host to be a standard HID which > unknown to the host speaks PS/2 to the keyboard and/or mouse. > > http://www.usb.org/developers/hidpage/ > http://www.usb.org/developers/devclass_docs/HID1_11.pdf Aha, that makes sense. The clickykeyboards website actually makes mention of this, too: http://www.clickykeyboards.com/index.cfm/fa/items.main/parentcat/11298/subcatid/0/id/124184 ... I think I'll just order one of their converters. As someone else has already managed (http://zevv.nl/play/misc/ibm-usb) it's even small enough to fit their converter internal to a Model M if desired. cheers Jules From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Tue Dec 9 12:53:27 2008 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 10:53:27 -0800 (PST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493EBA17.4080705@gmail.com> References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net> <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> <200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net> <49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> <1ba201c959f1$1dcec3d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <493E74EC.2060003@gmail.com> <4affc5e0812090659n55e0caddp86d38116d69d7e4b@mail.gmail.com> <493E90F1.9010801@gmail.com> <1e1fc3e90812090947n7c5b8e1ci6a213c34c7b482fc@mail.gmail.com> <493EBA17.4080705@gmail.com> Message-ID: On Tue, 9 Dec 2008, Jules Richardson wrote: > Glen Slick wrote: > > USB keyboards and mice are HID (Human Interface Device) devices and > > there is a standard specification for these devices. The active > > PS/2-USB adapters appear to the host to be a standard HID which > > unknown to the host speaks PS/2 to the keyboard and/or mouse. > > > > http://www.usb.org/developers/hidpage/ > > http://www.usb.org/developers/devclass_docs/HID1_11.pdf > > Aha, that makes sense. > > The clickykeyboards website actually makes mention of this, too: > > http://www.clickykeyboards.com/index.cfm/fa/items.main/parentcat/11298/subcatid/0/id/124184 > > ... I think I'll just order one of their converters. As someone else has > already managed (http://zevv.nl/play/misc/ibm-usb) it's even small enough to > fit their converter internal to a Model M if desired. I ordered one of those converters a week ago. Hacking one of these up is the route I'll eventually take after I get the screws necessary to reassemble the inner sandwich of steel and plastic. -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Dec 9 13:01:29 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 11:01:29 -0800 (PST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" atDec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> > > Sigh. You'd think if they actually wanted to make the documentation > > _usable_, they'd make it plain text. Apparently glitz wins out over > > usability once again. On Tue, 9 Dec 2008, Alexandre Souza wrote: > PDFs are _usable_ enough. Things change and progress. How would you > include drawings on ASCII? Using ASCII ART?!?! Wake up, 2008 is now! :oD on material that is ALL text? source code? > ?!? I just load it and read...What else is needed? :oO searching extracting not having to run multiple megabytes through a dial-up line to get a few pages of text print in a different font being able to make changes without needing special Adobe software From jos.mar at bluewin.ch Tue Dec 9 13:15:17 2008 From: jos.mar at bluewin.ch (Jos Dreesen / Marian Capel) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 20:15:17 +0100 Subject: ETH Lilith Emulator available In-Reply-To: <251772.97501.qm@web37101.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <251772.97501.qm@web37101.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <493EC3C5.4080804@bluewin.ch> Julian Skidmore wrote: > Hi Jos, > > Well done! At last I've been able to run EmuLith on my 17" G5 iMac under Panther. Almost all reactions I get are : hey, it also runs on OS-X ! > 2. Why is it white on black when all the photos show black on white? My real Lilith is white on black.... It can be switched under program control, but that is not yet implemented. > 3. I used Sara to write HelloWorld.MOD, but Couldn't compile it (Disk5.IMG). > It complains about missing InOut (though InOut.OBJ is there). > Compiler runs though :-D My error : there are still some files with the last byte corrupted in the image. I will provide a new image this weekend. > 4. 768x592 seems to be partially implemented, it'd be nice to fully > implement it; though I'll try and run it on my external display. > (I get around my inadequate display by pressing RETURN ;-) ) To my amazement quite a number of people have an issue with the 1280x1024 requirement. > I presume the microcode is different for the smaller display, > but the OS and libraries are almost the same, since I guess > the 4:3 Liliths were still used when the 7:9 ones appeared. Microcode is identical. I believe that only the very first prototypes were 4:3, certainly all software for Medos 5.2 assumes the portrait display. > 5. Lara wouldn't run, problem with DiskWindows. No idea, but also the real Lilith has some issues, probably some files have been mixed between Medos releases. Jos From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Dec 9 13:28:43 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 14:28:43 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" atDec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <46DB449D-BD40-40C9-82B7-74D9F20C5751@neurotica.com> On Dec 9, 2008, at 2:01 PM, Fred Cisin wrote: >>> Sigh. You'd think if they actually wanted to make the documentation >>> _usable_, they'd make it plain text. Apparently glitz wins out over >>> usability once again. > > On Tue, 9 Dec 2008, Alexandre Souza wrote: >> PDFs are _usable_ enough. Things change and progress. How >> would you >> include drawings on ASCII? Using ASCII ART?!?! Wake up, 2008 is >> now! :oD > > on material that is ALL text? > source code? > >> ?!? I just load it and read...What else is needed? :oO > searching Trivial with free and non-free tools, I do it all the time. > extracting Also trivial with free and non-free tools, I do it all the time. > not having to run multiple megabytes through a dial-up line to get > a few > pages of text I have about three thousand component datasheets in PDF format. Most of them are a few dozen kilobytes. > print in a different font Huh? Ok, I must admit I have no idea how one would do that. I also have no idea of why someone would want to. > being able to make changes without needing special Adobe software Trivial with free and non-free tools. But why would you want to make changes to a component datasheet? -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Dec 9 13:00:17 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 19:00:17 +0000 (GMT) Subject: WTD: MPF-I/88 documentation In-Reply-To: from "PAUL James" at Dec 8, 8 11:02:37 am Message-ID: > > Tony, > =20 > Do you still have the documentation that goes with the MPF-I/88 computer > trainer? Yes, I do, all 3 books (and the little booklet for the video interface ROM that lets you use an MDA or CGA card in place of the built-in LCD) > If so, I know you said you didn't have a scanner, but how about taking > the manuals=20 > a Kinko's or Office Depot / Office Max, and see if they can copy it. =20 Alas my experience is that such places (at least in the UK) ask lots of nasty questions if asked to copy complete books.. And these books have a binding which does not make them easy to copy :-( -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Dec 9 13:05:14 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 19:05:14 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493D8BE4.1060304@gmail.com> from "Jules Richardson" at Dec 8, 8 03:04:36 pm Message-ID: > For sure. Various places will let you upload documents for printing, but I'm > not sure if I've seen one that will then mail the result out to you - they > offer the upload as a data transfer convenience, but still expect you to > collect the printed material in person. Haviong to collect it would not be a problem, assuming I could reasonably get to the company. Does anyone know of such an organisation in the London (England) area? -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Dec 9 13:09:45 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 19:09:45 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493DBD67.9030404@jbrain.com> from "Jim Brain" at Dec 8, 8 06:35:51 pm Message-ID: > > Tony Duell wrote: > > Well, I am not going to write a C compiler from scratch. But certainly > > for some of the simpler tools I've found it quicker in the past to write > > my own versions. > > > I'm curious as to why one would do that? Is it really quicker to > design, implement, test, maintain, support something on your own rather > than use a pretested application/utility? Oh yes. Particulalry if the pre-written thing is not pre-tested, and is as buggy has hell. Or if it doesn't quite do what you want. Or if you want to use it with/on some odd hardware (that is a particular problem for me). Even with open-source stuff it can sometimes be quicker to write from scratch rather than try to unravel somewhat obfuscated code. It depends -- a lot -- on what the program is supposed to do. As I said, I'd not write a C compiler. But I would weite my own monitor program, or file conversion utilities, or disassembler, or... -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Dec 9 13:15:44 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 19:15:44 +0000 (GMT) Subject: HP Integral PC 82971A EPROM/ROM module - anyone have docs? In-Reply-To: <1e1fc3e90812081642x7d3ca5d5iebba1cfeb997a988@mail.gmail.com> from "Glen Slick" at Dec 8, 8 04:42:58 pm Message-ID: > Tony, with your notes on the 82971A EPROM/ROM Module switch settings I > was able to do a demonstration test of the one I have. Excellent, I am, glad it was of use. > > I used (15x) 27C256 EPROMs and built the ROM image to start at 1MB Can you hav an odd number of ROMs? I's aseemed that since they went in pairs (the ROMs are 8 bit wide, the Integral's data bus is of course 16 bits) you alwauys had to fit Hi_n and Lo_n together. Or is it like the Portable+ ROM drawer, when you can fit ROMs in pairs and then have the ability to execute programs out of ROM without copying them into RAM, but if oyu had a single ROM you can use it to store files (which may then be copied ito RAM and executed). [...] > Then I used split_rom to create the 15x 27C256 EPROM images {lo0 - > lo6, hi0 - hi6}, then use msdoscp to copy those image files to MS-DOS I make that 14 inmages. Which is it? > It would still be nice to find a copy of "HP82970A EPROM/ROM Software > Development Tools Users Guide" for reference. I know I don;t have it, alas. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Dec 9 13:23:43 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 19:23:43 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <1c8201c959f1$e10f5a80$46fea8c0@DeskJara> from "Alexandre Souza" at Dec 9, 8 09:32:20 am Message-ID: > > > than $20. Compared to the price of admission fee for, say, FPGA, > > it's a real bargain. > > You can program xilinx and altera FPGAs for less than $20 if you have a > parallel port. Do a search on "byteblaster" and be happy :) Yes, but what about the software to compile your design (as a scheamtic or VHDL) into the data to program into the chip? How much does that cost _including the machine to run it on_ -tony From cclist at sydex.com Tue Dec 9 13:28:43 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 11:28:43 -0800 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara>, <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com> On 9 Dec 2008 at 11:01, Fred Cisin wrote: > not having to run multiple megabytes through a dial-up line to get a few > pages of text > > print in a different font > > being able to make changes without needing special Adobe software. I'm somewhat in agreement with you here. To print 300-odd pages so that you can have the information at your fingertips (I work by having my documentation spread out on a table in front of me) is more than just slightly annoying. If the same documentation were at least converted to HTML online, I could browse to the pages that I needed, instead of downloading everything and printing it out. What's notable about the AVR documenation is that there's a table of contents of sorts, but no index. So one is reduced to leafing through the document until one finds what one needs. Ah, they don't write 'em like they used to. Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Tue Dec 9 11:41:51 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 09:41:51 -0800 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <1c8201c959f1$e10f5a80$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: , <1c8201c959f1$e10f5a80$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <493E3D5F.29187.42C8A91@cclist.sydex.com> On 9 Dec 2008 at 9:32, Alexandre Souza wrote: > > than $20. Compared to the price of admission fee for, say, FPGA, > > it's a real bargain. > > You can program xilinx and altera FPGAs for less than $20 if you have a > parallel port. Do a search on "byteblaster" and be happy :) That's not what I said. The TI stick will get you a CPU and the USB debugging/programming interface--basically an eval kit for $20. You even get a few LEDs to play with as well as something like (I don't remember exactly) 14 I/Os. There's a $50 version with a wireless interface. Show me a $20 FPGA eval kit (with programmer) and I'll buy it. Cheers, Chuck From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Tue Dec 9 13:41:23 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 12:41:23 -0700 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <46DB449D-BD40-40C9-82B7-74D9F20C5751@neurotica.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" atDec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <46DB449D-BD40-40C9-82B7-74D9F20C5751@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <493EC9E3.7090905@jetnet.ab.ca> Dave McGuire wrote: > > Trivial with free and non-free tools. But why would you want to > make changes to a component datasheet? > Umm to remove the 'product is obsolete -- do not use in new designs' water mark. > -Dave > From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Dec 9 13:49:38 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 14:49:38 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493EC9E3.7090905@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" atDec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <46DB449D-BD40-40C9-82B7-74D9F20C5751@neurotica.com> <493EC9E3.7090905@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <219B2C78-7912-457E-B45C-F62CCF2AE718@neurotica.com> On Dec 9, 2008, at 2:41 PM, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: >> Trivial with free and non-free tools. But why would you want to >> make changes to a component datasheet? >> > Umm to remove the 'product is obsolete -- do not use in new > designs' water mark. Hmm, they are indeed annoying, but is it really worth bothering to remove them? -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Dec 9 13:54:13 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 11:54:13 -0800 (PST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <46DB449D-BD40-40C9-82B7-74D9F20C5751@neurotica.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" atDec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <46DB449D-BD40-40C9-82B7-74D9F20C5751@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <20081209114103.U421@shell.lmi.net> On Tue, 9 Dec 2008, Dave McGuire wrote: > Trivial with free and non-free tools, I do it all the time. There is no question that there are some things for which PDF is the perfect solution. Unfortunately, I have to deal with college administrators who will do things such as attach a Weird .DOC file or PDF with decorative images, etc. in place of plain text for a 3 line announcement that a meeting has been rescheduled. I am/was referring to the abuses and incorrect usage, not to the valid uses. > Trivial with free and non-free tools. But why would you want to > make changes to a component datasheet? example: edit the 1771 FDC to reflect that the "built-in data separator" is NOT adequate correct typos - there is a probably apocryphal story that Randy Cook's choices for data address marks were due to a transposition error in a datasheet But, I was talking about the abuses, not the legitimate uses. I do NOT challenge that there are many things that PDF IS good for. I would like it a lot more if there were frequent defenestration of administrators who send "FYI"/"See the attachment" emails, without even a meaningful Subject:. -- Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com From brain at jbrain.com Tue Dec 9 13:54:36 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 13:54:36 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" atDec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <493ECCFC.5030700@jbrain.com> Fred Cisin wrote: > on material that is ALL text? > source code? > Momma says don't feed the trolls, but I am evidently not mature enough yet. I can see it for source code, and most source code is supplied as source files. However, for documentation, I still believe PDF has advantages, if one wants to print the documentation out. Still, on the specific topic (datasheets), text is just not appropriate. > > searching > Most of the PDF readers have search. You can also install something on your local OS that will crawl your directories and create a search engine for you. > not having to run multiple megabytes through a dial-up line to get a few > pages of text > I'm not sure how any format besides straight text will solve this, and the text conversion will lose important information from these files. As others have noted, requesting the documents from Atmel would be better. I also find it hard to comprehend that the "reimplement assemblers for breakfast, wire up their own logic analyzers, etc." crowd here can't script their favorite OS to dial up in the middle of the night and dload the PDF when no one is using the phone line. > print in a different font > Run any of the favorite PDF to HTML converters (free OSS one on sourceforge) and then change the font as desired in the HTML. > being able to make changes without needing special Adobe software > As above. Sorry, I don't buy it. I'm continually amazed at what people on this list know and know how to do (I'm a good programmer, and have made quite a bit of income from my talents, but there is no way I'd embark on a compiler implementation or an assembler development effort). Thus, I can't accept that a mere format issue is of any concern to the members of this list. I definitely expected comments like "Sigh, text is no longer the format of choice, but no worries...", but these comments go way beyond what I was expecting. Text is no longer the document format of choice, it's PDF. Consider it a "vintage" format and use some of those programming hours to author a conversion app/utility. Asking for companies to supply documentation in text is like asking computer companies to return to floppies. I hear arguments like the ones on this topic at home.... from my young son... He complains because the world does not revolve around him in these instances, requiring him to do some work to fit into the world. Surely that's not the issue here. Jim From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Dec 9 13:55:40 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 11:55:40 -0800 (PST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <219B2C78-7912-457E-B45C-F62CCF2AE718@neurotica.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" atDec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <46DB449D-BD40-40C9-82B7-74D9F20C5751@neurotica.com> <493EC9E3.7090905@jetnet.ab.ca> <219B2C78-7912-457E-B45C-F62CCF2AE718@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <20081209115517.L421@shell.lmi.net> > > Umm to remove the 'product is obsolete -- do not use in new > > designs' water mark. > > Hmm, they are indeed annoying, but is it really worth bothering to > remove them? or add them From mikelee at tdh.com Tue Dec 9 14:06:13 2008 From: mikelee at tdh.com (Michael Lee) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 14:06:13 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <20081209115517.L421@shell.lmi.net> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" atDec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <46DB449D-BD40-40C9-82B7-74D9F20C5751@neurotica.com> <493EC9E3.7090905@jetnet.ab.ca> <219B2C78-7912-457E-B45C-F62CCF2AE718@neurotica.com> <20081209115517.L421@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <493ECFB5.401@tdh.com> So in the end, is there any source of old ASCII, 8b, TTL keyboards? Been monitoring the thread, but there doesn't seem to be any source available for them anymore or anything I might be able to salvage one from that isn't a desirable vintage item. I ask because I would like some for the Obtronix Apple I kits, and don't want to have to take apart my working Apple ][ and/or ][plus units for that. From brain at jbrain.com Tue Dec 9 14:04:26 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 14:04:26 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493E3D5F.29187.42C8A91@cclist.sydex.com> References: , <1c8201c959f1$e10f5a80$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <493E3D5F.29187.42C8A91@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <493ECF4A.9040000@jbrain.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 9 Dec 2008 at 9:32, Alexandre Souza wrote: > > >>> than $20. Compared to the price of admission fee for, say, FPGA, >>> it's a real bargain. >>> >> You can program xilinx and altera FPGAs for less than $20 if you have a >> parallel port. Do a search on "byteblaster" and be happy :) >> > > That's not what I said. The TI stick will get you a CPU and the USB > debugging/programming interface--basically an eval kit for $20. You > even get a few LEDs to play with as well as something like (I don't > remember exactly) 14 I/Os. There's a $50 version with a wireless > interface. > > Show me a $20 FPGA eval kit (with programmer) and I'll buy it. > $20.00 is a bit hard to find, but I think it's an apples to oranges comparison. I used to see $49 Xilinx eval boards, but the best I can find this afternoon is $59.00 http://www.digilentinc.com/Products/Detail.cfm?NavTop=2&NavSub=457&Prod=BASYS Still, that's a complete unit. I would call $20 a better price, but not a "bargain". For $40.00 more, you get access to gate level design that runs at many MHz. Besides, you can get into AVR for $5.00, so I'd consider that a bargain over the TI stuff if we're going to call $20.00 a bargain over $60.00 I think being able to get into any of these technologies for < $100.00 is a bargain. In college, it cost $430.00 to get the HC11EVM, and the EVB was $99.00, which is > $100 in today's money. Jim From doc at mdrconsult.com Tue Dec 9 14:07:37 2008 From: doc at mdrconsult.com (Doc Shipley) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 14:07:37 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara>, <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <493ED009.60602@mdrconsult.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 9 Dec 2008 at 11:01, Fred Cisin wrote: > >> not having to run multiple megabytes through a dial-up line to get a few >> pages of text >> >> print in a different font >> >> being able to make changes without needing special Adobe software. > > I'm somewhat in agreement with you here. To print 300-odd pages so > that you can have the information at your fingertips (I work by > having my documentation spread out on a table in front of me) is more > than just slightly annoying. If the same documentation were at least > converted to HTML online, I could browse to the pages that I needed, > instead of downloading everything and printing it out. What's > notable about the AVR documenation is that there's a table of > contents of sorts, but no index. So one is reduced to leafing > through the document until one finds what one needs. Why would one print the whole PDF just to have a couple of pages at hand? Bottom line is, you can't really blame the format/doc type for misuse. I promise I can screw up an ASCII document just as badly as any text-based PDF, and I can make HTML behave even worse. If you don't understand the tools you use, it doesn't matter which tool it is. Your product will suck. Doc From doc at mdrconsult.com Tue Dec 9 14:14:43 2008 From: doc at mdrconsult.com (Doc Shipley) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 14:14:43 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493ECCFC.5030700@jbrain.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" atDec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <493ECCFC.5030700@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <493ED1B3.8080603@mdrconsult.com> Jim Brain wrote: > Text is no longer the document format of choice, it's PDF. Consider it > a "vintage" format and use some of those programming hours to author a > conversion app/utility. Asking for companies to supply documentation in > text is like asking computer companies to return to floppies. Agreed.^M However, my objection to the "TXT FOREVAR" idea goes past that.^M Even straight ASCII text isn't bulletproof or all that standard.^M Doc^M From brain at jbrain.com Tue Dec 9 14:24:52 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 14:24:52 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <493ED414.2080500@jbrain.com> Tony Duell wrote: >> Tony Duell wrote: >> >>> Well, I am not going to write a C compiler from scratch. But certainly >>> for some of the simpler tools I've found it quicker in the past to write >>> my own versions. >>> >>> >> I'm curious as to why one would do that? Is it really quicker to >> design, implement, test, maintain, support something on your own rather >> than use a pretested application/utility? >> > > Oh yes. Particulalry if the pre-written thing is not pre-tested, and is > as buggy has hell. Or if it doesn't quite do what you want. Or if you > want to use it with/on some odd hardware (that is a particular problem > for me). > > Even with open-source stuff it can sometimes be quicker to write from > scratch rather than try to unravel somewhat obfuscated code. > > It depends -- a lot -- on what the program is supposed to do. As I said, > I'd not write a C compiler. But I would weite my own monitor program, or > file conversion utilities, or disassembler, or... > > -tony > If the pre-written item is untested or buggy, I agree, all bets are off. My concern is the nature of this group. Not to play stereotype, but I consider the folks on this list the "mentors" of today's developer and hardware engineer. As an Architect in a Fortune 500 company, I see many developers come into our environment and promptly start wreaking havoc by writing their own solutions for things already available: * They feel their code is "great" and so much better than an established solution. This is very often wrong, so wrong. Ironically, this is less of an issue with young programmers and more of an issue with more experienced staff. Yes, some apps are horrid, but in this environment, it's often better to demand better quality from the vendor than try to re-implement and support an internal app. * They don't want to learn how to use an established app. In my opinion, the quality of a developer is his willingness to understand an environment he/she did not create. Rewriting just to avoid learning about something is truly a poor developer trait. * The feel the established application offers too much functionality, and it would be better to implement a simpler solution. This one can be debated, but often projects grow to expect more functionality, so implementing a simplier solution can provide disastrous in the longer term as the rewritten code must either be massively modified to add the more complex features, or the code must be excised and the original prewritten code hooked into the application. * "Not Invented Here" syndrome. Sigh. For my part, I beg those on the list to consider their positions. While I will pay well for a developer who has the knowledge to implement his/her own application, I value more the developer who chooses to write his own solution as a last resort, after evaluating all of the other options first. As a mentor in my own right, I try to relate this position on any who ask. Now, while the idea of implementing an assembler to learn the insides of the CPU hold merit in my opinion, I still think it is a slippery slope. Support can be an issue, especially if you give the code to someone else and then lose interest. Doing this denies an established project the resources of a great developer (the GCC team could use some good assembler/compiler developers to push that platform ahead for all of us), and unless your syntax is exactly the same as the established tools, your source code can't be directly compiled/assembled on other tools, which could deny others a chance to re-use your code. I know it all makes sense from your point of view, but I'd ask that you at least consider my viewpoint. I see it from the other side, where the tools get into the hands of people who cannot support them, or staff who use the development as a reason to justify their internal development. I know, it sucks to be looked up to by others, but it happens. It's a huge responsibility thrust onto many on this list. If you want to respond that your comments are only for hobby stuff or personal stuff, I'm all for that, if you note that consistently. I do that at times ("Yeah, I'll whip up something here, but this really should use App X to do it right. Do NOT do this at work!") Jim -- Jim Brain, Brain Innovations (X) brain at jbrain.com Dabbling in WWW, Embedded Systems, Old CBM computers, and Good Times! Home: http://www.jbrain.com From brain at jbrain.com Tue Dec 9 14:26:59 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 14:26:59 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <493ED493.9090902@jbrain.com> Tony Duell wrote: >>> than $20. Compared to the price of admission fee for, say, FPGA, >>> it's a real bargain. >>> >> You can program xilinx and altera FPGAs for less than $20 if you have a >> parallel port. Do a search on "byteblaster" and be happy :) >> > > Yes, but what about the software to compile your design (as a scheamtic > or VHDL) into the data to program into the chip? How much does that cost > _including the machine to run it on_ > > -tony > Well, the $20.00 requires a machine to. Probably the same kind. We need to be fair here. As for the SW, Both Altera and Xilinx (and Atmel, for their CPLD parts) offer free tools (OK, not sure if they offer the tools on all platforms, but I suspect the TI tooling is Windows specific as well. The tools might run in Wine and I am sure they will run on VMWare, if you're willing to go that route) -- Jim Brain, Brain Innovations (X) brain at jbrain.com Dabbling in WWW, Embedded Systems, Old CBM computers, and Good Times! Home: http://www.jbrain.com From brain at jbrain.com Tue Dec 9 14:30:17 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 14:30:17 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara>, <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: > I'm somewhat in agreement with you here. To print 300-odd pages so > that you can have the information at your fingertips (I work by > having my documentation spread out on a table in front of me) is more > than just slightly annoying. If the same documentation were at least > converted to HTML online, I could browse to the pages that I needed, > instead of downloading everything and printing it out. What's > notable about the AVR documenation is that there's a table of > contents of sorts, but no index. So one is reduced to leafing > through the document until one finds what one needs. > > Ah, they don't write 'em like they used to. > > Cheers, > Chuck > I think most folks assume you'll use the search functionality anyway. And, I think there are conversion solutions online that will render PDF as HTML online for your use. I find, though, it's better to save the PDF local, as I use them all the time. From joachim.thiemann at gmail.com Tue Dec 9 14:35:01 2008 From: joachim.thiemann at gmail.com (Joachim Thiemann) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 15:35:01 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493ECF4A.9040000@jbrain.com> References: <1c8201c959f1$e10f5a80$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <493E3D5F.29187.42C8A91@cclist.sydex.com> <493ECF4A.9040000@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <4affc5e0812091235s756500c3ta0a8d16af7cfba6a@mail.gmail.com> On Tue, Dec 9, 2008 at 3:04 PM, Jim Brain wrote: > $20.00 is a bit hard to find, but I think it's an apples to oranges > comparison. I used to see $49 Xilinx eval boards, but the best I can find > this afternoon is $59.00 > > http://www.digilentinc.com/Products/Detail.cfm?NavTop=2&NavSub=457&Prod=BASYS > > Still, that's a complete unit. I would call $20 a better price, but not a > "bargain". For $40.00 more, you get access to gate level design that runs > at many MHz. Besides, you can get into AVR for $5.00, so I'd consider that > a bargain over the TI stuff if we're going to call $20.00 a bargain over > $60.00 > > I think being able to get into any of these technologies for < $100.00 is a > bargain. In college, it cost $430.00 to get the HC11EVM, and the EVB was > $99.00, which is > $100 in today's money. > Jim If you're lucky, see if you can find a Xilinx rep at a trade show or (as it was in my case) University EE career fair. I got (for free) a Spartan 3e "Sample Pack" (with power supply) as well as a Parallel port JTAG interface - all horribly outdated stuff (in FPGA terms; the (c) on the CD with documentation is 2005) but good enough to allow me to tech myself some VHDL. I have a few ideas of projects with it, and as I continue toying with their admittedly horrible, bloated, win32-only software, this is mostly an educational exercise. As such, it works well enough. Joe. -- Joachim Thiemann :: http://www.tsp.ece.mcgill.ca/~jthiem From glen.slick at gmail.com Tue Dec 9 14:36:12 2008 From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 12:36:12 -0800 Subject: HP Integral PC 82971A EPROM/ROM module - anyone have docs? In-Reply-To: References: <1e1fc3e90812081642x7d3ca5d5iebba1cfeb997a988@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1e1fc3e90812091236j51c22a99pc84f7a4e5ea42c6e@mail.gmail.com> On Tue, Dec 9, 2008 at 11:15 AM, Tony Duell wrote: >> >> I used (15x) 27C256 EPROMs and built the ROM image to start at 1MB > > Can you hav an odd number of ROMs? I's aseemed that since they went in > pairs (the ROMs are 8 bit wide, the Integral's data bus is of course 16 > bits) you alwauys had to fit Hi_n and Lo_n together. > Yes, I'm not sure what I was thinking when I typed that. I filled (14x) of the max (16x) EPROM sockets with 27c256 EPROMs for a total of 448KB (458,752 bytes). > >> It would still be nice to find a copy of "HP82970A EPROM/ROM Software >> Development Tools Users Guide" for reference. > > I know I don;t have it, alas. > Maybe some day a copy of that will turn up somewhere. I'm curious what the magic .init file does that appears to be necessary to include in the ROM image, and also what the file annotations mean in the romrc file. Maybe 'a' mean executable application that needs to be fixed up by ld_mod to execute in place, 'D' means non-executable data file, 's' means executable script file with no fix-ups necessary. Not sure what 'on' would mean. Here's the romrc file from the ROM tools disk example2: /Rtools/example2/.init /Rtools/example1/time_of_day a /Rtools/example1/set_font a /Rtools/example1/7x10 D /Rtools/example1/status a /Rtools/example2/Autost s /Rtools/example2/set_win on From brain at jbrain.com Tue Dec 9 14:44:27 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 14:44:27 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493ECFB5.401@tdh.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" atDec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <46DB449D-BD40-40C9-82B7-74D9F20C5751@neurotica.com> <493EC9E3.7090905@jetnet.ab.ca> <219B2C78-7912-457E-B45C-F62CCF2AE718@neurotica.com> <20081209115517.L421@shell.lmi.net> <493ECFB5.401@tdh.com> Message-ID: <493ED8AB.5090901@jbrain.com> Michael Lee wrote: > So in the end, is there any source of old ASCII, 8b, TTL keyboards? > Been monitoring the thread, but there doesn't seem to be any source > available for them anymore or anything I might be able to salvage one > from that isn't a desirable vintage item. > I ask because I would like some for the Obtronix Apple I kits, and > don't want to have to take apart my working Apple ][ and/or ][plus > units for that. To provide some "on topic-ness", since I've probably caused the thread to stray significantly. I can't help with old ASCII KBs, but I'm happy to modify existing code to offer an interface for NOS or new. With a 40 pin .6" spacing DIP and 1 external resistor, I should be able to provide 12x8 matrix scanning, ASCII output with strobe, IRQ for RESET/etc., and RS232 TTL level output of data. The solution should have enough pins left over to provide PS/2 KB input as well as RS232->ASCII conversion as well. A quick search does not bring up any NOS vintage KBs, though. Jim From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Dec 9 14:52:24 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 15:52:24 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <20081209114103.U421@shell.lmi.net> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" atDec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <46DB449D-BD40-40C9-82B7-74D9F20C5751@neurotica.com> <20081209114103.U421@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <1F731321-4203-4A54-A7E5-47DACAB3615E@neurotica.com> On Dec 9, 2008, at 2:54 PM, Fred Cisin wrote: >> Trivial with free and non-free tools, I do it all the time. > > There is no question that there are some things for which PDF is the > perfect solution. Unfortunately, I have to deal with college > administrators who will do things such as attach a Weird .DOC file > or PDF > with decorative images, etc. in place of plain text for a 3 line > announcement that a meeting has been rescheduled. I am/was > referring to > the abuses and incorrect usage, not to the valid uses. Gotcha...understood and agreed. > example: edit the 1771 FDC to reflect that the "built-in data > separator" > is NOT adequate > correct typos - there is a probably apocryphal story that Randy Cook's > choices for data address marks were due to a transposition error in a > datasheet I do wonder if that's really true. > I do NOT challenge that there are many things that PDF IS good for. > I would like it a lot more if there were frequent defenestration of > administrators who send "FYI"/"See the attachment" emails, without > even a > meaningful Subject:. Yes, that is most infuriating. Some people should not be allowed to use computer technology. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Tue Dec 9 15:06:59 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 19:06:59 -0200 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net><4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com><200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net><49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> <1ba201c959f1$1dcec3d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <493E74EC.2060003@gmail.com> Message-ID: <022c01c95a42$2c88e440$46fea8c0@DeskJara> >> With PS/2-to-usb converters avaiable for $3? Why??? > Hmm, all the ones I've been finding are in the $20 range, modulo a couple > which are much cheaper but which claim to be for specific keyboard vendors > (I'd assume they rely on specific OS/vendor drivers, rather than adhering > to > some kind of "USB keyboard standard") www.dealextreme.com Have fun :o) From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Tue Dec 9 15:09:18 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 19:09:18 -0200 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) References: Message-ID: <025101c95a42$708a1a10$46fea8c0@DeskJara> >> > than $20. Compared to the price of admission fee for, say, FPGA, >> > it's a real bargain. >> You can program xilinx and altera FPGAs for less than $20 if you have >> a >> parallel port. Do a search on "byteblaster" and be happy :) > Yes, but what about the software to compile your design (as a scheamtic > or VHDL) into the data to program into the chip? How much does that cost > _including the machine to run it on_ Software is free (for Altera or Xilinx). The machine costs the same the machine 99% of people uses to type e-mail and read web pages. :o) Alexandre Your friend :) From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Dec 9 15:18:17 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 13:18:17 -0800 (PST) Subject: DAMs (Was: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <1F731321-4203-4A54-A7E5-47DACAB3615E@neurotica.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" atDec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <46DB449D-BD40-40C9-82B7-74D9F20C5751@neurotica.com> <20081209114103.U421@shell.lmi.net> <1F731321-4203-4A54-A7E5-47DACAB3615E@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <20081209131219.X421@shell.lmi.net> > > example: edit the 1771 FDC to reflect that the "built-in data > > separator" > > is NOT adequate > > correct typos - there is a probably apocryphal story that Randy Cook's > > choices for data address marks were due to a transposition error in a > > datasheet On Tue, 9 Dec 2008, Dave McGuire wrote: > I do wonder if that's really true. Well the inadequacy of the 1771 data separator is unquestionable. Randy Cook's choice of DAMs could be: 1) error on the datasheet 2) misunderstanding on his part 3) deliberate, as part of some grandiose scheme to include unreasonably sophisticated features that never got implemented It seems as though he had brilliant ideas, but never finished ANYTHING. > Yes, that is most infuriating. Some people should not be allowed > to use computer technology. The biggest argument against defenestration is the mess that would have to be cleaned up from the sidewalk. -- Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Tue Dec 9 15:12:32 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 15:12:32 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493ECCFC.5030700@jbrain.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" atDec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <493ECCFC.5030700@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <493EDF40.7070807@gmail.com> Jim Brain wrote: > However, for documentation, I still believe PDF has advantages, > if one wants to print the documentation out. I wonder if it's just suffered the same way HTML has - perhaps back in the day it was a good format for quickly laying out simple text, but then over the year has been completely wrecked by "let's just add this feature" syndrome? From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Tue Dec 9 15:44:20 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 15:44:20 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493ED009.60602@mdrconsult.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara>, <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com> <493ED009.60602@mdrconsult.com> Message-ID: <493EE6B4.6000004@gmail.com> Doc Shipley wrote: > Bottom line is, you can't really blame the format/doc type for misuse. > I promise I can screw up an ASCII document just as badly as any > text-based PDF, and I can make HTML behave even worse. If you don't > understand the tools you use, it doesn't matter which tool it is. Your > product will suck. But then the tools can be to blame, if they introduce a large amount of overhead into even the simplest files (akin to expecting MS Word to save good HTML, I suppose) That's where I dislike the ubiquitous use of PDF - in that for simple jobs, where you just need a few paragraphs of text and maybe an image or two, it seems to be quite a heavyweight format (ditto for the tools needed to display it). Unfortunately I don't think there's any real alternative, and possibly never has been (RTF, perhaps, but was that ever really an agreed standard?) cheers Jules From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Tue Dec 9 16:00:38 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 17:00:38 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <493ECCFC.5030700@jbrain.com> <493EDF40.7070807@gmail.com> Message-ID: <18750.60038.779922.194042@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> >>>>> "Jules" == Jules Richardson writes: Jules> Jim Brain wrote: >> However, for documentation, I still believe PDF has advantages, if >> one wants to print the documentation out. Jules> I wonder if it's just suffered the same way HTML has - perhaps Jules> back in the day it was a good format for quickly laying out Jules> simple text, but then over the year has been completely Jules> wrecked by "let's just add this feature" syndrome? It never was that. PDF has always been a portable, compact way of encoding a "final form" document to look exactly the way the designer wanted it to look. Contrast that with editable formats like TeX or MS Word, or "approximate" formats like HTML. In other words, PDF is like PS except that it isn't supposed to be machine dependent (which PS tends to be). And it basically does just that, which is why PDF is a common format for producing camera-ready material for print shops. paul From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Tue Dec 9 16:06:39 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 16:06:39 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <022c01c95a42$2c88e440$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net><4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com><200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net><49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> <1ba201c959f1$1dcec3d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <493E74EC.2060003@gmail.com> <022c01c95a42$2c88e440$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <493EEBEF.6010908@gmail.com> Alexandre Souza wrote: > www.dealextreme.com > > Have fun :o) "Pinky-Thumb Body Muscle Massager with Strength Controller"?? What kind of site is this!? :-) From doc at mdrconsult.com Tue Dec 9 16:30:27 2008 From: doc at mdrconsult.com (Doc Shipley) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 16:30:27 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493EEBEF.6010908@gmail.com> References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net><4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com><200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net><49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> <1ba201c959f1$1dcec3d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <493E74EC.2060003@gmail.com> <022c01c95a42$2c88e440$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <493EEBEF.6010908@gmail.com> Message-ID: <493EF183.9070301@mdrconsult.com> Jules Richardson wrote: > Alexandre Souza wrote: >> www.dealextreme.com >> >> Have fun :o) > > "Pinky-Thumb Body Muscle Massager with Strength Controller"?? What kind > of site is this!? :-) URL please? :) Doc From cclist at sydex.com Tue Dec 9 15:56:34 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 13:56:34 -0800 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> On 9 Dec 2008 at 14:30, Jim Brain wrote: > I think most folks assume you'll use the search functionality anyway. > And, I think there are conversion solutions online that will render PDF > as HTML online for your use. > > I find, though, it's better to save the PDF local, as I use them all the > time. If it's a document I constantly refer to, I prefer paper (with an index, if possible, not just a table of contents). My big gripe is with the oddball web search. Usually a PDF hit involves downloading the entire document. What slows me up is when I'm doing a search and I *think* that a Google search has hit paydirt, but I have to download the entire PDF and search it to see if it's what I'm looking for. (Don't even get me started on the inadquecy of Google's "View as HTML" feature!). Perhaps Google can spiff up its search so that it extracts just a few pages, converts them to HTML and points me there, like Google Books does. Maybe there's a search that already does and I'm just not aware of it. Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Tue Dec 9 16:31:57 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 14:31:57 -0800 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493EEBEF.6010908@gmail.com> References: , <022c01c95a42$2c88e440$46fea8c0@DeskJara>, <493EEBEF.6010908@gmail.com> Message-ID: <493E815D.3277.5361BBD@cclist.sydex.com> On 9 Dec 2008 at 16:06, Jules Richardson wrote: > Alexandre Souza wrote: > > www.dealextreme.com > > > > Have fun :o) > > "Pinky-Thumb Body Muscle Massager with Strength Controller"?? What kind of > site is this!? :-) I like the "Shock-You-Friend Electric Shock Ball Pen". Just the thing for a slow day at work... Cheers, Chuck From andy at smokebelch.org Tue Dec 9 16:52:20 2008 From: andy at smokebelch.org (Andrew Back) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 22:52:20 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Source for MMJ cables. Message-ID: Hello, A little while ago I bought a "new" 10ft MMJ cable from That Website. Today I came to use it and discovered it was a crossover cable. So, my question is where can I buy a straight MMJ - MMJ? 10ft would be fine, longer perhaps better, and ideally a UK source. Whilst on the subject of DEC, I'm also looking for an ethernet card for a PDP 11/53 and perhaps a TK drive (assuming that if on power-up the drive wheel just spins continually and you can't lift the handle, the drive is broken). Cheers, Andrew ---------------- Andrew Back a at smokebelch.org From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Tue Dec 9 16:55:31 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 16:55:31 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493EF183.9070301@mdrconsult.com> References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net><4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com><200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net><49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> <1ba201c959f1$1dcec3d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <493E74EC.2060003@gmail.com> <022c01c95a42$2c88e440$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <493EEBEF.6010908@gmail.com> <493EF183.9070301@mdrconsult.com> Message-ID: <493EF763.10202@gmail.com> Doc Shipley wrote: > Jules Richardson wrote: >> Alexandre Souza wrote: >>> www.dealextreme.com >>> >>> Have fun :o) >> >> "Pinky-Thumb Body Muscle Massager with Strength Controller"?? What >> kind of site is this!? :-) > > URL please? :) > > Ha - it's on their main page, just scroll down. Must be a top-seller, I guess... From brain at jbrain.com Tue Dec 9 17:09:54 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 17:09:54 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: > If it's a document I constantly refer to, I prefer paper (with an > index, if possible, not just a table of contents). My big gripe is > with the oddball web search. > I've weaned myself from paper in this area. While I agree paper is nice, I find the PDF easier to navigate when I am writing code or laying out parts in EAGLE. I do tend to print out a page or two from the PDF at times (pinouts and such) for brainstorming and such. As a collector of Commodore Magazines and other dead-tree things, I've drowning in paper, so something had to give. Now, even though most if not all of the CBM mags are in PDF now, I am not planning to ditch my dead tree versions, and my old but trusty TI TTL book still lives prominently on my reference shelf beside me. I'm forward thinking, but untrusting in some areas. Jim From steve at cosam.org Tue Dec 9 17:22:28 2008 From: steve at cosam.org (Steve Maddison) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 00:22:28 +0100 Subject: Source for MMJ cables. In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <95838e090812091522h4f955f52qde00cc9a43b275bc@mail.gmail.com> 2008/12/9 Andrew Back : > Whilst on the subject of DEC, I'm also looking for an ethernet card for a > PDP 11/53 If your post here doesn't get you any offers, DEQNAs often pop up on ePay for not-too-ridiculous prices (although DELQAs are supposedly more reliable if you can find one). > and perhaps a TK drive (assuming that if on power-up the drive > wheel just spins continually and you can't lift the handle, the drive is > broken). I take it this is with the load button in the "out" position? Might be worth opening it up to check nothing's stuck, making it think a tape's loaded when there isn't. Cheers, -- Steve Maddison http://www.cosam.org/ From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Dec 9 17:24:33 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 15:24:33 -0800 (PST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493ECCFC.5030700@jbrain.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" atDec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <493ECCFC.5030700@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <20081209152227.C421@shell.lmi.net> On Tue, 9 Dec 2008, Jim Brain wrote: > Momma says don't feed the trolls, but I am evidently not mature enough > yet. Such ad-hominem remarks are an inappropriate way to respond to a disagreement of personal opinion. From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Tue Dec 9 17:38:12 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 16:38:12 -0700 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493E815D.3277.5361BBD@cclist.sydex.com> References: , <022c01c95a42$2c88e440$46fea8c0@DeskJara>, <493EEBEF.6010908@gmail.com> <493E815D.3277.5361BBD@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <493F0164.2030700@jetnet.ab.ca> Chuck Guzis wrote: > I like the "Shock-You-Friend Electric Shock Ball Pen". Just the > thing for a slow day at work... > > Would that not be 'An electric Banana' for the real management types. Bannna bunch ----- [= <- power cord > Cheers, > Chuck > > > From glen.slick at gmail.com Tue Dec 9 17:51:52 2008 From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 15:51:52 -0800 Subject: Source for MMJ cables. In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <1e1fc3e90812091551x6d48ae99ud4e07acdc190a379@mail.gmail.com> On Tue, Dec 9, 2008 at 2:52 PM, Andrew Back wrote: > Hello, > > A little while ago I bought a "new" 10ft MMJ cable from That Website. Today > I came to use it and discovered it was a crossover cable. So, my question is > where can I buy a straight MMJ - MMJ? 10ft would be fine, longer perhaps > better, and ideally a UK source. > Are there normal MMJ cables which are not crossover cables? A BC16E is a crossover cable and isn't that what is normally used and the trick is to use the correct adapter (or no adapter all all) at either end of the MMJ cable? http://www.lammertbies.nl/comm/cable/dec-mmj.html From cclist at sydex.com Tue Dec 9 18:10:40 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 16:10:40 -0800 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com>, <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <493E9880.5146.5907BC9@cclist.sydex.com> On 9 Dec 2008 at 17:09, Jim Brain wrote: > I've weaned myself from paper in this area. While I agree paper is > nice, I find the PDF easier to navigate when I am writing code or laying > out parts in EAGLE. I do tend to print out a page or two from the PDF > at times (pinouts and such) for brainstorming and such. Someday, I might be able to be that facile with my reading material. But I prefer to look down when I'm working on something in front of me, not up at a screen and grab my pencil and check things off or annotate them. You know, they call it a "desktop", but have you ever tried to put your lunch on the Windows variety, or use it as a support for a stapler? Damned things keep sliding off... Does anyone here stick their PDFs on an ebook reader to keep them handy? Cheers, Chuck From andy at smokebelch.org Tue Dec 9 18:22:12 2008 From: andy at smokebelch.org (Andrew Back) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 00:22:12 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Source for MMJ cables. In-Reply-To: <1e1fc3e90812091551x6d48ae99ud4e07acdc190a379@mail.gmail.com> References: <1e1fc3e90812091551x6d48ae99ud4e07acdc190a379@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Tue, 9 Dec 2008, Glen Slick wrote: > On Tue, Dec 9, 2008 at 2:52 PM, Andrew Back wrote: >> Hello, >> >> A little while ago I bought a "new" 10ft MMJ cable from That Website. Today >> I came to use it and discovered it was a crossover cable. So, my question is >> where can I buy a straight MMJ - MMJ? 10ft would be fine, longer perhaps >> better, and ideally a UK source. >> > > Are there normal MMJ cables which are not crossover cables? > > A BC16E is a crossover cable and isn't that what is normally used and > the trick is to use the correct adapter (or no adapter all all) at > either end of the MMJ cable? Ah, so I have a BC16E-10. It's been a while but I assumed that since it was crossover and I was having no joy that I had the wrong cable. I should be clear, I'm trying to connect a VT420 to a PDP11/53. Tried both ports on the PDP and all manner of settings on the VT. I'm assuming that I can use the MMJ socket on the VT (the one not marked for a printer obviously) and that I don't need to use the 25W D and an MMJ convertor. You'll have to bear with me, it's been about 11 years since I've played around with MMJs Etc. Cheers, Andrew From glen.slick at gmail.com Tue Dec 9 19:30:17 2008 From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 17:30:17 -0800 Subject: Source for MMJ cables. In-Reply-To: References: <1e1fc3e90812091551x6d48ae99ud4e07acdc190a379@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1e1fc3e90812091730i4093eebeh5fb1353746e21d03@mail.gmail.com> On Tue, Dec 9, 2008 at 4:22 PM, Andrew Back wrote: > > Ah, so I have a BC16E-10. It's been a while but I assumed that since it was > crossover and I was having no joy that I had the wrong cable. I should be > clear, I'm trying to connect a VT420 to a PDP11/53. Tried both ports on the > PDP and all manner of settings on the VT. I'm assuming that I can use the > MMJ socket on the VT (the one not marked for a printer obviously) and that I > don't need to use the 25W D and an MMJ convertor. > Just a minute ago I connected a KDJ11-SD / M7554-SD to a VT320 by plugging one end of a BC16E cable into the A1 plug on the 11/53 and the other end into the VT320. Set the VT320 for 9600 baud and powered on the 11/53 and got the boot ROM startup. No messing around required for this setup for me... -Glen From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Tue Dec 9 19:37:48 2008 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 17:37:48 -0800 Subject: Engelbart's mouse / 40th anniversary Message-ID: <493F1D6C.78498637@cs.ubc.ca> There was a blurb just now on the radio (CBC) about Engelbart's development of the mouse, including an audio recording of his presentation of it at a conference in 1968. That was nice, but weird/annnoying is that the reporter referred to it as a "discovery". Is it not possible to invent anything anymore? Is everything, and everything that will ever be in the future, an already-existing concept waiting out there in some alternative universe of the imagination, just waiting to be "discovered" by the mind of somebody? Or did I miss a debate about the semiotics of "discovery" vs. "invention" in the public discourse somewhere along the way? It's nice to be humble about achievements and acknowledge that developments are built upon other developments and don't occur in isolation but isn't this taking it a bit far? From curt at atarimuseum.com Tue Dec 9 19:44:59 2008 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 20:44:59 -0500 Subject: Source for MMJ cables. In-Reply-To: <95838e090812091522h4f955f52qde00cc9a43b275bc@mail.gmail.com> References: <95838e090812091522h4f955f52qde00cc9a43b275bc@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <493F1F1B.5030802@atarimuseum.com> Are there any sources for MMJ crimp-on connectors??? I used to work at Baystate Computer Group many years ago, it was a major east coast DEC seller and we used to have parts bins filled with MMJ crimp-on's for doing cable work. Curt Steve Maddison wrote: > 2008/12/9 Andrew Back : > >> Whilst on the subject of DEC, I'm also looking for an ethernet card for a >> PDP 11/53 >> > > If your post here doesn't get you any offers, DEQNAs often pop up on > ePay for not-too-ridiculous prices (although DELQAs are supposedly > more reliable if you can find one). > > >> and perhaps a TK drive (assuming that if on power-up the drive >> wheel just spins continually and you can't lift the handle, the drive is >> broken). >> > > I take it this is with the load button in the "out" position? Might be > worth opening it up to check nothing's stuck, making it think a tape's > loaded when there isn't. > > Cheers, > > From wdonzelli at gmail.com Tue Dec 9 20:08:36 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 21:08:36 -0500 Subject: Raised floors Message-ID: Here is an aspect of computer history not yet touched - when did the industry standardize on the 2 x 2 raised floor? Certainly they were common in the 1960s, but were they standard in the 1950s? -- Will From IanK at vulcan.com Tue Dec 9 21:35:27 2008 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 19:35:27 -0800 Subject: Source for MMJ cables. In-Reply-To: <1e1fc3e90812091730i4093eebeh5fb1353746e21d03@mail.gmail.com> References: <1e1fc3e90812091551x6d48ae99ud4e07acdc190a379@mail.gmail.com> , <1e1fc3e90812091730i4093eebeh5fb1353746e21d03@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: >From my reading of the relevant literature, the 'smarts' for direct vs. "null modem" connections is in the endpoint - if you were connecting a MMJ-equipped device to a D-connector-equipped device. When I've connected a computer to a monitor (i.e. a VT420 to a PDP11/73, pretty similar to your setup), just plugging the MMJ cable into each one has always worked. I'm not aware that there are crossed vs. non-crossed MMJ-tipped cables. FWIW -- Ian ________________________________________ From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Glen Slick [glen.slick at gmail.com] Sent: Tuesday, December 09, 2008 5:30 PM To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Re: Source for MMJ cables. On Tue, Dec 9, 2008 at 4:22 PM, Andrew Back wrote: > > Ah, so I have a BC16E-10. It's been a while but I assumed that since it was > crossover and I was having no joy that I had the wrong cable. I should be > clear, I'm trying to connect a VT420 to a PDP11/53. Tried both ports on the > PDP and all manner of settings on the VT. I'm assuming that I can use the > MMJ socket on the VT (the one not marked for a printer obviously) and that I > don't need to use the 25W D and an MMJ convertor. > Just a minute ago I connected a KDJ11-SD / M7554-SD to a VT320 by plugging one end of a BC16E cable into the A1 plug on the 11/53 and the other end into the VT320. Set the VT320 for 9600 baud and powered on the 11/53 and got the boot ROM startup. No messing around required for this setup for me... -Glen From IanK at vulcan.com Tue Dec 9 21:55:42 2008 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 19:55:42 -0800 Subject: Source for MMJ cables. In-Reply-To: References: <1e1fc3e90812091551x6d48ae99ud4e07acdc190a379@mail.gmail.com> , <1e1fc3e90812091730i4093eebeh5fb1353746e21d03@mail.gmail.com>, Message-ID: Um, correction: I just remembered that the console connection on my PDP-11/73 is a D connector, so I'm using one of the various endpoint adapters. But it IS true that when I'm connecting the VT420 to any of my VAXen, which all bear MMJ connectors, everything Just Works. -- Ian ________________________________________ From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Ian King [IanK at vulcan.com] Sent: Tuesday, December 09, 2008 7:35 PM To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: RE: Source for MMJ cables. >From my reading of the relevant literature, the 'smarts' for direct vs. "null modem" connections is in the endpoint - if you were connecting a MMJ-equipped device to a D-connector-equipped device. When I've connected a computer to a monitor (i.e. a VT420 to a PDP11/73, pretty similar to your setup), just plugging the MMJ cable into each one has always worked. I'm not aware that there are crossed vs. non-crossed MMJ-tipped cables. FWIW -- Ian ________________________________________ From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Glen Slick [glen.slick at gmail.com] Sent: Tuesday, December 09, 2008 5:30 PM To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Re: Source for MMJ cables. On Tue, Dec 9, 2008 at 4:22 PM, Andrew Back wrote: > > Ah, so I have a BC16E-10. It's been a while but I assumed that since it was > crossover and I was having no joy that I had the wrong cable. I should be > clear, I'm trying to connect a VT420 to a PDP11/53. Tried both ports on the > PDP and all manner of settings on the VT. I'm assuming that I can use the > MMJ socket on the VT (the one not marked for a printer obviously) and that I > don't need to use the 25W D and an MMJ convertor. > Just a minute ago I connected a KDJ11-SD / M7554-SD to a VT320 by plugging one end of a BC16E cable into the A1 plug on the 11/53 and the other end into the VT320. Set the VT320 for 9600 baud and powered on the 11/53 and got the boot ROM startup. No messing around required for this setup for me... -Glen From ploopster at gmail.com Tue Dec 9 23:30:49 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 00:30:49 -0500 Subject: Source for MMJ cables. In-Reply-To: <493F1F1B.5030802@atarimuseum.com> References: <95838e090812091522h4f955f52qde00cc9a43b275bc@mail.gmail.com> <493F1F1B.5030802@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <493F5409.8060008@gmail.com> Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > Are there any sources for MMJ crimp-on connectors??? I used to work at > Baystate Computer Group many years ago, it was a major east coast DEC > seller and we used to have parts bins filled with MMJ crimp-on's for > doing cable work. Last time I looked, I was able to buy them from http://www.cables.com/ for reasonable money. Peace... Sridhar From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Tue Dec 9 23:51:04 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 18:51:04 +1300 Subject: trying to use AT&T VFD display module In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 12/6/08, Jeff Jonas wrote: > I salvaged several AT&T/Lucent/Avaya > D401A Digital Display Modules, > apparently from a Definity phone system. > The label says > D401A AT&T > 89338 series 1 > > The module has 8 touch-buttons and LEDS > and an Itron DC 405A2 VFD > (one line of 40 characters, > each char a 5x7 matrix) Nice. > I'd like to use the entire module > since it has a microcontroller and power supply, > but I have no clue as to the interface. > Any help would be appreciated, starting with pinout. > I really need the internal programming document > with all the commands :-( I don't have any information on that particular device, but I have fiddled with a number of text-and-button frontpanels over the years. Does that Itron VFD look like it is "formatted" or bare? A formatted VFD would typically have a PCB the same size or smaller permanently affixed to the back of the glass, and that PCB would have a small number of SMT chips on it and possibly a 14x1 or 7x2 0.1" connector pad on it, either direct soldered to the larger board, or perhaps with a connector. A bare VFD would just have its leads coming out of the glass, right to the only PCB you are looking at. If the microcontroller is an MCS51-family part (8051 and on up to quite modern devices), it should be easy to trace out large portions of its circuit with little effort. At 100% schematic usually takes a long time, but there is often much you can do with some of the core circuitry documented. If there are obvious serial interface chips (1488/1489, or MAX232, or perhaps a 9636/9637-type 8-pin DIP), it might be easy to see a) how to talk and listen, and b) if you need voltages other than just +5VDC. VFDs require something odd - perhaps 36V?, and the formatted VFDs I've seen (and unformatted VFDs on HP printer frontpanels) have a switching supply right there so they _do_ only need +5V. Something from a telephone device might be able to reduce +48V down to what it needs locally, since that's a common voltage in switch gear. Tracing buttons to the microcontroller should be easy. If you are lucky, pressing one would cause the MCU to send out events spontaneously. If you are unlucky, you'd need to send the unit some sort of init code or keypad unlock code first. If you take a few photos (especially if they are properly focused), it's possible to divine much from a visual inspection. If you cannot find docs and the VFD looks formatted, it might be worth cutting out the MCU and wiring your own in its place. There are projects around that use PICs and AVRs to talk to LCDs and VFDs that are HD44780-controller-compatible, and many of those also have provisions for buttons and lights. At some point, if you do get it working, especially if you get it working without hardware mods, I can recommend writing an LCDproc driver for it (http://www.lcdproc.org/). That way, you can use existing control software and existing clients to do interesting things with your display without resorting to writing everything from the ground up. I've written several LCDproc drivers for a variety of serial-interfaced devices, and debugged drivers for several other interface types. It's not too hard to do if you know C. I'm interested to see pictures, especially since I already do so much with displays and LCDproc. Good luck, -ethan From tiggerlasv at aim.com Wed Dec 10 01:20:08 2008 From: tiggerlasv at aim.com (tiggerlasv at aim.com) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 02:20:08 -0500 Subject: Source for MMJ cables. Message-ID: <8CB28AEDD6D0B7E-EBC-18FC@mblk-d16.sysops.aol.com> I don't have a source for MMJ cables, but I do have a US/Domestic source for MMP's (the offset modular connectors). . . http://www.gruber.com/GruberInd/pg.asp?FeatureID=38 They are .14 / each for flat cable, and .41 / each for round cable. Last I checked, they don't ship internationally. There are two different styles of DecConnect cables; both inverted, and not inverted.?? The only difference of course, is that one connector is flipped on one end. When used with genuine DEC adapters, one?style worked for printers (DCE), and the other style worked with terminals (DTE). Back in the early 90's, our office used uVax 2000's, connected to VT220's. along with various printers, connected using DEC MMJ <> DB25 adapters. You couldn't simply swap the DecConnect cables because of the inverted MMP's on some of the cables. All of our cabling and adapters were unmodified DEC products. If you're really in a pinch, you can always pop the connector off of one end of the cable, and re-crimp it by hand. It's a bit cumbersome, but you can use a thumb-tack to lift the gold contacts out of the connector, and then use a small flat-blade screwdriver to push them back in. Just be careful not to stab yourself in the process.? ;-) As info. . . T From roger.holmes at microspot.co.uk Wed Dec 10 02:25:50 2008 From: roger.holmes at microspot.co.uk (Roger Holmes) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 08:25:50 +0000 Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: <200812100553.mBA5rECM087959@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812100553.mBA5rECM087959@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: On 10 Dec, 2008, at 05:53, cctalk-request at classiccmp.org wrote: > Message: 25 > Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 21:08:36 -0500 > From: "William Donzelli" > Subject: Raised floors > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > > Here is an aspect of computer history not yet touched - when did the > industry standardize on the 2 x 2 raised floor? Certainly they were > common in the 1960s, but were they standard in the 1950s? An interesting question. I would have said they were common in the late 60s but not in the early 60s. None of the 1301s (built 1962-65) I have seen were on raised floors, maybe because 700 square feet of raised flooring would have been expensive, but I suppose not compared to 247,000 pounds for the computer itself. When I first started programming them in 1969, I think all the ones I visited were on raised floors, had 'tacky mats' and air conditioning, which often blew out of the floor. On the other hand, when I went to work for a company which made computers (in 1974) and which used them extensively for software development, there were no raised floors, no tacky mats and only one of the computer rooms had air conditioning because it was the only one to used exchangeable hard disks, the rest used paper tape or cartridge mag tape or one inch analogue tape for audio data which was used as test input to sonar processing computers. Just my experience, maybe not typical, and in the UK. Roger Holmes From ray at arachelian.com Wed Dec 10 05:56:15 2008 From: ray at arachelian.com (Ray Arachelian) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 06:56:15 -0500 Subject: PDF (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com> Now that this topic has strayed far from TTL keyboards, and into either PRO or ANTI PDF formats, can we at least change the subject line? Please? Drifting off subject does tend to be endemic here, please, do change the subject line once it has nothing to do with the conversation. It's perfectly fine to discuss it as it does relate to our hobby, and yes, it's over 10 years old ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PDF ) IMHO, I think PDF is wonderful. It does a far better job than HTML at rendering documents. No, I'm not proposing the replacement of HTML on websites with PDFs. It can be better than PostScript in terms of the compression and can be searchabe. For example, you can guarantee that the font you want your document to be displayed in doesn't have to exist on the viewer's machine or printer. Unlike PS, it can have a table of contents and bookmarks. For our hobby, you can use it to scan in large paper documents, and OCR them, but display the images instead of the unreliable OCR'ed text, and use the OCR to allow the end user to search. PDF's were designed to be portable, that's what the "P" stands for. It's an open standard. If you don't like viewer from Adobe because it is bloatware, (and I don't) there are alternatives. There are also plenty of tools with which to create PDF's, including imagemagick which is useful if you've scanned in an old 500 page document. Yes, it can be much more expensive than HTML, 50M PDFs are quite common, but it does offer a lot of advantages over plain text and over HTML. But to save a document as HTML means to have it saved as multiple files, which would include style sheets, images, and other stuff. Plain text may be considered a standard, but whose? EBCDIC or ASCII? ASCII or PETSCII? or ATASCII? CR? CRLF? LF? 7-bit or 8-bit? If it's 8-bit whose encoding? How do you italicize, underline or bold with plain text? (Yes, I know, if you're printing, you can send back spaces and stamp over the same character multiple times to do underline or bold, or accents, but what about on a CRT?) That said, I do think that plain text is wonderful, except as mentioned, there's really no such thing as true plain text. RTF? Meh, some of us are allergic due to it being a blood-relation to that monstrosity from Redmond that claims to be a program that supposedly processes words. Good luck trying to edit RTF with something like vi - far worse than HTML. Yes, PDFs can be evil, you can prevent the end user from modifying, copying, or printing the document. Yes, while working at a hedge fund many years ago, I saw that someone had written a DRM plug in for Acrobat (and Acrobat only at that) that locked down documents for viewing only by specific machines. Yes, I think HTML is wonderful too. I dislike the syntax, and I don't agree that XML and its derivates are really human readable - they can be, but a lot of the time they aren't, and there are a lot of problems with HTML - namely that CSS and HTML have completely different syntaxes so if you wish to edit web pages, you have to learn a ton of stuff, and it can be painful, but at least I can almost always use vi to edit HTML. So as with everything, there is a right tool for the job. If you feel RTF or HTML or plain text (whatever that means) is the right tool for the job, use that. Tools aren't bad or good or evil, they're just tools. Blaming the tools is silly. Nobody is forcing anyone to use a hammer with to nail a screw, especially when screwdrivers exist. From andy at smokebelch.org Wed Dec 10 06:00:56 2008 From: andy at smokebelch.org (Andrew Back) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 12:00:56 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Source for MMJ cables. In-Reply-To: <8CB28AEDD6D0B7E-EBC-18FC@mblk-d16.sysops.aol.com> References: <8CB28AEDD6D0B7E-EBC-18FC@mblk-d16.sysops.aol.com> Message-ID: On Wed, 10 Dec 2008, tiggerlasv at aim.com wrote: <> > There are two different styles of DecConnect cables; > both inverted, and not inverted.?? The only difference > of course, is that one connector is flipped on one end. > > When used with genuine DEC adapters, one?style worked > for printers (DCE), and the other style worked with terminals (DTE). Ah, OK, so my cable is physically crossed - if I hold the plugs side-by-side the colours run in reverse order. And Googling 'BC16E-10' suggests this is a crossover. So assuming the MMJ port on my VT420 marked '1' (plus arrows) is not broken it is likely I have a cable for a printer. > Back in the early 90's, our office used uVax 2000's, > connected to VT220's. along with various printers, > connected using DEC MMJ <> DB25 adapters. > You couldn't simply swap the DecConnect cables > because of the inverted MMP's on some of the cables. > All of our cabling and adapters were unmodified DEC products. In the 90s I had loads of MMJ cables and adapters, and uVAX 2000s with the 3 port adapter, pizza box SCSI and external RD54 Etc. Ugh, all gone sadly :o( > If you're really in a pinch, you can always > pop the connector off of one end of the cable, > and re-crimp it by hand. > > It's a bit cumbersome, but you can use a thumb-tack > to lift the gold contacts out of the connector, and then > use a small flat-blade screwdriver to push them back in. > Just be careful not to stab yourself in the process.? ;-) I think I'll try and find a ready made straight cable! But thanks for the tip. Cheers, Andrew From stimpy.u.idiot at gmail.com Wed Dec 10 07:56:31 2008 From: stimpy.u.idiot at gmail.com (Pete Edwards) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 13:56:31 +0000 Subject: Source for MMJ cables. In-Reply-To: References: <8CB28AEDD6D0B7E-EBC-18FC@mblk-d16.sysops.aol.com> Message-ID: <11c909eb0812100556u5b701a9fx168ef2863fcf7713@mail.gmail.com> 2008/12/10 Andrew Back > On Wed, 10 Dec 2008, tiggerlasv at aim.com wrote: > > > > I think I'll try and find a ready made straight cable! But thanks for the > tip. > I got a pile of MMJ cables from another list member a while back, IIRC more than I needed. I'll take a look in the loft next day or so, I can probably spare a few. I'll let you know what I've got next couple of days. -- Pete Edwards "Prediction is very difficult, especially if it's about the future" - Niels Bohr From jhfinedp3k at compsys.to Wed Dec 10 07:57:00 2008 From: jhfinedp3k at compsys.to (Jerome H. Fine) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 08:57:00 -0500 Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: References: <200812100553.mBA5rECM087959@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <493FCAAC.6010307@compsys.to> >Roger Holmes wrote: >> Here is an aspect of computer history not yet touched - when did the >> industry standardize on the 2 x 2 raised floor? Certainly they were >> common in the 1960s, but were they standard in the 1950s? > > An interesting question. I would have said they were common in the > late 60s but not in the early 60s. None of the 1301s (built 1962-65) > I have seen were on raised floors, maybe because 700 square feet of > raised flooring would have been expensive, but I suppose not compared > to 247,000 pounds for the computer itself. When I first started > programming them in 1969, I think all the ones I visited were on > raised floors, had 'tacky mats' and air conditioning, which often > blew out of the floor. On the other hand, when I went to work for a > company which made computers (in 1974) and which used them > extensively for software development, there were no raised floors, no > tacky mats and only one of the computer rooms had air conditioning > because it was the only one to used exchangeable hard disks, the rest > used paper tape or cartridge mag tape or one inch analogue tape for > audio data which was used as test input to sonar processing computers. > > Just my experience, maybe not typical, and in the UK. Jerome Fine replies: Details of an IBM 650 in 1960 at the University of Toronto. I started to use the IBM 650 in 1960. I am very confident that a raised floor was used, but since that was 48 years ago, my memory might be faulty. Since there were a number of tape units, the card reader and card punch in addition to the main unit housing the CPU, I am fairly confident that the room of about 30 feet x 20 feet had a raised floor. I certainly do not visualize any cables (must have been under the floor) connecting the different units. Since that system had already been in use for a few years by the time I started to use it, I assume that raised floors were standard for such systems back in the 1950s. Sincerely yours, Jerome Fine From wdonzelli at gmail.com Wed Dec 10 08:11:42 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 09:11:42 -0500 Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: <493FCAAC.6010307@compsys.to> References: <200812100553.mBA5rECM087959@dewey.classiccmp.org> <493FCAAC.6010307@compsys.to> Message-ID: Good data, thanks. > I assume that raised floors were standard for such systems back in the > 1950s. Raised floors date to the turn of the century. I am wondering when they started to standardize. -- Will From tshoppa at wmata.com Wed Dec 10 08:26:41 2008 From: tshoppa at wmata.com (Tim Shoppa) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 09:26:41 -0500 Subject: Source for MMJ cables Message-ID: <493F8B51020000370004375B@gwiavs.nservices.wmata.com> Andrew writes: > A little while ago I bought a "new" 10ft MMJ cable from That Website. > Today I came to use it and discovered it was a crossover cable. All MMJ cables are supposed to be crossover cables. If you are using DB-9 or DB-25 adapters on the ends of the MMJ's, then they have to be appropriate to the wiring for the device. Examples: Rdy Out TX+ TX- RX- RX+ Rdy In Adaptor Gender 1 2 3 4 5 6 Use with: -------------------------------------------------------------------------- H8575-A F 20 2 7 7 3 6&8 VTxxx terminal H8571-C M 6 3 7 7 2 20 Digital printer H8571-D M 6 3 7 7 2 20 Modem H8571-E M 20 2 7 7 3 6&8 Female terminal or LaserWriter -------------------------------------------------------------------------- If you've got the wrong adapter, you may be able to open it up and swap around pins 2&3, 6&20. Some are shells you can open up and use the DB-pin-remover tools to swap things around, others are molded solid and you can't take them apart so easily. MMJ was a nice concept for serial cables. Tim. From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Wed Dec 10 09:31:09 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 09:31:09 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493E9880.5146.5907BC9@cclist.sydex.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com>, <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493E9880.5146.5907BC9@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <493FE0BD.8040307@gmail.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: >> I've weaned myself from paper in this area. While I agree paper is >> nice, I find the PDF easier to navigate when I am writing code or laying >> out parts in EAGLE. I do tend to print out a page or two from the PDF >> at times (pinouts and such) for brainstorming and such. > > Someday, I might be able to be that facile with my reading material. > But I prefer to look down when I'm working on something in front of > me, not up at a screen and grab my pencil and check things off or > annotate them. Yes, me too. I like being able to scribble notes and diagrams in the margins of reference books. > You know, they call it a "desktop", but have you ever tried to put > your lunch on the Windows variety, We hid someone's lunch inside their PC once. They weren't best pleased, although the smell of warm sandwiches which gradually filled the office was quite inviting. > or use it as a support for a > stapler? Damned things keep sliding off... Heh, that's actually one of the reasons* I don't like LCD panels - in the past I've always had quite large CRT monitors, and the space above the face of the tube is quite good for balancing stacks of papers and other important things. * The main one is that they give me a headache after a while, where a well-adjusted CRT never has. > Does anyone here stick their PDFs on an ebook reader to keep them > handy? I've never tried one. For me it's really emissive display technology which affects the readability of a document, even more so than its packaging. From glen.slick at gmail.com Wed Dec 10 10:39:40 2008 From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 08:39:40 -0800 Subject: Source for MMJ cables. In-Reply-To: References: <8CB28AEDD6D0B7E-EBC-18FC@mblk-d16.sysops.aol.com> Message-ID: <1e1fc3e90812100839q4b060f79oe2b528563b924482@mail.gmail.com> On Wed, Dec 10, 2008 at 4:00 AM, Andrew Back wrote: > > Ah, OK, so my cable is physically crossed - if I hold the plugs side-by-side > the colours run in reverse order. And Googling 'BC16E-10' suggests this is a > crossover. So assuming the MMJ port on my VT420 marked '1' (plus arrows) is > not broken it is likely I have a cable for a printer. > All of my cables on hand are physically reversered - {white, green, red, orange,black, blue} on one plug and {blue, black, orange, red, green, white} on the other plug on the other end of the cable. That is type of cable I used to plug directly from a KDJ11-SD / M7554-SD to a VT320 with no adapters at either end of the BC16E cable. Not sure why that wouldn't work for you. Are you also using a KDJ11-SD / M7554-SD (or -PB)? I'm not sure if any other 11/53 versions had MMJ console ports. Mine originally came from a DECserver 550 CPU and I reprogrammed the EPROMs with 11/53 firmware. From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Dec 10 13:24:53 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 19:24:53 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <025101c95a42$708a1a10$46fea8c0@DeskJara> from "Alexandre Souza" at Dec 9, 8 07:09:18 pm Message-ID: > > >> > than $20. Compared to the price of admission fee for, say, FPGA, > >> > it's a real bargain. > >> You can program xilinx and altera FPGAs for less than $20 if you have > >> a > >> parallel port. Do a search on "byteblaster" and be happy :) > > Yes, but what about the software to compile your design (as a scheamtic > > or VHDL) into the data to program into the chip? How much does that cost > > _including the machine to run it on_ > > Software is free (for Altera or Xilinx). The machine costs the same the > machine 99% of people uses to type e-mail and read web pages. > That is _exactly_ my point. 99% != 100% >From the discussion fo the AVR and PIC microcontorllers, it appears that should I wish to program them using an HP9816, or a PERQ, or a PDP11, or... then the information is available to do so. I can write a cross-assembler, debugger, downloader, etc. You may feel that's not a sensible use of my time, byt darn it this is a hobby, and it is very difficult to justify time spent on hobbies _other than 'you enjoy doing it'. But AFAIK the same information is not avaiable for any FPGA or CPLD. You _have_ to use the mnudactuere's tools running on whatever machine they tell you you should be using. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Dec 10 13:32:12 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 19:32:12 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493E9880.5146.5907BC9@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Dec 9, 8 04:10:40 pm Message-ID: > > On 9 Dec 2008 at 17:09, Jim Brain wrote: > > > > I've weaned myself from paper in this area. While I agree paper is > > nice, I find the PDF easier to navigate when I am writing code or laying > > out parts in EAGLE. I do tend to print out a page or two from the PDF > > at times (pinouts and such) for brainstorming and such. > > Someday, I might be able to be that facile with my reading material. > But I prefer to look down when I'm working on something in front of > me, not up at a screen and grab my pencil and check things off or > annotate them. I find it completely impossible to design from a document on-screen. I can only work from the paper version. Of course paper has the advantage that I can read it anywhere, it never crashes, it never gives strange error messages, etc. And it withstands a hot soldering iron a lot better than any computer does :-) And I simply can't 'flip through' a pdf file (even on the fastest machines I've ever used) in the same way that I can flip through a book. I used to routinely flip through data books, etc and interesting devices would catch my eye. It's much more difficult doing that with pdf files. -tony From cclist at sydex.com Wed Dec 10 14:42:49 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 12:42:49 -0800 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: <025101c95a42$708a1a10$46fea8c0@DeskJara> from "Alexandre Souza" at Dec 9, 8 07:09:18 pm, Message-ID: <493FB949.11404.9F888DA@cclist.sydex.com> On 10 Dec 2008 at 19:24, Tony Duell wrote: > >From the discussion fo the AVR and PIC microcontorllers, it appears that > should I wish to program them using an HP9816, or a PERQ, or a PDP11, > or... then the information is available to do so. I can write a > cross-assembler, debugger, downloader, etc. You may feel that's not a > sensible use of my time, byt darn it this is a hobby, and it is very > difficult to justify time spent on hobbies _other than 'you enjoy doing > it'. Given the simplicity of the AVR and PIC tools, you could easily host a development system on a 8080, Z80, 6502, etc.-based system, provided that you had the necessary (e.g. parallel port) interface. I've not seen any Z80-based VHDL compilers, but then, maybe I'm not looking hard enough. :) Cheers, Chuck From silvercreekvalley at yahoo.com Wed Dec 10 16:16:44 2008 From: silvercreekvalley at yahoo.com (silvercreekvalley) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 14:16:44 -0800 (PST) Subject: Kennedy tape drive 9600 Message-ID: <948889.16525.qm@web56202.mail.re3.yahoo.com> I'd like to try and get a Kennedy tape drive (9600) up and running and wondered if anyone had any advice or possible interface cards? The unit is complete and appears to be working, I have two 50 pin connectors on the back, and the ribbon cables to IDE connectors. This is the PERTEC interface I'm assuming? I'm ultimately wanting to connect this to a PDP 11, but initially it would be good to connect this some how to a regular PC. Are there any cards available to do this? I do have older PC's (this is vintage computing after all) ie with ISA slots which I'm guessing would be required. Anyway, any pointers/leads appreciated. Thanks Ian. From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Wed Dec 10 16:26:56 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 15:26:56 -0700 Subject: Odd cpu lengths In-Reply-To: <493FB949.11404.9F888DA@cclist.sydex.com> References: <025101c95a42$708a1a10$46fea8c0@DeskJara> from "Alexandre Souza" at Dec 9, 8 07:09:18 pm, <493FB949.11404.9F888DA@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <49404230.4030704@jetnet.ab.ca> Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 10 Dec 2008 at 19:24, Tony Duell wrote: > > >> >From the discussion fo the AVR and PIC microcontorllers, it appears that >> should I wish to program them using an HP9816, or a PERQ, or a PDP11, >> or... then the information is available to do so. I can write a >> cross-assembler, debugger, downloader, etc. You may feel that's not a >> sensible use of my time, byt darn it this is a hobby, and it is very >> difficult to justify time spent on hobbies _other than 'you enjoy doing >> it'. >> > > Given the simplicity of the AVR and PIC tools, you could easily host > a development system on a 8080, Z80, 6502, etc.-based system, > provided that you had the necessary (e.g. parallel port) interface. > > I've not seen any Z80-based VHDL compilers, but then, maybe I'm not > looking hard enough. :) > > Move up to 18bits ... buy Ben's new CPLD bug free [1] chip set or wait late 1975 ish for the 48 PIN dips to come out. But when you think of it, most develpment on the small 8 bit micros were done by hand ... ie Apple integer basic or cross compiled on a larger machine PDP-10? under Fortran IV. PL/M for the 8080 comes to mind. > Cheers, > Chuck > > The instruction set is very 1969 ish, but it does have a software stack and the idea of character data. The CPLD design is a emulation of the 48 pin CPU, in that it is functionaly the same design, but not hardware compatable as small PCB that fits over a 48 pin socket. http://www.jetnet.ab.ca/users/bfranchuk/fox1.html [1] ISZ sadly was one the few instructions not implimented as well as skips and PUSH/POP. They are features not bugs. From cclist at sydex.com Wed Dec 10 16:55:45 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 14:55:45 -0800 Subject: Odd cpu lengths In-Reply-To: <49404230.4030704@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <025101c95a42$708a1a10$46fea8c0@DeskJara>, <493FB949.11404.9F888DA@cclist.sydex.com>, <49404230.4030704@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <493FD871.960.A723E23@cclist.sydex.com> On 10 Dec 2008 at 15:26, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > But when you think of it, most develpment on the small 8 bit micros > were done by hand ... ie Apple integer basic or cross compiled on a larger > machine PDP-10? under Fortran IV. PL/M for the 8080 comes to mind. Actually, most early CPUs (including Intel) had available cross- assemblers written in (gasp!) FORTRAN--being one of the more portable languages of the time. Since one couldn't assume ASCII (nor even 8- bit characters), one of the first statements tended to be one to read in the character set of the machine in A1 format. Cheers, Chuck From RichA at vulcan.com Wed Dec 10 17:03:36 2008 From: RichA at vulcan.com (Rich Alderson) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 15:03:36 -0800 Subject: Odd cpu lengths In-Reply-To: <49404230.4030704@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <025101c95a42$708a1a10$46fea8c0@DeskJara> from "Alexandre Souza" at Dec 9, 8 07:09:18 pm, <493FB949.11404.9F888DA@cclist.sydex.com> <49404230.4030704@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Sent: Wednesday, December 10, 2008 2:27 PM > But when you think of it, most develpment on the small 8 bit micros > were done by hand ... ie Apple integer basic or cross compiled on a > larger machine PDP-10? under Fortran IV. PL/M for the 8080 comes to > mind. I forget: Was Apple Integer BASIC a Microsoft product, or homegrown? All of Microsoft's language products until well into the 1980s were developed in Macro-10 on DECsystem-10 (PDP-10) processors; a friend of mine was one of the toolset developers (badge #11). No FORTRAN was involved. Thanks, Rich Rich Alderson Server Engineer, PDPplanet Project Vulcan, Inc. 505 5th Avenue S, Suite 900 Seattle, WA 98104 mailto:RichA at vulcan.com (206) 342-2239 (206) 465-2916 cell From glen.slick at gmail.com Wed Dec 10 17:19:58 2008 From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 15:19:58 -0800 Subject: Kennedy tape drive 9600 In-Reply-To: <948889.16525.qm@web56202.mail.re3.yahoo.com> References: <948889.16525.qm@web56202.mail.re3.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <1e1fc3e90812101519i260e407eu350c3b8b262d5af3@mail.gmail.com> On Wed, Dec 10, 2008 at 2:16 PM, silvercreekvalley wrote: > I'd like to try and get a Kennedy tape drive (9600) up > and running and wondered if anyone had any advice or > possible interface cards? > > I'm ultimately wanting to connect this to a PDP 11, but > initially it would be good to connect this some how to a > regular PC. > > Are there any cards available to do this? I do have older > PC's (this is vintage computing after all) ie with ISA > slots which I'm guessing would be required. > I have no experience with a Kennedy 9600. If you can find a Computer Logics PCTD16 that should work in an old 16-bit ISA bus slot. I found a couple off of eBay a while back for under $20 each. Building interface cables might take a bit of work to split the 62-pin D-shell connector on the adapter to the (2x) 50-pin connectors on the driver. I have one PCTD16 connected to a Fujitsu M2444AC and one connected to a different flavor drive. I wrote some simple real mode DOS utilities to write TAP/TPC files to a tape and to read a tape to a TAP/TPC file. I used that to create a 2.11BSD setup tape from a PC. If your PDP-11 is a QBus PDP-11 there are multiple options. I've used Emulex TC02, TC03 and QT13 adapters and Dilog DQ132 and DQ142 adapters. Those are usually not too hard to find on eBay, but the examples currently listed seem overpriced. Making 50-pin cables for these with ribbon cable is easy if you have proper tools. From cclist at sydex.com Wed Dec 10 10:39:38 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 08:39:38 -0800 Subject: PDFs for reference material; was: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493FE0BD.8040307@gmail.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <493E9880.5146.5907BC9@cclist.sydex.com>, <493FE0BD.8040307@gmail.com> Message-ID: <493F804A.23549.919E714@cclist.sydex.com> On 10 Dec 2008 at 9:31, Jules Richardson wrote: > I've never tried one. For me it's really emissive display technology which > affects the readability of a document, even more so than its packaging. For the a few years, an outfit in the music biz has been attempting to sell an LCD sheet music display device to take the place of traiditional paper scores. It's quite expensive (about $1K the last time I checked) and hasn't yet addressed the questions of "What do I do when some idiot kicks my music stand over?" and "What do I do when the batteries fail in the middle of a performance?". Pencil and paper is still king for a lot of folks. Sketching out schematics or code is still easiest scribbled on paper for me. I know a number of music composers who wouldn't be caught dead using anything but manuscript paper and a pencil. Likewise, there's nothing quite like a printed databook. To those who suggest a service to print online PDFs, I'd also add that such services could also add an option to bind the result and print it on thinner stock than standard letter paper. Sounds like something the Rocky Ford Bill Gates might think up. (Is he still around?) Cheers, Chuck From frustum at pacbell.net Wed Dec 10 18:08:04 2008 From: frustum at pacbell.net (Jim Battle) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 18:08:04 -0600 Subject: Odd cpu lengths In-Reply-To: References: <025101c95a42$708a1a10$46fea8c0@DeskJara> from "Alexandre Souza" at Dec 9, 8 07:09:18 pm, <493FB949.11404.9F888DA@cclist.sydex.com> <49404230.4030704@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <494059E4.10703@pacbell.net> Rich Alderson wrote: ... > I forget: Was Apple Integer BASIC a Microsoft product, or homegrown? Woz wrote it. From IanK at vulcan.com Wed Dec 10 18:14:20 2008 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 16:14:20 -0800 Subject: PDFs for reference material; was: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493F804A.23549.919E714@cclist.sydex.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <493E9880.5146.5907BC9@cclist.sydex.com>, <493FE0BD.8040307@gmail.com> <493F804A.23549.919E714@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: > -----Original Message----- > > On 10 Dec 2008 at 9:31, Jules Richardson wrote: > > > I've never tried one. For me it's really emissive display technology > which > > affects the readability of a document, even more so than its > packaging. > > For the a few years, an outfit in the music biz has been attempting > to sell an LCD sheet music display device to take the place of > traiditional paper scores. It's quite expensive (about $1K the last > time I checked) and hasn't yet addressed the questions of "What do I > do when some idiot kicks my music stand over?" and "What do I do when > the batteries fail in the middle of a performance?". > [snip] Or, "What do I do when the conductor decides to change the score?" In my experience, it wasn't uncommon for a conductor to decide that the composer OBVIOUSLY meant there to be a crescendo at that bar, so everyone pencil it in, please. Those 'amended' scores are often a treasure in later years, if only for personal reasons. -- Ian From tosteve at yahoo.com Wed Dec 10 18:18:00 2008 From: tosteve at yahoo.com (steven stengel) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 16:18:00 -0800 (PST) Subject: OT? Heavy duty web hosting needed Message-ID: <884225.46099.qm@web110610.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Hello, My entire classic computer website is down for exceeding my monthly bandwidth allotment. I exceeded 60 Gigs in 2 weeks. Can anyone recommend a good host? I need 150+ Gig/month bandwidth. Thanks! Steven Stengel http://oldcomputers.net From brain at jbrain.com Wed Dec 10 18:22:13 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 18:22:13 -0600 Subject: PDF (Was: something irrelevant given the thread's migration) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <49405D35.6090707@jbrain.com> Tony Duell wrote: > > Of course paper has the advantage that I can read it anywhere, it never > crashes, it never gives strange error messages, etc. And it withstands a > hot soldering iron a lot better than any computer does :-) > On the other hand, it's hard to drag 1000 pages of doc on a business trip because you want to do some hobby coding/design during the boring evenings, or if you do work on the road. > And I simply can't 'flip through' a pdf file (even on the fastest > machines I've ever used) in the same way that I can flip through a book. > I used to routinely flip through data books, etc and interesting devices > would catch my eye. It's much more difficult doing that with pdf files. > "flip"? You really are oldskool. If you need to go to a section, there's search, and a specific page is but a few numbers into the "Page" box away. > -tony > PDF can be our common ground though, You print it out, I read it on screen. I like formats that allow us both to work effectively. Can't go with the "TXT FOREVAR" folks, though. And to your other point, to be consistent, I must concur. It's a hobby, and anything goes. I was only asking that a disclaimer be applied, since the difference between "I code this up on my own because it's a hobby and I think it's fun" and "I don't trust pre-written apps and you should not either. Write them yourself all times" is sometimes hard to distinguish. Jim -- Jim Brain, Brain Innovations (X) brain at jbrain.com Dabbling in WWW, Embedded Systems, Old CBM computers, and Good Times! Home: http://www.jbrain.com From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Wed Dec 10 18:31:11 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 17:31:11 -0700 Subject: PDF (Was: something irrelevant given the thread's migration) In-Reply-To: <49405D35.6090707@jbrain.com> References: <49405D35.6090707@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <49405F4F.1060309@jetnet.ab.ca> Jim Brain wrote: > > Can't go with the "TXT FOREVAR" folks, though. SIX BIT ASCII IS STILL FINE --- LOOK AT ALL THE RARE L@@K ADS ON EBAY! > And to your other point, to be consistent, I must concur. It's a > hobby, and anything goes. I was only asking that a disclaimer be > applied, since the difference between "I code this up on my own > because it's a hobby and I think it's fun" and "I don't trust > pre-written apps and you should not either. Write them yourself all > times" is sometimes hard to distinguish. > > Jim > Any good leads as am still looking for a small boot strapable langauge here. Tiny C will not work as my instruction set does NOT have register to register operations. I plan to have a wopping 48Kb system as that was BIG memory 1975 ish. From cclist at sydex.com Wed Dec 10 19:02:33 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 17:02:33 -0800 Subject: PDF (Was: something irrelevant given the thread's migration) In-Reply-To: <49405F4F.1060309@jetnet.ab.ca> References: , <49405D35.6090707@jbrain.com>, <49405F4F.1060309@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <493FF629.15789.AE655BE@cclist.sydex.com> On 10 Dec 2008 at 17:31, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > SIX BIT ASCII IS STILL FINE --- LOOK AT ALL THE > RARE L@@K ADS ON EBAY! ASCII? Whuzzat? --Chuck From classiccmp at vintage-computer.com Wed Dec 10 19:35:06 2008 From: classiccmp at vintage-computer.com (Erik Klein) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 17:35:06 -0800 Subject: OT? Heavy duty web hosting needed In-Reply-To: <884225.46099.qm@web110610.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <1A9FBDD744D4496BAFA5CDAA8AF47326@NFORCE4> -----Original Message----- From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of steven stengel Sent: Wednesday, December 10, 2008 4:18 PM To: cctech at classiccmp.org Subject: OT? Heavy duty web hosting needed > Can anyone recommend a good host? I need 150+ Gig/month bandwidth. I like Westhost (http://www.westhost.com/) and they are running a great special right now with 1,000 GB of bandwidth for $10/mo. Tell them I sent ya. :) ----- Erik Klein www.vintage-computer.com www.vintage-computer.com/vcforum - The Vintage Computer Forums marketplace.vintage-computer.com - The Vintage Computer and Gaming Marketplace From schoedel at kw.igs.net Wed Dec 10 19:49:05 2008 From: schoedel at kw.igs.net (Kevin Schoedel) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 20:49:05 -0500 Subject: USB Model M (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net> <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> <200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net> <49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> Message-ID: At 1:53 pm -0800 2008/12/05, David Griffith wrote: >This made me start wondering about going a couple steps farther. Consider >a replacement board for the controller found in a Model M keyboard which >is a drop-in replacement that turns the thing into a USB keyboard. At least two people have done this before: http://mg8.org/rump/ http://www.schatenseite.de/dulcimer.html?L=2 Both have schematics and source. -- Kevin Schoedel VA3TCS From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Wed Dec 10 20:17:47 2008 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 18:17:47 -0800 (PST) Subject: USB Model M (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: References: <200812041414.16335.rtellason@verizon.net> <4937C619.31026.61A4B4@cclist.sydex.com> <200812051506.39439.rtellason@verizon.net> <49399897.2070003@jbrain.com> Message-ID: On Wed, 10 Dec 2008, Kevin Schoedel wrote: > At 1:53 pm -0800 2008/12/05, David Griffith wrote: > >This made me start wondering about going a couple steps farther. Consider > >a replacement board for the controller found in a Model M keyboard which > >is a drop-in replacement that turns the thing into a USB keyboard. > > At least two people have done this before: > > http://mg8.org/rump/ > http://www.schatenseite.de/dulcimer.html?L=2 > > Both have schematics and source. Yay! -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? From dgahling at hotmail.com Wed Dec 10 20:20:09 2008 From: dgahling at hotmail.com (Dan Gahlinger) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 21:20:09 -0500 Subject: anyone have/can make an openvms (vax) ISO? Message-ID: I just moved, and all my stuff is still packed away, including all my openvms CDs, which kinda sucks because I sorta need one right now. in the interim I could get away with an ISO, if someone has one. Any version would do, so if there's someone on the list that has one or could make one, it'd be much appreciated. As I said, I own the originals, bought from montagar, just not sure which box it's hiding in... Dan. _________________________________________________________________ From cclist at sydex.com Wed Dec 10 20:20:38 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 18:20:38 -0800 Subject: USB Model M (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: References: , , Message-ID: <49400876.5263.B2DD073@cclist.sydex.com> On 10 Dec 2008 at 20:49, Kevin Schoedel wrote: > At least two people have done this before: > > http://mg8.org/rump/ > http://www.schatenseite.de/dulcimer.html?L=2 > > Both have schematics and source. Do you know of a similar project to convert a Model M to an Apple ADB keyboard? Cheers, Chuck From classiccmp at vintage-computer.com Wed Dec 10 20:50:37 2008 From: classiccmp at vintage-computer.com (Erik Klein) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 18:50:37 -0800 Subject: USB Model M (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <614C868E78D14A5C902ACC23D4759080@NFORCE4> -----Original Message----- From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Kevin Schoedel Sent: Wednesday, December 10, 2008 5:49 PM To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: USB Model M (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)) At 1:53 pm -0800 2008/12/05, David Griffith wrote: >>This made me start wondering about going a couple steps farther. Consider >>a replacement board for the controller found in a Model M keyboard which >>is a drop-in replacement that turns the thing into a USB keyboard. >At least two people have done this before: > http://mg8.org/rump/ > http://www.schatenseite.de/dulcimer.html?L=2 >Both have schematics and source. Or just buy the USB dongle thingie at www.clickykeyboards.com (specifically the USB to PS/2 Adapter at http://www.clickykeyboards.com/index.cfm/fa/items.main/parentcat/11298/subca tid/0/id/124184) I use them and haven't found a desktop or laptop that they won't work on. Note, this is not a simple cable adaptor, it actually converts the signal and allows PnP, etc. on the old Model M. ----- Erik Klein www.vintage-computer.com www.vintage-computer.com/vcforum - The Vintage Computer Forums marketplace.vintage-computer.com - The Vintage Computer and Gaming Marketplace From dgahling at hotmail.com Wed Dec 10 20:51:11 2008 From: dgahling at hotmail.com (Dan Gahlinger) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 21:51:11 -0500 Subject: anyone have/can make an openvms (vax) ISO? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: thanks to those that helped, I got an ISO now. thanks again, I can work on my vax now :) :) Dan. > From: dgahling at hotmail.com > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 21:20:09 -0500 > Subject: anyone have/can make an openvms (vax) ISO? > > > I just moved, and all my stuff is still packed away, > including all my openvms CDs, which kinda sucks because I sorta need one right now. > > in the interim I could get away with an ISO, if someone has one. > > Any version would do, so if there's someone on the list that has one or could make one, > it'd be much appreciated. > > As I said, I own the originals, bought from montagar, just not sure which box it's hiding in... > > Dan. > > _________________________________________________________________ > _________________________________________________________________ From IanK at vulcan.com Wed Dec 10 21:36:29 2008 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 19:36:29 -0800 Subject: anyone have/can make an openvms (vax) ISO? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: I have an ISO image that I made for booting the SIMH 11/780 emulator. I can think of several ways of getting it to you, but I am on the other side of a DSL connection and it's nearly 700MB. How about contacting me off-list and let's see if I can help you out -- Ian ________________________________________ From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Dan Gahlinger [dgahling at hotmail.com] Sent: Wednesday, December 10, 2008 6:20 PM To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Subject: anyone have/can make an openvms (vax) ISO? I just moved, and all my stuff is still packed away, including all my openvms CDs, which kinda sucks because I sorta need one right now. in the interim I could get away with an ISO, if someone has one. Any version would do, so if there's someone on the list that has one or could make one, it'd be much appreciated. As I said, I own the originals, bought from montagar, just not sure which box it's hiding in... Dan. _________________________________________________________________ From pat at computer-refuge.org Wed Dec 10 21:53:55 2008 From: pat at computer-refuge.org (Patrick Finnegan) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 22:53:55 -0500 Subject: Booting a VAX 11/780 (was: anyone have/can make an openvms (vax) ISO?) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <200812102253.55752.pat@computer-refuge.org> On Wednesday 10 December 2008, Ian King wrote: > I have an ISO image that I made for booting the SIMH 11/780 emulator. > I can think of several ways of getting it to you, but I am on the > other side of a DSL connection and it's nearly 700MB. How about > contacting me off-list and let's see if I can help you out -- Ian Speaking of booting a VAX 11/780, I think that the most fun I've ever had was booting my 11/780 off of a OpenVMS hobbyist CD in a SCSI CDROM drive attached to it... Pat -- Purdue University Research Computing --- http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/ The Computer Refuge --- http://computer-refuge.org From mbg at world.std.com Wed Dec 10 22:00:35 2008 From: mbg at world.std.com (Megan Gentry) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 23:00:35 -0500 Subject: Happy DEC-10 day... Message-ID: <49409063.9060802@world.std.com> From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Wed Dec 10 22:06:34 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 21:06:34 -0700 Subject: Happy DEC-10 day... In-Reply-To: <49409063.9060802@world.std.com> References: <49409063.9060802@world.std.com> Message-ID: <494091CA.4040709@jetnet.ab.ca> Megan Gentry wrote: > :( No DEC-10 to play with. From curt at atarimuseum.com Wed Dec 10 22:08:37 2008 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 23:08:37 -0500 Subject: Happy DEC-10 day... In-Reply-To: <49409063.9060802@world.std.com> References: <49409063.9060802@world.std.com> Message-ID: <49409245.7040205@atarimuseum.com> Everyone gets a free DEC-10 ??? ;-) Curt Megan Gentry wrote: > From blstuart at bellsouth.net Wed Dec 10 22:11:44 2008 From: blstuart at bellsouth.net (blstuart at bellsouth.net) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 22:11:44 -0600 Subject: Bootstrappable language (was: PDF (Was: ...)) In-Reply-To: <49405F4F.1060309@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <7daed98b83b358cb3c2f0e27b34a03d6@bellsouth.net> > Any good leads as am still looking for a small boot strapable langauge > here. Tiny C will not work > as my instruction set does NOT have register to register operations. I > plan to have a wopping > 48Kb system as that was BIG memory 1975 ish. The two that immediately jump to mind are forth and lisp. BLS From healyzh at aracnet.com Wed Dec 10 22:15:26 2008 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 20:15:26 -0800 Subject: Booting a VAX 11/780 (was: anyone have/can make an openvms (vax) ISO?) In-Reply-To: <200812102253.55752.pat@computer-refuge.org> References: <200812102253.55752.pat@computer-refuge.org> Message-ID: At 10:53 PM -0500 12/10/08, Patrick Finnegan wrote: >Speaking of booting a VAX 11/780, I think that the most fun I've ever >had was booting my 11/780 off of a OpenVMS hobbyist CD in a SCSI CDROM >drive attached to it... I know what you mean, I think it's pretty cool being able to boot my PDP-11's off of a SCSI CDROM drive. Sure beats installing from tape or floppies! Zane -- | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator | | healyzh at aracnet.com (primary) | OpenVMS Enthusiast | | MONK::HEALYZH (DECnet) | Classic Computer Collector | +----------------------------------+----------------------------+ | Empire of the Petal Throne and Traveller Role Playing, | | PDP-10 Emulation and Zane's Computer Museum. | | http://www.aracnet.com/~healyzh/ | From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Wed Dec 10 22:15:07 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 21:15:07 -0700 Subject: Happy DEC-10 day... In-Reply-To: <49409245.7040205@atarimuseum.com> References: <49409063.9060802@world.std.com> <49409245.7040205@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <494093CB.1070404@jetnet.ab.ca> Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > Everyone gets a free DEC-10 ??? ;-) I don't think you can even log into one any more. Note a DEC-10 emulated would be nice if you could get it on single card computer ... IDE - serial port - Boot streight into the emulator. This is a JOB for super RISC ... Or a nice linux stick hidden behind a PANADA display .... hint hint hint To the quiet BOB :) From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Wed Dec 10 22:22:29 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 21:22:29 -0700 Subject: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <7daed98b83b358cb3c2f0e27b34a03d6@bellsouth.net> References: <7daed98b83b358cb3c2f0e27b34a03d6@bellsouth.net> Message-ID: <49409585.4020904@jetnet.ab.ca> blstuart at bellsouth.net wrote: >> Any good leads as am still looking for a small boot strapable langauge >> here. Tiny C will not work >> as my instruction set does NOT have register to register operations. I >> plan to have a wopping >> 48Kb system as that was BIG memory 1975 ish. >> > > The two that immediately jump to mind are forth and lisp. > > BLS > > Off hand I have not seen many small LISP's around other than the one for the PDP-1. I think there was one for the 6800 once, but LISP tends to need lots of memory space. I could do Forth but it would be slow as I have no auto-incriment registers and wound need to use memory variables. More like NEXT: ISZ FPC; LD IX I FPC, JMP I IX+0 From IanK at vulcan.com Wed Dec 10 22:26:43 2008 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 20:26:43 -0800 Subject: Happy DEC-10 day... In-Reply-To: <494091CA.4040709@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <49409063.9060802@world.std.com>,<494091CA.4040709@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: You don't have your account at http://www.pdpplanet.com? :-) ________________________________________ From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca [bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca] Sent: Wednesday, December 10, 2008 8:06 PM To: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Re: Happy DEC-10 day... Megan Gentry wrote: > :( No DEC-10 to play with. From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Wed Dec 10 22:36:18 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 21:36:18 -0700 Subject: Happy DEC-10 day... In-Reply-To: References: <49409063.9060802@world.std.com>, <494091CA.4040709@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <494098C2.4070109@jetnet.ab.ca> Ian King wrote: > You don't have your account at http://www.pdpplanet.com? :-) > Bfranchuk WROTE THIS "I thought I wrote that stuff that was snipped. No acount at all, but I do have a NEW SHINY bookmark for it. " From blstuart at bellsouth.net Wed Dec 10 22:58:25 2008 From: blstuart at bellsouth.net (blstuart at bellsouth.net) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 22:58:25 -0600 Subject: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <49409585.4020904@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <9524cd36c3b7d6df0d63cbac9f3df1f3@bellsouth.net> > blstuart at bellsouth.net wrote: >>> Any good leads as am still looking for a small boot strapable langauge >>> here. Tiny C will not work >>> as my instruction set does NOT have register to register operations. I >>> plan to have a wopping >>> 48Kb system as that was BIG memory 1975 ish.>> >> The two that immediately jump to mind are forth and lisp. >> >> BLS >> > Off hand I have not seen many small LISP's around other than the one > for the PDP-1. I think there was one for the 6800 once, but LISP tends to > need lots of memory space. A lot of the space is in the big libraries of stuff, especially for common lisp. XLISP is a good example of one that's more managable--and it's author is among us. There are also some really tiny schemes that can be used to bootstrap. I did think of ML, but decided against suggesting it because of the memory. > I could do Forth but it would be slow as I have > no auto-incriment registers and wound need to use memory variables. > More like NEXT: ISZ FPC; LD IX I FPC, JMP I IX+0 Yeah, that does make stack operations slower. Years ago I started playing with a mental design for a language that was bootstrapped from a form of macros that directly specified machine code. The idea seemed like it was rich, but I never got far enough to see if that was a correct intuition. BLS From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Dec 10 23:10:47 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 00:10:47 -0500 Subject: PDF (Was: something irrelevant given the thread's migration) In-Reply-To: <49405F4F.1060309@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <49405D35.6090707@jbrain.com> <49405F4F.1060309@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: On Dec 10, 2008, at 7:31 PM, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > Any good leads as am still looking for a small boot strapable > langauge here. Tiny C will not work > as my instruction set does NOT have register to register > operations. I plan to have a wopping > 48Kb system as that was BIG memory 1975 ish. Forth? -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From frustum at pacbell.net Wed Dec 10 23:20:34 2008 From: frustum at pacbell.net (Jim Battle) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 23:20:34 -0600 Subject: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <49409585.4020904@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <7daed98b83b358cb3c2f0e27b34a03d6@bellsouth.net> <49409585.4020904@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <4940A322.8070003@pacbell.net> bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > blstuart at bellsouth.net wrote: >>> Any good leads as am still looking for a small boot strapable >>> langauge here. Tiny C will not work >>> as my instruction set does NOT have register to register operations. >>> I plan to have a wopping >>> 48Kb system as that was BIG memory 1975 ish. >>> >> >> The two that immediately jump to mind are forth and lisp. >> >> BLS >> >> > Off hand I have not seen many small LISP's around other than the one > for the PDP-1. I think there was one for the 6800 once, but LISP tends to > need lots of memory space. I could do Forth but it would be slow as I have > no auto-incriment registers and wound need to use memory variables. > More like NEXT: ISZ FPC; LD IX I FPC, JMP I IX+0 Ben you have said these three things in this thread: (1) "Any good leads as am still looking for a small boot strapable langauge here." (2) "Tiny C will not work as my instruction set does NOT have register to register operations." (3) "I could do Forth but it would be slow as I have no auto-incriment registers and wound need to use memory variables." What is your goal? If you don't care to have any existing code base to draw upon, then you should be able to make up a language that *does* fit your weird-ass architecture, whatever it is. If you do hope to have some semi-standard HLL language so you can then run existing code, it sounds like you are off to a bad start if you can target neither a pared down C nor Forth. I don't see why the lack of register to register ops would prevent implementing a tiny C. There is nothing in the language that would demand it. Some of the Tiny-BASICs published in Dr. Dobbs early on were two level interpreters, kind of a specialized byte code. They would define some artificial machine code that was easy to implement on an 8b micro, and then wrote the Tiny BASIC in the artificial machine code. It made the interpreter slower, but it saved bytes and made it possible to move the tiny basic to another uP by rewriting just the artificial machine code interpreter. The Apple II ROMs had the SWEET-16 interpreter built in. From nico at farumdata.dk Thu Dec 11 00:03:32 2008 From: nico at farumdata.dk (Nico de Jong) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 07:03:32 +0100 Subject: Kennedy tape drive 9600 References: <948889.16525.qm@web56202.mail.re3.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <0BC0C6F7DA664AE8A822872BF0954ECD@udvikling> You could look for cards called TXi16, TX8 and Datatrack ATC16. You will also need some software, such as ODI (Overland Data). The worst problem will be the cable, as this must correspond to the card. TXi16 and TX8 cables are identical to the best of my knowledge, but I've no idea regarding the ATC16 Nico ----- Original Message ----- From: "silvercreekvalley" To: "cctalk" Sent: Wednesday, December 10, 2008 11:16 PM Subject: Kennedy tape drive 9600 > I'd like to try and get a Kennedy tape drive (9600) up > and running and wondered if anyone had any advice or > possible interface cards? > > The unit is complete and appears to be working, I have > two 50 pin connectors on the back, and the ribbon cables > to IDE connectors. This is the PERTEC interface I'm assuming? > > I'm ultimately wanting to connect this to a PDP 11, but > initially it would be good to connect this some how to a > regular PC. > > Are there any cards available to do this? I do have older > PC's (this is vintage computing after all) ie with ISA > slots which I'm guessing would be required. > > Anyway, any pointers/leads appreciated. > > Thanks > > Ian. > > > > From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Thu Dec 11 01:02:58 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 00:02:58 -0700 Subject: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <4940A322.8070003@pacbell.net> References: <7daed98b83b358cb3c2f0e27b34a03d6@bellsouth.net> <49409585.4020904@jetnet.ab.ca> <4940A322.8070003@pacbell.net> Message-ID: <4940BB22.10502@jetnet.ab.ca> Jim Battle wrote: > bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: >> blstuart at bellsouth.net wrote: >>>> Any good leads as am still looking for a small boot strapable >>>> langauge here. Tiny C will not work >>>> as my instruction set does NOT have register to register >>>> operations. I plan to have a wopping >>>> 48Kb system as that was BIG memory 1975 ish. >>>> >>> >>> The two that immediately jump to mind are forth and lisp. >>> >>> BLS >>> >>> >> Off hand I have not seen many small LISP's around other than the one >> for the PDP-1. I think there was one for the 6800 once, but LISP >> tends to >> need lots of memory space. I could do Forth but it would be slow as I >> have >> no auto-incriment registers and wound need to use memory variables. >> More like NEXT: ISZ FPC; LD IX I FPC, JMP I IX+0 > > Ben you have said these three things in this thread: > > (1) "Any good leads as am still looking for a small boot strapable > langauge here." > > (2) "Tiny C will not work as my instruction set does NOT have register > to register operations." > > (3) "I could do Forth but it would be slow as I have no auto-incriment > registers and wound need to use memory variables." > > What is your goal? If you don't care to have any existing code base > to draw upon, then you should be able to make up a language that > *does* fit your weird-ass architecture, whatever it is. If you do > hope to have some semi-standard HLL language so you can then run > existing code, it sounds like you are off to a bad start if you can > target neither a pared down C nor Forth. > I am still trying to figure out my word length here again. I can do 18 bits with CPLD's or 20 bits with 2901's now you got me thinking of the overhead of modern logic. The architecture is the classic PDP 8 style design but with full alu ops Add,sub,and,or,xor,ld,st. Immediate (#) instructions have been added so I have use JZ,JNZ rather than skips. I still think a tiny but full bootstrap[1] language could fit in 16 Kb of memory as well as a limited assembler for the bootstrap language [2]. > I don't see why the lack of register to register ops would prevent > implementing a tiny C. There is nothing in the language that would > demand it. > The two compilers I have seen require some register to register moves, that my logic design does not permit. In order to keep the instruction set simple as well as not having the room to decode more operations, register to register operations had to be limited to from a index reg to the AC, rather than the general format. > Some of the Tiny-BASICs published in Dr. Dobbs early on were two level > interpreters, kind of a specialized byte code. They would define some > artificial machine code that was easy to implement on an 8b micro, and > then wrote the Tiny BASIC in the artificial machine code. It made the > interpreter slower, but it saved bytes and made it possible to move > the tiny basic to another uP by rewriting just the artificial machine > code interpreter. The Apple II ROMs had the SWEET-16 interpreter > built in. > This is still too tiny ... I am looking for a semi -practical language and all modern stuff is ment for 24+bit addressing. 1) Structures and arrays must be definable. Only + - & | ^ and == <= >= != need to be alu operations. n *n n[i] n[i].foo need be variable types. 2) No symbols permited, only numeric labels. _oooo or $oooo where o is a octal digit. This way a simple index look up can find a symbol value. From vern4wright at yahoo.com Thu Dec 11 01:20:23 2008 From: vern4wright at yahoo.com (Vernon Wright) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 23:20:23 -0800 (PST) Subject: Raised floors Message-ID: <651307.78825.qm@web65513.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> I see one response saying that they predated the electronic stored program computer by about 40 years. Perhaps, I wasn't around that early. But I recall a GE installation at a university of the late 1950's that had the raised floor that became standard in the 1960's. As were a couple of IBM 7xxx systems. OTOH, a 650 I knew in 1957 was on concrete, as was a 1401 as late as 1967. Cabling was an issue, cooling the other. The 1401 was in a well-air conditioned room, and the cabling was OVERHEAD!! Damn cheaper than raised floor. Until the large systems of the middle 1960's required cabling be out of the way, it was as much a matter of convenience as anything else - you need to be able to truck trays of cards, paper, tapes in and out, and cables made that a problem. I'd be interested in the turn of the 20th-century-raised floors. Must make a note to look that up. Vern --- On Tue, 12/9/08, William Donzelli wrote: > From: William Donzelli > Subject: Raised floors > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > Date: Tuesday, December 9, 2008, 6:08 PM > Here is an aspect of computer history not yet touched - when > did the > industry standardize on the 2 x 2 raised floor? Certainly > they were > common in the 1960s, but were they standard in the 1950s? > > -- > Will From cclist at sydex.com Thu Dec 11 01:41:13 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 23:41:13 -0800 Subject: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <4940BB22.10502@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <7daed98b83b358cb3c2f0e27b34a03d6@bellsouth.net>, <4940A322.8070003@pacbell.net>, <4940BB22.10502@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <49405399.32701.B893F@cclist.sydex.com> How about FORTRAN--say FORTRAN II or USA BASIC FORTRAN? Very small language; very few statement types and historically correct. Can be (and was) implemented on just about anything. You don't need registers, stacks or any of that fancy stuff. Seems that a dialect (LRLTRAN) was used to bootstrap operating systems at Lawrence Livermore back in the day. Some tiny BASICs also come to mind. Cheers, Chuck From rivie at ridgenet.net Thu Dec 11 02:40:12 2008 From: rivie at ridgenet.net (Roger Ivie) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 00:40:12 -0800 (PST) Subject: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <4940BB22.10502@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <7daed98b83b358cb3c2f0e27b34a03d6@bellsouth.net> <49409585.4020904@jetnet.ab.ca> <4940A322.8070003@pacbell.net> <4940BB22.10502@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: On Thu, 11 Dec 2008, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > I am still trying to figure out my word length here again. I can do 18 bits > with CPLD's > or 20 bits with 2901's now you got me thinking of the overhead of modern > logic. > The architecture is the classic PDP 8 style design but with full alu ops > Add,sub,and,or,xor,ld,st. > Immediate (#) instructions have been added so I have use JZ,JNZ rather than > skips. > I still think a tiny but full bootstrap[1] language could fit in 16 Kb of > memory as well as > a limited assembler for the bootstrap language [2]. Don't count FORTH out. I've done a simple FORTH on PDP-8. My particular implemenation is extremely portable, being expressed in terms of a four-level fixed-depth math stack. This is not the math stack seen by FORTH, but is used to construct the FORTH stack; the basic idea behind the four-level stack is that it's used for working calculations much in the manner of an HP calculator. The FORTH system relies on a compiler crafted in C that builds the headers and compiles the simple stack machine assembly. Over the years, I've run the FORTH with 4-byte (VAX, i960), 2-byte (Z80), and 1-byte (PDP-8) cells, all with no changes to the basic FORTH code. Except for console terminal I/O and system startup, these systems have identical source even for those words normally done in assembly, because those are expressed in an assembly for the simple stack machine. On the PDP-8, the implementation is almost a bytecode. Each simple stack machine op compiles as a page-zero indirect jump through a word that holds a pointer to the implementing function. For the simple stack-machine assembly, the basic rules are that the math stack must be empty going into a branch or coming out of a label, allowing the compiler to track the stack depth. For the PDP-8, the compiler selects one of four functions to execute the primitive based upon the current depth of the math stack. Other implementations compile to assembly for the target processor, selecting the registers involved in each instruction based on the stack depth. On the PDP-8, the system requires approximately 3KW. Oddly enough, I've just been resurrecting it for a new project. This time, I have it compiling to a bytecode compiled with MACRO32 on an Alpha; the difficulty with direct compilation on the Alpha is that the MACRO32 compiler does not allow data and instructions to be mixed, which I circumvent by compiling to a bytecode. I had the following versions lying around: The new Alpha bytecode version requires 1765 32-bit words for the FORTH system compiled to bytecode and approximately 532 32-bit words for the bytecode interpreter, for a total of about 2297 words. I just got this version running today, so I know it works. The PDP-8 system, described above, requires 3262 words for the combination of FORTH code and primitive functions. This excludes space required for the math and return stacks; I place them at opposite ends of a chunk of memory growing towards each other. The Z80 version is implemented in a manner similar to the PDP-8 version, but subroutine calls require three bytes instead of the PDP-8's single 12-bit byte, so the code is a bit larger. It requires 4102 16-bit words. This version has also been run. I did, but did never debugged, a 68HC08 version. That one requires 2843 16-bit words for the combined system, but that does not include I/O because I never got far enough in that project to wind up with target hardware. The PowerPC version compiles the simple stack-machine primitives to PowerPC assembly. I don't think I ever ran that one, either. It requires 3973 32-bit words for the combined FORTH and primitives. The VAX version also compiles to assembly code instead of bytecode. I've run it both standalone on a MicroVAX 2000 and under my long-neglected port of CP/M to that platform. It requires 2347 32-bit bit words for the combined FORTH and primitives. I also have an ARM version that compiles to assembly code, but has never been executed; like the 68HC08 version, it has no I/O because I never got far enough to have a concrete target. That version requires about 2287 32-bit words for the combined FORTH and primitives. It is by no means a standard FORTH; it only has a couple of control structures, all numeric console I/O is done in hex, and it can't do inline string constants (i.e., no ." I have to declare a word containing the constant instead and then compile a reference to that word). Efficiency also was not a goal; the threaded code is position-independent, which makes NEXT larger (a design goal for the original i960 implementation was the ability to migrate the system from ROM to RAM so the EPROM it was booted from could be erased and re-programmed). The PDP-8 and Z-80 systems as a whole aren't position independent because the functions that implement the primitives aren't. It's small, primitive, and portable. I'll be using it to bring up some new hardware in the near future. -- roger ivie rivie at ridgenet.net From cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de Thu Dec 11 03:57:08 2008 From: cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de (Christian Corti) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 10:57:08 +0100 (CET) Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <614C868E78D14A5C902ACC23D4759080@NFORCE4> References: <614C868E78D14A5C902ACC23D4759080@NFORCE4> Message-ID: On Wed, 10 Dec 2008, Erik Klein wrote: > Or just buy the USB dongle thingie at www.clickykeyboards.com (specifically > the USB to PS/2 Adapter at > http://www.clickykeyboards.com/index.cfm/fa/items.main/parentcat/11298/subca > tid/0/id/124184) I went to that page just out of curiosity, and what should I say... don't trust them. Their "typical examples of passive ps/2 to USB adapters that are not true ps/2 to USB signal converters" are just wrong. For example, the second one from the left is a real converter that I am actually using to connect my "Model M" (IBM has never called the keyboard model M) and my old IBM PS/2 mouse via USB to a modern computer. And what is this supposed to mean: "Simple ps/2 to USB adapters do not use specific software drivers" (but their expensive converter does?) And they want 18$ ?!? And it doesn't even handle PS/2 mice? Well, I'd prefer buying the 1.50$ one as mentioned before. Christian From dave06a at dunfield.com Thu Dec 11 06:13:40 2008 From: dave06a at dunfield.com (Dave Dunfield) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 07:13:40 -0500 Subject: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <4940BB22.10502@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <4940A322.8070003@pacbell.net> Message-ID: <6E0CA8CE428B@dunfield.com> > >>>> Any good leads as am still looking for a small boot strapable > >>>> langauge here. Tiny C will not work > >>>> as my instruction set does NOT have register to register > >>>> operations. I plan to have a wopping > >>>> 48Kb system as that was BIG memory 1975 ish. > This is still too tiny ... I am looking for a semi -practical language > and all modern stuff is ment > for 24+bit addressing. > 1) Structures and arrays must be definable. Only + - & | ^ and == <= >= > != need to be alu operations. > n *n n[i] n[i].foo need be variable types. > > 2) No symbols permited, only numeric labels. _oooo or $oooo where o is > a octal digit. > This way a simple index look up can find a symbol value. You don't need register to register operations to support a C compiler. Can you provide any details of your architecture and instruction set? It might be feasable to make a port of my Micro-C toolset to it... If not, it might be feasable to make a port of "C-flea" a virtual machine I designed specifically to support Micro-C (I've supported some pretty weird architectures by employing C-flea). Micro-C is a very small, but reasonably powerful dialect of C - For an example, refer to the ImageDisk sources on my site ... ImageDisk and all of it's utilities are compiled with the PC version of Micro-C (as are my simulators, transfer tools and pretty much all of the other DOS based tools I've posted). Dave Btw: If you haven't written an assembler yet, let me know - I've got a universal table driven assembler generator which I developed to rapidly produce assemblers for many of the later architectures I supported. -- dave06a (at) Dave Dunfield dunfield (dot) Firmware development services & tools: www.dunfield.com com Collector of vintage computing equipment: http://www.classiccmp.org/dunfield/index.html From spectre at floodgap.com Thu Dec 11 07:47:09 2008 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 05:47:09 -0800 (PST) Subject: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <49405399.32701.B893F@cclist.sydex.com> from Chuck Guzis at "Dec 10, 8 11:41:13 pm" Message-ID: <200812111347.mBBDl97x020488@floodgap.com> > How about FORTRAN--say FORTRAN II or USA BASIC FORTRAN? Very small > language; very few statement types and historically correct. Can be > (and was) implemented on just about anything. You don't need > registers, stacks or any of that fancy stuff. Where would you find something like that? -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- All generalizations are false, including this one. -- Mark Twain ----------- From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Thu Dec 11 07:41:08 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 07:41:08 -0600 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: References: <614C868E78D14A5C902ACC23D4759080@NFORCE4> Message-ID: <49411874.4070006@gmail.com> Christian Corti wrote: > On Wed, 10 Dec 2008, Erik Klein wrote: >> Or just buy the USB dongle thingie at www.clickykeyboards.com >> (specifically >> the USB to PS/2 Adapter at >> http://www.clickykeyboards.com/index.cfm/fa/items.main/parentcat/11298/subca >> > Their "typical examples of passive ps/2 to USB > adapters that are not true ps/2 to USB signal converters" are just > wrong. For example, the second one from the left is a real converter I agree there - that second-from-left converter looks to be the same one as RS (UK) sell, and is an active converter. However, given that it's the equivalent of around $60 I think I'll go with the $18 product :-) It wouldn't surprise me if some far-east company has cloned the look of the active adapter but it's actually a passive one, such that both types exist on the market but look the same. > And what is this supposed to mean: "Simple ps/2 to USB adapters do not > use specific software drivers" (but their expensive converter does?) Yeah, I don't get that one either. Plus I believe some keyboards shipped with passive adapters *do* come with drivers (although whether they're vital or just there to add extra functionality, I'm not sure) Personally I don't really need a mouse port as well, although the keyboards site does one for an extra 4 bucks. cheers Jules From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Thu Dec 11 07:44:11 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 07:44:11 -0600 Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: <651307.78825.qm@web65513.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> References: <651307.78825.qm@web65513.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4941192B.8060906@gmail.com> Vernon Wright wrote: > Cabling was an issue, cooling the other. The 1401 was in a well-air > conditioned room, and the cabling was OVERHEAD!! Damn cheaper than raised > floor. That was my first thought upon reading this thread - how come raised floors even came about? Message systems based on air-filled tubes seem to have always been overhead, and of course lots of stores still pass power and data down to terminals from above; if in a room with a false ceiling it seems a natural thing to take advantage of. Maybe the sheer weight of the cabling needed for a mainframe environment was just too much to justify running it overhead? From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Thu Dec 11 07:48:26 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 07:48:26 -0600 Subject: OT? Heavy duty web hosting needed In-Reply-To: <884225.46099.qm@web110610.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> References: <884225.46099.qm@web110610.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <49411A2A.4030104@gmail.com> steven stengel wrote: > Hello, My entire classic computer website is down for exceeding my monthly > bandwidth allotment. I exceeded 60 Gigs in 2 weeks. > > Can anyone recommend a good host? I need 150+ Gig/month bandwidth. Well Jay always said he'd host vintage computing sites for free, but I've no idea how your throughput compares to sites that he's hosting at present (or how close to the limit the burden of hosting the existing sites is). From mloewen at cpumagic.scol.pa.us Thu Dec 11 07:58:18 2008 From: mloewen at cpumagic.scol.pa.us (Mike Loewen) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 08:58:18 -0500 (EST) Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: <4941192B.8060906@gmail.com> References: <651307.78825.qm@web65513.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> <4941192B.8060906@gmail.com> Message-ID: On Thu, 11 Dec 2008, Jules Richardson wrote: > Maybe the sheer weight of the cabling needed for a mainframe environment > was just too much to justify running it overhead? The SAGE installations used overhead wiring in cable trays. They didn't come much bigger than that. Mike Loewen mloewen at cpumagic.scol.pa.us Old Technology http://sturgeon.css.psu.edu/~mloewen/Oldtech/ From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Thu Dec 11 07:53:40 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 07:53:40 -0600 Subject: PDF (Was: something irrelevant given the thread's migration) In-Reply-To: <49405F4F.1060309@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <49405D35.6090707@jbrain.com> <49405F4F.1060309@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <49411B64.8040906@gmail.com> bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > Any good leads as am still looking for a small boot strapable langauge > here. Tiny C will not work > as my instruction set does NOT have register to register operations. I > plan to have a wopping > 48Kb system as that was BIG memory 1975 ish. You could run a Brainfuck interpreter from ROM in a few hundred bytes :-) From schoedel at kw.igs.net Thu Dec 11 09:05:00 2008 From: schoedel at kw.igs.net (schoedel at kw.igs.net) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 10:05:00 -0500 Subject: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <4940BB22.10502@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <7daed98b83b358cb3c2f0e27b34a03d6@bellsouth.net> <49409585.4020904@jetnet.ab.ca> <4940A322.8070003@pacbell.net> <4940BB22.10502@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <20081211144952.M59359@kw.igs.net> On Thu, 11 Dec 2008 00:02:58 -0700, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote > The architecture is the classic PDP 8 style design but with full alu > [....] > The two compilers I have seen require some register to register moves, Modern compilers generally like to have a register file. For an accumulator architecture like the PDP8 or 6502 the straightforward approach is to treat page zero as general-purpose registers. -- Kevin Schoedel VA3TCS From dbetz at xlisper.com Thu Dec 11 09:23:44 2008 From: dbetz at xlisper.com (David Betz) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 10:23:44 -0500 Subject: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <9524cd36c3b7d6df0d63cbac9f3df1f3@bellsouth.net> References: <9524cd36c3b7d6df0d63cbac9f3df1f3@bellsouth.net> Message-ID: <8D8196C0-E2EF-4F1E-999D-F43A1B7A463E@xlisper.com> On Dec 10, 2008, at 11:58 PM, blstuart at bellsouth.net wrote: > A lot of the space is in the big libraries of stuff, especially > for common lisp. XLISP is a good example of one that's > more managable--and it's author is among us. There are > also some really tiny schemes that can be used to bootstrap. If you're interested in a tiny Lisp that is easy to port, check out the Lispkit system described by Peter Henderson in his book "Functional Programming: Application and Implementation". I read that just before building the bytecode compiler that is in XScheme (later called XLISP 3.0). He gives a complete listing of the virtual machine code for the compiler in the back of the book. You have to do a little work because his instructions are represented as lists and you generally want to use just sequences of bytes but that isn't too hard and then you have a working Lisp system. From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Thu Dec 11 09:42:21 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 10:42:21 -0500 Subject: Bootstrappable language References: <7daed98b83b358cb3c2f0e27b34a03d6@bellsouth.net> <49409585.4020904@jetnet.ab.ca> <4940A322.8070003@pacbell.net> Message-ID: <18753.13533.516025.55128@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> Some further comments... >>>>> "Jim" == Jim Battle writes: Jim> Ben you have said these three things in this thread: Jim> (1) "Any good leads as am still looking for a small boot Jim> strapable langauge here." Jim> (2) "Tiny C will not work as my instruction set does NOT have Jim> register to register operations." Jim> (3) "I could do Forth but it would be slow as I have no Jim> auto-incriment registers and wound need to use memory Jim> variables." Jim> ...I don't see why the lack of register to register ops would Jim> prevent implementing a tiny C. There is nothing in the language Jim> that would demand it. Agreed. Consider that C was first implemented on a machine that doesn't have such ops. And for that matter, doesn't have auto increment ops either. Similarly, you don't need stack ops to have a stack; C compilers exist for plenty of machines like that. (The 360 comes to mind -- gcc handles that. And I know there was a C compiler for the CDC 6000 series, though it appears to have been lost.) In any case, I second the suggestion of Forth. Forth was originally designed as a real time control system language; it's both fast and small. The limited instruction set Ben mentioned will make some difference but I doubt it's large, especially since memory is pretty fast compared to the CPU of low end machines. I've done some large scale worth with FIG Forth; a full port of that to a PDP-11 which (if memory serves) took 8 kbytes. That was usermode code, so no drivers (but instead OS interfaces, which is probably not all that different). Another place where Forth has been used: several popular workstations use it for their bootloaders. Sun does (or did) and I think Apple does too. At least I once got an "ok" prompt when I powered up a very confused Power Mac... and it answered like Forth interactive mode. Porting Forth is very easy because most of a Forth implementation (FIG Forth is a good example) is in Forth; only 10% or so is assembler for the target machine and these are low level primitives that are easy to design and code. That leaves some drivers, which you can code in Forth, and if the hardware is at all close to industry standards (like a UART probably will be) you can just use a stock driver and drop it in. paul From caveguy at sbcglobal.net Thu Dec 11 10:21:49 2008 From: caveguy at sbcglobal.net (Bob Bradlee) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 11:21:49 -0500 Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: <4941192B.8060906@gmail.com> Message-ID: <200812111622.mBBGLtvY082982@keith.ezwind.net> On Thu, 11 Dec 2008 07:44:11 -0600, Jules Richardson wrote: >Vernon Wright wrote: >> Cabling was an issue, cooling the other. The 1401 was in a well-air >> conditioned room, and the cabling was OVERHEAD!! Damn cheaper than raised >> floor. >That was my first thought upon reading this thread - how come raised floors >even came about? Message systems based on air-filled tubes seem to have always >been overhead, and of course lots of stores still pass power and data down to >terminals from above; if in a room with a false ceiling it seems a natural >thing to take advantage of. Maybe the sheer weight of the cabling needed for >a mainframe environment was just too much to justify running it overhead? Cooling! cold air is plumbed through the floors to where it is needed. Hot air rises and is easily collected and recycled. The fact that one could hide the cabeling easily under the floor was just a bennie :-) Glass walls became popular with management, as did windowless concrete bunker like basements. Not sure when it began but there is little question that it became the standard by the mid 60's. Back under my rock ... The other Bob From vern4wright at yahoo.com Thu Dec 11 12:29:17 2008 From: vern4wright at yahoo.com (Vernon Wright) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 10:29:17 -0800 (PST) Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: <200812111622.mBBGLtvY082982@keith.ezwind.net> Message-ID: <928932.25979.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> No argument about the cooling - except that until the late 60's the air WASN'T run through the floor - in the installations I recall. And recall that by the time of the S/360 class of computers cables between the various units, and the power cables, could be 3+" in diameter. You couldn't run an efficient operation trucking card trays, disk cake dishes, tapes, and paper over those cables (which had to be of minimum possible length). Still want to know about those early 20th century raised floors. A Hollerith tab machine on a raised floor? Maybe.... Vern --- On Thu, 12/11/08, Bob Bradlee wrote: > From: Bob Bradlee > Subject: Re: Raised floors > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > Date: Thursday, December 11, 2008, 8:21 AM > On Thu, 11 Dec 2008 07:44:11 -0600, Jules Richardson wrote: > > >Vernon Wright wrote: > >> Cabling was an issue, cooling the other. The 1401 > was in a well-air > >> conditioned room, and the cabling was OVERHEAD!! > Damn cheaper than raised > >> floor. > > >That was my first thought upon reading this thread - > how come raised floors > >even came about? Message systems based on air-filled > tubes seem to have always > >been overhead, and of course lots of stores still pass > power and data down to > >terminals from above; if in a room with a false ceiling > it seems a natural > >thing to take advantage of. Maybe the sheer weight of > the cabling needed for > >a mainframe environment was just too much to justify > running it overhead? > > > > Cooling! > cold air is plumbed through the floors to where it is > needed. > Hot air rises and is easily collected and recycled. > > The fact that one could hide the cabeling easily under the > floor was just a bennie :-) > > Glass walls became popular with management, as did > windowless concrete bunker like basements. > > Not sure when it began but there is little question that it > became the standard by the mid 60's. > > Back under my rock ... > The other Bob From mc at media.mit.edu Thu Dec 11 12:31:45 2008 From: mc at media.mit.edu (Tim McNerney) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 13:31:45 -0500 Subject: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <200812111800.mBBI03h9011016@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812111800.mBBI03h9011016@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <49415C91.3040901@media.mit.edu> bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > Any good leads as am still looking for a small boot strapable langauge > here. Tiny C will not work > as my instruction set does NOT have register to register operations. I > plan to have a wopping > 48Kb system as that was BIG memory 1975 ish.>> > Your best bet is to write a byte-code interpreter in your native instruction set. If your architecture Turing-equivalent it doesn't matter what operations are missing. Tiny Basic, UCSD Pascal, Logo, Java, Scheme and lots of other languages have been implemented this way. Sure, this might be slower than a "native implementation," but you can always bootstrap a native compiler later if you have the time. Byte-code interpreters typically run faster than "regular" interpreters. If you can find it, I would recommend UCSD Pascal. It is a full-featured language (structs/records, etc.). I ran this on the Apple II in about the amount of memory you have. From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Thu Dec 11 12:31:30 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 11:31:30 -0700 Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: <200812111622.mBBGLtvY082982@keith.ezwind.net> References: <200812111622.mBBGLtvY082982@keith.ezwind.net> Message-ID: <49415C82.8040703@jetnet.ab.ca> Bob Bradlee wrote: > Back under my rock ... Don't you mean Floor here. :) > The other Bob > > From cclist at sydex.com Thu Dec 11 12:34:48 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 10:34:48 -0800 Subject: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <200812111347.mBBDl97x020488@floodgap.com> References: <49405399.32701.B893F@cclist.sydex.com> from Chuck Guzis at "Dec 10, 8 11:41:13 pm", <200812111347.mBBDl97x020488@floodgap.com> Message-ID: <4940ECC8.16227.D8BD5@cclist.sydex.com> On 11 Dec 2008 at 5:47, Cameron Kaiser wrote: > > How about FORTRAN--say FORTRAN II or USA BASIC FORTRAN? Very small > > language; very few statement types and historically correct. Can be > > (and was) implemented on just about anything. You don't need > > registers, stacks or any of that fancy stuff. > > Where would you find something like that? Do you mean source code? It's not hard to write one otherwise. Manuals exist. Examples from the 60's must certainly exist. Note that we're not talking about F77 here, but rather a very limited dialect; something that could be run on a 360/20 or 1620. Consider the 4K FORTRAN for the PDP-8. Wasn't that cross-compiled on a PDP-6? Were there ever any tiny Algol-60 subsets marketed? Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Thu Dec 11 12:41:46 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 10:41:46 -0800 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: References: <614C868E78D14A5C902ACC23D4759080@NFORCE4>, Message-ID: <4940EE6A.15206.13EB9C@cclist.sydex.com> On 11 Dec 2008 at 10:57, Christian Corti wrote: > For example, the second one from the left is a real converter that I am > actually using to connect my "Model M" (IBM has never called the > keyboard model M) and my old IBM PS/2 mouse via USB to a modern computer. Let's see if I can type and still read the label on the bottom of my keyboard--the one with the big IBM logo on the bottom. Part No: 1397721 FRU No: 1397725 I.D. No: 5002413 Date: 06-08-92 Plt No; F2 Model M Made in the U S A So, the "Model M" refers to the manufacturing plant? Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Thu Dec 11 12:46:35 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 10:46:35 -0800 Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: <928932.25979.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> References: <200812111622.mBBGLtvY082982@keith.ezwind.net>, <928932.25979.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4940EF8B.8324.185697@cclist.sydex.com> While ceiling heights could vary all over the place (the machine floor at CDC Sunnyvale had very high ceilings--perhaps 16 ft., which made for playing ring-toss with tape write-enable rings onto the lighting fixtures very challenging--the distance between a floor and the equipment standing on it is pretty much a known distance--and probably the shortest practical path. Cheers, Chuck From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Thu Dec 11 12:47:10 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 13:47:10 -0500 Subject: Bootstrappable language References: <200812111800.mBBI03h9011016@dewey.classiccmp.org> <49415C91.3040901@media.mit.edu> Message-ID: <18753.24622.741218.832307@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> >>>>> "Tim" == Tim McNerney writes: Tim> bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: >> Any good leads as am still looking for a small boot strapable >> langauge here. Tiny C will not work as my instruction set does >> NOT have register to register operations. I plan to have a wopping >> 48Kb system as that was BIG memory 1975 ish.>> >> Tim> Your best bet is to write a byte-code interpreter in your native Tim> instruction set. If your architecture Turing-equivalent it Tim> doesn't matter what operations are missing. Tiny Basic, UCSD Tim> Pascal, Logo, Java, Scheme and lots of other languages have been Tim> implemented this way. So is Forth, with a twist: much of the implementation is itself coded in Forth (i.e., in bytecode) so the amount of stuff you have to write in assembler is very small indeed. In the PDP-11 implementation I have, the "core" assembly code is 500 lines; there's a bunch more stuff coded in assembler that doesn't actually need to be (I changed it to assembler as an optimization). That may be another few hundred lines, max. paul From vern4wright at yahoo.com Thu Dec 11 12:48:22 2008 From: vern4wright at yahoo.com (Vernon Wright) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 10:48:22 -0800 (PST) Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. Message-ID: <154558.88239.qm@web65508.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> Over the past four years I've been taking the digests, pulling down the archives and saving them, in the hope that I'd find time to read and perhaps participate. Never found time. Gotta get this out of the way first: some of you may recall that I was Don Maslin's friend, that I promised to rescue the software archive, and that his widow made that impossible. A mutual friend queried me about this recently, and I have to say that so far as I know, Don's archive rests in his garage, untouched. SAD!!! This year I lost another computer addict friend who participated in the early days of the Z80 (and before that as one of the Non-Linear Systems bright lights) - Bill Bailey. Our Old Farts group is getting smaller. I wonder - are there any warm bodies here in San Diego still interested in the old computers we created over 30 years ago? If so, I'd sure like to talk with them. Perhaps reconstitute the Dina-SIG I founded some 20+ years ago as a local activity for celebration of the early personal computer, idea and information exchange, and good fellowship over good beer! Anyway, I intend to try to drop in here daily and join in the daily conversations. Regards, Vern Wright San Diego, CA From cclist at sydex.com Thu Dec 11 12:50:40 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 10:50:40 -0800 Subject: OT: Forrest Mims resurfaces Message-ID: <4940F080.31639.1C1380@cclist.sydex.com> A bit of spam in my inbox today from Jameco, shows that Forrest is still cooking up stuff: http://www.jameco.com/Jameco/PressRoom/recipe1.html Cheers, Chuck From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Thu Dec 11 12:52:33 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 13:52:33 -0500 Subject: Bootstrappable language References: <49405399.32701.B893F@cclist.sydex.com> <200812111347.mBBDl97x020488@floodgap.com> <4940ECC8.16227.D8BD5@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <18753.24945.798147.894254@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> >>>>> "Chuck" == Chuck Guzis writes: Chuck> Were there ever any tiny Algol-60 subsets marketed? Well, there's DECUS Algol for the PDP-11 (which, according to comments, apparently was originally done for the PDP-8). That's a variation of Burroughs 5500 Algol, so it's pretty powerful. It uses bytecode; roughly speaking, you can think of those as 16-bit analogs of the B6700 instruction set. I wouldn't call that tiny; it's actually a substantial superset of standard Algol. And the bytecode interpreter is pretty large because of that. But you can use it to write substantial programs -- the compiler itself for example. That's not particularly doable with standard Algol-60. I have a copy of the Algol source code for that thing, but unfortunately I have misplaced the bytecode interpreter. It almost certainly lives on an old magtape; the problem is finding and then reading that tape... paul From us21090 at yahoo.com Thu Dec 11 13:23:27 2008 From: us21090 at yahoo.com (Scott Austin) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 11:23:27 -0800 (PST) Subject: Apple II keyboards Message-ID: <845284.23240.qm@web30808.mail.mud.yahoo.com> All, I'm looking for a final accurate answer. When the Apple II's came out, the keyboard had a power-light that looked like a lit up key at the keyboard's lower left corner, below the shift key. Apple II+'s had a power-light that was (nearly) flush with the case. See these for comparison: http://www.vectronicsappleworld.com/ads/ads/appleii/howto2.jpg http://www.computercloset.org/apple2Plus.htm The question: Did Apple ever produce II's with this flush-power-light keyboard? I know the II and II+ lines were sold concurrently, so it doesn't surprise me if, for a time, the hardware was identical. All I've read (and which sounds definitive) the only initial difference was the ROMs. See the 1980 price list mid page two: http://www.barse.org/blog/archives/apple1980pricelist.pdf . In time, the II+'s motherboard's did go through changes Other, slightly related info It has an Apple II 16K model #: A2S0016. The motherboard is a Rev 4, which, if I understand it correctly, was used for both II and II+'s. The silkscreen on the MB near the "apple computer inc" text (above ROMs) says 1978. The manufacture date code (handprinted on MB corner near slot 0) is 7928-- 28th week (mid July) 1979. It has the AppleSoft/Auto-Start ROMs, but these were available as an upgrade. (The previous owner also added memory to 48K plus a language card). Oh yeah, the previous owner lost the lid!! All this is consistent with it being an Apple II. BUT one kicker is that the keyboard has a (nearly) flush power light that are used in II+'s. Thanks, Scott From dm561 at torfree.net Thu Dec 11 13:29:11 2008 From: dm561 at torfree.net (M H Stein) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 14:29:11 -0500 Subject: USB Model M Message-ID: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 10:57:08 +0100 (CET) From: Christian Corti Subject: RE: USB Model M what should I say... don't trust them. ... IBM has never called the keyboard model M Christian ----------Reply: Really? Odd, mine all say IBM in big letters on the front and back, and "Model M" quite clearly on the back (M2 on the newer ones). I wonder; do you suppose someone else printed that on there? Maybe they're counterfeit... Can I trust what *you* say? ;-) Or did I misunderstand something? m From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Thu Dec 11 13:27:12 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 12:27:12 -0700 Subject: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <6E0CA8CE428B@dunfield.com> References: <4940A322.8070003@pacbell.net> <6E0CA8CE428B@dunfield.com> Message-ID: <49416990.205@jetnet.ab.ca> Dave Dunfield wrote: > You don't need register to register operations to support a C compiler. > > Can you provide any details of your architecture and instruction set? > > It might be feasable to make a port of my Micro-C toolset to it... If > not, it might be feasable to make a port of "C-flea" a virtual machine > I designed specifically to support Micro-C (I've supported some pretty > weird architectures by employing C-flea). > The architecture is like I said before a stretched PDP-8, with a 512 byte direct addressing range and more compleate set of alu operations. I am exploring the idea that 18 bits is still the best size word size for a small computer or digital controller. The extra opcode bit is used to support word & byte sized operands, compared to the that of a 8 bit micro. The two more address bits negate the loss of byte addressing and give a bit more room for a resident OS rather than swapping core in and out. Using CPLD's also gives me the feel that a 18 bit simple cpu like my design could have been developed as microchip computer similar to 6800 or 6502 chip set around the time the Z80 was developed. Using 48 rather 40 pins as packaging a 18 bit cpu with front panel support could have been developed. A) Cpu chip. B) Swr/data/address bus display support chips . C) data/byte swap buffer. > Micro-C is a very small, but reasonably powerful dialect of C - For an > example, refer to the ImageDisk sources on my site ... ImageDisk and all > of it's utilities are compiled with the PC version of Micro-C (as are my > simulators, transfer tools and pretty much all of the other DOS based > tools I've posted). > > Dave > > Btw: If you haven't written an assembler yet, let me know - I've got a > universal table driven assembler generator which I developed to rapidly > produce assemblers for many of the later architectures I supported. > > Unlikely it will work , I have 9 bit bytes. I have hacked, Jones's PDP 8 assembler to cross assemble for me. Once I get the the single PCB board built later next year, then I will consider porting Micro-C. I plan to only have about 64Kb + bootstrap EEPROM, IDE interface and a two 6850 uarts along with a front panel. I am not sure yet if the IDE interface will be 16 or 9 bits wide yet. > -- > dave06a (at) Dave Dunfield > dunfield (dot) Firmware development services & tools: www.dunfield.com > com Collector of vintage computing equipment: > http://www.classiccmp.org/dunfield/index.html > > From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Thu Dec 11 13:20:48 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 13:20:48 -0600 Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: <928932.25979.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> References: <928932.25979.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <49416810.1030705@gmail.com> Vernon Wright wrote: > Still want to know about those early 20th century raised floors. A > Hollerith tab machine on a raised floor? Maybe.... Hmm, I'll see if I can find out what Bletchley Park did in wartime - aside from several Colossus machines, there was a significant teleprinter and punched-card presence, too. I seem to remember that the main floors in H Block (now housing the computer museum, and where - IIRC - 4 Colossus machines used to live) are solid concrete with a central channel for wiring and power, but I don't know if this channel was put in after the war or when the building was put up. (Of course that's all 1940s, so not significantly before the 1950/60 dates already being talked about - and punched-card equipment had existed for a long time by then) cheers Jules From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Thu Dec 11 13:29:17 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 13:29:17 -0600 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> Message-ID: <49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> M H Stein wrote: > Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 10:57:08 +0100 (CET) > From: Christian Corti > Subject: RE: USB Model M > > > what should I say... don't trust them. > ... > IBM has never called the keyboard model M > > Christian > > ----------Reply: > > Really? Odd, mine all say IBM in big letters on the front and back, > and "Model M" quite clearly on the back (M2 on the newer ones). Hmm, mine* (IBM p/n 1390120) says "Model M" on the underside label - maybe they dropped it for later ones though (mine's a 1986 and I believe a 'first generation'; it lacks the status LEDs) * Thanks again, Bill :) (I wonder why they were called Model M - anyone know?) cheers Jules From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Dec 11 13:05:06 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 19:05:06 +0000 (GMT) Subject: PDFs for reference material; In-Reply-To: <493F804A.23549.919E714@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Dec 10, 8 08:39:38 am Message-ID: > Pencil and paper is still king for a lot of folks. Sketching out I almost always carry a notebook. Not a notebook computer, but a good old book of paper. I find it more use than any electronic replacement > schematics or code is still easiest scribbled on paper for me. I Yep. As I've said many times before, I'll use a CAD system when it actually aids me in designing something (as opposed to hindering me, which most seem to). Until then, I'll use a 'Paper Aided Dasign' system, more commonly called a 'PAD' (of paper :-)). I design by sketching out scheamticvs and doing he calculations on a pocket calculator (and beofre anyone askes, I have scheamtics, machine language instruction set, and ROM listings for said calculator, OK :-)) > know a number of music composers who wouldn't be caught dead using > anything but manuscript paper and a pencil. > > Likewise, there's nothing quite like a printed databook. To those Indeed... -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Dec 11 13:27:14 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 19:27:14 +0000 (GMT) Subject: PDF (Was: something irrelevant given the thread's migration) In-Reply-To: <49405D35.6090707@jbrain.com> from "Jim Brain" at Dec 10, 8 06:22:13 pm Message-ID: > > Tony Duell wrote: > > > > Of course paper has the advantage that I can read it anywhere, it never > > crashes, it never gives strange error messages, etc. And it withstands a > > hot soldering iron a lot better than any computer does :-) > > > On the other hand, it's hard to drag 1000 pages of doc on a business > trip because you want to do some hobby coding/design during the boring I've never been on a business trip, and probably never will, so that's not an issue for me. In any case, 1000 pages is not that thick a pile of paper. And if I'm doing serious design, I like to have the device in front of me, a soldering iron, logic analyser, etc. In other words, I'd want to investigage the device. Not something that's easy to do away from the bench. > evenings, or if you do work on the road. > > And I simply can't 'flip through' a pdf file (even on the fastest > > machines I've ever used) in the same way that I can flip through a book. > > I used to routinely flip through data books, etc and interesting devices > > would catch my eye. It's much more difficult doing that with pdf files. > > > "flip"? You really are oldskool. If you need to go to a section, > there's search, and a specific page is but a few numbers into the "Page" > box away. Ypu miounderstnad me. If I want to find a particular device -- by type number -- then I have no problem typing the number into one of the approriate web pages and looking at the pdf data sheet. Well, one problem, which I'll mention later. But I routinely flip through databooks looking for 'interesting' devices. Not necessarily from the highlighted specifications. Or even the data sheet on that device. I might spot an application circuit, see some device in it that I've not heard of, look it up, and then file away in the back of my brain that makes a useful chip to do , the data sheet is in book . And I'll rememebr that when I have that sort of problem to solve. I have yet to find a way to do that efficiently with pdf files. > > -tony > > > PDF can be our common ground though, You print it out, I read it on > screen. I like formats that allow us both to work effectively. > > Can't go with the "TXT FOREVAR" folks, though. Ah, well, alas I am one of those folks. My moan about pdf is that it's not portable. At least not to any of the 200 or so computers I own (well, unless thrre is suddenly a pdf view for the PERQ, which is the machine I most use with a bitmapped display). Before you tell be there's a version that would run on this PC, I will point out that this machine has a text-only MDA display. Plain text is readable on just about every machine I own. It's printable on just about every printer I own. And it is possible to represent all I need in plain text. Document formatting is not something that is that important to preserve, at least not for the things I read. At least one technical manual from HP uses ASCII-art diagrams for everything apart from the complete schematics. BLock diagrams, memory maps, pinouts, etc are all in ASCII-art. I don't see the problem. > > And to your other point, to be consistent, I must concur. It's a hobby, > and anything goes. I was only asking that a disclaimer be applied, > since the difference between "I code this up on my own because it's a > hobby and I think it's fun" and "I don't trust pre-written apps and you > should not either. Write them yourself all times" is sometimes hard to > distinguish. I didn't comment on your earlier message on this, but I feel you're misguided. Well, that's putting it politely, I won't use the words I was thinking of on a public list :-) I have _never_ found a computer or electronics company that offers what I consider to be even marginally adequate technical support. I've contacts many, both privately, when working at well-known universities, and when working at large, well-known companies. Without exception they have been useless. That's one reason I insist on being able to support everything I depend on myself (meaning that I have schematics, source code, etc). I feel I (and most, if not all other desingers/programmers) are most productive if they are using the right tools. Those might be commercial tools, they might be home-made. Nobody would expect an electronics designer to make his own 'scope or multimeter before starting out. Noody would expect a machinist to start by having to make the lathe. But every electronics designer that I know has a number of home-made devices to simplify certain jobs, praabluy as add-ons to commerical instruments. Every machinist makes add-ons for the lathe (In fact I've read plenty of books on things like clockmaking which point out that many such special tools are simply not avaiale commercially, you have to make them). When it comes to programming, I wouldn't expect to have to write a C compiler (unless I was being asked to develop tools for a new processor :-)). But there are plenty of samller jobs where it can easily make sense to write the necessary program from scratch. A trivial example. I had to convert some ROM dumps from one format to another. There may be a program that does just what I want if I give it the right options. But by the time I've found the program, worked out what those options are, etc, I might as well have writen the 10 lines or so of C to do the job. However, I do feel that any 'tool' like this needs to be supportable. A progam needs comments to say what it does, and any odd features. A bit of hardware needs a scheamtic. Any engineer/programmer who can't support something as simple as this given comments/a schematic is quite frankly in the wrong job. -tony From mtapley at swri.edu Thu Dec 11 13:26:15 2008 From: mtapley at swri.edu (Mark Tapley) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 13:26:15 -0600 Subject: Paper vs. PDF vs... (was: Re: Sources for 8b T...) In-Reply-To: <200812110426.mBB4Q0Ae003044@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812110426.mBB4Q0Ae003044@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: At 22:26 -0600 12/10/08, Tony wrote: >Of course paper has the advantage that ... it withstands a >hot soldering iron a lot better than any computer does :-) Hm. I assume this refers to soldering iron settings below, as Ray Bradbury would put it, "Fahrenheit 451"? -- - Mark 210-379-4635 ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Large Asteroids headed toward planets inhabited by beings that don't have technology adequate to stop them: Think of it as Evolution in Fast-Forward. From mtapley at swri.edu Thu Dec 11 13:52:54 2008 From: mtapley at swri.edu (Mark Tapley) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 13:52:54 -0600 Subject: Small bootstrappable languages (Was: Re: PDF...) In-Reply-To: <200812111800.mBBI03h9011016@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812111800.mBBI03h9011016@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: At 22:26 -0600 12/10/08, bfranchuk wrote: >Any good leads as am still looking for a small boot strapable langauge >here. Tiny C will not work >as my instruction set does NOT have register to register operations. I >plan to have a wopping >48Kb system as that was BIG memory 1975 ish. At 12:00 -0600 12/11/08, Jim Battle summarized: >Ben you have said these three things in this thread: > >(1) "Any good leads as am still looking for a small boot strapable >langauge here." > >(2) "Tiny C will not work as my instruction set does NOT have >register to register >operations." > >(3) "I could do Forth but it would be slow as I have no >auto-incriment registers and wound >need to use memory variables." Ben (?), I note that on: http://www.altair680kit.com/index.html or more specifically, http://www.altair680kit.com/manuals/Altair_680-VTL-2%20Manual-05-Beta_1-Searchable.pdf Grant Stockly refers to "VTL-2" from Gary Shannon and Frank McCoy. The manual says it requires 768 bytes to implement on a 6800 (which has, admittedly, a pretty flexible instruction set, including good stack operations). Not knowing anything more about your system or the language than what I've posted above, I still suggest it might be worth a look. -- - Mark 210-379-4635 ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Large Asteroids headed toward planets inhabited by beings that don't have technology adequate to stop them: Think of it as Evolution in Fast-Forward. From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Thu Dec 11 14:10:22 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 14:10:22 -0600 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> Message-ID: <494173AE.7070609@gmail.com> Jules Richardson wrote: > * Thanks again, Bill :) ... and it would help if I'd typed Brian, wouldn't it? ;) oops! From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Thu Dec 11 14:31:45 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 13:31:45 -0700 Subject: Small bootstrappable languages (Was: Re: PDF...) In-Reply-To: References: <200812111800.mBBI03h9011016@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <494178B1.5070601@jetnet.ab.ca> Mark Tapley wrote: > > http://www.altair680kit.com/index.html > > or more specifically, > > http://www.altair680kit.com/manuals/Altair_680-VTL-2%20Manual-05-Beta_1-Searchable.pdf > > > Grant Stockly refers to "VTL-2" from Gary Shannon and Frank McCoy. The > manual says it requires 768 bytes to implement on a 6800 (which has, > admittedly, a pretty flexible instruction set, including good stack > operations). > > Not knowing anything more about your system or the language than what > I've posted above, I still suggest it might be worth a look. I looked at that, and it was a toy language. Alas most of the languages I want to use, still have commerical copyrites on them, or the OS or the source has been lost years ago. The cpu I have designed does not lend itself to the simple compilers that produce a stack based instruction set. a - *n compiles to: load a, st --*sp, load n, st --*sp , load **sp, reverse subtract *sp++. I want to generate is ld ac a, sub ac @ n. From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Thu Dec 11 14:25:24 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 14:25:24 -0600 Subject: vintage CPU instruction sets Message-ID: <49417734.2050405@gmail.com> All this talk of CPUs got me back onto thoughts of homebrew CPU design, which has been a stalled project of mine for the last year or so. So, has anyone come across a good online resource which compares vintage CPU instruction sets? It'd be useful to see what 'core' instructions* were most common back in the day and use that as a basis for my own homebrew effort; I think I can probably rustle up things like hardware multiply and divide, but really don't want an all-singing solution. KISS and all that. :-) * My hands-on knowledge is pretty much limited to Z80, 6502, 68000 and x86, and it'd be nice to go a little further back in time - but hopefully without having to download and digest many different databooks! cheers Jules From spectre at floodgap.com Thu Dec 11 14:37:26 2008 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 12:37:26 -0800 (PST) Subject: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <18753.13533.516025.55128@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> from Paul Koning at "Dec 11, 8 10:42:21 am" Message-ID: <200812112037.mBBKbRDJ017642@floodgap.com> > Another place where Forth has been used: several popular workstations > use it for their bootloaders. Sun does (or did) and I think Apple > does too. At least I once got an "ok" prompt when I powered up a very > confused Power Mac... and it answered like Forth interactive mode. That's OpenFirmware. I'm sure Al Kossow can tell you oodles about that :) Every PCI-based Power Macintosh up to and through the G5 has it. My OLPC XO-1 also has OpenFirmware and responds to Forth. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- Eggheads unite! You have nothing to lose but your yolks. -- Adlai Stevenson From rtellason at verizon.net Thu Dec 11 14:39:34 2008 From: rtellason at verizon.net (Roy J. Tellason) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 15:39:34 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: <493E74EC.2060003@gmail.com> Message-ID: <200812111539.34760.rtellason@verizon.net> On Tuesday 09 December 2008 09:58:35 am Christian Corti wrote: > On Tue, 9 Dec 2008, Jules Richardson wrote: > > Alexandre Souza wrote: > >> With PS/2-to-usb converters avaiable for $3? Why??? > > > > Hmm, all the ones I've been finding are in the $20 range, modulo a couple > > which are much cheaper but which claim to be for specific keyboard > > vendors (I'd assume they rely on specific OS/vendor drivers, rather than > > adhering to some kind of "USB keyboard standard") > > ?!? > My PS/2-to-USB converter did cost 2.23 EUR and has two cables at the end, > one for the PS/2 keyboard and one for the PS/2 mouse. And yes, it works > perfectly well with an IBM 1391403 kbd. > > Christian > > PS: > And the converter has become cheaper, it now costs 1,10 EUR incl. VAT. I too had to get one of those recently, having switched laptops -- 2x the RAM, 2x the speed, and 3+ times the HD space. No drivers involved anywhere, just plugged it in and it works. The other one had a single PS2 port, this one doesn't have any but does have two USB ports. And it cost me less than $5. -- Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters" - Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James M Dakin From spectre at floodgap.com Thu Dec 11 14:40:36 2008 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 12:40:36 -0800 (PST) Subject: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <4940ECC8.16227.D8BD5@cclist.sydex.com> from Chuck Guzis at "Dec 11, 8 10:34:48 am" Message-ID: <200812112040.mBBKea96010854@floodgap.com> > > > How about FORTRAN--say FORTRAN II or USA BASIC FORTRAN? Very small > > > language; very few statement types and historically correct. Can be > > > (and was) implemented on just about anything. You don't need > > > registers, stacks or any of that fancy stuff. > > > > Where would you find something like that? > > Do you mean source code? Yes. I did find the IBM 704 reference manual, but adaptation from source would be even better. The VTL-2 and Lispkit also mentioned in this thread were also thought provoking. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- Intel outside -- 6502 inside! ---------------------------------------------- From ploopster at gmail.com Thu Dec 11 15:02:58 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 16:02:58 -0500 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <4940EE6A.15206.13EB9C@cclist.sydex.com> References: <614C868E78D14A5C902ACC23D4759080@NFORCE4>, <4940EE6A.15206.13EB9C@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <49418002.5000904@gmail.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: > So, the "Model M" refers to the manufacturing plant? I doubt it. These keyboards were made in Lexington, KY. Peace... Sridhar From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Thu Dec 11 15:05:33 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 16:05:33 -0500 Subject: Small bootstrappable languages (Was: Re: PDF...) References: <200812111800.mBBI03h9011016@dewey.classiccmp.org> <494178B1.5070601@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <18753.32925.535311.96423@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> >>>>> "bfranchuk" == bfranchuk writes: bfranchuk> I looked at that, and it was a toy language. Alas most of bfranchuk> the languages I want to use, still have commerical bfranchuk> copyrites on them, or the OS or the source has been lost bfranchuk> years ago. The cpu I have designed does not lend itself bfranchuk> to the simple compilers that produce a stack based bfranchuk> instruction set. a - *n compiles to: load a, st --*sp, bfranchuk> load n, st --*sp , load **sp, reverse subtract *sp++. I bfranchuk> want to generate is ld ac a, sub ac @ n. I don't think I've ever seen a compiler that bad, not even in compiler class in college in 1976... paul From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Dec 11 15:10:58 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 21:10:58 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Paper vs. PDF vs... (was: Re: Sources for 8b T...) In-Reply-To: from "Mark Tapley" at Dec 11, 8 01:26:15 pm Message-ID: > >Of course paper has the advantage that ... it withstands a > >hot soldering iron a lot better than any computer does :-) > > Hm. I assume this refers to soldering iron settings below, as Ray > Bradbury would put it, "Fahrenheit 451"? Hmmm... The 'number' of a Weller TCP bit is the temperature it gets to in hundreds of degrees fahrenheit. And I normally use a #8 bit. But while a soldering iron (at that tmeperature) will char paper, it won't get it on fire. But it will make a right mess of most computer keyboards/cases/etc. -tony From wdonzelli at gmail.com Thu Dec 11 15:28:11 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 16:28:11 -0500 Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: <928932.25979.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> References: <200812111622.mBBGLtvY082982@keith.ezwind.net> <928932.25979.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> Message-ID: > Still want to know about those early 20th century raised floors. A Hollerith tab machine on a raised floor? Maybe.... They were used in the control rooms of power stations, and later (1930s) found much use in the fire control and gyrocompass spaces on larger warships. -- Will From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Thu Dec 11 15:35:18 2008 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 13:35:18 -0800 Subject: Algol & MTS / was Re: Bootstrappable language References: <49405399.32701.B893F@cclist.sydex.com> <200812111347.mBBDl97x020488@floodgap.com> <4940ECC8.16227.D8BD5@cclist.sydex.com> <18753.24945.798147.894254@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> Message-ID: <49418796.8D16AB02@cs.ubc.ca> Paul Koning wrote: > > >>>>> "Chuck" == Chuck Guzis writes: > > Chuck> Were there ever any tiny Algol-60 subsets marketed? > > Well, there's DECUS Algol for the PDP-11 (which, according to > comments, apparently was originally done for the PDP-8). That's a > variation of Burroughs 5500 Algol, so it's pretty powerful. It uses > bytecode; roughly speaking, you can think of those as 16-bit analogs > of the B6700 instruction set. > > I wouldn't call that tiny; it's actually a substantial superset of > standard Algol. And the bytecode interpreter is pretty large because > of that. But you can use it to write substantial programs -- the > compiler itself for example. That's not particularly doable with > standard Algol-60. > ... We were taught Algol in 1st year Comp Sci, I quite liked it (except for the verbosity of "BEGIN"-"END") for it's regularity, but that may have something to do with it being the first structured language I experienced (various assemblers and BASICs prior). Waterloo version - I believe it was something near Algol 68, running in batch (cards) under MTS. PASCAL was used in 2nd year - seemed like a step backwards. (Anyone recall the MTS OS: Michigan Terminal System?) From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Thu Dec 11 15:51:27 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 16:51:27 -0500 Subject: Algol & MTS / was Re: Bootstrappable language References: <49405399.32701.B893F@cclist.sydex.com> <200812111347.mBBDl97x020488@floodgap.com> <4940ECC8.16227.D8BD5@cclist.sydex.com> <18753.24945.798147.894254@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> <49418796.8D16AB02@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: <18753.35679.528119.939177@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> >>>>> "Brent" == Brent Hilpert writes: Brent> We were taught Algol in 1st year Comp Sci, I quite liked it Brent> (except for the verbosity of "BEGIN"-"END") for it's Brent> regularity, but that may have something to do with it being Brent> the first structured language I experienced (various Brent> assemblers and BASICs prior). Waterloo version - I believe it Brent> was something near Algol 68, running in batch (cards) under Brent> MTS. Near Algol-68? Hm. Algol-68 was a pretty rare beast, and quite thoroughly different from Algol-60. Much harder to implement, too. (Then again... I have alisting -- tech report -- of an Algol-68 interpreter written in Algol-60. Maybe I should scan that one?) Brent> PASCAL was used in 2nd year - seemed like a step backwards. Hm, I wouldn't have said that. Did a bunch in Algol-60 (my first language, too) and some years later in Pascal, having traveled through Fortran and Basic and PL/I in between. I would say Pascal is every bit as good as Algol-60 -- a few missing things added, and a few mistakes removed. Both have sane syntax, quite unlike the absurdities of C, or (almost but not quite as bad) PL/I. paul From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Thu Dec 11 15:48:34 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 15:48:34 -0600 Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: References: <200812111622.mBBGLtvY082982@keith.ezwind.net> <928932.25979.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <49418AB2.4060007@gmail.com> William Donzelli wrote: >> Still want to know about those early 20th century raised floors. A Hollerith tab machine on a raised floor? Maybe.... > > They were used in the control rooms of power stations, and later > (1930s) Interesting - I've only been in one power station of that sort of era (built 1925 I think), and it was all under-floor trunking (i.e. the floors were solid, with covered channels carved for the cablework). From tshoppa at wmata.com Thu Dec 11 16:00:40 2008 From: tshoppa at wmata.com (Tim Shoppa) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 17:00:40 -0500 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. Message-ID: <494147380200003700043C03@gwiavs.nservices.wmata.com> Hi Vern! Certainly Don was always happy and joyful to help out in any way he could with the contents of his archive and his ability to make odd-format floppies for any CP/M user. If you ever get to the archive, you'll find several dozen floppies (Compupro and VT180) that I sent his way. In the 1990's I was encouraging him to make disk images and make them publicly available. Tools at the time were teledisk etc. He was worried about copyright issues with a massively public on-the-net archive, he said. Tim. From drb at msu.edu Thu Dec 11 16:04:44 2008 From: drb at msu.edu (Dennis Boone) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 17:04:44 -0500 Subject: Algol & MTS / was Re: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: (Your message of Thu, 11 Dec 2008 13:35:18 PST.) <49418796.8D16AB02@cs.ubc.ca> References: <49418796.8D16AB02@cs.ubc.ca> <49405399.32701.B893F@cclist.sydex.com> <200812111347.mBBDl97x020488@floodgap.com> <4940ECC8.16227.D8BD5@cclist.sydex.com> <18753.24945.798147.894254@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> Message-ID: <200812112204.mBBM4ihO024303@yagi.h-net.msu.edu> > We were taught Algol in 1st year Comp Sci, I quite liked it (except for > the verbosity of "BEGIN"-"END") for it's regularity, but that may have > something to do with it being the first structured language I > experienced (various assemblers and BASICs prior). Waterloo version - I > believe it was something near Algol 68, running in batch (cards) under > MTS. I'll have to look through my collection of docs to see if I can find anything about the Algol compiler. Or perhaps this was a UBC addition that wasn't in the distribution? > (Anyone recall the MTS OS: Michigan Terminal System?) Yes. A friend attended UMich, and we used their machine for email. (Well, at that point it would have been one of their machines, as that was about when they started having two: UM and UB.) Helped him with a Pascal class once by taking my Osborne-1 down to use as a terminal. De From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Thu Dec 11 16:14:16 2008 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 14:14:16 -0800 Subject: Algol & MTS / was Re: Bootstrappable language References: <49405399.32701.B893F@cclist.sydex.com> <200812111347.mBBDl97x020488@floodgap.com> <4940ECC8.16227.D8BD5@cclist.sydex.com> <18753.24945.798147.894254@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> <49418796.8D16AB02@cs.ubc.ca> <18753.35679.528119.939177@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> Message-ID: <494190B7.302B2D41@cs.ubc.ca> Paul Koning wrote: > > >>>>> "Brent" == Brent Hilpert writes: > > Brent> We were taught Algol in 1st year Comp Sci, I quite liked it > Brent> (except for the verbosity of "BEGIN"-"END") for it's > Brent> regularity, but that may have something to do with it being > Brent> the first structured language I experienced (various > Brent> assemblers and BASICs prior). Waterloo version - I believe it > Brent> was something near Algol 68, running in batch (cards) under > Brent> MTS. > > Near Algol-68? Hm. Algol-68 was a pretty rare beast, and quite > thoroughly different from Algol-60. Much harder to implement, too. > > (Then again... I have alisting -- tech report -- of an Algol-68 > interpreter written in Algol-60. Maybe I should scan that one?) > > Brent> PASCAL was used in 2nd year - seemed like a step backwards. > > Hm, I wouldn't have said that. Did a bunch in Algol-60 (my first > language, too) and some years later in Pascal, having traveled through > Fortran and Basic and PL/I in between. I would say Pascal is every > bit as good as Algol-60 -- a few missing things added, and a few > mistakes removed. Both have sane syntax, quite unlike the absurdities > of C, or (almost but not quite as bad) PL/I. I could be quite wrong about the "near 68". I just pulled out the textbook we used ("FANGET AN - an algolw primer"/1978), so the language was actually "AlgolW". It doesn't discuss the relationship to -60 or -68, so I don't know. I'm presuming the W is for Waterloo but I could be confusing that with WATFIV (Waterloo Fortran IV) that we also used, as well. It was all 30 years ago and I haven't used either Algol or Pascal since, but as I recall there was some limitation around Pascal that bugged me. (I tend to prefer curly-brace languages over BEGIN-END languages, but that's just another religious argument... ) From cclist at sydex.com Thu Dec 11 16:28:15 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 14:28:15 -0800 Subject: Algol & MTS / was Re: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <18753.35679.528119.939177@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> References: <49405399.32701.B893F@cclist.sydex.com>, <18753.35679.528119.939177@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> Message-ID: <4941237F.23143.E340C2@cclist.sydex.com> On 11 Dec 2008 at 16:51, Paul Koning wrote: > Hm, I wouldn't have said that. Did a bunch in Algol-60 (my first > language, too) and some years later in Pascal, having traveled through > Fortran and Basic and PL/I in between. I would say Pascal is every > bit as good as Algol-60 -- a few missing things added, and a few > mistakes removed. Both have sane syntax, quite unlike the absurdities > of C, or (almost but not quite as bad) PL/I. Algol and FORTRAN at one time represented the European-versus-US computing community division. ACM CALGO would take algorithms submitted in either language. My experience with Algol was very brief, using a miserable implementation that required one to prefix each keyword with a $ (perhaps the author had some experience with JOVIAL) and gave very cryptic diagnostics. The Algol-60 report was unusual for its time in that it used upper-and-lower case alphabetics (as well as boldface) to describe language elements. Cheers, Chuck From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Thu Dec 11 16:33:33 2008 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 14:33:33 -0800 Subject: Algol & MTS / was Re: Bootstrappable language References: <49418796.8D16AB02@cs.ubc.ca> <49405399.32701.B893F@cclist.sydex.com> <200812111347.mBBDl97x020488@floodgap.com> <4940ECC8.16227.D8BD5@cclist.sydex.com> <18753.24945.798147.894254@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> <200812112204.mBBM4ihO024303@yagi.h-net.msu.edu> Message-ID: <4941953D.7D5E66FF@cs.ubc.ca> Dennis Boone wrote: > > > We were taught Algol in 1st year Comp Sci, I quite liked it (except for > > the verbosity of "BEGIN"-"END") for it's regularity, but that may have > > something to do with it being the first structured language I > > experienced (various assemblers and BASICs prior). Waterloo version - I > > believe it was something near Algol 68, running in batch (cards) under > > MTS. > > I'll have to look through my collection of docs to see if I can find > anything about the Algol compiler. Or perhaps this was a UBC addition > that wasn't in the distribution? (See intervening message about AlgolW.) The preface in the textbook "Fanget An" begins: "Fanget An was first written by Roger Palay to serve as the text for a course in elementary programming concepts, Computer and Communication Sciences 274 at the University of Michigan. ..." "... represents our knowledge and understanding of the state of AlgolW on MTS as of July 19, 1978. AlgolW is an evolving language. ..." A few other people mentioned but no more about the origins of the language/effort. > > (Anyone recall the MTS OS: Michigan Terminal System?) > > Yes. A friend attended UMich, and we used their machine for email. > (Well, at that point it would have been one of their machines, as that > was about when they started having two: UM and UB.) Helped him with a > Pascal class once by taking my Osborne-1 down to use as a terminal. It only ran at half-a-dozen-or-so sites around the world to my knowledge, but another one of those massive efforts that bit the dust with the demise of large, central time-sharing systems. From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Thu Dec 11 16:41:01 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 17:41:01 -0500 Subject: Algol & MTS / was Re: Bootstrappable language References: <49418796.8D16AB02@cs.ubc.ca> <49405399.32701.B893F@cclist.sydex.com> <200812111347.mBBDl97x020488@floodgap.com> <4940ECC8.16227.D8BD5@cclist.sydex.com> <18753.24945.798147.894254@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> <200812112204.mBBM4ihO024303@yagi.h-net.msu.edu> <4941953D.7D5E66FF@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: <18753.38653.541417.495570@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> >>>>> "Brent" == Brent Hilpert writes: Brent> ...A few other people mentioned but no more about the origins of Brent> the language/effort. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algol_W says that it came from Niklaus Wirth (inventor of Pascal). That fits a vague memory -- it was a proposed successor to Algol-60 but wasn't adopted and Algol-68 was picked instead. This caused various big names of the time to go ballistic; I still remember getting scorched by Dijkstra when I mentioned Algol-68 to him (innocently; I didn't know any of the background at the time). It doesn't sound like Waterloo is the W in this case. paul From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Thu Dec 11 16:39:54 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 15:39:54 -0700 Subject: Small bootstrappable languages (Was: Re: PDF...) In-Reply-To: <18753.32925.535311.96423@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> References: <200812111800.mBBI03h9011016@dewey.classiccmp.org> <494178B1.5070601@jetnet.ab.ca> <18753.32925.535311.96423@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> Message-ID: <494196BA.2010007@jetnet.ab.ca> Paul Koning wrote: > I don't think I've ever seen a compiler that bad, not even in compiler > class in college in 1976... > > I think I can something up and running just I have to think how close to the hardware I want to get. I have the DRAGON book and that still is the best reference I have seen so far. > paul > > From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Thu Dec 11 16:48:04 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 15:48:04 -0700 Subject: vintage CPU instruction sets In-Reply-To: <49417734.2050405@gmail.com> References: <49417734.2050405@gmail.com> Message-ID: <494198A4.2050109@jetnet.ab.ca> Jules Richardson wrote: > > All this talk of CPUs got me back onto thoughts of homebrew CPU > design, which has been a stalled project of mine for the last year or so. > Check here for ideas. http://members.iinet.net.au/~daveb/simplex/simplex.html > So, has anyone come across a good online resource which compares > vintage CPU instruction sets? It'd be useful to see what 'core' > instructions* were most common back in the day and use that as a basis > for my own homebrew effort; I think I can probably rustle up things > like hardware multiply and divide, but really don't want an > all-singing solution. KISS and all that. :-) > > * My hands-on knowledge is pretty much limited to Z80, 6502, 68000 and > x86, and it'd be nice to go a little further back in time - but > hopefully without having to download and digest many different databooks! > > cheers > > Jules > From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Thu Dec 11 16:57:45 2008 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 14:57:45 -0800 Subject: Algol & MTS / was Re: Bootstrappable language References: <49418796.8D16AB02@cs.ubc.ca> <49405399.32701.B893F@cclist.sydex.com> <200812111347.mBBDl97x020488@floodgap.com> <4940ECC8.16227.D8BD5@cclist.sydex.com> <18753.24945.798147.894254@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> <200812112204.mBBM4ihO024303@yagi.h-net.msu.edu> <4941953D.7D5E66FF@cs.ubc.ca> <18753.38653.541417.495570@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> Message-ID: <49419AE9.530AFD26@cs.ubc.ca> Paul Koning wrote: > > >>>>> "Brent" == Brent Hilpert writes: > > Brent> ...A few other people mentioned but no more about the origins of > Brent> the language/effort. > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algol_W says that it came from Niklaus > Wirth (inventor of Pascal). That fits a vague memory -- it was a > proposed successor to Algol-60 but wasn't adopted and Algol-68 was > picked instead. This caused various big names of the time to go > ballistic; I still remember getting scorched by Dijkstra when I > mentioned Algol-68 to him (innocently; I didn't know any of the > background at the time). > It doesn't sound like Waterloo is the W in this case. (agreed) Very interesting. Thanks for pulling that out. (I often forget to look at new things like Wiki for old things like this) Sounds like it may be considered in part an intervening step on the way to Wirth's development of Pascal then. (I will point out the following from the Wiki page though :) : "Algol W @ Everything2 An informal but detailed description of the language by a former user, with sidebars extolling Algol W over Pascal as an Educational programming language." ) (I still have the greenbar listings/printouts of the AlgolW programs/assignments I wrote.) From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Thu Dec 11 16:59:20 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 22:59:20 +0000 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> Message-ID: <49419B48.8090202@gjcp.net> Jules Richardson wrote: > M H Stein wrote: >> Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 10:57:08 +0100 (CET) >> From: Christian Corti >> Subject: RE: USB Model M >> >> >> what should I say... don't trust them. ... >> IBM has never called the keyboard model M >> >> Christian >> >> ----------Reply: >> >> Really? Odd, mine all say IBM in big letters on the front and back, >> and "Model M" quite clearly on the back (M2 on the newer ones). > > Hmm, mine* (IBM p/n 1390120) says "Model M" on the underside label - > maybe they dropped it for later ones though (mine's a 1986 and I believe > a 'first generation'; it lacks the status LEDs) > Mine (IBM p/n 139-1406) doesn't say Model M anywhere, although it does say "IBM" on the top and "Lexmark" on the bottom... Gordon From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Thu Dec 11 17:02:08 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 16:02:08 -0700 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <49419B48.8090202@gjcp.net> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> <49419B48.8090202@gjcp.net> Message-ID: <49419BF0.5040304@jetnet.ab.ca> Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote: > > Mine (IBM p/n 139-1406) doesn't say Model M anywhere, although it does > say "IBM" on the top and "Lexmark" on the bottom... > > Gordon > My keyboard says MADE IN CHINA :( From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Thu Dec 11 17:04:54 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 23:04:54 +0000 Subject: PDF (Was: something irrelevant given the thread's migration) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <49419C96.40505@gjcp.net> Tony Duell wrote: > Ah, well, alas I am one of those folks. My moan about pdf is that it's > not portable. At least not to any of the 200 or so computers I own (well, > unless thrre is suddenly a pdf view for the PERQ, which is the machine I > most use with a bitmapped display). Before you tell be there's a version > that would run on this PC, I will point out that this machine has a > text-only MDA display. PDF is a well-documented standard, with many different open-source readers. There's nothing to stop you porting one to the Perq. In terms of the time and effort it would take to do so, I'd say you'd be better off picking up a PC capable of running some sort of PDF viewer on modernish hardware. Gordon From cclist at sydex.com Thu Dec 11 17:24:17 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 15:24:17 -0800 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <49419B48.8090202@gjcp.net> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, <49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com>, <49419B48.8090202@gjcp.net> Message-ID: <494130A1.18371.1168D43@cclist.sydex.com> On 11 Dec 2008 at 22:59, Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote: > Mine (IBM p/n 139-1406) doesn't say Model M anywhere, although it does > say "IBM" on the top and "Lexmark" on the bottom... Mine says "IBM" on the bottom ((c) IBM Corp. 1984) and "Wang" on the top. Cheers, Chuck From brain at jbrain.com Thu Dec 11 18:27:57 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 18:27:57 -0600 Subject: Buy versus Build (Was: Re: PDF (Was: something irrelevant given the thread's migration)) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4941B00D.902@jbrain.com> Tony Duell wrote: > But I routinely flip through databooks looking for 'interesting' devices. > Not necessarily from the highlighted specifications. Or even the data > sheet on that device. I might spot an application circuit, see some > device in it that I've not heard of, look it up, and then file away in > the back of my brain that makes a useful chip to do , > the data sheet is in book . And I'll rememebr that when I have that > sort of problem to solve. > > I have yet to find a way to do that efficiently with pdf files. > I'll concede that point. > Ah, well, alas I am one of those folks. My moan about pdf is that it's > not portable. At least not to any of the 200 or so computers I own (well, > I guess I included "printing" as a portable destination that was a lowest common denominator. > Plain text is readable on just about every machine I own. It's printable > on just about every printer I own. And it is possible to represent all I > need in plain text. Document formatting is not something that is that > important to preserve, at least not for the things I read. > Maybe you can glean layouts for parts from text only data, but I simply must have a picture to go by when I lay out parts in PCB design. > I have _never_ found a computer or electronics company that offers what > I consider to be even marginally adequate technical support. I've > contacts many, both privately, when working at well-known universities, > and when working at large, well-known companies. Without exception they > have been useless. Can't argue there. I am called in to deal with this issue on a daily basis. > That's one reason I insist on being able to support > everything I depend on myself (meaning that I have schematics, source > code, etc). > Admirable, but unrealistic, in my opinion. Systems today have gotten so complicated, that one person cannot possible gather and retain all of the information. Our main admin system runs on zOS, but it is buried behind miles of interfaces, middleware, application specific hardware appliances, and web GUIs. I cannot and will not ask a person who depends on that system to be available to have access to all of that knowledge. > the necessary program from scratch. A trivial example. I had to convert > some ROM dumps from one format to another. There may be a program that > does just what I want if I give it the right options. But by the time > I've found the program, worked out what those options are, etc, I might > as well have writen the 10 lines or so of C to do the job. > I have been misunderstood. If developers want to write little utilities for such things, I'm fine with that. It's the "multi-week developments they insist on doing themselves because they don't want to learn a tool, or can't image a tool could be as elegant as what they are cooking up" solutions that I speak of. If you want to spend a day writing a script to parse some ROM or clean up a dataset as a one time thing, I'd join you, as I do the same thing (long live AWK, SED, PERL, SH, etc.). But, when someone spend weeks re-implementing something I could have purchased for $1000.00, I'm not as happy. If the support is horrid, I say find an open source tool that performs the function and learn *THAT* code. You may think I'm misguided, but I can definitely provide information to back up my position. Perhaps no one else in here has this issue, and so I am outnumbered. But, I at least stated my position, with the possibility you'll consider it. Maybe, if I find myself at a gathering of folks from the group at some point, I'll be happy to discuss it over a favorite beverage and you all can convince me why I'm wrong. But, regardless of whether I am right or wrong, I feel there is great responsibility in being an experienced software or hardware developer/technician/engineer. I always try to include those folks, because they've "been there, done that", and have seen what works and what does not. In my opinion, the best are those who can keep one foot in the past "Jim, there is no way that will work, CICS just does not keep a connection open that long") and one in the future "We can use XML for that. We used to dislike verbose formats like that, for space reasons, but DASD is cheap now and we see value in that format"). Jim From brain at jbrain.com Thu Dec 11 18:28:00 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 18:28:00 -0600 Subject: PDFs for reference material; In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4941B010.4070009@jbrain.com> Tony Duell wrote: >> Pencil and paper is still king for a lot of folks. Sketching out >> > > I almost always carry a notebook. Not a notebook computer, but a good old > book of paper. I find it more use than any electronic replacement > I trust preferring PDF documents doesn't make folks like me "paper haters" I keep a notebook around for many of the same reasons, and one is in my travel backpack as well. In addition, I print out portions of datasheets at times, because it can be easier to handle large multi-page tables, etc. I like paper, I love the fact PDF can give me paper output if needed, electronic if I do not. > Yep. As I've said many times before, I'll use a CAD system when it > actually aids me in designing something (as opposed to hindering me, > which most seem to). Until then, I'll use a 'Paper Aided Dasign' system, > more commonly called a 'PAD' (of paper :-)). I design by sketching out > My experience is the opposite. I can lay out much faster on CAD than on paper. > scheamticvs and doing he calculations on a pocket calculator (and beofre > anyone askes, I have scheamtics, machine language instruction set, and > ROM listings for said calculator, OK :-)) > Consistent, you are. Now, I'll concede that, even though Windows has a cute Calculator handy at all times, I carry a small pocket calc and one sits on my desk as well. So, I'm not a PC fanboi) > Jim From ploopster at gmail.com Thu Dec 11 19:23:52 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 20:23:52 -0500 Subject: Algol & MTS / was Re: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <18753.38653.541417.495570@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> References: <49418796.8D16AB02@cs.ubc.ca> <49405399.32701.B893F@cclist.sydex.com> <200812111347.mBBDl97x020488@floodgap.com> <4940ECC8.16227.D8BD5@cclist.sydex.com> <18753.24945.798147.894254@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> <200812112204.mBBM4ihO024303@yagi.h-net.msu.edu> <4941953D.7D5E66FF@cs.ubc.ca> <18753.38653.541417.495570@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> Message-ID: <4941BD28.5030402@gmail.com> Paul Koning wrote: > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algol_W says that it came from Niklaus > Wirth (inventor of Pascal). That fits a vague memory -- it was a > proposed successor to Algol-60 but wasn't adopted and Algol-68 was > picked instead. This caused various big names of the time to go > ballistic; I still remember getting scorched by Dijkstra when I > mentioned Algol-68 to him (innocently; I didn't know any of the > background at the time). I do believe that having Edsger Dijkstra had gone ballistic on you probably gives you geek cred. 8-) Peace... Sridhar From slawmaster at gmail.com Thu Dec 11 20:39:13 2008 From: slawmaster at gmail.com (John Floren) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 21:39:13 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts Message-ID: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> Hi everyone As a 4th year computer engineering student with a part time job, I definitely have too much time on my hands, so I've been thinking about doing something like building my own computer. I remember playing with the 68k SBCs back in my assembly class, so I thought something from that family might be an interesting choice. It's ambitious, but ideally I'd like to do 16/32 bits and a few megs of memory. Have any of you built something like this? I'm looking for links to project pages, shared experiences, and advice on what processor to use. Reminiscence is welcome too, if you have fond memories of such a thing :) Thanks John Floren -- Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Thu Dec 11 20:45:55 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 19:45:55 -0700 Subject: Algol & MTS / was Re: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <4941BD28.5030402@gmail.com> References: <49418796.8D16AB02@cs.ubc.ca> <49405399.32701.B893F@cclist.sydex.com> <200812111347.mBBDl97x020488@floodgap.com> <4940ECC8.16227.D8BD5@cclist.sydex.com> <18753.24945.798147.894254@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> <200812112204.mBBM4ihO024303@yagi.h-net.msu.edu> <4941953D.7D5E66FF@cs.ubc.ca> <18753.38653.541417.495570@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> <4941BD28.5030402@gmail.com> Message-ID: <4941D063.7080107@jetnet.ab.ca> Sridhar Ayengar wrote: > Paul Koning wrote: >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algol_W says that it came from Niklaus >> Wirth (inventor of Pascal). That fits a vague memory -- it was a >> proposed successor to Algol-60 but wasn't adopted and Algol-68 was >> picked instead. This caused various big names of the time to go >> ballistic; I still remember getting scorched by Dijkstra when I >> mentioned Algol-68 to him (innocently; I didn't know any of the >> background at the time). > > I do believe that having Edsger Dijkstra had gone ballistic on you > probably gives you geek cred. 8-) > It was a good thing he was not taken for a italian dinner thinking of his goto comment. > Peace... Sridhar > Well you you can get ALGOL 60 for DOS but not CP/M. The still think there is some life in z80 imbeded products. http://www.angelfire.com/biz/rhaminisys/algol60.html From ploopster at gmail.com Thu Dec 11 21:10:04 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 22:10:04 -0500 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <49419B48.8090202@gjcp.net> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> <49419B48.8090202@gjcp.net> Message-ID: <4941D60C.5070005@gmail.com> Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote: > Mine (IBM p/n 139-1406) doesn't say Model M anywhere, although it does > say "IBM" on the top and "Lexmark" on the bottom... One of my many model Ms has no labels on it and has "PENIS" written on it in magic marker. There were a *lot* of revisions and end-user mods. Peace... Sridhar From wdonzelli at gmail.com Thu Dec 11 21:14:20 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 22:14:20 -0500 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <4941D60C.5070005@gmail.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> <49419B48.8090202@gjcp.net> <4941D60C.5070005@gmail.com> Message-ID: > One of my many model Ms has no labels on it and has "PENIS" written on it > in magic marker. > > There were a *lot* of revisions and end-user mods. What was the RPQ code for the PENIS feature? -- Will From wdonzelli at gmail.com Thu Dec 11 21:17:28 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 22:17:28 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: > Have any of you built something like this? I'm looking for links to > project pages, shared experiences, and advice on what processor to > use. Reminiscence is welcome too, if you have fond memories of such a > thing :) Well, in MY day, we BUILT a simple 68K computer from scratch in our class, from "kits" supplied by Motorola. I had the foresight to buy a couple of tubes of 68000s at a hamfest for a couple of bucks. By the end of the semester, I had sold every one of them... -- Will From trag at io.com Thu Dec 11 21:22:30 2008 From: trag at io.com (Jeff Walther) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 21:22:30 -0600 Subject: IBM 2.5" WD-280 80MB Drives: Free + Shipping In-Reply-To: <200812111800.mBBI0RxV011055@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812111800.mBBI0RxV011055@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: I'm cleaning house a bit. I have four IBM Model: WD-280 2.5" hard drives. The interface is not IDE nor SCSI. I once managed to Google up a page with an extensive listing of 2.5" drives (laptop service company?) which indicated that the interface was something else, the name of which I no longer remember. Anyway, I have no use for these. If you do, email me, pay shipping and they're yours. If I do not hear from anyone in one week I will dispose of them. Two of them are still factory sealed. A third one's bag is opened but the drive passes a non-electrical inspection. The fourth one has an ominous rattle coming from inside as if the head arm is swinging around loose. If you do not want the fourth one, I am happy to ship only three. Other markings on the drive include: P/N 06G6449 FRU P/N 95F4708 MLC C99714 I hope someone has a use for these unusual drives. Jeff Walther From silent700 at gmail.com Thu Dec 11 21:25:24 2008 From: silent700 at gmail.com (Jason T) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 21:25:24 -0600 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <4941D60C.5070005@gmail.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> <49419B48.8090202@gjcp.net> <4941D60C.5070005@gmail.com> Message-ID: <51ea77730812111925xcf86102r186a51be2ed66b60@mail.gmail.com> On Thu, Dec 11, 2008 at 9:10 PM, Sridhar Ayengar wrote: > One of my many model Ms has no labels on it and has "PENIS" written on it in > magic marker. > > There were a *lot* of revisions and end-user mods. I have many, but I don't have that one. Nor do I have a Spacesaver model. But I did find one with APL keycaps :) From ploopster at gmail.com Thu Dec 11 21:33:26 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 22:33:26 -0500 Subject: IBM 2.5" WD-280 80MB Drives: Free + Shipping In-Reply-To: References: <200812111800.mBBI0RxV011055@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <4941DB86.2010603@gmail.com> Jeff Walther wrote: > I'm cleaning house a bit. I have four IBM Model: WD-280 2.5" hard > drives. The interface is not IDE nor SCSI. I once managed to Google > up a page with an extensive listing of 2.5" drives (laptop service > company?) which indicated that the interface was something else, the > name of which I no longer remember. According to IBM, they're IDE, but pre-date the "standardized" 2.5" drive pinout. Peace... Sridhar From ploopster at gmail.com Thu Dec 11 21:48:15 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 22:48:15 -0500 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <51ea77730812111925xcf86102r186a51be2ed66b60@mail.gmail.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> <49419B48.8090202@gjcp.net> <4941D60C.5070005@gmail.com> <51ea77730812111925xcf86102r186a51be2ed66b60@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4941DEFF.7020607@gmail.com> Jason T wrote: >> One of my many model Ms has no labels on it and has "PENIS" written on it in >> magic marker. >> >> There were a *lot* of revisions and end-user mods. > > I have many, but I don't have that one. Nor do I have a Spacesaver > model. But I did find one with APL keycaps :) I have one of the spacesavers, but not one of the APL ones. Peace... Sridhar From frustum at pacbell.net Thu Dec 11 22:56:35 2008 From: frustum at pacbell.net (Jim Battle) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 22:56:35 -0600 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> John Floren wrote: > Hi everyone > > As a 4th year computer engineering student with a part time job, I > definitely have too much time on my hands, so I've been thinking about > doing something like building my own computer. I remember playing with > the 68k SBCs back in my assembly class, so I thought something from > that family might be an interesting choice. It's ambitious, but > ideally I'd like to do 16/32 bits and a few megs of memory. > > Have any of you built something like this? I'm looking for links to > project pages, shared experiences, and advice on what processor to > use. Reminiscence is welcome too, if you have fond memories of such a > thing :) In 1985 I was fresh out of school, moved to Sunnyvale CA to work for BTI Computer Systems, and in within two weeks of starting work had been through the first round of layoffs. They were kind on the college kids and didn't lay us off, but told us to start interviewing. As a result, I had some time on my hands. One thing I did was to design and build a 68000 computer. I used an S-100 backplane and boards, although I didn't adhere to any standard. The design had 256KB of DRAM, a uart, and a timer chip. I debugged it by writing a "JMP *" program and looking at the waves with an oscope until it looked like it was working. Then I wrote a short program that printed some fixed string to the UART and didn't use any DRAM. Then I wrote a simple program to read from the uart and echo it back, again not using DRAM. Once I had I/O capabilities, it was easy to write short memory test programs until I had that debugged. Next I found the source for a 68K monitor program, call VuBug. As I recall the 68K assembler was in the BTI dialect of FORTRAN. I believe it was a version of RM Fortran (Ryan McFarland). The 68K debugger was primitive, so I enhanced it. Luckily, I managed to keep the 5.25" floppies that contained the source, and you are welcomed to use it if you want. Here is the comment block from the debugger: **************************************************************************** * * * DBug is a 68000 debugger. It allows downloading, examining/changing * * memory, disassembling, single-stepping, tracing, breakpointing, * * and examining/changing registers. It was originally called VuBug. * * * * This is its history: * * * * 1) Vubug was written by Edward M. Carter at Vanderbilt University. * * See the copyright notice below. * * * * 2) Mark Isfeld and Dave Conroy modified VuBug for work on the SCC * * project. The modifications they made were: * * -- * * * * 3) Jim Battle took VuBug and modified it in these ways: * * -- made syntax checking stronger and error reporting better * * -- added the Lookup subroutine to allow word commands instead of * * single letter commands * * -- added text substitute to substitute memory (SM) command * * -- changed copy to allow bigger than 64k blocks * * -- rewrote register (R) command * * -- added ability to evaluate expressions and changed all commands to * * allow expressions for parameters * * -- added disassembly capability * * -- added symbol managment and changed the load command to read * * symbols. * * -- added ascii, asm, bsr, clear, clearsym, dis, fill, help, set, * * setsym, and = (calc) commands * * -- changed I/O dependent routines (especially the TERM command) * * * **************************************************************************** ******************************************* * * ******** VUBUG ********* * * * Copyright (C) 1983 * * Vanderbilt Univ. * * Comp. Sci. Dept. * * PO Box 1679 * * Station B * * Nashville, Tenn. * * 37235 * * * * Author: * * Edward M. Carter * * * ******************************************* * * * Although the information contained here-* * in, as well as any information provided * * relative thereto, has been carefully re-* * viewed and is believed correct, Vander- * * bilt University assumes no liability * * arising out of its application or use, * * neither does it convey any license under* * its patent rights nor the rights of * * others. * * * ******************************************* DBUG.68K: 4227 lines (a few authors) ASSEM.68K: 2447 lines (entirely written by me) DISASSEM.68K: 2308 lines (entirely written by me) It was the first 68K code I ever wrote so it is pretty brute-force, which means it is easy to understand: * output in #,Dx format. is [7:0] and Dx is [11:9] Dis_MOVEQ equ * move.b #'.',(a1)+ send '.L' as a reminder move.b #'L',(a1)+ movea.l a4,a1 point to operand buffer move.b #'#',(a1)+ move.w d0,d5 bsr SymOr_slzsb signed, leading-zero-suppressed format move.b #',',(a1)+ move.w d5,d0 recall opcode rol.w #7,d0 move bits [11:9] to [2:0] bsr Make_Dx rts Once I had it all working, I simply moved on to something else. I had no need to actually use it for anything, since I had quite capable computers all around me anyway. That next project was a modula compiler. I only completed a subset of that before I got my next job, and then there was no time to develop it further. It will need to wait for my retirement in 20 years. :-) From cclist at sydex.com Thu Dec 11 23:27:37 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 21:27:37 -0800 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com>, <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> Message-ID: <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> Since there's little point (other than nostalgia) of constructing a machine with a genuine MC68000 CPU today and using the 68K-based Coldfire MCUs is just too easy, why not implement your own CPU design in an FPGA? That would be fun and you'd learn something too. Cheers, Chuck P.S. I built both NS PACE and GI CP1600 CPU boards to plug into an S100 bus on my own time out of curiosity, but couldn't think of anything to do with them, so they got recycled for other projects after a few years. From chris at mainecoon.com Thu Dec 11 23:34:26 2008 From: chris at mainecoon.com (Chris Kennedy) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 21:34:26 -0800 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> Message-ID: <4941F7E2.7060407@mainecoon.com> Jim Battle wrote: > In 1985 I was fresh out of school, moved to Sunnyvale CA to work for BTI > Computer Systems, and in within two weeks of starting work had been > through the first round of layoffs. First round then, maybe -- trust me, there were a bunch well before then ;) [snip] > Next I found the source for a 68K monitor program, call VuBug. As I > recall the 68K assembler was in the BTI dialect of FORTRAN. I believe > it was a version of RM Fortran (Ryan McFarland). That would probably be right. Aside from the Dragon complier and the assembler I think pretty much everything in the timeframe in question was purchased from RM. -- Chris Kennedy chris at mainecoon.com AF6AP/AFA6KY http://www.mainecoon.com PGP KeyID 108DAB97 PGP fingerprint: 4E99 10B6 7253 B048 6685 6CBC 55E1 20A3 108D AB97 "Mr. McKittrick, after careful consideration..." From IanK at vulcan.com Fri Dec 12 01:11:01 2008 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 23:11:01 -0800 Subject: HP Omnibook 600C startup disk? Message-ID: I picked up a nice little HP Omnibook 600C from someone here on the list, and after a few minutes of playing with it the hard drive decided it did not like its new home. Hey, no worries, stuff happens. It's a PCMCIA hard drive, so I plugged a CF card into a PCMCIA adapter and voila!, I have a new C: drive. But unfortunately, when the disk did its swan dive it took with it all the custom drivers and such that HP loads on it. That may explain why I can't get apparently simple things to work. So, does anyone have one of these machines or its startup disk, and are you willing to share? Thanks -- Ian From cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de Fri Dec 12 03:51:25 2008 From: cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de (Christian Corti) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 10:51:25 +0100 (CET) Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <4940EE6A.15206.13EB9C@cclist.sydex.com> References: <614C868E78D14A5C902ACC23D4759080@NFORCE4>, <4940EE6A.15206.13EB9C@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: On Thu, 11 Dec 2008, Chuck Guzis wrote: > Let's see if I can type and still read the label on the bottom of my > keyboard--the one with the big IBM logo on the bottom. > > Part No: 1397721 > FRU No: 1397725 > I.D. No: 5002413 > Date: 06-08-92 > Plt No; F2 Model M > Made in the U S A > I think this is not the classic IBM keyboard we're talking about. *The* classic keyboard has the part number 139140x where x differs from country to country. This is what's on the label of my keyboard (a rather new one, the oldest one I have dates from 1987 and came along with my 8550-021). There's no IBM logo on the bottom, only the oval grey logo on the top left. 1391403 55-0749972L 1386716 EC 528557 EC 528693 1992-06-23 MANUFACTURED IN UNITED KINGDOM (C) IBM CORPORATION 1985 PRINT BUILD TEST INSP 14A 60A (sig.) (sig.) Christian PS: The US version of the keyboard is the model 1391401. From hp-fix at xs4all.nl Fri Dec 12 04:21:19 2008 From: hp-fix at xs4all.nl (Rik Bos) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 11:21:19 +0100 Subject: HP Omnibook 600C startup disk? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <7BEFA879216549CEAB796AE03253FF81@xp1800> > -----Oorspronkelijk bericht----- > Van: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org > [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] Namens Ian King > Verzonden: vrijdag 12 december 2008 8:11 > Aan: (cctalk at classiccmp.org) > Onderwerp: HP Omnibook 600C startup disk? > > I picked up a nice little HP Omnibook 600C from someone here > on the list, and after a few minutes of playing with it the > hard drive decided it did not like its new home. Hey, no > worries, stuff happens. It's a PCMCIA hard drive, so I > plugged a CF card into a PCMCIA adapter and voila!, I have a > new C: drive. But unfortunately, when the disk did its swan > dive it took with it all the custom drivers and such that HP > loads on it. That may explain why I can't get apparently > simple things to work. So, does anyone have one of these > machines or its startup disk, and are you willing to share? > Thanks -- Ian > > Ian, Did you checkl the HP site ? They have some support files online. Otherwise check the HP Computer Museum www.hpmuseum.net The omnibook list http://www.omnibook.org/omnilist/ If you can't find what you I do have a iso with a lot of the support files, witch I can upload. -Rik From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Fri Dec 12 08:55:51 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 08:55:51 -0600 Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: <49416810.1030705@gmail.com> References: <928932.25979.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> <49416810.1030705@gmail.com> Message-ID: <49427B77.8070302@gmail.com> Jules Richardson wrote: > Vernon Wright wrote: >> Still want to know about those early 20th century raised floors. A >> Hollerith tab machine on a raised floor? Maybe.... > > Hmm, I'll see if I can find out what Bletchley Park did in wartime - > aside from several Colossus machines, there was a significant > teleprinter and punched-card presence, too. OK... Colossus machines were all wired standalone, with overhead rack runs to nearby power cabinets and between components. The Tunny machines had a common power supply, but were sited such that cabling was run around the machine room walls. Teleprinters I'm told were wired according to GPO convention of the time - i.e. overhead runs. I'm still not sure about the punched card equipment - I'm struggling to think who the best person is to ask about that, though. Anyway, all of this doesn't further the raised floor discussion much, except to say that things could be done without raised floors (and given the way that computing evolved in the UK, if GPO convention was to wire overhead then doubtless this was carried over into a lot of computer installations; the US and other countries may have taken a much different route though, with raised floors adopted much earlier) (which raises an incidental question; were Strowger exchanges in non-UK countries typically wired overhead or below-floor?) cheers Jules From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Fri Dec 12 09:00:36 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 09:00:36 -0600 Subject: vintage CPU instruction sets In-Reply-To: <494198A4.2050109@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <49417734.2050405@gmail.com> <494198A4.2050109@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <49427C94.4000806@gmail.com> bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > Jules Richardson wrote: >> >> All this talk of CPUs got me back onto thoughts of homebrew CPU >> design, which has been a stalled project of mine for the last year or so. >> > Check here for ideas. > http://members.iinet.net.au/~daveb/simplex/simplex.html Interesting! I've always been thinking of doing a bit-serial ALU, just to keep parts down a little (speed isn't exactly an issue anyway! :-) I actually got as far as cooking up a suitable design, but that's sadly in a notebook that's in storage right now (although I think I can remember enough to reproduce it). I've got no TTL handy here though right now (that's in storage too), but was screwing around with writing a logic simulator the other day, which will at least allow me to prototype some stuff. cheers Jules From db at db.net Fri Dec 12 09:16:43 2008 From: db at db.net (Diane Bruce) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 10:16:43 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> Message-ID: <20081212151643.GA3117@night.db.net> On Thu, Dec 11, 2008 at 10:56:35PM -0600, Jim Battle wrote: > John Floren wrote: > >Hi everyone > > > >As a 4th year computer engineering student with a part time job, I ... > Next I found the source for a 68K monitor program, call VuBug. As I recall > the 68K assembler was in the BTI dialect of FORTRAN. I believe it was a I wrote my own 68K monitor program years ago for the surplus mac boards that were becoming available. Complete with mini-disassembler and S code downloader. - Diane -- - db at FreeBSD.org db at db.net http://www.db.net/~db From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Fri Dec 12 09:08:43 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 09:08:43 -0600 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> Message-ID: <49427E7B.2030707@gmail.com> Jim Battle wrote: > In 1985 I was fresh out of school, moved to Sunnyvale CA to work for BTI > ... Thanks for that; I've seen quite a lot of homebrew machines over the years, but they always seem to be lacking the back-story of quite why their inventors built them, or of how they got them working, so that was a good read! (I've always been curious as to how many homebrew machines 'just work' on their first try - in the sense that at at least the CPU, enough memory, and enough I/O comes to life in order to debug things further.) cheers Jules From slawmaster at gmail.com Fri Dec 12 09:22:47 2008 From: slawmaster at gmail.com (John Floren) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 10:22:47 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> On Fri, Dec 12, 2008 at 12:27 AM, Chuck Guzis wrote: > Since there's little point (other than nostalgia) of constructing a > machine with a genuine MC68000 CPU today and using the 68K-based > Coldfire MCUs is just too easy, why not implement your own CPU design > in an FPGA? > Well, I wasn't thinking the MC68000 processor exactly, just something from that family. I *do* have some experience with FPGA, so I'll consider doing that as well. John -- Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn From blstuart at bellsouth.net Fri Dec 12 09:35:44 2008 From: blstuart at bellsouth.net (Brian L. Stuart) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 15:35:44 +0000 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <49427E7B.2030707@gmail.com> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com><4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> <49427E7B.2030707@gmail.com> Message-ID: <121220081535.1049.494284D00004F8D50000041922193122529B0A02D2089B9A019C04040A0DBF9B9D0E9A9B9C040D@att.net> > Thanks for that; I've seen quite a lot of homebrew machines over the years, > but they always seem to be lacking the back-story of quite why their inventors > built them, or of how they got them working, so that was a good read! > > (I've always been curious as to how many homebrew machines 'just work' on > their first try - in the sense that at at least the CPU, enough memory, and > enough I/O comes to life in order to debug things further.) I did two lo these many years ago. It was 1987, but I still can't bring myself to think it's been over 20 years. Anyway, they were part of a larger, multi-processor system. As I recall, they did mostly just work. But I should mention that I used static RAM rather than dynamic and I'm sure that helped. I never did finish debugging the floppy controller though... It was for my master's and once I had defended, I don't think I ever powered it up again. And re the other thread, my schematics were all hand-drawn. They were good enough that my (at that time newlywed) wife was able to do the wire-wrapping on one of them. BLS From IanK at vulcan.com Fri Dec 12 09:57:51 2008 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 07:57:51 -0800 Subject: HP Omnibook 600C startup disk? In-Reply-To: <7BEFA879216549CEAB796AE03253FF81@xp1800> References: , <7BEFA879216549CEAB796AE03253FF81@xp1800> Message-ID: Thanks for the pointers - I found some documentation I'd been wanting, but no binaries. Fortunately, the person who sold it to me says he may have a backup. But if anyone has the original startup/restore material, I'd love to get a copy. The HP site? In my experience, HP has always been aggressive about removing references to old products. They don't even offer the owner's manual as a download. To their credit, they do have a BIOS upgrade for running Windows (which I don't intend to do). -- Ian ________________________________________ From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Rik Bos [hp-fix at xs4all.nl] Sent: Friday, December 12, 2008 2:21 AM To: 'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts' Subject: RE: HP Omnibook 600C startup disk? > -----Oorspronkelijk bericht----- > Van: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org > [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] Namens Ian King > Verzonden: vrijdag 12 december 2008 8:11 > Aan: (cctalk at classiccmp.org) > Onderwerp: HP Omnibook 600C startup disk? > > I picked up a nice little HP Omnibook 600C from someone here > on the list, and after a few minutes of playing with it the > hard drive decided it did not like its new home. Hey, no > worries, stuff happens. It's a PCMCIA hard drive, so I > plugged a CF card into a PCMCIA adapter and voila!, I have a > new C: drive. But unfortunately, when the disk did its swan > dive it took with it all the custom drivers and such that HP > loads on it. That may explain why I can't get apparently > simple things to work. So, does anyone have one of these > machines or its startup disk, and are you willing to share? > Thanks -- Ian > > Ian, Did you checkl the HP site ? They have some support files online. Otherwise check the HP Computer Museum www.hpmuseum.net The omnibook list http://www.omnibook.org/omnilist/ If you can't find what you I do have a iso with a lot of the support files, witch I can upload. -Rik From drb at msu.edu Fri Dec 12 10:10:00 2008 From: drb at msu.edu (Dennis Boone) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 11:10:00 -0500 Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: (Your message of Fri, 12 Dec 2008 08:55:51 CST.) <49427B77.8070302@gmail.com> References: <49427B77.8070302@gmail.com> <928932.25979.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> <49416810.1030705@gmail.com> Message-ID: <200812121610.mBCGA0QA017946@yagi.h-net.msu.edu> > Anyway, all of this doesn't further the raised floor discussion much, > except to say that things could be done without raised floors (and given > the way that computing evolved in the UK, if GPO convention was to wire > overhead then doubtless this was carried over into a lot of computer > installations; the US and other countries may have taken a much > different route though, with raised floors adopted much earlier) > (which raises an incidental question; were Strowger exchanges in non-UK > countries typically wired overhead or below-floor?) A friend who has spent a lot of time working in US COs says: The only below-floor wiring I've *ever* seen in a CO was in the 7th floor computer room, which was managed by the company from whom Bell bought the computer. Everything else is overhead, always always always. De From hp-fix at xs4all.nl Fri Dec 12 10:20:17 2008 From: hp-fix at xs4all.nl (Rik Bos) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 17:20:17 +0100 Subject: HP Omnibook 600C startup disk? In-Reply-To: References: , <7BEFA879216549CEAB796AE03253FF81@xp1800> Message-ID: <27535FCE0E4B4933828991829081EA1E@xp1800> > Thanks for the pointers - I found some documentation I'd been > wanting, but no binaries. Fortunately, the person who sold > it to me says he may have a backup. But if anyone has the > original startup/restore material, I'd love to get a copy. > As I told you I do have a CDROM-ISO with all the omnibook binaries and other OB related stuff. If you have a place/site where I can upload it's yours........... -Rik From ploopster at gmail.com Fri Dec 12 10:26:04 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 11:26:04 -0500 Subject: Harvard v. von Neumann Message-ID: <4942909C.7090900@gmail.com> [I tried to send this before, but I don't think it went out. My apologies if you're seeing this a second time.] According to my reading, the Burroughs B5000 and Manchester Atlas were both Harvard architecture machines, and the GE-645 was von Neumann. Am I correct in my interpretation? Peace... Sridhar From IanK at vulcan.com Fri Dec 12 10:50:15 2008 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 08:50:15 -0800 Subject: HP Omnibook 600C startup disk? In-Reply-To: <27535FCE0E4B4933828991829081EA1E@xp1800> References: , <7BEFA879216549CEAB796AE03253FF81@xp1800> , <27535FCE0E4B4933828991829081EA1E@xp1800> Message-ID: Oops, I missed that. Thanks! I'll send you email off-list with details.... -- Ian ________________________________________ From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Rik Bos [hp-fix at xs4all.nl] Sent: Friday, December 12, 2008 8:20 AM To: 'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts' Subject: RE: HP Omnibook 600C startup disk? > Thanks for the pointers - I found some documentation I'd been > wanting, but no binaries. Fortunately, the person who sold > it to me says he may have a backup. But if anyone has the > original startup/restore material, I'd love to get a copy. > As I told you I do have a CDROM-ISO with all the omnibook binaries and other OB related stuff. If you have a place/site where I can upload it's yours........... -Rik From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Fri Dec 12 11:47:42 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 10:47:42 -0700 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4942A3BE.5090702@jetnet.ab.ca> John Floren wrote: > Well, I wasn't thinking the MC68000 processor exactly, just something > from that family. I *do* have some experience with FPGA, so I'll > consider doing that as well. > > Most of the FPGA designs I have seen are RISC's or some 6502 offshoot. I am sticking for now to CPLD's, since you don't have to configure the chip like a FPGA, Also a little cheaper if you stick to a bare design like a PDP8. Two CPLD's for the data path and 1 CPLD for control. > John > From cclist at sydex.com Fri Dec 12 12:12:27 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 10:12:27 -0800 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <49419BF0.5040304@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, <49419B48.8090202@gjcp.net>, <49419BF0.5040304@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <4942390B.30386.28FBA3@cclist.sydex.com> (Re: Christian's message about real Model M's) I've got other Model M's with different part numbers--the Wang model has "double" keycaps, each with an outer shell., presumably for easy customization. They all say "Model M". But to the point of "real" Model M's, have a look at the clickykeyboard exhibits: http://www.clickykeyboards.com/index.cfm/fa/categories.main/parentcat/ 9230 There you have Model M's from early 1986. In every case, the label on the underside identifies it clearly as "Model M". Perhaps only the versions of this keyboard produced in the UK lack the appellation. For all I know, "Model M" in British English might refer to an off- color(colour) joke and so was omitted. Or the person designing the label for the UK model thought that "Model M" was unnecessary. But all of the USA-made units that I've seen all say "Model M" on the label. Cheers, Chuck From paul at frixxon.co.uk Fri Dec 12 13:00:52 2008 From: paul at frixxon.co.uk (Paul Williams) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 19:00:52 +0000 Subject: More terminals and microcomputers to go in West Sussex, UK Message-ID: <4942B4E4.8020204@frixxon.co.uk> Here's another batch of things that I don't have time to play with. Same deal as before -- tell me you can come and collect them from Crawley, the sooner the better. Most of these are easily obtainable, so they will go to landfill if they aren't claimed. Sharp MZ-700 2 x Amstrad CPC 464, one boxed and clean, the other with the inevitable cracked cassette cover DEC Letterwriter 100 DECserver 200/MC (DSRVB-A) 2 x Commodore Amiga 500 Acorn Electron and games TI Silent 700 (the enormous briefcase one with acoustic coupler) 2 x DEC TK50Z drives 2 x Commodore 64 Motorola EXORterm 155 -- no keyboard with this. AVID video editing unit and the BBC micro that it was used with I've put photos of some of these on Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/frixxon/ Paul. From pat at computer-refuge.org Fri Dec 12 13:12:06 2008 From: pat at computer-refuge.org (Patrick Finnegan) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 14:12:06 -0500 Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: <49427B77.8070302@gmail.com> References: <928932.25979.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> <49416810.1030705@gmail.com> <49427B77.8070302@gmail.com> Message-ID: <200812121412.06281.pat@computer-refuge.org> On Friday 12 December 2008, Jules Richardson wrote: > Anyway, all of this doesn't further the raised floor discussion much, > except to say that things could be done without raised floors (and > given the way that computing evolved in the UK, if GPO convention was > to wire overhead then doubtless this was carried over into a lot of > computer installations; the US and other countries may have taken a > much different route though, with raised floors adopted much > earlier) After having spend several years working in a datacenter with a raised floor, I have to say that I really hate raised-floors, and prefer overhead wiring. Keeping the wiring overhead makes it visible, which makes it more necessary to keep it neat and tidy (and remove old wiring which is no longer used). Raised floors encourage people to make messes out of wiring because it's all hidden. (Also, not having a raised floor provides less opportunity for parts and tools to find the holes in the floor to fall through when you drop them.) Besides, why hide the wiring? You should proudly display all parts of the computer system! :) Pat -- Purdue University Research Computing --- http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/ The Computer Refuge --- http://computer-refuge.org From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Fri Dec 12 13:05:00 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 13:05:00 -0600 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <4942390B.30386.28FBA3@cclist.sydex.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, <49419B48.8090202@gjcp.net>, <49419BF0.5040304@jetnet.ab.ca> <4942390B.30386.28FBA3@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4942B5DC.1060803@gmail.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: > For all I know, "Model M" in British English might refer to an off- > color(colour) joke and so was omitted. Or the person designing the > label for the UK model thought that "Model M" was unnecessary. Well... there was presumably a change in the internal keyboard layout to accommodate a 102 (rather than US 101) key design. If that fab was done by IBM outside of the US then it seems entirely possible that they retained important bits (s/n, p/n and "IBM" text) but that the "Model M" name became lost somewhere. (I believe that the 102-key layout was sufficiently generic for most non-US markets, so it wouldn't surprise me if other non-US Model M's lack the branding too) I can't think of a reason why "Model M" would either have been frowned upon in the UK or infringed on some other keyboard-related territory that involved the name. I suspect it's pure fate (and not even a screw-up). From dm561 at torfree.net Fri Dec 12 13:22:38 2008 From: dm561 at torfree.net (M H Stein) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 14:22:38 -0500 Subject: USB Model M Message-ID: <01C95C65.4801CE60@host-208-72-123-4.dyn.295.ca> Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 10:51:25 +0100 (CET) From: Christian Corti Subject: RE: USB Model M I think this is not the classic IBM keyboard we're talking about. *The* classic keyboard has the part number 139140x where x differs from country to country. This is what's on the label of my keyboard (a rather new one, the oldest one I have dates from 1987 and came along with my 8550-021). There's no IBM logo on the bottom, only the oval grey logo on the top left. 1391403 55-0749972L 1386716 EC 528557 EC 528693 1992-06-23 MANUFACTURED IN UNITED KINGDOM (C) IBM CORPORATION 1985 PRINT BUILD TEST INSP 14A 60A (sig.) (sig.) Christian PS: The US version of the keyboard is the model 1391401. -------------Reply: Probably no point in arguing with someone who, because his particular keyboard does not say "Model M," therefore insists that "IBM *never* called the (Model M) keyboard a Model M." Presumably even if I sent him a picture of one of my 1391401s plainly labelled "Model M" he would not be convinced any more than he is by others on here and the extensive Wiki entry. Oh well... From silent700 at gmail.com Fri Dec 12 13:31:24 2008 From: silent700 at gmail.com (Jason T) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 13:31:24 -0600 Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: <200812121412.06281.pat@computer-refuge.org> References: <928932.25979.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> <49416810.1030705@gmail.com> <49427B77.8070302@gmail.com> <200812121412.06281.pat@computer-refuge.org> Message-ID: <51ea77730812121131h7f0aa23bk5c0d71078ba7f4f1@mail.gmail.com> On Fri, Dec 12, 2008 at 1:12 PM, Patrick Finnegan wrote: > all hidden. (Also, not having a raised floor provides less opportunity > for parts and tools to find the holes in the floor to fall through when > you drop them.) You can't hide beer in an overhead rack, nor keep it cool there. From silent700 at gmail.com Fri Dec 12 13:32:09 2008 From: silent700 at gmail.com (Jason T) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 13:32:09 -0600 Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: <200812121412.06281.pat@computer-refuge.org> References: <928932.25979.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> <49416810.1030705@gmail.com> <49427B77.8070302@gmail.com> <200812121412.06281.pat@computer-refuge.org> Message-ID: <51ea77730812121132j40e4643ax7405a01b258e9bbc@mail.gmail.com> On Fri, Dec 12, 2008 at 1:12 PM, Patrick Finnegan wrote: > all hidden. (Also, not having a raised floor provides less opportunity > for parts and tools to find the holes in the floor to fall through when > you drop them.) You can't hide beer in an overhead rack, nor keep it cool there. From cclist at sydex.com Fri Dec 12 13:34:16 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 11:34:16 -0800 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <4942B5DC.1060803@gmail.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, <4942390B.30386.28FBA3@cclist.sydex.com>, <4942B5DC.1060803@gmail.com> Message-ID: <49424C38.7161.73E62A@cclist.sydex.com> On 12 Dec 2008 at 13:05, Jules Richardson wrote: > Well... there was presumably a change in the internal keyboard layout to > accommodate a 102 (rather than US 101) key design. If that fab was done by IBM > outside of the US then it seems entirely possible that they retained important > bits (s/n, p/n and "IBM" text) but that the "Model M" name became lost somewhere. Wandering around the clickykeyboards site, it's quite apparent that for the keyboards manufactured in the UK, the "Model M" labeling is missing. US-manufactured ones seem to all have the "Model M" tag, regardless of 101- or 102-key-edness or date of manufacture. See, for example, the Spanish examples here: http://www.clickykeyboards.com/index.cfm/fa/categories.main/parentcat/ 11067/endrw/12 I suppose we could say that keyboards manufactured in the UK are not "real" model M's, but that would open another can of worms... Cheers, Chuck From vern4wright at yahoo.com Fri Dec 12 14:00:12 2008 From: vern4wright at yahoo.com (Vernon Wright) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 12:00:12 -0800 (PST) Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <212749.82860.qm@web65502.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> Interesting, Will. I'll put it onto my list of things to find a picture of. Thanks. Vern --- On Thu, 12/11/08, William Donzelli wrote: > From: William Donzelli > Subject: Re: Raised floors > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > Date: Thursday, December 11, 2008, 1:28 PM > > Still want to know about those early 20th century > raised floors. A Hollerith tab machine on a raised floor? > Maybe.... > > They were used in the control rooms of power stations, and > later > (1930s) found much use in the fire control and gyrocompass > spaces on > larger warships. > > -- > Will From vern4wright at yahoo.com Fri Dec 12 14:10:36 2008 From: vern4wright at yahoo.com (Vernon Wright) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 12:10:36 -0800 (PST) Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: <200812121412.06281.pat@computer-refuge.org> Message-ID: <277630.70572.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> CEO's and such, taking visitors to their million-dollar computer installations, found 3" cables snaking down from the ceiling 'unsightly'; I can recall several managements who would send a memo instructing that the computer room be made extra-tidy (no boxes of paper, cards, all the tapes and disks in their racks) for a coming visit. I really found the raised floor to be quite valuable. There were no holes (except later when A/C was pushed through and small vents were put in), cables were accessible by pulling up a section or two, and as I said, you didn't have to hassle with trucking data and supplies over big cables. Vern --- On Fri, 12/12/08, Patrick Finnegan wrote: > From: Patrick Finnegan > Subject: Re: Raised floors > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > Date: Friday, December 12, 2008, 11:12 AM > On Friday 12 December 2008, Jules Richardson wrote: > > Anyway, all of this doesn't further the raised > floor discussion much, > > except to say that things could be done without raised > floors (and > > given the way that computing evolved in the UK, if GPO > convention was > > to wire overhead then doubtless this was carried over > into a lot of > > computer installations; the US and other countries may > have taken a > > much different route though, with raised floors > adopted much > > earlier) > > After having spend several years working in a datacenter > with a raised > floor, I have to say that I really hate raised-floors, and > prefer > overhead wiring. Keeping the wiring overhead makes it > visible, which > makes it more necessary to keep it neat and tidy (and > remove old wiring > which is no longer used). > > Raised floors encourage people to make messes out of wiring > because it's > all hidden. (Also, not having a raised floor provides less > opportunity > for parts and tools to find the holes in the floor to fall > through when > you drop them.) > > Besides, why hide the wiring? You should proudly display > all parts of > the computer system! :) > > Pat > -- > Purdue University Research Computing --- > http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/ > The Computer Refuge --- > http://computer-refuge.org From cclist at sydex.com Fri Dec 12 14:29:26 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 12:29:26 -0800 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <4942A3BE.5090702@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com>, <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com>, <4942A3BE.5090702@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <49425926.11764.A6676D@cclist.sydex.com> On 12 Dec 2008 at 10:47, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > Most of the FPGA designs I have seen are RISC's or some 6502 offshoot. > I am sticking for now to CPLD's, since you don't have to configure the chip > like a FPGA, Also a little cheaper if you stick to a bare design like a > PDP8. > Two CPLD's for the data path and 1 CPLD for control. How about a 20-bit word size, 4 bit opcode, 65KW addressing space, simple one-address+accumulator machine? Enough directly-addressable memory to do just about whatever you need to do, simple to implement. Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Fri Dec 12 14:21:09 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 12:21:09 -0800 Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: <277630.70572.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> References: <200812121412.06281.pat@computer-refuge.org>, <277630.70572.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <49425735.1765.9ECFD2@cclist.sydex.com> On 12 Dec 2008 at 12:10, Vernon Wright wrote: > CEO's and such, taking visitors to their million-dollar computer > installations, found 3" cables snaking down from the ceiling > 'unsightly'; I can recall several managements who would send a memo > instructing that the computer room be made extra-tidy (no boxes of > paper, cards, all the tapes and disks in their racks) for a coming > visit. Besides, raised floors keeps the rats out of sight... Nothing more upsetting than seeing rodents making use of overhead cable runs as elevated freeways. Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Fri Dec 12 13:04:12 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 11:04:12 -0800 Subject: Harvard v. von Neumann In-Reply-To: <4942909C.7090900@gmail.com> References: <4942909C.7090900@gmail.com> Message-ID: <4942452C.3650.585ECD@cclist.sydex.com> On 12 Dec 2008 at 11:26, Sridhar Ayengar wrote: > According to my reading, the Burroughs B5000 and Manchester Atlas were > both Harvard architecture machines, and the GE-645 was von Neumann. Am > I correct in my interpretation? On the B5000, one certainly couldn't call the architecture strict Harvard, I think it'd be a real stretch to call it modified Harvard. While descriptors differentiated between code and data, these could be altered under program control. I'd call it more of a protection mechanism on a von Neumann machine, although that's even an oversimplification. Cheers, Chuck From ian_primus at yahoo.com Fri Dec 12 14:36:57 2008 From: ian_primus at yahoo.com (Mr Ian Primus) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 12:36:57 -0800 (PST) Subject: Commodore PET RS-232 Message-ID: <556792.93053.qm@web52711.mail.re2.yahoo.com> What options are there for adding an RS-232 port to a Commodore PET? The computer's user port has a different pinout from the C64 (although it uses the same connector), and the port doesn't have the serial output signals the 64 does. Therefore, the quick and dirty hacks that worked great on the 64 to provide serial won't work on the PET. What communications options exist/existed for the PET, aside from Commodore-produced IEEE-488 modems? Does the ROM include routines to handle such communication, like the C64, or would software need to be created for a particular interface? Is there a teminal emulation software available for the PET? I have an 8032, and an 8050 disk drive - but of course, the 8050 is completely incompatible with nearly everything else - serial communication would be a big help. This is new territory for me - the C64, I know. The PET... I'm learning :) -Ian From pcw at mesanet.com Fri Dec 12 14:34:57 2008 From: pcw at mesanet.com (Peter C. Wallace) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 12:34:57 -0800 (PST) Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <49425926.11764.A6676D@cclist.sydex.com> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com>, <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com>, <4942A3BE.5090702@jetnet.ab.ca> <49425926.11764.A6676D@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: On Fri, 12 Dec 2008, Chuck Guzis wrote: > Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 12:29:26 -0800 > From: Chuck Guzis > Reply-To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > Subject: Re: 68k homebuilts > > On 12 Dec 2008 at 10:47, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > >> Most of the FPGA designs I have seen are RISC's or some 6502 offshoot. >> I am sticking for now to CPLD's, since you don't have to configure the chip >> like a FPGA, Also a little cheaper if you stick to a bare design like a >> PDP8. >> Two CPLD's for the data path and 1 CPLD for control. > > How about a 20-bit word size, 4 bit opcode, 65KW addressing space, > simple one-address+accumulator machine? Enough directly-addressable > memory to do just about whatever you need to do, simple to implement. > > Cheers, > Chuck Very similar to what we use for embeddded 8,16,32 bit CPUs in FPGAs. For I/O (well memory) intensive operations, the accumulator oriented architecture beats the socks off of RISCy designs with only memory load and store (that are basically designed for systems with large slow memory instead of small fast memory) > Peter Wallace Mesa Electronics (\__/) (='.'=) This is Bunny. Copy and paste bunny into your (")_(") signature to help him gain world domination. From dave.thearchivist at gmail.com Fri Dec 12 15:04:37 2008 From: dave.thearchivist at gmail.com (Dave Caroline) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 21:04:37 +0000 Subject: Commodore PET RS-232 In-Reply-To: <556792.93053.qm@web52711.mail.re2.yahoo.com> References: <556792.93053.qm@web52711.mail.re2.yahoo.com> Message-ID: there were some books around at the time, I had one interfacing to the Commodore Pet if I remember the title correctly. I used a circuit from there to put S100 bus in my Pet (which I still have) I will rummage for the book over the weekend see if I can find it Dave Caroline archivist on irc From joachim.thiemann at gmail.com Fri Dec 12 15:13:34 2008 From: joachim.thiemann at gmail.com (Joachim Thiemann) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 16:13:34 -0500 Subject: Commodore PET RS-232 In-Reply-To: <556792.93053.qm@web52711.mail.re2.yahoo.com> References: <556792.93053.qm@web52711.mail.re2.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4affc5e0812121313s2fb93c9kc4ef067f815f459b@mail.gmail.com> On Fri, Dec 12, 2008 at 3:36 PM, Mr Ian Primus wrote: > What options are there for adding an RS-232 port to a Commodore PET? The computer's user port has a different pinout from the C64 (although it uses the same connector), and the port doesn't have the serial output signals the 64 does. Therefore, the quick and dirty hacks that worked great on the 64 to provide serial won't work on the PET. > > What communications options exist/existed for the PET, aside from Commodore-produced IEEE-488 modems? Does the ROM include routines to handle such communication, like the C64, or would software need to be created for a particular interface? Is there a teminal emulation software available for the PET? > > I have an 8032, and an 8050 disk drive - but of course, the 8050 is completely incompatible with nearly everything else - serial communication would be a big help. > > This is new territory for me - the C64, I know. The PET... I'm learning :) > > -Ian > The SuperPET is basically a 8032 with additional board containing a 6809, RAM and a 6551. ISTR it was mapped somewhere around $E000. However, I don't know if it ever saw widespread use other than from the 6809 side (where I think the Waterloo software wanted it to talk to a `real' computer). Still, I think it would be an (historically) appropriate expansion to a stock 8032. You should have a big two-row header on the right side of the PET motherboard where you could add such a project. I do have a Commodore IEEE-488 acoustic coupler hanging about, but I don't have the power supply and have never used it. Long ago, I did hook a modem up to my SuperPET using the (internal) DB-25 connector, and even looked into writing a terminal emulator - but I was otherwise busy at the time and abandoned that project. Joe. PS. Ian, there are still the Apple II's for you to pick up, you can have a look at the PET stuff as well when you're here (but I'm keeping it!) - unfortunately, the weather has gotten somewhat messy :-) -- Joachim Thiemann :: http://www.tsp.ece.mcgill.ca/~jthiem From spc at conman.org Fri Dec 12 15:21:27 2008 From: spc at conman.org (Sean Conner) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 16:21:27 -0500 Subject: IBM PS2 8573-061 available in South Florida Message-ID: <20081212212126.GA27808@brevard.conman.org> I recieved an email from someone looking to sell an IBM PS2 8573-061 (he saw my name mentioned in a newpaper article about collecting old computers and contacted me). Asking about the price, here's what he said: > I did a little research on pricing this morning and I see the same unit at > Computer Fusion Inc. for $425 and on eBay for $490. I'd be willing to sell > mine for half price to get it out of my garage. > > I'm thinking of putting it on eBay. Let me know. If anyone is interested, say so and I'll pass on his email address. The person lives in Boyton Beach, Florida and works in Boca Raton (home of the IBM PC). -spc From bryan.pope at comcast.net Fri Dec 12 15:24:19 2008 From: bryan.pope at comcast.net (Bryan Pope) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 16:24:19 -0500 Subject: Commodore PET RS-232 In-Reply-To: <556792.93053.qm@web52711.mail.re2.yahoo.com> References: <556792.93053.qm@web52711.mail.re2.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4942D683.8040100@comcast.net> Mr Ian Primus wrote: > What options are there for adding an RS-232 port to a Commodore PET? The computer's user port has a different pinout from the C64 (although it uses the same connector), and the port doesn't have the serial output signals the 64 does. Therefore, the quick and dirty hacks that worked great on the 64 to provide serial won't work on the PET. > > What communications options exist/existed for the PET, aside from Commodore-produced IEEE-488 modems? Does the ROM include routines to handle such communication, like the C64, or would software need to be created for a particular interface? Is there a teminal emulation software available for the PET? > > I have an 8032, and an 8050 disk drive - but of course, the 8050 is completely incompatible with nearly everything else - serial communication would be a big help. > > BTW, you do know that the 8050 has an IEEE-488 interface and not a serial interface, right? Cheers, Bryan P.S. The 8050 is compatible with a C64 and the proper interface cartridge.. ;-) > This is new territory for me - the C64, I know. The PET... I'm learning :) > > -Ian From sellam at vintagetech.com Fri Dec 12 15:25:59 2008 From: sellam at vintagetech.com (Sellam Ismail) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 13:25:59 -0800 (PST) Subject: ACCRC Sealed Bid Auction for Vintage Computers Message-ID: The Alameda County Computer Resource Center (ACCRC) is forced to liquidate its computer museum due to the current economic climate. The VCF has been contracted to auction off the ACCRC museum to raise needed funds for their non-profit operation. I have put up the first batch of machines at the following URL: http://www.vintage.org/special/2008/accrc/ In order to use the system you must have a VCF Community ID. Getting one is simple: just following the links and prompts when you visit the site above and read the instructions. I have been cataloging the hundreds of items in the ACCRC museum and will be putting up auction lots weekly until the collection is dissipated. There are still many items to go (with lots of duplicates) so check back every week to see the latest batch. All items are offered as-is. Functional condition is unknown unless specified in the item description. For more information about a particular item, please contact the VCF and your inquiry will be answered as soon as possible. Winning bidders will be notified at the close of the auction (see below for closing time). In the event of a tie bid, the winning bid will be the one submitted the earliest. Upon receiving a winning bid notification, payment and pick-up at the ACCRC facilities in Berkeley, California, is preferred. Payment from winning bidders is due within 72 hours after the close of the auction. Non-payment will invalidate your high bid and the item will automatically go to the next highest bidder (no exceptions). Upon request, items will be packaged and shipped at bidder's expense plus a $25 handling fee. Payment in the form of cash, money order, or PayPal (in that order) is preferred. Personal checks will be accepted on the condition that they first clear the bank. All items must be sold. No reasonable offer will be refused. Your purchases will go towards supporting an organization that over the years has provided nearly 20,000 refurbished computers to needy organizations and individuals worldwide. 100% of the proceeds of this auction will go directly to the ACCRC (minus the handling fees, which are covering my time...barely). Please contact me DIRECTLY with any questions you might have of any of the items. I'll be happy to get more notes and photos on particulars items of interest from inquiring bidders. http://www.vintage.org/special/2008/accrc/ -- Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org [ Old computing resources for business || Buy/Sell/Trade Vintage Computers ] [ and academia at www.VintageTech.com || at http://marketplace.vintage.org ] From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Dec 12 15:30:09 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 21:30:09 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Commodore PET RS-232 In-Reply-To: <556792.93053.qm@web52711.mail.re2.yahoo.com> from "Mr Ian Primus" at Dec 12, 8 12:36:57 pm Message-ID: > > What options are there for adding an RS-232 port to a Commodore PET? The way I've always seen it done [1] was to have an IEEE-488 to RS232 interface. The ones I have were made by -- Oh, I forget, something like 'Small Systems Inc' (Philip, do you rememebr), I have the B200 (EPROM-based stat machines + UART) and B300 (8048-based). I am sure thre were others, anyway, making an IEEE-488-RS232 interface is a good exercise in understand the IEEE488 bus (if you want to do that :-)). [1] Years ago I was given an HP plotter with an IEEE-488 interface. At the time, the computer I did most of my work on was a CoCo. I remember using a PET + 8050 disk drive + B200 RS232 interface to simply read bytes coming on the RS232 line from the CoCo and send them to the plotter. Overkill, but it worked. That method has the advantage of needing minimal software -- the standard BASIC I/O commands will work. But I can think of 2 other solutions that might work, if you don't mind writing the software. 1) Bit-bang it on 2 lines of the user port. Easy for output, a lot harder for input if you want to avoid dropping characters -- you have to keep on polling that RxD line :-). Then buffer those lines to RS232 levels using a MAX232 or similar. 2) Hang a seiral chip off the system bus, mapping it to some unused address. Obvious choices for the seiral chip (as they'll interface to the 6502 bus easily) would be the 6850 (needs an external baud rate generator) or the 6551 (internal baud rate generator). Again you'd have to buffer the serial lines to RS232 levels. You'd have to write driver code for the chip you use, but it's a lot easier than writing the bit-banging program. -tony From ian_primus at yahoo.com Fri Dec 12 15:31:27 2008 From: ian_primus at yahoo.com (Mr Ian Primus) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 13:31:27 -0800 (PST) Subject: Commodore PET RS-232 In-Reply-To: <4942D683.8040100@comcast.net> Message-ID: <788131.19617.qm@web52709.mail.re2.yahoo.com> --- On Fri, 12/12/08, Bryan Pope wrote: > > I have an 8032, and an 8050 disk drive - but of > course, the 8050 is completely incompatible with nearly > everything else - serial communication would be a big help. > > > > > BTW, you do know that the 8050 has an IEEE-488 interface > and not a > serial interface, right? Of course. I had to make the bloody cable myself... By "serial communication", I was referring to the possiblity of transferring data over an RS-232 link, not through IEC serial, like on the 64. -Ian From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Fri Dec 12 15:31:20 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 14:31:20 -0700 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <49425926.11764.A6676D@cclist.sydex.com> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com>, <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com>, <4942A3BE.5090702@jetnet.ab.ca> <49425926.11764.A6676D@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4942D828.7010404@jetnet.ab.ca> Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 12 Dec 2008 at 10:47, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > > How about a 20-bit word size, 4 bit opcode, 65KW addressing space, > simple one-address+accumulator machine? Enough directly-addressable > memory to do just about whatever you need to do, simple to implement. > > Cheers, > Chuck > > That was last weeks design. :( That is 3 opcode bits and a indirect bit. Going to 4 opcode bits gives you 32K of memory and would make a nice small machine that dates around the early 60's. The problem is that I want to have local function variables, and that requires a stack frame pointer and one index register at least for structure address. (A 6809 DP style register provides global variables, but hardware relocation is not possible.) This architecture requires a register file and alu design rather than the dedicated logic of a AC,PC,MAR and MBR on a classic machine. The CPLD's don't have ample hardware for a complex machine like a PDP-11 but they do just have the capacity for machine's hardware somewhere between the 6800 and the 6809. Word and byte operations for LD,ST,ADD,SUB,AND,OR,XOR. {AC,IX,SP) Addressing modes 1) # long :immedate long 2) #short :immedate short 3) (0,dp,ix,sp) + nnn : indexed 4) @ (0,dp,ix,sp)+ nnn : indirect indexed. Direct and # addressing modes AC ONLY JMP,JMS,JZ,JNZ,ADC,SBC Direct only - INCRIMENT/DECRIMENT MEMORY INC,IN2,DEC,DE2 Special function - AC,IX OPERANDS LEA,STX,NEG,NGC,SCC,{SHIFT},EI,DI From dave.thearchivist at gmail.com Fri Dec 12 15:39:14 2008 From: dave.thearchivist at gmail.com (Dave Caroline) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 21:39:14 +0000 Subject: Commodore PET RS-232 In-Reply-To: <788131.19617.qm@web52709.mail.re2.yahoo.com> References: <4942D683.8040100@comcast.net> <788131.19617.qm@web52709.mail.re2.yahoo.com> Message-ID: should be a way/was a way to use the 6522 VIA chip it will need translation to rs232 levels though Dave Caroline From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Dec 12 15:06:43 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 21:06:43 +0000 (GMT) Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> from "John Floren" at Dec 11, 8 09:39:13 pm Message-ID: > > Hi everyone > > As a 4th year computer engineering student with a part time job, I > definitely have too much time on my hands, so I've been thinking about > doing something like building my own computer. I remember playing with > the 68k SBCs back in my assembly class, so I thought something from > that family might be an interesting choice. It's ambitious, but > ideally I'd like to do 16/32 bits and a few megs of memory. > > Have any of you built something like this? I'm looking for links to I've built several machines from scratch, but never a 68K-based one. But I do feel that's a pretty good choice for a processor :-) I would start by tracking down a _second edition_ of the 'Student Manual for the Art of Electronics' (that may not be the exact title, but if you can't find it I'll dig out my copy and post more details). This is the 'laboaratory book' for the famous 'Art of Electronics' book (which you should have anyway :-)), and the last few exercises are making a 68008-based computer (so 8-bit data bus) with something like 8K of static RAM a bit of I/O, etc. You won;t want to copy that design, but it'll give you ideas. As regards RAM, I really would use static RAM, at least to start with. It's a lot easier to work with than dynamic RAM, and SRAM is getting pretty cheap these days. You also need to think what I/O you want. Do you want a toggle-switch panel to load ROM, a monitor program (hex keypad and display, or an ASCII terminal interface?), a bootstrap for some larger OS (to be loadrd from what device?) and so on. Personally, I'd probably add a serial port and have a simple machine code monitor in EPROM, but it's up to you. -tony From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Fri Dec 12 15:51:30 2008 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 13:51:30 -0800 (PST) Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: <49425735.1765.9ECFD2@cclist.sydex.com> References: <200812121412.06281.pat@computer-refuge.org>, <277630.70572.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> <49425735.1765.9ECFD2@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: On Fri, 12 Dec 2008, Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 12 Dec 2008 at 12:10, Vernon Wright wrote: > > > CEO's and such, taking visitors to their million-dollar computer > > installations, found 3" cables snaking down from the ceiling > > 'unsightly'; I can recall several managements who would send a memo > > instructing that the computer room be made extra-tidy (no boxes of > > paper, cards, all the tapes and disks in their racks) for a coming > > visit. > > Besides, raised floors keeps the rats out of sight... Nothing more > upsetting than seeing rodents making use of overhead cable runs as > elevated freeways. Building on that fact, overhead rat^H^H^Hcable runs provide entertainment during long sessions of waiting for something to finish, provided you remembered to bring in your bb gun. -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Dec 12 15:09:50 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 21:09:50 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Algol & MTS / was Re: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <4941D063.7080107@jetnet.ab.ca> from "bfranchuk@jetnet.ab.ca" at Dec 11, 8 07:45:55 pm Message-ID: > Well you you can get ALGOL 60 for DOS but not CP/M. The still think I am sure I remeber a cut-down Algol 60 running under CP/M on the RML380Z computers we had at school (this would be about 25 years ago, in the UK). Alas I don't still have it, the RML:380-Z I bought second-hand didn't come with it. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Dec 12 14:59:46 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 20:59:46 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Buy versus Build (Was: Re: PDF (Was: something irrelevant given the In-Reply-To: <4941B00D.902@jbrain.com> from "Jim Brain" at Dec 11, 8 06:27:57 pm Message-ID: > > That's one reason I insist on being able to support > > everything I depend on myself (meaning that I have schematics, source > > code, etc). > > > Admirable, but unrealistic, in my opinion. Systems today have gotten so Well, it probably is commercially, but it's not for a hobbyist. I don't _need_ the latest machines, I can do all I need with my classics. And those I understand. > > the necessary program from scratch. A trivial example. I had to convert > > some ROM dumps from one format to another. There may be a program that > > does just what I want if I give it the right options. But by the time > > I've found the program, worked out what those options are, etc, I might > > as well have writen the 10 lines or so of C to do the job. > > > I have been misunderstood. If developers want to write little utilities Agreed, I think we have misundertood each other, and actually I agree with much of what you say. > for such things, I'm fine with that. It's the "multi-week developments > they insist on doing themselves because they don't want to learn a tool, > or can't image a tool could be as elegant as what they are cooking up" > solutions that I speak of. If you want to spend a day writing a script > to parse some ROM or clean up a dataset as a one time thing, I'd join Commercially, there must be trade-offs. I guess everything is ultimately goverend by money (I wish it wasn't, but that's the way it is), and thus you have to weigh up the cost of buying the right tool, the cost of supporting it and the cost of learnign to use it against the cost of making it from sceatch (and the materials needed to do that if it's a hardware rather htan software device), the cost of supporting that, and so on. > you, as I do the same thing (long live AWK, SED, PERL, SH, etc.). But, > when someone spend weeks re-implementing something I could have > purchased for $1000.00, I'm not as happy. If the support is horrid, I > say find an open source tool that performs the function and learn *THAT* > code. I totally agree with you. Of course things are different when we're talking about a hobby (and to be honset, for most people on this list, classic computers are a hobby). You do things them because you enjoy them, not because it makes financial sense. It doesn't amke financial sense to spend several months writing the repair manual and then restoring a desktop calcaultor when you canbuy a much more powerful pocket calculator for less than the repair parts for the old machine cost. But none-the-less I did just that a couple of years ago, and I enjoyed every minute of it. It's a hobby, so why not :-) Similarly, if somebody wants to write an OS for the PDP11 as a hobby (given there are already quite a few OSes for that machine, at least one of which would probably be suitable), then I see no reason why they shouldn't. > > You may think I'm misguided, but I can definitely provide information to No, I don't, after you clarified your position. -tony From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Fri Dec 12 15:54:47 2008 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 13:54:47 -0800 (PST) Subject: ACCRC Sealed Bid Auction for Vintage Computers In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Fri, 12 Dec 2008, Sellam Ismail wrote: > The Alameda County Computer Resource Center (ACCRC) is forced to liquidate > its computer museum due to the current economic climate. The VCF has been > contracted to auction off the ACCRC museum to raise needed funds for their > non-profit operation. Here's a request for you deep-pockets out there, please consider checking to see if there's anything in the collection that the Computer History Museum lacks and buy something for that museum. -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? From slawmaster at gmail.com Fri Dec 12 16:09:51 2008 From: slawmaster at gmail.com (John Floren) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 17:09:51 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <7d3530220812121409t6da349d1y5343ea5a99fe1b42@mail.gmail.com> On Fri, Dec 12, 2008 at 4:06 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >> >> Hi everyone >> >> As a 4th year computer engineering student with a part time job, I >> definitely have too much time on my hands, so I've been thinking about >> doing something like building my own computer. I remember playing with >> the 68k SBCs back in my assembly class, so I thought something from >> that family might be an interesting choice. It's ambitious, but >> ideally I'd like to do 16/32 bits and a few megs of memory. >> >> Have any of you built something like this? I'm looking for links to > > I've built several machines from scratch, but never a 68K-based one. But > I do feel that's a pretty good choice for a processor :-) > > I would start by tracking down a _second edition_ of the 'Student Manual > for the Art of Electronics' (that may not be the exact title, but if you > can't find it I'll dig out my copy and post more details). This is the > 'laboaratory book' for the famous 'Art of Electronics' book (which you > should have anyway :-)), and the last few exercises are making a > 68008-based computer (so 8-bit data bus) with something like 8K of static > RAM a bit of I/O, etc. You won;t want to copy that design, but it'll give > you ideas. > > As regards RAM, I really would use static RAM, at least to start with. > It's a lot easier to work with than dynamic RAM, and SRAM is getting > pretty cheap these days. > > You also need to think what I/O you want. Do you want a toggle-switch > panel to load ROM, a monitor program (hex keypad and display, or an ASCII > terminal interface?), a bootstrap for some larger OS (to be loadrd from > what device?) and so on. Personally, I'd probably add a serial port and > have a simple machine code monitor in EPROM, but it's up to you. > > -tony Well, part of my motivation for doing this is that I'm really an operating systems guy, so in a perfect world I'd be able to make something I could hack around with easily. With that in mind, I'm thinking a serial terminal interface, but also including a front panel with toggles and lights to play with. It would be really fun to go so crazy as to do a PDP-11 to the point where I could boot one of the old OS's, but that may be too ambitious for me at this time (can you even buy PDP-11 microprocessors anymore?). Given my druthers, I'd go with a 32-bit system, but I'm not sure if that will increase the complexity beyond my abilities. I'm competent with soldering and ok when it comes to breadboarding; things could quickly go downhill if I tried to assemble on perfboard since I've only tried that for very small circuits. The whole process of assembling a computer system from the chip level is new to me, so any tips would be appreciated. My reasons for preferring 32-bit is that the potential capabilities are much greater. What does it take to do video (bitmapped) output, by the way? That would be especially interesting, in my opinion. John -- Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Fri Dec 12 16:23:00 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 16:23:00 -0600 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 12/12/08, John Floren wrote: > On Fri, Dec 12, 2008 at 12:27 AM, Chuck Guzis wrote: > > Since there's little point (other than nostalgia) of constructing a > > machine with a genuine MC68000 CPU today and using the 68K-based > > Coldfire MCUs is just too easy, why not implement your own CPU design > > in an FPGA? > > > > Well, I wasn't thinking the MC68000 processor exactly, just something > from that family. I *do* have some experience with FPGA, so I'll > consider doing that as well. I have a bit of experience with the 68008 and 68000/68010 from the design end (they were used in various released and unreleased COMBOARD products) A simple design with a real 68K processor isn't that hard to whip up or debug - in fact not much harder than a simple 6502 or Z80 system. SRAM, of course, is simpler to implement than DRAM, but DRAM can be easier to expand over a couple of MB (for 1MB or less, I'd stuff in a couple of JEDEC RAM sockets for a 16-bit RAM field). Let me amend "simple" - simple is peripheral chips and memory that can keep up with the cycle time of your processor so that you don't have to handle wait-states, etc., and can therefore tie DTACK to ground (as advocated by a famous newsletter, "DTACK Grounded". At 4MHz to 8Mhz, it shouldn't be a problem these days unless you have a particular VLSI chip you want to use for I/O (6821, 6522, etc.) and it isn't fast enough. ROM and RAM that are fast enough shouldn't be an issue, even with inexpensive parts. I haven't handwired a 68K project, but I've worked on a few from design to prototype. One thing we ran into with one design was that UDS and LDS got swapped. Things mostly worked, but the one thing that failed was byte-wide reads. We didn't do those in too many places in our firmware, so it took a little work to figure out what the problem was. Once I got a trace over a screenful of instructions, the flaw was obvious. Other problems include byte-swapping between the 68K and the Unibus or Qbus it was mounted in (not a problem for most designs) and CAS/RAS undershoot between the DRAM controller and the RAM field (the solution is now widely known to put 30-39Ohm resistors in-line with the CAS/RAS lines). Our design was not one I'd call simple, so these sorts of problems are less likely to crop up with a homebrew. As pointed out, there are several varieties of 68K-core MCUs. Some of those have so many I/O peripherals integrated that I think you could get away with the MCU, some external ROM and RAM and little else. Your design would look, perhaps, like a early Palm Pilot, but wouldn't be hard to wire up and would look, to the software, like any other mix of ROM, RAM and I/O, integrated or not. I guess it comes down to what you want it to do when you are done. Is it going to use terminals and run a custom OS or OS68K? Is it going to have a framebuffer video of some kind? (I would not call that a simple design at that point) IDE disks? CF cards? Networking (ethernet?) -ethan From cclist at sydex.com Fri Dec 12 16:19:26 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 14:19:26 -0800 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <4942D828.7010404@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com>, <49425926.11764.A6676D@cclist.sydex.com>, <4942D828.7010404@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <494272EE.16384.10B1BD2@cclist.sydex.com> On 12 Dec 2008 at 14:31, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > That is 3 opcode bits and a indirect bit. Going to 4 opcode bits > gives you 32K of memory and would make a nice small machine > that dates around the early 60's. > > The problem is that I want to have local function variables, and that > requires I suppose that a 16-bit (or 20-bit 3-(16/32 register) address design would be too complex. But it would give you the flexibility you need without an explicitly-implemented hardware stack. Make one of the registers PC and branches get interesting. Who needs registers or indirect addressing anyway? IA was an *option* on the CADET. Instruction modification was a way of life. Cheers, Chuck From steven.alan.canning at verizon.net Fri Dec 12 16:27:28 2008 From: steven.alan.canning at verizon.net (Scanning) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 14:27:28 -0800 Subject: 68k homebuilts References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <000701c95ca8$d0f46af0$0201a8c0@hal9000> John, When I first started we built our own microprocessors out of discrete transistors and built our floppy drives from scratch. Also we had to walk through the snow to get to school and it was uphill both ways... All seriousness aside, start with something not too ambitious so as not to get overwhelmed early on because then it will never get done. If you want to start REALLY simple, I have VHDL code for the Motorola MC14500B ONE bit microprocessor. You can't get a smaller data buss than that !! You can tackle more ambitious projects as your expertise grows. Wiring up a 32 bit buss would be a real bitch or a labor of love. I'm certain you will get a plethora of great ideas from these guys. Good luck ! Best regards, Steven P.S. Personally I like the RCA / Hughes CMOS 1802 running FORTH. > Hi everyone > > As a 4th year computer engineering student with a part time job, I > definitely have too much time on my hands, so I've been thinking about > doing something like building my own computer. I remember playing with > the 68k SBCs back in my assembly class, so I thought something from > that family might be an interesting choice. It's ambitious, but > ideally I'd like to do 16/32 bits and a few megs of memory. > > Have any of you built something like this? I'm looking for links to > project pages, shared experiences, and advice on what processor to > use. Reminiscence is welcome too, if you have fond memories of such a > thing :) > > Thanks > > John Floren From ploopster at gmail.com Fri Dec 12 16:41:10 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 17:41:10 -0500 Subject: Harvard v. von Neumann In-Reply-To: <4942452C.3650.585ECD@cclist.sydex.com> References: <4942909C.7090900@gmail.com> <4942452C.3650.585ECD@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4942E886.1030401@gmail.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: >> According to my reading, the Burroughs B5000 and Manchester Atlas were >> both Harvard architecture machines, and the GE-645 was von Neumann. Am >> I correct in my interpretation? > > On the B5000, one certainly couldn't call the architecture strict > Harvard, I think it'd be a real stretch to call it modified Harvard. > While descriptors differentiated between code and data, these could > be altered under program control. I'd call it more of a protection > mechanism on a von Neumann machine, although that's even an > oversimplification. What was the mechanism for transferring data between the stack and the program space? Peace... Sridhar From ploopster at gmail.com Fri Dec 12 16:45:10 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 17:45:10 -0500 Subject: IBM PS2 8573-061 available in South Florida In-Reply-To: <20081212212126.GA27808@brevard.conman.org> References: <20081212212126.GA27808@brevard.conman.org> Message-ID: <4942E976.6070108@gmail.com> Sean Conner wrote: > I recieved an email from someone looking to sell an IBM PS2 8573-061 (he > saw my name mentioned in a newpaper article about collecting old computers > and contacted me). Asking about the price, here's what he said: > >> I did a little research on pricing this morning and I see the same unit at >> Computer Fusion Inc. for $425 and on eBay for $490. I'd be willing to sell >> mine for half price to get it out of my garage. >> >> I'm thinking of putting it on eBay. Let me know. > > If anyone is interested, say so and I'll pass on his email address. > > The person lives in Boyton Beach, Florida and works in Boca Raton (home of > the IBM PC). He's a bit optimistic on the value. Peace... Sridhar From slawmaster at gmail.com Fri Dec 12 16:47:42 2008 From: slawmaster at gmail.com (John Floren) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 17:47:42 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <7d3530220812121447g37e4babak479d5b1314eb78a@mail.gmail.com> On Fri, Dec 12, 2008 at 5:23 PM, Ethan Dicks wrote: > On 12/12/08, John Floren wrote: >> On Fri, Dec 12, 2008 at 12:27 AM, Chuck Guzis wrote: >> > Since there's little point (other than nostalgia) of constructing a >> > machine with a genuine MC68000 CPU today and using the 68K-based >> > Coldfire MCUs is just too easy, why not implement your own CPU design >> > in an FPGA? >> > >> >> Well, I wasn't thinking the MC68000 processor exactly, just something >> from that family. I *do* have some experience with FPGA, so I'll >> consider doing that as well. > > I have a bit of experience with the 68008 and 68000/68010 from the > design end (they were used in various released and unreleased COMBOARD > products) > > A simple design with a real 68K processor isn't that hard to whip up > or debug - in fact not much harder than a simple 6502 or Z80 system. > SRAM, of course, is simpler to implement than DRAM, but DRAM can be > easier to expand over a couple of MB (for 1MB or less, I'd stuff in a > couple of JEDEC RAM sockets for a 16-bit RAM field). Let me amend > "simple" - simple is peripheral chips and memory that can keep up with > the cycle time of your processor so that you don't have to handle > wait-states, etc., and can therefore tie DTACK to ground (as advocated > by a famous newsletter, "DTACK Grounded". At 4MHz to 8Mhz, it > shouldn't be a problem these days unless you have a particular VLSI > chip you want to use for I/O (6821, 6522, etc.) and it isn't fast > enough. ROM and RAM that are fast enough shouldn't be an issue, even > with inexpensive parts. > > I haven't handwired a 68K project, but I've worked on a few from > design to prototype. One thing we ran into with one design was that > UDS and LDS got swapped. Things mostly worked, but the one thing that > failed was byte-wide reads. We didn't do those in too many places in > our firmware, so it took a little work to figure out what the problem > was. Once I got a trace over a screenful of instructions, the flaw > was obvious. Other problems include byte-swapping between the 68K and > the Unibus or Qbus it was mounted in (not a problem for most designs) > and CAS/RAS undershoot between the DRAM controller and the RAM field > (the solution is now widely known to put 30-39Ohm resistors in-line > with the CAS/RAS lines). Our design was not one I'd call simple, so > these sorts of problems are less likely to crop up with a homebrew. > > As pointed out, there are several varieties of 68K-core MCUs. Some of > those have so many I/O peripherals integrated that I think you could > get away with the MCU, some external ROM and RAM and little else. > Your design would look, perhaps, like a early Palm Pilot, but wouldn't > be hard to wire up and would look, to the software, like any other mix > of ROM, RAM and I/O, integrated or not. > > I guess it comes down to what you want it to do when you are done. Is > it going to use terminals and run a custom OS or OS68K? Is it going > to have a framebuffer video of some kind? (I would > not call that a simple design at that point) IDE disks? CF cards? > Networking (ethernet?) > > -ethan > Thanks for the info Can you, ethan, or anyone else point me to a good source of 68k processors? It seems that they were good enough for the early Sun workstations, so they should be good enough for me ;) Their widespread use and the resulting information available should be useful too. I'd be interested in one of the MCUs you mentioned... were you thinking of stuff like Freescale's ColdFire? Those look cheap and I may be able to sample one for free... To answer your other questions: I plan to use terminals (I've got a vt-220 and an ADM-3A lying around, might as well use them). Framebuffer would be nice but it's probably a difficult goal. I'd like to implement some kind of storage, yes, and since floppies are kinda a pain, I guess IDE or CF would be a good choice if it's not too much work. As for networking... depends on how easy it is to put in. It seems that other people have done ethernet on homebuilt boxes, so that might be possible, or maybe PPP/SLIP to one of my other boxes? John -- Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Fri Dec 12 17:03:48 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 16:03:48 -0700 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4942EDD4.3090800@jetnet.ab.ca> Ethan Dicks wrote: > A simple design with a real 68K processor isn't that hard to whip up > or debug - in fact not much harder than a simple 6502 or Z80 system. > SRAM, of course, is simpler to implement than DRAM, but DRAM can be > easier to expand over a couple of MB (for 1MB or less, I'd stuff in a > couple of JEDEC RAM sockets for a 16-bit RAM field). Let me amend > "simple" - simple is peripheral chips and memory that can keep up with > the cycle time of your processor so that you don't have to handle > wait-states, etc., and can therefore tie DTACK to ground (as advocated > by a famous newsletter, "DTACK Grounded". At 4MHz to 8Mhz, it > shouldn't be a problem these days unless you have a particular VLSI > chip you want to use for I/O (6821, 6522, etc.) and it isn't fast > enough. ROM and RAM that are fast enough shouldn't be an issue, even > with inexpensive parts. > > Was not that newsletter for a APPLE II, co-processor board? Did anybody ever use one, or any kind of general purpose co-processor boards for the PC? > -ethan From cclist at sydex.com Fri Dec 12 17:22:07 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 15:22:07 -0800 Subject: Harvard v. von Neumann In-Reply-To: <4942E886.1030401@gmail.com> References: <4942909C.7090900@gmail.com>, <4942452C.3650.585ECD@cclist.sydex.com>, <4942E886.1030401@gmail.com> Message-ID: <4942819F.6213.1447E7E@cclist.sydex.com> On 12 Dec 2008 at 17:41, Sridhar Ayengar wrote: > What was the mechanism for transferring data between the stack and the > program space? As far as I can remember, there was no prohibition on two entries in the PRT describing the same physical address space--one as program, the other as data. That would seem to kill the Harvard Architecture idea, no? Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Fri Dec 12 17:28:38 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 15:28:38 -0800 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <4942EDD4.3090800@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com>, , <4942EDD4.3090800@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <49428326.17082.14A76B1@cclist.sydex.com> On 12 Dec 2008 at 16:03, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > Was not that newsletter for a APPLE II, co-processor board? > Did anybody ever use one, or any kind of general purpose co-processor > boards for the PC? Z80 boards were quite popular. I recall using one called "Blue Lightning" or something like that. But 68K, Z8000, NS16032 and others were certainly made. Didn't someone also make Clipper and/or Transputer boards for the PC? Cheers, Chuck From db at db.net Fri Dec 12 17:32:06 2008 From: db at db.net (Diane Bruce) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 18:32:06 -0500 Subject: Harvard v. von Neumann In-Reply-To: <4942452C.3650.585ECD@cclist.sydex.com> References: <4942909C.7090900@gmail.com> <4942452C.3650.585ECD@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <20081212233206.GA7329@night.db.net> On Fri, Dec 12, 2008 at 11:04:12AM -0800, Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 12 Dec 2008 at 11:26, Sridhar Ayengar wrote: > > > According to my reading, the Burroughs B5000 and Manchester Atlas were > > both Harvard architecture machines, and the GE-645 was von Neumann. Am > > I correct in my interpretation? > > On the B5000, one certainly couldn't call the architecture strict > Harvard, I think it'd be a real stretch to call it modified Harvard. > While descriptors differentiated between code and data, these could > be altered under program control. I'd call it more of a protection > mechanism on a von Neumann machine, although that's even an > oversimplification. Similar to I/D on the PDP-11 then? - Diane -- - db at FreeBSD.org db at db.net http://www.db.net/~db From ploopster at gmail.com Fri Dec 12 17:41:07 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 18:41:07 -0500 Subject: Harvard v. von Neumann In-Reply-To: <4942819F.6213.1447E7E@cclist.sydex.com> References: <4942909C.7090900@gmail.com>, <4942452C.3650.585ECD@cclist.sydex.com>, <4942E886.1030401@gmail.com> <4942819F.6213.1447E7E@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4942F693.2030501@gmail.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: >> What was the mechanism for transferring data between the stack and the >> program space? > > As far as I can remember, there was no prohibition on two entries in > the PRT describing the same physical address space--one as program, > the other as data. That would seem to kill the Harvard Architecture > idea, no? But, the data could only be operated on from the stack, right? So, if you wanted to write a self-modifying program, wouldn't you need to have two entries in the PRT, similarly to what you've suggested, and then wouldn't you also need to push the elements of the array containing the program data onto the stack, operate on them, then pop them off the stack and back into the array space, thereby allowing the code to run? Or am I missing something? Peace... Sridhar From glen.slick at gmail.com Fri Dec 12 17:50:31 2008 From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 15:50:31 -0800 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <4942EDD4.3090800@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> <4942EDD4.3090800@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <1e1fc3e90812121550k38f60528g5f6f2aa46ca356aa@mail.gmail.com> > Was not that newsletter for a APPLE II, co-processor board? > Did anybody ever use one, or any kind of general purpose co-processor > boards for the PC? >> HP made the 82300C BASIC Language Processor and the 82324A Measurement Coprocessor cards, which were basically 68000 and 68030 based HP 9000 200/300 class systems on ISA bus cards which used the host PC for I/O and ran HP BASIC 5.x or 6.x http://www.hpmuseum.net/display_item.php?hw=681 http://www.hpmuseum.net/display_item.php?hw=909 Not really general purpose co-processors, although I suppose your could always write your own software to run on them instead of HP BASIC if you were motivated to do so. From brain at jbrain.com Fri Dec 12 17:51:37 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 17:51:37 -0600 Subject: Buy versus Build In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4942F909.9090207@jbrain.com> Tony Duell wrote: > Of course things are different when we're talking about a hobby (and to > be honset, for most people on this list, classic computers are a > hobby). You do things them because you enjoy them, not because it makes > financial sense. It doesn't amke financial sense to spend several months > writing the repair manual and then restoring a desktop calcaultor when > you canbuy a much more powerful pocket calculator for less than the > repair parts for the old machine cost. But none-the-less I did just that > a couple of years ago, and I enjoyed every minute of it. It's a hobby, so > why not :-) > I concur. My original point was not to apply work-related decisioning to a hobby, merely to note that those you mentor may not notice you have two sets of rules. (hobby rules, and work rules) At least for me, they are significantly different (I use a $2.00 AVR programmer I made because I'm evidently too cheap to buy a good one, but I'd fire myself if I did that at work. The cheap programmer sucks CPU and fails every so often, which is fine for hobby use, but useless for work. Since I'm aware of the difference, I try to point it out to folks whom I mentor. Although one might assume the person I mentor would know the difference, I've learned such assumptions are often invalid. Jim For good or bad, my hobby is turning into a side business, which complicates things further. And, it means I really need to buy or build a good AVR programmer :-) From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Fri Dec 12 17:44:29 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 17:44:29 -0600 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <49428326.17082.14A76B1@cclist.sydex.com> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com>, , <4942EDD4.3090800@jetnet.ab.ca> <49428326.17082.14A76B1@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4942F75D.6080108@gmail.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 12 Dec 2008 at 16:03, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > > >> Was not that newsletter for a APPLE II, co-processor board? >> Did anybody ever use one, or any kind of general purpose co-processor >> boards for the PC? > > Z80 boards were quite popular. I recall using one called "Blue > Lightning" or something like that. But 68K, Z8000, NS16032 and > others were certainly made. I've got a couple of ARM ones too, just to add them to the pot. I'd love to fine a NS32016 or m88k one (not sure if the latter ever existed) > Didn't someone also make Clipper and/or > Transputer boards for the PC? Transputer ones certainly existed; IIRC seeing one (I think it was Inmos themselves) which supported plug-in TRAM modules at the far end of the board (I had a photo of it too, but can't find where I've filed it right now) cheers Jules From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Fri Dec 12 18:05:07 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 18:05:07 -0600 Subject: Commodore PET RS-232 In-Reply-To: <556792.93053.qm@web52711.mail.re2.yahoo.com> References: <556792.93053.qm@web52711.mail.re2.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 12/12/08, Mr Ian Primus wrote: > What options are there for adding an RS-232 port to a Commodore PET? There are a couple that I am aware of... > The computer's user port has a different pinout from the C64 (although it uses the same connector), and the port doesn't have the serial output signals the 64 does. Therefore, the quick and dirty hacks that worked great on the 64 to provide serial won't work on the PET. As far as I recall, there's nothing magical about the "serial" pins on the C-64 except that there's some ROM routines backing them up so that you just "OPEN 2,2" and it's all "handled". I _think_ someone did port those routines to the PET, but I couldn't tell you what magazine it was published in. > What communications options exist/existed for the PET, aside from Commodore-produced IEEE-488 modems? I have a TNW (The Net Works?) IEEE-488 serial adapter. It's a "dumb" UART like a 6402 that you strap for baud, stop bits, parity, etc., and enough logic to gate its 8-bit RCV and 8-bit TX buses onto and off of the PET's IEEE bus. Since there's no CPU, it's more than a small handful of popcorn logic. It could probably be done these days with a small amount of bus drivers and GALs/CPLDs in a fraction of the space. I also have a ROM-socket 6850 adapter. It occupies the entire ROM space (i.e., it doesn't share the socket with a ROM), but it's easy to address from software on the PET side. You have to write your own software from scratch, but it's less tough than bit-banging, I'd say. The circuit is trivial since ROM sockets have the data bus, plenty of address bits and address enables. The only thing you need is a flying lead for R/W (since ROM sockets do _not_ have that). > Does the ROM include routines to handle such communication, like the C64, or would software need to be created for a particular interface? The PET has no facilities specifically for serial port comms, unlike the C-64. Something like the TNW adapter would be easy to talk to - regular PET I/O (OPEN, PRINT, INPUT, GET). Wiring up a 6850 or using User Port bit-banging would require custom software. > Is there a teminal emulation software available for the PET? I think I've seen something in BASIC for the IEEE acoustic coupler (it would resemble the example one given in the VIC-MODEM manual), but I don't recall any comms software specifically for the PET back in the day. -ethan From cclist at sydex.com Fri Dec 12 18:08:51 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 16:08:51 -0800 Subject: Harvard v. von Neumann In-Reply-To: <4942F693.2030501@gmail.com> References: <4942909C.7090900@gmail.com>, <4942819F.6213.1447E7E@cclist.sydex.com>, <4942F693.2030501@gmail.com> Message-ID: <49428C93.23575.16F4906@cclist.sydex.com> On 12 Dec 2008 at 18:41, Sridhar Ayengar wrote: > But, the data could only be operated on from the stack, right? So, if > you wanted to write a self-modifying program, wouldn't you need to have > two entries in the PRT, similarly to what you've suggested, and then > wouldn't you also need to push the elements of the array containing the > program data onto the stack, operate on them, then pop them off the > stack and back into the array space, thereby allowing the code to run? > > Or am I missing something? I think we're saying the same thing. In other words, code modification was certainly possible. Cheers, Chuck From ploopster at gmail.com Fri Dec 12 18:13:57 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 19:13:57 -0500 Subject: Harvard v. von Neumann In-Reply-To: <49428C93.23575.16F4906@cclist.sydex.com> References: <4942909C.7090900@gmail.com>, <4942819F.6213.1447E7E@cclist.sydex.com>, <4942F693.2030501@gmail.com> <49428C93.23575.16F4906@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4942FE45.3020509@gmail.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 12 Dec 2008 at 18:41, Sridhar Ayengar wrote: > >> But, the data could only be operated on from the stack, right? So, if >> you wanted to write a self-modifying program, wouldn't you need to have >> two entries in the PRT, similarly to what you've suggested, and then >> wouldn't you also need to push the elements of the array containing the >> program data onto the stack, operate on them, then pop them off the >> stack and back into the array space, thereby allowing the code to run? >> >> Or am I missing something? > > I think we're saying the same thing. In other words, code > modification was certainly possible. But they threw up roadblocks to try to prevent it, right? It sure looks like the array storage out-of-stack seemed to have been tacked onto the architecture as an afterthought. Peace... Sridhar From cclist at sydex.com Fri Dec 12 18:32:17 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 16:32:17 -0800 Subject: Harvard v. von Neumann In-Reply-To: <4942FE45.3020509@gmail.com> References: <4942909C.7090900@gmail.com>, <49428C93.23575.16F4906@cclist.sydex.com>, <4942FE45.3020509@gmail.com> Message-ID: <49429211.2781.184BB51@cclist.sydex.com> On 12 Dec 2008 at 19:13, Sridhar Ayengar wrote: > But they threw up roadblocks to try to prevent it, right? It sure looks > like the array storage out-of-stack seemed to have been tacked onto the > architecture as an afterthought. I don't know about the history of the various features, but any general-purpose computer has to have some way to generate and execute code to be very useful, no? Even the (specialized) upper PIC and AVR people figured that one out eventually. Cheers, Chuck From cisin at xenosoft.com Fri Dec 12 19:47:10 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 17:47:10 -0800 (PST) Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: <49425735.1765.9ECFD2@cclist.sydex.com> References: <200812121412.06281.pat@computer-refuge.org>, <277630.70572.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> <49425735.1765.9ECFD2@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <20081212174540.B20361@shell.lmi.net> > On 12 Dec 2008 at 12:10, Vernon Wright wrote: > > CEO's and such, . . . On Fri, 12 Dec 2008, Chuck Guzis wrote: > Besides, raised floors keeps the rats out of sight... How do you get the CEO's and such to stay under those floors? From cisin at xenosoft.com Fri Dec 12 20:22:39 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 18:22:39 -0800 (PST) Subject: Commodore PET RS-232 In-Reply-To: References: <4942D683.8040100@comcast.net> <788131.19617.qm@web52709.mail.re2.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20081212182111.W20361@shell.lmi.net> On Fri, 12 Dec 2008, Dave Caroline wrote: > should be a way/was a way to use the 6522 VIA chip it will need > translation to rs232 levels though Does anybody here remember a thread from last month called: Re: RS232 voltage level converter box (trying to figure out what a board with 1488s and 1489s was for) From cclist at sydex.com Fri Dec 12 20:59:18 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 18:59:18 -0800 Subject: Commodore PET RS-232 In-Reply-To: <20081212182111.W20361@shell.lmi.net> References: <4942D683.8040100@comcast.net>, , <20081212182111.W20361@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4942B486.27344.20B5091@cclist.sydex.com> On 12 Dec 2008 at 18:22, Fred Cisin wrote: > Does anybody here remember a thread from last month called: > Re: RS232 voltage level converter box > > (trying to figure out what a board with 1488s and 1489s was for) Othrewise known as "What does a MAX233 do really well?" Cheers, Chuck From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Sat Dec 13 03:27:40 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 09:27:40 +0000 Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: <20081212174540.B20361@shell.lmi.net> References: <200812121412.06281.pat@computer-refuge.org>, <277630.70572.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> <49425735.1765.9ECFD2@cclist.sydex.com> <20081212174540.B20361@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <4943800C.1030200@gjcp.net> Fred Cisin wrote: >> On 12 Dec 2008 at 12:10, Vernon Wright wrote: >>> CEO's and such, . . . > > On Fri, 12 Dec 2008, Chuck Guzis wrote: >> Besides, raised floors keeps the rats out of sight... > > How do you get the CEO's and such to stay under those floors? Ketamine and gaffa tape. Gordon From henk.gooijen at hotmail.com Sat Dec 13 05:13:28 2008 From: henk.gooijen at hotmail.com (Henk Gooijen) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 12:13:28 +0100 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: > Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 16:23:00 -0600 > From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com > To: cctalk at classiccmp.org > Subject: Re: 68k homebuilts > > I have a bit of experience with the 68008 and 68000/68010 from the > design end (they were used in various released and unreleased COMBOARD > products) > > ... At 4MHz to 8Mhz, it shouldn't be a problem these days unless you > have a particular VLSI chip you want to use for I/O (6821, 6522, etc.) > and it isn't fast enough. The 68k CPU even provides signals to interface the 6800/6809 era I/O peripheral chips like the ACIA, PIA and PTM. The 68k synchronizes to the E clock when VPA is asserted. The 68k is really easy to use together with SRAM and simple I/O. I have designed one for my StarShip when I discovered that the 6802 was no longer sufficient. In the end, the 68000 was replaced by the pin-compatible 68010 (but the '010 has a different stack frame, so interrupt (exception) processing (in the OS) has to be adapted. And now I am using a VME bus card with an 68020 at 30 MHz. Should pick up that hobby again! So little time, so many (geeky) things to do ... - Henk. From dkelvey at hotmail.com Sat Dec 13 08:50:03 2008 From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 06:50:03 -0800 Subject: Canon Cat was: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: Hi First I'd like to mention that the Canon Cat is an interseting 68K machine. With an assembler written in Forth for the 68K one could even use it to create their code for their home built 68K machine. Behind the Cat's editor is a nice Forth that give one complete access to the Cat's I/O and memory space. It has a bit mapped video as well. It would be a great machine to create code and debug. The ability to attach code words to the Forth makes it an easy way to run code in an environment that is one of the best for experimenting and debugging. One can use the editor to write the code and then assemble and debug using Forth as a debug monitor. A few of us have started a google group specifically for the Canon Cat. It can be found at: http://groups.google.com/group/canon-cat We are new ( a few weeks old ) and are looking for more members. We welcome talk on other related subjects. This includes the Swyft prototype, Apple II's SwyftCard and SwyftWare. Talk on Jef Raskin's concepts of Humane Interface are also welcome. You say, this is all fine but you don't have a Canon Cat and these machines are as rare as hen's teeth. It seems that one has just come up for auction. See: http://www.vintage.org/special/2008/accrc/ The suggested price is not giveaway but reasonable, considering that they have gone for as high as $1800 on ebay. Dwight _________________________________________________________________ Send e-mail anywhere. No map, no compass. http://windowslive.com/Explore/hotmail?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_hotmail_acq_anywhere_122008 From lproven at gmail.com Sat Dec 13 09:14:15 2008 From: lproven at gmail.com (Liam Proven) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 15:14:15 +0000 Subject: The first video game Message-ID: <575131af0812130714s6f942cc6y9d3449a71ea1464@mail.gmail.com> I never knew there was a coin-op Spacewar! http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/12/13/tob_computer_space/print.html -- Liam Proven ? Profile: http://www.linkedin.com/in/liamproven Email: lproven at cix.co.uk ? GMail/GoogleTalk/Orkut: lproven at gmail.com Tel: +44 20-8685-0498 ? Cell: +44 7939-087884 ? Fax: + 44 870-9151419 AOL/AIM/iChat: liamproven at aol.com ? MSN/Messenger: lproven at hotmail.com Yahoo: liamproven at yahoo.co.uk ? Skype: liamproven ? ICQ: 73187508 From witchy at binarydinosaurs.co.uk Sat Dec 13 11:26:13 2008 From: witchy at binarydinosaurs.co.uk (Adrian Graham) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 17:26:13 +0000 Subject: The first video game In-Reply-To: <575131af0812130714s6f942cc6y9d3449a71ea1464@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 13/12/2008 15:14, "Liam Proven" wrote: > I never knew there was a coin-op Spacewar! > > http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/12/13/tob_computer_space/print.html Yep, it was Nolan Bushnell's first foray into video games but didn't get too much money because it was too complicated for the 'average' user. From my own Atari page: " Whilst working at Ampex (creators of the first practical video recorder no less), Nolan Bushnell had already created an arcade video game based on Spacewar, which was a game written by Steve Russell in 1961 for the PDP-1 from Digital Equipment. Nolan's version was called Computer Space and it was being distributed by Nutting Associates. However, it wasn't as popular as he'd have liked (he said you had to read the instructions, and people didn't have the patience!)" -- Adrian/Witchy Binary Dinosaurs creator/curator Www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk - the UK's biggest private home computer collection? From glen.slick at gmail.com Sat Dec 13 11:29:07 2008 From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 09:29:07 -0800 Subject: HP 5036A built in demos Message-ID: <1e1fc3e90812130929i104b9868g816b38060da65a0@mail.gmail.com> Anyone on the list have an HP 5036A microprocessor lab and not have a manual and not know that there are built in demo programs in the monitor ROM? RESET, FETCH ADRS, 0, 5, F, 9, RUN http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73ShZ6zasfs RESET, FETCH ADRS, 0, 5, 3, E, RUN http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSwRafN5BjE RESET, FETCH ADRS, 0, 5, 5, A, RUN http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QNw8h4O_OrQ (turn your speakers on if you watch the videos) From mcguire at neurotica.com Sat Dec 13 11:39:14 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 12:39:14 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <4942EDD4.3090800@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> <4942EDD4.3090800@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <9A2E2660-C006-4666-A9DD-274418CBB8EE@neurotica.com> On Dec 12, 2008, at 6:03 PM, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: >> A simple design with a real 68K processor isn't that hard to whip up >> or debug - in fact not much harder than a simple 6502 or Z80 system. >> SRAM, of course, is simpler to implement than DRAM, but DRAM can be >> easier to expand over a couple of MB (for 1MB or less, I'd stuff in a >> couple of JEDEC RAM sockets for a 16-bit RAM field). Let me amend >> "simple" - simple is peripheral chips and memory that can keep up >> with >> the cycle time of your processor so that you don't have to handle >> wait-states, etc., and can therefore tie DTACK to ground (as >> advocated >> by a famous newsletter, "DTACK Grounded". At 4MHz to 8Mhz, it >> shouldn't be a problem these days unless you have a particular VLSI >> chip you want to use for I/O (6821, 6522, etc.) and it isn't fast >> enough. ROM and RAM that are fast enough shouldn't be an issue, even >> with inexpensive parts. >> >> > Was not that newsletter for a APPLE II, co-processor board? > Did anybody ever use one, or any kind of general purpose co-processor > boards for the PC? I used to use a CP/M board in my XT, back when an 8MHz 8088 was a "real screamer". It had 64KB of onboard memory, and I had a little program that ran from autoexec.bat on the XT which made my DOS- available memory 704KB using that board. It otherwise sat idle when DOS was running. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Sat Dec 13 13:57:01 2008 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 11:57:01 -0800 Subject: The first video game References: <575131af0812130714s6f942cc6y9d3449a71ea1464@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4944138D.5243161C@cs.ubc.ca> Liam Proven wrote: > > I never knew there was a coin-op Spacewar! > > http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/12/13/tob_computer_space/print.html One of the links there eventually ends up here: http://www.computerspacefan.com/BarnFind.htm From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Dec 13 13:57:45 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 19:57:45 +0000 (GMT) Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <4942F75D.6080108@gmail.com> from "Jules Richardson" at Dec 12, 8 05:44:29 pm Message-ID: > > Didn't someone also make Clipper and/or > > Transputer boards for the PC? > > Transputer ones certainly existed; IIRC seeing one (I think it was Inmos > themselves) which supported plug-in TRAM modules at the far end of the board > (I had a photo of it too, but can't find where I've filed it right now) There are certainly transputer boards for the PC. The most common in my experience si the B004, which is am ISA card with a T4 or T8 chip on it, rows of DIP DRAM, the link interface and ISA bus logic and not a lot else. It has the nromal link connectors on the rear bracket so you can hang more transputers off it. There's at least one non-INMOS clone of this board. There was also a TRAM motherboard for the PC. I forget the number (B008?) It has the link interface (with ISA logic) and IIRC a C004 link swithc on it. You can fill it with TRAMs (TRAnsputer Modules, the simplest being transputer + RAM, but ones iwth SCSI, GPIB, ethernet, etc interfaces exist, as does one with a vector processor chip (alongside the transputer). -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Dec 13 13:52:04 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 19:52:04 +0000 (GMT) Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <7d3530220812121409t6da349d1y5343ea5a99fe1b42@mail.gmail.com> from "John Floren" at Dec 12, 8 05:09:51 pm Message-ID: > Well, part of my motivation for doing this is that I'm really an > operating systems guy, so in a perfect world I'd be able to make > something I could hack around with easily. With that in mind, I'm > thinking a serial terminal interface, but also including a front panel > with toggles and lights to play with. It would be really fun to go so > crazy as to do a PDP-11 to the point where I could boot one of the old > OS's, but that may be too ambitious for me at this time (can you even > buy PDP-11 microprocessors anymore?). > > Given my druthers, I'd go with a 32-bit system, but I'm not sure if > that will increase the complexity beyond my abilities. I'm competent Making a 32 bit system is not inherently any harder than making a 16 bit one, there are just more data bus lines to wire up, more RAM/EPROM chips, more bufferes, etc. It ;s worth rememberign at this point that the cirtcuit can be divided into 'data path' and 'control' sectiosn. In this case, 'data path' is the data buffers nas the physical connetions to the chips, which is relatively easy to design, but the number of connections increases with the data width. 'Control' is when to enable those buffers, the chip selects to the RAMs, EPROMs, etc, the DTACK/ generator, and so on. More complesx to design, but essentially independant of data width. > with soldering and ok when it comes to breadboarding; things could > quickly go downhill if I tried to assemble on perfboard since I've > only tried that for very small circuits. The whole process of > assembling a computer system from the chip level is new to me, so any > tips would be appreciated. My reasons for preferring 32-bit is that > the potential capabilities are much greater. I don't want to put you off, bnt I think you might be taking on rather more than you should to start with. Avoid those plugblock-type solderless breadboards. You will have no end of problems from bad connections, and maybe even stray capacitance. Solder it up (or wire wrap it) from the start. You can build it on stripboard (in fact I would recomend against making a PCB for an experimental machine, since you want to be able to change things). My recomentation is that you look at that book I suggested. And possibly uild the machine descried there (if you can get a 68008, are they easy to get now?). The point is, it's an 8 bit bus, with 8K of RAM, or something like that. Easy to wire up. You know the instruction set (I beleive), so you'll have no problems writing simple programs for it. Maybe all you'll do is blink LEDs, detect swtich closeures, that sort of thing. But I can assure you ity's agreat feeling when your homebuilt machine runs a program, no matter how simple. And from building that you'll get skils and confidence to try soemthing bigger. > > What does it take to do video (bitmapped) output, by the way? That > would be especially interesting, in my opinion. A sup[rising amount of logic. Basically you need an area of memory that can be accessed both by the CPU and by the video hardware. Typvially RAM with multiplexers to switch it between the 2 devices. Then counters to scan trhough the RAM, and also generate the video sync signals (take a look at the 6845 chip to have some idea as to what's involved). Read bytes out of RAM into a shift register, shift htem along to make the dot stream, combine it with the syncs to make a composite signal and feed it to the monitor I guess yuo could use an FPGA to house most of the logic, but I find it's easire to debug something like this when I can clip my 'scope or logic analyser onto just about any point in the circuit. -tony From mcguire at neurotica.com Sat Dec 13 14:57:45 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 15:57:45 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <0AB8D9CD-3582-4B51-BE3E-916999375532@neurotica.com> On Dec 13, 2008, at 2:57 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >>> Didn't someone also make Clipper and/or >>> Transputer boards for the PC? >> >> Transputer ones certainly existed; IIRC seeing one (I think it was >> Inmos >> themselves) which supported plug-in TRAM modules at the far end of >> the board >> (I had a photo of it too, but can't find where I've filed it right >> now) > > There are certainly transputer boards for the PC. The most common > in my > experience si the B004, which is am ISA card with a T4 or T8 chip > on it, > rows of DIP DRAM, the link interface and ISA bus logic and not a lot > else. It has the nromal link connectors on the rear bracket so you can > hang more transputers off it. There's at least one non-INMOS clone of > this board. I had a Transputer ISA board (T414) for a while. Brian Hechinger has it now. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From curt at atarimuseum.com Sat Dec 13 15:47:39 2008 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 16:47:39 -0500 Subject: The first video game In-Reply-To: <4944138D.5243161C@cs.ubc.ca> References: <575131af0812130714s6f942cc6y9d3449a71ea1464@mail.gmail.com> <4944138D.5243161C@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: <49442D7B.8030607@atarimuseum.com> Before Computer Space there was Galaxy - which I believe the original MIT breakroom coin-op is now at the Computer Museum. Later on there was an actual coin-op called Space War, MONSTEROUS sized cabinet, all with Star Trek artwork all over it... ah the good old days when you could steal copyrighted work and no one hunted you down to sue you ;-) Curt Brent Hilpert wrote: > Liam Proven wrote: > >> I never knew there was a coin-op Spacewar! >> >> http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/12/13/tob_computer_space/print.html >> > > One of the links there eventually ends up here: > http://www.computerspacefan.com/BarnFind.htm > > From lynchaj at yahoo.com Sat Dec 13 16:20:58 2008 From: lynchaj at yahoo.com (Andrew Lynch) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 17:20:58 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts Message-ID: Hi everyone As a 4th year computer engineering student with a part time job, I definitely have too much time on my hands, so I've been thinking about doing something like building my own computer. I remember playing with the 68k SBCs back in my assembly class, so I thought something from that family might be an interesting choice. It's ambitious, but ideally I'd like to do 16/32 bits and a few megs of memory. Have any of you built something like this? I'm looking for links to project pages, shared experiences, and advice on what processor to use. Reminiscence is welcome too, if you have fond memories of such a thing :) Thanks John Floren -- Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn -----REPLY----- Hi! If you are interested in home brew computing you are welcome to join us on the N8VEM home brew computer project. It is currently Z80 CP/M based but if you would like to explore 6800/6809/68k designs you could design your own SBC and reuse the peripheral board designs we have already. There is an SBC, an ECB backplane, an ECB bus monitor, and an ECB prototyping board available now. There have been 68k based ECB designs in the past although I am not an expert in how those work. As long as it uses +5, GND, Address, Data, and a variety of control bus signals it should work though. A Disk IO board (IDE and NEC765A FDC) and a Terminal Replacement Board (uses VGA monitor & PS/2 keyboard) are in the works. Several builders have projects as well such as a USB & network peripheral (!) which allows running CP/NET. There is another builder with a project that allows wireless serial communications and numerous interfaces to relays, etc. That same builder made an AT keyboard interface and a 20x4 LCD display with NVRAM controller. In short, you could focus on your 68k SBC design while leveraging the peripherals and standard bus components already available. Take it for what it's worth. You can contact me offline if you'd like more information. There are photos, schematics, PCB layouts, ROM images, parts lists, BOMs, and bunch of other stuff on the website. The PCBs are all $20 each. Good luck with your project! Thanks and have a nice day! Andrew Lynch http://groups.google.com/group/n8vem http://n8vem-sbc.pbwiki.com/ From cclist at sydex.com Sat Dec 13 16:25:55 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 14:25:55 -0800 Subject: The first video game In-Reply-To: <49442D7B.8030607@atarimuseum.com> References: <575131af0812130714s6f942cc6y9d3449a71ea1464@mail.gmail.com>, <4944138D.5243161C@cs.ubc.ca>, <49442D7B.8030607@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <4943C5F3.28669.112AE3C@cclist.sydex.com> On 13 Dec 2008 at 16:47, Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > Before Computer Space there was Galaxy - which I believe the original > MIT breakroom coin-op is now at the Computer Museum. Later on there > was an actual coin-op called Space War, MONSTEROUS sized cabinet, all > with Star Trek artwork all over it... ah the good old days when you > could steal copyrighted work and no one hunted you down to sue you ;-) Anyone know when the racecar coin-op game went in at Andy Capp's in Sunnyvale during the 1970's? Cheers, Chuck From coredump at gifford.co.uk Sat Dec 13 17:00:07 2008 From: coredump at gifford.co.uk (John Honniball) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 23:00:07 +0000 Subject: INMOS boards (was: 68k homebuilts) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <49443E77.8070604@gifford.co.uk> Tony Duell wrote: > There are certainly transputer boards for the PC. The most common in my > experience si the B004, which is am ISA card with a T4 or T8 chip on it, > rows of DIP DRAM, the link interface and ISA bus logic and not a lot > else. All that DIP RAM was usually 2Mbytes so that you could run the occam compiler in it. Remember, this was in the days of 640k PC memories. > It has the nromal link connectors on the rear bracket so you can > hang more transputers off it. There's at least one non-INMOS clone of > this board. It used 0.1-inch Berg connectors, which were notorious for falling out when you least expected it. > There was also a TRAM motherboard for the PC. I forget the number > (B008?) Yes, the TRAM motherboard for the ISA bus was the B008. > It has the link interface (with ISA logic) and IIRC a C004 link > swithc on it. You can fill it with TRAMs (TRAnsputer Modules, the > simplest being transputer + RAM, but ones iwth SCSI, GPIB, ethernet, etc > interfaces exist, as does one with a vector processor chip (alongside the > transputer). The Zoran chip? Anyway, the so-called BOO boards were (as best I can remember them): B001: Single Rev.A transputer and SRAM on ITEM card B002: Single Rev.A transputer and 2Mb DRAM on ITEM card B003: Four transputers and RAM, on an ITEM card B004: Transputer and DRAM on ISA card B005: M212 disk transputer with MFM hard disk and floppy disk B006: Early TRAM demo board with T212 TRAMs B007: transputer with VRAM, 6545 and G170 palette chip, ITEM card B008: TRAM motherboard for ISA bus B009: A100 DSP chips on ISA card B010: NEC PC version of B004 (?) B011: TRAM motherboard in ITEM card format (?) B012: VME card with transputer and memory B013: Never built! B014: TRAM motherboard (with C011 and C004) for VME bus B015: NEC PC version of B008 (?) B016: VME bus master card with T801 transputer B017: TRAM motherboard on MCA card for PS/2 hosts B018: Special TRAM motherboard for B300 B019: Special differential link I/O board for B300 B020: Transputer with SIMM memory and G332 graphics chip B042: 6x7 array of transputers for burn-in, used in-house The ITEM (INMOS Transputer Evauation Module) was a sub-rack holding a dozen or so extended-Eurocard-sized boards. The B300 was the ethernet gateway, with four differential links accessible via TCP/IP. I worked for INMOS 1989-1994, writing drivers for some of these boards. -- John Honniball coredump at gifford.co.uk From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Sat Dec 13 17:05:02 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 17:05:02 -0600 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <49443F9E.8080008@gmail.com> Tony Duell wrote: >> Given my druthers, I'd go with a 32-bit system, but I'm not sure if >> that will increase the complexity beyond my abilities. I'm competent > > Making a 32 bit system is not inherently any harder than making a 16 bit > one, there are just more data bus lines to wire up, more RAM/EPROM chips, > more bufferes, etc. Agreed - it's likely to be more of a pain in the backside due to the amount of wiring, but shouldn't necessarily be any more complex (at least if using SRAM for memory - I've seen some really convoluted DRAM refresh designs for CPUs of 16 or more data bits) > Avoid those plugblock-type solderless breadboards. You will have no end > of problems from bad connections, and maybe even stray capacitance. I've heard of people having no problems with 8 bit CPUs, but I'm sure it does become an issue at some stage - maybe even for an 8MHz or so 68k. > Solder it up (or wire wrap it) from the start. You can build it on > stripboard (in fact I would recomend against making a PCB for an > experimental machine, since you want to be able to change things). One of the things that's kept putting me off doing this myself over the years is actually *how* to best tackle the design phase. I'm not sure what the best technology is to use (given the large amount of interconnects), but then I've never tried wirewrap before. > (if you can get a 68008, are they easy to get now?) Were they ever? I've got two 68008 ICs (one in the Cumana copro for a BBC micro, and one in a STE-bus board) and those are the only two I've ever come across. Compare that to a healthy pile of Z80 and 68000 (and '010 etc.) processors... I'm not sure they ever really saw much widespread use (actually, what commercial machines used them other than the Sinclair QL?) >> What does it take to do video (bitmapped) output, by the way? That >> would be especially interesting, in my opinion. > > A sup[rising amount of logic. Way back I had some sort of RS232-capable graphics box called Pluto - I believe the idea was that you could send it graphics primitive commands via RS232 and it'd render them on a suitable display (I think it was VGA, but it's been so long now). Whilst that's not quite what the OP's after, I think there's some potential there in that a modern PC with a serial port could be initially and quickly used to do that task, with the 'real' hardware built later. (I suspect it's the route I would take, purely as offloading the graphics ability elsewhere seems to have a certain 'cool factor' about it :-) > Basically you need an area of memory that > can be accessed both by the CPU and by the video hardware. Typvially RAM > with multiplexers to switch it between the 2 devices. I think quite a few systems did it on the falling edge of the clock signal, didn't they? i.e. the memory was only accessed by the CPU on the rising edge, so (if fast enough) was essentially free on a falling edge. Elegant, but probably hell to debug and get working as a first project (particular if DRAM refresh is thrown in there) cheers Jules From slawmaster at gmail.com Sat Dec 13 17:20:29 2008 From: slawmaster at gmail.com (John Floren) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 18:20:29 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <49443F9E.8080008@gmail.com> References: <49443F9E.8080008@gmail.com> Message-ID: <7d3530220812131520j49e63683s215b382336ea4df7@mail.gmail.com> On Sat, Dec 13, 2008 at 6:05 PM, Jules Richardson wrote: > Tony Duell wrote: >> (if you can get a 68008, are they easy to get now?) > > Were they ever? I've got two 68008 ICs (one in the Cumana copro for a BBC > micro, and one in a STE-bus board) and those are the only two I've ever come > across. Compare that to a healthy pile of Z80 and 68000 (and '010 etc.) > processors... > > I'm not sure they ever really saw much widespread use (actually, what > commercial machines used them other than the Sinclair QL?) > After doing some looking I thought I'd go with 68020 if I were to do 32-bit, or 68000 for 16-bit. I may take Tony's excellent advice and try something even simpler first, if I can get my hands on the Art of Electronics books... they're on Amazon, I'll probably just have to buckle down and shell out the money. John -- Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Sat Dec 13 17:27:40 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 18:27:40 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <4942EDD4.3090800@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> <4942EDD4.3090800@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: On 12/12/08, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > Ethan Dicks wrote: > > > A simple design with a real 68K processor isn't that hard to whip up > > or debug... tie DTACK to ground (as advocated > > by a famous newsletter, "DTACK Grounded"...) > > > Was not that newsletter for a APPLE II, co-processor board? Yes. That was the basic product, but the newsletter has lots of 68K design info. > Did anybody ever use one, or any kind of general purpose co-processor > boards for the PC? Not me, but I remember such things existed for a while in the days before the 486 was dominant. -ethan From ploopster at gmail.com Sat Dec 13 17:50:30 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 18:50:30 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <7d3530220812131520j49e63683s215b382336ea4df7@mail.gmail.com> References: <49443F9E.8080008@gmail.com> <7d3530220812131520j49e63683s215b382336ea4df7@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <49444A46.6060300@gmail.com> John Floren wrote: > After doing some looking I thought I'd go with 68020 if I were to do > 32-bit, or 68000 for 16-bit. I may take Tony's excellent advice and > try something even simpler first, if I can get my hands on the Art of > Electronics books... they're on Amazon, I'll probably just have to > buckle down and shell out the money. My vote is for processor-from-scratch. Designing and building a simple RISC architecture into a CPLD is still one of the most fun exercises I've ever undertaken. BTW, my machine runs FORTH. Most of the FORTH environment consists of, as has been suggested as a good method, off-the-shelf FORTH primitives written in FORTH. Peace... Sridhar From ploopster at gmail.com Sat Dec 13 17:51:47 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 18:51:47 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> <4942EDD4.3090800@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <49444A93.60400@gmail.com> Ethan Dicks wrote: >> Did anybody ever use one, or any kind of general purpose co-processor >> boards for the PC? > > Not me, but I remember such things existed for a while in the days > before the 486 was dominant. I seem to remember something about co-processor boards with i860 chips on them? Peace... Sridhar From wdonzelli at gmail.com Sat Dec 13 18:00:40 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 19:00:40 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <49443F9E.8080008@gmail.com> References: <49443F9E.8080008@gmail.com> Message-ID: > > (if you can get a 68008, are they easy to get now?) > > > > Were they ever? I've got two 68008 ICs (one in the Cumana copro for a BBC > micro, and one in a STE-bus board) and those are the only two I've ever come > across. Compare that to a healthy pile of Z80 and 68000 (and '010 etc.) > processors... > > I'm not sure they ever really saw much widespread use (actually, what > commercial machines used them other than the Sinclair QL?) 68008 was reasonably popular in the embedded world. The chips are really not hard to get in the US. -- Will From wdonzelli at gmail.com Sat Dec 13 18:03:36 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 19:03:36 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <49444A93.60400@gmail.com> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> <4942EDD4.3090800@jetnet.ab.ca> <49444A93.60400@gmail.com> Message-ID: > I seem to remember something about co-processor boards with i860 chips on > them? Yes, RCS has some of those kicking around. Quite some time back I used an OCR package on a 486 that used the AMD 29K PeeCee development board for the horsepower. -- Will From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Sat Dec 13 18:19:55 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 19:19:55 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <7d3530220812121447g37e4babak479d5b1314eb78a@mail.gmail.com> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> <7d3530220812121447g37e4babak479d5b1314eb78a@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 12/12/08, John Floren wrote: > On Fri, Dec 12, 2008 at 5:23 PM, Ethan Dicks wrote: > > I have a bit of experience with the 68008 and 68000/68010 from the > > design end (they were used in various released and unreleased COMBOARD > > products)... . . . > Thanks for the info You bet. > Can you, ethan, or anyone else point me to a good source of 68k > processors? I don't know about 68008s, those weren't common, even 20 years ago, but 68000s should be available from the usual sources we trade here - BG Micro or Unicorn. The actual MC68000 hasn't been made in 12 years, apparently, but I know where a several dozen could be located quickly ;-) Freescale, as you've already discovered, would be the likely source of the newer MCUs with a 68K core. > It seems that they were good enough for the early Sun > workstations, so they should be good enough for me ;) Their widespread > use and the resulting information available should be useful too. I'd > be interested in one of the MCUs you mentioned... were you thinking of > stuff like Freescale's ColdFire? Those look cheap and I may be able to > sample one for free... Yep. > To answer your other questions: I plan to use terminals (I've got a > vt-220 and an ADM-3A lying around, might as well use them). Easy enough, then. > Framebuffer would be nice but it's probably a difficult goal. Framebuffers, unless you were planning on reusing an existing component, say and ISA video card, can be fiddly to work with. Simple textual video, as with a 6845, isn't too bad (but have a look at a late-model PET schematic to see what sort of support logic is needed), and since there's no character ROM, a straight bits-to-pixels "framebuffer" isn't hard in and of itself, but then you have to work up graphics primitives and font routines to see any results (and video logic is always full of timing issues no matter how you implement it). > I'd like > to implement some kind of storage, yes, and since floppies are kinda a > pain, I guess IDE or CF would be a good choice if it's not too much > work. It's easy to support PATA and CF cards - there are designs out there for plenty of microprocessors, and with the 68000, you have a 16- bit data bus, which is the native size of the PATA bus, simplifying that interface (to a small handful of chips, really). > As for networking... depends on how easy it is to put in. It > seems that other people have done ethernet on homebuilt boxes, so that > might be possible, or maybe PPP/SLIP to one of my other boxes? There are encapsulated Ethernet modules for embedded computing now, or some of the 68K MCUs have a serial port that's fast enough to bitbang-out 10Mbps Ethernet (I have something like that in a network appliance called a WebRamp - runs OS68K, has some form of 68302 or 68306 and a 10BaseT media converter). I'm sure the software end of that design isn't simple, but the hardware end is. -ethan From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Sat Dec 13 19:30:39 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 18:30:39 -0700 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <49444A46.6060300@gmail.com> References: <49443F9E.8080008@gmail.com> <7d3530220812131520j49e63683s215b382336ea4df7@mail.gmail.com> <49444A46.6060300@gmail.com> Message-ID: <494461BF.9020707@jetnet.ab.ca> Sridhar Ayengar wrote: > John Floren wrote: >> After doing some looking I thought I'd go with 68020 if I were to do >> 32-bit, or 68000 for 16-bit. I may take Tony's excellent advice and >> try something even simpler first, if I can get my hands on the Art of >> Electronics books... they're on Amazon, I'll probably just have to >> buckle down and shell out the money. > > My vote is for processor-from-scratch. Designing and building a > simple RISC architecture into a CPLD is still one of the most fun > exercises I've ever undertaken. > > BTW, my machine runs FORTH. Most of the FORTH environment consists > of, as has been suggested as a good method, off-the-shelf FORTH > primitives written in FORTH. > > Peace... Sridhar > How do you have RISC from a CPLD since RISC implies a large register stack? Live long and prosper ... Spock From frustum at pacbell.net Sat Dec 13 20:17:41 2008 From: frustum at pacbell.net (Jim Battle) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 20:17:41 -0600 Subject: WangEmu 2.1 released Message-ID: <49446CC5.6090406@pacbell.net> A new version of my Wang 2200 emulator, version 2.1, was just released after a three year snooze: http://www.wang2200.org/emu.html This version runs on Win XP/Vista, PPC OS X, or i386 OS X. Full source code is included. The big changes are support for large format disk geometries due to emulation of the intelligent disk controller protocol, 2200B mode, the ability to print directly to the parallel port, and a massive code clean up. Release notes: http://www.wang2200.org/emu/relnotes_2.1.txt From ploopster at gmail.com Sat Dec 13 21:33:35 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 22:33:35 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <494461BF.9020707@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <49443F9E.8080008@gmail.com> <7d3530220812131520j49e63683s215b382336ea4df7@mail.gmail.com> <49444A46.6060300@gmail.com> <494461BF.9020707@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <49447E8F.1040202@gmail.com> bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > Sridhar Ayengar wrote: >> John Floren wrote: >>> After doing some looking I thought I'd go with 68020 if I were to do >>> 32-bit, or 68000 for 16-bit. I may take Tony's excellent advice and >>> try something even simpler first, if I can get my hands on the Art of >>> Electronics books... they're on Amazon, I'll probably just have to >>> buckle down and shell out the money. >> >> My vote is for processor-from-scratch. Designing and building a >> simple RISC architecture into a CPLD is still one of the most fun >> exercises I've ever undertaken. >> >> BTW, my machine runs FORTH. Most of the FORTH environment consists >> of, as has been suggested as a good method, off-the-shelf FORTH >> primitives written in FORTH. >> >> Peace... Sridhar >> > How do you have RISC from a CPLD since RISC implies a large register stack? Not necessarily. That's one possible advantage of a RISC design, but it isn't necessary in order to be a RISC. Peace... Sridhar From joachim.thiemann at gmail.com Sat Dec 13 23:45:41 2008 From: joachim.thiemann at gmail.com (Joachim Thiemann) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 00:45:41 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <7d3530220812131520j49e63683s215b382336ea4df7@mail.gmail.com> References: <49443F9E.8080008@gmail.com> <7d3530220812131520j49e63683s215b382336ea4df7@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4affc5e0812132145i49ece021wea3ca114e6bd88b8@mail.gmail.com> On Sat, Dec 13, 2008 at 6:20 PM, John Floren wrote: > After doing some looking I thought I'd go with 68020 if I were to do > 32-bit, or 68000 for 16-bit. I may take Tony's excellent advice and > try something even simpler first, if I can get my hands on the Art of > Electronics books... they're on Amazon, I'll probably just have to > buckle down and shell out the money. The 68020 can actually run with a 8-bit data bus. See Motorola Application Note AN1015, "68020 Minimum System Configuration", I have it in my copy of the 16/32-bit Applications Manual, DL409/D. If you can't find it on-line, I could scan it next week some time. Joe. -- Joachim Thiemann :: http://www.tsp.ece.mcgill.ca/~jthiem From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Sat Dec 13 23:54:21 2008 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 21:54:21 -0800 (PST) Subject: radio shack catalogs Message-ID: Someone on comp.os.cpm pointed this out. I don't recall anyone doing so here. http://www.radioshackcatalogs.com/. Mmm... Fond memories of when Radio Shack didn't stink. -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? From innfoclassics at gmail.com Sun Dec 14 01:02:06 2008 From: innfoclassics at gmail.com (Paxton Hoag) Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 23:02:06 -0800 Subject: 9 DEC H-500 Trainers on Epay Message-ID: Spotted on ebay... DEC H-500 computer logic trainers. I thiink it is a reasonable price and there is the chance to make an offer. Front panels look PDP-8 vintage. http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=200279483013 No connection with the seller, just spotted what I hope is an interesting item. Pax -- Paxton Hoag Astoria, OR USA From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Sun Dec 14 02:51:07 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 03:51:07 -0500 Subject: 9 DEC H-500 Trainers on Epay In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 12/14/08, Paxton Hoag wrote: > Spotted on ebay... > DEC H-500 computer logic trainers. > > I thiink it is a reasonable price and there is the chance to make an > offer. Front panels look PDP-8 vintage. The switches are the same style as the -8/i. > http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=200279483013 Thanks for pointing this out. I've had the student handbook since I was in Jr. High (a gift from my step-dad's mother who was a school teacher), and have wanted the logic trainer since. One of the last ones I was considering buying was $175-$200, and I couldn't afford it. These are, IMO, quite reasonable. As of my purchase, there are 6 left. One issue, though... I don't see any plug-in wires in the photo nor do I expect any will arrive with the unit. Does anyone have any idea what they originally looked like? Lengths? Pin type/size? I'm anticipating having to hand-make a bunch of these. -ethan From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Tue Dec 9 10:17:47 2008 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 11:17:47 -0500 (EST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" atDec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <200812091631.LAA16674@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> >> Sigh. You'd think if they actually wanted to make the documentation >> _usable_, they'd make it plain text. Apparently glitz wins out over >> usability once again. > PDFs are _usable_ enough. For you. Bully for you. (They're even usable _enough_ for me; as I said later, the costs of using PDFs are costs I'm willing to invest for a good chip. It's just there are other forms they could have provided the information in which would be substantially less costly for me.) > Things change and progress. How would you include drawings on ASCII? > Using ASCII ART?!?! See my other message in this thread. > Wake up, 2008 is now! Exactly the mindset that makes them use PDFs. They'd rather have something that looks slick and glitzy and "2008" even at the price of impairing usability (probably because "everybody" prefers PDFs, which actually means that either they're living in a fantasy world or they just don't care about the people who don't). >> Perhaps I should revisit them - do you happen to have a pointer to >> the instruction set documentation handy? (I perhaps could find it, >> eventually, but the Web searches that appear to be everybody else's >> - and in particular companies' - idea of easy-to-find > Heloo-ooow? :oD I'm not sure what you mean by this. Perhaps you don't believe me when I say that digging stuff up on the Web is difficult and unpleasant for me, perhaps because it isn't for you? > www.atmel.com - microcontrollers, atmel 8-bit risc, docs, > http://www.atmel.com/dyn/resources/prod_documents/doc0856.pdf Thank you. That's what I was looking for. >> I assume they're more of those damned PDFs, meaning hours spent >> extracting the information from them into a form that's actually >> usable, but that's an overhead cost I'm willing to invest [...] > ?!? I just load it and read...What else is needed? :oO Converting it into a usable form. This means me reading the printed pages (or spending even longer reading it under even less pleasant circumstances on-screen, which occasionally doesn't even work) and generating, myself, some of the text files I wish they had provided in the first place. /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Tue Dec 9 10:32:03 2008 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 11:32:03 -0500 (EST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <1c8201c959f1$e10f5a80$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: , <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> <1c8201c959f1$e10f5a80$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <200812091633.LAA16715@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> >> Compared to the price of admission fee for, say, FPGA, it's a real >> bargain. > You can program xilinx and altera FPGAs for less than $20 if you have > a parallel port. Do a search on "byteblaster" and be happy :) I thought they required proprietary binary-only software (which runs only under Windows, of course) to generate the data in the first place (which is a much higher cost, at least for me, than a little hardware). Am I wrong? Perhaps I should be looking into FPGAs too. /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From steerex at ccvn.com Tue Dec 9 13:29:37 2008 From: steerex at ccvn.com (Steve Robertson) Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 14:29:37 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Dec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <1228850977.3875.9.camel@host-72-250-236-64.ccvn.com> > Here, for example, is one parallel-port in-circuit programmer for the > AVR: > > http://wiredworld.tripod.com/tronics/atmel_isp.html > > It is by no means the simplest, requiring one 74HCT245 to work. If > you want to write your own programming software, the manual documents > the protocol. A few years ago, I bought a STK500 development board for around $70 US. For anyone wants to tinker with ATMEL micros without doing a bunch of breadboarding, they are worth every penny. I think the software could use a little polish though. For instance, I have been unable to set up the page length when printing source code to my dot matrix printer and it prints a header on every page. I find that annoying. I was also hoping to make it run on Wine under Linux so I wouldn't have to set up another development environment but, haven't had any success (yet). See ya, SteveRob From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Tue Dec 9 13:40:21 2008 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 14:40:21 -0500 (EST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <46DB449D-BD40-40C9-82B7-74D9F20C5751@neurotica.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" atDec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <46DB449D-BD40-40C9-82B7-74D9F20C5751@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <200812091942.OAA00896@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> >>> [...PDFs...] >> searching > Trivial with free and non-free tools, I do it all the time. Which tools? The only open PDF reader I know of is ghostscript, and it doesn't do searching as far as I can tell. Which one am I missing? >> being able to make changes without needing special Adobe software > [W]hy would you want to make changes to a component datasheet? To integrate your hand-scribbled notes so they're there next time you look at it? /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Tue Dec 9 09:50:55 2008 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 10:50:55 -0500 (EST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493E4C49.5010102@gjcp.net> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Dec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <493E4C49.5010102@gjcp.net> Message-ID: <200812091600.LAA16318@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> >> Sigh. You'd think if they actually wanted to make the documentation >> _usable_, they'd make it plain text. Apparently glitz wins out over >> usability once again. > I don't see any way of making a usable plain-text manual. How would > you get the diagrams to work? Little ASCII-art squiggles? What diagrams? I haven't, obviously, seen the atmega* manuals. But the Freescale chip I did end up with I've seen the doc file for, and I don't think there's anything there that would be difficult to do in plain text, with the possible exception of a few schematics. Those, I see three options for: (1) use ascii-art (I've done schematics that way often enough); (2) accompanying image files; (3) describe in text instead of drawing schematics (none of them are at all complicated). I certainly would prefer text-file doc with any of those options to a PDF. > This is actually what PDF is *designed* for. So? Just because X was designed to do Y does not, per se, mean X is the best, or even a particularly good, way to do Y. /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Tue Dec 9 10:10:40 2008 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 11:10:40 -0500 (EST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493E7240.7000504@gmail.com> References: <0d2601c958a2$1e0fada0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <200812072152.QAA22128@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <493E7240.7000504@gmail.com> Message-ID: <200812091614.LAA16555@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> >>> I have a WORKABLE and PLEASURE TO USE copy of windows XP. >> How did you get it out of reverse video? > Mono display and a little inverter on the video signal? :-) (I'm > actually curious as to how that'd look, now) Horrible, I expect. I've usd the software equivalent in two contexts, and it was horrible each time. (One was on Lisp Machines back in the '80s, with 1bpp displays; the other was relatively recently, on a Macbook I was flirting with for a few days.) /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Tue Dec 9 14:38:47 2008 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 15:38:47 -0500 (EST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493ECCFC.5030700@jbrain.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" atDec 6, 8 04:05:19 pm, <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <493ECCFC.5030700@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <200812092104.QAA01551@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> > However, for documentation, I still believe PDF has advantages, if > one wants to print the documentation out. It doubtless does. It also has disadvantages. Personally, the major disadvantage is how involved it is to turn a PDF into something that can be thrown at a printer. Text is easy; PDFs are..more involved. (I've tried using pdf2ps and got such uniformly crappy results that I now render all the way to bitmaps and pnmtops them. Slow and disk-hungry, but it produces good enough quality for 9up printouts to be usable.) > Still, on the specific topic (datasheets), text is just not > appropriate. Strongly disagree. I often end up (manually) processing the (printed) PDF into a text file, which I then use for whatever it is I'm doing. >> searching > Most of the PDF readers have search. As I mentioned upthread, the only open PDF reader I know of is ghostscript. Does it do search and I just haven't figured out how, or is there a better one I just don't know about, or what? If there are others I want to at least consider them, even if I decide (for example) that they involve too many dependcies, or have a UI I can't stand.... >> not having to run multiple megabytes through a dial-up line to get a >> few pages of text > I'm not sure how any format besides straight text will solve this, Exactly. > and the text conversion will lose important information from these > files. Like what? Manufacturer logos?? I keep seeing this claimed. It's definitely not true for most, in many case all, of the information in the data sheets I've seen. (Unless it's done badly, of course, but anything looks bad if it's done badly.) > Sorry, I don't buy it. You don't have to. PDFs annoy me, and apparently others, because they are inconvenient for us. Your agreement - or even understanding - is irrelevant to that. > Thus, I can't accept that a mere format issue is of any concern to > the members of this list. It concerns me, and apparently others. Your acceptance or lack thereof of that fact - and it is a fact - is of no relevance as far as I can see. Your inability to get your head around our circumstances, preferences, whatever, is not _our_ problem. > Text is no longer the document format of choice, it's PDF. Choice of chip makers, yes. That's where we came in. PDFs are an inconvenient delivery format for documentation for some people, such as me. There probably are a few cases where there isn't anything better, but certainly for the stuff I've seen - including a lot of chip data sheets; I've got well over an inch of printed data sheets - I'm having trouble thinking of anything that text wouldn't do almost as well for, and damn few it wouldn't do better for. It's certainly more portable - the number of systems that can handle plain text but not PDFs, while small as a percentage of total systems in use, is substantially greater than the converse. /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Tue Dec 9 15:06:04 2008 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 16:06:04 -0500 (EST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <493ED414.2080500@jbrain.com> References: <493ED414.2080500@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <200812092123.QAA01692@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> > I know it all makes sense from your point of view, but I'd ask that > you at least consider my viewpoint. Okay, let's take this a piece at a time. > As an Architect in a Fortune 500 company, I see many developers come > into our environment and promptly start wreaking havoc by writing > their own solutions for things already available: > * [...] Yes, some apps are horrid, but in this environment, it's > often better to demand better quality from the vendor than try > to re-implement and support an internal app. And what do you use in the meantime? I went through my larval phase under VMS in the '80s. We submitted numerous bug reports (SPRs, they called them) to DEC. The only one we ever got anything at all back in response to was one which was my own mistake. No fixes. No patches. Not even an acknowledgement that the problems were problems. Later, I worked on a project with JPL, under SunOS (this was before Solaris). They'd bought the right to access internal support techs at Sun. By the time we had to call them, it almost every case (I think every case, but it was long enough memory is going fuzzy) we knew the relevant part of the system better than the tech we spoke with did. I am deeply cynical about vendor support. With reason, I believe. > * They don't want to learn how to use an established app. In my > opinion, the quality of a developer is his willingness to > understand an environment he/she did not create. That doesn't sound much like a develoepr to me. Developers develop; understanding others' work is more an attribute of users and maintainers. > Doing this denies an established project the resources of a great > developer (the GCC team could use some good assembler/compiler > developers to push that platform ahead for all of us), I've tried. The gcc people do not appear to be interested in any of the things I've done to gcc. Furthermore, speaking of it this way betrays a paid-developer mentality, which is severely inappropriate for volunteer projects like gcc: the project does not have the resources of the developer in the sense that an employer does, the sense of being able to call on them at will for whatever the project wants done. I write code becayse I enjoy writing code. If it's useful to me, that's a substantial benefit (and there are enough things to write for which I want the functionality that the issue of having nothing useful to write doesn't arise). If it's useful to others, that's even more of a benefit. But it is not nearly as much fun for me to fetch something from somewhere else and wade in with a machete to make it build for me as it is to build my own. At work, I'm much readier to install a prerolled package than I am at home; the tradeoffs are very different. Again, this comes back to the difference between the paid-developer mentality which you as "an Architect in a Fortune 500 company" presumably (and reasonably) exhibit at work, and the volunteer-developer world that is far better represented on this list. /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Tue Dec 9 16:58:35 2008 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse) Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 17:58:35 -0500 (EST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <18750.60038.779922.194042@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <493ECCFC.5030700@jbrain.com> <493EDF40.7070807@gmail.com> <18750.60038.779922.194042@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> Message-ID: <200812092300.SAA02673@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> > In other words, PDF is like PS except that it isn't supposed to be > machine dependent (which PS tends to be). PS isn't supposed to be machine dependent either. In fact it rather goes out of its way to make it difficult to be machine dependent, unless you just punt and use nonstandard words defined idiosyncratically by the PS engine you're using. /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Wed Dec 10 10:35:34 2008 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 11:35:34 -0500 (EST) Subject: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com> Message-ID: <200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> > IMHO, I think PDF is wonderful. It does a far better job than HTML > at rendering documents. Indeed it does. If good-looking results is what I want, I'll pick PDF over plain text every time. (I don't see what HTML has to do with it.) But the job of datasheets is not to look pretty; it's to transmit information usably. > It's an open standard. ...which, apparently, most PDF creaters don't follow. I can't remember the last time I looked at PDF for which ghostscript didn't give me its "please notify the author of the code that produced this that it's not conforming to Adobe's published spec" warning. In at least one of those cases, it was an Adobe application - or, at least, the application name string claimed it was. It's also something like 600 pages; I question whether more than a dozen people in the world grok more than tiny fractions of it. > How do you italicize, underline or bold with plain text? You don't, of course. The point is to transmit useful information, not get pretty markup. (The point of datasheets, at least.) > Yes, PDFs can be evil, you can prevent the end user from modifying, > copying, or printing the document. No, you can't. You can just make it a little more difficult. > Yes, while working at a hedge fund many years ago, I saw that someone > had written a DRM plug in for Acrobat (and Acrobat only at that) that > locked down documents for viewing only by specific machines. Can't be done against a determined and skilled adversary; whatever the application is using to check the machine identity can be fooled, if necessary by a complete hardware emulation. The only way to get even very close to this is to encrypt everything all the way through to the display, and that depends on embedding a computer (with encryption keys kept in tamper-"proof" hardware) in the display. Once the keys leak (which they will, eventually), anything the in-display computer can do, the attacker's software can do. > Blaming the tools is silly. Nobody is forcing anyone to use a hammer > with to nail a screw, especially when screwdrivers exist. I'm not blaming the tool. I'm blaming the chip makers for using the tool inappropriately. PDFs are fine for cases where presentation is important compared to content. Chip datasheets are not such a case. /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From bqt at softjar.se Wed Dec 10 12:23:25 2008 From: bqt at softjar.se (Johnny Billquist) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 19:23:25 +0100 Subject: Source for MMJ cables. In-Reply-To: <200812101800.mBAI0FDq095288@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812101800.mBAI0FDq095288@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <4940091D.6090602@softjar.se> tiggerlasv at aim.com wrote: > I don't have a source for MMJ cables, > but I do have a US/Domestic source for MMP's > (the offset modular connectors). . . > > http://www.gruber.com/GruberInd/pg.asp?FeatureID=38 > > They are .14 / each for flat cable, and .41 / each for round cable. > Last I checked, they don't ship internationally. > > > There are two different styles of DecConnect cables; > both inverted, and not inverted.?? The only difference > of course, is that one connector is flipped on one end. Correct. And excellent info. > When used with genuine DEC adapters, one?style worked > for printers (DCE), and the other style worked with terminals (DTE). Um. No. :-) Both printers, terminals and computers are DTE. DTE means data terminal (or terminating) equipment, while DCE means data communcation equipment. A typical DCE is a modem. DEC was one of the few companies that actually got this right, and made cables and connectors that actually followed the standard (well, until the switched to MMJ anyway, which was a standard of it's own). If just every computer manufacturer had read the specs, the world would have been much nicer, but what can one expect from companies who just didn't put in the effort because of money and lockins (most anyone), or just was too big to even bother (IBM). The other company I know of who was pretty good at actually following the RS-232 standard is HP. > Back in the early 90's, our office used uVax 2000's, > connected to VT220's. along with various printers, > connected using DEC MMJ <> DB25 adapters. > You couldn't simply swap the DecConnect cables > because of the inverted MMP's on some of the cables. > All of our cabling and adapters were unmodified DEC products. Well, which adapter worked was obviously based on which cable you had. :-) You still got four combinations, two of which would make you happy. Johnny From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Wed Dec 10 20:42:27 2008 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 21:42:27 -0500 (EST) Subject: PDF (Was: something irrelevant given the thread's migration) In-Reply-To: <49405F4F.1060309@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <49405D35.6090707@jbrain.com> <49405F4F.1060309@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <200812110243.VAA15490@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> > SIX BIT ASCII IS STILL FINE Um, if it's only six bits, it ain't ASCII; ASCII is a seven-bit code. (It may be a half-size subset of ASCII....) /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From ajp166 at bellatlantic.net Wed Dec 10 21:33:04 2008 From: ajp166 at bellatlantic.net (Allison) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 22:33:04 -0500 Subject: PDF (Was: something irrelevant given the thread's migration) Message-ID: <0KBP00CSD0F4UHF0@vms173007.mailsrvcs.net> > >Subject: Re: PDF (Was: something irrelevant given the thread's migration) > From: "bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca" > Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 17:31:11 -0700 > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > >Jim Brain wrote: >> >> Can't go with the "TXT FOREVAR" folks, though. >SIX BIT ASCII IS STILL FINE --- LOOK AT ALL THE >RARE L@@K ADS ON EBAY! >> And to your other point, to be consistent, I must concur. It's a >> hobby, and anything goes. I was only asking that a disclaimer be >> applied, since the difference between "I code this up on my own >> because it's a hobby and I think it's fun" and "I don't trust >> pre-written apps and you should not either. Write them yourself all >> times" is sometimes hard to distinguish. >> >> Jim >> >Any good leads as am still looking for a small boot strapable langauge >here. Tiny C will not work >as my instruction set does NOT have register to register operations. I >plan to have a wopping >48Kb system as that was BIG memory 1975 ish. I'd suggest Tiny Basic as a starting point. If you need less than that how about a machine level monitor like ODT? Generally that's where I've started for any machine, some form of keyboard monitor. It's also a starting point for IO that can be used by more sophisticated software or a language. Allison > > From chrism3667 at yahoo.com Thu Dec 11 15:46:05 2008 From: chrism3667 at yahoo.com (Chris M) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 13:46:05 -0800 (PST) Subject: IBM 5110 Message-ID: <459389.46162.qm@web65514.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> is it likely I'd be able to read disks from this system on one of the following (all equipped w/8" floppy drives): IBM System 23/Datamaster Canon AS-100 NEC APC From ajp166 at bellatlantic.net Thu Dec 11 17:40:32 2008 From: ajp166 at bellatlantic.net (Allison) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 18:40:32 -0500 Subject: Bootstrappable language Message-ID: <0KBQ003MHKDHL5A0@vms173005.mailsrvcs.net> > >Subject: Re: Bootstrappable language > From: "bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca" > Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 12:27:12 -0700 > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > >Dave Dunfield wrote: >> You don't need register to register operations to support a C compiler. >> >> Can you provide any details of your architecture and instruction set? >> >> It might be feasable to make a port of my Micro-C toolset to it... If >> not, it might be feasable to make a port of "C-flea" a virtual machine >> I designed specifically to support Micro-C (I've supported some pretty >> weird architectures by employing C-flea). >> >The architecture is like I said before a stretched PDP-8, with a >512 byte direct addressing range and more compleate set of alu operations. >I am exploring the idea that 18 bits is still the best size word size >for a small Have you lookd at DG Nova? Sounds like your traversing that same path. >computer or digital controller. The extra opcode bit is used to >support word & >byte sized operands, compared to the that of a 8 bit micro. The two more >address >bits negate the loss of byte addressing and give a bit more room for a >resident >OS rather than swapping core in and out. > >Using CPLD's also gives me the feel that a 18 bit simple cpu like my design >could have been developed as microchip computer similar to 6800 or 6502 >chip set around the time the Z80 was developed. Using 48 rather 40 pins >as packaging a 18 bit cpu with front panel support could have been >developed. > >A) Cpu chip. B) Swr/data/address bus display support chips . C) >data/byte swap buffer. > >> Micro-C is a very small, but reasonably powerful dialect of C - For an >> example, refer to the ImageDisk sources on my site ... ImageDisk and all >> of it's utilities are compiled with the PC version of Micro-C (as are my >> simulators, transfer tools and pretty much all of the other DOS based >> tools I've posted). >> >> Dave >> >> Btw: If you haven't written an assembler yet, let me know - I've got a >> universal table driven assembler generator which I developed to rapidly >> produce assemblers for many of the later architectures I supported. >> >> >Unlikely it will work , I have 9 bit bytes. >I have hacked, Jones's PDP 8 assembler to cross assemble for me. >Once I get the the single PCB board built later next year, then I >will consider porting Micro-C. I plan to only have about 64Kb + >bootstrap EEPROM, IDE interface and a two 6850 uarts >along with a front panel. I am not sure yet if the IDE interface will be >16 or 9 bits wide yet. > A table driven assembler can produce anything. Also a stack based language or even C can have the anythig stack related as multiple instructions only code efficientcy suffers and code size. An alternate way to go is a small emulation engine written in assebler to emulate a easier to compiler for virtual machine (P-code). The IDE can be 9 bits as the upper 8 (or less) bits are only used for data and a non required ops. I've done that for 8bits to simplify the interface and the only cost is 50% of the data space was not used, a minor nit as I had 500% more than needed. Allison From derschjo at msu.edu Fri Dec 12 01:17:31 2008 From: derschjo at msu.edu (Josh Dersch) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 23:17:31 -0800 Subject: Looking for Olivetti Quaderno Message-ID: <4942100B.301@msu.edu> Title says it all... I've been looking for one of these for awhile. Picked one up off eBay awhile back but it was totally trashed (though I now have several spare batteries & accessories if I ever find a working one...) Anyone have one for trade/sale? Thanks, Josh From andyh at andyh-rayleigh.freeserve.co.uk Fri Dec 12 04:15:26 2008 From: andyh at andyh-rayleigh.freeserve.co.uk (Andy Holt) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 10:15:26 -0000 Subject: vintage CPU instruction sets In-Reply-To: <49417734.2050405@gmail.com> Message-ID: >>>> So, has anyone come across a good online resource which compares vintage CPU instruction sets? It'd be useful to see what 'core' instructions* were most common back in the day and use that as a basis for my own homebrew effort;... * My hands-on knowledge is pretty much limited to Z80, 6502, 68000 and x86, and it'd be nice to go a little further back in time - but hopefully without having to download and digest many different databooks! <<<< It sounds like what you really require is information on vintage computer _architectures_ (probably from the programmers view). The classic text on the subject is, luckily, available online from a rather unexpected address: http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/gbell/Computer_Structures__Rea dings_and_Examples/contents.html [Computer Structures: Readings & Examples, by Gordon Bell] As personal thoughts on the subject and going backwards in time I'd think of looking-at and comparing the following. The two pre-micro classics, nay extremes, of CISC: *IBM system 360/370/... [Multi-GP-register - store organisation with a sprinkling of store-store operarions] *DEC VAX (and its simpler predecessor, the PDP-11) [address-modes-R-us] The RISC before there ws RISC: *CDC6600 The classic 36-bit architectures *IBM709/7090/7094 [single accumulator/few index registers] *GE6xx/Multics/Honeywell L66 [similar architecture, taken to its limits, and (in later models) even more address modes than a VAX] Traditional mini-computer *PDP-8 *PDP-11 any of hundreds of 16 or 18 bit accumulator-store designs ... they tend to be very similar - like PDP9 or CDC1700 or EAL640 or ... "Weirdos" *Burroughs B5500 [stack structured] *IBM 1620 [pure store-store organisation] *IBM 650 [and the effect of having program memory on a drum] Other cases of interest *Ferranti Atlas [virtual memory before IBM invented tomorrow] *FP6000 became ICT1900 [multi-register - store but simpler and less general than the '360 ... and 24 bits] *MU5/ICL2900 [designed for block-structured high-level-languagues - pity ICL's main market was for people who used COBOL] Andy From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Fri Dec 12 11:44:49 2008 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 12:44:49 -0500 (EST) Subject: Buy versus Build (Was: Re: PDF (Was: something irrelevant given the thread's migration)) In-Reply-To: <4941B00D.902@jbrain.com> References: <4941B00D.902@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <200812121748.MAA28363@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> >> That's one reason I insist on being able to support everything I >> depend on myself (meaning that I have schematics, source code, etc). > Admirable, but unrealistic, in my opinion. Unrealistic? Tony's lived that way for...I don't know, but at least as long as I've been on the list. Take off your "it has to work for all environments, or at least my environment" blinkers for a minute. Your stance is at least as unrealistic for Tony's environment as his is for yours. /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From andyh at andyh-rayleigh.freeserve.co.uk Fri Dec 12 13:18:20 2008 From: andyh at andyh-rayleigh.freeserve.co.uk (Andy Holt) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 19:18:20 -0000 Subject: Harvard v. von Neumann In-Reply-To: <4942909C.7090900@gmail.com> Message-ID: >>Sridhar Ayengar According to my reading, the Burroughs B5000 and Manchester Atlas were both Harvard architecture machines, and the GE-645 was von Neumann. Am I correct in my interpretation? << Technically none of them can be pure Harvard architecture because the operating system can write to memory (to load the program) and then start executing instructions from the same memory. When the 645 was running Multics (ie its normal status) then, like the other two, the user programming model had execute (+ read) -only code segments and thus would have the Harvard principle of non-self-modifying code. However, the hardware of both the Atlas and the 645 could, in theory, run with a user-writeable code segment ... I think that the B5000 would need tags explicitly to be switched to do such tricks. Andy From chrism3667 at yahoo.com Fri Dec 12 19:27:52 2008 From: chrism3667 at yahoo.com (Chris M) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 17:27:52 -0800 (PST) Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <931926.82884.qm@web65513.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> got to read further down the messages. For fun, you might want to pull apart a Sega Genesis. Radio Electronics had (2) project 68k thingees - 1 was just a write up of supposedly a popular kit or project in Europe back when (never heard of it otherwise, maybe it circulated around uni's and whatnot) - the other was a bona fide Gernsback RE project, several installments (I don't have a complete set). It turns out that project is still *supported*, presumably by the person who developed it, and received *free* advertising in the magazine. He wants an absorbadent amount of money for anything related to it. The schematics and artwork even was featured in the magazine, but rom listing were not. You'll likely want to write your own. There has been interest in these items on the list in the past. Like I said I don't have a complete set of articles, but at least 1 or 2. I'll dig them out and look them over and get back to you. One neat thing about the RE unit - it had an 8-bit ISA bus. --- On Thu, 12/11/08, John Floren wrote: > From: John Floren > Subject: 68k homebuilts > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > Date: Thursday, December 11, 2008, 9:39 PM > Hi everyone > > As a 4th year computer engineering student with a part time > job, I > definitely have too much time on my hands, so I've been > thinking about > doing something like building my own computer. I remember > playing with > the 68k SBCs back in my assembly class, so I thought > something from > that family might be an interesting choice. It's > ambitious, but > ideally I'd like to do 16/32 bits and a few megs of > memory. > > Have any of you built something like this? I'm looking > for links to > project pages, shared experiences, and advice on what > processor to > use. Reminiscence is welcome too, if you have fond memories > of such a > thing :) > > Thanks > > John Floren > > -- > Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl > fhtagn From chrism3667 at yahoo.com Fri Dec 12 19:29:10 2008 From: chrism3667 at yahoo.com (Chris M) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 17:29:10 -0800 (PST) Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <422485.81651.qm@web65503.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> there are millions of Sega Genesis' out there. Might not include every peripheral chip you're looking for though... --- On Thu, 12/11/08, William Donzelli wrote: > From: William Donzelli > Subject: Re: 68k homebuilts > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > Date: Thursday, December 11, 2008, 10:17 PM > > Have any of you built something like this? I'm > looking for links to > > project pages, shared experiences, and advice on what > processor to > > use. Reminiscence is welcome too, if you have fond > memories of such a > > thing :) > > Well, in MY day, we BUILT a simple 68K computer from > scratch in our > class, from "kits" supplied by Motorola. > > I had the foresight to buy a couple of tubes of 68000s at a > hamfest > for a couple of bucks. By the end of the semester, I had > sold every > one of them... > > -- > Will From chrism3667 at yahoo.com Fri Dec 12 19:56:09 2008 From: chrism3667 at yahoo.com (Chris M) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 17:56:09 -0800 (PST) Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <7d3530220812121409t6da349d1y5343ea5a99fe1b42@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <854198.89598.qm@web65504.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> --- On Fri, 12/12/08, John Floren wrote: > What does it take to do video (bitmapped) output, by the > way? That > would be especially interesting, in my opinion. adding a subsystem based around some crt controller (the early Macs incidentally lacked a dedicated crt controller). W/some low level graphics primitives to boot if you felt like it. If I understand the question... From ajp166 at bellatlantic.net Fri Dec 12 20:45:28 2008 From: ajp166 at bellatlantic.net (Allison) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 21:45:28 -0500 Subject: Commodore PET RS-232 Message-ID: <0KBS00EY6NLLY2L1@vms173005.mailsrvcs.net> > >Subject: Re: Commodore PET RS-232 > From: Fred Cisin > Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 18:22:39 -0800 (PST) > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > >On Fri, 12 Dec 2008, Dave Caroline wrote: >> should be a way/was a way to use the 6522 VIA chip it will need >> translation to rs232 levels though > >Does anybody here remember a thread from last month called: >Re: RS232 voltage level converter box > >(trying to figure out what a board with 1488s and 1489s was for) > DEC had boards like that for going from TTL to RS232 as modules and for current loop (TTY) to RS232 or the other way around. There were a lot of "things" that often had oddball interfaces like Ham radio tranceivers that could be driven by computer but only had serial TTL. Allison From spasticcolin-cctalk at yahoo.com Sun Dec 14 07:46:05 2008 From: spasticcolin-cctalk at yahoo.com (spasticcolin-cctalk at yahoo.com) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 05:46:05 -0800 (PST) Subject: DEC H-500 trainer manual anywhere on the net Message-ID: <271318.64981.qm@web82408.mail.mud.yahoo.com> had a manual in the '70's but no trainer. now no manual and trainers are available. From healyzh at aracnet.com Sun Dec 14 08:36:54 2008 From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 06:36:54 -0800 Subject: 9 DEC H-500 Trainers on Epay In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: At 11:02 PM -0800 12/13/08, Paxton Hoag wrote: >Spotted on ebay... >DEC H-500 computer logic trainers. > >I thiink it is a reasonable price and there is the chance to make an >offer. Front panels look PDP-8 vintage. > >http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=200279483013 > >No connection with the seller, just spotted what I hope is an >interesting item. Rats! They are already oll sold. That was a good deal, though I suspect they were missing the cables. At least no mention of cables, and they weren't in the picture. Zane -- | Zane H. Healy | UNIX Systems Administrator | | healyzh at aracnet.com (primary) | OpenVMS Enthusiast | | MONK::HEALYZH (DECnet) | Classic Computer Collector | +----------------------------------+----------------------------+ | Empire of the Petal Throne and Traveller Role Playing, | | PDP-10 Emulation and Zane's Computer Museum. | | http://www.aracnet.com/~healyzh/ | From silent700 at gmail.com Sun Dec 14 10:07:16 2008 From: silent700 at gmail.com (Jason T) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 10:07:16 -0600 Subject: 9 DEC H-500 Trainers on Epay In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <51ea77730812140807g3afdfcb7h93e77410c0bb8a0@mail.gmail.com> On Sun, Dec 14, 2008 at 1:02 AM, Paxton Hoag wrote: > Spotted on ebay... > DEC H-500 computer logic trainers. > Argh, all gone as of 10am. Why did I choose last night to go to bed early?!? From als at thangorodrim.de Sun Dec 14 10:25:24 2008 From: als at thangorodrim.de (Alexander Schreiber) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 17:25:24 +0100 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <200812092300.SAA02673@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <493ECCFC.5030700@jbrain.com> <493EDF40.7070807@gmail.com> <18750.60038.779922.194042@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> <200812092300.SAA02673@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <20081214162524.GB19623@thangorodrim.de> On Tue, Dec 09, 2008 at 05:58:35PM -0500, der Mouse wrote: > > In other words, PDF is like PS except that it isn't supposed to be > > machine dependent (which PS tends to be). > > PS isn't supposed to be machine dependent either. In fact it rather > goes out of its way to make it difficult to be machine dependent, > unless you just punt and use nonstandard words defined > idiosyncratically by the PS engine you're using. Tell that to the guys who were running print shops and got handed PostScript files by their clients. It is amazing how different PS can look on different display/print environments. That was one of the reaons for PDF and more specifically for the restricted PDF subset that is designed to guarantee full WYSIWYG from editing to printout. Turns out, that is harder than one would naively expect ... Regards, Alex. -- "Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work." -- Thomas A. Edison From als at thangorodrim.de Sun Dec 14 10:20:48 2008 From: als at thangorodrim.de (Alexander Schreiber) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 17:20:48 +0100 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <200812091942.OAA00896@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <46DB449D-BD40-40C9-82B7-74D9F20C5751@neurotica.com> <200812091942.OAA00896@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <20081214162048.GA19623@thangorodrim.de> On Tue, Dec 09, 2008 at 02:40:21PM -0500, der Mouse wrote: > >>> [...PDFs...] > >> searching > > Trivial with free and non-free tools, I do it all the time. > > Which tools? The only open PDF reader I know of is ghostscript, and it > doesn't do searching as far as I can tell. Which one am I missing? xpdf for one thing, evince also displays PDF. Both of which support text search in the PDF file. Of course, this assumes a reasonably sanely built PDF file. If all the text is really just graphics, you are screwed. Or if some idiotic PDF generator does silly things, see below. Also, I don't know how bad Microsofts PDF/PS "printer drivers" are these days, but several years back they were horrible. I was working on an online archive for scientific papers back then and one of the things we did was searching in the papers. Which requires indexing them first. Worked great for PS/PDF coming out of the LaTeX toolchain, but we got absolutely _nothing_ from PS files we knew were created using the Microsoft Windows PS "printer drivers". Ok, time to check by hand. Turns out the blistering idiots were positioning _every_ single character indiviually, including whitespace characters. Great. Then I found a tool (IIRC ps2txt written by some DEC guys back then) that went through the PS file and used heuristics over the distance between letters to rebuild the words and extract the text. That worked more or less. > >> being able to make changes without needing special Adobe software > > [W]hy would you want to make changes to a component datasheet? > > To integrate your hand-scribbled notes so they're there next time you > look at it? Hmm, that would be useful, but IIRC the only tools that can add comments to PDF files are the Adobe ones. :-( Regards, Alex. -- "Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work." -- Thomas A. Edison From als at thangorodrim.de Sun Dec 14 10:34:35 2008 From: als at thangorodrim.de (Alexander Schreiber) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 17:34:35 +0100 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <200812092123.QAA01692@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> References: <493ED414.2080500@jbrain.com> <200812092123.QAA01692@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <20081214163435.GC19623@thangorodrim.de> On Tue, Dec 09, 2008 at 04:06:04PM -0500, der Mouse wrote: > > I know it all makes sense from your point of view, but I'd ask that > > you at least consider my viewpoint. > > Okay, let's take this a piece at a time. > > > As an Architect in a Fortune 500 company, I see many developers come > > into our environment and promptly start wreaking havoc by writing > > their own solutions for things already available: > > > * [...] Yes, some apps are horrid, but in this environment, it's > > often better to demand better quality from the vendor than try > > to re-implement and support an internal app. > > And what do you use in the meantime? > > I went through my larval phase under VMS in the '80s. We submitted > numerous bug reports (SPRs, they called them) to DEC. The only one we > ever got anything at all back in response to was one which was my own > mistake. > > No fixes. No patches. Not even an acknowledgement that the problems > were problems. > > Later, I worked on a project with JPL, under SunOS (this was before > Solaris). They'd bought the right to access internal support techs at > Sun. By the time we had to call them, it almost every case (I think > every case, but it was long enough memory is going fuzzy) we knew the > relevant part of the system better than the tech we spoke with did. > > I am deeply cynical about vendor support. With reason, I believe. Amen to that. From what I went through with HP, the hardware support, while expensive, was worth it. The software support was simply a waste of money. We tried to do something with MC/ServiceGuard and LVM that sounded reasonable to us, but ended in MC/SG blowing up. Hmm, call HP. Calls go back and forth, we get updated binaries from the OS developers for testing. Still doesn't work. Then they finally managed to dig up one of the developers who actually seemed to understand the code. Turns out, what we wanted to do is impossible due to design limits in the code. Took us just about two weeks and plenty of back-and-forth calls and testing to get to that stage. The fun of closed source and "vendor support". And that was a situation where the vendor actually was responsive (well, they better did since we paid for the (bloody expensive) mission-critical support package). With available source code, we could have found out about that in a few hours and even possible have fixed it. *sigh* Regards, Alex. -- "Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work." -- Thomas A. Edison From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Sun Dec 14 10:45:06 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 16:45:06 +0000 Subject: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: <200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com> <200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <49453812.1040401@gjcp.net> der Mouse wrote: >> IMHO, I think PDF is wonderful. It does a far better job than HTML >> at rendering documents. > > Indeed it does. If good-looking results is what I want, I'll pick PDF > over plain text every time. (I don't see what HTML has to do with it.) > > But the job of datasheets is not to look pretty; it's to transmit > information usably. > >> It's an open standard. > > ...which, apparently, most PDF creaters don't follow. I can't remember > the last time I looked at PDF for which ghostscript didn't give me its > "please notify the author of the code that produced this that it's not > conforming to Adobe's published spec" warning. In at least one of > those cases, it was an Adobe application - or, at least, the > application name string claimed it was. That's because ghostscript is based on a long-obsolete version of the standard, as far as I can see >> Blaming the tools is silly. Nobody is forcing anyone to use a hammer >> with to nail a screw, especially when screwdrivers exist. > > I'm not blaming the tool. I'm blaming the chip makers for using the > tool inappropriately. PDFs are fine for cases where presentation is > important compared to content. Chip datasheets are not such a case. That's fine, if you want to stick with bloated plain-text documents and live without usable searching, indexes, annotations and bookmarking. Please stop railing against the rest of us, who have moved onto better things. Gordon From jos.mar at bluewin.ch Sun Dec 14 10:49:11 2008 From: jos.mar at bluewin.ch (Jos Dreesen / Marian Capel) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 17:49:11 +0100 Subject: Looking for a 1/3 height Apple II type diskdrive Message-ID: <49453907.8050707@bluewin.ch> Subject says it all : I need to replace the floppy drive in my Lilith. The floppy PCB is so crappy that further repairs are pointless, PCB traces fall off whenever a soldering iron comes with smelling distance. Willing to pay reasonable amount, location Switzerland Jos. From arcarlini at iee.org Sun Dec 14 10:54:56 2008 From: arcarlini at iee.org (a.carlini) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 16:54:56 -0000 Subject: Algol & MTS / was Re: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <4941BD28.5030402@gmail.com> Message-ID: <002701c95e0c$b2ec9f40$c004010a@dis754cbb81360> >I do believe that having Edsger Dijkstra had gone ballistic on you >probably gives you geek cred. 8-) Having read his online trip reports and heard him lecture (sadly just the once) I think "being his student" and "being scorched" just go together somehow :-) Antonio From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Sun Dec 14 10:57:13 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 16:57:13 +0000 Subject: Algol & MTS / was Re: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <4941D063.7080107@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <49418796.8D16AB02@cs.ubc.ca> <49405399.32701.B893F@cclist.sydex.com> <200812111347.mBBDl97x020488@floodgap.com> <4940ECC8.16227.D8BD5@cclist.sydex.com> <18753.24945.798147.894254@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> <200812112204.mBBM4ihO024303@yagi.h-net.msu.edu> <4941953D.7D5E66FF@cs.ubc.ca> <18753.38653.541417.495570@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> <4941BD28.5030402@gmail.com> <4941D063.7080107@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <49453AE9.4020709@gjcp.net> bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > Well you you can get ALGOL 60 for DOS but not CP/M. The still think > there is some life in > z80 imbeded products. > http://www.angelfire.com/biz/rhaminisys/algol60.html Good grief, someone buy a copy from them so they can get proper hosting... Gordon From curt at atarimuseum.com Sun Dec 14 11:12:30 2008 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 12:12:30 -0500 Subject: radio shack catalogs In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <49453E7E.5040009@atarimuseum.com> The good old days of Radio Shack, were the electronics parts isles outnumbered the rest of the store, where you could buy just about anything for hobbyist work without having to weed through 5,000 radio controlled crapola toys, cellular displays and other useless nonsense... When Radio Shack was a respectable place to shop, and not a mini-Circuit City wannabe Curt David Griffith wrote: > Someone on comp.os.cpm pointed this out. I don't recall anyone doing so > here. http://www.radioshackcatalogs.com/. Mmm... Fond memories of when > Radio Shack didn't stink. > > From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Sun Dec 14 11:26:26 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 10:26:26 -0700 Subject: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: <49453812.1040401@gjcp.net> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com> <200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <49453812.1040401@gjcp.net> Message-ID: <494541C2.7080602@jetnet.ab.ca> Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote: > > That's fine, if you want to stick with bloated plain-text documents > and live without usable searching, indexes, annotations and > bookmarking. Please stop railing against the rest of us, who have > moved onto better things. > I want NONE of that! I am a happy 5.0 user. The main advantage of PFP's for me is that you can get ON-LINE manuals from Bitsavers for old machines. > Gordon > DOC files, now that is a pain to read. From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Sun Dec 14 11:33:44 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 10:33:44 -0700 Subject: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <0KBQ003MHKDHL5A0@vms173005.mailsrvcs.net> References: <0KBQ003MHKDHL5A0@vms173005.mailsrvcs.net> Message-ID: <49454378.1070408@jetnet.ab.ca> Allison wrote: > Have you lookd at DG Nova? Sounds like your traversing that same path. > > Yes and NO! > A table driven assembler can produce anything. > > 99% of the code I have seen assumes 8 bit bytes. I have decided to a 20 bit cpu ... 10 bit bytes. So far every thing seems to fit in the CPLD's I can get, but it is not done until I get all the bugs checking done, as right now it is more hacking as I go with the logic. Try Idea, it fits , fix new bug, it don't fit, start over again. > The IDE can be 9 bits as the upper 8 (or less) bits are only used for data and a > non required ops. I've done that for 8bits to simplify the interface and the > only cost is 50% of the data space was not used, a minor nit as I had 500% > more than needed. > > I plan to do it that way ... Just I/O lines on the CPLD's are very limited. > Allison > > > From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Sun Dec 14 11:39:29 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 17:39:29 +0000 Subject: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: <494541C2.7080602@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com> <200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <49453812.1040401@gjcp.net> <494541C2.7080602@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <494544D1.2050809@gjcp.net> bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote: >> >> That's fine, if you want to stick with bloated plain-text documents >> and live without usable searching, indexes, annotations and >> bookmarking. Please stop railing against the rest of us, who have >> moved onto better things. >> > I want NONE of that! I am a happy 5.0 user. > The main advantage of PFP's for me is that you can get ON-LINE manuals > from Bitsavers for old machines. >> Gordon >> > DOC files, now that is a pain to read. No, plain-text files, with .doc as the extension, because then Firefox cranks OpenOffice into life, which then complains that it's not a *real* .doc file and would I please be more careful in future? Gordon From mcguire at neurotica.com Sun Dec 14 11:53:44 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 12:53:44 -0500 Subject: Source for MMJ cables. In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <2814B8D2-37C9-4903-99D9-3D7A7D5523C2@neurotica.com> On Dec 9, 2008, at 5:52 PM, Andrew Back wrote: > A little while ago I bought a "new" 10ft MMJ cable from That > Website. Today I came to use it and discovered it was a crossover > cable. So, my question is where can I buy a straight MMJ - MMJ? > 10ft would be fine, longer perhaps better, and ideally a UK source. Not a UK source, but if you strike out elsewhere, I got my last bag from either Mouser or DigiKey. I think it was Mouser. They still stocked them as of about two years ago. > Whilst on the subject of DEC, I'm also looking for an ethernet card > for a PDP 11/53 and perhaps a TK drive (assuming that if on power- > up the drive wheel just spins continually and you can't lift the > handle, the drive is broken). TK drives are my nemesis; I've got EIGHT of the damned things here and none of them work. (with five different controllers and three cables, obviously not all permutations tested) DEQNA and DELQA boards, though...I've got scads of those, and some other hardware that we discussed offline awhile back. We should figure out how to get a box out to you. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Sun Dec 14 11:54:49 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 12:54:49 -0500 Subject: Source for MMJ cables. In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Dec 9, 2008, at 5:52 PM, Andrew Back wrote: > A little while ago I bought a "new" 10ft MMJ cable from That > Website. Today I came to use it and discovered it was a crossover > cable. So, my question is where can I buy a straight MMJ - MMJ? > 10ft would be fine, longer perhaps better, and ideally a UK source. Duh, you said MMJ cables, and I was thinking MMJ connectors. Sorry about that. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From ggs at shiresoft.com Sun Dec 14 11:54:45 2008 From: ggs at shiresoft.com (Guy Sotomayor) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 09:54:45 -0800 Subject: IBM 5110 In-Reply-To: <459389.46162.qm@web65514.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> References: <459389.46162.qm@web65514.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <79D119C7-CD70-43C8-8C63-8E053B6A9780@shiresoft.com> On Dec 11, 2008, at 1:46 PM, Chris M wrote: > is it likely I'd be able to read disks from this system on one of > the following (all equipped w/8" floppy drives): > > IBM System 23/Datamaster No. You won't be able to read the disks from a 5110 (or 5120) on a System 23. TTFN - Guy From mcguire at neurotica.com Sun Dec 14 11:56:04 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 12:56:04 -0500 Subject: Source for MMJ cables. In-Reply-To: <493F1F1B.5030802@atarimuseum.com> References: <95838e090812091522h4f955f52qde00cc9a43b275bc@mail.gmail.com> <493F1F1B.5030802@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <5531FDF2-AC47-4134-9B82-3C383CEF55C9@neurotica.com> On Dec 9, 2008, at 8:44 PM, Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > Are there any sources for MMJ crimp-on connectors??? I used to > work at Baystate Computer Group many years ago, it was a major east > coast DEC seller and we used to have parts bins filled with MMJ > crimp-on's for doing cable work. Mouser and/or DigiKey had them as recently as two years ago. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Sun Dec 14 11:57:25 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 12:57:25 -0500 Subject: Source for MMJ cables. In-Reply-To: <95838e090812091522h4f955f52qde00cc9a43b275bc@mail.gmail.com> References: <95838e090812091522h4f955f52qde00cc9a43b275bc@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Dec 9, 2008, at 6:22 PM, Steve Maddison wrote: >> Whilst on the subject of DEC, I'm also looking for an ethernet >> card for a >> PDP 11/53 > > If your post here doesn't get you any offers, DEQNAs often pop up on > ePay for not-too-ridiculous prices (although DELQAs are supposedly > more reliable if you can find one). And OH so much faster. DEQNAs really are pieces of crap. DELQAs spank them in just about every way. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Sun Dec 14 12:10:40 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 12:10:40 -0600 Subject: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: <200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com> <200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <49454C20.50006@gmail.com> der Mouse wrote: >> IMHO, I think PDF is wonderful. It does a far better job than HTML >> at rendering documents. > > Indeed it does. If good-looking results is what I want, I'll pick PDF > over plain text every time. (I don't see what HTML has to do with it.) Hmm, so has anyone homebrewed a machine which uses PDF for the display and print engine yet? :-) From ploopster at gmail.com Sun Dec 14 12:25:45 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 13:25:45 -0500 Subject: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: <49454C20.50006@gmail.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com> <200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <49454C20.50006@gmail.com> Message-ID: <49454FA9.2030304@gmail.com> Jules Richardson wrote: >>> IMHO, I think PDF is wonderful. It does a far better job than HTML >>> at rendering documents. >> >> Indeed it does. If good-looking results is what I want, I'll pick PDF >> over plain text every time. (I don't see what HTML has to do with it.) > > Hmm, so has anyone homebrewed a machine which uses PDF for the display > and print engine yet? :-) Doesn't that describe Mac OS X Aqua? Peace... Sridhar From mcguire at neurotica.com Sun Dec 14 12:27:01 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 13:27:01 -0500 Subject: OT: Forrest Mims resurfaces In-Reply-To: <4940F080.31639.1C1380@cclist.sydex.com> References: <4940F080.31639.1C1380@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <596522EB-3AD4-44E0-A741-532757E3DF86@neurotica.com> On Dec 11, 2008, at 1:50 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote: > A bit of spam in my inbox today from Jameco, shows that Forrest is > still cooking up stuff: > > http://www.jameco.com/Jameco/PressRoom/recipe1.html I grew up reading the books he wrote for Radio Shack. I'm amazed he's still cranking out articles. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From cclist at sydex.com Sun Dec 14 12:28:41 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 10:28:41 -0800 Subject: PDF (Was: something irrelevant given the thread's migration) In-Reply-To: <200812110243.VAA15490@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> References: , <49405F4F.1060309@jetnet.ab.ca>, <200812110243.VAA15490@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <4944DFD9.30767.2619B9@cclist.sydex.com> On 10 Dec 2008 at 21:42, der Mouse wrote: > Um, if it's only six bits, it ain't ASCII; ASCII is a seven-bit code. > (It may be a half-size subset of ASCII....) On my old CDC Cyber 70 quick reference card, there's a nice table on one panel with colums specifying the character, "Display" (CDC's own code) "Hollerith" (card punch configuration) "BCD" (IBM's 6 bit code) with two sub-columns ("Ext" and "Int" (I don't recall the precise difference, but I believe that one was used with some of the attached card and printer equipment and the other was used for mag tape--maybe someone can refresh my memory). The last column is labeled "ASCII Subset" with three sub-columns "Char", showing the character (the 6000/Cyber 70 native character set was more of an Algol set and lacked characters such as exclamation and quote, so ASCII needed a different display set), "Code", the 6-bit value of the character, and "Punch" showing the card code). Basically, the 6-bit ASCII subset was the same as 7-bit but with bit 4 omittted. Thus, no lowercase nor control codes--e.g. the code for the numeral "zero" was 10 (octal). This wasn't unreasonable in a day when equipment capable of displaying lowercase alphabetics was unusual. Cheers, Chuck From mcguire at neurotica.com Sun Dec 14 12:30:12 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 13:30:12 -0500 Subject: Open Firmware, was Re: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <18753.13533.516025.55128@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> References: <7daed98b83b358cb3c2f0e27b34a03d6@bellsouth.net> <49409585.4020904@jetnet.ab.ca> <4940A322.8070003@pacbell.net> <18753.13533.516025.55128@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> Message-ID: On Dec 11, 2008, at 10:42 AM, Paul Koning wrote: > Another place where Forth has been used: several popular workstations > use it for their bootloaders. Sun does (or did) and I think Apple > does too. At least I once got an "ok" prompt when I powered up a very > confused Power Mac... and it answered like Forth interactive mode. This is correct...it's called Open Firmware, and it has been the ROM-based boot facility (and some other neat stuff) in all SPARC- based Sun systems from the SPARCstation-1 on up to the current hardware, all Apple PCI-based PPC systems, and many IBM POWER-based (RS/6000) systems. Sun calls it OpenBoot. The OLPC XO-1 laptop (based on an AMD x86 implementation) also has Open Firmware, and probably other machines as well. Open Firmware is an IEEE standard (1275) and can be implemented on just about anything. It is well documented, portable, well behaved, and used to great success. In the face of these facts, one wonders why things like EFI are brought into existence. What seems to surprise most people is that this makes Forth one of the most widely-deployed languages in modern computing. I recently had a conversation with an otherwise extremely clueful guy who even has a background in embedded systems, who thought Forth was completely dead. He was shocked to learn that the Mac he was typing on had a Forth implementation in flash. As you observed, it is indeed Forth. It's an extremely powerful and well-thought-out system that allows expansion cards to contain machine-independent code ("FCode", Forth bytecode) in ROM or flash that implements initialization and diagnostic routines, bootstrap code, and OS-accessible/-usable device drivers. If you've ever noticed the flash chip on Sbus cards...that's what's in there. Some PCI cards have it as well; the world would be a much happier place if all of them did. So, one other implication here is that any old SPARCstation sitting in a closet makes a great Forth hack machine. -Dave > -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From cclist at sydex.com Sun Dec 14 12:45:05 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 10:45:05 -0800 Subject: Commodore PET RS-232 In-Reply-To: <0KBS00EY6NLLY2L1@vms173005.mailsrvcs.net> References: <0KBS00EY6NLLY2L1@vms173005.mailsrvcs.net> Message-ID: <4944E3B1.24332.351C40@cclist.sydex.com> On 12 Dec 2008 at 21:45, Allison wrote: > DEC had boards like that for going from TTL to RS232 as modules and > for current loop (TTY) to RS232 or the other way around. There were > a lot of "things" that often had oddball interfaces like Ham radio > tranceivers that could be driven by computer but only had serial TTL. The one in question was hand-wired on pad-per-hole perfboard. I submit that its purpose may never be known. I'd have to rattle my brains quite a bit to even get an inkling for the application of some of the bits of perfboard with stuff on them in my hellbox that I built years ago. I ran across tiny one the other day with two 7475s (not LS) with a header on it. I don't have a clue about the application, but it probably goes back pretty far. Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Sun Dec 14 13:15:34 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 11:15:34 -0800 Subject: Harvard v. von Neumann In-Reply-To: References: <4942909C.7090900@gmail.com>, Message-ID: <4944EAD6.4939.50FBFE@cclist.sydex.com> On 12 Dec 2008 at 19:18, Andy Holt wrote: > Technically none of them can be pure Harvard architecture because the > operating system can write to memory (to load the program) and then start > executing instructions from the same memory. We agree on that one, even "pure" Harvard isn't what it used to mean. Pure Harvard architecture used to mean separate stores (and, by extension, datapaths) for instructions and data. Lower PICs probably qualify, as the data and program areas are very separate (and not even of the same word length). But it's a bit of a stretch to say that a machine with a defeatable protection scheme is "Harvard" in any sense of the word. By that logic, an 80286 running in protected mode is a Harvard machine. By that token upper PICs with software-writable program memory are not Harvard, even though the data books say the contrary. Things get more complicated even on the "pure" architectures if off- line storage (e.g. tape, cards, quipu, guru beads) can be written by a program and read into either data or program (i.e. executed) space. Is a machine with separate code and data spaces still considered to be "Harvard" if the instruction set includes an "execute" instruction that permits modification of the target instruction operand specification? (e.g. the S/360 EX instruction). It's not a simple distinction. Cheers, Chuck From vern4wright at yahoo.com Sun Dec 14 13:20:58 2008 From: vern4wright at yahoo.com (Vernon Wright) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 11:20:58 -0800 (PST) Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: <49425735.1765.9ECFD2@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <631378.45591.qm@web65501.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> Wish we could have kept the CEO's under the floors! :) Vern --- On Fri, 12/12/08, Chuck Guzis wrote: > From: Chuck Guzis > Subject: Re: Raised floors > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > Date: Friday, December 12, 2008, 12:21 PM > On 12 Dec 2008 at 12:10, Vernon Wright wrote: > > > CEO's and such, taking visitors to their > million-dollar computer > > installations, found 3" cables snaking down from > the ceiling > > 'unsightly'; I can recall several managements > who would send a memo > > instructing that the computer room be made extra-tidy > (no boxes of > > paper, cards, all the tapes and disks in their racks) > for a coming > > visit. > > Besides, raised floors keeps the rats out of sight... > Nothing more > upsetting than seeing rodents making use of overhead cable > runs as > elevated freeways. > > Cheers, > Chuck From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sun Dec 14 13:00:22 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 19:00:22 +0000 (GMT) Subject: INMOS boards (was: 68k homebuilts) In-Reply-To: <49443E77.8070604@gifford.co.uk> from "John Honniball" at Dec 13, 8 11:00:07 pm Message-ID: > > Tony Duell wrote: > > There are certainly transputer boards for the PC. The most common in my > > experience si the B004, which is am ISA card with a T4 or T8 chip on it, > > rows of DIP DRAM, the link interface and ISA bus logic and not a lot > > else. > > All that DIP RAM was usually 2Mbytes so that you could run the occam That sounds about right. All in 41256s IIRC. > compiler in it. Remember, this was in the days of 640k PC memories. [...] [TRAMs] > > interfaces exist, as does one with a vector processor chip (alongside the > > transputer). > > The Zoran chip? That's the one. I have such a TRAM somewhere... [...] > B011: TRAM motherboard in ITEM card format (?) Are you sure? I thought the B011 was a VME card. I seem to rememebr seeing one in the particle physics lab at Bristol, where I was making my own transputer-based machine. [..] > The ITEM (INMOS Transputer Evauation Module) was a sub-rack holding > a dozen or so extended-Eurocard-sized boards. The oen I have is a 3U rack with the horizontal adapter for 6U boards (if you see what I mean, the extended Eurocard boards fit horizontally). There's a PSU at one end and a fan unit at the other. It lokes to take 5 such PCBs. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sun Dec 14 13:07:44 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 19:07:44 +0000 (GMT) Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <49443F9E.8080008@gmail.com> from "Jules Richardson" at Dec 13, 8 05:05:02 pm Message-ID: [Adding a video display] > > A sup[rising amount of logic. > > Way back I had some sort of RS232-capable graphics box called Pluto - I I think I have one of those somewhere. I thoguht the video outptu was analogue RGB at TV rates, but I could well be mistaken. [...] > Whilst that's not quite what the OP's after, I think there's some potential > there in that a modern PC with a serial port could be initially and quickly > used to do that task, with the 'real' hardware built later. (I suspect it's > the route I would take, purely as offloading the graphics ability elsewhere > seems to have a certain 'cool factor' about it :-) Another possibilty would be to add some slots compatible with HP's DIO (strictly now DIO-1) bus. This uses the same connectors as the S100 bus, but it's basically the 68000 bus (23 address lines, 16 data lines) with a few extras that yuu could mostly ignore. About the only thing you'd have to have on your processor board would be the prioirty encoder from 7 interrupt lines to the CPU's IPL signals. There is at least one DIO monochrome video board set -- the 98204 IIRC. It comes in 2 versions, for differnt horixontal scan rates (the 98204A is TV-rate I think). It's all standard chips (maybe the odd PAL), I am pretty sure I have scheamtics. And of course there are DIO RAM boards, I/O boards, etc. I think there's some info on the DIO hardware spec in one of the _Pascal_ OS manuals on bitsavvers. I can dig out the URL if anyone can't find it. > > > Basically you need an area of memory that > > can be accessed both by the CPU and by the video hardware. Typvially RAM > > with multiplexers to switch it between the 2 devices. > > I think quite a few systems did it on the falling edge of the clock signal, > didn't they? i.e. the memory was only accessed by the CPU on the rising edge, > so (if fast enough) was essentially free on a falling edge. Elegant, but > probably hell to debug and get working as a first project (particular if DRAM > refresh is thrown in there) On 68K machines it;'s more ocmmonly done by delaying DTACK until the video hardare has completed oth its memory cycle and allowed the CPU to do one. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sun Dec 14 13:13:15 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 19:13:15 +0000 (GMT) Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <7d3530220812131520j49e63683s215b382336ea4df7@mail.gmail.com> from "John Floren" at Dec 13, 8 06:20:29 pm Message-ID: > After doing some looking I thought I'd go with 68020 if I were to do > 32-bit, or 68000 for 16-bit. I may take Tony's excellent advice and IIRC, the 68020 has the feature that you can set the bus width by the states of a couple of pins. This was normally done to allow efficient access to 8-bit I/O devices (you can change the states of these pins depending on the current address ,of course), but there's no reason why you shouldn't hold the pins in the states for an 8-bit data bus and just have 8 it memory. Of course it's slower (4 memory cycles for each 32 it access), but it will work. > try something even simpler first, if I can get my hands on the Art of > Electronics books... they're on Amazon, I'll probably just have to > buckle down and shell out the money. 'The Art of ELectronics' is IMHO a book every electronics engineer should own. There's a lot of good stuff in it. Sure there are the odd things I disagree with, there are things I'd do differently, but by the time you've read it, you'll know enough to be able to work out how you'd want to do things. My criticism of the Student Manual is that as it was written for a university course, it assumes you have access to some nice test gear (like a 'scope, bench PSU, etc). This means the esperiments possibly can't be done by the average hobyist just starting out. But again there's a loot of good stuff in it, and I don't think you need too much exotic stuff for the 68008 circuits. -tony From mcguire at neurotica.com Sun Dec 14 13:26:06 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 14:26:06 -0500 Subject: INMOS boards (was: 68k homebuilts) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <18AA007F-76C6-48C0-9787-B87C9A14BF88@neurotica.com> On Dec 14, 2008, at 2:00 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >>> interfaces exist, as does one with a vector processor chip >>> (alongside the >>> transputer). >> >> The Zoran chip? > > That's the one. I have such a TRAM somewhere... Hmm? What chip is this? -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From cclist at sydex.com Sun Dec 14 13:41:48 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 11:41:48 -0800 Subject: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <49454378.1070408@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <0KBQ003MHKDHL5A0@vms173005.mailsrvcs.net>, <49454378.1070408@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <4944F0FC.31356.690475@cclist.sydex.com> On 14 Dec 2008 at 10:33, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > 99% of the code I have seen assumes 8 bit bytes. > I have decided to a 20 bit cpu ... 10 bit bytes. So far every thing > seems to fit in the CPLD's I can get, but it is not done until > I get all the bugs checking done, as right now it is more hacking > as I go with the logic. Is there any need for any "byte-edness" at all? Stick with a convenient word size, make it easy to shift and mask out subfields and forget about "bytes". You get the benefit of being able to address more memory with fewer bits if you stick to word addressing. The IBM marketing people used to propogate the notion that the high- end CDC mainframes were only good for "scientific" applications (read: "written in FORTRAN), where the S/360 architecture with its rich memory-to-memory byte and BCD manipulation instruction repertoire would smoke the competition in "commercial" applications (read: "written in COBOL"). In fact, for a time, CDC had one of the fastest COBOLs on the planet, S/360 notwithstanding. When you can do things 60 bits at a time fast enough to keep memory busy, you don't need a fancy "commercial instruction set" option. Seymour Cray was no idiot. I submit that the details of any instruction set over another hardly matters, so long as an instruction set is complete (i.e., there's no "you can't get there from here" situation) and is executed efficiently. Cheers, Chuck From arcarlini at iee.org Sun Dec 14 14:31:41 2008 From: arcarlini at iee.org (a.carlini) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 20:31:41 -0000 Subject: radio shack catalogs In-Reply-To: <49453E7E.5040009@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <009101c95e2a$fc616b10$c004010a@dis754cbb81360> David Griffith wrote: > Someone on comp.os.cpm pointed this out. I don't recall anyone doing so > here. http://www.radioshackcatalogs.com/. Mmm... Fond memories of when > Radio Shack didn't stink. "For almost 65 years RadioShack has produced a catalog to rival no other electronics and technology company." Certainly the case now, but I expect that in the early days they _did_ intend to rival many other's catalogues :-) (I suppose the same could be said for Maplin). Nice site BTW. Cue someone to ask for a faster page-flick mode ... Antonio From vern4wright at yahoo.com Sun Dec 14 14:35:27 2008 From: vern4wright at yahoo.com (Vernon Wright) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 12:35:27 -0800 (PST) Subject: Engelbart's mouse / 40th anniversary In-Reply-To: <493F1D6C.78498637@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: <964328.23699.qm@web65516.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> I had an invite to his presentation down at Stanford. But I had meetings that day that I just couldn't off :< So I missed the historic event. Though I use mice and realize the value of them, I still don't like vermin! On your topic, yes, "discovery" v. "invention" annoys me. Even worse is "invention" v. "idea"; so many people think that having an idea is the same as creating an invention. If I had a patent for every idea that I never went so far as to "invent", I'd have bought an Iowa class battleship, an SR-71, and the Library of Congress. OTOH, reporters are not well-known for using words precisely. Vern --- On Tue, 12/9/08, Brent Hilpert wrote: > From: Brent Hilpert > Subject: Engelbart's mouse / 40th anniversary > To: "cctalk at classiccmp.org" > Date: Tuesday, December 9, 2008, 5:37 PM > There was a blurb just now on the radio (CBC) about > Engelbart's development of > the mouse, including an audio recording of his presentation > of it at a > conference in 1968. > > That was nice, but weird/annnoying is that the reporter > referred to it as a > "discovery". Is it not possible to invent > anything anymore? Is everything, and > everything that will ever be in the future, an > already-existing concept waiting > out there in some alternative universe of the imagination, > just waiting to be > "discovered" by the mind of somebody? > > Or did I miss a debate about the semiotics of > "discovery" vs. "invention" in > the public discourse somewhere along the way? > > It's nice to be humble about achievements and > acknowledge that developments are > built upon other developments and don't occur in > isolation but isn't this > taking it a bit far? From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Sun Dec 14 14:43:51 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 20:43:51 +0000 Subject: radio shack catalogs In-Reply-To: <009101c95e2a$fc616b10$c004010a@dis754cbb81360> References: <009101c95e2a$fc616b10$c004010a@dis754cbb81360> Message-ID: <49457007.6080702@gjcp.net> a.carlini wrote: > (I suppose the same could be said for Maplin). Now, if someone's got a site with the 70s/80s Maplin catalogue cover art... IIRC they used to sell posters of it. Gordon From roger.holmes at microspot.co.uk Sun Dec 14 14:47:26 2008 From: roger.holmes at microspot.co.uk (Roger Holmes) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 20:47:26 +0000 Subject: vintage CPU instruction sets In-Reply-To: <200812141648.mBEGmJEC068135@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812141648.mBEGmJEC068135@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: >>>>> > So, has anyone come across a good online resource which compares > vintage CPU > instruction sets? It'd be useful to see what 'core' instructions* > were most > common back in the day and use that as a basis for my own homebrew > effort;... Have a look here: http://www.ourcomputerheritage.org/ Around 40 machines from 1950 to 66. 17 machines from Elliott, 11 Ferranti, 3 Leo, 4 English Electric, 2 BTM and 5 ICT. For me the Elliott 900/920 series is particularly interesting, 4 op- code bits, a B line modifier and 13 address bits. I worked on compilers for this before writing one for the Zilog Z8001 to replace the 920 ATC. The language was Coral 66, and Algol 60 derivative for real time computing. The 900 had no OR,XOR or NOT instructions, but it did have a negate and add instruction, and if you had a word in memory holding the constant -1, then a negate and add -1 could be used to do a NOT. From this and the built in AND instruction could be built the other bitwise logic operations. There is no subtract operation either which meant that the order of evaluation had to be changed around within the compiler to use the negate and add instead. The other conditional jumps had to be constructed from jump zero, jump negative and unconditional jump. Increment but no decrement. No stack, no immediate operands, an accumulator (A) and a right side extension (Q) and a B register which could be used to modify any instruction allowing access to all 256k memory words (though only 128k of program). No carry flag so multi word arithmetic was hard work, including software floating point, thankfully built into hardware in the 920ATC. My other personal interest is the ICT 1301 which is memorable for having no program counter, in being 4 bit parallel, 12 digits serial, having no indexing instructions and being programmable purely in decimal. Even core memory is decimal, if you try to execute a non decimal digit the machine would stop at instruction fetch. If you directly hand key an instruction with a non decimal digit in the address field, the core memory will not respond (the CPU sees a zero) and stop the machine with a parity error unless parity checking has been turned off. From silent700 at gmail.com Sun Dec 14 14:50:39 2008 From: silent700 at gmail.com (Jason T) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 14:50:39 -0600 Subject: radio shack catalogs In-Reply-To: <009101c95e2a$fc616b10$c004010a@dis754cbb81360> References: <49453E7E.5040009@atarimuseum.com> <009101c95e2a$fc616b10$c004010a@dis754cbb81360> Message-ID: <51ea77730812141250j670c7223hbd0bb56218f567e0@mail.gmail.com> On Sun, Dec 14, 2008 at 2:31 PM, a.carlini wrote: > Nice site BTW. Cue someone to ask for a faster page-flick mode ... Well there's this, if you don't want to put up with all that javascript silliness: http://pdf.textfiles.com/catalogs/RADIOSHACK/ From ics65 at sbcglobal.net Sun Dec 14 15:05:49 2008 From: ics65 at sbcglobal.net (George Wiegand) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 16:05:49 -0500 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. References: <154558.88239.qm@web65508.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <001901c95e2f$beaf1970$7ae9da45@efficienfhlqu9> What are you refering to when you say Non-Linear systems, are you talking about Non-Linear Video systems? ,George Wiegand ----- Original Message ----- From: "Vernon Wright" To: Sent: Thursday, December 11, 2008 1:48 PM Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. > Over the past four years I've been taking the digests, pulling down the archives and saving them, in the hope that I'd find time to read and perhaps participate. Never found time. > > Gotta get this out of the way first: some of you may recall that I was Don Maslin's friend, that I promised to rescue the software archive, and that his widow made that impossible. A mutual friend queried me about this recently, and I have to say that so far as I know, Don's archive rests in his garage, untouched. SAD!!! > > This year I lost another computer addict friend who participated in the early days of the Z80 (and before that as one of the Non-Linear Systems bright lights) - Bill Bailey. Our Old Farts group is getting smaller. > > I wonder - are there any warm bodies here in San Diego still interested in the old computers we created over 30 years ago? If so, I'd sure like to talk with them. Perhaps reconstitute the Dina-SIG I founded some 20+ years ago as a local activity for celebration of the early personal computer, idea and information exchange, and good fellowship over good beer! > > Anyway, I intend to try to drop in here daily and join in the daily conversations. > > Regards, > Vern Wright > San Diego, CA > > > From lynchaj at yahoo.com Sun Dec 14 15:12:41 2008 From: lynchaj at yahoo.com (Andrew Lynch) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 16:12:41 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts (FW: MC68000 ECB SBCs?) Message-ID: <7B01C673B72249E0B2EEC39A08B4703D@andrewdesktop> Hi! I asked my friend Rolf in Germany about 68k home brew computers using ECB bus. Here is bunch of information on the subject which is in German. Fortunately the schematics are universal and there is Google Translate to handle the translation. He also has a nice photo shoot of the N8VEM SBC so you can see the home brew computer to give you an idea of what sort of system it is. http://www.hd64180-ecb.de/html/n8vem.html Although the N8VEM SBC may not be all that useful in a completed ECB 68k project, it could be used as a host processor while the 68k SBC is in development. If the /BUSRQ & /BUSAK lines are used, the 68k CPU can assume control of the ECB bus until the 68k releases it. That might be useful to use the Z80 SBC temporarily for a "kickstart" processor. In any event, the ECB backplane, ECB bus monitor, and ECB prototyping boards could be used "as is" with an ECB 68k SBC. Presumably developer could use the Disk IO and Terminal Replacement Board once those are completed as well. A 68k SBC certainly would be a welcome addition to the N8VEM project and I think you'd enjoy working with the team of builders. Thanks and have a nice day! Andrew Lynch -----Original Message----- Sent: Sunday, December 14, 2008 3:09 PM To: Andrew Lynch Subject: Re: MC68000 ECB SBCs? Hello Andrew, Am 13 Dec 2008 um 17:20 hat Andrew Lynch geschrieben: > > Hi Rolf! Do you know of any MC68000 or similar SBCs for the ECB? If > so do you have any links? > > I recall seeing a MC68008 ECB board on eBay once. > > Thanks and have a nice day! > > Andrew Lynch > > Info only in German. http://www.drcrazy.de/nkc/ http://www.schuetz.thtec.org/NKC/doku/cpu.html http://www.ndr-nkc.de/compo/68000/index.htm http://www.ndr-nkc.de/compo/datenblatt/processor.htm http://www.ndr-nkc.de/compo/doku/mc.htm http://www.audioschaltungen.de/Konzept.pdf MC68010 ECB BUS 16bit Version I have uploaded Files. You can download this when paste it into your Browser's Address bar. "http://www.hd64180-z80180.de/assets/download2008/68000_ct8410.zip" ca. 12,3 MB "http://www.hd64180-z80180.de/assets/download2008/68000_ct8411.zip" ca. 75,9 MB "http://www.hd64180-z80180.de/assets/download2008/68000_ct8412.zip" ca. 36,7 MB "http://www.hd64180-z80180.de/assets/download2008/68000_ct8412_2.zip" ca. 31,5 MB "http://www.hd64180-z80180.de/assets/download2008/68000_ct8501.zip" ca. 27,6 MB "http://www.hd64180-z80180.de/assets/download2008/68000_ct8501_2.zip" ca. 16,8 MB "http://www.hd64180-z80180.de/assets/download2008/68000_ct8501_3.zip" ca. 10,9 MB "http://www.hd64180-z80180.de/assets/download2008/68000_ct8505.zip" ca. 7,75 MB "http://www.hd64180-z80180.de/assets/download2008/68000_ct8506.zip" ca. 24,1 MB "http://www.hd64180-z80180.de/assets/download2008/68000_ct8510.zip" ca. 28,0 MB "http://www.hd64180-z80180.de/assets/download2008/68000_ct8511_0.zip" ca. 48,7 MB "http://www.hd64180-z80180.de/assets/download2008/68000_ct8511.zip" ca. 5,53 MB "http://www.hd64180-z80180.de/assets/download2008/68000_ct8511_X.zip" ca. 24,7 MB "http://www.hd64180-z80180.de/assets/download2008/68000_ct8512.zip" ca. 39,4 MB "http://www.hd64180-z80180.de/assets/download2008/68000_ct8602.zip" ca. 12,6 MB Thank you! Have a nice day! Rolf From mwichary at gmail.com Sun Dec 14 15:24:10 2008 From: mwichary at gmail.com (Marcin Wichary) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 13:24:10 -0800 Subject: Engelbart's mouse / 40th anniversary In-Reply-To: <964328.23699.qm@web65516.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> References: <493F1D6C.78498637@cs.ubc.ca> <964328.23699.qm@web65516.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <1debc0350812141324y5f70b1bg5957a16ab405d6e6@mail.gmail.com> Here are my photos from the event, for those interested: http://flickriver.com/photos/mwichary/sets/72157610918709769/ (48 photos in total. Scroll down to see more.) On Sun, Dec 14, 2008 at 12:35 PM, Vernon Wright wrote: > I had an invite to his presentation down at Stanford. > > But I had meetings that day that I just couldn't off :< > > So I missed the historic event. > > Though I use mice and realize the value of them, I still don't like vermin! > > On your topic, yes, "discovery" v. "invention" annoys me. Even worse is > "invention" v. "idea"; so many people think that having an idea is the same > as creating an invention. If I had a patent for every idea that I never went > so far as to "invent", I'd have bought an Iowa class battleship, an SR-71, > and the Library of Congress. > > OTOH, reporters are not well-known for using words precisely. > > Vern > > > --- On Tue, 12/9/08, Brent Hilpert wrote: > > > From: Brent Hilpert > > Subject: Engelbart's mouse / 40th anniversary > > To: "cctalk at classiccmp.org" > > Date: Tuesday, December 9, 2008, 5:37 PM > > There was a blurb just now on the radio (CBC) about > > Engelbart's development of > > the mouse, including an audio recording of his presentation > > of it at a > > conference in 1968. > > > > That was nice, but weird/annnoying is that the reporter > > referred to it as a > > "discovery". Is it not possible to invent > > anything anymore? Is everything, and > > everything that will ever be in the future, an > > already-existing concept waiting > > out there in some alternative universe of the imagination, > > just waiting to be > > "discovered" by the mind of somebody? > > > > Or did I miss a debate about the semiotics of > > "discovery" vs. "invention" in > > the public discourse somewhere along the way? > > > > It's nice to be humble about achievements and > > acknowledge that developments are > > built upon other developments and don't occur in > > isolation but isn't this > > taking it a bit far? > > > > -- Marcin Wichary Sr. user experience designer, Google Graphical User Interface gallery >> www.guidebookgallery.org From mcguire at neurotica.com Sun Dec 14 16:16:28 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 17:16:28 -0500 Subject: Raised floors In-Reply-To: <200812121610.mBCGA0QA017946@yagi.h-net.msu.edu> References: <49427B77.8070302@gmail.com> <928932.25979.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> <49416810.1030705@gmail.com> <200812121610.mBCGA0QA017946@yagi.h-net.msu.edu> Message-ID: <4417820E-3CBC-46CC-890E-6D03556A67BE@neurotica.com> On Dec 12, 2008, at 11:10 AM, Dennis Boone wrote: >> Anyway, all of this doesn't further the raised floor discussion much, >> except to say that things could be done without raised floors (and >> given >> the way that computing evolved in the UK, if GPO convention was to >> wire >> overhead then doubtless this was carried over into a lot of computer >> installations; the US and other countries may have taken a much >> different route though, with raised floors adopted much earlier) > >> (which raises an incidental question; were Strowger exchanges in >> non-UK >> countries typically wired overhead or below-floor?) > > A friend who has spent a lot of time working in US COs says: > > The only below-floor wiring I've *ever* seen in a CO was in the > 7th > floor computer room, which was managed by the company from whom > Bell > bought the computer. Everything else is overhead, always always > always. My old employer's facility in Laurel, MD was in a building that formerly housed a Bell CO. There were channels in the floor with round holes every few feet (presumably they used fish tape to get stuff around) and the facility's wiring was all done through there. Just FYI. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From cclist at sydex.com Sun Dec 14 16:18:32 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 14:18:32 -0800 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: <001901c95e2f$beaf1970$7ae9da45@efficienfhlqu9> References: <154558.88239.qm@web65508.mail.ac4.yahoo.com>, <001901c95e2f$beaf1970$7ae9da45@efficienfhlqu9> Message-ID: <494515B8.27282.F871AF@cclist.sydex.com> On 14 Dec 2008 at 16:05, George Wiegand wrote: > What are you refering to when you say Non-Linear systems, are you talking > about Non-Linear Video systems? > ,George Wiegand I think he's talking about NLS, the un-renamed Kaypro. Maker of a small portable oscilloscope among other things. Cheers, Chuck From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk Sun Dec 14 16:52:18 2008 From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 22:52:18 +0000 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: <001901c95e2f$beaf1970$7ae9da45@efficienfhlqu9> References: <154558.88239.qm@web65508.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> <001901c95e2f$beaf1970$7ae9da45@efficienfhlqu9> Message-ID: <49458E22.10203@philpem.me.uk> George Wiegand wrote: > What are you refering to when you say Non-Linear systems, are you talking > about Non-Linear Video systems? I'd have thought Kaypro would have been a better guess... (NLS was the name Kaypro originally used before changing their name to Kaypro) -- Phil. classiccmp at philpem.me.uk http://www.philpem.me.uk/ From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Sun Dec 14 17:24:39 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 18:24:39 -0500 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: <494515B8.27282.F871AF@cclist.sydex.com> References: <154558.88239.qm@web65508.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> <001901c95e2f$beaf1970$7ae9da45@efficienfhlqu9> <494515B8.27282.F871AF@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: On 12/14/08, Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 14 Dec 2008 at 16:05, George Wiegand wrote: > > > What are you refering to when you say Non-Linear systems, are you talking > > about Non-Linear Video systems? > > ,George Wiegand > > I think he's talking about NLS, the un-renamed Kaypro. Maker of a > small portable oscilloscope among other things. I have one of those portable o-scopes. Need to see if it just needs new batteries or what. -ethan From pcw at mesanet.com Sun Dec 14 17:21:33 2008 From: pcw at mesanet.com (Peter C. Wallace) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 15:21:33 -0800 (PST) Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: <494515B8.27282.F871AF@cclist.sydex.com> References: <154558.88239.qm@web65508.mail.ac4.yahoo.com>, <001901c95e2f$beaf1970$7ae9da45@efficienfhlqu9> <494515B8.27282.F871AF@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: On Sun, 14 Dec 2008, Chuck Guzis wrote: > Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 14:18:32 -0800 > From: Chuck Guzis > Reply-To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > Subject: Re: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. > > On 14 Dec 2008 at 16:05, George Wiegand wrote: > >> What are you refering to when you say Non-Linear systems, are you talking >> about Non-Linear Video systems? >> ,George Wiegand > > I think he's talking about NLS, the un-renamed Kaypro. Maker of a > small portable oscilloscope among other things. > > Cheers, > Chuck > And before that, very early digital voltmeters... Peter Wallace From trixter at oldskool.org Sun Dec 14 17:31:21 2008 From: trixter at oldskool.org (Jim Leonard) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 17:31:21 -0600 Subject: radio shack catalogs In-Reply-To: <51ea77730812141250j670c7223hbd0bb56218f567e0@mail.gmail.com> References: <49453E7E.5040009@atarimuseum.com> <009101c95e2a$fc616b10$c004010a@dis754cbb81360> <51ea77730812141250j670c7223hbd0bb56218f567e0@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <49459749.30505@oldskool.org> Jason T wrote: > On Sun, Dec 14, 2008 at 2:31 PM, a.carlini wrote: >> Nice site BTW. Cue someone to ask for a faster page-flick mode ... > > Well there's this, if you don't want to put up with all that > javascript silliness: > > http://pdf.textfiles.com/catalogs/RADIOSHACK/ And let's also give a shout to the person doing things correctly: http://ascii.textfiles.com/archives/1558 -- Jim Leonard (trixter at oldskool.org) http://www.oldskool.org/ Help our electronic games project: http://www.mobygames.com/ Or check out some trippy MindCandy at http://www.mindcandydvd.com/ A child borne of the home computer wars: http://trixter.wordpress.com/ From rtellason at verizon.net Sun Dec 14 18:11:39 2008 From: rtellason at verizon.net (Roy J. Tellason) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 19:11:39 -0500 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: <494515B8.27282.F871AF@cclist.sydex.com> References: <154558.88239.qm@web65508.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> <001901c95e2f$beaf1970$7ae9da45@efficienfhlqu9> <494515B8.27282.F871AF@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <200812141911.39438.rtellason@verizon.net> On Sunday 14 December 2008 05:18:32 pm Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 14 Dec 2008 at 16:05, George Wiegand wrote: > > What are you refering to when you say Non-Linear systems, are you talking > > about Non-Linear Video systems? > > ,George Wiegand > > I think he's talking about NLS, the un-renamed Kaypro. Maker of a > small portable oscilloscope among other things. I always thought that one of those would be nifty to play with, though I was a little dubious about the usability of a one inch screen. And then they came out with a dual-trace model... -- Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters" - Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James M Dakin From brain at jbrain.com Sun Dec 14 18:11:23 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 18:11:23 -0600 Subject: Buy versus Build (Was: Re: PDF (Was: something irrelevant given the thread's migration)) In-Reply-To: <200812121748.MAA28363@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> References: <4941B00D.902@jbrain.com> <200812121748.MAA28363@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <4945A0AB.2080806@jbrain.com> der Mouse wrote: > Unrealistic? Tony's lived that way for...I don't know, but at least as > long as I've been on the list. > > Take off your "it has to work for all environments, or at least my > environment" blinkers for a minute. Your stance is at least as > unrealistic for Tony's environment as his is for yours. > Hmm, it seems a whole slew of emails got postponed. I think Tony and I came to an agreement on this earlier. As I previously noted, I'm not asking Tony to live in my world. I only encouraged some clarity. To stay on topic, I can lament that the world has moved away from rebuildable, fixable systems into disposable HW, SW, etc., and that's a shame. What makes it awkward is folks like myself who lament that, and yet on Monday, I'll make decisions that will no doubt widen that gap. Jim From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Sun Dec 14 18:43:25 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 17:43:25 -0700 Subject: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <4944F0FC.31356.690475@cclist.sydex.com> References: <0KBQ003MHKDHL5A0@vms173005.mailsrvcs.net>, <49454378.1070408@jetnet.ab.ca> <4944F0FC.31356.690475@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4945A82D.7030607@jetnet.ab.ca> Chuck Guzis wrote: > Is there any need for any "byte-edness" at all? Stick with a > convenient word size, make it easy to shift and mask out subfields > and forget about "bytes". You get the benefit of being able to > address more memory with fewer bits if you stick to word addressing. > > BIg ENDIAN lives on my machine... :) > I submit that the details of any instruction set over another hardly > matters, so long as an instruction set is complete (i.e., there's no > "you can't get there from here" situation) and is executed > efficiently. > > One instruction computers[1]: Compliment and add, jmp if negitive are not exactly popular for some reason... Hmmm > Cheers, > Chuck > > [1] Something like that anyhow. From rollerton at gmail.com Sun Dec 14 19:23:43 2008 From: rollerton at gmail.com (Robert Ollerton) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 19:23:43 -0600 Subject: DEC H-500 trainer manual anywhere on the net In-Reply-To: <271318.64981.qm@web82408.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <271318.64981.qm@web82408.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <2789adda0812141723j157975e4ied47d8a093ba3310@mail.gmail.com> I have a hard copy in deep storage, might be a few months before I can get to it. On Sun, Dec 14, 2008 at 7:46 AM, wrote: > had a manual in the '70's but no trainer. > now no manual and trainers are available. > From cclist at sydex.com Sun Dec 14 19:39:57 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 17:39:57 -0800 Subject: Bootstrappable language In-Reply-To: <4945A82D.7030607@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <0KBQ003MHKDHL5A0@vms173005.mailsrvcs.net>, <4944F0FC.31356.690475@cclist.sydex.com>, <4945A82D.7030607@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <494544ED.796.1B10A08@cclist.sydex.com> On 14 Dec 2008 at 17:43, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > One instruction computers[1]: Compliment and add, jmp if negitive > are not exactly popular for some reason... Hmmm Make it fast enough, who cares? I kind of like move architecture, myself. While some believe in complimenting twice, I say once is good enough--why encourage a swelled head? :) Cheers, Chuck From wgungfu at uwm.edu Sun Dec 14 19:47:39 2008 From: wgungfu at uwm.edu (Martin Scott Goldberg) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 19:47:39 -0600 (CST) Subject: The first video game In-Reply-To: <1109208011.11287611229305501988.JavaMail.root@mail01.pantherlink.uwm.edu> Message-ID: <772409253.11288311229305659287.JavaMail.root@mail01.pantherlink.uwm.edu> Actually, Nolan and Ted Dabney's first foray in to video games. The two designed and built it together. Always amazes me how Nolan's PR over the years has effectively wiped Ted's contributions, and in some cases sought to rewrite history. Marty ----- Original Message ----- From: "Adrian Graham" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Saturday, December 13, 2008 11:26:13 AM GMT -06:00 Central America Subject: Re: The first video game On 13/12/2008 15:14, "Liam Proven" wrote: > I never knew there was a coin-op Spacewar! > > http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/12/13/tob_computer_space/print.html Yep, it was Nolan Bushnell's first foray into video games but didn't get too much money because it was too complicated for the 'average' user. From my own Atari page: " Whilst working at Ampex (creators of the first practical video recorder no less), Nolan Bushnell had already created an arcade video game based on Spacewar, which was a game written by Steve Russell in 1961 for the PDP-1 from Digital Equipment. Nolan's version was called Computer Space and it was being distributed by Nutting Associates. However, it wasn't as popular as he'd have liked (he said you had to read the instructions, and people didn't have the patience!)" -- Adrian/Witchy Binary Dinosaurs creator/curator Www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk - the UK's biggest private home computer collection? From witchy at binarydinosaurs.co.uk Sun Dec 14 19:55:43 2008 From: witchy at binarydinosaurs.co.uk (Adrian Graham) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 01:55:43 +0000 Subject: The first video game In-Reply-To: <772409253.11288311229305659287.JavaMail.root@mail01.pantherlink.uwm.edu> Message-ID: Hey Marty, I've never been against further updates to my stories, you've spoken to me in the past so let me update my pages for future historians :) Cheers A On 15/12/2008 01:47, "Martin Scott Goldberg" wrote: > Actually, Nolan and Ted Dabney's first foray in to video games. The two > designed and built it together. > Always amazes me how Nolan's PR over the years has effectively wiped Ted's > contributions, and in some cases sought to rewrite history. > > Marty > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Adrian Graham" > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > Sent: Saturday, December 13, 2008 11:26:13 AM GMT -06:00 Central America > Subject: Re: The first video game > > On 13/12/2008 15:14, "Liam Proven" wrote: > >> I never knew there was a coin-op Spacewar! >> >> http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/12/13/tob_computer_space/print.html > > Yep, it was Nolan Bushnell's first foray into video games but didn't get too > much money because it was too complicated for the 'average' user. From my > own Atari page: > > " Whilst working at Ampex (creators of the first practical video recorder no > less), Nolan Bushnell had already created an arcade video game based on > Spacewar, which was a game written by Steve Russell in 1961 for the PDP-1 > from Digital Equipment. Nolan's version was called Computer Space and it was > being distributed by Nutting Associates. However, it wasn't as popular as > he'd have liked (he said you had to read the instructions, and people didn't > have the patience!)" -- Adrian/Witchy Binary Dinosaurs creator/curator Www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk - the UK's biggest private home computer collection? From mcguire at neurotica.com Sun Dec 14 20:32:55 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 21:32:55 -0500 Subject: Canon Cat was: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <7F889F30-7AED-4092-BA47-58026C5666D2@neurotica.com> On Dec 13, 2008, at 9:50 AM, dwight elvey wrote: > First I'd like to mention that the Canon Cat is an interseting > 68K machine. With an assembler written in Forth for the 68K > one could even use it to create their code for their home > built 68K machine. > Behind the Cat's editor is a nice Forth that give one complete > access to the Cat's I/O and memory space. It has a bit mapped video > as well. > It would be a great machine to create code and debug. The > ability to attach code words to the Forth makes it an > easy way to run code in an environment that is one of the > best for experimenting and debugging. One can use the > editor to write the code and then assemble and debug > using Forth as a debug monitor. That machine sounds like a great deal of fun. It's a shame there aren't more of them out there. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Sun Dec 14 20:38:56 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 21:38:56 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <79EDB8CF-463E-48DA-895C-83266DE84C80@neurotica.com> On Dec 14, 2008, at 2:13 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > 'The Art of ELectronics' is IMHO a book every electronics engineer > should > own. There's a lot of good stuff in it. Sure there are the odd > things I > disagree with, there are things I'd do differently, but by the time > you've read it, you'll know enough to be able to work out how you'd > want > to do things. Agreed 100%. That book always lives in an easily-grabbable spot in my library. > My criticism of the Student Manual is that as it was written for a > university course, it assumes you have access to some nice test gear > (like a 'scope, bench PSU, etc). This means the esperiments possibly > can't be done by the average hobyist just starting out. But again > there's > a loot of good stuff in it, and I don't think you need too much exotic > stuff for the 68008 circuits. Eh, a good scope and bench power supply can both be had for less (possibly much less) than $100 these days. That's not much of a limitation. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From kahrs at caip.rutgers.edu Sun Dec 14 20:53:15 2008 From: kahrs at caip.rutgers.edu (Mark KAHRS) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 21:53:15 -0500 (EST) Subject: Algol W In-Reply-To: <200812142318.mBENIMDO076647@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812142318.mBENIMDO076647@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: Wirth was at Stanford at the time and there is a Stanford Tech Report that gives the grammar and usage of Algol W. I presume everyone knows the joke; Wirth is call by name in Europe and Call by Value in the US. IMHO (but of course), the significant contribution of 'W is Call by Reference and Call by Result. From vern4wright at yahoo.com Sun Dec 14 21:10:40 2008 From: vern4wright at yahoo.com (Vernon Wright) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 19:10:40 -0800 (PST) Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: <001901c95e2f$beaf1970$7ae9da45@efficienfhlqu9> Message-ID: <406624.59959.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> NonLinear Systems was an electronics test tool builder in Solana Beach, CA ('bout half an hour north of San Diego). I don't recall when it was formed by Andrew Kay (probably the 50's or even earlier), but it created the first digital voltmeter in the early 60's. It was a very inventive company. But the company is now better known for the Kaypro computer. The first Kaypro II actually was called NonLinear Systems Kaypro. It was the second portable (the Ozzy was the first) personal computer, running CP/M with a couple of floppies, a screen, and the keyboard in a cover. The whole thing is the size of a suitcase and was a terribly heavy item. I know; I have one with the TurboRom and a 10 meg hard drive. Kaypro went on to making IBM clones. Both NLS and Kaypro (separate companies now, after computer success and then failure) still are in existence, I believe. --- On Sun, 12/14/08, George Wiegand wrote: > From: George Wiegand > Subject: Re: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" > Date: Sunday, December 14, 2008, 1:05 PM > What are you refering to when you say Non-Linear systems, > are you talking > about Non-Linear Video systems? > ,George Wiegand > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Vernon Wright" > > To: > Sent: Thursday, December 11, 2008 1:48 PM > Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software > archive, etc. > > > > Over the past four years I've been taking the > digests, pulling down the > archives and saving them, in the hope that I'd find > time to read and perhaps > participate. Never found time. > > > > Gotta get this out of the way first: some of you may > recall that I was Don > Maslin's friend, that I promised to rescue the software > archive, and that > his widow made that impossible. A mutual friend queried me > about this > recently, and I have to say that so far as I know, > Don's archive rests in > his garage, untouched. SAD!!! > > > > This year I lost another computer addict friend who > participated in the > early days of the Z80 (and before that as one of the > Non-Linear Systems > bright lights) - Bill Bailey. Our Old Farts group is > getting smaller. > > > > I wonder - are there any warm bodies here in San Diego > still interested in > the old computers we created over 30 years ago? If so, > I'd sure like to talk > with them. Perhaps reconstitute the Dina-SIG I founded some > 20+ years ago as > a local activity for celebration of the early personal > computer, idea and > information exchange, and good fellowship over good beer! > > > > Anyway, I intend to try to drop in here daily and join > in the daily > conversations. > > > > Regards, > > Vern Wright > > San Diego, CA > > > > > > From mcguire at neurotica.com Sun Dec 14 21:16:26 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 22:16:26 -0500 Subject: HP 5036A built in demos In-Reply-To: <1e1fc3e90812130929i104b9868g816b38060da65a0@mail.gmail.com> References: <1e1fc3e90812130929i104b9868g816b38060da65a0@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <68190C78-D228-49F6-9B86-A61C19C01D94@neurotica.com> On Dec 13, 2008, at 12:29 PM, Glen Slick wrote: > Anyone on the list have an HP 5036A microprocessor lab and not have a > manual and not know that there are built in demo programs in the > monitor ROM? > > RESET, FETCH ADRS, 0, 5, F, 9, RUN > http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73ShZ6zasfs > > RESET, FETCH ADRS, 0, 5, 3, E, RUN > http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSwRafN5BjE > > RESET, FETCH ADRS, 0, 5, 5, A, RUN > http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QNw8h4O_OrQ > > (turn your speakers on if you watch the videos) Hey, those are neatl! I have a 5036A and I *do* have the manual, but I've never run across these in there. I'll have to run them when I get a chance. Thanks for making videos of them. The 5036A really is a neat little SBC. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Sun Dec 14 21:21:41 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 22:21:41 -0500 Subject: Engelbart's mouse / 40th anniversary In-Reply-To: <493F1D6C.78498637@cs.ubc.ca> References: <493F1D6C.78498637@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: On Dec 9, 2008, at 8:37 PM, Brent Hilpert wrote: > There was a blurb just now on the radio (CBC) about Engelbart's > development of > the mouse, including an audio recording of his presentation of it at a > conference in 1968. > > That was nice, but weird/annnoying is that the reporter referred to > it as a > "discovery". Is it not possible to invent anything anymore? Is > everything, and > everything that will ever be in the future, an already-existing > concept waiting > out there in some alternative universe of the imagination, just > waiting to be > "discovered" by the mind of somebody? > > Or did I miss a debate about the semiotics of "discovery" vs. > "invention" in > the public discourse somewhere along the way? > > It's nice to be humble about achievements and acknowledge that > developments are > built upon other developments and don't occur in isolation but > isn't this > taking it a bit far? Abuse of terminology due to cluelessness is endemic in our society. Witness all the people who have "broadband" connections to their houses (they're almost always baseband, but have lots of bandwidth), and the guy down the street from me who swears that he "has a satellite" in his back yard. It is really infuriating sometimes. I cope with it (to keep from tearing peoples' heads off) by reminding myself that language is an evolving thing, and that a few years from now, "broadband" really will be officially synonymous with "high bandwidth". I think "discovery" vs. "invention" is a similar thing. People are clueless. That, in itself, is forgivable. What's NOT forgivable is people being happy about the fact that they're clueless, and lacking any particular desire to change. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From curt at atarimuseum.com Sun Dec 14 21:28:01 2008 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 22:28:01 -0500 Subject: The first video game In-Reply-To: <772409253.11288311229305659287.JavaMail.root@mail01.pantherlink.uwm.edu> References: <772409253.11288311229305659287.JavaMail.root@mail01.pantherlink.uwm.edu> Message-ID: <4945CEC1.1060204@atarimuseum.com> Ted actually contributed the major amount of work into Computer Space, Nolan actually took most of the credit for it. You should see how Nolan has systematically tried to put down Ralph Baer for many years, to the point of belittling the man's work (and reputation) on the design and engineering of Ralph's 1966 original designs for a Home TV based video game system which he would later see become commericalized into the Magnavox Odyssey in 1972. Curt Martin Scott Goldberg wrote: > Actually, Nolan and Ted Dabney's first foray in to video games. The two designed and built it together. > Always amazes me how Nolan's PR over the years has effectively wiped Ted's contributions, and in some cases sought to rewrite history. > > Marty > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Adrian Graham" > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > Sent: Saturday, December 13, 2008 11:26:13 AM GMT -06:00 Central America > Subject: Re: The first video game > > On 13/12/2008 15:14, "Liam Proven" wrote: > > >> I never knew there was a coin-op Spacewar! >> >> http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/12/13/tob_computer_space/print.html >> > > Yep, it was Nolan Bushnell's first foray into video games but didn't get too > much money because it was too complicated for the 'average' user. From my > own Atari page: > > " Whilst working at Ampex (creators of the first practical video recorder no > less), Nolan Bushnell had already created an arcade video game based on > Spacewar, which was a game written by Steve Russell in 1961 for the PDP-1 > from Digital Equipment. Nolan's version was called Computer Space and it was > being distributed by Nutting Associates. However, it wasn't as popular as > he'd have liked (he said you had to read the instructions, and people didn't > have the patience!)" > > From mikelee at tdh.com Sun Dec 14 22:42:13 2008 From: mikelee at tdh.com (Michael Lee) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 22:42:13 -0600 Subject: Amiga Video Toaster with Penn and Teller Message-ID: <4945E025.803@tdh.com> Anyone have a copy of or know if copies even exists of the videos done by NewTek with Penn and Teller?** From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Sun Dec 14 22:56:05 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 22:56:05 -0600 Subject: [BBC-Micro] PSU Failure In-Reply-To: References: <4945AE33.7040907@aurigae.demon.co.uk> Message-ID: <4945E365.2030302@gmail.com> Mark Haysman wrote: > Hi. > > The X2 class capacitors fail, causing that smoke. That seems the most likely cause to me. I don't think I've ever seen a transformer in a switchmode supply go into meltdown. Not that shorted windings can't happen, but it's a very uncommon failure IME... cheers Jules From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Sun Dec 14 23:44:54 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 23:44:54 -0600 Subject: [BBC-Micro] PSU Failure In-Reply-To: <4945E365.2030302@gmail.com> References: <4945AE33.7040907@aurigae.demon.co.uk> <4945E365.2030302@gmail.com> Message-ID: <4945EED6.3050108@gmail.com> Jules Richardson wrote: > Mark Haysman wrote: Hmm - wrong list :( (the perils of being on a mailing list which requires me to cut 'n paste the list address every time I post, I suppose) From eric at brouhaha.com Mon Dec 15 00:38:25 2008 From: eric at brouhaha.com (Eric Smith) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 22:38:25 -0800 Subject: The first video game In-Reply-To: <49442D7B.8030607@atarimuseum.com> References: <575131af0812130714s6f942cc6y9d3449a71ea1464@mail.gmail.com> <4944138D.5243161C@cs.ubc.ca> <49442D7B.8030607@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <4945FB61.4090509@brouhaha.com> Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > Before Computer Space there was Galaxy - which I believe the original > MIT breakroom coin-op is now at the Computer Museum. Stanford University: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galaxy_Game From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Mon Dec 15 00:50:23 2008 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 22:50:23 -0800 Subject: NonLinear Systems / was Re: My return to Classic Cmp References: <406624.59959.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4945FE30.9D09FEA0@cs.ubc.ca> Vernon Wright wrote: > > NonLinear Systems was an electronics test tool builder in Solana Beach, CA ('bout half an hour north of San Diego). I don't recall when it was formed by Andrew Kay (probably the 50's or even earlier), but it created the first digital voltmeter in the early 60's. It was a very inventive company. The radio museum here received one of what I believe was that first DVM from NLS (circa mid-50's), something of an historic model. It disappeared before I had a chance to look at in depth or work on it. From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Dec 15 02:00:07 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 03:00:07 -0500 Subject: NonLinear Systems / was Re: My return to Classic Cmp In-Reply-To: <4945FE30.9D09FEA0@cs.ubc.ca> References: <406624.59959.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> <4945FE30.9D09FEA0@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: On Dec 15, 2008, at 1:50 AM, Brent Hilpert wrote: >> NonLinear Systems was an electronics test tool builder in Solana >> Beach, CA ('bout half an hour north of San Diego). I don't recall >> when it was formed by Andrew Kay (probably the 50's or even >> earlier), but it created the first digital voltmeter in the early >> 60's. It was a very inventive company. > > The radio museum here received one of what I believe was that first > DVM from > NLS (circa mid-50's), something of an historic model. > > It disappeared before I had a chance to look at in depth or work on > it. They're neat, and historically very important. One showed up on eBay a few months ago; it went for serious bucks, so apparently some people know about the model. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Dec 15 02:15:46 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 03:15:46 -0500 Subject: radio shack catalogs In-Reply-To: <49453E7E.5040009@atarimuseum.com> References: <49453E7E.5040009@atarimuseum.com> Message-ID: <967A9DF3-B214-4F01-8104-72B23F795EEE@neurotica.com> On Dec 14, 2008, at 12:12 PM, Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: > The good old days of Radio Shack, were the electronics parts isles > outnumbered the rest of the store, where you could buy just about > anything for hobbyist work without having to weed through 5,000 > radio controlled crapola toys, cellular displays and other useless > nonsense... > > When Radio Shack was a respectable place to shop, and not a mini- > Circuit City wannabe To be fair...Radio Shack did indeed descend into the murky depths of being an overcommercialized cell phone and cheap stereo equipment pusher, but just recently, over the past two years or so, they've started to come back. In that time, the electronic parts inventories of my two local RS stores has more than doubled. They've inked some sort of an agreement with Parallax, Inc. and are now selling their stuff, including Basic Stamps and various sensors and robotics goodies. Not all stores stock all of this stuff, but I've seen bits and pieces of it at several of them. This is a huge step in the right direction. I suggest we support them in this effort in any way we can. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Dec 15 02:43:32 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 03:43:32 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <49444A93.60400@gmail.com> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> <4942EDD4.3090800@jetnet.ab.ca> <49444A93.60400@gmail.com> Message-ID: On Dec 13, 2008, at 6:51 PM, Sridhar Ayengar wrote: >>> Did anybody ever use one, or any kind of general purpose co- >>> processor >>> boards for the PC? >> Not me, but I remember such things existed for a while in the days >> before the 486 was dominant. > > I seem to remember something about co-processor boards with i860 > chips on them? MicroWay's Number Smasher 860. One showed up on eBay in September. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Dec 15 02:45:23 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 03:45:23 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> <4942EDD4.3090800@jetnet.ab.ca> <49444A93.60400@gmail.com> Message-ID: <28F1024F-D778-43A9-B0FC-6E332527E945@neurotica.com> On Dec 13, 2008, at 7:03 PM, William Donzelli wrote: >> I seem to remember something about co-processor boards with i860 >> chips on >> them? > > Yes, RCS has some of those kicking around. > > Quite some time back I used an OCR package on a 486 that used the AMD > 29K PeeCee development board for the horsepower. In 1988 or so, I used a similar OCR setup at work. I think it was called Calera, but I'm not sure. It used an ISA board with a 16MHz 68020 and a bunch of memory on it. It ran under DOS. Its code was all RAM-based, and was downloaded into the board at boot time by programs run from autoexec.bat. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Dec 15 02:48:33 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 03:48:33 -0500 Subject: radio shack catalogs In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Dec 14, 2008, at 12:54 AM, David Griffith wrote: > Someone on comp.os.cpm pointed this out. I don't recall anyone > doing so > here. http://www.radioshackcatalogs.com/. Mmm... Fond memories of > when > Radio Shack didn't stink. Good heavens, I could stare at the cover of the 2002 catalog all day long! -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Sun Dec 14 08:19:23 2008 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 09:19:23 -0500 (EST) Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <494461BF.9020707@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <49443F9E.8080008@gmail.com> <7d3530220812131520j49e63683s215b382336ea4df7@mail.gmail.com> <49444A46.6060300@gmail.com> <494461BF.9020707@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <200812141420.JAA10928@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> > How do you have RISC from a CPLD since RISC implies a large register > stack? It does? I thought it implied a (moderately) minimalist instruction set. This tends to correlate with having lots of registers, but that's hardly necessary - consider the PDP-8, for example. /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Sun Dec 14 08:20:58 2008 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse) Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 09:20:58 -0500 (EST) Subject: Source for MMJ cables. In-Reply-To: <4940091D.6090602@softjar.se> References: <200812101800.mBAI0FDq095288@dewey.classiccmp.org> <4940091D.6090602@softjar.se> Message-ID: <200812141427.JAA10963@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> > [...DTE...DCE...] > DEC was one of the few companies that actually got this right, and > made cables and connectors that actually followed the standard [...] > If just every computer manufacturer had read the specs, the world > would have been much nicer, I'm not so sure. It was inevitable that someone would try to connect two DTEs together directly, as indeed is easily the commonest today. It would have been much simpler if everything had been specced the same and all cables had been what today are loosely called null-modem. The same mistake plagues 10baseT and 100baseTX today. You'd think they'd've learned from the serial-line mses, but noooo, there are hosts and hubs and you sometimes want a crossed cable and sometimes don't, depending on what you're connecting. I really wish they'd specced everything the same, making all cables the same (what today we call crossed). At least now with auto-X this mess is easing some extent. Okay, okay, .... /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From emu at e-bbes.com Mon Dec 15 05:54:50 2008 From: emu at e-bbes.com (emu at e-bbes.com) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 12:54:50 +0100 Subject: 68k homebuilts Message-ID: <20081215125450.5ukib9jabu4oosgg@webmail.opentransfer.com> John Floren wrote: > Well, I wasn't thinking the MC68000 processor exactly, just something > from that family. I *do* have some experience with FPGA, so I'll > consider doing that as well. So check google/wiki for Minimig. It is an amiga 500 clone with a real mc68000 cpu and all peripherals in an FPGA. Seems to be a lot of fun. Cheers From frustum at pacbell.net Mon Dec 15 07:56:20 2008 From: frustum at pacbell.net (Jim Battle) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 07:56:20 -0600 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <28F1024F-D778-43A9-B0FC-6E332527E945@neurotica.com> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> <4942EDD4.3090800@jetnet.ab.ca> <49444A93.60400@gmail.com> <28F1024F-D778-43A9-B0FC-6E332527E945@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <49466204.6070002@pacbell.net> Dave McGuire wrote: > On Dec 13, 2008, at 7:03 PM, William Donzelli wrote: >>> I seem to remember something about co-processor boards with i860 >>> chips on >>> them? >> >> Yes, RCS has some of those kicking around. >> >> Quite some time back I used an OCR package on a 486 that used the AMD >> 29K PeeCee development board for the horsepower. > > In 1988 or so, I used a similar OCR setup at work. I think it was > called Calera, but I'm not sure. It used an ISA board with a 16MHz > 68020 and a bunch of memory on it. It ran under DOS. Its code was all > RAM-based, and was downloaded into the board at boot time by programs > run from autoexec.bat. > > -Dave (somehow cctalk and cctech are both on the distribution list -- I'm taking cctech off) Heh, thank you, thank you. I designed that board, as well as two of the three ASICs on it. I later designed a replacement ASIC that combined all of them into one, and was pin compatible with one of the existing parts so the same board could be used. Forgive my ramble, as the opportunity to talk about this 20 year old product doesn't happen very often. The first year Byte magazine ran their top 10 products of the year, it was one of the winners. One ASIC, the first one I ever designed, was what LSI logic called a "structured array". It contained a 2KB RAM and about 5K usable gates. This part would be programmed with the x,w,w,h of some putative location of a character image on the 1 bpp frame buffer. It would fetch the bitmap and turn it into a normalized MxN gray scale image, although 5x7 was always what was used. Added as an afterthought, because I had a few hundred unused gates, I added the ability to rotate a 32x32 block of image. The 68020 would write 32 words to registers on the chip (really, it went into that 2KB RAM), then it would read them back out at a different address and get them rotated. By stepping through the image in the right order, you could rotate the entire image. It was considerably faster than having the 68020 do the rotation in software. The other ASIC I designed for that product was a 68020 memory controller plus vector compare logic. The memory controller had flexible timing control to allow interfacing to different types of DRAM, and also took care of parity generation/checking (optional). The vector compare logic would be loaded with one of the normalized 5x7 character images (although other sizes were permitted, software only ever used 5x7) and would be given a stream of pointers to reference 5x7 images in memory. The vector compare would compute the sum of squared differences on each image, and would save the best fit distance and an index to which reference character generated that best fit. A large part of the memory contained these reference characters sets. A hierarchical search was used to find the closest match very quickly, instead of a brute force compare each character against all reference images. Right now I'm drawing a blank what the 3rd ASIC did. It was designed by a guy named Jeffrey Soreff. This was before Verilog was widely used, so all of it was done via gate-level schematics, drawn using LSI's schematic capture program. While the ASICs were in fab, I designed the ISA card. We had no spec for the ISA bus, so I simply looked at the schematics and timing diagrams that came with one of our Compaq computers and with an early IBM PC. There was a control register that the ISA side could write to control the 68020; the ISA side could reset the 68020 and it could also raise an interrupt. There was an 8 bit "mailbox" register that both sides could read or write. Both sides could also read and write the DRAM on the board, although on the ISA side only an 8KB window was visible at any time, selected via a mapping register. One very interesting and touchy part of the design came from the marketing dictate that there be no user configuration jumpers on the card, which was nearly universal at the time. Instead a very elaborate configuration sequence was used; I contributed some of the ideas, but most of the hard work of making it reliable fell to a guy named John Taves. I described how it worked on this list a few years ago; in fact, I see it was on January 31, 2005. Search the archives for that date or the text "Calera Recognition Systems" and you should find it, if you care to. From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Mon Dec 15 07:48:15 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 07:48:15 -0600 Subject: radio shack catalogs In-Reply-To: <967A9DF3-B214-4F01-8104-72B23F795EEE@neurotica.com> References: <49453E7E.5040009@atarimuseum.com> <967A9DF3-B214-4F01-8104-72B23F795EEE@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <4946601F.7090806@gmail.com> Dave McGuire wrote: > To be fair...Radio Shack did indeed descend into the murky depths of > being an overcommercialized cell phone and cheap stereo equipment > pusher, but just recently, over the past two years or so, they've > started to come back. > > In that time, the electronic parts inventories of my two local RS > stores has more than doubled. They've inked some sort of an agreement > with Parallax, Inc. and are now selling their stuff, including Basic > Stamps and various sensors and robotics goodies. Not all stores stock > all of this stuff, but I've seen bits and pieces of it at several of them. Hmm, I went into the local one a little while back looking for something or other... 1) Anything remotely interesting is stashed behind acres of gimmicky plastic crap electrical goods, 2) There seemed to be a huge markup for 'convenience', 3) Fifteen sales assistants tried to pounce on me the moment I entered the store, 4) The shop was in a mall, and basically a box with one side missing - the noise level made it utterly impossible to have any kind of conversation without shouting. Now, I can understand the first two in a business context - and I actually don't mind paying over the odds for a nice environment and good service. But given that RS seem to offer neither, there's little point in using them for something I can get elsewhere anyway. (Now Digikey are only about an hours' drive from me - maybe I should suggest that they open a store here :-) cheers Jules From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Mon Dec 15 07:52:55 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 07:52:55 -0600 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <28F1024F-D778-43A9-B0FC-6E332527E945@neurotica.com> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> <4942EDD4.3090800@jetnet.ab.ca> <49444A93.60400@gmail.com> <28F1024F-D778-43A9-B0FC-6E332527E945@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <49466137.60202@gmail.com> Dave McGuire wrote: > On Dec 13, 2008, at 7:03 PM, William Donzelli wrote: >>> I seem to remember something about co-processor boards with i860 >>> chips on >>> them? >> >> Yes, RCS has some of those kicking around. >> >> Quite some time back I used an OCR package on a 486 that used the AMD >> 29K PeeCee development board for the horsepower. > > In 1988 or so, I used a similar OCR setup at work. I think it was > called Calera, but I'm not sure. It used an ISA board with a 16MHz > 68020 and a bunch of memory on it. It ran under DOS. Its code was all > RAM-based, and was downloaded into the board at boot time by programs > run from autoexec.bat. That's interesting - so I wonder if they made a design decision to use the 68k, or did they already have a product based around a 68k (possibly on a Mac?) and it made the porting effort to the PC platform a lot easier just to sell the product with a copro board? Back then most OCR products commanded a huge price tag, so doubtless adding the cost of an ISA card didn't make much difference (but I assume that they bought in the card from somewhere else rather than making in-house?) cheers Jules From frustum at pacbell.net Mon Dec 15 08:34:54 2008 From: frustum at pacbell.net (Jim Battle) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 08:34:54 -0600 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <49466137.60202@gmail.com> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> <4942EDD4.3090800@jetnet.ab.ca> <49444A93.60400@gmail.com> <28F1024F-D778-43A9-B0FC-6E332527E945@neurotica.com> <49466137.60202@gmail.com> Message-ID: <49466B0E.6020206@pacbell.net> Jules Richardson wrote: > Dave McGuire wrote: ... >> In 1988 or so, I used a similar OCR setup at work. I think it was >> called Calera, but I'm not sure. It used an ISA board with a 16MHz >> 68020 and a bunch of memory on it. It ran under DOS. Its code was >> all RAM-based, and was downloaded into the board at boot time by >> programs run from autoexec.bat. > > That's interesting - so I wonder if they made a design decision to use > the 68k, or did they already have a product based around a 68k (possibly > on a Mac?) and it made the porting effort to the PC platform a lot > easier just to sell the product with a copro board? Back then most OCR > products commanded a huge price tag, so doubtless adding the cost of an > ISA card didn't make much difference (but I assume that they bought in > the card from somewhere else rather than making in-house?) The first generation Palantir (later renamed Calera) OCR machines contained a pipeline of four 8 MHz 68000s, each doing a bit of the pipeline. It was a $30K machine. The second generation machine upgraded to 68020s running at 16 MHz, as I recall, but it is kinda blurry since I also spent a fair amount of time prototyping systems with 16 MHz 68000s from Thompson. We tried a number of configurations to see which gave the best performace/$. The second generation machine came out at $30K, and they continued to sell the first generation machine at a reduced price, like $24K. The funny thing is the first generation machine was more expensive to build, so in time they switched to shipping 2nd generation machines with delay loops to the customers who could afford only the $24K price tag. The 68020-based ISA accelerator was $2K, and ran as fast as the first generation machine. Although a 16 MHz 68020 isn't four times as fast as four 8 MHz 68000s, the pipeline nature of the 1st gen machine meant that frequently one or more processors were idled waiting for input or output. The 68020 on the ISA card ran full out all the time that work was available. So why the 68020 on the ISA card? 68K code compatibility was part of the decision, although the vast majority of code was done in C. The bigger reason was that at the time, RISC was a new trend. At the time I don't know if Sun had announced SPARC yet. MIPS was around, but the R2K was expensive and hard to fit on an ISA card. R3K was manageable, and that came later. BTW, Caere also came out with 68020 accelerator board for doing OCR around the same time Calera did, although they didn't use any ASICs for acceleration. It was all software. Eventually Caere acquired Calera, or they merged. Caere's Omnipage name lives on as a Scansoft product, although they recently got acquired by a different company. I've read that the latest couple of versions (I think they are at Omnipage 16 now) are a step backwards. From pat at computer-refuge.org Mon Dec 15 08:41:44 2008 From: pat at computer-refuge.org (Patrick Finnegan) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 09:41:44 -0500 Subject: Source for MMJ cables. In-Reply-To: <200812141427.JAA10963@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> References: <200812101800.mBAI0FDq095288@dewey.classiccmp.org> <4940091D.6090602@softjar.se> <200812141427.JAA10963@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <200812150941.44574.pat@computer-refuge.org> On Sunday 14 December 2008, der Mouse wrote: > The same mistake plagues 10baseT and 100baseTX today. But, this is fixed with 1000Base-T, and works just fine with 10Base-FL, 100Base-FX, 1000Base-SX/LX/ZX, and other fiber ethernet interconnects. :) Even connecting 10 and 100Mbit (copper) equipment to a 1Gb switch works whether or not you have a crossover cable. Pat -- Purdue University Research Computing --- http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/ The Computer Refuge --- http://computer-refuge.org From wdonzelli at gmail.com Mon Dec 15 09:00:40 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 10:00:40 -0500 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: <406624.59959.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> References: <001901c95e2f$beaf1970$7ae9da45@efficienfhlqu9> <406624.59959.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> Message-ID: > NonLinear Systems was an electronics test tool builder in Solana Beach, CA ('bout half an hour north of San Diego). I don't recall when it was formed by Andrew Kay (probably the 50's or even earlier), but it created the first digital voltmeter in the early 60's. It was a very inventive company. NLS *almost* made minicomputers in the early 1960s. They offered some very large digital ATE systems that had simple processors made out of small logic boards. -- Will From mbbrutman-cctalk at brutman.com Mon Dec 15 09:22:45 2008 From: mbbrutman-cctalk at brutman.com (Michael B. Brutman) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 09:22:45 -0600 Subject: Commodore PET RS-232 In-Reply-To: <20081212182111.W20361@shell.lmi.net> References: <4942D683.8040100@comcast.net> <788131.19617.qm@web52709.mail.re2.yahoo.com> <20081212182111.W20361@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <49467645.4090602@brutman.com> Fred Cisin wrote: > On Fri, 12 Dec 2008, Dave Caroline wrote: >> should be a way/was a way to use the 6522 VIA chip it will need >> translation to rs232 levels though > > Does anybody here remember a thread from last month called: > Re: RS232 voltage level converter box > > (trying to figure out what a board with 1488s and 1489s was for) > > > Yep. That was my thread. And the box is still sitting here looking at me. :-) (I've not had a lot of time to play lately ...) Mike From doc at mdrconsult.com Mon Dec 15 11:03:08 2008 From: doc at mdrconsult.com (Doc Shipley) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 11:03:08 -0600 Subject: 8008 chips Message-ID: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> First, I know approximately nothing about old Intel chips, so forgive any incoherence. A friend of mine just came across a couple of Intel 8008 chips. Apparently, some ebay sellers think they're solid gold. http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=260099837541 As far as we can tell, that's what Mel has. Anyway, I told him I'd try to find out what it's actually worth and whether anyone here is willing to pay whatever's reasonable. He also has some later 8008s without the gold cap. Doc From trixter at oldskool.org Mon Dec 15 11:05:33 2008 From: trixter at oldskool.org (Jim Leonard) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 11:05:33 -0600 Subject: Amiga Video Toaster with Penn and Teller In-Reply-To: <4945E025.803@tdh.com> References: <4945E025.803@tdh.com> Message-ID: <49468E5D.1030807@oldskool.org> Michael Lee wrote: > Anyone have a copy of or know if copies even exists of the videos done > by NewTek with Penn and Teller?** Youtube has at least one promotional video that features Penn; maybe they have others? -- Jim Leonard (trixter at oldskool.org) http://www.oldskool.org/ Help our electronic games project: http://www.mobygames.com/ Or check out some trippy MindCandy at http://www.mindcandydvd.com/ A child borne of the home computer wars: http://trixter.wordpress.com/ From doc at mdrconsult.com Mon Dec 15 11:06:44 2008 From: doc at mdrconsult.com (Doc Shipley) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 11:06:44 -0600 Subject: radio shack catalogs In-Reply-To: <967A9DF3-B214-4F01-8104-72B23F795EEE@neurotica.com> References: <49453E7E.5040009@atarimuseum.com> <967A9DF3-B214-4F01-8104-72B23F795EEE@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <49468EA4.1030908@mdrconsult.com> Dave McGuire wrote: > In that time, the electronic parts inventories of my two local RS > stores has more than doubled. They've inked some sort of an agreement > with Parallax, Inc. and are now selling their stuff, including Basic > Stamps and various sensors and robotics goodies. Not all stores stock > all of this stuff, but I've seen bits and pieces of it at several of them. > > This is a huge step in the right direction. I suggest we support them > in this effort in any way we can. Another nice thing is their $0 shipping policy. If you order online and have your parts shipped to the nearest store, it takes a day or two at no charge. And yeah, they charge silly money for common component parts. Like somebody said, I just consider it a "convenience tax". Doc From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Mon Dec 15 11:10:13 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 12:10:13 -0500 Subject: Harvard v. von Neumann References: <4942909C.7090900@gmail.com> Message-ID: <18758.36725.824442.829754@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> >>>>> "Sridhar" == Sridhar Ayengar writes: Sridhar> [I tried to send this before, but I don't think it went out. Sridhar> My apologies if you're seeing this a second time.] Sridhar> According to my reading, the Burroughs B5000 and Manchester Sridhar> Atlas were both Harvard architecture machines, and the Sridhar> GE-645 was von Neumann. Am I correct in my interpretation? I don't know the GE, but the Burroughs mainframes are v.N. Perhaps you got that interpretation because code is distinguished from data. But that's not by memory space; code (and for that matter other non-data things like pointers) is identified by "tag" bits which are stored in memory along with the data bits of each word. For example, data has tag 0, while executable code has tag 7. That gives you some protection. (Indeed, that's about all the protection you get; OS security in Burroughs mainframe systems did not come from the hardware, but rather from the fact that creating code files was a privileged operation, and only compilers were privileged to do that, and the ESPOL compiler was protected so Joe User couldn't use it.) You can find more on Bitsavers; there are a bunch of B6700 manuals there including the system reference manual. paul From dave.thearchivist at gmail.com Mon Dec 15 11:25:10 2008 From: dave.thearchivist at gmail.com (Dave Caroline) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 17:25:10 +0000 Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> Message-ID: hehe wishful thinking on the part of the seller. I have one in a PCB rescued from a piece of HP (voltmeter iirc) perhaps I should put in a bank deposit box Dave Caroline From cclist at sydex.com Mon Dec 15 11:13:28 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 09:13:28 -0800 Subject: radio shack catalogs In-Reply-To: <967A9DF3-B214-4F01-8104-72B23F795EEE@neurotica.com> References: , <49453E7E.5040009@atarimuseum.com>, <967A9DF3-B214-4F01-8104-72B23F795EEE@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <49461FB8.8878.5078B25@cclist.sydex.com> On 15 Dec 2008 at 3:15, Dave McGuire wrote: > In that time, the electronic parts inventories of my two local RS > stores has more than doubled. They've inked some sort of an > agreement with Parallax, Inc. and are now selling their stuff, > including Basic Stamps and various sensors and robotics goodies. Not > all stores stock all of this stuff, but I've seen bits and pieces of > it at several of them. Is this a local phenomenon? I certainly don't see any sign of it on the RS website. While the local store offered some great bargains 10-15 years ago while it was trashing its inventory of components (as in, "How about 10 bucks for the whole box of stuff there in the corner?"), I see no improvement at all. Periodically (the local store is near where I shop for groceries), I'll go in and wander to the rear of the store to where what passes for components are sold and try to see what could be built with what is in stock. I can still make a linear PSU, as the store has some power transformers, diodes and voltage regulators (LM317, 7812, 7805) and capacitors. I could also probably build a small audio amplifier and a few other analog projects. I don't see the Parallax uCs on the RS web site, however. I miss the "bubble pack" wrapping for components, particularly connectors. The local store now keeps many connectors in small drawers that staff seems to reserve the right to browse in. And prices for the same have gone up substantially. I miss the "grap bag" assortments that RS used to offer of semiconductors. Most of the time, the stuff contained therein was pretty ordinary, but the occasional bit of exotica could be found. Just like playing the lottery. It wouldn't hurt one bit if we could get the young 'uns interested in low-level electronic tinkering once again. Radio Shack used to be a good source for that stuff, but it seems, no longer. Cheers, Chuck From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Mon Dec 15 11:43:06 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 10:43:06 -0700 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <200812141420.JAA10928@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> References: <49443F9E.8080008@gmail.com> <7d3530220812131520j49e63683s215b382336ea4df7@mail.gmail.com> <49444A46.6060300@gmail.com> <494461BF.9020707@jetnet.ab.ca> <200812141420.JAA10928@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <4946972A.3080706@jetnet.ab.ca> der Mouse wrote: >> How do you have RISC from a CPLD since RISC implies a large register >> stack? >> > > It does? I thought it implied a (moderately) minimalist instruction > set. This tends to correlate with having lots of registers, but that's > hardly necessary - consider the PDP-8, for example. > > The idea of a RISC is that out of few general addressing modes ( to keep decoding simple ) you generate all the other needed ones in software. Since decoding is so simple you can ran faster by pipelining everything and goes real fast, providing *gotya* main memory is that fast too. The 8 is reduced because you have to cram everything in 12 bits. > /~\ The ASCII Mouse > \ / Ribbon Campaign > X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org > / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B > > From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Mon Dec 15 11:37:55 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 11:37:55 -0600 Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> Message-ID: <494695F3.7010907@gmail.com> Doc Shipley wrote: > First, I know approximately nothing about old Intel chips, so forgive > any incoherence. > > A friend of mine just came across a couple of Intel 8008 chips. > Apparently, some ebay sellers think they're solid gold. So, is anyone counterfeiting them yet? It wouldn't surprise me - after all presumably people don't generally sell them as "tested and working" anyway... cheers Jules From jos.mar at bluewin.ch Mon Dec 15 11:52:10 2008 From: jos.mar at bluewin.ch (Jos Dreesen / Marian Capel) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 18:52:10 +0100 Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> Message-ID: <4946994A.5020304@bluewin.ch> Doc Shipley wrote: > First, I know approximately nothing about old Intel chips, so forgive > any incoherence. > > A friend of mine just came across a couple of Intel 8008 chips. > Apparently, some ebay sellers think they're solid gold. > It might be the first microprocessor, (i4004 is just a controller...), but what really made the microcomputer possible is the DRAM. Why dont people collect i1103's ? Jos From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Dec 15 11:53:01 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 12:53:01 -0500 Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> Message-ID: <78C4457C-13EF-4FA1-A3C7-1B2484D6FFF3@neurotica.com> On Dec 15, 2008, at 12:03 PM, Doc Shipley wrote: > First, I know approximately nothing about old Intel chips, so > forgive any incoherence. > > A friend of mine just came across a couple of Intel 8008 chips. > Apparently, some ebay sellers think they're solid gold. > > http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=260099837541 > > As far as we can tell, that's what Mel has. > > Anyway, I told him I'd try to find out what it's actually worth > and whether anyone here is willing to pay whatever's reasonable. > > He also has some later 8008s without the gold cap. They're worth $100 absolute max in my opinion, probably half that. The eBay seller is smoking crack. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From jfoust at threedee.com Mon Dec 15 11:53:39 2008 From: jfoust at threedee.com (John Foust) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 11:53:39 -0600 Subject: Engelbart's mouse / 40th anniversary In-Reply-To: References: <493F1D6C.78498637@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: <6.2.3.4.2.20081215115216.0744f4d0@mail.threedee.com> At 09:21 PM 12/14/2008, Dave McGuire wrote: > Abuse of terminology due to cluelessness is endemic in our >society. Witness all the people who have "broadband" connections to >their houses (they're almost always baseband, but have lots of >bandwidth), and the guy down the street from me who swears that he >"has a satellite" in his back yard. It is really infuriating sometimes. Hey, maybe after you get them to stop saying that, you can teach them about the difference between "download" and "install." - John From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Mon Dec 15 12:06:31 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 12:06:31 -0600 Subject: Engelbart's mouse / 40th anniversary In-Reply-To: <6.2.3.4.2.20081215115216.0744f4d0@mail.threedee.com> References: <493F1D6C.78498637@cs.ubc.ca> <6.2.3.4.2.20081215115216.0744f4d0@mail.threedee.com> Message-ID: <49469CA7.1030708@gmail.com> John Foust wrote: > At 09:21 PM 12/14/2008, Dave McGuire wrote: >> Abuse of terminology due to cluelessness is endemic in our >> society. Witness all the people who have "broadband" connections to >> their houses (they're almost always baseband, but have lots of >> bandwidth), and the guy down the street from me who swears that he >> "has a satellite" in his back yard. It is really infuriating sometimes. > > Hey, maybe after you get them to stop saying that, you can teach them > about the difference between "download" and "install." That's after they've 'logged on' to a website, right? From cclist at sydex.com Mon Dec 15 12:14:36 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 10:14:36 -0800 Subject: Harvard v. von Neumann In-Reply-To: <18758.36725.824442.829754@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> References: <4942909C.7090900@gmail.com>, <18758.36725.824442.829754@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> Message-ID: <49462E0C.3591.53F7C8E@cclist.sydex.com> On 15 Dec 2008 at 12:10, Paul Koning wrote: > You can find more on Bitsavers; there are a bunch of B6700 manuals > there including the system reference manual. Bitsavers has a couple of B5000 manuals, which may prove to be useful. The B5000 could hardly have been Harvard, when one considers the fucntions of the MCP, which had free access to all areas of core, including satisfying all "not in core" references. Cheers, Chuck From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Dec 15 12:33:35 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 13:33:35 -0500 Subject: radio shack catalogs In-Reply-To: <49461FB8.8878.5078B25@cclist.sydex.com> References: , <49453E7E.5040009@atarimuseum.com>, <967A9DF3-B214-4F01-8104-72B23F795EEE@neurotica.com> <49461FB8.8878.5078B25@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: On Dec 15, 2008, at 12:13 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote: >> In that time, the electronic parts inventories of my two local RS >> stores has more than doubled. They've inked some sort of an >> agreement with Parallax, Inc. and are now selling their stuff, >> including Basic Stamps and various sensors and robotics goodies. Not >> all stores stock all of this stuff, but I've seen bits and pieces of >> it at several of them. > > Is this a local phenomenon? I certainly don't see any sign of it on > the RS website. I saw the press release about the Parallax deal a long time ago; it's chain-wide. My stores here (southwest Florida) have the stuff, and I've heard from a friend in Rhode Island that they do up there as well. I don't think I've ever looked at their web site. > While the local store offered some great bargains > 10-15 years ago while it was trashing its inventory of components (as > in, "How about 10 bucks for the whole box of stuff there in the > corner?"), I see no improvement at all. Keep an eye open. My local store (and I live in a VERY nontechnical area...nothing but bike trash and "cougars" around here) added a second parts cabinet this past spring. It's nowhere near what it was when I was growing up in the 1970s, but it's FAR better than it was in the late 1990s. > I don't see the Parallax uCs on the RS web site, however. I see them in the store. =) I bought one of the Parallax PIR sensors there a few weeks ago. > I miss the "bubble pack" wrapping for components, particularly > connectors. The local store now keeps many connectors in small > drawers that staff seems to reserve the right to browse in. And > prices for the same have gone up substantially. Holy cow...I think you should complain to the manager of that store, or simply go to a different one. The drawers are there to browse in. I do it all the time. Pricing...well, not much can be done about that. If you're buying enough components to warrant that hard of a look at their pricing, you should probably be ordering them from DigiKey or Mouser. ;) > I miss the "grap bag" assortments that RS used to offer of > semiconductors. Most of the time, the stuff contained therein was > pretty ordinary, but the occasional bit of exotica could be found. > Just like playing the lottery. Oh yes, I remember those! > It wouldn't hurt one bit if we could get the young 'uns interested in > low-level electronic tinkering once again. Radio Shack used to be a > good source for that stuff, but it seems, no longer. Well like I said, keep an eye open. It's far better than it was. I think they deserve a pat on the back for that. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Mon Dec 15 12:37:50 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 13:37:50 -0500 Subject: Harvard v. von Neumann References: <4942909C.7090900@gmail.com> <18758.36725.824442.829754@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> <49462E0C.3591.53F7C8E@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <18758.41982.450835.205310@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> >>>>> "Chuck" == Chuck Guzis writes: Chuck> On 15 Dec 2008 at 12:10, Paul Koning wrote: >> You can find more on Bitsavers; there are a bunch of B6700 manuals >> there including the system reference manual. Chuck> Bitsavers has a couple of B5000 manuals, which may prove to be Chuck> useful. Right. I was quoting from my memory of the 6700 and the manuals I had for that machine, on the basis that it's a successor to the 5000 series with the same general architecture. paul From bryan.pope at comcast.net Mon Dec 15 12:47:15 2008 From: bryan.pope at comcast.net (Bryan Pope) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 13:47:15 -0500 Subject: radio shack catalogs In-Reply-To: <4946601F.7090806@gmail.com> References: <49453E7E.5040009@atarimuseum.com> <967A9DF3-B214-4F01-8104-72B23F795EEE@neurotica.com> <4946601F.7090806@gmail.com> Message-ID: <4946A633.5050100@comcast.net> Jules Richardson wrote: > Dave McGuire wrote: >> To be fair...Radio Shack did indeed descend into the murky depths >> of being an overcommercialized cell phone and cheap stereo equipment >> pusher, but just recently, over the past two years or so, they've >> started to come back. >> >> In that time, the electronic parts inventories of my two local RS >> stores has more than doubled. They've inked some sort of an >> agreement with Parallax, Inc. and are now selling their stuff, >> including Basic Stamps and various sensors and robotics goodies. Not >> all stores stock all of this stuff, but I've seen bits and pieces of >> it at several of them. > > Hmm, I went into the local one a little while back looking for > something or other... > > 1) Anything remotely interesting is stashed behind acres of gimmicky > plastic crap electrical goods, > > 2) There seemed to be a huge markup for 'convenience', > > 3) Fifteen sales assistants tried to pounce on me the moment I entered > the store, > > 4) The shop was in a mall, and basically a box with one side missing - > the noise level made it utterly impossible to have any kind of > conversation without shouting. You will probably find the best selection of components at Radio Shacks in strip malls. Cheers, Bryan From wdonzelli at gmail.com Mon Dec 15 12:49:52 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 13:49:52 -0500 Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <78C4457C-13EF-4FA1-A3C7-1B2484D6FFF3@neurotica.com> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> <78C4457C-13EF-4FA1-A3C7-1B2484D6FFF3@neurotica.com> Message-ID: > They're worth $100 absolute max in my opinion, probably half that. The > eBay seller is smoking crack. And when he sells it for 1300 bucks, he can buy a lot of crack, and laugh all the way home. The "super-price" philosophy of surplus and antiques actually DOES work, but the sellers must have balls of brass and infinite patience. And a lot of stock with little overhead. -- Will From wdonzelli at gmail.com Mon Dec 15 12:50:49 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 13:50:49 -0500 Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <494695F3.7010907@gmail.com> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> <494695F3.7010907@gmail.com> Message-ID: > So, is anyone counterfeiting them yet? It wouldn't surprise me - after all > presumably people don't generally sell them as "tested and working" > anyway... I think there were bogus SIDs at one point. Certainly there are bogus tubes. -- Will From wdonzelli at gmail.com Mon Dec 15 12:52:21 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 13:52:21 -0500 Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <4946994A.5020304@bluewin.ch> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> <4946994A.5020304@bluewin.ch> Message-ID: > It might be the first microprocessor, (i4004 is just a controller...), but > what really made the microcomputer possible is the DRAM. Why dont people > collect i1103's ? They do. Some of the early RAM fetches HUGE money. Multiple hundreds for some of the real raries. -- Will From bryan.pope at comcast.net Mon Dec 15 13:01:17 2008 From: bryan.pope at comcast.net (Bryan Pope) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 14:01:17 -0500 Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> <494695F3.7010907@gmail.com> Message-ID: <4946A97D.20405@comcast.net> William Donzelli wrote: >> So, is anyone counterfeiting them yet? It wouldn't surprise me - after all >> presumably people don't generally sell them as "tested and working" >> anyway... >> > > I think there were bogus SIDs at one point. > > Certainly there are bogus tubes. > > Remarked SID chips sold as new: http://kevtris.org/Projects/sid/remarked_sids.html Cheers, Bryan From cisin at xenosoft.com Mon Dec 15 13:02:07 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 11:02:07 -0800 (PST) Subject: "First"?? Hardly. (Was: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego In-Reply-To: <406624.59959.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> References: <406624.59959.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20081215105119.I40212@shell.lmi.net> On Sun, 14 Dec 2008, Vernon Wright wrote: > But the company is now better known for the Kaypro computer. The first > Kaypro II actually was called NonLinear Systems Kaypro. It was the > second portable (the Ozzy was the first) personal computer, running CP/M It was NOT. Although the Oz could be called the first "Successful well-hyped mass marketed portable personal computer to be covered by the press". Elcompco made its first sale of a CP/M machine built into a Halliburton attache case hours before Adam announced that he "was going to be first". Adam looked at it and shook my hand, and then pretended it didn't exist for his press conference. Elcompco never claimed it was first, because anybody with any sense knew that there were already a few garage-builts. BTW, the NLS 215 scope was sweet when it worked, but I always wished for the 230, because the 215 wasn't really adequate for aligning drives. I sold mine at VCF to a colector who was pleased to get a "prototype of a Kaypro" -- Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Mon Dec 15 13:15:47 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 12:15:47 -0700 Subject: radio shack catalogs In-Reply-To: <4946A633.5050100@comcast.net> References: <49453E7E.5040009@atarimuseum.com> <967A9DF3-B214-4F01-8104-72B23F795EEE@neurotica.com> <4946601F.7090806@gmail.com> <4946A633.5050100@comcast.net> Message-ID: <4946ACE3.5090208@jetnet.ab.ca> Bryan Pope wrote: > You will probably find the best selection of components at Radio > Shacks in strip malls. > But never strippers in strip malls! Other than patching a odd cable together ( audio or serial ) and few 10 cent parts I needed ( diodes, odd led , cap ) I have not bought any thing large from RS. > Cheers, > > Bryan > Ben. From evan at snarc.net Mon Dec 15 13:36:33 2008 From: evan at snarc.net (Evan Koblentz) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 14:36:33 -0500 (EST) Subject: "First"?? Hardly. (Was: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego In-Reply-To: <20081215105119.I40212@shell.lmi.net> References: <406624.59959.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> <20081215105119.I40212@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <42084.65.126.154.6.1229369793.squirrel@vandal.degnanco.net> >>> Elcompco never claimed it was first, because anybody with any sense knew that there were already a few garage-builts. One company that offered more than just a garage-built was GM Research, as described http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portable_computer Slightly OT: few people believe that I'm writing a book anymore, as I've been claiming it since 2002-ish, BUT, one topic in the (eventual!) book will be a discussion of SEVERAL portable computers that existed pre-Osborne. I'll tell cctalk'ers what I tell everyone else: it will be published when it's done, and not a day sooner. :) From ploopster at gmail.com Mon Dec 15 13:44:35 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 14:44:35 -0500 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <4946972A.3080706@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <49443F9E.8080008@gmail.com> <7d3530220812131520j49e63683s215b382336ea4df7@mail.gmail.com> <49444A46.6060300@gmail.com> <494461BF.9020707@jetnet.ab.ca> <200812141420.JAA10928@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <4946972A.3080706@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <4946B3A3.2060004@gmail.com> bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > der Mouse wrote: >>> How do you have RISC from a CPLD since RISC implies a large register >>> stack? >>> >> >> It does? I thought it implied a (moderately) minimalist instruction >> set. This tends to correlate with having lots of registers, but that's >> hardly necessary - consider the PDP-8, for example. >> >> > The idea of a RISC is that out of few general addressing modes > ( to keep decoding simple ) you generate all the other needed > ones in software. Since decoding is so simple you can ran faster by > pipelining > everything and goes real fast, providing *gotya* main memory is that fast > too. But again, none of those performance enhancement strategies are *required* to be in a RISC chip. Peace... Sridhar From ian_primus at yahoo.com Mon Dec 15 13:49:21 2008 From: ian_primus at yahoo.com (Mr Ian Primus) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 11:49:21 -0800 (PST) Subject: Screen burn. How long does it take to affect a tube? Message-ID: <40522.75833.qm@web52705.mail.re2.yahoo.com> Everyone has seen old monitors/terminals with text clearly burned into the screen, or a grid of fuzzy boxes where the character cells line up, wear from many years of use and abuse. While graphic color tubes can and do develop screen burn (the Macintosh menu bar, and Windows taskbar being commonly found etched into discarded color monitors), the burn-in problem seems more prevelant on older, monochrome tubes. I use a fair number of old monochrome monitors, and a couple of terminals I use every day. Yesterday, I accidentally left a computer and it's monochrome monitor running unattended for about four hours (I forgot to shut it off/got distracted). When I returned, I carefully examined the areas where text had been on the screen, and could not detect any burn-in, although I can tell that the left side of the display has an oh-so-faint browning to it. Now, I am almost positive that this was there all along, after all - this thing lived a hard life before I found it. But, it got me thinking, how long does text need to be on the screen to burn into a monocrhome tube? Four hours doesn't seem like enough time - otherwise every PC monitor would have the WordPerfect ruler burned into it. I did some searching, but of course, could only turn up things relating to modern plasma screen TV's, which apparently suffer similar degredation from use. Were there any studies conducted, or actual ratings for picture tubes like this? The sort of tubes I'm referring to are standard monochrome CRT's, like the ones used in terminals and monitors in the early 80's. On a similar note, I was playing with a system test utility program for the Commodore PET. It tests the RAM and ROM, loops continuously and displays the test results and running time on the screen. The Commodore PET also uses this sort of monochrome picture tube - and unlike most other machines, you can't shut off just the screen and leave the computer running. So, this test program alternates every second or so between normal and inverse video modes. Now, since the screen is flashing, it shouldn't damage the phosphors - since it is my understanding that the phosphor burn phenomenon isn't so much the phosphors wearing out, but related to them being constantly excited, and therefore heating up and darkening. Is this correct thinking? While I don't plan on running this test for extended periods of time, I do wonder about it's potential effect on the screen, if any. It's interesting to see what's already burned into screens though, it gives an insight into what the computer used to do. I have terminals with logon promts burned into them, menu systems, and at least one with a dire confidentiality warning permently etched into the tube. I've got a Monitor IIe with "Apple //e" burned into the top - clearly someone left the computer on without a disk in it for a very long time to get that clear of a burn in. So, like I said, I just got curious about the whole thing, and figured I'd see if anyone else knew more on the subject. Obviously, I always try to be careful and shut things off when I'm not using them, but, you know, mistakes happen. -Ian From doc at mdrconsult.com Mon Dec 15 14:03:39 2008 From: doc at mdrconsult.com (Doc Shipley) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 14:03:39 -0600 Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <78C4457C-13EF-4FA1-A3C7-1B2484D6FFF3@neurotica.com> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> <78C4457C-13EF-4FA1-A3C7-1B2484D6FFF3@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <4946B81B.5070506@mdrconsult.com> Dave McGuire wrote: > On Dec 15, 2008, at 12:03 PM, Doc Shipley wrote: >> First, I know approximately nothing about old Intel chips, so >> forgive any incoherence. >> >> A friend of mine just came across a couple of Intel 8008 chips. >> Apparently, some ebay sellers think they're solid gold. >> >> http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=260099837541 >> >> As far as we can tell, that's what Mel has. >> >> Anyway, I told him I'd try to find out what it's actually worth and >> whether anyone here is willing to pay whatever's reasonable. >> >> He also has some later 8008s without the gold cap. > > They're worth $100 absolute max in my opinion, probably half that. > The eBay seller is smoking crack. Well that was a given. :) Hence, "what they're actually worth" Doc From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Mon Dec 15 14:03:12 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 13:03:12 -0700 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <4946B3A3.2060004@gmail.com> References: <49443F9E.8080008@gmail.com> <7d3530220812131520j49e63683s215b382336ea4df7@mail.gmail.com> <49444A46.6060300@gmail.com> <494461BF.9020707@jetnet.ab.ca> <200812141420.JAA10928@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <4946972A.3080706@jetnet.ab.ca> <4946B3A3.2060004@gmail.com> Message-ID: <4946B800.9000007@jetnet.ab.ca> Sridhar Ayengar wrote: > > But again, none of those performance enhancement strategies are > *required* to be in a RISC chip. > > Peace... Sridhar > Umm who said chip :) From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Mon Dec 15 14:05:05 2008 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 12:05:05 -0800 Subject: 8008 chips References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> <4946994A.5020304@bluewin.ch> Message-ID: <4946B871.C88F63C4@cs.ubc.ca> William Donzelli wrote: > > It might be the first microprocessor, (i4004 is just a controller...), but > > what really made the microcomputer possible is the DRAM. Why dont people > > collect i1103's ? > > They do. Some of the early RAM fetches HUGE money. Multiple hundreds > for some of the real raries. I have a bag of 35 NOS type "MF1103P" dated 722x, 18-pin plastic DIP, gold-plate pins, made by Microsystems International Ltd. (a briefly-existent Canadian chip maker). I believe these were 2nd-sourced 1103's, as MIL also made an MF8008 and MF1702. I also have a gold-capped C8008. One idea would be to make a period-style 8008 system with all of it. If I sell them can I retire to Monte Carlo instead? From wdonzelli at gmail.com Mon Dec 15 14:28:41 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 15:28:41 -0500 Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <4946B871.C88F63C4@cs.ubc.ca> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> <4946994A.5020304@bluewin.ch> <4946B871.C88F63C4@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: > I have a bag of 35 NOS type "MF1103P" dated 722x, 18-pin plastic DIP, gold-plate > pins, made by Microsystems International Ltd. (a briefly-existent Canadian > chip maker). I believe these were 2nd-sourced 1103's, as MIL also made an > MF8008 and MF1702. > > I also have a gold-capped C8008. One idea would be to make a period-style > 8008 system with all of it. > > If I sell them can I retire to Monte Carlo instead? You could probably get a nice plane ticket. There is a "missing link" Intel RAM that many chip guys lust for. I do not recall the number - 210something. If I look thru my records I can probably remember, but I have too many things to do right now. -- Will -- From cclist at sydex.com Mon Dec 15 14:24:38 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 12:24:38 -0800 Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <4946B81B.5070506@mdrconsult.com> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com>, <78C4457C-13EF-4FA1-A3C7-1B2484D6FFF3@neurotica.com>, <4946B81B.5070506@mdrconsult.com> Message-ID: <49464C86.30631.5B68B8F@cclist.sydex.com> On 15 Dec 2008 at 14:03, Doc Shipley wrote: > Hence, "what they're actually worth" Well, if they've got gold, they *obviously* must be worth a lot. Speaking of which, I discovered that I've got a bunch of InMOS 16Kx1 static RAMs (IMS1400S55) in gold-capped ceramic packages. Are they used in any vintage equipment or are they better used as fodder for the scrappers? Cheers, Chuck From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Dec 15 15:08:58 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 16:08:58 -0500 Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <4946994A.5020304@bluewin.ch> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> <4946994A.5020304@bluewin.ch> Message-ID: On Dec 15, 2008, at 12:52 PM, Jos Dreesen / Marian Capel wrote: >> First, I know approximately nothing about old Intel chips, so >> forgive any incoherence. >> A friend of mine just came across a couple of Intel 8008 chips. >> Apparently, some ebay sellers think they're solid gold. > > It might be the first microprocessor, (i4004 is just a > controller...), but what really made the microcomputer possible is > the DRAM. Why dont people collect i1103's ? Not to be argumentative, but...What about the i4004 makes you think it's just a controller? It seems rather microprocessor-like to me. Further, DRAMs have always had better density (one transistor and one capacitor per bit, versus, what, four transistors or so?) but I really don't think it's fair to suggest that microcomputers wouldn't have existed without them. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Dec 15 15:16:36 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 16:16:36 -0500 Subject: Canon Cat was: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <538122.27168.qm@web65503.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> References: <538122.27168.qm@web65503.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <81667585-FA87-4E10-8888-A2870085A2AE@neurotica.com> On Dec 15, 2008, at 1:36 PM, Chris M wrote: >> That machine sounds like a great deal of fun. It's a >> shame there aren't more of them out there. > > There would be if some reverse engineered the asics. Or developed > a generic Canon Cat board. Maybe those roms (or the forth portion > anyway) would work in any 68k system. > My IBM System 23/Datamaster has a built in FORTH interpreter. > Haven't had time to experiment. Anyone have experience w/that? No, I didn't know it had a Forth, I thought the System 23 had BASIC in ROM. Neat! > What benefits does having FORTH in rom have over BASIC? Or a ml > monitor? Hmm, what benefits...Howabout "Forth is less ugly than BASIC"? ;) [dave ducks] -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Mon Dec 15 15:21:31 2008 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 21:21:31 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Screen burn. How long does it take to affect a tube? In-Reply-To: <40522.75833.qm@web52705.mail.re2.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <337534.4812.qm@web23405.mail.ird.yahoo.com> I have never really had to worry about that problem. Most modern games consoles (since the Dreamcast onwards) have built-in screensavers and/or cut the display image by about %50 after being left alone for 10 minutes or so. I do however, have a Dell Latitude C610 with (as far as I know) an LCD screen. Now I had heard that LCD's couldn't get the 'burn' problem. I was proved wrong though, as I spent a long time (a few hours) downloading and installing software back when I first got it (2nd-hand from epay) around February 2007. Now whenever the screen goes all one colour, especially black, I notice a lighter rectangular patch where the downloading window had been left. It's not visible at any other time thank goodness. Also, a year or so ago, someone accidentally left a computer on at work over the weekend (so atleast 48 hours) and the screensaver didn't kick in. Now theres a permanently faint Windows taskbar and icons viewable all over the screen! Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk --- On Mon, 15/12/08, Mr Ian Primus wrote: From: Mr Ian Primus Subject: Screen burn. How long does it take to affect a tube? To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Date: Monday, 15 December, 2008, 7:49 PM Everyone has seen old monitors/terminals with text clearly burned into the screen, or a grid of fuzzy boxes where the character cells line up, wear from many years of use and abuse. While graphic color tubes can and do develop screen burn (the Macintosh menu bar, and Windows taskbar being commonly found etched into discarded color monitors), the burn-in problem seems more prevelant on older, monochrome tubes. I use a fair number of old monochrome monitors, and a couple of terminals I use every day. Yesterday, I accidentally left a computer and it's monochrome monitor running unattended for about four hours (I forgot to shut it off/got distracted). When I returned, I carefully examined the areas where text had been on the screen, and could not detect any burn-in, although I can tell that the left side of the display has an oh-so-faint browning to it. Now, I am almost positive that this was there all along, after all - this thing lived a hard life before I found it. But, it got me thinking, how long does text need to be on the screen to burn into a monocrhome tube? Four hours doesn't seem like enough time - otherwise every PC monitor would have the WordPerfect ruler burned into it. I did some searching, but of course, could only turn up things relating to modern plasma screen TV's, which apparently suffer similar degredation from use. Were there any studies conducted, or actual ratings for picture tubes like this? The sort of tubes I'm referring to are standard monochrome CRT's, like the ones used in terminals and monitors in the early 80's. On a similar note, I was playing with a system test utility program for the Commodore PET. It tests the RAM and ROM, loops continuously and displays the test results and running time on the screen. The Commodore PET also uses this sort of monochrome picture tube - and unlike most other machines, you can't shut off just the screen and leave the computer running. So, this test program alternates every second or so between normal and inverse video modes. Now, since the screen is flashing, it shouldn't damage the phosphors - since it is my understanding that the phosphor burn phenomenon isn't so much the phosphors wearing out, but related to them being constantly excited, and therefore heating up and darkening. Is this correct thinking? While I don't plan on running this test for extended periods of time, I do wonder about it's potential effect on the screen, if any. It's interesting to see what's already burned into screens though, it gives an insight into what the computer used to do. I have terminals with logon promts burned into them, menu systems, and at least one with a dire confidentiality warning permently etched into the tube. I've got a Monitor IIe with "Apple //e" burned into the top - clearly someone left the computer on without a disk in it for a very long time to get that clear of a burn in. So, like I said, I just got curious about the whole thing, and figured I'd see if anyone else knew more on the subject. Obviously, I always try to be careful and shut things off when I'm not using them, but, you know, mistakes happen. -Ian From jos.mar at bluewin.ch Mon Dec 15 15:37:04 2008 From: jos.mar at bluewin.ch (Jos Dreesen / Marian Capel) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 22:37:04 +0100 Subject: 8008 chips / RAM's In-Reply-To: References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> <4946994A.5020304@bluewin.ch> Message-ID: <4946CE00.3000202@bluewin.ch> > Further, DRAMs have always had better density (one transistor and one > capacitor per bit, versus, what, four transistors or so?) but I really > don't think it's fair to suggest that microcomputers wouldn't have > existed without them. > I wrote DRAM, but actually meant semiconductor RAM, so also SRAM. To put it in anther way : there was never a core based homecomputer. The i4004 is a controller, at least to me, because it is dependent on a specific set of supporting ciruits (4001,40002 and 4003). The 8008 is much more general purpose. Jos From keithvz at verizon.net Mon Dec 15 14:58:43 2008 From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 15:58:43 -0500 Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> <4946994A.5020304@bluewin.ch> Message-ID: <4946C503.50408@verizon.net> William Donzelli wrote: >> It might be the first microprocessor, (i4004 is just a controller...), but >> what really made the microcomputer possible is the DRAM. Why dont people >> collect i1103's ? > > They do. Some of the early RAM fetches HUGE money. Multiple hundreds > for some of the real raries. Tell me about it. I've been looking for 1Mx4-bit 20-pin DIP DRAMs for years. The closest I've come is some 26/20-pin surface mount. USBID.com has them, provided I fork over $300-$500 MINIMUM order size. > -- > Will Keith From cisin at xenosoft.com Mon Dec 15 15:57:25 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 13:57:25 -0800 (PST) Subject: Screen burn. How long does it take to affect a tube? In-Reply-To: <337534.4812.qm@web23405.mail.ird.yahoo.com> References: <337534.4812.qm@web23405.mail.ird.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20081215135645.X50303@shell.lmi.net> > Also, a year or so ago, someone accidentally left a computer on at work > over the weekend (so atleast 48 hours) and the screensaver didn't kick > in. Now theres a permanently faint Windows taskbar and icons viewable > all over the screen! How long would it take to burn in a BSOD? From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Mon Dec 15 16:22:29 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 20:22:29 -0200 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) References: , <1c8201c959f1$e10f5a80$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <493E3D5F.29187.42C8A91@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <2e9501c95f03$a4172290$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > Show me a $20 FPGA eval kit (with programmer) and I'll buy it. You cannot buy a $20 evaluation kit (even because an FPGA costs more than that, we are talking different beasties here), but you can use a low-gate-count FPGA in a protoboard and have it for less than $20 or 30. From RichA at vulcan.com Mon Dec 15 16:26:06 2008 From: RichA at vulcan.com (Rich Alderson) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 14:26:06 -0800 Subject: vintage CPU instruction sets In-Reply-To: References: <49417734.2050405@gmail.com> Message-ID: From: Andy Holt Sent: Friday, December 12, 2008 2:15 AM [snip ] > [Computer Structures: Readings & Examples, by Gordon Bell] > As personal thoughts on the subject and going backwards in time I'd think of > looking-at and comparing the following. > The two pre-micro classics, nay extremes, of CISC: > *IBM system 360/370/... [Multi-GP-register - store organisation with a > sprinkling of store-store operarions] > *DEC VAX (and its simpler predecessor, the PDP-11) [address-modes-R-us] > The RISC before there ws RISC: > *CDC6600 The PDP-10 is often described this way. > The classic 36-bit architectures > *IBM709/7090/7094 [single accumulator/few index registers] > *GE6xx/Multics/Honeywell L66 [similar architecture, taken to its limits, and > (in later models) even more address modes than a VAX] ...and I'm surprised that you don't consider the PDP-10 to be a classic 36-bit architecture. Or the SDS Sigma series, for that matter. [snip] Rich Alderson Server Engineer, PDPplanet Project Vulcan, Inc. 505 5th Avenue S, Suite 900 Seattle, WA 98104 mailto:RichA at vulcan.com (206) 342-2239 (206) 465-2916 cell From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Mon Dec 15 16:34:21 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 20:34:21 -0200 Subject: Odd cpu lengths References: <025101c95a42$708a1a10$46fea8c0@DeskJara> from"Alexandre Souza" at Dec 9, 8 07:09:18 pm, <493FB949.11404.9F888DA@cclist.sydex.com> <49404230.4030704@jetnet.ab.ca> <494059E4.10703@pacbell.net> Message-ID: <2fd901c95f05$82b4c510$46fea8c0@DeskJara> >> I forget: Was Apple Integer BASIC a Microsoft product, or homegrown? > Woz wrote it. From scratch. From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Mon Dec 15 16:35:18 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 20:35:18 -0200 Subject: USB Model M (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)) References: , , <49400876.5263.B2DD073@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <2fda01c95f05$84f36a70$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > Do you know of a similar project to convert a Model M to an Apple ADB > keyboard? Wow, that was different! :oD I'd love the inverse, adb to ps/2 converter .The Mac keyboards are sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeet! :D From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Mon Dec 15 16:37:45 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 20:37:45 -0200 Subject: USB Model M References: <614C868E78D14A5C902ACC23D4759080@NFORCE4> <49411874.4070006@gmail.com> Message-ID: <302a01c95f05$e386d770$46fea8c0@DeskJara> >> Their "typical examples of passive ps/2 to USB >> adapters that are not true ps/2 to USB signal converters" are just >> wrong. For example, the second one from the left is a real converter > I agree there - that second-from-left converter looks to be the same one > as RS > (UK) sell, and is an active converter. However, given that it's the > equivalent > of around $60 I think I'll go with the $18 product :-) > It wouldn't surprise me if some far-east company has cloned the look of > the > active adapter but it's actually a passive one, such that both types exist > on > the market but look the same. I still cannot understand "uadarrel". In Brazil I can get any of these for a song. www.dealextreme.com has all of them for cheap. From slawmaster at gmail.com Mon Dec 15 16:42:50 2008 From: slawmaster at gmail.com (John Floren) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 17:42:50 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <20081214162524.GB19623@thangorodrim.de> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <493ECCFC.5030700@jbrain.com> <493EDF40.7070807@gmail.com> <18750.60038.779922.194042@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> <200812092300.SAA02673@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <20081214162524.GB19623@thangorodrim.de> Message-ID: <7d3530220812151442y3371cfa4yacc0885750f02f7d@mail.gmail.com> On Sun, Dec 14, 2008 at 11:25 AM, Alexander Schreiber wrote: > On Tue, Dec 09, 2008 at 05:58:35PM -0500, der Mouse wrote: >> > In other words, PDF is like PS except that it isn't supposed to be >> > machine dependent (which PS tends to be). >> >> PS isn't supposed to be machine dependent either. In fact it rather >> goes out of its way to make it difficult to be machine dependent, >> unless you just punt and use nonstandard words defined >> idiosyncratically by the PS engine you're using. > > Tell that to the guys who were running print shops and got handed > PostScript files by their clients. It is amazing how different PS > can look on different display/print environments. That was one of the > reaons for PDF and more specifically for the restricted PDF subset > that is designed to guarantee full WYSIWYG from editing to printout. > Turns out, that is harder than one would naively expect ... > > Regards, > Alex. That's why I always just send people straight troff documents! Now to find out why that company hasn't gotten back to me about the resume I sent in... John -- Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Mon Dec 15 16:43:34 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 17:43:34 -0500 Subject: 1Mx4 DRAMs (was Re: 8008 chips) Message-ID: On 12/15/08, Keith wrote: > William Donzelli wrote: > > > ...Why dont people collect i1103's ? > > > > They do. Some of the early RAM fetches HUGE money. Multiple hundreds > > for some of the real raries. > > Tell me about it. I've been looking for 1Mx4-bit 20-pin DIP DRAMs for > years. The closest I've come is some 26/20-pin surface mount. I have, too... I need 4 of them to upgrade my Rejuvenator in my Amiga 1000 from 1M of CHIP RAM to 2M of CHIP RAM (that and a "Fatter Agnus", but those aren't as difficult to find as the RAM itself). It's never been critical, so I've never bothered, but with the Sprit InBoard and the Starboard on the side (w/StarDrive SCSI interface), it would be a nice boost. Worst case, if I ever did start using my A1000 and really, really wanted it, I suppose I could cobble a daughter card up that would plug into the RAM bank on the Rejuvenator, but that's a lot of work for a very optional upgrade. -ethan -ethan From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Mon Dec 15 16:46:22 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 20:46:22 -0200 Subject: USB Model M References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> Message-ID: <30c101c95f07$28ee3780$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > (I wonder why they were called Model M - anyone know?) M de "iMdestructible" or M de "MACHO" :) This is a very MACHO keyboard :oD What was the biggest abuse you took with your M? :o) From RichA at vulcan.com Mon Dec 15 16:50:24 2008 From: RichA at vulcan.com (Rich Alderson) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 14:50:24 -0800 Subject: proper markup [was RE: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)] In-Reply-To: <7d3530220812151442y3371cfa4yacc0885750f02f7d@mail.gmail.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <493ECCFC.5030700@jbrain.com> <493EDF40.7070807@gmail.com> <18750.60038.779922.194042@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> <200812092300.SAA02673@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <20081214162524.GB19623@thangorodrim.de> <7d3530220812151442y3371cfa4yacc0885750f02f7d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: From: John Floren Sent: Monday, December 15, 2008 2:43 PM > That's why I always just send people straight troff documents! Now to > find out why that company hasn't gotten back to me about the resume I > sent in... There's your mistake. You should have sent them using a (La)TeX markup. Rich Alderson Server Engineer, PDPplanet Project Vulcan, Inc. 505 5th Avenue S, Suite 900 Seattle, WA 98104 mailto:RichA at vulcan.com (206) 342-2239 (206) 465-2916 cell From spectre at floodgap.com Mon Dec 15 17:00:39 2008 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 15:00:39 -0800 (PST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <7d3530220812151442y3371cfa4yacc0885750f02f7d@mail.gmail.com> from John Floren at "Dec 15, 8 05:42:50 pm" Message-ID: <200812152300.mBFN0e69018002@floodgap.com> > That's why I always just send people straight troff documents! I (re)discovered the *roff family a couple years back and I don't know why I didn't do it sooner. Plus, tools like man2html make it easy to use it as a central repository format. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- The older a man gets, the farther he had to walk to school as a boy. ------- From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Dec 15 16:21:57 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 22:21:57 +0000 (GMT) Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: from "Peter C. Wallace" at Dec 14, 8 03:21:33 pm Message-ID: [NLS's products] > And before that, very early digital voltmeters... How did they work? I rmember seeing (and alas failing to obtain) an partically mechanical digital voltmeter. The circuitry was a servo system, similar to the ones used in chart recorders. The motor drove a mechanicla turns counter, coupled to an accurate multi-turn helical potentiometer, which provided the feedback to the servo amplifier (it replaced the slidewire in th chart recorder implementation). THe operation is obvious, apply an input voltage, the motor turns until the feedback from the pot balances the input votlage, the turns counter then effectively shows where the pot is Somewhere I have most of a valved DVM. 'Most of' because alas some idiot stripped a number of passive components off it before I got it. It's stuffed with valves (I would guess about 50 of them), including 4 trochotron counter tubes. The display is a row of nixie tubes. I've not figured out how it worked, alas. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Dec 15 16:30:00 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 22:30:00 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Source for MMJ cables. In-Reply-To: <200812141427.JAA10963@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> from "der Mouse" at Dec 14, 8 09:20:58 am Message-ID: [RS232 cables] > > If just every computer manufacturer had read the specs, the world > > would have been much nicer, > > I'm not so sure. It was inevitable that someone would try to connect > two DTEs together directly, as indeed is easily the commonest today. > It would have been much simpler if everything had been specced the same > and all cables had been what today are loosely called null-modem. I would agree, but then the RS232 signals would need a re-think. They are not totally symmetircal. For example, DCD (Carrier Detect) and RI (Ring Indicator) are outptus on the DCE, inputs on the DTE, and there's no obvious signal that does the same thing going the other way. That's why many null-modem cables are not simply pin-swaps (there are jumpers between pins as well, for example crossing STR with DSR-strapped-to-DCD), and why, as a friend of mine once found out the hard way, joining 2 null-modem cables trgether doesn't get you an exact straight-through cable. As regards reading the specs, I've spent too many late nights trying to convince an HP82164 to do what I want. That's the HPIL-RS232 interface, and it appears the designer read the specs as regards the correct use of the flow cotnrol lines, and ingorned the fact that everyone else didn't follow the standard. The result is a device that follwos the spec and which is a right pain to actually used. -tony From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Mon Dec 15 17:07:55 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 21:07:55 -0200 Subject: Commodore PET RS-232 References: <0KBS00EY6NLLY2L1@vms173005.mailsrvcs.net> Message-ID: <327001c95f0a$34d6bdd0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > DEC had boards like that for going from TTL to RS232 as modules and > for current loop (TTY) to RS232 or the other way around. There were > a lot of "things" that often had oddball interfaces like Ham radio > tranceivers that could be driven by computer but only had serial TTL. You can use the good old max 232 and 5 1?F caps. From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Dec 15 16:33:01 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 22:33:01 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Engelbart's mouse / 40th anniversary In-Reply-To: from "Dave McGuire" at Dec 14, 8 10:21:41 pm Message-ID: > Abuse of terminology due to cluelessness is endemic in our > society. Witness all the people who have "broadband" connections to > their houses (they're almost always baseband, but have lots of > bandwidth), and the guy down the street from me who swears that he > "has a satellite" in his back yard. The ones that reallly irritate me are people taking about 'A USB' meaning a memory stick with a USB interface and 'Changing the CMOS' meaning the configuration RAM of a PC/AT or later. > People are clueless. That, in itself, is forgivable. What's NOT > forgivable is people being happy about the fact that they're > clueless, and lacking any particular desire to change. Now when I make comments like that, I get flamed alive.... -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Dec 15 17:02:27 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 23:02:27 +0000 (GMT) Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <4946994A.5020304@bluewin.ch> from "Jos Dreesen / Marian Capel" at Dec 15, 8 06:52:10 pm Message-ID: > It might be the first microprocessor, (i4004 is just a controller...), > but what really made the microcomputer possible is the DRAM. Why dont > people collect i1103's ? Well, I would, if I could find plenty of them at a sensible price. Of course I 'collect' them to use them, I'd fill up the second memory PCB in my 9830 with the 32 chips it doesn't have (2K words more of memory), and add the control locig. Maybe also make a memory ezpnasion PCB for the 9820 (it's indentical to the stnaard memory PCB, and contains just 16 1103s and some decoupling caps IIRC). -tony From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Mon Dec 15 17:15:36 2008 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 15:15:36 -0800 (PST) Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <30c101c95f07$28ee3780$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> <30c101c95f07$28ee3780$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: On Mon, 15 Dec 2008, Alexandre Souza wrote: > > (I wonder why they were called Model M - anyone know?) > > M de "iMdestructible" or M de "MACHO" :) > > This is a very MACHO keyboard :oD > > What was the biggest abuse you took with your M? :o) How about Mmmmmmm. I splashed solder on mine. Currently I have one completely stripped until I can get a USB driver board worked out that I like. Talking to the two guys who already made USB boards, implementing a USB 2.0 hub is beyond the capabilities of AVR microcontrollers. Anyone know of an easily-obtainable USB 2.0 chip that's not a pain to solder? -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Mon Dec 15 17:19:19 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 21:19:19 -0200 Subject: Engelbart's mouse / 40th anniversary References: <493F1D6C.78498637@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: <33ba01c95f0b$af26bbc0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > evolving thing, and that a few years from now, "broadband" really > will be officially synonymous with "high bandwidth". I think > "discovery" vs. "invention" is a similar thing. In Brazil, broadband ("banda larga" in portuguese") is already high bandwidth. The term broadband actually means wideband or high bandwidth in portuguese. :o( From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Mon Dec 15 17:20:11 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 21:20:11 -0200 Subject: Amiga Video Toaster with Penn and Teller References: <4945E025.803@tdh.com> Message-ID: <33cc01c95f0b$e47d0f90$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > Anyone have a copy of or know if copies even exists of the videos done > by NewTek with Penn and Teller?** Nah, where is the fun? I want to see Kiki Stockhammer speaking! :oD Woohoo! So HOT! :oD Alexandre, the #1 fan of Kiki :oD From cclist at sydex.com Mon Dec 15 17:09:37 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 15:09:37 -0800 Subject: vintage CPU instruction sets In-Reply-To: References: <49417734.2050405@gmail.com>, , Message-ID: <49467331.2652.64D8874@cclist.sydex.com> From: Andy Holt Sent: Friday, December 12, 2008 2:15 AM > The two pre-micro classics, nay extremes, of CISC: > *IBM system 360/370/... [Multi-GP-register - store organisation with a > sprinkling of store-store operarions] I missed this observation the first time. You've obvioiusly never run into a CDC STAR-100. 48 bit virtual addressing (bit addressed), 256 64-bit registers with an instruction set that, while it allocated 8 bits to the opcode, used a second 8-bit field (the "G" bits) in many instructions yielding thousands of variations (that included strings (including BCD arithmetic) and vectors (including sparse and compressed). If you ever hankered after a "polynomial evaluation" or byte-string modulo addition (with variable modulus) instruction, the STAR had it for you. Postively and grotesquely baroque in in the range of instructions. The hardware reference manual is on bitsavers; most of the almost 19 megabyte text is instruction descriptions. The one for "Search Masked Key Byte" occupies 3 pages alone. The "kitchen sink" of supercomputers. Cheers, Chuck From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Mon Dec 15 17:36:27 2008 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 15:36:27 -0800 (PST) Subject: Amiga Video Toaster with Penn and Teller In-Reply-To: <33cc01c95f0b$e47d0f90$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <4945E025.803@tdh.com> <33cc01c95f0b$e47d0f90$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: On Mon, 15 Dec 2008, Alexandre Souza wrote: > > Anyone have a copy of or know if copies even exists of the videos done > > by NewTek with Penn and Teller?** > > Nah, where is the fun? I want to see Kiki Stockhammer speaking! :oD > > Woohoo! So HOT! :oD > Alexandre, the #1 fan of Kiki :oD Can someone point out the demo that put a guy who looked like Bluto from Popeye in the place of Kiki yelling "SCREWTEK"? -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? From halarewich at gmail.com Mon Dec 15 17:42:23 2008 From: halarewich at gmail.com (Chris Halarewich) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 15:42:23 -0800 Subject: USB Model M (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: <2fda01c95f05$84f36a70$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <49400876.5263.B2DD073@cclist.sydex.com> <2fda01c95f05$84f36a70$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <6d6501090812151542n5d8792c2h1b3e001e14d05531@mail.gmail.com> heres a link were u can have an old adb keyboard on one end and usb on the othey they all u do is get a usb/ps2 adapter http://www.griffintechnology.com/products/imate On 12/15/08, Alexandre Souza wrote: > > Do you know of a similar project to convert a Model M to an Apple ADB >> keyboard? >> > > > Wow, that was different! :oD > > I'd love the inverse, adb to ps/2 converter .The Mac keyboards are > sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeet! :D > From cclist at sydex.com Mon Dec 15 18:04:14 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 16:04:14 -0800 Subject: Commodore PET RS-232 In-Reply-To: <327001c95f0a$34d6bdd0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <0KBS00EY6NLLY2L1@vms173005.mailsrvcs.net>, <327001c95f0a$34d6bdd0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <49467FFE.4073.67FAEB5@cclist.sydex.com> On 15 Dec 2008 at 21:07, Alexandre Souza wrote: > > DEC had boards like that for going from TTL to RS232 as modules and > > for current loop (TTY) to RS232 or the other way around. There were > > a lot of "things" that often had oddball interfaces like Ham radio > > tranceivers that could be driven by computer but only had serial TTL. > > You can use the good old max 232 and 5 1?F caps. I bought a tubeful of TI MAX232Ns, thinking that they were the same as the MAX232A--nope, the "N" takes 1.0 uF caps and the "A" uses 0.1 uF. If I had to do it over again, I'd use a MAX233 (only a single 1.0 uF decoupling cap) or a MAX202 (0.1 uF caps). Cheers, Chuck From cisin at xenosoft.com Mon Dec 15 18:05:47 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 16:05:47 -0800 (PST) Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <7d3530220812151442y3371cfa4yacc0885750f02f7d@mail.gmail.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <493ECCFC.5030700@jbrain.com> <493EDF40.7070807@gmail.com> <18750.60038.779922.194042@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> <200812092300.SAA02673@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <20081214162524.GB19623@thangorodrim.de> <7d3530220812151442y3371cfa4yacc0885750f02f7d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20081215160204.I56062@shell.lmi.net> On Mon, 15 Dec 2008, John Floren wrote: > That's why I always just send people straight troff documents! Now to > find out why that company hasn't gotten back to me about the resume I > sent in... They probably only accept resumes in WordPervert form. How important is FORMAT in a resume? Does it need PDF? Does it need PS? Does it even need HTML? What color paper? What texture paper do they need to be on? Do they need a scent added? Has smell-o-vision been standardized yet? From cisin at xenosoft.com Mon Dec 15 18:08:07 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 16:08:07 -0800 (PST) Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <30c101c95f07$28ee3780$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> <30c101c95f07$28ee3780$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <20081215160649.W56062@shell.lmi.net> On Mon, 15 Dec 2008, Alexandre Souza wrote: > > (I wonder why they were called Model M - anyone know?) > M de "iMdestructible" or M de "MACHO" :) > This is a very MACHO keyboard :oD > What was the biggest abuse you took with your M? :o) Are they rated for LART use? Howzbout for use on college administrators? (additiona toxicity issues) From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Mon Dec 15 18:08:05 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 22:08:05 -0200 Subject: 68k homebuilts References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> <4942EDD4.3090800@jetnet.ab.ca> <49444A93.60400@gmail.com> <28F1024F-D778-43A9-B0FC-6E332527E945@neurotica.com> <49466204.6070002@pacbell.net> Message-ID: <352201c95f12$96835810$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > One ASIC, the first one I ever designed, was what LSI logic called a > "structured array". > It contained a 2KB RAM and about 5K usable gates. This part would be > programmed with the > x,w,w,h of some putative location of a character image on the 1 bpp frame > buffer. It > would fetch the bitmap and turn it into a normalized MxN gray scale image, > although 5x7 > was always what was used. Added as an afterthought, because I had a few > hundred unused > gates, I added the ability to rotate a 32x32 block of image. The 68020 > would write 32 > words to registers on the chip (really, it went into that 2KB RAM), then > it would read > them back out at a different address and get them rotated. By stepping > through the image > in the right order, you could rotate the entire image. It was > considerably faster than > having the 68020 do the rotation in software. Wish I could understand what you are saying :) But it will take some time... From cisin at xenosoft.com Mon Dec 15 18:16:04 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 16:16:04 -0800 (PST) Subject: USB Model M (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: <6d6501090812151542n5d8792c2h1b3e001e14d05531@mail.gmail.com> References: <49400876.5263.B2DD073@cclist.sydex.com> <2fda01c95f05$84f36a70$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <6d6501090812151542n5d8792c2h1b3e001e14d05531@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20081215161438.Q56062@shell.lmi.net> > heres a link were u can have an old adb keyboard on one end and usb on the > othey they all u do is get a usb/ps2 adapter > http://www.griffintechnology.com/products/imate You might want to try it; your keyboard seems to be getting flaky From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Mon Dec 15 18:15:51 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 22:15:51 -0200 Subject: 1Mx4 DRAMs (was Re: 8008 chips) References: Message-ID: <362e01c95f13$84a234d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > I have, too... I need 4 of them to upgrade my Rejuvenator in my Amiga > 1000 from 1M of CHIP RAM to 2M of CHIP RAM (that and a "Fatter Agnus", > but those aren't as difficult to find as the RAM itself). > 411000s? I have lots of these stashed somewhere. I could send you, but I'm in Brazil and these are by no means rare... From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Mon Dec 15 18:18:28 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 22:18:28 -0200 Subject: USB Model M References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca><49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> <30c101c95f07$28ee3780$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081215160649.W56062@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <363801c95f13$e89c6230$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > On Mon, 15 Dec 2008, Alexandre Souza wrote: >> > (I wonder why they were called Model M - anyone know?) >> M de "iMdestructible" or M de "MACHO" :) >> This is a very MACHO keyboard :oD >> What was the biggest abuse you took with your M? :o) > Are they rated for LART use? Sure, and you can hit them HARD. > Howzbout for use on college administrators? (additiona toxicity issues) It can stand anything. The Model "M" is the keyboard of Chuck Norris!!! :oO From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Mon Dec 15 18:24:03 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 19:24:03 -0500 Subject: 1Mx4 DRAMs (was Re: 8008 chips) In-Reply-To: <362e01c95f13$84a234d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <362e01c95f13$84a234d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: On 12/15/08, Alexandre Souza wrote: > > I have, too... I need 4 of them to upgrade my Rejuvenator in my Amiga > > 1000 from 1M of CHIP RAM to 2M of CHIP RAM (that and a "Fatter Agnus", > > but those aren't as difficult to find as the RAM itself). > > > > > 411000s? I have lots of these stashed somewhere. I could send you, but > I'm in Brazil and these are by no means rare... Not 411000s - those are 1Mx1s unless I'm quite mistaken. I have a small pile of those. What I need (as mentioned in the subject line) is 1Mx4, perhaps known as 441000s, perhaps by other numbers; and I agree with Keith that they are uncommon in DIP format (which is what the Rejuvenator is prewired for - remove 8 256Kx4 DIPs, install 4 1Mx4 DIPs). -ethan From cclist at sydex.com Mon Dec 15 18:32:58 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 16:32:58 -0800 Subject: 1Mx4 DRAMs (was Re: 8008 chips) In-Reply-To: References: , <362e01c95f13$84a234d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>, Message-ID: <494686BA.3217.69A096A@cclist.sydex.com> On 15 Dec 2008 at 19:24, Ethan Dicks wrote: > Not 411000s - those are 1Mx1s unless I'm quite mistaken. I have a > small pile of those. What I need (as mentioned in the subject line) > is 1Mx4, perhaps known as 441000s, perhaps by other numbers; and I > agree with Keith that they are uncommon in DIP format (which is what > the Rejuvenator is prewired for - remove 8 256Kx4 DIPs, install 4 1Mx4 > DIPs). Weren't those used on some 1Mx8 SIMMS? Cheers, Chuck From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Mon Dec 15 18:55:36 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 19:55:36 -0500 Subject: 1Mx4 DRAMs (was Re: 8008 chips) In-Reply-To: <494686BA.3217.69A096A@cclist.sydex.com> References: <362e01c95f13$84a234d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <494686BA.3217.69A096A@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: On 12/15/08, Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 15 Dec 2008 at 19:24, Ethan Dicks wrote: > > > Not 411000s - those are 1Mx1s unless I'm quite mistaken. I have a > > small pile of those. What I need (as mentioned in the subject line) > > is 1Mx4, perhaps known as 441000s, perhaps by other numbers; and I > > agree with Keith that they are uncommon in DIP format... > > > Weren't those used on some 1Mx8 SIMMS? Perhaps there were in the early days, but I don't recall many SIMMs with DIPs, and those I do recall had 9 chips, not 3. There was this cycle of lots of smaller chips rather than few large chips, then the economic balance would tip, but that started with 256K SIMMs. It's also possible that there were some early 72-pin SIMMs with DIPs (thus needing to be 32 or 36-bits wide, favoring 4-bit-wide RAMs), but most I remember seeing were covered in SOJ packages. -ethan From coredump at gifford.co.uk Mon Dec 15 19:04:05 2008 From: coredump at gifford.co.uk (John Honniball) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 01:04:05 +0000 Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <49464C86.30631.5B68B8F@cclist.sydex.com> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com>, <78C4457C-13EF-4FA1-A3C7-1B2484D6FFF3@neurotica.com>, <4946B81B.5070506@mdrconsult.com> <49464C86.30631.5B68B8F@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4946FE85.5020702@gifford.co.uk> Chuck Guzis wrote: > Speaking of which, I discovered that I've got a bunch of InMOS 16Kx1 > static RAMs (IMS1400S55) in gold-capped ceramic packages. Are they > used in any vintage equipment or are they better used as fodder for > the scrappers? ISTR a Sun 3-something that used those SRAMs in some way. Cache, maybe? Possibly a Sun 3-110? The ones I saw weren't gold-capped ceramic parts, though, just ordinary plastic DIPs. I have an Oric Atmos fitted with INMOS 2600 DRAMs -- "support your local chip shop" as the T-shirt used to say! The RAM: http://www.flickr.com/photos/anachrocomputer/2670713527/ The whole PCB: http://www.flickr.com/photos/anachrocomputer/2671535624/ The keyboard: http://www.flickr.com/photos/anachrocomputer/2671535896/ -- John Honniball coredump at gifford.co.uk From wbblair3 at yahoo.com Mon Dec 15 19:07:04 2008 From: wbblair3 at yahoo.com (William Blair) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 17:07:04 -0800 (PST) Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <200812151800.mBFI0E0K095904@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <960460.33227.qm@web111513.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> > A friend of mine just came across a couple of Intel 8008 > chips. Apparently, some ebay sellers think they're solid gold. > > http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=260099837541 > > As far as we can tell, that's what Mel has. > > Anyway, I told him I'd try to find out what it's > actually worth and whether anyone here is willing > to pay whatever's reasonable. > > He also has some later 8008s without the gold cap. They are relatively rare, but they aren't even close to being _THAT_ rare. I'm talking about his asking price. I bought one three years ago from a fellow collector of CPU chips for _$20_ that had some markings worn off and was scratched. I opened it up to photograph the die (a hobby of mine): http://diephotos.blogspot.com/ I've haven't even seen rare versions of white ceramic 4004 ICs in perfect condition go for anything close to his asking price. I've seen a complete, mint condition MCS-4 (4004) chip _SET_ go for something close to $1K. From cisin at xenosoft.com Mon Dec 15 19:09:05 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 17:09:05 -0800 (PST) Subject: 1Mx4 DRAMs (was Re: 8008 chips) In-Reply-To: References: <362e01c95f13$84a234d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <494686BA.3217.69A096A@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <20081215170442.J58954@shell.lmi.net> On Mon, 15 Dec 2008, Ethan Dicks wrote: > Perhaps there were in the early days, but I don't recall many SIMMs > with DIPs, and those I do recall had 9 chips, not 3. There was this > cycle of lots of smaller chips rather than few large chips, then the > economic balance would tip, but that started with 256K SIMMs. Many early SIMMs were DIP based. One popular configuration was two 1Mx4 DIPs, or two 1Mx4 DIPs plus a 1Mx1. They were even available socketed! (to use the DIPs that are now getting scarcer) The 9 DIP SIMMs were generally thought to be more reliable. From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Dec 15 19:27:11 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 20:27:11 -0500 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <3BF14679-288A-4D5A-A931-3ACB9DE7DC79@neurotica.com> On Dec 15, 2008, at 5:21 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > [NLS's products] > >> And before that, very early digital voltmeters... > > How did they work? [pardon me for jumping in, but I know a little about the instrument in question] It uses relays to switch resistors in and out of what amounts to a discrete implementation of a Kelvin bridge, with the relay configuration reflected in the displays in much the same way as you describe the mechanical bridge in the paragraph below. I believe (but am not sure) that the null detector was a simple comparator circuit. The displays are the engraved plate style, edge-lit using incandescent lamps. I've been looking for schematics for this instrument for many years but have not been able to find them. > I rmember seeing (and alas failing to obtain) an > partically mechanical digital voltmeter. The circuitry was a servo > system, similar to the ones used in chart recorders. The motor drove a > mechanicla turns counter, coupled to an accurate multi-turn helical > potentiometer, which provided the feedback to the servo amplifier (it > replaced the slidewire in th chart recorder implementation). THe > operation is obvious, apply an input voltage, the motor turns until > the > feedback from the pot balances the input votlage, the turns counter > then > effectively shows where the pot is Nifty! -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Mon Dec 15 19:16:29 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 19:16:29 -0600 Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <352201c95f12$96835810$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <7d3530220812111839o42f2929dy52710c749cf7c015@mail.gmail.com> <4941EF03.3070902@pacbell.net> <494185C9.9079.14BC578@cclist.sydex.com> <7d3530220812120722y6a329177le1705e9ee8b4702d@mail.gmail.com> <4942EDD4.3090800@jetnet.ab.ca> <49444A93.60400@gmail.com> <28F1024F-D778-43A9-B0FC-6E332527E945@neurotica.com> <49466204.6070002@pacbell.net> <352201c95f12$96835810$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <4947016D.5080705@gmail.com> Alexandre Souza wrote: >> One ASIC, the first one I ever designed, was what LSI logic called a >> "structured array". >> ... > > Wish I could understand what you are saying :) But it will take some > time... That made sense to me, I think - and thanks, Jim... It's nice when the people involved in some of the stuff that gets talked about here speak up and go a little into the internals; for some reason that doesn't seem to happen much here and I wish it did :-) From wbblair3 at yahoo.com Mon Dec 15 19:45:18 2008 From: wbblair3 at yahoo.com (William Blair) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 17:45:18 -0800 (PST) Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <200812160109.mBG199Ms005348@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <797437.52750.qm@web111505.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Rarest Intel chips in no particular order (from a CPU collector forum; posted in 2005; nobody disagreed): X8008 G8008 C4040 Purple C4040 Left Ground Strap 8080B 8080-8 8008 8008-1 MC8080 C4004 W #5 & Ground Strap From wdonzelli at gmail.com Mon Dec 15 19:50:31 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 20:50:31 -0500 Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <797437.52750.qm@web111505.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> References: <200812160109.mBG199Ms005348@dewey.classiccmp.org> <797437.52750.qm@web111505.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: > Rarest Intel chips in no particular order (from a CPU collector forum; posted in 2005; nobody disagreed): > > X8008 > G8008 > C4040 Purple > C4040 Left Ground Strap > 8080B > 8080-8 > 8008 > 8008-1 > MC8080 > C4004 W #5 & Ground Strap Has someone unearthed a bunch of i432s? Any reason they are not on the list? -- Will From jchisolm at computer.org Mon Dec 15 20:03:53 2008 From: jchisolm at computer.org (Joe Chisolm) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 20:03:53 -0600 Subject: vintage CPU instruction sets In-Reply-To: References: <49417734.2050405@gmail.com> Message-ID: <49470C89.4030208@computer.org> Rich Alderson wrote: > [snip] >> *IBM system 360/370/... [Multi-GP-register - store organisation with a >> sprinkling of store-store operarions] >> *DEC VAX (and its simpler predecessor, the PDP-11) [address-modes-R-us] >> > > >> The RISC before there ws RISC: >> > > >> *CDC6600 >> > > The PDP-10 is often described this way. > > >> The classic 36-bit architectures >> > > >> *IBM709/7090/7094 [single accumulator/few index registers] >> *GE6xx/Multics/Honeywell L66 [similar architecture, taken to its limits, and >> (in later models) even more address modes than a VAX] >> > > ...and I'm surprised that you don't consider the PDP-10 to be a classic 36-bit > architecture. Or the SDS Sigma series, for that matter. > I would consider the Sigma 5/6/7/9 series RISC for the day. Basic load/store, multiple register sets. It did have a few string instructions (move byte string, compare byte string,edit byte string) but in general load/store. Since the design was async most instructions completed in 1 clock "cycle". The 5/6/7/9 were 32 bit. The 16 bit Sigma 2/3 series had a nice small instruction set that I once considered implementing in a CPLD or FPGA. Just never had the time. > [snip] > > > Rich Alderson > Server Engineer, PDPplanet Project > Vulcan, Inc. > 505 5th Avenue S, Suite 900 > Seattle, WA 98104 > > mailto:RichA at vulcan.com > (206) 342-2239 > (206) 465-2916 cell > > > -- Joe Chisolm Computer Translations, Inc. Marble Falls, Tx. 830-265-8018 From marvin at west.net Mon Dec 15 19:31:57 2008 From: marvin at west.net (Marvin Johnston) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 17:31:57 -0800 Subject: 1Mx4 DRAMs (was Re: 8008 chips) References: <200812160109.mBG199Mk005348@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <4947050D.2DCB93FE@west.net> ISTR that the 441000s were used in some of the RAM expansion boards for the HP laserjet Series II printers as well as some of the EMS memory expansion boards. I probably have a stash of them around here in boards, but it would also probably take a day of looking to find them :). > > > Not 411000s - those are 1Mx1s unless I'm quite mistaken. I have a > > > small pile of those. What I need (as mentioned in the subject line) > > > is 1Mx4, perhaps known as 441000s, perhaps by other numbers; and I > > > agree with Keith that they are uncommon in DIP format... From mcguire at neurotica.com Mon Dec 15 20:11:07 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 21:11:07 -0500 Subject: Engelbart's mouse / 40th anniversary In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Dec 15, 2008, at 5:33 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >> Abuse of terminology due to cluelessness is endemic in our >> society. Witness all the people who have "broadband" connections to >> their houses (they're almost always baseband, but have lots of >> bandwidth), and the guy down the street from me who swears that he >> "has a satellite" in his back yard. > > The ones that reallly irritate me are people taking about 'A USB' > meaning > a memory stick with a USB interface and 'Changing the CMOS' meaning > the > configuration RAM of a PC/AT or later. *twitch* *twitch* >> People are clueless. That, in itself, is forgivable. What's NOT >> forgivable is people being happy about the fact that they're >> clueless, and lacking any particular desire to change. > > Now when I make comments like that, I get flamed alive.... Not by me! -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From evan at snarc.net Mon Dec 15 20:21:39 2008 From: evan at snarc.net (Evan Koblentz) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 21:21:39 -0500 Subject: Edmund Berkeley question Message-ID: <002101c95f25$0896f7b0$0301a8c0@evan> Anyone know when Berkeley Enterprises closed? From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Mon Dec 15 20:29:05 2008 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 18:29:05 -0800 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. References: <3BF14679-288A-4D5A-A931-3ACB9DE7DC79@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <49471271.FDC806E2@cs.ubc.ca> Dave McGuire wrote: > > On Dec 15, 2008, at 5:21 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > > [NLS's products] > > > >> And before that, very early digital voltmeters... > > > > How did they work? > > [pardon me for jumping in, but I know a little about the > instrument in question] > > It uses relays to switch resistors in and out of what amounts to a This what I recall from the brief look I had inside the unit, the relays were hermetically sealed types for contact reliability. > discrete implementation of a Kelvin bridge, with the relay > configuration reflected in the displays in much the same way as you > describe the mechanical bridge in the paragraph below. I believe > (but am not sure) that the null detector was a simple comparator > circuit. > > The displays are the engraved plate style, edge-lit using > incandescent lamps. > > I've been looking for schematics for this instrument for many > years but have not been able to find them. My plan was to reverse engineer it to produce the schematic, .. if it hadn't disappeared. I am a tad miffed. From cclist at sydex.com Mon Dec 15 20:47:42 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 18:47:42 -0800 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: <3BF14679-288A-4D5A-A931-3ACB9DE7DC79@neurotica.com> References: , <3BF14679-288A-4D5A-A931-3ACB9DE7DC79@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <4946A64E.13470.7155D40@cclist.sydex.com> On Dec 15, 2008, at 5:21 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > I rmember seeing (and alas failing to obtain) an partically mechanical > digital voltmeter. The circuitry was a servo system, similar to the > ones used in chart recorders. The motor drove a mechanicla turns > counter, coupled to an accurate multi-turn helical potentiometer, which > provided the feedback to the servo amplifier (it replaced the > slidewire in th chart recorder implementation). THe operation is > obvious, apply an input voltage, the motor turns until the feedback > from the pot balances the input votlage, the turns counter then > effectively shows where the pot is In the early days of my youth (pre computer), I worked as an instrumentation technician. Many chart recorders, such as L&N Speedomax, used a "slidewire" that resembled a single-turn wirewound potentiometer. But the Honeywell Brown Electronik recorders used a multi-turn helical pot about the size of a coffee mug. I never understood why they were referred to as "slidewires" and not "helipots". It was not uncommon for the line operators to steal the silver bead used as a contact in those. They also used to steal the gold support wires in the galvanometers in L&N Micromax recorders. There was an interesting device--could run for a month on a single dry cell, provided you kept the drive mechanism wound (worked by periodically clamping the galvanometer needle and mechanically sensing which way to move the pen to bring the bridge back into balance). Except for those support wires, rugged as a cast-iron toothbrush. The thefts were really odd considering that these recorders were connected to an array of Pt-Pt+10% Rh thermocouples, each about 4 ft. long. The metal in one of those was probably worth almost as much as a bucket of those silver beads. Yet they were never filched. Cheers, Chuck From wdonzelli at gmail.com Mon Dec 15 21:12:12 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 22:12:12 -0500 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: <4946A64E.13470.7155D40@cclist.sydex.com> References: <3BF14679-288A-4D5A-A931-3ACB9DE7DC79@neurotica.com> <4946A64E.13470.7155D40@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: > The thefts were really odd considering that these recorders were > connected to an array of Pt-Pt+10% Rh thermocouples, each about 4 ft. > long. The metal in one of those was probably worth almost as much as > a bucket of those silver beads. Yet they were never filched. The thieves may have been smart - Platinum is harder to sell on the open market, while gold an silver can be sold almost anywhere amongst zillions of other deals that act as cover (or "noise"). -- Will From joachim.thiemann at gmail.com Mon Dec 15 21:45:23 2008 From: joachim.thiemann at gmail.com (Joachim Thiemann) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 22:45:23 -0500 Subject: 1Mx4 DRAMs (was Re: 8008 chips) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4affc5e0812151945p3aed6d50v74e7536cc353c51b@mail.gmail.com> On Mon, Dec 15, 2008 at 5:43 PM, Ethan Dicks wrote: >> Tell me about it. I've been looking for 1Mx4-bit 20-pin DIP DRAMs for >> years. The closest I've come is some 26/20-pin surface mount. > > I have, too... I need 4 of them to upgrade my Rejuvenator in my Amiga > 1000 from 1M of CHIP RAM to 2M of CHIP RAM (that and a "Fatter Agnus", > but those aren't as difficult to find as the RAM itself). I've got some TC514258AP-80's (20-pin DIP), originally from the fast RAM of my A3000 (replaced by ZIL (Zig-zag in-line?) chips). Those what you need? I think they're only 256kx4. Joe. -- Joachim Thiemann :: http://www.tsp.ece.mcgill.ca/~jthiem From curt at atarimuseum.com Mon Dec 15 22:07:05 2008 From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 23:07:05 -0500 Subject: The first video game In-Reply-To: <4945FB61.4090509@brouhaha.com> References: <575131af0812130714s6f942cc6y9d3449a71ea1464@mail.gmail.com> <4944138D.5243161C@cs.ubc.ca> <49442D7B.8030607@atarimuseum.com> <4945FB61.4090509@brouhaha.com> Message-ID: <49472969.7090908@atarimuseum.com> MIT, Stanford.... details, details... ;-) Thanks for the clarification Eric. Curt Eric Smith wrote: > Curt @ Atari Museum wrote: >> Before Computer Space there was Galaxy - which I believe the original >> MIT breakroom coin-op is now at the Computer Museum. > > Stanford University: > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galaxy_Game > > From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Mon Dec 15 22:35:17 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 23:35:17 -0500 Subject: 1Mx4 DRAMs (was Re: 8008 chips) In-Reply-To: <4affc5e0812151945p3aed6d50v74e7536cc353c51b@mail.gmail.com> References: <4affc5e0812151945p3aed6d50v74e7536cc353c51b@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 12/15/08, Joachim Thiemann wrote: > On Mon, Dec 15, 2008 at 5:43 PM, Ethan Dicks wrote: > >> Tell me about it. I've been looking for 1Mx4-bit 20-pin DIP DRAMs for > >> years. The closest I've come is some 26/20-pin surface mount. > > > > I have, too... I need 4 of them to upgrade my Rejuvenator in my Amiga > > 1000 from 1M of CHIP RAM to 2M of CHIP RAM (that and a "Fatter Agnus", > > but those aren't as difficult to find as the RAM itself). > > I've got some TC514258AP-80's (20-pin DIP), originally from the fast > RAM of my A3000 (replaced by ZIL (Zig-zag in-line?) chips). Those what > you need? I think they're only 256kx4. Those _are_ 256Kx4 (1Mbit) and that's what I have eight of in my Rejuvenator now. What I need to upgrade is four 1Mx4 (4Mbit) chips, and, as a couple of us have been saying, those are somewhat uncommon. Save yours for another Amiga, though - 514258s are, IIRC, "static column" DRAMs and were not as common as 514256s (or 44256s, etc). There is a measurable performance difference in an Amiga 3000 with "plain" DRAMs vs "static column" DRAMs (5%? 10%?) AFAIK, they will work in an A2091 (and other Amiga memory boards) or some older ISA VGA cards as regular 256x4 chips. I already have a few 256Kx4 chips - we used to populate our VAXBI COMBOARDs with 2MB of them, as did many Amiga A2091 and A590 owners (and a few PC owners, IIRC). Those chips aren't too hard to find in DIP packages. By the time 4Mbit dice were being produced, memory had largely (but not entirely) moved on to SMT packaging. -ethan From dkelvey at hotmail.com Mon Dec 15 23:41:34 2008 From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 21:41:34 -0800 Subject: Canon Cat was: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <81667585-FA87-4E10-8888-A2870085A2AE@neurotica.com> References: <538122.27168.qm@web65503.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> <81667585-FA87-4E10-8888-A2870085A2AE@neurotica.com> Message-ID: > From: mcguire at neurotica.com> Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 16:16:36 -0500> To: cctech at classiccmp.org> CC: > Subject: Re: Canon Cat was: 68k homebuilts> > On Dec 15, 2008, at 1:36 PM, Chris M wrote:> >> That machine sounds like a great deal of fun. It's a> >> shame there aren't more of them out there.> >> > There would be if some reverse engineered the asics. Or developed > > a generic Canon Cat board. Maybe those roms (or the forth portion > > anyway) would work in any 68k system.> > My IBM System 23/Datamaster has a built in FORTH interpreter. > > Haven't had time to experiment. Anyone have experience w/that?> > No, I didn't know it had a Forth, I thought the System 23 had > BASIC in ROM. Neat!> > > What benefits does having FORTH in rom have over BASIC? Or a ml > > monitor? Hi I've tried to explain this to people over the years and about the best way I can say it is, it is about problem factoring. Dwight > > Hmm, what benefits...Howabout "Forth is less ugly than > BASIC"? ;) [dave ducks]> > -Dave> > -- > Dave McGuire> Port Charlotte, FL> > _________________________________________________________________ Send e-mail faster without improving your typing skills. http://windowslive.com/Explore/hotmail?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_hotmail_acq_speed_122008 From doc at mdrconsult.com Tue Dec 16 00:38:01 2008 From: doc at mdrconsult.com (Doc Shipley) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 00:38:01 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <20081215160204.I56062@shell.lmi.net> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> <493BB6A1.22314.9A905C@cclist.sydex.com> <200812072207.RAA22224@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <1d0001c959f3$21ceb650$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081209105751.R421@shell.lmi.net> <493ECCFC.5030700@jbrain.com> <493EDF40.7070807@gmail.com> <18750.60038.779922.194042@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> <200812092300.SAA02673@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <20081214162524.GB19623@thangorodrim.de> <7d3530220812151442y3371cfa4yacc0885750f02f7d@mail.gmail.com> <20081215160204.I56062@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <49474CC9.2020606@mdrconsult.com> Fred Cisin wrote: > On Mon, 15 Dec 2008, John Floren wrote: >> That's why I always just send people straight troff documents! Now to >> find out why that company hasn't gotten back to me about the resume I >> sent in... > > They probably only accept resumes in WordPervert form. > > > How important is FORMAT in a resume? > Does it need PDF? > Does it need PS? > Does it even need HTML? > What color paper? > What texture paper do they need to be on? > Do they need a scent added? Has smell-o-vision been standardized yet? One of my friends got fed up with headhunters who insisted on MS-WORD format resumes - for UNIX admin positions. He rendered the rresume to PostScript, used ImageMagick to render the pages at very low resolution to TIFF, rotated each page a degree or two, and then inserted each page as a full-page picture object in Word. It's magnificently awful. Doc From chrism3667 at yahoo.com Mon Dec 15 12:36:28 2008 From: chrism3667 at yahoo.com (Chris M) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 10:36:28 -0800 (PST) Subject: Canon Cat was: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <7F889F30-7AED-4092-BA47-58026C5666D2@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <538122.27168.qm@web65503.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> --- On Sun, 12/14/08, Dave McGuire wrote: > That machine sounds like a great deal of fun. It's a > shame there aren't more of them out there. There would be if some reverse engineered the asics. Or developed a generic Canon Cat board. Maybe those roms (or the forth portion anyway) would work in any 68k system. My IBM System 23/Datamaster has a built in FORTH interpreter. Haven't had time to experiment. Anyone have experience w/that? What benefits does having FORTH in rom have over BASIC? Or a ml monitor? From chrism3667 at yahoo.com Mon Dec 15 13:01:40 2008 From: chrism3667 at yahoo.com (Chris M) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 11:01:40 -0800 (PST) Subject: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <28F1024F-D778-43A9-B0FC-6E332527E945@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <456831.64688.qm@web65509.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> --- On Mon, 12/15/08, Dave McGuire wrote: > > Quite some time back I used an OCR package on a 486 > that used the AMD > > 29K PeeCee development board for the horsepower. > > In 1988 or so, I used a similar OCR setup at work. I > think it was called Calera, but I'm not sure. It used > an ISA board with a 16MHz 68020 and a bunch of memory on it. > It ran under DOS. Its code was all RAM-based, and was > downloaded into the board at boot time by programs run from > autoexec.bat. BYTE had a coprocessor project sporting a 68020. For the life of me I can't remember what it's job was though. Something tells me it was related to graphics, but not an actual crt controller or what have you. From jws at jwsss.com Mon Dec 15 13:06:37 2008 From: jws at jwsss.com (jim s) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 11:06:37 -0800 Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <78C4457C-13EF-4FA1-A3C7-1B2484D6FFF3@neurotica.com> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> <78C4457C-13EF-4FA1-A3C7-1B2484D6FFF3@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <4946AABD.3010805@jwsss.com> Was there not a sale of a "one of everything Intel made" collection in the last year? I wonder if this guy is trying to recover from the silly price paid for that collection by parting it out? I see these chips have no solder on the leads, so are probably pretty pristine specimens. I wonder if a really workable counterfeit could made from other than a different chip with new paint? Hopefully that won't happen, but with this kind of money involved who knows. Also, these high dollar listings he did are foolish as he has to pay real money to list them even if they don't sell. I dont know if there is a discount by setting up as a store, but epay has gotten expensive if you pick a price anymore, rather than starting the auction at $1.00 and letting the item float. JimW Dave McGuire wrote: > >> me later 8008s without the gold cap. > > They're worth $100 absolute max in my opinion, probably half that. > The eBay seller is smoking crack. > > -Dave > From chrism3667 at yahoo.com Mon Dec 15 15:38:14 2008 From: chrism3667 at yahoo.com (Chris M) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 13:38:14 -0800 (PST) Subject: Canon Cat was: 68k homebuilts In-Reply-To: <81667585-FA87-4E10-8888-A2870085A2AE@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <998721.16830.qm@web65506.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> --- On Mon, 12/15/08, Dave McGuire wrote: > > My IBM System 23/Datamaster has a built in FORTH > interpreter. Haven't had time to experiment. Anyone have > experience w/that? > > No, I didn't know it had a Forth, I thought the > System 23 had BASIC in ROM. Neat! Hmm. Can't find any references to this upon googling. Could it be a myth? Could the reports have solely originated from this list... From ajp166 at bellatlantic.net Mon Dec 15 18:07:28 2008 From: ajp166 at bellatlantic.net (Allison) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 19:07:28 -0500 Subject: 8008 chips Message-ID: <0KBY007840A1D640@vms173001.mailsrvcs.net> > >Subject: Re: 8008 chips > From: "William Donzelli" > Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 15:28:41 -0500 > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > >> I have a bag of 35 NOS type "MF1103P" dated 722x, 18-pin plastic DIP, gold-plate >> pins, made by Microsystems International Ltd. (a briefly-existent Canadian >> chip maker). I believe these were 2nd-sourced 1103's, as MIL also made an >> MF8008 and MF1702. >> >> I also have a gold-capped C8008. One idea would be to make a period-style >> 8008 system with all of it. >> >> If I sell them can I retire to Monte Carlo instead? > >You could probably get a nice plane ticket. > >There is a "missing link" Intel RAM that many chip guys lust for. I do >not recall the number - 210something. The 1101 256 byte static ram. Later there would be the 2102 (1kx1) and 2102 256x4 that were important to small computeres. The 1103 was dynamic and while cheaper it was also hard to work with due to refresh and interface needs. Allison > >If I look thru my records I can probably remember, but I have too many >things to do right now. > >-- >Will > >-- From cclist at sydex.com Tue Dec 16 01:30:39 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 23:30:39 -0800 Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <4946AABD.3010805@jwsss.com> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com>, <78C4457C-13EF-4FA1-A3C7-1B2484D6FFF3@neurotica.com>, <4946AABD.3010805@jwsss.com> Message-ID: <4946E89F.16554.818739B@cclist.sydex.com> On 15 Dec 2008 at 11:06, jim s wrote: > I see these chips have no solder on the leads, so are probably pretty > pristine specimens. Might only mean that the chips were socketed (given the period price of an 8008, not an unreasonable idea). > I wonder if a really workable counterfeit could made from other than a > different chip with new paint? Hopefully that won't happen, but with > this kind of money involved who knows. How many chip collectors actually test the chips they receive? According to some (fairly) reputable sources, chip counterfeiting isn't all that uncommon: http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/may06/3423 I sometimes wonder if all of the Chinese sites that pop up when you're doing a web search for a datasheet aren't part of this action. Cheers, Chuck From michaelgreen42 at comcast.net Tue Dec 16 02:31:34 2008 From: michaelgreen42 at comcast.net (Michael) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 00:31:34 -0800 Subject: Altos 580-10A on eBay In-Reply-To: <200812160722.mBG7MNDO010216@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812160722.mBG7MNDO010216@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <010101c95f58$b4bb3be0$1e31b3a0$@net> System is in excellent condition overall and comes with several books and even some software. http://cgi.ebay.com/RARE-Altos-580-10A-Computer-ORIGINAL-DOCS-AND-SOFTWARE_W 0QQitemZ120350775271QQcmdZViewItemQQptZLH_DefaultDomain_0?hash=item120350775 271&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=72%3A1234|66%3A2|65%3A12|39%3A1|240%3A131 8|301%3A1|293%3A1|294%3A50 From mike at brickfieldspark.org Tue Dec 16 03:14:27 2008 From: mike at brickfieldspark.org (Mike Hatch) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 09:14:27 -0000 Subject: [personal] Re: 8008 chips References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> <4946994A.5020304@bluewin.ch><4946B871.C88F63C4@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: <004501c95f5e$b25f89e0$961ca8c0@mss.local> > There is a "missing link" Intel RAM that many chip guys lust for. I do > not recall the number - 210something. That's a 2102 if I remember rightly, and I have a 8008 orginal brand new never used in anti-stat foam. Mike ----- Original Message ----- From: "William Donzelli" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Monday, December 15, 2008 8:28 PM Subject: [personal] Re: 8008 chips >> I have a bag of 35 NOS type "MF1103P" dated 722x, 18-pin plastic DIP, >> gold-plate >> pins, made by Microsystems International Ltd. (a briefly-existent >> Canadian >> chip maker). I believe these were 2nd-sourced 1103's, as MIL also made >> an >> MF8008 and MF1702. >> >> I also have a gold-capped C8008. One idea would be to make a >> period-style >> 8008 system with all of it. >> >> If I sell them can I retire to Monte Carlo instead? > > You could probably get a nice plane ticket. > > There is a "missing link" Intel RAM that many chip guys lust for. I do > not recall the number - 210something. > > If I look thru my records I can probably remember, but I have too many > things to do right now. > > -- > Will > > -- > > > From cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de Tue Dec 16 03:58:13 2008 From: cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de (Christian Corti) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 10:58:13 +0100 (CET) Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Mon, 15 Dec 2008, Tony Duell wrote: > How did they work? I rmember seeing (and alas failing to obtain) an > partically mechanical digital voltmeter. The circuitry was a servo We have an old DVM from 1960, a Solartron LM 902. It has a few tubes, a lot of Germanium transistors and also a lot of relais for the display. The display consists of four digits, which are big black blocks with twelve light bulbs in a 3x4 matrix (ten digits, decimal point and red background illumination for *positive* numbers) and a mask for each digit. The light passing the mask is then projected onto the front of the digit unit. And best of all, this DVM contains a Weston element which still has its nominal value. We also have the successor from Solartron, the LM 1440. It has big nixie tubes instead of the digit units. Christian From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Tue Dec 16 04:00:48 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 08:00:48 -0200 Subject: 1Mx4 DRAMs (was Re: 8008 chips) References: <362e01c95f13$84a234d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <382b01c95f65$3e735050$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > Not 411000s - those are 1Mx1s unless I'm quite mistaken. I have a > small pile of those. What I need (as mentioned in the subject line) > is 1Mx4, perhaps known as 441000s, perhaps by other numbers; and I > agree with Keith that they are uncommon in DIP format (which is what > the Rejuvenator is prewired for - remove 8 256Kx4 DIPs, install 4 1Mx4 > DIPs). Ops, sorry! :) I though 441000 and wrote 411000 :) As I told you, these are (were?) very common memories. I have a bunch here, drop me a mail if you are unable to find it anywhere. From wdonzelli at gmail.com Tue Dec 16 07:54:25 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 08:54:25 -0500 Subject: [personal] Re: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <004501c95f5e$b25f89e0$961ca8c0@mss.local> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> <4946994A.5020304@bluewin.ch> <4946B871.C88F63C4@cs.ubc.ca> <004501c95f5e$b25f89e0$961ca8c0@mss.local> Message-ID: > That's a 2102 if I remember rightly, and I have a 8008 orginal brand new > never used in anti-stat foam. No, not that. I really want to say 2108 or something. -- Will From wdonzelli at gmail.com Tue Dec 16 07:55:40 2008 From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 08:55:40 -0500 Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <0KBY007840A1D640@vms173001.mailsrvcs.net> References: <0KBY007840A1D640@vms173001.mailsrvcs.net> Message-ID: > The 1101 256 byte static ram. No, not this either. Hard to find, these 1101s, but not impossible. -- Will From wmaddox at pacbell.net Tue Dec 16 08:26:31 2008 From: wmaddox at pacbell.net (William Maddox) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 06:26:31 -0800 (PST) Subject: DEC system module (PDP-1/4/5/6) and CDC 1604/160A-type boards on eBay Message-ID: <985677.94589.qm@web82604.mail.mud.yahoo.com> There is a DEC system module (PDP-1/4/5/6 era) in this lot, as well as several Control Data modules of the sort used in the 1604 and 160A. These are nice display pieces, but I'm well-stocked on both accounts, so I'm going to pass on this one. With 6 hours to go, the price is at $5 with no bids. --Bill http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=270315494162 Lot of 8 Vintage Circuit Boards - 1960s From wbblair3 at yahoo.com Tue Dec 16 08:40:29 2008 From: wbblair3 at yahoo.com (William Blair) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 06:40:29 -0800 (PST) Subject: Rare CPUs (was 8008) In-Reply-To: <200812161358.mBGDwIRJ014588@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <559707.49906.qm@web111512.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> > > Rarest Intel chips in no particular order (from a CPU > collector forum; posted in 2005; nobody disagreed): > > > > X8008 > > G8008 > > C4040 Purple > > C4040 Left Ground Strap > > 8080B > > 8080-8 > > 8008 > > 8008-1 > > MC8080 > > C4004 W #5 & Ground Strap > > Has someone unearthed a bunch of i432s? Any reason they are > not on the list? Quote from same forum, different thread: "I think the iAPX432 and Nx686 are the most wanted cpu in the collectors community." From wbblair3 at yahoo.com Tue Dec 16 09:00:37 2008 From: wbblair3 at yahoo.com (William Blair) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 07:00:37 -0800 (PST) Subject: cctalk Digest, Vol 64, Issue 42 In-Reply-To: <200812161358.mBGDwIRJ014588@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <883686.62645.qm@web111512.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> > I wonder if a really workable counterfeit could made from > other than a different chip with new paint? Hopefully that won't > happen, but with this kind of money involved who knows. There are discussions of this in CPU collector forums often. If the price is high enough, it's well worth it (to thieves). China appears to be a significant source for counterfeited chips, mainly "Engineering Samples," "Prototype" and "Confidential" supplementary-marked chips. And I can imagine that somewhere along the line, there were a whole bunch of ICs with exactly the same external appearance as the 4004 that could be remarked. If the buyer doesn't functional check the chip or open it up for die inspection, who'd know other than the thief who sold it? From keithvz at verizon.net Tue Dec 16 09:20:52 2008 From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 10:20:52 -0500 Subject: 1Mx4 DRAMs (was Re: 8008 chips) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4947C754.6060505@verizon.net> Ethan Dicks wrote: > I have, too... I need 4 of them to upgrade my Rejuvenator in my Amiga > 1000 from 1M of CHIP RAM to 2M of CHIP RAM (that and a "Fatter Agnus", > but those aren't as difficult to find as the RAM itself). I'm looking to upgrade a VXL-30 RAM expansion card from 2MB to 8MB. Requires 16 of those 1Mx4 chips. Keith From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Dec 16 09:40:12 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 10:40:12 -0500 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: <49471271.FDC806E2@cs.ubc.ca> References: <3BF14679-288A-4D5A-A931-3ACB9DE7DC79@neurotica.com> <49471271.FDC806E2@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: <4CC45EBE-E8D9-43B1-8513-21DC64795E33@neurotica.com> On Dec 15, 2008, at 9:29 PM, Brent Hilpert wrote: >> I've been looking for schematics for this instrument for many >> years but have not been able to find them. > > My plan was to reverse engineer it to produce the schematic, > .. if it hadn't disappeared. I am a tad miffed. Yeah, I'd be miffed too. Well, one did come across eBay recently, so they're not completely unobtainium. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Dec 16 09:42:03 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 10:42:03 -0500 Subject: 8008 chips / RAM's In-Reply-To: <4946CE00.3000202@bluewin.ch> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> <4946994A.5020304@bluewin.ch> <4946CE00.3000202@bluewin.ch> Message-ID: <24A9DB74-81AD-4B46-9FB2-2B285D968505@neurotica.com> On Dec 15, 2008, at 4:37 PM, Jos Dreesen / Marian Capel wrote: >> Further, DRAMs have always had better density (one transistor >> and one capacitor per bit, versus, what, four transistors or so?) >> but I really don't think it's fair to suggest that microcomputers >> wouldn't have existed without them. > > I wrote DRAM, but actually meant semiconductor RAM, so also SRAM. > To put it in anther way : there was never a core based homecomputer. Ahh ok, well in that case, I agree! > The i4004 is a controller, at least to me, because it is dependent > on a specific set of supporting ciruits (4001,40002 and 4003). > The 8008 is much more general purpose. Hmm. I'll agree that it's quite limited, but it's certainly not the only processor chip "set" in history. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Dec 16 10:09:45 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 11:09:45 -0500 Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <4946FE85.5020702@gifford.co.uk> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com>, <78C4457C-13EF-4FA1-A3C7-1B2484D6FFF3@neurotica.com>, <4946B81B.5070506@mdrconsult.com> <49464C86.30631.5B68B8F@cclist.sydex.com> <4946FE85.5020702@gifford.co.uk> Message-ID: On Dec 15, 2008, at 8:04 PM, John Honniball wrote: >> Speaking of which, I discovered that I've got a bunch of InMOS >> 16Kx1 static RAMs (IMS1400S55) in gold-capped ceramic packages. >> Are they used in any vintage equipment or are they better used as >> fodder for the scrappers? > > ISTR a Sun 3-something that used those SRAMs in some way. Cache, > maybe? Possibly a Sun 3-110? The ones I saw weren't gold-capped > ceramic parts, though, just ordinary plastic DIPs. That would be the page map; all Sun-3 machines will have that. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From keithvz at verizon.net Tue Dec 16 09:29:36 2008 From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 10:29:36 -0500 Subject: 1Mx4 DRAMs (was Re: 8008 chips) In-Reply-To: <382b01c95f65$3e735050$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <362e01c95f13$84a234d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <382b01c95f65$3e735050$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <4947C960.5050801@verizon.net> Alexandre Souza wrote: >> Not 411000s - those are 1Mx1s unless I'm quite mistaken. I have a >> small pile of those. What I need (as mentioned in the subject line) >> is 1Mx4, perhaps known as 441000s, perhaps by other numbers; and I >> agree with Keith that they are uncommon in DIP format (which is what >> the Rejuvenator is prewired for - remove 8 256Kx4 DIPs, install 4 1Mx4 >> DIPs). > > Ops, sorry! :) I though 441000 and wrote 411000 :) As I told you, > these are (were?) very common memories. I have a bunch here, drop me a > mail if you are unable to find it anywhere. > Unfortunately, I think 441000 is 4Mx1 instead of 1Mx4. The info I have on the chips I need (and it sounds like Ethan needs): 20-pin DIP memory chips (16) 1meg x 4-bit dips make up a bank of 8mb. Should be 60-ns Fast Page Mode non-parity An example would be Toshiba TC514400AP-60. Other manufacturers might use the following base part numbers: Fujitsu MB : 814400 Goldstar GM : 71C4400 Hitachi HM : 514400 Hyundai HY : 514400 Micron MT : 4C4001 Mitsubishi M5M: 44400 Can anyone verify that 441000 is 4Mx1 ? Thanks Keith P.S. I'm not picky. If someone has 80ns chips with no FPM (would that be edo?) that would work too! :) From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Tue Dec 16 11:20:10 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 12:20:10 -0500 Subject: 8008 chips / RAM's References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> <4946994A.5020304@bluewin.ch> <4946CE00.3000202@bluewin.ch> Message-ID: <18759.58186.905537.889852@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> >>>>> "Jos" == Jos Dreesen > writes: Jos> ...The i4004 is a controller, at least to me, because it is Jos> dependent on a specific set of supporting ciruits (4001,40002 Jos> and 4003). The 8008 is much more general purpose. I would make the distinction on the basis of what you can do with it. A college classmate of mine built a 4004 based microcomputer in 1974 that was a general purpose machine, just as the early 8008 basd micros. I would certainly call his creation a microcomputer, not a controller. It certainly was hairy -- about 100 chips on a large wire wrap board. paul From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Tue Dec 16 11:26:13 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 12:26:13 -0500 Subject: vintage CPU instruction sets References: <49417734.2050405@gmail.com> Message-ID: <18759.58549.309878.649728@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> >>>>> "Rich" == Rich Alderson writes: Rich> From: Andy Holt Sent: Friday, December 12, 2008 2:15 AM >> ...The RISC before there ws RISC: >> *CDC6600 Rich> The PDP-10 is often described this way. Interesting. I wouldn't, for a couple of reasons. The PDP-10 instruction set is quite large. Also, RISC generally means load/store instructions and the rest of the ops are register based. CDC 6000 series does that, as do contemporary RISC architectures like MIPS -- but the PDP-10 doesn't. paul From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Tue Dec 16 11:29:26 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 12:29:26 -0500 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. References: Message-ID: <18759.58742.639818.944877@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> >>>>> "Tony" == Tony Duell writes: Tony> [NLS's products] >> And before that, very early digital voltmeters... Tony> How did they work? I rmember seeing (and alas failing to Tony> obtain) an partically mechanical digital voltmeter. The Tony> circuitry was a servo system, similar to the ones used in chart Tony> recorders. The motor drove a mechanicla turns counter, coupled Tony> to an accurate multi-turn helical potentiometer, which provided Tony> the feedback to the servo amplifier (it replaced the slidewire Tony> in th chart recorder implementation). THe operation is obvious, Tony> apply an input voltage, the motor turns until the feedback from Tony> the pot balances the input votlage, the turns counter then Tony> effectively shows where the pot is Interesting approach. The only mechanical one I've seen was based on a successive approximation A/D converter with relays. It would take a sample in a few hundred milliseconds, with a clear "prrrt" sound as the relays flipped back and forth through the approximation sequence. I'm fairly sure it was made by HP. paul From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Dec 16 10:33:17 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 11:33:17 -0500 Subject: [personal] Re: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <200812161559.KAA05237@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> <4946994A.5020304@bluewin.ch><4946B871.C88F63C4@cs.ubc.ca> <004501c95f5e$b25f89e0$961ca8c0@mss.local> <200812161559.KAA05237@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <69CF58CA-65EF-4551-887F-3D93BF8FC4B8@neurotica.com> On Dec 16, 2008, at 10:55 AM, der Mouse wrote: >>> There is a "missing link" Intel RAM that many chip guys lust for. I >>> do not recall the number - 210something. >> That's a 2102 if I remember rightly, > > 1Kx1 static RAM? This is rare? Radio Shack even sold them, back when > Radio Shack was still a parts store (276-2501, my notes say). While I > don't think any are obviously marked as made by Intel, I do have a > fair > number of them (most having no obvious manufacturer marking). I think > they work, even.... Not rare at all. I even have two or three of them in the original Radio Shack blister packs. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Tue Dec 16 11:55:27 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 12:55:27 -0500 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. References: Message-ID: <18759.60303.10995.469099@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> >>>>> "Christian" == Christian Corti writes: Christian> On Mon, 15 Dec 2008, Tony Duell wrote: >> How did they work? I rmember seeing (and alas failing to obtain) >> an partically mechanical digital voltmeter. The circuitry was a >> servo Christian> We have an old DVM from 1960, a Solartron LM 902. It has a Christian> few tubes, a lot of Germanium transistors and also a lot Christian> of relais for the display. The display consists of four Christian> digits, which are big black blocks with twelve light bulbs Christian> in a 3x4 matrix (ten digits, decimal point and red Christian> background illumination for *positive* numbers) and a mask Christian> for each digit. The light passing the mask is then Christian> projected onto the front of the digit unit. Those were the best quality (by far) numeric display devices ever made. Unfortunately, also rather bulky. I think I still have a set of 3 somewhere. They were also used in some computers; the CDC 1604 console is full of them. paul From mcguire at neurotica.com Tue Dec 16 11:31:59 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 12:31:59 -0500 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: <4946A64E.13470.7155D40@cclist.sydex.com> References: , <3BF14679-288A-4D5A-A931-3ACB9DE7DC79@neurotica.com> <4946A64E.13470.7155D40@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <5A0A48AB-F7A5-441F-B4C2-F220DAFA9F35@neurotica.com> On Dec 15, 2008, at 9:47 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote: > In the early days of my youth (pre computer), I worked as an > instrumentation technician. Many chart recorders, such as L&N > Speedomax, used a "slidewire" that resembled a single-turn wirewound > potentiometer. But the Honeywell Brown Electronik recorders used a > multi-turn helical pot about the size of a coffee mug. I never > understood why they were referred to as "slidewires" and not > "helipots". It was not uncommon for the line operators to steal the > silver bead used as a contact in those. "Slidewire" is a term that dates back to the 1800s. A length of wire whose resistance per unit of length is accurately known is stretched between two binding posts alongside a ruler, and a tap can be slid along it to make contact at various points. Here are two of mine: http://www.neurotica.com/misc/slidewires.jpg (yeah, I haven't dusted in there in a while) > They also used to steal the gold support wires in the galvanometers > in L&N Micromax recorders. There was an interesting device--could > run for a month on a single dry cell, provided you kept the drive > mechanism wound (worked by periodically clamping the galvanometer > needle and mechanically sensing which way to move the pen to bring > the bridge back into balance). Except for those support wires, > rugged as a cast-iron toothbrush. Neat stuff. I have a big collection of L&N equipment here, but it all predates their mechanized recorders. They actually seem to be more rare than the older stuff. > The thefts were really odd considering that these recorders were > connected to an array of Pt-Pt+10% Rh thermocouples, each about 4 ft. > long. The metal in one of those was probably worth almost as much as > a bucket of those silver beads. Yet they were never filched. I think the types of people who would lift that stuff from work are the ones who wouldn't have any clue about Pt. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From cclist at sydex.com Tue Dec 16 11:57:47 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 09:57:47 -0800 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: <5A0A48AB-F7A5-441F-B4C2-F220DAFA9F35@neurotica.com> References: , <4946A64E.13470.7155D40@cclist.sydex.com>, <5A0A48AB-F7A5-441F-B4C2-F220DAFA9F35@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <49477B9B.31757.A567A98@cclist.sydex.com> On 16 Dec 2008 at 12:31, Dave McGuire wrote: > "Slidewire" is a term that dates back to the 1800s. A length of > wire whose resistance per unit of length is accurately known is > stretched between two binding posts alongside a ruler, and a tap can > be slid along it to make contact at various points. Here are two of > mine: > > http://www.neurotica.com/misc/slidewires.jpg I remember running into those in school in Electrical Measurements Lab. Wall galvanometers, standard resistances, slidewires... In the mill we used a wooden box that everyone called a "galvanometer", but was really a potentiometer bridge (in the classic, not the common electronic usage sense) bridge with a Weston cell for setting reference voltage from a dry cell and a book of tables correlating temperature with the (rotary) slidewire position. You measured ambient temperature with your pocket thermometer to get the cold junction reference and worked from there, applying millivoltages to the recorder/controller. I believe the box was also made by L&N. Every instrument was to be calibrated (and the case cleaned and waxed) once each month. Very welcome relaxing work in contrast to the everyday hot, filthy stuff. I haven't the faintest idea how things are done nowadays. Cheers, Chuck > > (yeah, I haven't dusted in there in a while) > > > They also used to steal the gold support wires in the galvanometers > > in L&N Micromax recorders. There was an interesting device--could > > run for a month on a single dry cell, provided you kept the drive > > mechanism wound (worked by periodically clamping the galvanometer > > needle and mechanically sensing which way to move the pen to bring > > the bridge back into balance). Except for those support wires, > > rugged as a cast-iron toothbrush. > > Neat stuff. I have a big collection of L&N equipment here, but it > all predates their mechanized recorders. They actually seem to be > more rare than the older stuff. > > > The thefts were really odd considering that these recorders were > > connected to an array of Pt-Pt+10% Rh thermocouples, each about 4 ft. > > long. The metal in one of those was probably worth almost as much as > > a bucket of those silver beads. Yet they were never filched. > > I think the types of people who would lift that stuff from work > are the ones who wouldn't have any clue about Pt. > > -Dave > > -- > Dave McGuire > Port Charlotte, FL > > From glen.slick at gmail.com Tue Dec 16 12:26:45 2008 From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 10:26:45 -0800 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <2e9501c95f03$a4172290$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <1c8201c959f1$e10f5a80$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <493E3D5F.29187.42C8A91@cclist.sydex.com> <2e9501c95f03$a4172290$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <1e1fc3e90812161026j4fcd1e21i8f5823bd0a8739aa@mail.gmail.com> On Mon, Dec 15, 2008 at 2:22 PM, Alexandre Souza wrote: >> Show me a $20 FPGA eval kit (with programmer) and I'll buy it. > > You cannot buy a $20 evaluation kit (even because an FPGA costs more than > that, we are talking different beasties here), but you can use a > low-gate-count FPGA in a protoboard and have it for less than $20 or 30. > There is the http://www.avnet.com/ AES-SP3A-EVAL400-G Xilinx XC3S400A-4FTG256C Spartan-3A Evaluation Kit for $39. I don't know anything about FPGAs, but that might be low cost enough to give it a try. Anyone here done any MicroBlaze work? From cclist at sydex.com Tue Dec 16 12:34:58 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 10:34:58 -0800 Subject: 8008 chips / RAM's In-Reply-To: <24A9DB74-81AD-4B46-9FB2-2B285D968505@neurotica.com> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com>, <4946CE00.3000202@bluewin.ch>, <24A9DB74-81AD-4B46-9FB2-2B285D968505@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <49478452.28386.A787A26@cclist.sydex.com> On 16 Dec 2008 at 10:42, Dave McGuire wrote: > On Dec 15, 2008, at 4:37 PM, Jos Dreesen / Marian Capel wrote: > > The i4004 is a controller, at least to me, because it is dependent > > on a specific set of supporting ciruits (4001,40002 and 4003). > > The 8008 is much more general purpose. > > Hmm. I'll agree that it's quite limited, but it's certainly not > the only processor chip "set" in history. I've always wondered why the National IMP-16 chipset is so widely ignored. Remarkable for its time (1973) in that it was a 16-bit design. Were there any 8008/8080 designs implemented without at least one other member of the support chipset? Cheers, Chuck From mc at media.mit.edu Tue Dec 16 13:11:49 2008 From: mc at media.mit.edu (Tim McNerney) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 14:11:49 -0500 Subject: 8008 v. 4004... & what was the second COTS microprocessor? In-Reply-To: <200812161800.mBGI0Qea018388@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812161800.mBGI0Qea018388@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <4947FD75.1090800@media.mit.edu> From: Paul Koning Subject: Re: 8008 chips / RAM's Jos> ...The i4004 is a controller, at least to me, because it is Jos> dependent on a specific set of supporting ciruits (4001,40002 Jos> and 4003). The 8008 is much more general purpose. I would make the distinction on the basis of what you can do with it. A college classmate of mine built a 4004 based microcomputer in 1974 that was a general purpose machine, just as the early 8008 basd micros. I would certainly call his creation a microcomputer, not a controller. It certainly was hairy -- about 100 chips on a large wire wrap board. paul Sure, I could imagine agreeing that the 4004 was a "controller," but these are just names. It is still a microprocessor, just that it had a very convenient bus architecture that let you connect RAMs, ROMs, and I/O with no "glue logic." It is certainly true that the bus interface of the 8008 was more general than the 4004, but this meant that the 8008 required dozens of support chips just to build the most minimal system. Peripherals and memory each required decoders to partition the bus address space, whereas the 4001 and 4002 had built-in decoders. It is worth noting that eventually the 4008, 4009 and then the combined 4289 came along to allow the 4004 (and the 4040) to interface to standard memories (static RAMs and e.g. 1702 PROMs). Alas, the 8008 didn't last very long, whereas the 4004 had a 15-year manufacturing run, even as the space of 8-bit microprocessors exploded and surpassed the meager 4004 in capability. The 8008 was originally purpose-built to be a terminal controller and then released for general use. People make a big deal about the first-this and the first-that, but then what happens is no-one can remember the second-this and the second-that. Can anyone remember what the second commercial, customer-programmable microprocessor to hit the market? The 8008 came out in 1972. Were there others introduced that year? I know that the TMS-1000 was right around that time. --Tim From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Tue Dec 16 13:17:10 2008 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 11:17:10 -0800 Subject: 8008 chips / RAM's References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com>, <4946CE00.3000202@bluewin.ch>, <24A9DB74-81AD-4B46-9FB2-2B285D968505@neurotica.com> <49478452.28386.A787A26@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4947FEB6.B7F9340E@cs.ubc.ca> Chuck Guzis wrote: > > On 16 Dec 2008 at 10:42, Dave McGuire wrote: > > > On Dec 15, 2008, at 4:37 PM, Jos Dreesen / Marian Capel wrote: > > > > The i4004 is a controller, at least to me, because it is dependent > > > on a specific set of supporting ciruits (4001,40002 and 4003). > > > The 8008 is much more general purpose. > > > > Hmm. I'll agree that it's quite limited, but it's certainly not > > the only processor chip "set" in history. > > I've always wondered why the National IMP-16 chipset is so widely > ignored. Remarkable for its time (1973) in that it was a 16-bit > design. > > Were there any 8008/8080 designs implemented without at least one > other member of the support chipset? I have a Tektronix cartridge tape drive (ca 1977) here using an 8008. There doesn't appear to be any other 8008-specific chips in it. A 2708 EPROM, 8316 ROM, 2 2102 RAMs, 2 GI LSI chips of unknown function. The rest is a mess of 74 TTL. I'm reasonably well-acquainted with the 4004 family chips and their inter-communication and execution cycle, but not so with the 8008. From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Dec 16 12:50:58 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 18:50:58 +0000 (GMT) Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <0KBY007840A1D640@vms173001.mailsrvcs.net> from "Allison" at Dec 15, 8 07:07:28 pm Message-ID: > The 1103 was dynamic and while cheaper it was also hard to work with > due to refresh and interface needs. The thing I rmemeber about the 1103 was that it's PMOS. Not only does it need strange supply voltage levesl (+16V and +19V), but also all I/O pins (address, data, etc) work at, IIRC, 16V levels. There were Intel chips to covnert those to TTL (3207, 3208 I think), but they came out later than the 1103. The HP9810 calculator uses '06 + active pull-up (1 transistor) circuits to level-shift TTL to PMOS levels, and IIRC some kind of fast comparator to take the data outputs back to TTL. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Dec 16 12:57:30 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 18:57:30 +0000 (GMT) Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <4946FE85.5020702@gifford.co.uk> from "John Honniball" at Dec 16, 8 01:04:05 am Message-ID: > > Chuck Guzis wrote: > > Speaking of which, I discovered that I've got a bunch of InMOS 16Kx1 > > static RAMs (IMS1400S55) in gold-capped ceramic packages. Are they > > used in any vintage equipment or are they better used as fodder for > > the scrappers? > > ISTR a Sun 3-something that used those SRAMs in some way. Cache, I knew I'd seen them somewhere. They're used as the writeable control store RAMs in every classic PERQ after the PERQ 1 (that is, all models with the 16K WCS CPU board). Few PERQs had Inoms RAMs originally, but I have good experimental evidence that they work. > maybe? Possibly a Sun 3-110? The ones I saw weren't gold-capped > ceramic parts, though, just ordinary plastic DIPs. YEs, the one I stuck in one of my PERQs was a plasic DIP. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Dec 16 13:04:24 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 19:04:24 +0000 (GMT) Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: <4946A64E.13470.7155D40@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Dec 15, 8 06:47:42 pm Message-ID: > In the early days of my youth (pre computer), I worked as an > instrumentation technician. Many chart recorders, such as L&N > Speedomax, used a "slidewire" that resembled a single-turn wirewound > potentiometer. But the Honeywell Brown Electronik recorders used a > multi-turn helical pot about the size of a coffee mug. I never > understood why they were referred to as "slidewires" and not > "helipots". It was not uncommon for the line operators to steal the > silver bead used as a contact in those. I have the mechanism from an old chart recorder, I beleve a Honeywell, but modified by Pye Unicam, which has 2 feedback pots. One is the normal linear slidewire mounted across the chassis (the slider being on the pen carriage. The other is an accurate logarithmic pot driven by a pulley on the drive cable that links the motor to the pen carriage. I also have a little box of electronics containing a cathode followe buffer and a relay to switch between the 2 slidewires. The insturment, of course, could either have a linear or logirithmic pen movement. -tony From vern4wright at yahoo.com Tue Dec 16 13:19:41 2008 From: vern4wright at yahoo.com (Vernon Wright) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 11:19:41 -0800 (PST) Subject: Edmund Berkeley question In-Reply-To: <002101c95f25$0896f7b0$0301a8c0@evan> Message-ID: <250930.39358.qm@web65502.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> Boy Evan, that one caught me! My parents gave me a Brainiac in the '50's, and I later (in the Journal of the San Diego Computer Society, I believe) wrote a short appreciation of Berkeley and that flaky toy. Even though it was flaky, he caught my mind. I subscribed to C&A for many years, even when he renamed it Computers & People (and changed it back). He died in 1988. His papers are in the Babbage Institute. Here's a link to the inventory: http://www.cbi.umn.edu/collections/inv/cbi00050.html Vern --- On Mon, 12/15/08, Evan Koblentz wrote: > From: Evan Koblentz > Subject: Edmund Berkeley question > To: "'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts'" > Date: Monday, December 15, 2008, 6:21 PM > Anyone know when Berkeley Enterprises closed? From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Dec 16 13:13:55 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 19:13:55 +0000 (GMT) Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: from "Christian Corti" at Dec 16, 8 10:58:13 am Message-ID: > > On Mon, 15 Dec 2008, Tony Duell wrote: > > How did they work? I rmember seeing (and alas failing to obtain) an > > partically mechanical digital voltmeter. The circuitry was a servo > > We have an old DVM from 1960, a Solartron LM 902. It has a few tubes, a > lot of Germanium transistors and also a lot of relais for the display. The > display consists of four digits, which are big black blocks with twelve > light bulbs in a 3x4 matrix (ten digits, decimal point and red background > illumination for *positive* numbers) and a mask for each digit. The light > passing the mask is then projected onto the front of the digit unit. > And best of all, this DVM contains a Weston element which still has its > nominal value. > We also have the successor from Solartron, the LM 1440. It has big nixie > tubes instead of the digit units. Solartron instruments are, not suprisingly, fairly common in England. I have an LM1420.2 (the .2 meaning it's got the BCD output socket on the back), which is all discrete transistors with nixie tubes for the display. And a somewhat better model (LM1602???) which uses DTL chips. The former certainly contains a Seston Standard Cell, I suspect the latter does too (ass, incidentally, does that Blackburn valved DVM I mentioned in another message). Solartron also made soemthing called a DTU -- Data Transfer Unit. I have a couple. A rack of boards stuffed with DTL chips, it connets to a DVM (or counter) and turns it into a data logger. There's a relay-based multiplexer to seelct different inputs, a real time clock board (it uses the mains as it frequerncy refernce) and various optional output oards to drive an IBM typeriter or card punch, an ASR33 or a Facit 4070 tape punch. You set it up with internal links and front panel controls, and then every so often (set by the clock PCB), it springs into life, samples the appropraite number of inputs, takes the value from the DVM and prints/punches it. This instruemtn dates from the time that computers were begining to be availale in large-ish companies, but it was not common to find them in the labs. But with a DTU at least you didn't have to write down the readins and later punch them by hand. -tony From cclist at sydex.com Tue Dec 16 13:32:22 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 11:32:22 -0800 Subject: 8008 v. 4004... & what was the second COTS microprocessor? In-Reply-To: <4947FD75.1090800@media.mit.edu> References: <200812161800.mBGI0Qea018388@dewey.classiccmp.org>, <4947FD75.1090800@media.mit.edu> Message-ID: <494791C6.19167.AAD0A24@cclist.sydex.com> On 16 Dec 2008 at 14:11, Tim McNerney wrote: > People make a big deal about the first-this and the first-that, but > then what happens is no-one can remember the second-this and the > second-that. Can anyone remember what the second commercial, > customer-programmable microprocessor to hit the market? The 8008 came > out in 1972. Were there others introduced that year? I know that the > TMS-1000 was right around that time. The Rockwell PPS-4 was in there somewhere. (Microcontroller or microprocessor?). Cheers, Chuck From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Tue Dec 16 13:58:39 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 13:58:39 -0600 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> <30c101c95f07$28ee3780$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> David Griffith wrote: >> What was the biggest abuse you took with your M? :o) > > How about Mmmmmmm. I splashed solder on mine. Currently I have one > completely stripped until I can get a USB driver board worked out that I > like. Well, my PS/2-USB adapter just arrived in the mail. Plugged it in, and it Just Worked (tm) - I don't think I've ever had anything do that in Linux before :-) The adapter's pretty small, but I can't find a suitable socket bit in my toolbox that's slimline enough to use to take the Model M case apart so I can see if it'll fit inside comfortably. Re. Model M itself - it's nice to be typing on one; I've suffered a laptop keyboard for far too long! My only criticism of it is that the right-hand shift key seems to require fairly central pressing in order to work (i.e. I can't just reach across from the cursor keys and tap the end) - does anyone know if they changed this (i.e. added a metal travel-assist bar as with the spacebar, keypad enter key etc.) on the later models? cheers Jules (basking in clicky goodness) From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Dec 16 14:28:24 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 12:28:24 -0800 (PST) Subject: 8008 chips / RAM's In-Reply-To: <49478452.28386.A787A26@cclist.sydex.com> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com>, <4946CE00.3000202@bluewin.ch>, <24A9DB74-81AD-4B46-9FB2-2B285D968505@neurotica.com> <49478452.28386.A787A26@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <20081216122546.O95031@shell.lmi.net> > The i4004 is a controller, at least to me, because it is dependent > on a specific set of supporting ciruits (4001,40002 and 4003). > The 8008 is much more general purpose. How do we DEFINE 'microprocessor' v 'controller'? "How can you call the 80386 a 'microprocessor'? It doesn't even have an FPU!" From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Tue Dec 16 15:08:56 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 21:08:56 +0000 (GMT) Subject: 8008 chips / RAM's In-Reply-To: <4947FEB6.B7F9340E@cs.ubc.ca> from "Brent Hilpert" at Dec 16, 8 11:17:10 am Message-ID: > > Were there any 8008/8080 designs implemented without at least one > > other member of the support chipset? > > I have a Tektronix cartridge tape drive (ca 1977) here using an 8008. > There doesn't appear to be any other 8008-specific chips in it. > A 2708 EPROM, 8316 ROM, 2 2102 RAMs, 2 GI LSI chips of unknown function. > The rest is a mess of 74 TTL. I don;t have it in front of me, but I don't recall any 8008-sprcific ICs (other than the 8008, of course) in the PDP11/34 front panel controller. -tony From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Tue Dec 16 15:24:45 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 21:24:45 +0000 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> <30c101c95f07$28ee3780$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> Message-ID: <49481C9D.1020307@gjcp.net> Jules Richardson wrote: > David Griffith wrote: >>> What was the biggest abuse you took with your M? :o) >> >> How about Mmmmmmm. I splashed solder on mine. Currently I have one >> completely stripped until I can get a USB driver board worked out that I >> like. > > Well, my PS/2-USB adapter just arrived in the mail. Plugged it in, and > it Just Worked (tm) - I don't think I've ever had anything do that in > Linux before :-) You tend to find that with USB devices in Linux - they either Just Plain Work, or are totally unsupported. I know a lot of people in here don't seem to like USB, but it reduces all the device-to-host interfacing to a Small Matter Of Programming. None of this tedious mucking about with IO ports, and interrupts, and getting the timing absolutely bang on - you just read packets off the interface ;-) Gordon From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Tue Dec 16 15:31:07 2008 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 13:31:07 -0800 (PST) Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> <30c101c95f07$28ee3780$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> Message-ID: On Tue, 16 Dec 2008, Jules Richardson wrote: > David Griffith wrote: > >> What was the biggest abuse you took with your M? :o) > > > > How about Mmmmmmm. I splashed solder on mine. Currently I have one > > completely stripped until I can get a USB driver board worked out that I > > like. > > Well, my PS/2-USB adapter just arrived in the mail. Plugged it in, and it Just > Worked (tm) - I don't think I've ever had anything do that in Linux before :-) > > The adapter's pretty small, but I can't find a suitable socket bit in my > toolbox that's slimline enough to use to take the Model M case apart so I can > see if it'll fit inside comfortably. > > Re. Model M itself - it's nice to be typing on one; I've suffered a laptop > keyboard for far too long! My only criticism of it is that the right-hand > shift key seems to require fairly central pressing in order to work (i.e. I > can't just reach across from the cursor keys and tap the end) - does anyone > know if they changed this (i.e. added a metal travel-assist bar as with the > spacebar, keypad enter key etc.) on the later models? My Model Ms have a travel-assist bar only for the space bar. The right-hand shift spans two studs and uses the second stud for smooth actuation no matter where you press. -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? From RichA at vulcan.com Tue Dec 16 15:32:20 2008 From: RichA at vulcan.com (Rich Alderson) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 13:32:20 -0800 Subject: vintage CPU instruction sets In-Reply-To: <18759.58549.309878.649728@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> References: <49417734.2050405@gmail.com> <18759.58549.309878.649728@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> Message-ID: From: Paul Koning Sent: Tuesday, December 16, 2008 9:26 AM >>>>> "Rich" == Rich Alderson writes: Rich>> From: Andy Holt Sent: Friday, December 12, 2008 2:15 AM >>> ...The RISC before there ws RISC: >>> *CDC6600 Rich>> The PDP-10 is often described this way. > Interesting. I wouldn't, for a couple of reasons. The PDP-10 > instruction set is quite large. Also, RISC generally means load/store > instructions and the rest of the ops are register based. CDC 6000 > series does that, as do contemporary RISC architectures like MIPS -- > but the PDP-10 doesn't. I'm well aware of where the PDP-10 architecture fails that definition. On the other hand, nearly 30 years of programming the PDP-10 architecture tells me that very nearly all the work done by a PDP-10 program is done with accumulator load/store and accumulator-to-accumulator or accumulator + immediate data operations. And the size of an instruction set is not indicative of the RISCiness of the architecture. Rich Alderson Server Engineer, PDPplanet Project Vulcan, Inc. 505 5th Avenue S, Suite 900 Seattle, WA 98104 mailto:RichA at vulcan.com (206) 342-2239 (206) 465-2916 cell From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Tue Dec 16 15:36:57 2008 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 21:36:57 +0000 (GMT) Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <49481C9D.1020307@gjcp.net> Message-ID: <749275.95976.qm@web23408.mail.ird.yahoo.com> I love USB devices, so easy to use and (in my experience so far) absolutely no drivers required (on Windows 2K atleast), just plug and play :) However, it sucks when I want (or need) to use said devices with my classic Amiga's. Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk --- On Tue, 16/12/08, Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote: You tend to find that with USB devices in Linux - they either Just Plain Work, or are totally unsupported. I know a lot of people in here don't seem to like USB, but it reduces all the device-to-host interfacing to a Small Matter Of Programming. None of this tedious mucking about with IO ports, and interrupts, and getting the timing absolutely bang on - you just read packets off the interface ;-) Gordon From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Tue Dec 16 15:38:59 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 14:38:59 -0700 Subject: 8008 chips / RAM's In-Reply-To: <20081216122546.O95031@shell.lmi.net> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com>, <4946CE00.3000202@bluewin.ch>, <24A9DB74-81AD-4B46-9FB2-2B285D968505@neurotica.com> <49478452.28386.A787A26@cclist.sydex.com> <20081216122546.O95031@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <49481FF3.80500@jetnet.ab.ca> Fred Cisin wrote: >> The i4004 is a controller, at least to me, because it is dependent >> on a specific set of supporting ciruits (4001,40002 and 4003). >> The 8008 is much more general purpose. > > How do we DEFINE 'microprocessor' v 'controller'? My guess is *Does it have a overflow flag*. Just a link or carry flag - controller , full flags micro. Comparing a PDP-8 vs a PDP-11 > "How can you call the 80386 a 'microprocessor'? > It doesn't even have an FPU!" I allways thought *built in floating point* was main frame stuff. > > From cclist at sydex.com Tue Dec 16 15:45:29 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 13:45:29 -0800 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, , <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> Message-ID: <4947B0F9.20243.B26DBCF@cclist.sydex.com> On 16 Dec 2008 at 13:58, Jules Richardson wrote: > Re. Model M itself - it's nice to be typing on one; I've suffered a laptop > keyboard for far too long! My only criticism of it is that the right-hand > shift key seems to require fairly central pressing in order to work (i.e. I > can't just reach across from the cursor keys and tap the end) - does anyone > know if they changed this (i.e. added a metal travel-assist bar as with the > spacebar, keypad enter key etc.) on the later models? Hmmm, the right shift on all my model M keyboards is just fine. But they're all the 101-key models. Is yours perchance a 102-key version? Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Tue Dec 16 15:52:48 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 13:52:48 -0800 Subject: 8008 chips / RAM's In-Reply-To: <49481FF3.80500@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com>, <20081216122546.O95031@shell.lmi.net>, <49481FF3.80500@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <4947B2B0.22365.B2D8977@cclist.sydex.com> On 16 Dec 2008 at 14:38, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > My guess is *Does it have a overflow flag*. > Just a link or carry flag - controller , full flags micro. AVRs have overflow flags; 8080s don't. A CDC6600 has no flags at all. Cheers, Chuck From keithvz at verizon.net Tue Dec 16 15:59:06 2008 From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 16:59:06 -0500 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <49481C9D.1020307@gjcp.net> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> <30c101c95f07$28ee3780$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> <49481C9D.1020307@gjcp.net> Message-ID: <494824AA.6030508@verizon.net> Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote: > I know a lot of people in here don't seem to like USB, but it reduces > all the device-to-host interfacing to a Small Matter Of Programming. > None of this tedious mucking about with IO ports, and interrupts, and > getting the timing absolutely bang on - you just read packets off the > interface ;-) I have a small uC device that I made that uses an FTDI USB->TTL converter. I wish USB was as straight-forward as you describe. I'm currently running into problems when transferring, very quickly, some data from the uC to the PC. The problems are related to overrunning the PC, where the PC isn't scheduling reads from the device fast enough to prevent drops. At least interrupt-based I/O can "demand" attention from the cpu at any time, where USB is at the mercy of being scheduled. I'm now implementing an xmodem-like ACK/NAK block based protocol on top of USB, in addition to setting USB read-size to the precise size of a block to obtain more efficient usage. > > Gordon > Keith From ploopster at gmail.com Tue Dec 16 16:46:59 2008 From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 17:46:59 -0500 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> <30c101c95f07$28ee3780$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> Message-ID: <49482FE3.1030907@gmail.com> Jules Richardson wrote: > Re. Model M itself - it's nice to be typing on one; I've suffered a > laptop keyboard for far too long! My only criticism of it is that the > right-hand shift key seems to require fairly central pressing in order > to work (i.e. I can't just reach across from the cursor keys and tap the > end) - does anyone know if they changed this (i.e. added a metal > travel-assist bar as with the spacebar, keypad enter key etc.) on the > later models? I know for a fact that they didn't. Try a mild lubricant. Peace... Sridhar From sellam at vintagetech.com Tue Dec 16 17:07:40 2008 From: sellam at vintagetech.com (Sellam Ismail) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 15:07:40 -0800 (PST) Subject: NCR system 3400 (fwd) Message-ID: An NCR 3400 is available in Cary, North Carolina. See below. Please respond to the original sender. Reply-to: terry at eurosoftinc.com ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 13:45:59 -0500 From: Terry Stanfield To: donate at vintage.org Subject: NCR system 3400 We have an old NCR system 3400 here in our office that I would be very sad to send to the dumpster. Would you be interested? Unfortunately we are on the east coast. Thanks, Terry Stanfield Eurosoft, Inc., 1628 Old Apex Road Cary, NC 27513 (919)468-3003 ext 223 http://www.eurosoftinc.com --- -- Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org [ Old computing resources for business || Buy/Sell/Trade Vintage Computers ] [ and academia at www.VintageTech.com || at http://marketplace.vintage.org ] From coredump at gifford.co.uk Tue Dec 16 17:39:15 2008 From: coredump at gifford.co.uk (John Honniball) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 23:39:15 +0000 Subject: 8008 chips / RAM's In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <49483C23.6010605@gifford.co.uk> Tony Duell wrote: > I don;t have it in front of me, but I don't recall any 8008-sprcific ICs > (other than the 8008, of course) in the PDP11/34 front panel controller. Having done a component-level repair to such a baord, I think Tony's right: there's an Intel 8008 chip, but no other chips from the "set". -- John Honniball coredump at gifford.co.uk From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Tue Dec 16 17:42:52 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 17:42:52 -0600 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <49482FE3.1030907@gmail.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> <30c101c95f07$28ee3780$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> <49482FE3.1030907@gmail.com> Message-ID: <49483CFC.1030408@gmail.com> Sridhar Ayengar wrote: > Jules Richardson wrote: > > Re. Model M itself - it's nice to be typing on one; I've suffered a >> laptop keyboard for far too long! My only criticism of it is that the >> right-hand shift key seems to require fairly central pressing in order >> to work (i.e. I can't just reach across from the cursor keys and tap >> the end) - does anyone know if they changed this (i.e. added a metal >> travel-assist bar as with the spacebar, keypad enter key etc.) on the >> later models? > > I know for a fact that they didn't. Try a mild lubricant. Yep, will do. If that doesn't work then I can just get used to it I think, it's not really *that* big a deal. cheers Jules From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Tue Dec 16 17:45:38 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 17:45:38 -0600 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <4947B0F9.20243.B26DBCF@cclist.sydex.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, , <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> <4947B0F9.20243.B26DBCF@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <49483DA2.6010407@gmail.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 16 Dec 2008 at 13:58, Jules Richardson wrote: > >> Re. Model M itself - it's nice to be typing on one; I've suffered a laptop >> keyboard for far too long! My only criticism of it is that the right-hand >> shift key seems to require fairly central pressing in order to work (i.e. I >> can't just reach across from the cursor keys and tap the end) - does anyone >> know if they changed this (i.e. added a metal travel-assist bar as with the >> spacebar, keypad enter key etc.) on the later models? > > Hmmm, the right shift on all my model M keyboards is just fine. But > they're all the 101-key models. Is yours perchance a 102-key > version? Nope, it's a 101 - I expect it's just 20 years' worth of age! I'll try Sridhar's suggestion and give it a light oiling with something. (I'm typing next to the wife at the mo - I'm surprised she hasn't mentioned about the noise yet :-) cheers Jules From cclist at sydex.com Tue Dec 16 18:19:04 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 16:19:04 -0800 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <494824AA.6030508@verizon.net> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, <49481C9D.1020307@gjcp.net>, <494824AA.6030508@verizon.net> Message-ID: <4947D4F8.13169.BB36CFA@cclist.sydex.com> On 16 Dec 2008 at 16:59, Keith wrote: > I have a small uC device that I made that uses an FTDI USB->TTL > converter. I wish USB was as straight-forward as you describe. I'm > currently running into problems when transferring, very quickly, some > data from the uC to the PC. The problems are related to overrunning the > PC, where the PC isn't scheduling reads from the device fast enough to > prevent drops. At least interrupt-based I/O can "demand" attention from > the cpu at any time, where USB is at the mercy of being scheduled. I'm probably stating what you are already aware of, but on the off- chance that it sheds some light... Don't those things have a FIFO--something like 384 bytes? Regardless, there are two basic modes of operation on those things-- the first is single-character "comm port" type transfer; the second is block-mode transfer (as you'd see in a storage device). Single- mode transfers have considerable overhead, severely limiting the speed. Unfortunately, most of the FTDI development kits include drivers for only the former mode and not the block mode. FWIW, Chuck From brain at jbrain.com Tue Dec 16 19:55:07 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 19:55:07 -0600 Subject: PS2Encoder Message-ID: <49485BFB.9080802@jbrain.com> Based on a response to my note about having PS/2 keyboard routines that can output parallel ASCII, I thought I'd mention that I took some time these past few nights to clean up my PS2Encoder project. The original project supported: * converting AT and PS/2 keyboard data into parallel with strobe * Capturing CTRL/ALT/DEL keystroke and triggering active low output upon receipt. * RS232 output * Hobbyist friendly 28 pin .300" DIP package layout I've added the following features: * Removal of crystal requirement. While the code can be compiled for one, it is no required for operation * CAPS LOCK works (I have not gotten the code that updates the LED to work yet, but the interface adjusts to uppercase) * Ability to configure interface via keyboard itself * Ability to set parallel strobe to be active low or active high * Ability to set ENTER to send CR or CRLF * Ability to set inter-char holdoff from 0 to 2550uS, in 10uS increments * Ability to set BS to send either BS or DEL * Ability to set RS232 speed (2400,4800,9600,19200,38400) * Ability to save settings permanently in EEPROM The code is available (or will be, as soon as I post it) under GPL (v2), but I'm wondering a few things: * Any other features folks might find handy? I can't promise things (someone suggested full keyboard mapping, which I am still thinking about. It's not a technical issue per se, more a user interface one), but I can try * Anyone interested in a programmed IC for $20.00 (shipping in US included)? Jim -- Jim Brain, Brain Innovations (X) brain at jbrain.com Dabbling in WWW, Embedded Systems, Old CBM computers, and Good Times! Home: http://www.jbrain.com From keithvz at verizon.net Tue Dec 16 20:54:03 2008 From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 21:54:03 -0500 Subject: OT: ping Joe Rigdon or Kenn Jorgensen Message-ID: <494869CB.7070603@verizon.net> If either Joe Rigdon or Kenn Jorgensen is monitoring this list, please contact me. Thanks Keith From brain at jbrain.com Tue Dec 16 22:10:03 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 22:10:03 -0600 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <1e1fc3e90812161026j4fcd1e21i8f5823bd0a8739aa@mail.gmail.com> References: <1c8201c959f1$e10f5a80$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <493E3D5F.29187.42C8A91@cclist.sydex.com> <2e9501c95f03$a4172290$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <1e1fc3e90812161026j4fcd1e21i8f5823bd0a8739aa@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <49487B9B.3010302@jbrain.com> Glen Slick wrote: > There is the http://www.avnet.com/ AES-SP3A-EVAL400-G Xilinx > XC3S400A-4FTG256C Spartan-3A Evaluation Kit for $39. > > I don't know anything about FPGAs, but that might be low cost enough > to give it a try. Anyone here done any MicroBlaze work? > Thanks for the link. I couldn't find that the other day when I responded. I think this is a good time to learn about FPGAs. Jim From sellam at vintagetech.com Tue Dec 16 23:08:52 2008 From: sellam at vintagetech.com (Sellam Ismail) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 21:08:52 -0800 Subject: ACCRC Sealed-bid Auction Update for 2008-12-16 Message-ID: <49488964.mailFO1113JFV@vintagetech.com> ACCRC Sealed-bid Auction Update for 2008-12-16 Many people asked about the functional condition of some of the items in the ACCRC sealed-bid auction, and some asked for the configurations of some of the higher-end systems. So I took the time last night to test each machine and below is a summary of the functional status of each machine in the current lot. In summary: nearly all the machines tested work just fine. Also, several people had problems logging in, changing their password, or creating an account. All of these problems should be fixed by now. If you continue to have any issues logging in or creating an account, please let me know ASAP and I will address the issue immediately. FYI, the closing time for this auction is this Thursday, December 18, at 12:00PM PST. There's still plenty of time to update your bids (if warranted). The next auction lot will be posted by this weekend, with a target date of December 19 (this coming Friday). More good stuff is on the way, so don't blow your wad all at once. Functional Summary of Current ACCRC Sealed-bid Auction Lot "GOOD" means the unit powers up and displays video (if applicable). "NLS" stands for "Non-Linear Systems" (see below for explanation). ## Item Condition -- -------------------------------- --------------------------------- 1 Olivetti Divisumma 24 Calculator Untested; needs funky power cord 2 HP1000 Model A900 Powers up; see below for config. 3 Apple Silentype Printer Unable to test (needs int. board) 4 Lagamarsino Totalia 6341 Calc. Untested; needs funky power cord 5 Kaypro 4 GOOD; NLS; drv. B latch is broken 7 Kaypro II GOOD; NLS 8 NEC PC-8201A GOOD 9 Kaypro 2X Does not power up 11 TRS-80 Model 4P GOOD 12 Kaypro 2 GOOD; slight video warping 14 Kaypro 1 GOOD 15 Non-Linear Systems Kaypro II Withdrawn (see notes below) 17 Osborne 1 Power cord cut; cannot test 18 Apple Silentype Printer Unable to test (needs int. board) 19 Apple //c Untested (no power brick) 20 IMSAI Z80 No attempt made to test 21 Osborne Executive GOOD; slight video jitter 22 Osborne 1 (Gray) GOOD 23 Osborne Executive GOOD; slight video jitter 25 Osborne Executive GOOD 26 Kaypro 4 GOOD; brightness is over-driven 27 TRS-80 Color Computer 2 Unable to test (no video cable) 28 Magnavox Odyssey 4000 Beeps; video untested; ~GOOD 29 Access Portable GOOD 30 TI 99/4a Expansion System Unable to test 31 TI 99/4a Didn't bother to test 32 Tandy 200 GOOD 33 TI Silent 700 Does not power up 34 Tandy 600 Powers up; scrambled video 35 Atari 800XL & 1050 Untested (no power brick) 36 Sony SMC-70 Powers up; need video cable 37 Macintosh 128K GOOD; see updated description 38 Macintosh (Original) GOOD; "Sad Mac" = 0F0002 39 Altos 8600 Powers up; HD sounds sick 40 Famicom Clone Unable to test 41 Canon Cat GOOD Additional notes on certain machines: Kaypros - Kaypro Corporation originally started out as "Non-Linear Systems, Inc.", changing its name after the success of their Kaypro computer line (their initial claim to fame is bringing to market the first digital voltmeter; see Wikipedia for more details). Early Kaypro computers were labeled as being made by "Non-Linear Systems". In my opinion, these early machines are more rare and valuable than the later "Kaypro" branded machines. During the course of my more detailed inspection, I realized that several of the Kaypro machines carry the "Non-Linear Systems" branding. "NLS" in the condition column above indicates a "Non-Linear Systems" branded machine. The item descriptions on the auction page have been updated to reflect this new information. The "Non-Linear Systems Kaypro II" (Item #15) has been withdrawn because it was determined that it was already sold. I apologize profusely for this. Osborne Executives - the "slight video jitter" indicated might be a side effect of the drive motors when the unit is seeking a boot disk. HP 1000 Model A900 ------------------ The configuration of the HP 1000 A900 is as follows: A900 CNTRL STOR A900 SEQUENCER A900 DATA PATH A900 CACHE CTRL A900 MEM CNTRL MEMORY 3 MB MEMORY 3/4 MB HP-IB 8 CHAN MUX BB PARALLEL HP-IB As noted above, this machines powers up, but no other information about it's functional condition is known. IMSAI Z80 --------- The configuration of the IMSAI Z80 is as follows: CompuPro CPU-Z (Z80 processor with 1985 date code) Cromemco 32K ByteSaver Fulcrum Static RAM (?) Fulcrum Static RAM (?) [second board] Digital Research Computers RAM (?) Godbout System Support 1 Morrow Disk Jockey/DMA (floppy disk controller) Morrow HDC/DMA (hard disk controller) IMSAI MIO (Rev. 2) CompuPro Interfacer 4 No attempt was made to power on the IMSAI. This is pretty much a project machine, though it's in good enough condition that an experienced hobbyist should be able to get it booted with a couple hours of tinkering. It's a good starter machine for a noob. Please contact me if you have any further questions about any of these items. Best regards, Sellam Ismail Proprietor Vintage Computer Festival From dkelvey at hotmail.com Tue Dec 16 23:57:48 2008 From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 21:57:48 -0800 Subject: Rare CPUs (was 8008) In-Reply-To: <559707.49906.qm@web111512.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> References: <200812161358.mBGDwIRJ014588@dewey.classiccmp.org> <559707.49906.qm@web111512.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: > Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 06:40:29 -0800> From: wbblair3 at yahoo.com> To: cctalk at classiccmp.org> Subject: Re: Rare CPUs (was 8008)> > > > Rarest Intel chips in no particular order (from a CPU> > collector forum; posted in 2005; nobody disagreed):> > >> > > X8008> > > G8008> > > C4040 Purple> > > C4040 Left Ground Strap> > > 8080B> > > 8080-8> > > 8008> > > 8008-1> > > MC8080> > > C4004 W #5 & Ground Strap> > > > Has someone unearthed a bunch of i432s? Any reason they are> > not on the list?> > Quote from same forum, different thread: "I think the iAPX432 and Nx686 are the most wanted cpu in the collectors community."> > > Hi How many have an 8096? Dwight _________________________________________________________________ You live life online. So we put Windows on the web. http://clk.atdmt.com/MRT/go/127032869/direct/01/ From stuart at retrocomputing.tv Tue Dec 16 05:10:57 2008 From: stuart at retrocomputing.tv (stuart birchall) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 11:10:57 +0000 Subject: wtd: 486 and P100~ class machine in NW UK Message-ID: Hi everyone, I'm having some difficulty in finding relatively old PC hardware of a certain vintage. I'm looking for a 486 class machine and a machine of P100~ performance. Only caveats are must be ISA/PCI and have some room for peripheral cards. I can pay a token amount and collect in the NW UK. Any leads, please drop me a line. Thanks. Stuart. From snhirsch at gmail.com Tue Dec 16 09:01:28 2008 From: snhirsch at gmail.com (Steven Hirsch) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 10:01:28 -0500 (EST) Subject: Rare CPUs (was 8008) In-Reply-To: <559707.49906.qm@web111512.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> References: <559707.49906.qm@web111512.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On Tue, 16 Dec 2008, William Blair wrote: >>> Rarest Intel chips in no particular order (from a CPU >> collector forum; posted in 2005; nobody disagreed): >>> >>> X8008 >>> G8008 >>> C4040 Purple >>> C4040 Left Ground Strap >>> 8080B >>> 8080-8 >>> 8008 >>> 8008-1 >>> MC8080 >>> C4004 W #5 & Ground Strap >> >> Has someone unearthed a bunch of i432s? Any reason they are >> not on the list? > > Quote from same forum, different thread: "I think the iAPX432 and Nx686 > are the most wanted cpu in the collectors community." Are you serious? Were the Nexgen chips really so rare? I think I have two or three of them along with the math coprocessors. Steve -- From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Tue Dec 16 09:55:59 2008 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 10:55:59 -0500 (EST) Subject: [personal] Re: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <004501c95f5e$b25f89e0$961ca8c0@mss.local> References: <49468DCC.1030004@mdrconsult.com> <4946994A.5020304@bluewin.ch><4946B871.C88F63C4@cs.ubc.ca> <004501c95f5e$b25f89e0$961ca8c0@mss.local> Message-ID: <200812161559.KAA05237@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> >> There is a "missing link" Intel RAM that many chip guys lust for. I >> do not recall the number - 210something. > That's a 2102 if I remember rightly, 1Kx1 static RAM? This is rare? Radio Shack even sold them, back when Radio Shack was still a parts store (276-2501, my notes say). While I don't think any are obviously marked as made by Intel, I do have a fair number of them (most having no obvious manufacturer marking). I think they work, even.... /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Wed Dec 17 04:30:43 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 10:30:43 +0000 Subject: wtd: 486 and P100~ class machine in NW UK In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4948D4D3.7080002@gjcp.net> stuart birchall wrote: > Hi everyone, > > I'm having some difficulty in finding relatively old PC hardware of a > certain vintage. I'm looking for a 486 class machine and a machine of P100~ > performance. Only caveats are must be ISA/PCI and have some room for > peripheral cards. I can pay a token amount and collect in the NW UK. Any > leads, please drop me a line. > > Thanks. > > Stuart. > I can have a look. You don't say where you are in the NW UK, though. In practice I've found that people who say "north-west UK" mean "north-west England", which isn't the same thing at all and they're considerably south-east of me ;-) Any preferences as to chipsets? Gordon From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Wed Dec 17 07:27:53 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 07:27:53 -0600 Subject: PS2Encoder In-Reply-To: <49485BFB.9080802@jbrain.com> References: <49485BFB.9080802@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <4948FE59.9050501@gmail.com> Jim Brain wrote: > Based on a response to my note about having PS/2 keyboard routines that > can output parallel ASCII, I thought I'd mention that I took some time > these past few nights to clean up my PS2Encoder project. The original > project supported: That sounds good :) I've got a couple of machines which use parallel ASCII keyboards, but only one genuine keyboard to share between them - plus all of its keyboard switch contacts are getting a little worn now, so it's not the best thing in the world to type on. I'll definitely look into using your widget once I eventually get the systems shipped over here... (can't think of any other features that I'd need, to be honest) cheers Jules From joachim.thiemann at gmail.com Wed Dec 17 08:09:48 2008 From: joachim.thiemann at gmail.com (Joachim Thiemann) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 09:09:48 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <49487B9B.3010302@jbrain.com> References: <1c8201c959f1$e10f5a80$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <493E3D5F.29187.42C8A91@cclist.sydex.com> <2e9501c95f03$a4172290$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <1e1fc3e90812161026j4fcd1e21i8f5823bd0a8739aa@mail.gmail.com> <49487B9B.3010302@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <4affc5e0812170609w4f1e214fw18eba4ea933c255e@mail.gmail.com> On Tue, Dec 16, 2008 at 11:10 PM, Jim Brain wrote: > Glen Slick wrote: >> >> There is the http://www.avnet.com/ AES-SP3A-EVAL400-G Xilinx >> XC3S400A-4FTG256C Spartan-3A Evaluation Kit for $39. > > Thanks for the link. I couldn't find that the other day when I responded. > I think this is a good time to learn about FPGAs. A bit cheaper - but also simpler, maybe too simple, is the Digilent C-Mod http://www.digilentinc.com/Products/Detail.cfm?NavTop=2&NavSub=419&Prod=CMOD The EE department here threw out a couple of dev kits last summer. Right now, I'm kicking myself for not nabbing one or two. Joe. -- Joachim Thiemann :: http://www.tsp.ece.mcgill.ca/~jthiem From james at jdfogg.com Wed Dec 17 08:22:52 2008 From: james at jdfogg.com (james) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 09:22:52 -0500 Subject: NCR system 3400 (fwd) Message-ID: <49490b3c.222.848.5633@jdfogg.com> > An NCR 3400 is available in Cary, North Carolina. See > below. Please respond to the original sender. Some of the NCR line was actually the old AT&T line. I think this might be one of them. From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Dec 17 09:42:17 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 10:42:17 -0500 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <302C52B0-2283-4753-9930-ACBCB9A0C258@neurotica.com> On Dec 16, 2008, at 2:13 PM, Tony Duell wrote: > Solartron instruments are, not suprisingly, fairly common in > England. I > have an LM1420.2 (the .2 meaning it's got the BCD output socket on the > back), which is all discrete transistors with nixie tubes for the > display. And a somewhat better model (LM1602???) which uses DTL chips. > The former certainly contains a Seston Standard Cell, I suspect the > latter does too (ass, incidentally, does that Blackburn valved DVM I > mentioned in another message). A DVM with a built-in standard cell?? Neat! Got pics and/or schematics? I'd love to see that. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de Wed Dec 17 11:35:25 2008 From: cc at informatik.uni-stuttgart.de (Christian Corti) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 18:35:25 +0100 (CET) Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: <302C52B0-2283-4753-9930-ACBCB9A0C258@neurotica.com> References: <302C52B0-2283-4753-9930-ACBCB9A0C258@neurotica.com> Message-ID: On Wed, 17 Dec 2008, Dave McGuire wrote: > On Dec 16, 2008, at 2:13 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >> Solartron instruments are, not suprisingly, fairly common in England. I >> have an LM1420.2 (the .2 meaning it's got the BCD output socket on the >> back), which is all discrete transistors with nixie tubes for the >> display. And a somewhat better model (LM1602???) which uses DTL chips. >> The former certainly contains a Seston Standard Cell, I suspect the >> latter does too (ass, incidentally, does that Blackburn valved DVM I >> mentioned in another message). > > A DVM with a built-in standard cell?? Neat! Got pics and/or schematics? > I'd love to see that. Here's the Solartron LM 902-2 (sorry, not in English yet): http://computermuseum.informatik.uni-stuttgart.de/dev/solartrn/ and at the bottom a link to the Weston cell (or element as in "galvanic element"). Christian From michaelgreen42 at comcast.net Wed Dec 17 11:43:29 2008 From: michaelgreen42 at comcast.net (Michael) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 09:43:29 -0800 Subject: Any interest in a Corvus Concept in Puget Sound? In-Reply-To: <200812170748.mBH7mUAA029048@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812170748.mBH7mUAA029048@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <01f701c9606e$f96b5600$ec420200$@net> Just the main unit. No idea of its status or config. Email me if interested. From dave.thearchivist at gmail.com Wed Dec 17 11:53:00 2008 From: dave.thearchivist at gmail.com (Dave Caroline) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 17:53:00 +0000 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: <302C52B0-2283-4753-9930-ACBCB9A0C258@neurotica.com> References: <302C52B0-2283-4753-9930-ACBCB9A0C258@neurotica.com> Message-ID: if pushed I can scan my Solartron docs I had a 1420 and got copies from Solartron themselves Dave Caroline From michaelgreen42 at comcast.net Wed Dec 17 11:54:52 2008 From: michaelgreen42 at comcast.net (Michael) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 09:54:52 -0800 Subject: Mac II's, IIx's, IIci's In-Reply-To: <200812170412.mBH4C8xI026306@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812170412.mBH4C8xI026306@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <01f801c96070$9049a940$b0dcfbc0$@net> I've got a large number of Mac II's and IIx's sitting around. None of them post (I believe due to dead batteries which I understand is common to them). Most of them are fairly yellow but intact. Is there any interest in these for parts/whatever? I also have some IIci's in similar state From mc at media.mit.edu Wed Dec 17 12:25:29 2008 From: mc at media.mit.edu (Tim McNerney) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 13:25:29 -0500 Subject: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) In-Reply-To: <200812171800.mBHI0EcT035138@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812171800.mBHI0EcT035138@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <49494419.6000608@media.mit.edu> Thanks for the lead on the Rockwell PPS-4. Does anyone know where I can find architectural info on it, and/or a die photo? It seems to be quite rare, and there is almost no information about this chip [family] on the web. --Tim From wbblair3 at yahoo.com Wed Dec 17 12:40:47 2008 From: wbblair3 at yahoo.com (William Blair) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 10:40:47 -0800 (PST) Subject: Rare CPUs (was 8008) In-Reply-To: <200812171802.mBHI0Ecf035138@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <723542.11652.qm@web111501.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> > Hi > How many have an 8096? > Dwight Not many, but this guy has one: http://www.cpushack.net/chippics/Intel/8x9x/IntelC8095-90.html From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Dec 17 12:39:38 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 18:39:38 +0000 (GMT) Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <49481C9D.1020307@gjcp.net> from "Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ" at Dec 16, 8 09:24:45 pm Message-ID: > I know a lot of people in here don't seem to like USB, but it reduces Well, i object to the name for a start. It's not Universal (in that of the 200 or so computers I own, not one of them has a USB port or can have a USB port). It is serial. It's not a bus , at least not electrically. I guess one aout of 3 is not too bad :-( > all the device-to-host interfacing to a Small Matter Of Programming. For suitable values of 'small'. It's a lot harder to send/.recive data on a USB port (both in terms of hardware and software) than to use any of the 'classic interfaces' like RS232, Centronics, GPIO, HPIB, etc. > None of this tedious mucking about with IO ports, and interrupts, and That is something that's never bothered me. And anyway, the main reason for all that faffing about is that the PC architcture was broken. It's a lot easier on other systems. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Dec 17 12:48:32 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 18:48:32 +0000 (GMT) Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: <302C52B0-2283-4753-9930-ACBCB9A0C258@neurotica.com> from "Dave McGuire" at Dec 17, 8 10:42:17 am Message-ID: > A DVM with a built-in standard cell?? Neat! Got pics and/or > schematics? I'd love to see that. It was quite common at one time. The ones I've memtioned have ther traditional H-shaped glass things in them (the Blackburn vavled one has a pair of them, just bare glass, on a bracket, the Solartron ones have them encased in a little plastic housing). I have a later DVM which has an enacpsulated thing with 2 wires comiong out that appears to be a standard cell, certainly the voltage between said wires, measured on a high-impedance votlmeter, is about right. On these instruments, there's a front-panel calibration cotnrol. You set the range switch to aparticular positon (and there's a warning about not leaving it there for logn periods, e.g. when you switch the instrument off), and adjust this control for the right reading. I have full service manuals for the Solartron instruments I have. I don't, alas, have anything on the Blackburn. As ever I have no canner or digital camera... -tony From cclist at sydex.com Wed Dec 17 12:57:27 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 10:57:27 -0800 Subject: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) In-Reply-To: <49494419.6000608@media.mit.edu> References: <200812171800.mBHI0EcT035138@dewey.classiccmp.org>, <49494419.6000608@media.mit.edu> Message-ID: <4948DB17.3669.FB365C2@cclist.sydex.com> On 17 Dec 2008 at 13:25, Tim McNerney wrote: > Thanks for the lead on the Rockwell PPS-4. > Does anyone know where I can find architectural info on it, > and/or a die photo? It seems to be quite rare, and there > is almost no information about this chip [family] on the web. The PPS-4 has a bit of a cult status among coin-op gamers as it was used in Gottlieb pinball machines. There's even a fellow on eBay who'd turned it into an art exhibit. See item 260202507832. Functioning PPS-4 chips command a pretty high premium among pinball restoration folks. Another early chip not mentioned much is the PPS-8, released at about the same time as the 8080. I believe that Diablo's first dot-matrix printer used it. (ISTR, that "PPS" stood for "Parallel Processing System") Cheers, Chuck From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Wed Dec 17 12:47:33 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 12:47:33 -0600 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <49483CFC.1030408@gmail.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> <30c101c95f07$28ee3780$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> <49482FE3.1030907@gmail.com> <49483CFC.1030408@gmail.com> Message-ID: <49494945.90702@gmail.com> Jules Richardson wrote: > Sridhar Ayengar wrote: >> Jules Richardson wrote: >> > Re. Model M itself - it's nice to be typing on one; I've suffered a >>> laptop keyboard for far too long! My only criticism of it is that the >>> right-hand shift key seems to require fairly central pressing in >>> order to work (i.e. I can't just reach across from the cursor keys >>> and tap the end) - does anyone know if they changed this (i.e. added >>> a metal travel-assist bar as with the spacebar, keypad enter key >>> etc.) on the later models? >> >> I know for a fact that they didn't. Try a mild lubricant. > > Yep, will do. If that doesn't work then I can just get used to it I > think, it's not really *that* big a deal. Well, sewing machine oil's the lightest stuff I had to hand, and that actually makes things worse (in that the key likes to not return from the down position if oiled). Clock/watch oil might be better if I order some in... There's no obvious signs of wear on the shift key mechanism (as compared to other keys) or on the keyboard itself (i.e. the pillars that support the key) or other debris which might be fouling things up. If I put the Ctrl key where the shift key is then I can press that on the right-hand edge and it works fine (although it doesn't extend out to the right quite as far as the shift key does). I suspect that it's the 'unsprung' support on the left hand side of the shift key that's fouling - pressing the shift key makes it rotate slightly and jam up in the left support. (I'm not yet sure how the little white plastic inserts on the unsprung key supports come out, but as a test maybe I can swap one of those in from elsewhere and see if things improve) cheers Jules From Paul_Koning at Dell.com Wed Dec 17 12:59:32 2008 From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 13:59:32 -0500 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. References: <302C52B0-2283-4753-9930-ACBCB9A0C258@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <18761.19476.180238.631780@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> >>>>> "Tony" == Tony Duell writes: >> A DVM with a built-in standard cell?? Neat! Got pics and/or >> schematics? I'd love to see that. Tony> It was quite common at one time. The ones I've memtioned have Tony> ther traditional H-shaped glass things in them... Makes sense. A DVM needs an accurate reference. These days that's a solid state device, the high end successor to the Zener diode. (I'm not sure how they work -- quite possibly a completely different scheme.) Before that came out you'd need something else, and a Weston cell is certainly a very good way to solve the problem. paul From cclist at sydex.com Wed Dec 17 13:13:06 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 11:13:06 -0800 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: References: <302C52B0-2283-4753-9930-ACBCB9A0C258@neurotica.com> from "Dave McGuire" at Dec 17, 8 10:42:17 am, Message-ID: <4948DEC2.10647.FC1C60E@cclist.sydex.com> On 17 Dec 2008 at 18:48, Tony Duell wrote: > It was quite common at one time. The ones I've memtioned have ther > traditional H-shaped glass things in them (the Blackburn vavled one has a > pair of them, just bare glass, on a bracket, the Solartron ones have them > encased in a little plastic housing). I have a later DVM which has an > enacpsulated thing with 2 wires comiong out that appears to be a standard > cell, certainly the voltage between said wires, measured on a > high-impedance votlmeter, is about right. One of the "round-tuit" jobs when I was an instrumentation tech was replacing all of those Weston-cell-plus-dry cell-plus-calibration- slidewire setups with Honeywell constand-voltage supplies, even in L&N equipment. You'd strip out the entire reference-voltage section and drill and tap a couple of holes in the instrument frame and mount the supply and connect up the wires (including AC). Took about 45 minutes to do right and you never had to replace another battery in that instrument. I must have done 100 of those conversions. One of the things that would probably tickle Tony's sense of "vintage" was that transistorized chopper amplifiers were just coming on the scene. Reliability of the solid-state gear was so low that we asked the manufacturer (L&N, I think) if we could get the amplifiers in the nice reliable tube version. (We couldn't, but they kept sending us "improved" versions of the solid-state stuff). I think one thing that militated against the solid-state versions was temperature extremes, even in air-conditioned pulpits. The radiant energy coming from an orange-hot steel ingot was awesome. When the ingot was only 20 or 30 feet from the instrument panel, air- conditioning and glass didn't make much of a difference. Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Wed Dec 17 13:18:38 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 11:18:38 -0800 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <49494945.90702@gmail.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, <49483CFC.1030408@gmail.com>, <49494945.90702@gmail.com> Message-ID: <4948E00E.31159.FC6D950@cclist.sydex.com> On 17 Dec 2008 at 12:47, Jules Richardson wrote: > Well, sewing machine oil's the lightest stuff I had to hand, and that actually > makes things worse (in that the key likes to not return from the down position > if oiled). Clock/watch oil might be better if I order some in... I think that a dry silicone spray lube might be the best choice. I hope that oil hasn't really gummed things up. Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Wed Dec 17 13:33:00 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 11:33:00 -0800 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: <18761.19476.180238.631780@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> References: <302C52B0-2283-4753-9930-ACBCB9A0C258@neurotica.com>, <18761.19476.180238.631780@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> Message-ID: <4948E36C.3304.FD406E8@cclist.sydex.com> On 17 Dec 2008 at 13:59, Paul Koning wrote: > Before that came out you'd need something else, and a Weston cell is > certainly a very good way to solve the problem. Except that you can't draw much current from a Weston cell. When used as a reference in a potentiometer, for example, you must first adjust the output of a dry cell to match the standard cell--and then use that dry-cell voltage as the bridge reference. Chart recorders would periodically recalibrate their reference automatically, but with manual equipment it was a real bother--and the temptation to skip the step was strong. The contents of a Weston cell read like an advertisement for a hazmat cleanup service--cadmium and mercury. Cheers, Chuck From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Wed Dec 17 14:05:55 2008 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 12:05:55 -0800 Subject: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) References: <200812171800.mBHI0EcT035138@dewey.classiccmp.org>, <49494419.6000608@media.mit.edu> <4948DB17.3669.FB365C2@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <49495BA1.7AA3C9B2@cs.ubc.ca> On 17 Dec 2008 at 13:25, Tim McNerney wrote: > Thanks for the lead on the Rockwell PPS-4. > Does anyone know where I can find architectural info on it, > and/or a die photo? It seems to be quite rare, and there > is almost no information about this chip [family] on the web. The PPS-4 is similar to the 4004 in that there is a family of chips which work together with a highly-specific set of control signals and bus cycle. The PPS-4/2 version could produce a minimal system in two chips: processor and combo mask-ROM/RAM/IO. As with the 4004 it was directed towards embedded systems and isn't so amenable to use as a general-purpose system. There was a later PPS-4/1 single-chip version. I don't know how popular this stuff was but I wonder if there aren't more PPS-4 systems buried in equipment and appliances from the period than is commonly known. (I have wondered, for example, what the 70's-era Amana Radarange microwave ovens used for control.) I suspect a version of the -4 may have been used in some Victor desktop calculators (1800,1900 series) ca 1972, as the chipset in these calcs is made by Rockwell and looks much like the PPS-4 chipset. The PPS-8 receives a chapter in Osborne's 1976 "An Introduction to Microcomputers - Vol II - Some Real Products". The bus cycles are quite similar so it would appear the -8 was based on the -4 to quite a degree. (We discussed the PPS-4 and -8 on the list a year or two ago, there should be some other mention in the archives.) From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Wed Dec 17 14:08:01 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 14:08:01 -0600 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <4948E00E.31159.FC6D950@cclist.sydex.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, <49483CFC.1030408@gmail.com>, <49494945.90702@gmail.com> <4948E00E.31159.FC6D950@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <49495C21.2000708@gmail.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 17 Dec 2008 at 12:47, Jules Richardson wrote: > > >> Well, sewing machine oil's the lightest stuff I had to hand, and that actually >> makes things worse (in that the key likes to not return from the down position >> if oiled). Clock/watch oil might be better if I order some in... > > I think that a dry silicone spray lube might be the best choice. I > hope that oil hasn't really gummed things up. No, no harm done to the mechanism... and you might be right about the dry silicone; maybe that's a good thing to try (I must say that I'm always reluctant to oil anything which wasn't ever oiled in the first place!) cheers Jules From rtellason at verizon.net Wed Dec 17 16:57:29 2008 From: rtellason at verizon.net (Roy J. Tellason) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 17:57:29 -0500 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> Message-ID: <200812171757.30554.rtellason@verizon.net> On Tuesday 16 December 2008 02:58:39 pm Jules Richardson wrote: > David Griffith wrote: > >> What was the biggest abuse you took with your M? :o) > > > > How about Mmmmmmm. I splashed solder on mine. Currently I have one > > completely stripped until I can get a USB driver board worked out that I > > like. > > Well, my PS/2-USB adapter just arrived in the mail. Plugged it in, and it > Just Worked (tm) - I don't think I've ever had anything do that in Linux > before :-) I recently switched from a slightly older laptop to the one I'm using now, and the difference is that the older one had a PS2 port and a single USB connector, while the newer one has only a couple of USB connectors and _no_ PS2 port. A visit to my local computer junk shop and less than $5 of expense got me one, I plugged it in, and it's worked just fine ever since. Under linux, yeah. The only odd behavior is that every now and then I'll hit a key and nothing happens, but that may be the keyboard, I dunno (and yes, it's a Model M). > The adapter's pretty small, but I can't find a suitable socket bit in my > toolbox that's slimline enough to use to take the Model M case apart so I > can see if it'll fit inside comfortably. This one's about an inch square by about half an inch thick. Does both keyboard and mouse, as I'm not fond of that little "pointing device" built into the laptops, either of them. Socket bit? Oh, I see what you mean. I've never had this apart and never took notice of that. Good quality tools are generally thinner metal for any given size, I like Snap-On for that. :-) > Re. Model M itself - it's nice to be typing on one; I've suffered a laptop > keyboard for far too long! I can't imagine trying to do any significant amount of typing on one. A bit here and there, yeah, but not much... > My only criticism of it is that the right-hand shift key seems to require > fairly central pressing in order to work (i.e. I can't just reach across > from the cursor keys and tap the end) - does anyone know if they changed > this (i.e. added a metal travel-assist bar as with the spacebar, keypad > enter key etc.) on the later models? > > cheers > > Jules > (basking in clicky goodness) (Clickety-click... :-) -- Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters" - Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James M Dakin From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Wed Dec 17 17:57:35 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 17:57:35 -0600 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <200812171757.30554.rtellason@verizon.net> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> <200812171757.30554.rtellason@verizon.net> Message-ID: <494991EF.7070308@gmail.com> Roy J. Tellason wrote: > On Tuesday 16 December 2008 02:58:39 pm Jules Richardson wrote: >> David Griffith wrote: >>>> What was the biggest abuse you took with your M? :o) >>> How about Mmmmmmm. I splashed solder on mine. Currently I have one >>> completely stripped until I can get a USB driver board worked out that I >>> like. >> Well, my PS/2-USB adapter just arrived in the mail. Plugged it in, and it >> Just Worked (tm) - I don't think I've ever had anything do that in Linux >> before :-) > > I recently switched from a slightly older laptop to the one I'm using now, > and the difference is that the older one had a PS2 port and a single USB > connector, while the newer one has only a couple of USB connectors and _no_ > PS2 port. Yep, that was my situation (well, 3 USB ports, but no "proper" connectivity :-) > linux, yeah. The only odd behavior is that every now and then I'll hit a > key and nothing happens, but that may be the keyboard, I dunno (and yes, > it's a Model M). What age of Model M, out of interest? I wonder if they added USB support into the hardware on the later ones (so they'd work with the "dumb" PS/2-USB adapters), or if you got lucky and found a cheap "intelligent" adapter... >> The adapter's pretty small, but I can't find a suitable socket bit in my >> toolbox that's slimline enough to use to take the Model M case apart so I >> can see if it'll fit inside comfortably. > > This one's about an inch square by about half an inch thick. Does both > keyboard and mouse, as I'm not fond of that little "pointing device" built > into the laptops, either of them. Yeah, I have an external USB mouse (Microsoft, of all people) that I normally use. I can handle a trackpad for about 5 minutes and then it drives me nuts. > Socket bit? Oh, I see what you mean. I've never had this apart and never > took notice of that. Good quality tools are generally thinner metal for any > given size, I like Snap-On for that. :-) Heh, I hear ya. I've got a nice set currently in storage back in the UK so I'm reluctant to go out and buy a nice set here in the US too. Maybe I'll borrow a bit from someone as I'm itching to see inside this thing just because I can't resist taking things apart :-) >> Re. Model M itself - it's nice to be typing on one; I've suffered a laptop >> keyboard for far too long! > > I can't imagine trying to do any significant amount of typing on one. A bit > here and there, yeah, but not much... I kind of got used to it I suppose - the keys are rather squishy, but that's true of 90% of full-sized modern PC keyboards anyway. It was the layout which bugged me (no right-hand ctrl key, for instance), and then when one of the dogs decided to hop on the desk and trample it it was Game Over :-) cheers Jules From hachti at hachti.de Wed Dec 17 19:34:00 2008 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 02:34:00 +0100 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? Message-ID: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> Hi folks, I just found out that someone called Hans Pufal has already designes a PDP-8 on an FPGA device. I've been doing the same this year. My first approach ran on a Xilinx Spartan-3 (200K). It passed all basic tests and was able to run Chekmo. The system could be clocked with about 80MHz using Xilinx ISE's free XST compiler and mapping tools. After realizing that I would like to have a complete 8/e implementation (with more memory), I redesigned the whole thing a lot. The new design seemed more reasonable to me - but gets worse synthesis results. I still expect about 50-70 MHz in the end. The current version is not yet debugged. All memory is kept in FPGA onchip block rams. RAM is capsuled into a pdp8_memory module that can be altered in size (several versions exist) and adapted to different FPGA architectures. I have a kind of SoC-OMNIBUS which supports 2 to n cycle IO operations. Currently I only have a TTY implementation for it. The TTY seems to be 100% compatible to the original. RK8E or similar are planned. Cycle times: * Memory reference 2 * Operate 1 * Jump 1 * ISZ 3 Indirection, auto-index each add one cycle. My core will have a front panel interface that allows attachement of several flavors of front panel logic, including the original functionality and perhaps some more (I hate not being able to directly manipulate AC, for example!). I would like to know if there is any "public" interest in my project. I appreciate every help or ideas to merge my project into one of those nice front panel projects I've seen on the web. And now, please comment! Best wishes, Philipp :-) -- http://www.hachti.de From rtellason at verizon.net Wed Dec 17 19:34:46 2008 From: rtellason at verizon.net (Roy J. Tellason) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 20:34:46 -0500 Subject: 8-bit ISA ethernet cards In-Reply-To: <200705052242.46977.pat@computer-refuge.org> References: <200705052242.46977.pat@computer-refuge.org> Message-ID: <200812172034.46449.rtellason@verizon.net> On Saturday 05 May 2007 10:42:46 pm Patrick Finnegan wrote: > A few weeks ago, some people in here were talking about putting network > cards in IBM PCs or XTs or something... > > As it happens, I ran across a box of 3com 3c503 network cards (AUI and > 10BaseT ports, 8 bit ISA card). > > If anyone wants one, lemme know, I'm asking $5+shipping, and I'll have > the box with me at Dayton if you want to harass me about them, then. I believe I also have a couple of those around as well, in case you get a lot of responses. I'm not 100% sure that they're 3c503, but they're definitely something pretty close to that. I'd need to look to say "new" or "used, like new" -- in any case they're boxed and everything. -- Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters" - Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James M Dakin From rtellason at verizon.net Wed Dec 17 19:44:32 2008 From: rtellason at verizon.net (Roy J. Tellason) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 20:44:32 -0500 Subject: 8-bit ISA ethernet cards In-Reply-To: <200812172034.46449.rtellason@verizon.net> References: <200705052242.46977.pat@computer-refuge.org> <200812172034.46449.rtellason@verizon.net> Message-ID: <200812172044.33414.rtellason@verizon.net> On Wednesday 17 December 2008 08:34:46 pm Roy J. Tellason wrote: > On Saturday 05 May 2007 10:42:46 pm Patrick Finnegan wrote: > > A few weeks ago, some people in here were talking about putting network > > cards in IBM PCs or XTs or something... > > > > As it happens, I ran across a box of 3com 3c503 network cards (AUI and > > 10BaseT ports, 8 bit ISA card). > > > > If anyone wants one, lemme know, I'm asking $5+shipping, and I'll have > > the box with me at Dayton if you want to harass me about them, then. > > I believe I also have a couple of those around as well, in case you get a > lot of responses. I'm not 100% sure that they're 3c503, but they're > definitely something pretty close to that. I'd need to look to say "new" > or "used, like new" -- in any case they're boxed and everything. Whoops, I didn't see the date on that one... Dunno why a bunch of old mail showed up in my folder for this list. -- Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters" - Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James M Dakin From rtellason at verizon.net Wed Dec 17 20:46:57 2008 From: rtellason at verizon.net (Roy J. Tellason) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 21:46:57 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <49474CC9.2020606@mdrconsult.com> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> <20081215160204.I56062@shell.lmi.net> <49474CC9.2020606@mdrconsult.com> Message-ID: <200812172146.57407.rtellason@verizon.net> On Tuesday 16 December 2008 01:38:01 am Doc Shipley wrote: > Fred Cisin wrote: > > On Mon, 15 Dec 2008, John Floren wrote: > >> That's why I always just send people straight troff documents! Now to > >> find out why that company hasn't gotten back to me about the resume I > >> sent in... > > > > They probably only accept resumes in WordPervert form. > > > > > > How important is FORMAT in a resume? > > Does it need PDF? > > Does it need PS? > > Does it even need HTML? > > What color paper? > > What texture paper do they need to be on? > > Do they need a scent added? Has smell-o-vision been standardized yet? > > One of my friends got fed up with headhunters who insisted on MS-WORD > format resumes - for UNIX admin positions. He rendered the rresume to > PostScript, used ImageMagick to render the pages at very low resolution > to TIFF, rotated each page a degree or two, and then inserted each page > as a full-page picture object in Word. > > It's magnificently awful. :-) I've been a little bothered by the "non mainstream" essence of my background and interests in terms of employment prospects and similar, until I was just contacted by somebody who observed in my online profile at one place I posted a decidedly "non-peecee" flavor to things, which as it turned out was just what they were looking for. A pleasant turn of events, to be sure! -- Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters" - Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James M Dakin From jfoust at threedee.com Wed Dec 17 20:45:52 2008 From: jfoust at threedee.com (John Foust) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 20:45:52 -0600 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <200812171757.30554.rtellason@verizon.net> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> <200812171757.30554.rtellason@verizon.net> Message-ID: <6.2.3.4.2.20081217204005.05c26150@mail.threedee.com> At 04:57 PM 12/17/2008, Roy J. Tellason wrote: >Under linux, yeah. The only odd behavior is that every now and then I'll hit a >key and nothing happens, but that may be the keyboard, I dunno (and yes, >it's a Model M). Funny you mention that. I'm using an older keyboard, AT-style, running the AT to a dumb PS/2 converter, then to a mouse-and-keyboard PS/2 to USB converter of today's $5 variety. Mine does the same thing now and then. It seems to eat four-five chars or just stop sending once or twice a day when I'm moving fast. Maybe it's due to weak handling of rollover. This is under WinXP. - John From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Dec 17 20:58:08 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 21:58:08 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: <200812172146.57407.rtellason@verizon.net> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> <20081215160204.I56062@shell.lmi.net> <49474CC9.2020606@mdrconsult.com> <200812172146.57407.rtellason@verizon.net> Message-ID: On Wed, Dec 17, 2008 at 9:46 PM, Roy J. Tellason wrote: >> > How important is FORMAT in a resume? It's "important" because the marketdroids who are going to receive it, only know one tool. :-/ >> One of my friends got fed up with headhunters who insisted on MS-WORD >> format resumes - for UNIX admin positions. Annoying, but I see that all the time. Occasionally, and I mean occasionally, the jobs I apply for mention that they will take a textual (unformatted ASCII, lest this prompt a bunch of back-and-forthing) resume. I generally figure those are the places with a higher clue factor. > I've been a little bothered by the "non mainstream" essence of my background > and interests in terms of employment prospects and similar, until I was just > contacted by somebody who observed in my online profile at one place I posted > a decidedly "non-peecee" flavor to things, which as it turned out was just > what they were looking for. That is exactly the sort of place I'd want to be seeking employment at. > A pleasant turn of events, to be sure! Yep. Congrats. -ethan From rtellason at verizon.net Wed Dec 17 21:00:32 2008 From: rtellason at verizon.net (Roy J. Tellason) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 22:00:32 -0500 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <6.2.3.4.2.20081217204005.05c26150@mail.threedee.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <200812171757.30554.rtellason@verizon.net> <6.2.3.4.2.20081217204005.05c26150@mail.threedee.com> Message-ID: <200812172200.32514.rtellason@verizon.net> On Wednesday 17 December 2008 09:45:52 pm John Foust wrote: > At 04:57 PM 12/17/2008, Roy J. Tellason wrote: > >Under linux, yeah. The only odd behavior is that every now and then I'll > > hit a key and nothing happens, but that may be the keyboard, I dunno > > (and yes, it's a Model M). > > Funny you mention that. I'm using an older keyboard, AT-style, > running the AT to a dumb PS/2 converter, then to a mouse-and-keyboard > PS/2 to USB converter of today's $5 variety. Mine does the same thing > now and then. It seems to eat four-five chars or just stop sending > once or twice a day when I'm moving fast. Maybe it's due to weak > handling of rollover. This is under WinXP. XP exists on this machine, but I haven't used it enough to note the problem there. Mostly I'm running under Slackware. :-) -- Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters" - Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James M Dakin From rescue at hawkmountain.net Wed Dec 17 22:17:42 2008 From: rescue at hawkmountain.net (Curtis H. Wilbar Jr.) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 23:17:42 -0500 Subject: Rare CPUs (was 8008) In-Reply-To: References: <559707.49906.qm@web111512.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4949CEE6.60601@hawkmountain.net> Steven Hirsch wrote: > On Tue, 16 Dec 2008, William Blair wrote: > >>>> Rarest Intel chips in no particular order (from a CPU >>> collector forum; posted in 2005; nobody disagreed): >>>> >>>> X8008 >>>> G8008 >>>> C4040 Purple >>>> C4040 Left Ground Strap >>>> 8080B >>>> 8080-8 >>>> 8008 >>>> 8008-1 >>>> MC8080 >>>> C4004 W #5 & Ground Strap >>> >>> Has someone unearthed a bunch of i432s? Any reason they are >>> not on the list? >> >> Quote from same forum, different thread: "I think the iAPX432 and >> Nx686 are the most wanted cpu in the collectors community." > > Are you serious? Were the Nexgen chips really so rare? I think I > have two or three of them along with the math coprocessors. No indication of rarity but I've always wanted a nexgen proc and mobo to 'tinker' with... -- Curt > > Steve > > From brain at jbrain.com Wed Dec 17 22:23:55 2008 From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 22:23:55 -0600 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4949D05B.8090708@jbrain.com> Tony Duell wrote: > For suitable values of 'small'. It's a lot harder to send/.recive data on > a USB port (both in terms of hardware and software) than to use any of > the 'classic interfaces' like RS232, Centronics, GPIO, HPIB, etc. > Amen to that. From a hobbyist interfacing standpoint, there is quite a bit of HW nwoledge needed to handle USB devices, ignoring the programming aspects. Consistency demands that I not reject USB, but I do hope none of the older interface standards die out, because many of them are easier to understand from the beginner's perspective. From rescue at hawkmountain.net Wed Dec 17 22:27:28 2008 From: rescue at hawkmountain.net (Curtis H. Wilbar Jr.) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 23:27:28 -0500 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <49495C21.2000708@gmail.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, <49483CFC.1030408@gmail.com>, <49494945.90702@gmail.com> <4948E00E.31159.FC6D950@cclist.sydex.com> <49495C21.2000708@gmail.com> Message-ID: <4949D130.3010109@hawkmountain.net> Jules Richardson wrote: > Chuck Guzis wrote: >> On 17 Dec 2008 at 12:47, Jules Richardson wrote: >> >> >>> Well, sewing machine oil's the lightest stuff I had to hand, and >>> that actually makes things worse (in that the key likes to not >>> return from the down position if oiled). Clock/watch oil might be >>> better if I order some in... >> >> I think that a dry silicone spray lube might be the best choice. I >> hope that oil hasn't really gummed things up. > > No, no harm done to the mechanism... and you might be right about the > dry silicone; maybe that's a good thing to try (I must say that I'm > always reluctant to oil anything which wasn't ever oiled in the first > place!) I read somewhere to use PTFE dry lube spray.... I've not located any yet in my few casual attempts to pick some up however. Anyone ever use this on a keyboard ? -- Curt > > cheers > > Jules > From rtellason at verizon.net Wed Dec 17 22:27:34 2008 From: rtellason at verizon.net (Roy J. Tellason) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 23:27:34 -0500 Subject: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics) In-Reply-To: References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> <200812172146.57407.rtellason@verizon.net> Message-ID: <200812172327.35312.rtellason@verizon.net> On Wednesday 17 December 2008 09:58:08 pm Ethan Dicks wrote: > On Wed, Dec 17, 2008 at 9:46 PM, Roy J. Tellason wrote: > >> > How important is FORMAT in a resume? > > It's "important" because the marketdroids who are going to receive it, > only know one tool. :-/ > > >> One of my friends got fed up with headhunters who insisted on MS-WORD > >> format resumes - for UNIX admin positions. > > Annoying, but I see that all the time. Occasionally, and I mean > occasionally, the jobs I apply for mention that they will take a > textual (unformatted ASCII, lest this prompt a bunch of > back-and-forthing) resume. > > I generally figure those are the places with a higher clue factor. > > > I've been a little bothered by the "non mainstream" essence of my > > background and interests in terms of employment prospects and similar, > > until I was just contacted by somebody who observed in my online profile > > at one place I posted a decidedly "non-peecee" flavor to things, which > > as it turned out was just what they were looking for. > > That is exactly the sort of place I'd want to be seeking employment at. Well, it's not "employment" per se, it's a service call, but hey, if it's the beginning of a good relationship with this company that'll work for me... Traditional employment in these parts has _not_ been good to me overall. Too many of the wrong people making the wrong decisions based on incomplete or erroneous information, combined with me having worked for myself for more of my adult life than not, has caused me to take a different tack lately. > > A pleasant turn of events, to be sure! > > Yep. Congrats. I have a ways to go before I'll have built up anything I could call viable, but tomorrow I go 100 miles to do some MB swaps and I have two more on friday neither one of which is peecee stuff, and it grows from there. I just found the approach taken by this lady on the phone when setting this up to be quite refreshing -- I'd put down all sorts of stuff but conspicuously _not_ the sort of thing that most of the peecee tech crowd seems to excel in, and it did me good rather than not for a change. I like that. :-) -- Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters" - Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James M Dakin From rtellason at verizon.net Wed Dec 17 22:30:33 2008 From: rtellason at verizon.net (Roy J. Tellason) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 23:30:33 -0500 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <4949D130.3010109@hawkmountain.net> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <49495C21.2000708@gmail.com> <4949D130.3010109@hawkmountain.net> Message-ID: <200812172330.33846.rtellason@verizon.net> On Wednesday 17 December 2008 11:27:28 pm Curtis H. Wilbar Jr. wrote: > Jules Richardson wrote: > > Chuck Guzis wrote: > >> On 17 Dec 2008 at 12:47, Jules Richardson wrote: > >>> Well, sewing machine oil's the lightest stuff I had to hand, and > >>> that actually makes things worse (in that the key likes to not > >>> return from the down position if oiled). Clock/watch oil might be > >>> better if I order some in... > >> > >> I think that a dry silicone spray lube might be the best choice. I > >> hope that oil hasn't really gummed things up. > > > > No, no harm done to the mechanism... and you might be right about the > > dry silicone; maybe that's a good thing to try (I must say that I'm > > always reluctant to oil anything which wasn't ever oiled in the first > > place!) > > I read somewhere to use PTFE dry lube spray.... > > I've not located any yet in my few casual attempts to pick some > up however. Have you tried an auto parts store? I'm not remembering anything specific offhand but for some reason that comes to mind. > Anyone ever use this on a keyboard ? I've not tried it here yet, but then the two model M keyboards I have here aren't giving me any grief. BTW, are you still receiving emails from this direction? -- Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters" - Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James M Dakin From cclist at sydex.com Wed Dec 17 22:51:19 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 20:51:19 -0800 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <4949D130.3010109@hawkmountain.net> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, <49495C21.2000708@gmail.com>, <4949D130.3010109@hawkmountain.net> Message-ID: <49496647.6781.11D30FFB@cclist.sydex.com> On 17 Dec 2008 at 23:27, Curtis H. Wilbar Jr. wrote: > I read somewhere to use PTFE dry lube spray.... > > I've not located any yet in my few casual attempts to pick some > up however. Probably any dry aerosol used to lubricate locks would be fine, but not graphite. I find several brands of silicone aerosol at the local hardware store. I haven't looked for PTFE spray, but I'm not enthusiastic about the PTFE lubricants that I've used that were suspensions in an oil base. I know that the firearms crowd uses various dry lubricants (Dri- Slide, Eezox, Tetra) but I don't know how they'd work in this application. Moly disulfide lube like Dri-Slide might be messy, though. I'd steer clear of any oil, even watch oil--it'll just attract dirt. If the crud in my own keyboard is any indication, that's not something that you'd want. Cheers, Chuck From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Wed Dec 17 22:54:57 2008 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 20:54:57 -0800 (PST) Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <49496647.6781.11D30FFB@cclist.sydex.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, <49495C21.2000708@gmail.com>, <4949D130.3010109@hawkmountain.net> <49496647.6781.11D30FFB@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: On Wed, 17 Dec 2008, Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 17 Dec 2008 at 23:27, Curtis H. Wilbar Jr. wrote: > >> I read somewhere to use PTFE dry lube spray.... >> >> I've not located any yet in my few casual attempts to pick some >> up however. > > Probably any dry aerosol used to lubricate locks would be fine, but > not graphite. I find several brands of silicone aerosol at the local > hardware store. I haven't looked for PTFE spray, but I'm not > enthusiastic about the PTFE lubricants that I've used that were > suspensions in an oil base. > > I know that the firearms crowd uses various dry lubricants (Dri- > Slide, Eezox, Tetra) but I don't know how they'd work in this > application. Moly disulfide lube like Dri-Slide might be messy, > though. > > I'd steer clear of any oil, even watch oil--it'll just attract dirt. > If the crud in my own keyboard is any indication, that's not > something that you'd want. Perhaps the spray lubes often used by Rubik's Cube people will do well. -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? From evan at snarc.net Wed Dec 17 23:08:06 2008 From: evan at snarc.net (Evan Koblentz) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 00:08:06 -0500 Subject: Replica Antikythera device Message-ID: <000001c960ce$9e6a35e0$0301a8c0@evan> http://blog.wired.com/gadgets/2008/12/2000-year-old-a.html?npu=1 &mbid=yhp From marvin at west.net Wed Dec 17 23:30:41 2008 From: marvin at west.net (Marvin Johnston) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 21:30:41 -0800 Subject: Jean Bartik: the untold story of a remarkable ENIAC programmer References: <200702281616.l1SGFZj8046126@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <4949E001.32B58B6E@west.net> This is an interesting post on Google Blogspot: Jean Bartik: the untold story of a remarkable ENIAC programmer Jean Bartik: the untold story of a remarkable ENIAC programmer This guest post was written by Kathy Kleiman, who discovered the ENIAC Programmers 20 years ago and founded the ENIAC Programmers Project to record their stories and produce the first feature documentary about their work. More at www.eniacprogrammers.org. ? Ed. http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/12/jean-bartik-untold-story-of-remarkable.html From lehmann at ans-netz.de Thu Dec 18 00:10:39 2008 From: lehmann at ans-netz.de (Oliver Lehmann) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 07:10:39 +0100 Subject: resurrecting a Zilog System 8000 Message-ID: <20081218071039.a0ba8322.lehmann@ans-netz.de> Hi, as someone might remember, I've got some Zilog System 8000 equipment and over the last days I've started resurrecting it. I thought - maybe someone feels interested in the story as well ;) 2 days ago I've built my "custom" frontpanel (just a transition solution) with the remaining stuff I had at home. The "original-like" push button I tried to get in my local electronic distributor was out of stock. So I reused an old circuit board, 11+40 ohm resisitor to get the needed 51 ohm and so on... ;-) The final version will contain the "original-like" push buttons, the LED banks and so on. It will be mounted then at the same position where the original panel sits. When it is then hidden behind the front door it will look nearly like the original one. At least, thats the plan. Until then: http://pics.pofo.de/gallery/v/S8000/Repair/P1070180.JPG.html http://pics.pofo.de/gallery/v/S8000/Repair/P1070181.JPG.html After this was done, I've used an old PC-AT PSU for supplying the required power to the backplane ("POWERFAIL" cable ignored): http://pics.pofo.de/gallery/v/S8000/Repair/P1070182.JPG.html And then put back all together, huck up a nulmodem cable to my PC and - yeah The firmware got loaded and the usual START message was printed: http://pics.pofo.de/gallery/v/S8000/Repair/P1070183.JPG.html http://pics.pofo.de/gallery/v/S8000/Repair/P1070186.JPG.html Pressing the NMI/START switch on my glamorous frontpanel brings up an immediate FATAL ERROR: S8000 Monitor 1.2 - Press START to Load System P *** ERROR #0000 *** FATAL ERROR [ Reading the hardware ref. manual - this means no external RAM - of course, I still don't have the 1MB dynamic memory board. :( Connecting the WDC board to the bus leads to a non-startable system having the BUSACK LED on the CPU board permanently on - probably the WDC is broken and spams the system BUS... But at least this was my first step which was done OK I guess ;) -- Oliver Lehmann http://www.pofo.de/ http://wishlist.ans-netz.de/ From henk.gooijen at hotmail.com Thu Dec 18 00:48:05 2008 From: henk.gooijen at hotmail.com (Henk Gooijen) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 07:48:05 +0100 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> Message-ID: > Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 02:34:00 +0100 > From: hachti at hachti.de > To: > Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? > > Hi folks, > > I just found out that someone called Hans Pufal has already designes a > PDP-8 on an FPGA device. > ... snip ... > My core will have a front panel interface that allows attachement of > several flavors of front panel logic, including the original > functionality and perhaps some more (I hate not being able to directly > manipulate AC, for example!). > > I would like to know if there is any "public" interest in my project. I > appreciate every help or ideas to merge my project into one of those > nice front panel projects I've seen on the web. > > And now, please comment! > > Best wishes, > > Philipp :-) > -- > http://www.hachti.de Hi Philipp, it's not up to me, but I guess Vince will be interested (me too)! Vince (and I just on the side) are working on this, see my webpage at www.pdp-11.nl . In the folder "my projects" is a link to "full-size pdp8i". Direct link: www.pdp-11.nl/homebrew/fullsize-pdp8/fullsize-pdp8-startpage.html - Henk, PA8PDP. From holger.veit at iais.fraunhofer.de Wed Dec 17 05:08:27 2008 From: holger.veit at iais.fraunhofer.de (Holger Veit) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 12:08:27 +0100 Subject: 8008 v. 4004... & what was the second COTS microprocessor? In-Reply-To: <4947FD75.1090800@media.mit.edu> References: <200812161800.mBGI0Qea018388@dewey.classiccmp.org> <4947FD75.1090800@media.mit.edu> Message-ID: <4948DDAB.5020300@iais.fraunhofer.de> Tim McNerney schrieb: > [...] > People make a big deal about the first-this and the first-that, but then what happens is no-one can remember the second-this and the second-that. Can anyone remember what the second commercial, customer-programmable microprocessor to hit the market? The 8008 came out in 1972. Were there others introduced that year? I know that the TMS-1000 was right around that time. > Few names come to mind: Rockwell PPS-4 (1973), NS IMP 4 (4Q74), uCOM 4 (?), IMP 8 (4Q74), NS CMP 8, Mostek 5065 (2Q75), Toshiba TLCS 12 (4Q74). IMP16 (3Q73) There was obviously some experimental gap between 71 (i4004) and 74/75 when the well-known chips appeared (8080, 6800, 2650, F8, CP1600, COSMAC, IM6100). Regards Holger From mtapley at swri.edu Thu Dec 18 02:12:06 2008 From: mtapley at swri.edu (Mark Tapley) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 02:12:06 -0600 Subject: Mac II's, IIx's, IIci's In-Reply-To: <200812171800.mBHI0EcT035138@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812171800.mBHI0EcT035138@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: At 12:00 -0600 12/17/08, Michael wrote: >I've got a large number of Mac II's and IIx's sitting around. ... ... err, around where? Hard drives, memory, etc. in place? KB, mice, monitors, etc? -- - Mark 210-379-4635 ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Large Asteroids headed toward planets inhabited by beings that don't have technology adequate to stop them: Think of it as Evolution in Fast-Forward. From spc at conman.org Thu Dec 18 02:26:22 2008 From: spc at conman.org (Sean Conner) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 03:26:22 -0500 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <6.2.3.4.2.20081217204005.05c26150@mail.threedee.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> <200812171757.30554.rtellason@verizon.net> <6.2.3.4.2.20081217204005.05c26150@mail.threedee.com> Message-ID: <20081218082622.GA32002@brevard.conman.org> It was thus said that the Great John Foust once stated: > At 04:57 PM 12/17/2008, Roy J. Tellason wrote: > >Under linux, yeah. The only odd behavior is that every now and then I'll hit a > >key and nothing happens, but that may be the keyboard, I dunno (and yes, > >it's a Model M). > > Funny you mention that. I'm using an older keyboard, AT-style, > running the AT to a dumb PS/2 converter, then to a mouse-and-keyboard > PS/2 to USB converter of today's $5 variety. Mine does the same thing > now and then. It seems to eat four-five chars or just stop sending > once or twice a day when I'm moving fast. Maybe it's due to weak > handling of rollover. This is under WinXP. I use a Model M with a PS/2-USB adaptor on both Linux and Mac (through a Belkin 8-port KVM---hey, it was free!) without any problems. -spc (Who has a stockpile of Model-M keyboards and won't give them up ... ) From hachti at hachti.de Thu Dec 18 04:12:36 2008 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 11:12:36 +0100 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> Message-ID: <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> Hi Henk, > Hi Philipp, it's not up to me, but I guess Vince will be interested (me too)! > Vince (and I just on the side) are working on this, see my webpage at > www.pdp-11.nl . In the folder "my projects" is a link to "full-size pdp8i". > Direct link: > www.pdp-11.nl/homebrew/fullsize-pdp8/fullsize-pdp8-startpage.html That's where I just came from when writing the first message. On the second page there's mentioned a pdp-8 core from Hans Pufal. Who is that? Is he still active? If the PDP-8/I thing has already been built with an FPGA, it won't be a problem to try out other cores... That's one of the reasons to use an FPGA :-) What's the current state of pdp-8 implementations on FPGA? Best wishes, Philipp :-) -- http://www.hachti.de From ken at seefried.com Thu Dec 18 04:04:51 2008 From: ken at seefried.com (Ken Seefried) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 05:04:51 -0500 (EST) Subject: Rare CPUs (was 8008) Message-ID: <20081218100451.22CEF3800072F@portal.seefried.com> Steven Hirsch >On Tue, 16 Dec 2008, William Blair wrote: > > > > Quote from same forum, different thread: "I think the iAPX432 and Nx686 > > are the most wanted cpu in the collectors community." >Are you serious? Were the Nexgen chips really so rare? Nx586 are pretty common. Nx686 aren't, as it was never released beyond the sampling stage before AMD picked up Nexgen and released it as the K6. From mcguire at neurotica.com Thu Dec 18 04:59:38 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 05:59:38 -0500 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: References: <302C52B0-2283-4753-9930-ACBCB9A0C258@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <77798993-1A47-4D80-940A-25D7549CAFB7@neurotica.com> On Dec 17, 2008, at 12:53 PM, Dave Caroline wrote: > if pushed I can scan my Solartron docs I had a 1420 and got copies > from Solartron themselves Consider yourself pushed. =) Low priority, though, I'd just like to study the design. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Thu Dec 18 05:04:12 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 06:04:12 -0500 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: <18761.19476.180238.631780@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> References: <302C52B0-2283-4753-9930-ACBCB9A0C258@neurotica.com> <18761.19476.180238.631780@pkoning-laptop.equallogic.com> Message-ID: <10713701-B11B-4742-AB4D-5BE742236139@neurotica.com> On Dec 17, 2008, at 1:59 PM, Paul Koning wrote: >>> A DVM with a built-in standard cell?? Neat! Got pics and/or >>> schematics? I'd love to see that. > > Tony> It was quite common at one time. The ones I've memtioned have > Tony> ther traditional H-shaped glass things in them... > > Makes sense. A DVM needs an accurate reference. These days that's a > solid state device, the high end successor to the Zener diode. (I'm > not sure how they work -- quite possibly a completely different > scheme.) Today, the standard voltage references are subsurface zeners and band-gap devices. The LTZ1000 is one of the former class, and one of the best units available. It's used, for example, in the amazing HP 8458 DVM. Here are a couple: http://www.neurotica.com/misc/tastyreference.jpg > Before that came out you'd need something else, and a Weston cell is > certainly a very good way to solve the problem. Well, Weston cells usually exhibit big instabilities after being moved, and don't settle down for weeks. Also, they are somewhat temperature sensitive. I'd not consider it a good choice for embedding in a device intended for anything other than cal/metrology lab equipment. In this case, I'd have expected a VR tube. They're far more rugged. I have several related pieces of equipment from that era which use VR tubes, though not a DVM per se. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Thu Dec 18 05:05:44 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 06:05:44 -0500 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: <4948DEC2.10647.FC1C60E@cclist.sydex.com> References: <302C52B0-2283-4753-9930-ACBCB9A0C258@neurotica.com> from "Dave McGuire" at Dec 17, 8 10:42:17 am, <4948DEC2.10647.FC1C60E@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <5B954E42-F9D1-4E34-8394-8F526EEFE684@neurotica.com> On Dec 17, 2008, at 2:13 PM, Chuck Guzis wrote: >> It was quite common at one time. The ones I've memtioned have ther >> traditional H-shaped glass things in them (the Blackburn vavled >> one has a >> pair of them, just bare glass, on a bracket, the Solartron ones >> have them >> encased in a little plastic housing). I have a later DVM which has an >> enacpsulated thing with 2 wires comiong out that appears to be a >> standard >> cell, certainly the voltage between said wires, measured on a >> high-impedance votlmeter, is about right. > > One of the "round-tuit" jobs when I was an instrumentation tech was > replacing all of those Weston-cell-plus-dry cell-plus-calibration- > slidewire setups with Honeywell constand-voltage supplies, even in > L&N equipment. You'd strip out the entire reference-voltage section > and drill and tap a couple of holes in the instrument frame and mount > the supply and connect up the wires (including AC). Took about 45 > minutes to do right and you never had to replace another battery in > that instrument. I must have done 100 of those conversions. Yow...What was the application? I'm familiar with those Honeywell CV supplies; they're nowhere near as stable as a Weston cell. Far, far, FAR more rugged though, and resilient to temperature shifts...which Weston cells are not. -Dave > -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From mcguire at neurotica.com Thu Dec 18 05:07:26 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 06:07:26 -0500 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <200812171757.30554.rtellason@verizon.net> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> <200812171757.30554.rtellason@verizon.net> Message-ID: <3E72CDA0-4537-4340-BA3B-CCD7D3E059DE@neurotica.com> On Dec 17, 2008, at 5:57 PM, Roy J. Tellason wrote: >> Re. Model M itself - it's nice to be typing on one; I've suffered >> a laptop >> keyboard for far too long! > > I can't imagine trying to do any significant amount of typing on > one. A bit > here and there, yeah, but not much... You guys are using the wrong laptops. I've written tens (if not hundreds) of thousands of lines of code on an Apple 17" Aluminum PowerBook. That keyboard is so good that I went out and found a desktop keyboard with the same mechanism. Now, I LOVE the venerable Model M, but I can absolutely fly on one of these Al PowerBook (and similar) keyboards. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Thu Dec 18 01:46:01 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 05:46:01 -0200 Subject: USB Model M References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, , <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> <4947B0F9.20243.B26DBCF@cclist.sydex.com> <49483DA2.6010407@gmail.com> Message-ID: <000901c96111$51d76a20$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > Nope, it's a 101 - I expect it's just 20 years' worth of age! I'll try > Sridhar's suggestion and give it a light oiling with something. BTW, anyone with a clue how to keep this beast clean? Mine gets dirty 1 to 3 months after throughout cleaning :( From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Thu Dec 18 01:51:20 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 05:51:20 -0200 Subject: USB Model M References: Message-ID: <000a01c96111$51f663d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > Well, i object to the name for a start. It's not Universal (in that of > the 200 or so computers I own, not one of them has a USB port or can have > a USB port). It is serial. It's not a bus , at least not electrically. I > guess one aout of 3 is not too bad :-( It is universal since you can create a usb host interface for anything you have :) > For suitable values of 'small'. It's a lot harder to send/.recive data on > a USB port (both in terms of hardware and software) than to use any of > the 'classic interfaces' like RS232, Centronics, GPIO, HPIB, etc. It depends of what you are using. I have a FT-232 here and it is transparent to me as a serial port. Electricaly it is a bit complicated, but clearly possible to do bitbanging and creating a usb slave. Look for igorplug on the net, and see a totally software solution for that. :o) Alexandre From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Thu Dec 18 01:44:03 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 05:44:03 -0200 Subject: USB Model M References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca><49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> <30c101c95f07$28ee3780$46fea8c0@DeskJara><4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> <49481C9D.1020307@gjcp.net> <494824AA.6030508@verizon.net> Message-ID: <000801c96111$4eb19910$46fea8c0@DeskJara> > I have a small uC device that I made that uses an FTDI USB->TTL > converter. I wish USB was as straight-forward as you describe. I'm > currently running into problems when transferring, very quickly, some > data from the uC to the PC. The problems are related to overrunning the > PC, where the PC isn't scheduling reads from the device fast enough to > prevent drops. At least interrupt-based I/O can "demand" attention from > the cpu at any time, where USB is at the mercy of being scheduled. I do that at 921kbps and had no issues. From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Thu Dec 18 07:24:32 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 07:24:32 -0600 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <4949D05B.8090708@jbrain.com> References: <4949D05B.8090708@jbrain.com> Message-ID: <494A4F10.20206@gmail.com> Jim Brain wrote: > Consistency demands that I not reject USB, but I do hope none of the > older interface standards die out, because many of them are easier to > understand from the beginner's perspective. For me it's more that the older interfaces do what they do very well. I hate having to change technology just for the sake of it, particularly if that involves a leap in complexity along the way. From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Thu Dec 18 07:32:04 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 07:32:04 -0600 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <3E72CDA0-4537-4340-BA3B-CCD7D3E059DE@neurotica.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> <200812171757.30554.rtellason@verizon.net> <3E72CDA0-4537-4340-BA3B-CCD7D3E059DE@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <494A50D4.5090606@gmail.com> Dave McGuire wrote: > On Dec 17, 2008, at 5:57 PM, Roy J. Tellason wrote: >>> Re. Model M itself - it's nice to be typing on one; I've suffered a >>> laptop >>> keyboard for far too long! >> >> I can't imagine trying to do any significant amount of typing on one. >> A bit >> here and there, yeah, but not much... > > You guys are using the wrong laptops. I can think of a million design faults with mine - I'll never buy Dell again, that's for sure (but I'll get my desktop machine over here at some point anyway, so won't have to use a laptop so much then, thankfully). cheers J. From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Thu Dec 18 07:43:17 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 07:43:17 -0600 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, <49495C21.2000708@gmail.com>, <4949D130.3010109@hawkmountain.net> <49496647.6781.11D30FFB@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <494A5375.8040808@gmail.com> David Griffith wrote: >> I'd steer clear of any oil, even watch oil--it'll just attract dirt. >> If the crud in my own keyboard is any indication, that's not >> something that you'd want. > > Perhaps the spray lubes often used by Rubik's Cube people will do well. Does Rubik's cube lube come in a tube? :-) I think I'm wary of anything used by the gun and automotive crowd just because the fact that it works on metal doesn't necessarily mean that it won't harm plastics - but something that says it works with plastics is probably the best bet. I do think the problem I'm having is the key binding due to twisting when pressed - the right shift key does appear to be the longest key that has an additional unsprung support and yet doesn't have a travel bar beneath, so on an old keyboard (that's potentially seen a lot of use) it's probably not surprising that it's the first to have problems. It's fine if pressed in the middle 50%. The left 25% feels a little less smooth, but still doesn't bind - it's only when pressed on the right 25% (i.e. anywhere to the right of the spring center) that it's prone to not going down (or, once in a while, going down and then sticking in the down position). I'll see what I can find for dry lubes anyway - if no luck there then I'll investigate adding a travel bar to the underside of the key... cheers Jules From mcguire at neurotica.com Thu Dec 18 09:29:59 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 10:29:59 -0500 (EST) Subject: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) Message-ID: <4299.71.98.250.26.1229614199.squirrel@mail.neurotica.com> On Wed, December 17, 2008 3:05 pm, Brent Hilpert wrote: > There was a later PPS-4/1 single-chip version. I don't know how popular > this > stuff was but I wonder if there aren't more PPS-4 systems buried in > equipment > and appliances from the period than is commonly known. (I have wondered, > for > example, what the 70's-era Amana Radarange microwave ovens used for > control.) Umm...mechanical timers. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From hachti at hachti.de Thu Dec 18 09:31:51 2008 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 16:31:51 +0100 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project: update In-Reply-To: <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> Message-ID: <494A6CE7.3090700@hachti.de> Here's an important update: I just gave the new design one hour of debug time... Nothing is fine yet, many features still untested (interrupt, mq, memory expansion), BUT: It currently runs Chekmo at 100 Mhz!!! There are some severe synthesis warnings I simply ignored. Will investigate in the process of further debugging the stuff. A 100Mhz Chekmo is a big step forward. And all that on a Spartan-3. On a Virtex-2 or -4 FPGA this would become even faster. Best wishes, Philipp :-) -- http://www.hachti.de From trag at io.com Thu Dec 18 09:31:56 2008 From: trag at io.com (Jeff Walther) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 09:31:56 -0600 (CST) Subject: Mac II's, IIx's, IIci's In-Reply-To: <200812180724.mBI7Nwtg044674@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812180724.mBI7Nwtg044674@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <3e899319ded4ce6a72f61604e2d874fc.squirrel@webmail.prismnet.com> > Send cctech mailing list submissions to > cctech at classiccmp.org > > To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit > http://www.classiccmp.org/mailman/listinfo/cctech > or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to > cctech-request at classiccmp.org > > > Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 09:54:52 -0800 > From: "Michael" > I've got a large number of Mac II's and IIx's sitting around. None of > them post (I believe due to dead batteries which I understand is common to > them). Most of them are fairly yellow but intact. Is there any interest in > these for parts/whatever? I also have some IIci's in similar state The Mac II and IIx require a working battery in order to trip the power supply. However, the IIci does not. It will power up just fine with a flat battery, because the power supply provides a 5V trickle, which the motherboard makes use of. So any IIci which does not power up has other issues. All those machines are at or past an age where the surface mount electrolytic caps should have leaked corrosive goo all over the logic board. A good cleaning at the least would be a good idea, to prevent further damage. Usually any damage from the leakage is not too hard to repair with careful examination and judicial use of wire wrap (or other tiny wires) and solder. The IIci's logic board power-on circuitry is particularly susceptible to this damage because four of the larger caps (47uF) are sitting on the portion of the board which contains the power-on circuitry. So a common symptom of capacitor-goo damaged IIci's is an inability to power up. Where are you located? Shipping plays a large part in whether there will be interest. The II and IIx are beasts which would cost a lot to ship. The power supply in the IIci was also used in the IIcx, IIvi, IIvx, Quadra 700, Centris 650, Quadra 650 and PowerMac 7100. So at the least, you should find some interest in the IIci power supplies. Jeff Walther From cclist at sydex.com Thu Dec 18 11:19:03 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 09:19:03 -0800 Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: <5B954E42-F9D1-4E34-8394-8F526EEFE684@neurotica.com> References: <302C52B0-2283-4753-9930-ACBCB9A0C258@neurotica.com>, <4948DEC2.10647.FC1C60E@cclist.sydex.com>, <5B954E42-F9D1-4E34-8394-8F526EEFE684@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <494A1587.2540.218D3B@cclist.sydex.com> On 18 Dec 2008 at 6:05, Dave McGuire wrote: > Yow...What was the application? I'm familiar with those Honeywell > CV supplies; they're nowhere near as stable as a Weston cell. Far, > far, FAR more rugged though, and resilient to temperature > shifts...which Weston cells are not. Almost all were for process temperature control--from ingot soaking pits to solutions on the continuous galvanizing line. "Rugged" was probably more important than "stable", but I think it was more to avoid the issue of once-monthly replacement of dry cells and maintenance of the associated calibration mechanism. The big square black 1.5v cells (made by National Union?) were used extensively, instead of the smaller round No. 6 ones. On an open mill floor, temperatures could go from sub-freezing to Saharan. Dirt, of course, was everywhere. Right about this time, I recall that IBM had installed a computer for process control in one of the new plants. Sadly, I don't recall any details. Perhaps a 1710 used with the BOF. Like a lot of American heavy industrial operations of the time, the mill was a wild mix of period technology, much of it pre-war and much running from 25 Hz power. Up until that computer, it seems to me that the most sophisticated stuff was pneumatic--full analog computers, with P-V and V-P converters, pneumatic amplifiers, square- root extractors, differentiators, integrators, etc. "Wiring" done with quarter-inch copper tubing and compression fittings. If the air supply was kept clean, the pneumatics were pretty much indestructible. Earlier controls were mostly hydrostatic types of the diaphragm-and- jet type. Keep the tank filled with Pydraul and you were good for decades. There were very few electrical-only process control systems, mostly restricted to non-critical processes. Cheers, Chuck (I hope there's enough "computer" content here not to irritate) From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Thu Dec 18 11:31:41 2008 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 09:31:41 -0800 Subject: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) References: <4299.71.98.250.26.1229614199.squirrel@mail.neurotica.com> Message-ID: <494A88FC.FAF1EA59@cs.ubc.ca> Dave McGuire wrote: > > On Wed, December 17, 2008 3:05 pm, Brent Hilpert wrote: > > There was a later PPS-4/1 single-chip version. I don't know how popular > > this > > stuff was but I wonder if there aren't more PPS-4 systems buried in > > equipment > > and appliances from the period than is commonly known. (I have wondered, > > for > > example, what the 70's-era Amana Radarange microwave ovens used for > > control.) > > Umm...mechanical timers. 60's era ones yes, but by 1978 or earlier they were like this: http://www.ssplprints.com/image.php?imgref=10240744 LED display, keypad input. A friend has one, still in use, but I haven't bugged him to let me look inside it. Could have been done with an ASIC of course but it would also have been a good candidate to have used some mask-programmed 1 or 2 chip micro such as the PPS-4/1. It's a minor interest: earliest consumer items (aside from the obvious calculators) to use embedded micros. The earliest I have seen so far is a Sherwood FM tuner ca. 1977 that uses an RCA 1802 (e.g. http://atlanta.craigslist.org/ele/927622156.html). Repaired a couple for a friend but forgot to take exact chip dates. From vrs at msn.com Thu Dec 18 12:18:47 2008 From: vrs at msn.com (Vincent Slyngstad) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 10:18:47 -0800 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> Message-ID: From: "Philipp Hachtmann" Sent: Thursday, December 18, 2008 2:12 AM >From: "Henk Gooijen" >Sent: Wednesday, December 17, 2008 10:48 PM >> Vince (and I just on the side) are working on this, see my webpage at >> www.pdp-11.nl . In the folder "my projects" is a link to "full-size >> pdp8i". >> Direct link: >> www.pdp-11.nl/homebrew/fullsize-pdp8/fullsize-pdp8-startpage.html > That's where I just came from when writing the first message. > On the second page there's mentioned a pdp-8 core from Hans Pufal. Who > is that? Is he still active? We have Hans' PDP-8 code from a few years ago, and John Kent did some nice work a year or so ago with us to clean up the build and to port to the XESS FPGA card. The code that Henk and I are using is derived from this code base. We haven't been able to reach Hans to get permission to redistribute, so there are just the three of us with the code (four, if you count Hans), as far as I know. I've got the code running FOCAL and other stuff in John's configuration, and the 8/i front panel is pretty much working in that configuration. There is currently a regression that broke the IOTs that FOCAL needs, so the more cool code examples don't work at the moment. Because the state lights (Fetch, Defer, Execute, WC, CA, Break, Pause) don't map well to Hans' machine states, and (more importantly) because we don't feel we can redistribute his code, I have recently started to implement a "direct coding" of the 8/i schematics in VHDL. That will hopefully give a "clock accurate" implementation of the 8/i. So far that's a bit experimental -- I haven't interfaced the memory or finished the timing generator, nor written the memory extension and timeshare code yet. Then again, I just started a couple of days ago :-). > If the PDP-8/I thing has already been built with an FPGA, it won't be a > problem to try out other cores... That's one of the reasons to use an > FPGA :-) Sure, though unless we can get permission to redistribute, that doesn't seem too important. > What's the current state of pdp-8 implementations on FPGA? I'm sure there are other implementations out there. Maybe some more will come out of the woodwork :-). Vince From vrs at msn.com Thu Dec 18 12:21:45 2008 From: vrs at msn.com (Vincent Slyngstad) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 10:21:45 -0800 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project: update References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A6CE7.3090700@hachti.de> Message-ID: From: "Philipp Hachtmann" Sent: Thursday, December 18, 2008 7:31 AM > Here's an important update: > I just gave the new design one hour of debug time... > Nothing is fine yet, many features still untested (interrupt, mq, memory > expansion), > > BUT: It currently runs Chekmo at 100 Mhz!!! Very cool! > There are some severe synthesis warnings I simply ignored. Will > investigate in the process of further debugging the stuff. Heh, it seems impossible to deal with the hundreds of warnings to figure out which, if any, are important. > A 100Mhz Chekmo is a big step forward. And all that on a Spartan-3. On a > Virtex-2 or -4 FPGA this would become even faster. Hmm...I don't share your need for speed :-). I am more worried about being able to interface with new and old external gear. Vince From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Thu Dec 18 12:38:45 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 12:38:45 -0600 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> Message-ID: <494A98B5.1030402@gmail.com> Vincent Slyngstad wrote: > The code that Henk and I are using is derived from this code base. We > haven't been able to reach Hans to get permission to redistribute, so > there are just the three of us with the code (four, if you count Hans), > as far as I know. Last I knew of Hans was about a year ago, but that was news via a third party... From cclist at sydex.com Thu Dec 18 13:00:40 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 11:00:40 -0800 Subject: 1959 RCA memory device Message-ID: <494A2D58.21632.7E947A@cclist.sydex.com> In this 1959 Popular Mechanix report of HECK--RCA's "Home Electronic Center Kid", the following is mentioned: "To speed up the working of electronic computers which assist in such discoveries, the RCA lab recently devised a memory storage plate smaller and thinner than a four-cent postage stamp. It has 256 tiny holes in it and can keep a million facts on file and produce them in any combination or alone in milli-seconds." Does anyone have any additional information about this device? Was it ever commercially deployed? (A couple of interesting asides: Note the "Roomba" in the photo and the description of the about-to-be-produced RCA Nuvistor--and what appears to be a raised floor in the exhibit. And the ghastly "contemporary decor"--could orange shag wall-to-wall carpet be long in coming?) Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Thu Dec 18 13:02:06 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 11:02:06 -0800 Subject: 1959 RCA memory device-URL Message-ID: <494A2DAE.27569.7FE574@cclist.sydex.com> Beg pardon, forgot the URL: http://blog.modernmechanix.com/2008/12/18/your-world-of-tomorrow- roomba/#comment-1063686 Cheers, Chuck From cclist at sydex.com Thu Dec 18 13:05:18 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 11:05:18 -0800 Subject: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) In-Reply-To: <494A88FC.FAF1EA59@cs.ubc.ca> References: <4299.71.98.250.26.1229614199.squirrel@mail.neurotica.com>, <494A88FC.FAF1EA59@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: <494A2E6E.21092.82D103@cclist.sydex.com> On 18 Dec 2008 at 9:31, Brent Hilpert wrote: > 60's era ones yes, but by 1978 or earlier they were like this: > > http://www.ssplprints.com/image.php?imgref=10240744 > > LED display, keypad input. A friend has one, still in use, but I haven't bugged > him to let me look inside it. Could have been done with an ASIC of course but > it would also have been a good candidate to have used some mask-programmed 1 or > 2 chip micro such as the PPS-4/1. A Toshiba microwave (just junked) from the same time has 4000-series SSI CMOS and not much more. Same goes for the 1978 Amana still sitting on my kitchen counter. I think microprocessors might not have reached a competitive price point yet. Cheers, Chuck From hachti at hachti.de Thu Dec 18 13:08:41 2008 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 20:08:41 +0100 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> Message-ID: <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> >> BUT: It currently runs Chekmo at 100 Mhz!!! > > Very cool! Yes, that's nice. >> There are some severe synthesis warnings I simply ignored. Will investigate in the process of further debugging the stuff. > > Heh, it seems impossible to deal with the hundreds of warnings to figure out which, if any, are important. Oh, I have written "severe" - like not met (and ignored) timing and a strange "combinatorial loop" involving the not yet tried out and debugged data break port. Yes, the tools tell you too much... Sometimes I wish I could turn off all the 599 unimportant warnings of 600... >> A 100Mhz Chekmo is a big step forward. And all that on a Spartan-3. On a Virtex-2 or -4 FPGA this would become even faster. > > Hmm...I don't share your need for speed :-) . I am more worried about being able to interface with new and old external gear. My TTY for example behaves like the original one and is connected via a kind of SOC OMNIBUS. It would be no problem (but some work, of course!) to write a module that attaches this to a real OMNIBUS (must generate timing pulses etc). Here the entity declaration of my teletype interface, just to give you an imagination: > entity pdp8_tty is > generic ( > tti_address : std_logic_vector(0 to 5) := "000011"; > tto_address : std_logic_vector(0 to 5) := "000100"; > clkfreq : integer := 75000000; > baud_rate : integer := 9600 > > ); > port ( > clk : in std_logic; > reset_n : in std_logic; > > -- I/O interface > io_addr : in std_logic_vector(3 to 8); > io_wdata : in std_logic_vector(0 to 11); > io_rdata : out std_logic_vector(0 to 11); > > io_wait : out std_logic; > io_active : in std_logic; > > io_opcode : in std_logic_vector(9 to 11); -- Command code from instruction > > io_cycle : in std_logic; -- IO signal qualifier! > io_cmd_ac_clear : out std_logic; > io_cmd_ac_or : out std_logic; > io_cmd_pc_load_abs : out std_logic; > io_cmd_pc_load_rel : out std_logic; > io_cmd_skip : out std_logic; > > -- Interrupt line > io_interrupt : out std_logic; > > -- Data break interface > break_cycle : in std_logic; -- IO signal qualifier! > break_address : out std_logic_vector(0 to 11); > break_ema : out std_logic_vector(0 to 2); > break_wdata : out std_logic_vector(0 to 11); > break_rdata : in std_logic_vector(0 to 11); > break_write : out std_logic; > break_request : out std_logic; > break_done : in std_logic; > > -- Data Lines > tty_rxd : in std_logic; > tty_txd : out std_logic := '1'; > > -- Hardware Handshake lines > tty_go_out : out std_logic; > tty_go_in : in std_logic); > > > end pdp8_tty; The break interface is not used by the TTY. I included it just for completeness... The wires end open. And there's no CLF line yet.... If multiple IO devices are to be connected, the IN lines (to the CPU) must be OR'ed together. When my project is in a usable state, I would like to put it on opencores.org. > We have Hans' PDP-8 code from a few years ago, and John Kent did some > nice work a year or so ago with us to clean up the build and to port to > the XESS FPGA card. VHDL or Verilog code? > The code that Henk and I are using is derived from this code base. We > haven't been able to reach Hans to get permission to redistribute, so > there are just the three of us with the code (four, if you count Hans), > as far as I know. Ok, Hans is not reachable anymore? What a pity.... > I've got the code running FOCAL and other stuff in John's configuration, > and the 8/i front panel is pretty much working in that configuration. How is it attached? Shift registers? > There is currently a regression that broke the IOTs that FOCAL needs, so > the more cool code examples don't work at the moment. Hm... Which IOTs? I will implement all basic 8/e functionality. > Because the state lights (Fetch, Defer, Execute, WC, CA, Break, Pause) > don't map well to Hans' machine states, Oh, yes... I have slightly different states, too: decode, defer, auto-index, io, break, fetch-exec. But a reasonable mapping should be possible. Cycle true MD would be a bit more complicated... > and (more importantly) because > we don't feel we can redistribute his code, Sure, that he cannot be reached? > I have recently started to > implement a "direct coding" of the 8/i schematics in VHDL. That will > hopefully give a "clock accurate" implementation of the 8/i. What a task!!! If you try the real thing, you will get lots of angry warnings about flip flop clock input abuse! DEC used the D-flip flops with preset and clear in a (today) very uncommon way....! > So far > that's a bit experimental -- I haven't interfaced the memory or finished > the timing generator, nor written the memory extension and timeshare > code yet. Then again, I just started a couple of days ago :-). Oh, I haven't built time-share and memory expansion yet, too. Only partially implemented. But will be completely available. >> What's the current state of pdp-8 implementations on FPGA? > > I'm sure there are other implementations out there. Maybe some more > will come out of the woodwork :-). There must be a lot of other PDP-8 implementations... But nothing well organized... Best wishes, Philipp :-) -- http://www.hachti.de From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Dec 18 12:57:12 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 18:57:12 +0000 (GMT) Subject: My return to Classic Cmp - San Diego, software archive, etc. In-Reply-To: <10713701-B11B-4742-AB4D-5BE742236139@neurotica.com> from "Dave McGuire" at Dec 18, 8 06:04:12 am Message-ID: > In this case, I'd have expected a VR tube. They're far more > rugged. I have several related pieces of equipment from that era > which use VR tubes, though not a DVM per se. In these older DVMs, the Weston cell is not used as a reference, but rather as a standard to calibrate against. There is a voltage refernce, typically a zener diode, which is used as the referece for the readigns. But it can drift with time/temperature/whatever, so you effecitvely use the DVM to measure the votlage fo the Weston cell and tweak the calibration control so that it give the right reading. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Thu Dec 18 13:13:31 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 19:13:31 +0000 (GMT) Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <494A4F10.20206@gmail.com> from "Jules Richardson" at Dec 18, 8 07:24:32 am Message-ID: > For me it's more that the older interfaces do what they do very well. I hate > having to change technology just for the sake of it, particularly if that > involves a leap in complexity along the way. That's much my attitude too, and not just about interfaces. I see no reason at all to replace a solution that works with one that's untested (at least by me) which may or may not have advantages (and often, alas, has problems). If I have something that does the job I want it to, then I'll stick with it. -tony From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Thu Dec 18 14:20:27 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 13:20:27 -0700 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> Message-ID: <494AB08B.8080708@jetnet.ab.ca> Vincent Slyngstad wrote: > I'm sure there are other implementations out there. Maybe some more > will come out of the woodwork :-). ARGGG!!!!!! **WORMS** Check bitsavers for the hardware manuals for the PDP-8 and the PDP-5 lots of detail in what happens. The problem as I see it is that you are thinking the PDP-8 can have any memory thrown at and it works for realistic state emulation. All the computers of that era is based on the memory cycle of *CORE* memory. Untill you design your memory around that you will have problems. The PDP 8/e's clock was I think 20MHZ to generate the proper timing for 1.2us memory cycle, I think you could just get by with 5 or 6 clocks per memory cycle. The tricky part is that Memory buffer register is latched with the core data, and then incrimented on the *same* clock. > Vince A 100 MHZ FPGA could endup at 20 MHZ but that really depends on the speed of the block ram. Ben. From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Thu Dec 18 14:23:57 2008 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 12:23:57 -0800 (PST) Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <000901c96111$51d76a20$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, , <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> <4947B0F9.20243.B26DBCF@cclist.sydex.com> <49483DA2.6010407@gmail.com> <000901c96111$51d76a20$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: On Thu, 18 Dec 2008, Alexandre Souza wrote: >> Nope, it's a 101 - I expect it's just 20 years' worth of age! I'll try >> Sridhar's suggestion and give it a light oiling with something. > > BTW, anyone with a clue how to keep this beast clean? Mine gets dirty 1 to > 3 months after throughout cleaning :( I pop the keys off and blow out the cruft that way. Works for me. I stripped one because it was in ten years of continuous service. It was quite filthy when I opened it. -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Thu Dec 18 14:28:38 2008 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 12:28:38 -0800 (PST) Subject: Mac II's, IIx's, IIci's In-Reply-To: <01f801c96070$9049a940$b0dcfbc0$@net> References: <200812170412.mBH4C8xI026306@dewey.classiccmp.org> <01f801c96070$9049a940$b0dcfbc0$@net> Message-ID: On Wed, 17 Dec 2008, Michael wrote: > I've got a large number of Mac II's and IIx's sitting around. None of them > post (I believe due to dead batteries which I understand is common to them). > Most of them are fairly yellow but intact. Is there any interest in these > for parts/whatever? I also have some IIci's in similar state This reminds me of something... Where can one get spare screws for an SE? -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? From hp-fix at xs4all.nl Thu Dec 18 14:45:17 2008 From: hp-fix at xs4all.nl (Rik Bos) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 21:45:17 +0100 Subject: Tektronix 4111 Graphic terminal Message-ID: I got a Tektronix 4111 terminal taking space in my house.. I think it needs a 'better' home, it powers up and all the eprom sockets are filled up but further ..? It's complete with keyboard and no manuals.. It's for a small drinking fee or trade for HP-stuff + shipping of cause. I live in the Netherlands (Europe for the people on the other end of the cable) Please react off-list.. -Rik From rborsuk at colourfull.com Thu Dec 18 15:58:08 2008 From: rborsuk at colourfull.com (Robert Borsuk) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 16:58:08 -0500 Subject: resurrecting a Zilog System 8000 In-Reply-To: <20081218071039.a0ba8322.lehmann@ans-netz.de> References: <20081218071039.a0ba8322.lehmann@ans-netz.de> Message-ID: On Dec 18, 2008, at 1:10 AM, Oliver Lehmann wrote: > Hi, > > as someone might remember, I've got some Zilog System 8000 equipment > and > over the last days I've started resurrecting it. > I thought - maybe someone feels interested in the story as well ;) Cool Oliver, nice work. Please keep us updated. Rob Rob Borsuk email: rborsuk at colourfull.com Colourfull Creations Web: http://www.colourfull.com From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Thu Dec 18 16:03:16 2008 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 22:03:16 +0000 (GMT) Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <494A50D4.5090606@gmail.com> Message-ID: <680653.16220.qm@web23403.mail.ird.yahoo.com> I like my Dell laptop! The only thing I hated was the dreaded 'mouse drift', caused by the silly little mouse stick (not sure what it's called) that lerks between the G,H and B keys. I soon fixed that by going into the setup menu on bootup (I actually had a problem with my HD that meant I had to go in there, presumably some trojan or whatsit had corrupted an important portion of it, which was fixed once settings were resaved). Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk --- On Thu, 18/12/08, Jules Richardson wrote: I can think of a million design faults with mine - I'll never buy Dell again, that's for sure (but I'll get my desktop machine over here at some point anyway, so won't have to use a laptop so much then, thankfully). cheers J. From cisin at xenosoft.com Thu Dec 18 16:08:26 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 14:08:26 -0800 (PST) Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <000901c96111$51d76a20$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, , <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> <4947B0F9.20243.B26DBCF@cclist.sydex.com> <49483DA2.6010407@gmail.com> <000901c96111$51d76a20$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <20081218140541.G2042@shell.lmi.net> > BTW, anyone with a clue how to keep this beast clean? Mine gets dirty 1 > to 3 months after throughout cleaning :( dishwasher Get a spare Model M for the cats - a model M is to cats what a beaded seat cushion is to a taxi driver. From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Thu Dec 18 16:29:30 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 15:29:30 -0700 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <20081218140541.G2042@shell.lmi.net> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, , <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> <4947B0F9.20243.B26DBCF@cclist.sydex.com> <49483DA2.6010407@gmail.com> <000901c96111$51d76a20$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081218140541.G2042@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <494ACECA.4030905@jetnet.ab.ca> Fred Cisin wrote: >> BTW, anyone with a clue how to keep this beast clean? Mine gets dirty 1 >> to 3 months after throughout cleaning :( > > dishwasher > YOU CAN"T USE THAT ... YOU COOK YOUR FISH IN A DISWASHER (oldwives tale) > > Get a spare Model M for the cats - > a model M is to cats what a beaded seat cushion is to a taxi driver. I thought that was any tall rack, with a warm computer hiding in it. > > > From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Thu Dec 18 16:46:30 2008 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 14:46:30 -0800 (PST) Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <20081218140541.G2042@shell.lmi.net> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, , <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> <4947B0F9.20243.B26DBCF@cclist.sydex.com> <49483DA2.6010407@gmail.com> <000901c96111$51d76a20$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081218140541.G2042@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: On Thu, 18 Dec 2008, Fred Cisin wrote: >> BTW, anyone with a clue how to keep this beast clean? Mine gets dirty 1 >> to 3 months after throughout cleaning :( > > dishwasher No! Look here instead: http://www.preater.com/modelm/ -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? From cisin at xenosoft.com Thu Dec 18 16:48:02 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 14:48:02 -0800 (PST) Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <680653.16220.qm@web23403.mail.ird.yahoo.com> References: <680653.16220.qm@web23403.mail.ird.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20081218144014.P2042@shell.lmi.net> On Thu, 18 Dec 2008, Andrew Burton wrote: > The only thing I hated was the dreaded 'mouse drift', caused by the > silly little mouse stick (not sure what it's called) that lerks between > the G,H and B keys. "clitoris" But many blue-nosed companies have come up with other names: "trackpoint" "track-stick" "touchstyk" "isometric joystick" From cisin at xenosoft.com Thu Dec 18 17:02:15 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 15:02:15 -0800 (PST) Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <20081218144014.P2042@shell.lmi.net> References: <680653.16220.qm@web23403.mail.ird.yahoo.com> <20081218144014.P2042@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <20081218150040.X2042@shell.lmi.net> > silly little mouse stick (not sure what it's called) that lerks between > the G,H and B keys. Wikipedia lists a few more names: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pointing_stick#Naming_and_brands From cisin at xenosoft.com Thu Dec 18 17:37:17 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 15:37:17 -0800 (PST) Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <494ACECA.4030905@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, , <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> <4947B0F9.20243.B26DBCF@cclist.sydex.com> <49483DA2.6010407@gmail.com> <000901c96111$51d76a20$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081218140541.G2042@shell.lmi.net> <494ACECA.4030905@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <20081218153217.G2042@shell.lmi.net> On Thu, 18 Dec 2008, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > > dishwasher > YOU CAN"T USE THAT ... YOU COOK YOUR FISH IN A DISWASHER > (oldwives tale) No, you cook on the exhaust manifold (Sorry, Jay) and use a Pentium to singe grill marks > > a model M is to cats what a beaded seat cushion is to a taxi driver. > I thought that was any tall rack, with a warm computer hiding in it. combine the two and the cat may decide that you deserve to live From cclist at sydex.com Thu Dec 18 17:48:25 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 15:48:25 -0800 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <20081218082622.GA32002@brevard.conman.org> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, <6.2.3.4.2.20081217204005.05c26150@mail.threedee.com>, <20081218082622.GA32002@brevard.conman.org> Message-ID: <494A70C9.7476.1860239@cclist.sydex.com> At 04:57 PM 12/17/2008, Roy J. Tellason wrote: >Under linux, yeah. The only odd behavior is that every now and then I'll hit a >key and nothing happens, but that may be the keyboard, I dunno (and yes, >it's a Model M). That can be fixed. Simply add one of these in front of the converter to supply those missing keystrokes: http://www.thinkgeek.com/gadgets/electronic/ae83/ Cheers, Chuck From aek at bitsavers.org Thu Dec 18 18:19:16 2008 From: aek at bitsavers.org (Al Kossow) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 16:19:16 -0800 Subject: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) Message-ID: <494AE884.3080004@bitsavers.org> > The earliest I have seen so far is a > Sherwood FM tuner ca. 1977 that uses an RCA 1802 (e.g. > http://atlanta.craigslist.org/ele/927622156.html). Bit of trivia. That tuner was designed and built in Milwaukee by a company that a friend of mine worked for. At the time, several of his friends built units up from leftovers from the production run. From IanK at vulcan.com Thu Dec 18 18:38:43 2008 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 16:38:43 -0800 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <20081218153217.G2042@shell.lmi.net> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, , <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> <4947B0F9.20243.B26DBCF@cclist.sydex.com> <49483DA2.6010407@gmail.com> <000901c96111$51d76a20$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081218140541.G2042@shell.lmi.net> <494ACECA.4030905@jetnet.ab.ca>,<20081218153217.G2042@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: When considering one of our lab environments when I was at Microsoft, I interjected into the discussion of cooling: "Let's boil the wort on the P100s, and mash on top of the drive arrays!" That's the day our PM and I (the test manager) bonded.... -- Ian ________________________________________ From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Fred Cisin [cisin at xenosoft.com] Sent: Thursday, December 18, 2008 3:37 PM To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Re: USB Model M On Thu, 18 Dec 2008, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > > dishwasher > YOU CAN"T USE THAT ... YOU COOK YOUR FISH IN A DISWASHER > (oldwives tale) No, you cook on the exhaust manifold (Sorry, Jay) and use a Pentium to singe grill marks > > a model M is to cats what a beaded seat cushion is to a taxi driver. > I thought that was any tall rack, with a warm computer hiding in it. combine the two and the cat may decide that you deserve to live From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Thu Dec 18 18:47:38 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 18:47:38 -0600 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <20081218140541.G2042@shell.lmi.net> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, , <4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> <4947B0F9.20243.B26DBCF@cclist.sydex.com> <49483DA2.6010407@gmail.com> <000901c96111$51d76a20$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <20081218140541.G2042@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <494AEF2A.6000307@gmail.com> Fred Cisin wrote: > Get a spare Model M for the cats - > a model M is to cats what a beaded seat cushion is to a taxi driver. Hmm, the cats have shown no interest in mine (yet). It was one of the dogs that destroyed my laptop keyboard :) From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com Thu Dec 18 18:50:38 2008 From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 18:50:38 -0600 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <494A70C9.7476.1860239@cclist.sydex.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca>, <6.2.3.4.2.20081217204005.05c26150@mail.threedee.com>, <20081218082622.GA32002@brevard.conman.org> <494A70C9.7476.1860239@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <494AEFDE.3060205@gmail.com> Chuck Guzis wrote: > At 04:57 PM 12/17/2008, Roy J. Tellason wrote: > >> Under linux, yeah. The only odd behavior is that every now and > then I'll hit a >> key and nothing happens, but that may be the keyboard, I dunno > (and yes, >> it's a Model M). > > That can be fixed. Simply add one of these in front of the converter > to supply those missing keystrokes: > > http://www.thinkgeek.com/gadgets/electronic/ae83/ That's clever. How's about one for Windows systems which moves the mouse to the start menu, invokes the 'run' option, and does ... From jfoust at threedee.com Thu Dec 18 20:29:35 2008 From: jfoust at threedee.com (John Foust) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 20:29:35 -0600 Subject: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) In-Reply-To: <494AE884.3080004@bitsavers.org> References: <494AE884.3080004@bitsavers.org> Message-ID: <6.2.3.4.2.20081218202813.07e82b90@mail.threedee.com> At 06:19 PM 12/18/2008, Al Kossow wrote: >> The earliest I have seen so far is a >> Sherwood FM tuner ca. 1977 that uses an RCA 1802 (e.g. >> http://atlanta.craigslist.org/ele/927622156.html). > >Bit of trivia. That tuner was designed and built in Milwaukee by a >company that a friend of mine worked for. At the time, several of >his friends built units up from leftovers from the production run. Draco was in Milwaukee? Interesting! It's probably in United States Patent 4122395. http://www.patentgenius.com/patent/4277785.html Patent says Grafton (northern suburb). PDF manual, including block diagram: http://www.fmtunerinfo.com/Sherwood.pdf - John From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Thu Dec 18 21:30:34 2008 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 19:30:34 -0800 Subject: Sherwood Micro CPU/100 / was Re: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) References: <494AE884.3080004@bitsavers.org> Message-ID: <494B155B.9F606E99@cs.ubc.ca> Al Kossow wrote: > > The earliest I have seen so far is a > > Sherwood FM tuner ca. 1977 that uses an RCA 1802 (e.g. > > http://atlanta.craigslist.org/ele/927622156.html). > > Bit of trivia. That tuner was designed and built in Milwaukee by a > company that a friend of mine worked for. At the time, several of > his friends built units up from leftovers from the production run. I should have made a better deal with my friend: fix one, keep one. Apparently they are rather valuable now. John Foust wrote: > Patent says Grafton (northern suburb). PDF manual, including block diagram: > > http://www.fmtunerinfo.com/Sherwood.pdf Interesting to see, although it was 11 years ago I worked on them. I RE'd the schematic for half of it if needed. It was interesting to see the 1802 with all it's support in there when I first opened them up. From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Thu Dec 18 21:30:57 2008 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 19:30:57 -0800 Subject: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) References: <4299.71.98.250.26.1229614199.squirrel@mail.neurotica.com>, <494A88FC.FAF1EA59@cs.ubc.ca> <494A2E6E.21092.82D103@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <494B1572.4EF4C1C6@cs.ubc.ca> Chuck Guzis wrote: > > On 18 Dec 2008 at 9:31, Brent Hilpert wrote: > > > 60's era ones yes, but by 1978 or earlier they were like this: > > > > http://www.ssplprints.com/image.php?imgref=10240744 > > > > LED display, keypad input. A friend has one, still in use, but I haven't bugged > > him to let me look inside it. Could have been done with an ASIC of course but > > it would also have been a good candidate to have used some mask-programmed 1 or > > 2 chip micro such as the PPS-4/1. > > A Toshiba microwave (just junked) from the same time has 4000-series > SSI CMOS and not much more. Same goes for the 1978 Amana still > sitting on my kitchen counter. I think microprocessors might not > have reached a competitive price point yet. Scratch that one from the list then. I'm mildly surprised. They may not have been making them by the millions but I would have guessed they were making enough of them to make LSI worthwhile over SSI. From spectre at floodgap.com Thu Dec 18 22:04:04 2008 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 20:04:04 -0800 (PST) Subject: Canon Cat: what density 3.5"? Message-ID: <200812190404.mBJ444O2016912@floodgap.com> What type of 3.5" floppies are people using in their Cats? Would off-the-shelf double-density suffice? Any special preparation required? -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- Nuclear war would really set back cable. -- Ted Turner --------------------- From vrs at msn.com Thu Dec 18 22:37:48 2008 From: vrs at msn.com (Vincent Slyngstad) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 20:37:48 -0800 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> Message-ID: From: "Philipp Hachtmann" Sent: Thursday, December 18, 2008 11:08 AM > Here the entity declaration of my teletype interface, just to give you an > imagination: [good stuff elided] > The break interface is not used by the TTY. I included it just for > completeness... The wires end open. > And there's no CLF line yet.... You definitely need the "reset" that the CAF instruction (and the "clear" key on an 8/e triggers). For an 8/i, it's BINITIALIZE, which is triggered by the "start" key on the front panel. > If multiple IO devices are to be connected, the IN lines (to the CPU) must > be OR'ed together. The original PDP-8's have these active low, and a logical OR is implemented with wire-and, via open-collector drivers. > When my project is in a usable state, I would like to put it on > opencores.org. Cool! It might be an interesting point to work from for what Henk and I are trying to do. >> We have Hans' PDP-8 code from a few years ago, and John Kent did some >> nice work a year or so ago with us to clean up the build and to port to >> the XESS FPGA card. > VHDL or Verilog code? VHDL. >> I've got the code running FOCAL and other stuff in John's configuration, >> and the 8/i front panel is pretty much working in that configuration. > How is it attached? Shift registers? > >> There is currently a regression that broke the IOTs that FOCAL needs, so >> the more cool code examples don't work at the moment. > Hm... Which IOTs? Most of them -- Skips are never skipping, and all IOTs clear AC. Shouldn't be too hard to fix, but I haven't really looked into it yet. >> and (more importantly) because we don't feel we can redistribute his >> code, > Sure, that he cannot be reached? Right. The word "license" doesn't appear in any of the files, and we haven't been able to get a response from him on the subject. >> I have recently started to implement a "direct coding" of the 8/i >> schematics in VHDL. That will hopefully give a "clock accurate" >> implementation of the 8/i. > What a task!!! > If you try the real thing, you will get lots of angry warnings about flip > flop clock input abuse! DEC used the D-flip flops with preset and clear in > a (today) very uncommon way....! I'm hoping to get around that by declaring TP1...TP4 (and *strobe*, etc.) to be the clocks, and re-expressing the latches so that they are clocked by an "official" clock. I don't know yet how well that is working out, as it's buried in with the other 188 warnings-of-the-moment. Vince From vrs at msn.com Thu Dec 18 22:41:41 2008 From: vrs at msn.com (Vincent Slyngstad) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 20:41:41 -0800 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494AB08B.8080708@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: From: bfranchuk Sent: Thursday, December 18, 2008 12:20 PM > Vincent Slyngstad wrote: >> I'm sure there are other implementations out there. Maybe some more will >> come out of the woodwork :-). > > ARGGG!!!!!! > **WORMS** I could only wish :-). > Check bitsavers for the hardware manuals for the PDP-8 and the PDP-5 > lots of detail in what happens. The problem as I see it is that you are > thinking > the PDP-8 can have any memory thrown at and it works for realistic state > emulation. No, realistic state emulation *requires* every memory cycle to be read-modify-write (even if you went to the trouble to suppress the writeback). > All the computers of that era is based on the memory cycle of *CORE* > memory. > Untill you design your memory > around that you will have problems. The PDP 8/e's clock was I think 20MHZ > to generate the proper timing for 1.2us memory cycle, I think you could > just get by > with 5 or 6 clocks per memory cycle. The tricky part is that Memory > buffer register > is latched with the core data, and then incrimented on the *same* clock. Yep. Vince From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Thu Dec 18 22:44:31 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 23:44:31 -0500 Subject: Sherwood Micro CPU/100 / was Re: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) In-Reply-To: <494B155B.9F606E99@cs.ubc.ca> References: <494AE884.3080004@bitsavers.org> <494B155B.9F606E99@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: On Thu, Dec 18, 2008 at 10:30 PM, Brent Hilpert wrote: >> > The earliest I have seen so far is a >> > Sherwood FM tuner ca. 1977 that uses an RCA 1802 (e.g. >> > http://atlanta.craigslist.org/ele/927622156.html). > > Interesting to see, although it was 11 years ago I worked on them. > I RE'd the schematic for half of it if needed. It was interesting to see the > 1802 with all it's support in there when I first opened them up. I had no idea there was a tuner from that era with a microprocessor, but they picked a fun one. What does it do? Run the digital display? -ethan From martinm at allwest.net Thu Dec 18 22:47:35 2008 From: martinm at allwest.net (Martin Marshall) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 21:47:35 -0700 Subject: Free for Cost of Shipping: Diamond TrackStar 128K - Apple II Message-ID: <0A7B87371B414336AC2D8A56CD4930B3@p4266> Here's one that I'll never get around to: Diamond TrackStar 128K board for PC, PC/XT, Tandy 1000 SX. This is an add-in board to run Apple II, etc software on a PC. In original box with original 5 1/4" disk and everything that I could scarf off the net in 2001 - 2002. Has cables, etc. Free for shipping. Please reply off-list to user "martinm" at domain "allwest.net". Thank you, Martin Marshall From IanK at vulcan.com Thu Dec 18 22:49:30 2008 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 20:49:30 -0800 Subject: Sherwood Micro CPU/100 / was Re: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) In-Reply-To: References: <494AE884.3080004@bitsavers.org> <494B155B.9F606E99@cs.ubc.ca>, Message-ID: >From what I read: it not only 'runs the digital display' but allows you to create a dictionary associating the frequency with a station's call letters. Rather slick, for the era. ________________________________________ From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Ethan Dicks [ethan.dicks at gmail.com] Sent: Thursday, December 18, 2008 8:44 PM To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: Re: Sherwood Micro CPU/100 / was Re: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) On Thu, Dec 18, 2008 at 10:30 PM, Brent Hilpert wrote: >> > The earliest I have seen so far is a >> > Sherwood FM tuner ca. 1977 that uses an RCA 1802 (e.g. >> > http://atlanta.craigslist.org/ele/927622156.html). > > Interesting to see, although it was 11 years ago I worked on them. > I RE'd the schematic for half of it if needed. It was interesting to see the > 1802 with all it's support in there when I first opened them up. I had no idea there was a tuner from that era with a microprocessor, but they picked a fun one. What does it do? Run the digital display? -ethan From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Thu Dec 18 22:54:15 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 23:54:15 -0500 Subject: Sherwood Micro CPU/100 / was Re: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) In-Reply-To: References: <494AE884.3080004@bitsavers.org> <494B155B.9F606E99@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: On Thu, Dec 18, 2008 at 11:49 PM, Ian King wrote: > >From what I read: it not only 'runs the digital display' but allows you to create a dictionary associating the frequency with a station's call letters. Rather slick, for the era. That is slick. I still don't have any gear that does that (but I've seen car stereos that must be getting that sort of info over the air). -ethan From kerobaros at gmail.com Thu Dec 18 23:12:38 2008 From: kerobaros at gmail.com (Matt Lichtenberg) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 22:12:38 -0700 Subject: In search of some RAM. Message-ID: <6103c8710812182112m386f1c63yd7bf2dfa152fb5d@mail.gmail.com> I co-manage a gaming center in the mall up here in Cheyenne, Wyoming. I've started setting up a couple older computers around the store as some sort of mini-museum, to try teach the kids that there was indeed something before Halo and WoW. My latest setup is a Power Mac 5500/225, with copies of the old Carmen Sandiego games, and Oregon Trail, and all those other fun things I grew up on. Only problem is that the computer has 48MB of RAM, when it could take up to 128MB, assuming I can lay my hands on the right sticks of RAM. Which is the point of this message! If anyone has a couple of 64MB DIMMs (LowEndMac says the computer wants it in a 60ns EDO flavor), I'd be much obliged if we could work out some sort of deal. If there's something one of you are looking for, I'm sure we could figure out something. I'm sure I have at least a gigabyte of the stuff somewhere in St. Louis, but that's enough hours away that it's not worth it at the moment. Thanks, folks! ~Matt From martinm at allwest.net Thu Dec 18 23:26:13 2008 From: martinm at allwest.net (Martin Marshall) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 22:26:13 -0700 Subject: Free for Cost of Shipping: Diamond TrackStar 128K - Apple II Message-ID: <766F132B29C0452A99D52504B16924F5@p4266> The TrackStar has been claimed. I working out who's on first. Thanks, Martin > -----Original Message----- > From: Martin Marshall [mailto:martinm at allwest.net] > Sent: Thursday, December 18, 2008 9:48 PM > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts; The Rescue List > Subject: Free for Cost of Shipping: Diamond TrackStar 128K - Apple II > > > Here's one that I'll never get around to: > > Diamond TrackStar 128K board for PC, PC/XT, Tandy 1000 SX. > This is an add-in board to run Apple II, etc software on a > PC. In original box with original 5 1/4" disk and everything > that I could scarf off the net in 2001 - 2002. Has cables, etc. > > Free for shipping. Please reply off-list to user "martinm" > at domain "allwest.net". > > Thank you, > Martin Marshall > From hachti at hachti.de Thu Dec 18 23:26:17 2008 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 06:26:17 +0100 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: <494AB08B.8080708@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494AB08B.8080708@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <494B3079.3040204@hachti.de> Ben, > Check bitsavers for the hardware manuals for the PDP-8 and the PDP-5 > lots of detail in what happens. Thanks. No docs needed: Bitsavers is well known and I have most of the original docs. > The problem as I see it is that you are > thinking > the PDP-8 can have any memory thrown at and it works for realistic state > emulation. Nearly realistic. Not 100% realistic. But it's quite sufficient the way I implemented it. > All the computers of that era is based on the memory cycle of *CORE* > memory. Yes, and my design is based on the memory cycle of block rams :-) My design makes one memory access on EVERY clock cycle. It is a bit pipelined as all operations (execute phase) is layered with next fetch etc. Only IOT operations need two cycles and waste one memory access time. That has been done because I wanted to give a bit relief to the decode state logic. > Untill you design your memory > around that you will have problems. Why should I? My (first) design has passed the MAINDEC acceptance tests and runs original software. The improved design is still being debugged and enhanced. > The PDP 8/e's clock was I think 20MHZ > to generate the proper timing for 1.2us memory cycle, I think you could > just get by > with 5 or 6 clocks per memory cycle. I do one clock per memory cycle. But an ISZ instruction takes at least three cycles. That's the only instruction where my design is really slower than the original. ISZ I plus auto-increment is currently the longest instruction. > The tricky part is that Memory > buffer register > is latched with the core data, and then incrimented on the *same* clock. I know. It's done nearly that way. > A 100 MHZ FPGA could endup at 20 MHZ but that really depends on the > speed of the > block ram. No. Currently I run 100Mhz CYCLE frequency. The block RAM can virtually has no speed limit on FPGAs. To be clear: My PDP-8 currently does 50000000 additions/second. Or 100000000 operate or jump instructions/second. Best wishes, Philipp -- http://www.hachti.de From cclist at sydex.com Thu Dec 18 23:26:54 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 21:26:54 -0800 Subject: Sherwood Micro CPU/100 / was Re: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) In-Reply-To: References: <494AE884.3080004@bitsavers.org>, , Message-ID: <494AC01E.23821.2BBE612@cclist.sydex.com> On Thu, Dec 18, 2008 at 11:49 PM, Ian King wrote: > From what I read: it not only 'runs the digital display' but allows > you to create a dictionary associating the frequency with a > station's call letters. Rather slick, for the era. >From what I can determine, it's up to the user to determine the call letters (the display supports 4 characters) and the corresponding frequency. I'm not clear why a microprocessor would be the best choice for this. Did the programming survive power outages? In a way, this reminds me of some 1930's radios with pushbutton selection that allowed the user to write the station call letters on a slip of paper and insert it next to the button. Most of the prewar Zeniths had 8 preset buttons; the Sherwood only has 4. Some other radios without presets simply printed the name of each station at the appropriate place on the dial. Cheers, Chuck From martinm at allwest.net Thu Dec 18 23:36:26 2008 From: martinm at allwest.net (Martin Marshall) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 22:36:26 -0700 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <494A70C9.7476.1860239@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <02925BBBC6C045C08DA0649D79C90ACB@p4266> A quick question - where can one get a cable for a Model M. I have a couple of Model M's but no cables. Haven't really searched, but the discussion reminded me. Martin From snhirsch at gmail.com Thu Dec 18 08:04:41 2008 From: snhirsch at gmail.com (Steven Hirsch) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 09:04:41 -0500 (EST) Subject: Rare CPUs (was 8008) In-Reply-To: <20081218100451.22CEF3800072F@portal.seefried.com> References: <20081218100451.22CEF3800072F@portal.seefried.com> Message-ID: On Thu, 18 Dec 2008, Ken Seefried wrote: > Steven Hirsch >> On Tue, 16 Dec 2008, William Blair wrote: >>> >>> Quote from same forum, different thread: "I think the iAPX432 and Nx686 >>> are the most wanted cpu in the collectors community." > >> Are you serious? Were the Nexgen chips really so rare? > > Nx586 are pretty common. Nx686 aren't, as it was never released beyond > the sampling stage before AMD picked up Nexgen and released it as the K6. Ah. Didn't read carefully enough. You may be correct that mine are Nx586. They're put away somewhere safe at the moment (euphimism for "I can't find them). -- From derschjo at msu.edu Thu Dec 18 19:41:19 2008 From: derschjo at msu.edu (Josh Dersch) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 17:41:19 -0800 Subject: CPU/Hardware info for Seiko UC-2000 Message-ID: <494AFBBF.1000508@msu.edu> Hi all -- Got myself a Seiko UC-2000 ("Wrist Information System") w/UC-2200 keyboard/terminal. The UC-2000 is a souped-up digital watch with a dot-matrix display, and the Keyboard unit is basically a computer that uses the watch as a display. (So it's more or less like the old Sharp/Casio BASIC programmables, only it uses a watch for a display instead of something built-in...) But the watch itself is _also_ a small computer -- one can upload small binary programs from the Keyboard unit to the watch. From the little information I've been able to find, it has 2k of RAM, 7k of ROM, and a 4-bit CPU running at 32kHz (yes, kHz). Does anyone know anything about the CPU? It'd be fun to write some little programs for this (assuming I can work out how to get them transferred over...) (See http://www.pocketcalculatorshow.com/nerdwatch/fun2.html for a brief description of the UC-2000 and others in the same family...) Josh From chrise at pobox.com Thu Dec 18 21:13:19 2008 From: chrise at pobox.com (Chris Elmquist) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 21:13:19 -0600 Subject: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) In-Reply-To: <4299.71.98.250.26.1229614199.squirrel@mail.neurotica.com> References: <4299.71.98.250.26.1229614199.squirrel@mail.neurotica.com> Message-ID: <20081219031319.GQ5784@n0jcf.net> On Thursday (12/18/2008 at 10:29AM -0500), Dave McGuire wrote: > On Wed, December 17, 2008 3:05 pm, Brent Hilpert wrote: > > There was a later PPS-4/1 single-chip version. I don't know how popular > > this > > stuff was but I wonder if there aren't more PPS-4 systems buried in > > equipment > > and appliances from the period than is commonly known. (I have wondered, > > for > > example, what the 70's-era Amana Radarange microwave ovens used for > > control.) > > Umm...mechanical timers. No! it was a "Touchmatic". Had a capacitive keypad and LED display. Very cool for 1974. Mom cooked a meatloaf in it in a bundt pan. Came out indistinguishable from a lawn tractor tire. http://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/images/object_images/277x265/10240744.jpg -- Chris Elmquist mailto:chrise at pobox.com From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Thu Dec 18 23:39:49 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 22:39:49 -0700 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> Message-ID: <494B33A5.50606@jetnet.ab.ca> Vincent Slyngstad wrote: > I'm hoping to get around that by declaring TP1...TP4 (and *strobe*, etc.) > to be the clocks, and re-expressing the latches so that they are clocked > by an "official" clock. I don't know yet how well that is working out, > as it's buried in with the other 188 warnings-of-the-moment. First goal get it working ... That is why I am staying away from doing a PDP -?? with CPLD's, I don't have all the knowlage up keeping the same features and bugs as the original hardware. > Vince Sometime late January, I hope to have the logic for a 20 bit cpu using 5 CPLD's, I find them a little more DIY freindly than FPGA's. Expect to have ballpark PDP-8/e speeds with but I have run with .8 us static ram memory cycle because I can't use the trick the PDP-8 uses for address generation, but run address generation thru the main adder. That is the price you pay for modern features like a Stack pointer or Index register. The fun part here is just having I/O pins just to display the AC, Mar and data from the last memory cycle, and a Switch register. Good luck with your design on those features. Ben From hachti at hachti.de Fri Dec 19 00:03:58 2008 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 07:03:58 +0100 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: <494B33A5.50606@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> <494B33A5.50606@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <494B394E.8080000@hachti.de> Ben, > Sometime late January, I hope to have the logic for a 20 bit cpu using 5 > CPLD's, > I find them a little more DIY freindly than FPGA's. Expect to have > ballpark PDP-8/e > speeds with but I have run with .8 us static ram memory cycle because I > can't use > the trick the PDP-8 uses for address generation, but run address generation > thru the main adder. That is the price you pay for modern features like > a Stack pointer > or Index register. No. That's the price for using arrays of CPLDs. In an FPGA you get waste amounts of logic and very fast RAM. The only hassle is soldering FPGAs. But cheap development boards can be found. > The fun part here is just having I/O pins just to > display the AC, Mar and data > from the last memory cycle, and a Switch register. Good luck with your > design > on those features. Where's the problem? I currently use a VGA front panel (view only) to see what my "machine" is doing :-) So everybody else can do that, too - on an FPGA, of course :-) Apropos "main adder": one thing about my PDP-8 design: It is designed for speed, not for size. So there are a lot of adders - no adder will get it's input switched. I always have a PC+1, PC+2, AC+1, MD+1, etc. Results are selected by multiplexers. Philipp -- http://www.hachti.de From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Fri Dec 19 00:19:59 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 23:19:59 -0700 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: <494B3079.3040204@hachti.de> References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494AB08B.8080708@jetnet.ab.ca> <494B3079.3040204@hachti.de> Message-ID: <494B3D0F.9080408@jetnet.ab.ca> Philipp Hachtmann wrote: > To be clear: > My PDP-8 currently does 50000000 additions/second. Or 100000000 operate > or jump instructions/second. Well that does make it the fastest 8 on the planet. > Best wishes, > Philipp I am lucky if I can get normal memory speeds ( min 1970's ) with my CPLD design but most the problem is that I have to use slow I/O chips. I don't use pipelining with my design so I figure I have about 4 gate delays for control signals, 4 gate delays for datapath logic and 4 x 2 gate delays for carry to ripple. With the cheap chips I have ( 20 ns delay ) I have no problem with creating a computer up to 2 Mhz ... nice and slow but it does fit my goal what cpu that is not 8 or 12 bits wide on the data path. The 20 bit cpu alas can't be a (fictional) single chip cpu since I can't fit it into a 48 pin dip. I am two pins extra. [1] Ben. [1] They are inputs so I might be able to multiplex them in but it is messy. From vrs at msn.com Fri Dec 19 00:30:57 2008 From: vrs at msn.com (Vincent Slyngstad) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 22:30:57 -0800 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> Message-ID: From: "Philipp Hachtmann" Sent: Thursday, December 18, 2008 11:08 AM >> I've got the code running FOCAL and other stuff in John's configuration, >> and the 8/i front panel is pretty much working in that configuration. > How is it attached? Shift registers? Forgot this bit earlier...yes. The bits are shifted into place and latched until the next value is available. There are 89 lights IIRC, and 96 bits of shift register. The 26 switches are embedded in a 32 bit input shift register. Since the shift registers move quite fast, it completely swamps the lamps' ability to change brightness. Unlike the VGA display, I haven't observed any "beat frequency" artifacts. Vince From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Fri Dec 19 00:30:18 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 23:30:18 -0700 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: <494B394E.8080000@hachti.de> References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> <494B33A5.50606@jetnet.ab.ca> <494B394E.8080000@hachti.de> Message-ID: <494B3F7A.5090606@jetnet.ab.ca> Philipp Hachtmann wrote: > Ben, > No. That's the price for using arrays of CPLDs. > In an FPGA you get waste amounts of logic and very fast RAM. The only > hassle is soldering FPGAs. > But cheap development boards can be found. That is the real reasion I don't use them ... times may have changed but when I looked several years ago all the development kits did not have a easy way to program the config Proms. > So everybody else can do that, too - on an FPGA, of course :-) I got a CPLD why can't I have the same fun too! Oddly the only cheap way to program the CPLD's is with CUPL and all the designs for a VGA display I can't compile easly. > Apropos "main adder": one thing about my PDP-8 design: It is designed > for speed, not for size. So there are a lot of > adders - no adder will get it's input switched. I always have a PC+1, > PC+2, AC+1, MD+1, etc. > Results are selected by multiplexers. Good design, since you have logic to burn. > Philipp > From hachti at hachti.de Fri Dec 19 00:38:14 2008 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 07:38:14 +0100 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> Message-ID: <494B4156.7000400@hachti.de> Hi Vince, > You definitely need the "reset" that the CAF instruction (and the > "clear" key on an 8/e triggers). For an 8/i, it's BINITIALIZE, > which is triggered by the "start" key on the front panel. Will add that - currently there is no proper CAF instruction *g* - Will be built in... >> If multiple IO devices are to be connected, the IN lines (to the CPU) >> must be OR'ed together. > > The original PDP-8's have these active low, and a logical OR is > implemented with wire-and, via open-collector drivers. I know. But there's no open collector logic in an FPGA (as I know). >> When my project is in a usable state, I would like to put it on >> opencores.org. > > Cool! It might be an interesting point to work from for what Henk > and I are trying to do. :-) >> VHDL or Verilog code? > > VHDL. Nice. I like it, too :-) Using Xemacs' VHDL mode. >> How is it attached? Shift registers? How is the front panel attached to the rest of the system? > Most of them -- Skips are never skipping, and all IOTs clear AC. > Shouldn't be too hard to fix, but I haven't really looked into > it yet. I would love to take a glance at the code...!! >>> I have recently started to implement a "direct coding" of the 8/i >>> schematics in VHDL. That will hopefully give a "clock accurate" >>> implementation of the 8/i. >> What a task!!! >> If you try the real thing, you will get lots of angry warnings about >> flip flop clock input abuse! DEC used the D-flip flops with preset and >> clear in a (today) very uncommon way....! > > I'm hoping to get around that by declaring TP1...TP4 (and *strobe*, etc.) > to be the clocks, and re-expressing the latches so that they are clocked > by an "official" clock. I don't know yet how well that is working out, > as it's buried in with the other 188 warnings-of-the-moment. That still sounds **EVIL** ! FPGAs are made for fully synchronous designs with only a single clock (or with a few clock domnains, of course). What you are doing is using LOTS of gated clocks. The tools don't like that. They expect clocks coming from global clock nets (GBUF for Xilinx). You have only a few of these. I have another idea: Write a D-flip-flop with R/S module and instantiate it in your design. Make everything synchronous to ONE system clock. DON'T use asynchronous stuff. FPGA can do real latches, but everybody (including the tools) start yelling if you do that.... I attach a code snippet.. Best wishes, Philipp :-) -- http://www.hachti.de From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Fri Dec 19 00:53:10 2008 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 22:53:10 -0800 (PST) Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <02925BBBC6C045C08DA0649D79C90ACB@p4266> References: <02925BBBC6C045C08DA0649D79C90ACB@p4266> Message-ID: On Thu, 18 Dec 2008, Martin Marshall wrote: > A quick question - where can one get a cable for a Model M. I have a couple > of Model M's but no cables. Haven't really searched, but the discussion > reminded me. Right here: http://pckeyboards.stores.yahoo.net/cabdetmin.html -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? From hachti at hachti.de Fri Dec 19 00:58:17 2008 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 07:58:17 +0100 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: <494B3F7A.5090606@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> <494B33A5.50606@jetnet.ab.ca> <494B394E.8080000@hachti.de> <494B3F7A.5090606@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <494B4609.6050606@hachti.de> > That is the real reasion I don't use them ... times may have changed > but when I looked several years ago all the development kits > did not have a easy way to program the config Proms. No easy way? It's TOTALLY hassle-free! With Xilinx, you just have to press a few buttons to compile and load your design. Works wonderfully! Many development boards come with USB and Windows software. That's the easiest way. I use a JTAG cable under Linux. Works perfectly. I can program the FPGA or the flash. >> So everybody else can do that, too - on an FPGA, of course :-) > > I got a CPLD why can't I have the same fun too! > Oddly the only cheap way to program the CPLD's is with CUPL > and all the designs for a VGA display I can't compile easly. Hehe :-) I've never used a CPLD... I started with FPGAs. >> Apropos "main adder": one thing about my PDP-8 design: It is designed >> for speed, not for size. So there are a lot of >> adders - no adder will get it's input switched. I always have a PC+1, >> PC+2, AC+1, MD+1, etc. >> Results are selected by multiplexers. The CPU roughly works as follows: In the first phase, decode, the opcode is already at the output of the RAM. Memory data is wired to the instruction decoder which makes a lot of tiny signals. All those signals are registered afterwards. Subsequent cycles in the same instruction use the registeres variants. Every register has a source select signal (with own VHDL type *g*) and a load enable signal. The state register is always loaded with the "next_state" signal. All control signals including next_state are made in the combinatorial sequencing process - it's a monster! There exist evil things like pc_next, ac_next etc. They're determined by the selector multiplexers. In the last cycle of an operation, load_pc is enabled, memory address source select set to "pc_next". Then, after the clock, the cpu halts in the decode state or continues. On power-on, one fetch cycle is forced, and the CPU halts in decode state as well. With PC loaded and memory data lines containing the instruction. ISZ I needs to store the pointer while it does other things with the memory. The MD register serves only for that purpose. A "true" memory data display like in the old machine would need a little bit of additional logic. But it's not too difficult to build. http://hachti.de/download/major_states.pdf > Good design, since you have logic to burn. Thanks. I HAVE logic to burn... The CPU with much additional stuff like VGA interface and useless PS/2 mouse interface currently fills about 60% of a Spartan-3 200K chip. The CPU takes (estimated, could have grown) between 20% and 30% of the chip. Most boards nowadays come with 400K, 500K, 1000K or 1200K gates FPGAs... :-) So... Why should I keep it small.... Philipp -- http://www.hachti.de From hachti at hachti.de Fri Dec 19 01:00:16 2008 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 08:00:16 +0100 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> Message-ID: <494B4680.7050501@hachti.de> > Since the shift registers move quite fast, it completely > swamps the lamps' ability to change brightness. Unlike the VGA display, > I haven't observed any "beat frequency" artifacts. I know the VGA problem... Happens only if I restrict the update to the blanking period... If I don't restrict, I get a slight stranger image, but the real blinkenlight effect :-) -- http://www.hachti.de From vrs at msn.com Fri Dec 19 01:03:39 2008 From: vrs at msn.com (Vincent Slyngstad) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 23:03:39 -0800 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> <494B4156.7000400@hachti.de> Message-ID: From: "Philipp Hachtmann" Sent: Thursday, December 18, 2008 10:38 PM >> The original PDP-8's have these active low, and a logical OR is >> implemented with wire-and, via open-collector drivers. > I know. But there's no open collector logic in an FPGA (as I know). You can emulate that in std_logic with a single driver driving an "H" (the "pull-up"), and everyone else drives either "0" or "Z". >> VHDL. > Nice. I like it, too :-) > Using Xemacs' VHDL mode. As an ex-software guy, I find VHDL counter-intuitive and kinda ugly, but it's what Hans used :-). I'm using the Xilinx ISE built in editor. >> I'm hoping to get around that by declaring TP1...TP4 (and *strobe*, etc.) >> to be the clocks, and re-expressing the latches so that they are clocked >> by an "official" clock. I don't know yet how well that is working out, >> as it's buried in with the other 188 warnings-of-the-moment. > > That still sounds **EVIL** ! > FPGAs are made for fully synchronous designs with only a single clock (or > with a few clock domnains, > of course). > What you are doing is using LOTS of gated clocks. The tools don't like > that. They expect clocks > coming from global clock nets (GBUF for Xilinx). You have only a few of > these. No, I'm trying to re-express everything in a few clock domains, namely the timing pulses at the beginning of the cycle. The rest goes in the combinatorial part of the thing: if (tp4'event and tp4 = '1') then fetch <= f_set; defer <= d_set; execute <= e_set; word_count <= wc_set; current_address <= word_count; break <= b_set; end if; and dozens more like it :-). > I have another idea: > Write a D-flip-flop with R/S module and instantiate it in your design. > Make everything synchronous > to ONE system clock. DON'T use asynchronous stuff. FPGA can do real > latches, but everybody > (including the tools) start yelling if you do that.... Yeah, I've seen that. Vince From hachti at hachti.de Fri Dec 19 01:08:25 2008 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 08:08:25 +0100 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: <494B3D0F.9080408@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494AB08B.8080708@jetnet.ab.ca> <494B3079.3040204@hachti.de> <494B3D0F.9080408@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <494B4869.9040801@hachti.de> >> To be clear: >> My PDP-8 currently does 50000000 additions/second. Or 100000000 >> operate or jump instructions/second. > > Well that does make it the fastest 8 on the planet. There's ONE problem: SIMH on a modern PC runs MUCH faster! > I am lucky if I can get normal memory speeds ( min 1970's ) with my > CPLD design Hm... Ok. When I turn on a real PDP-8, 1200ns is normal. But today... > but most the problem is that I have to use slow I/O chips. I don't use > pipelining > with my design so I figure I have about 4 gate delays for control > signals, 4 gate delays > for datapath logic and 4 x 2 gate delays for carry to ripple. I have much more gate delays: > ========================================================================= > Timing constraint: Default period analysis for Clock 'clk_50mhz' > Clock period: 20.448ns (frequency: 48.905MHz) > Total number of paths / destination ports: 48839 / 1336 > ------------------------------------------------------------------------- > Delay: 10.224ns (Levels of Logic = 8) > Source: cpu/pdp8_registers_1/major_state_reg_3_1 (FF) > Destination: cpu/pdp8_registers_1/ac_reg_10 (FF) > Source Clock: clk_50mhz rising 2.0X > Destination Clock: clk_50mhz rising 2.0X > > Data Path: cpu/pdp8_registers_1/major_state_reg_3_1 to cpu/pdp8_registers_1/ac_reg_10 > Gate Net > Cell:in->out fanout Delay Delay Logical Name (Net Name) > ---------------------------------------- ------------ > FDCE:C->Q 2 0.720 1.072 cpu/pdp8_registers_1/major_state_reg_3_1 (cpu/pdp8_registers_1/major_state_reg_3_1) > LUT3_L:I1->LO 1 0.551 0.126 tty/_xor00001_SW0 (N4280) > LUT4:I3->O 7 0.551 1.134 tty/_xor00001 (tty/_xor0000) > LUT4:I2->O 14 0.551 1.213 tty/_mux005311 (io_cmd_ac_or) > LUT4:I3->O 1 0.551 0.000 cpu/ac_next<10>6_G (N4461) > MUXF5:I1->O 2 0.360 0.903 cpu/ac_next<10>6 (cpu/ac_next<10>_map3256) > LUT4:I3->O 1 0.551 0.000 cpu/ac_next<10>111_SW0_F (N4426) > MUXF5:I0->O 1 0.360 0.827 cpu/ac_next<10>111_SW0 (N4272) > LUT4:I3->O 1 0.551 0.000 cpu/ac_next<10>135 (cpu/ac_next<10>) > FDCE:D 0.203 cpu/pdp8_registers_1/ac_reg_10 > ---------------------------------------- > Total 10.224ns (4.949ns logic, 5.275ns route) > (48.4% logic, 51.6% route) The times are only the synthesis estimates! In reality, it gets other timings (currently it wants 17ns - but runs with 10 *g*) > With the > cheap chips I have > ( 20 ns delay ) I have no problem with creating a computer up to 2 Mhz > ... nice and slow 20ns per stage? Ok, I understand... > The 20 bit cpu alas can't be a (fictional) single chip cpu since I can't > fit it into a 48 pin dip. > I am two pins extra. [1] ?? There are other packages :-) Xilinx Spartan-II, Spartan-3 and Spartan-3e at least can be found in handy 144 pin packages. They *can* be soldered manually. It's easier than everybody thinks. BGAs are quite impossible... And all the bigger Chips (>400k) are only available in BGA package :-( Philipp :-) -- http://www.hachti.de From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Fri Dec 19 01:15:51 2008 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 23:15:51 -0800 Subject: Sherwood Micro CPU/100 References: <494AE884.3080004@bitsavers.org> <494B155B.9F606E99@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: <494B4A27.589908D0@cs.ubc.ca> Ethan Dicks wrote: > > On Thu, Dec 18, 2008 at 11:49 PM, Ian King wrote: > > >From what I read: it not only 'runs the digital display' but allows you to create a dictionary associating the frequency with a station's call letters. Rather slick, for the era. > > That is slick. I still don't have any gear that does that (but I've > seen car stereos that must be getting that sort of info over the air). It was fun to play with for a bit once they were working, of course you can set in whatever four-letter word for a station you wish. The alphanumeric display uses LED dot-matrix units, so it's a much nicer display than the usual 7-segment types. There's also a slide-rule tuning display of a row of LEDs to keep those who couldn't make the transition to pure digital in one jump happy [*]. Capacitive touch-sensitive buttons for presets and scanning using 555 timers as the sensors, along with an optical rotary tuning knob. The 1802 handles all this and calculates the factor to load into the PLL divider for the synthesised tuning. Various other technical features. It's something of a tour-de-force of 70's technology/electronics design, although the actual physical construction leaves something to be desired, (IMHO). The downside is that all that stored state (presets, frequencies, call letters) required batteries to hold the CMOS memory, and of course they used NiCd's, mounted on the main power supply board. And of course they leak. The units I worked on required significant rebuilding. [*] I remember the consternation the transition from analog to digital clocks caused in the mid-70s. Many people seemed to have difficulty with it and were somehow concerned that it might 'change our perception of time'. From hachti at hachti.de Fri Dec 19 01:16:13 2008 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 08:16:13 +0100 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> <494B4156.7000400@hachti.de> Message-ID: <494B4A3D.2050804@hachti.de> > You can emulate that in std_logic with a single driver driving an "H" > (the "pull-up"), and everyone else drives either "0" or "Z". Yes. You can write that. But the synthesis tool - if it eats that - will generate many ORs... So avoid it. In the company I have worked a bit for, MANY constructs were simply forbidden. Thinks like Z, H, L in std_logic are suspicious :-) >>> VHDL. >> Nice. I like it, too :-) >> Using Xemacs' VHDL mode. > > As an ex-software guy, I find VHDL counter-intuitive and kinda ugly, > but it's what Hans used :-). I'm using the Xilinx ISE built in editor. Oh, if you have your first screwed Verilog design... Try Xemacs. Writes the code for you. Much of the typing is done for you automagically. You can also copy an entity and paste as component or instance etc. Without the Xemacs, I would HATE VHDL!!! > No, I'm trying to re-express everything in a few clock domains, namely > the timing pulses at the beginning of the cycle. The rest goes in the > combinatorial part of the thing: Timing pulses come at the END of a timing state! TS1 is the state, left with TP1... > if (tp4'event and tp4 = '1') then > fetch <= f_set; > defer <= d_set; > execute <= e_set; > word_count <= wc_set; > current_address <= word_count; > break <= b_set; > end if; That's sequential coding!! So I will see how you get it working your way. Everybody has his/her own way :-) I once thought of a gate level transformation of the Honeywell H316 into an FPGA. That's even more difficult: Nearly the whole machine is built from NAND-gates :-) So they have really cool things like a flip flop with many OC gates pulling it down. And no clock at all, only transport pulses... Philipp -- http://www.hachti.de From vrs at msn.com Fri Dec 19 01:16:37 2008 From: vrs at msn.com (Vincent Slyngstad) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 23:16:37 -0800 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> <494B4680.7050501@hachti.de> Message-ID: From: "Philipp Hachtmann" Sent: Thursday, December 18, 2008 11:00 PM > > Since the shift registers move quite fast, it completely >> swamps the lamps' ability to change brightness. Unlike the VGA display, >> I haven't observed any "beat frequency" artifacts. > I know the VGA problem... Happens only if I restrict the update to the > blanking period... > If I don't restrict, I get a slight stranger image, but the real > blinkenlight effect :-) I have had the VGA and the incandescent lamps running side-by-side, so I can see how "wrong" the VGA stuff looks :-). There is stuff flashing on and off in the VGA display that should just be "on dimly", all over the place. It gives a misleading impression that things are happening on a human timescale that just aren't. Of course, for single stepping, the VGA display is OK, since the display is "static" until you press a switch (or a key on the keyboard, in the case of my VGA display). The VGA display is *way* better than no lights, though :-). Vince From IanK at vulcan.com Fri Dec 19 01:18:51 2008 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 23:18:51 -0800 Subject: Sherwood Micro CPU/100 In-Reply-To: <494B4A27.589908D0@cs.ubc.ca> References: <494AE884.3080004@bitsavers.org> <494B155B.9F606E99@cs.ubc.ca> , <494B4A27.589908D0@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: Well, it did. My nine-year-old daughter has a hard time with me telling her it's "a quarter to nine" when it is, in fact, 8:42. The convenience of rounding is something I'm working to help her appreciate. There's a practical side, too: when I'm trying to get her ready for school in the morning, she'll cling to the useless fact that she has "three more minutes" before it's time to go, during which she can supposedly write a sonnet, create a work of art, and find her socks, shoes and a suitable coat. 'Perception of time', indeed.... -- Ian ________________________________________ [snip] [*] I remember the consternation the transition from analog to digital clocks caused in the mid-70s. Many people seemed to have difficulty with it and were somehow concerned that it might 'change our perception of time'. From vrs at msn.com Fri Dec 19 01:36:33 2008 From: vrs at msn.com (Vincent Slyngstad) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 23:36:33 -0800 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> <494B4156.7000400@hachti.de> <494B4A3D.2050804@hachti.de> Message-ID: From: "Philipp Hachtmann" Sent: Thursday, December 18, 2008 11:16 PM >> You can emulate that in std_logic with a single driver driving an "H" >> (the "pull-up"), and everyone else drives either "0" or "Z". > Yes. You can write that. But the synthesis tool - if it eats that - will > generate > many ORs... So avoid it. In the company I have worked a bit for, MANY > constructs > were simply forbidden. Thinks like Z, H, L in std_logic are suspicious :-) The advantage being that you didn't need to round up all the signals and OR them yourself :-). (I believe you do get yet more warnings, though.) >> No, I'm trying to re-express everything in a few clock domains, namely >> the timing pulses at the beginning of the cycle. The rest goes in the >> combinatorial part of the thing: > Timing pulses come at the END of a timing state! > TS1 is the state, left with TP1... Well, that's a matter of perspective, since the end of TS4 is just as easily thought of as the start of TS1. Thus TP4 triggers the setting of TS1 and initiates all the work of TS1. >> if (tp4'event and tp4 = '1') then >> fetch <= f_set; >> defer <= d_set; >> execute <= e_set; >> word_count <= wc_set; >> current_address <= word_count; >> break <= b_set; >> end if; > That's sequential coding!! Not sure what the epithet "sequential coding" means in this context. There is combinatoric logic elsewhere computing the new values for these 6 latches, which take their new values at the beginning of TP4. > I once thought of a gate level transformation of the Honeywell H316 into > an FPGA. That's even more > difficult: Nearly the whole machine is built from NAND-gates :-) > So they have really cool things like a flip flop with many OC gates > pulling it down. And no clock at all, only transport pulses... Much of the earlier R/S stuff in the straight-8 feels that way to me. Lots of transistors just being yanked this way and that. Then again, every time I look at the 8/i drawings, they seem more synchronous, so maybe it's just that I haven't fully understood the older machines yet. Vince From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Fri Dec 19 01:39:46 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 02:39:46 -0500 Subject: Timekeeping (was Re: Sherwood Micro CPU/100) Message-ID: On Fri, Dec 19, 2008 at 2:18 AM, Ian King wrote: > Well, it did. My nine-year-old daughter has a hard time with me telling her it's "a quarter to nine" when it is, in fact, 8:42. The convenience of rounding is something I'm working to help her appreciate. There's a practical side, too: when I'm trying to get her ready for school in the morning, she'll cling to the useless fact that she has "three more minutes" before it's time to go, during which she can supposedly write a sonnet, create a work of art, and find her socks, shoes and a suitable coat. 'Perception of time', indeed.... -- Ian > > [*] I remember the consternation the transition from analog to digital clocks > caused in the mid-70s. Many people seemed to have difficulty with it and were > somehow concerned that it might 'change our perception of time'. I just watched the Quartz Clock episode of "The Secret Life of Machines", and there was a bit in there about that - the animated character was trying to figure out how late he was to the opera by "doing the math" in his head about what time his digital watch showed and when the curtain would rise on the performance. He gave up with his sums and asked another animated character what the time was on her analog watch - he quickly saw the minuscule number of degrees difference between now and they and understood how late he was. It used to be a big deal to learn how to tell approximate time when learning foreign languages, but perhaps now that quartz/electric motor analog watches are inexpensive (certainly compared to a mechanical watch), knowing that it's "half past ten" or "ten to eleven" will become fashionable once again. My first watch was a "cheap" ($15?) digital LED watch, c. 1978. I got a Timex mechanical watch for a graduation present a few years later, but I guess I gave it more of a licking than it could stand, because I remember tearing it apart less than 5 years later (because it didn't work, not just to see what was inside). I don't really miss the Timex, but I miss those glowing red digits. Much more recently, someone got me a modern BCD/binary watch from ThinkGeek. I like it, but I've been reading binary clocks since they were popular when I was a kid. I remember trying to find a binary clock kit between about 1982 and 1992 and they just couldn't be found anywhere. That pendulum has certainly swung the other way (pun intended). Now if I could just find where I stashed my 4000-series CMOS and ~100 LED clock from the late 1970s that I picked up at a St Vincent DePaul's a couple of years back - I need to find which of the 30ish chips has a bad gate and consider replacing the LEDs with new, non-age-dimmed ones. It's a pretty neat clock, made in Indiana (can't remember where right now), and has a couple of concentric rings of LEDs to simulate analog hands. It mostly worked when I got it home, but there's a stray "ghost" hand that comes and goes as the time ticks around the face. So many ways to tell time in the modern era. This is a huge change from a few centuries ago, when a marked stick was close enough. -ethan From michaelgreen42 at comcast.net Fri Dec 19 01:43:04 2008 From: michaelgreen42 at comcast.net (Michael) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 23:43:04 -0800 Subject: Subject: Re: Mac II's, IIx's, IIci's In-Reply-To: <200812190440.mBJ4eHIs061043@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812190440.mBJ4eHIs061043@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <00e601c961ad$6f1e8f40$4d5badc0$@net> BTW I'm located in Fife WA. From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Fri Dec 19 01:49:04 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 00:49:04 -0700 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: <494B4869.9040801@hachti.de> References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494AB08B.8080708@jetnet.ab.ca> <494B3079.3040204@hachti.de> <494B3D0F.9080408@jetnet.ab.ca> <494B4869.9040801@hachti.de> Message-ID: <494B51F0.6090305@jetnet.ab.ca> Philipp Hachtmann wrote: > There's ONE problem: SIMH on a modern PC runs MUCH faster! Why worry , use a older PC :) > The times are only the synthesis estimates! In reality, it gets other > timings (currently it wants 17ns - but runs with 10 *g*) But who knows when the timing will getya ?? > 20ns per stage? Ok, I understand... > >> The 20 bit cpu alas can't be a (fictional) single chip cpu since I >> can't fit it into a 48 pin dip. >> I am two pins extra. [1] I said fictional ... I am using sockted 84 pin PLCC's... I got the chips and I got the sockets. Now I can't find a PCB layout program with a 84 pin plcc socket. I am using DipTrace and have made up my own socket but I am working on logic design. > ?? There are other packages :-) Xilinx Spartan-II, Spartan-3 and > Spartan-3e at least > can be found in handy 144 pin packages. They *can* be soldered manually. > It's easier than > everybody thinks. BGAs are quite impossible... And all the bigger Chips > (>400k) are only available > in BGA package :-( I am trying for thru the hole parts here,I don't need micro-microchips :) I just was looking my logic again and I can multi-plex my needed inputs so the logic is not dirty as I thought - just add a quad 2/1 multiplexer. Other than clock and front panel switch debouncing and encoding, most of my TTL is just glue. This gives me I about 8" x 10" PCB for the CPU, I/O chips and 96Kb of memory and some space for EEPROM's. The other PCB will be the front panel with about 60 lights and 24 switches. > Philipp :-) > > From martinm at allwest.net Fri Dec 19 01:55:39 2008 From: martinm at allwest.net (Martin Marshall) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 00:55:39 -0700 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <77716853364A458BA3ADC657E7A46A1D@p4266> Thanks - done > -----Original Message----- > From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org > [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of David Griffith > Sent: Thursday, December 18, 2008 11:53 PM > To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts > Subject: RE: USB Model M > > > On Thu, 18 Dec 2008, Martin Marshall wrote: > > > A quick question - where can one get a cable for a Model M. > I have a > > couple of Model M's but no cables. Haven't really > searched, but the > > discussion reminded me. > > Right here: http://pckeyboards.stores.yahoo.net/cabdetmin.html > > -- > David Griffith > dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu > > A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. > Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? > A: Top-posting. > Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? > From martinm at allwest.net Fri Dec 19 02:02:30 2008 From: martinm at allwest.net (Martin Marshall) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 01:02:30 -0700 Subject: Scrapping Sun IPX and IPC Message-ID: <41C5A495A6024015B639AE7838BAAA2F@p4266> These are going to recycle. Does anyone need any parts? Reply off-line to "martinm" at the domain "allwest.net". Thanks, Martin From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Fri Dec 19 02:04:50 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 01:04:50 -0700 Subject: Timekeeping (was Re: Sherwood Micro CPU/100) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <494B55A2.8070807@jetnet.ab.ca> Ethan Dicks wrote: > So many ways to tell time in the modern era. This is a huge change > from a few centuries ago, when a marked stick was close enough. Nope ... Looks out side, it is dark but is it after midight yet? Hard to tell with this candle what notch my sundial stick is at. While you don't get time as accurate as moden clocks sundial and moondials are still interesting time telling devices. > -ethan > From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Fri Dec 19 02:16:37 2008 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 00:16:37 -0800 (PST) Subject: Scrapping Sun IPX and IPC In-Reply-To: <41C5A495A6024015B639AE7838BAAA2F@p4266> References: <41C5A495A6024015B639AE7838BAAA2F@p4266> Message-ID: On Fri, 19 Dec 2008, Martin Marshall wrote: > These are going to recycle. Does anyone need any parts? Reply off-line to > "martinm" at the domain "allwest.net". Someone at least give that IPX a good home. NetBSD will run great on it. -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Fri Dec 19 02:20:18 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 03:20:18 -0500 Subject: Timekeeping (was Re: Sherwood Micro CPU/100) In-Reply-To: <494B55A2.8070807@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <494B55A2.8070807@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: On Fri, Dec 19, 2008 at 3:04 AM, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > Ethan Dicks wrote: > >> So many ways to tell time in the modern era. This is a huge change >> from a few centuries ago, when a marked stick was close enough. > > Nope ... Looks out side, it is dark but is it after midight yet? Hard to > tell with this candle what notch my sundial stick is at. There were also time-keeping candles - obviously the size and composition of the candles will affect burn rate, but for acceptable levels of accuracy of the time, burning calibrated candles would suffice for whatever hours you happened to be awake after sunset (we take electric light completely for granted after 100+ years of it, but formerly, there was a lot more rising and sleeping with the sun going on than now). > While you don't get time as accurate as moden clocks > sundial and moondials are still interesting time telling devices. Yes they are. I've only ever fiddled a little bit with telling time by the moon, but I did build a sundial at Pole - it was easy - the normal calculations all cancel out (think of "tangent of 90 degrees"), and I effectively made what looks like a dartboard, divided into 24 equal-angle slices. Piece of cake (or is that pi?) One of these days, I should make a sundial for 40N (Columbus, OH). It would be a nice accompaniment to all of my newfangled clocks. -ethan From frustum at pacbell.net Fri Dec 19 02:47:18 2008 From: frustum at pacbell.net (Jim Battle) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 02:47:18 -0600 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> <494B4680.7050501@hachti.de> Message-ID: <494B5F96.40904@pacbell.net> Vincent Slyngstad wrote: > From: "Philipp Hachtmann" > Sent: Thursday, December 18, 2008 11:00 PM >> > Since the shift registers move quite fast, it completely >>> swamps the lamps' ability to change brightness. Unlike the VGA display, >>> I haven't observed any "beat frequency" artifacts. >> I know the VGA problem... Happens only if I restrict the update to the >> blanking period... >> If I don't restrict, I get a slight stranger image, but the real >> blinkenlight effect :-) > > I have had the VGA and the incandescent lamps running side-by-side, so I > can see how "wrong" the VGA stuff looks :-). There is stuff flashing on > and off in the VGA display that should just be "on dimly", all over the > place. It gives a misleading impression that things are happening on > a human timescale that just aren't. Of course, for single stepping, > the VGA display is OK, since the display is "static" until you press > a switch (or a key on the keyboard, in the case of my VGA display). > > The VGA display is *way* better than no lights, though :-). > > Vince > An emulator I am developing for a machine (Wang 3300) with a front panel would suffer the same problem too. It is really an aliasing problem. You are attempting to sample a 1 MHz signal at 60 Hz, so what do you expect? My solution in the emulator is to compute the ratio of on/off over that 1/60th of a second and then use that to display an image of a lamp. Actually, I go one better than that. I have a simple first order time constant model of the lamp so that it doesn't go from 0->100% in 1/60th of a second. new_intensity = K*old_intensity + (1-K)*new_duty_cycle. Pick K to approximate the thermal inertia of the lamp. Oh, to keep from having to compute a tally of all the lamps after each instruction simulation cycle, I have an array of 256 counters for each byte of address or data bus. So for a given byte, after each instruction I just do: histo[byte_value]++. At the time it comes to display each lamp, I look at all the buckets and figure out the average duty cycle for each of the 8 lamps in the group. Those two solve the sampling problem to a sufficient degree that I'm done tweaking with it. From tosteve at yahoo.com Fri Dec 19 05:48:01 2008 From: tosteve at yahoo.com (steven stengel) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 03:48:01 -0800 (PST) Subject: Canon Cat: what density 3.5"? Message-ID: <410211.70575.qm@web110603.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> DSDD floppy disks work fine, but I don't believe that you can buy them anymore. I think the Cat only uses 265K of disk space, and will format them if required. Steve. --- On Thu, 12/18/08, Cameron Kaiser wrote: From: Cameron Kaiser Subject: Canon Cat: what density 3.5"? To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Date: Thursday, December 18, 2008, 8:04 PM What type of 3.5" floppies are people using in their Cats? Would off-the-shelf double-density suffice? Any special preparation required? -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- ? Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- Nuclear war would really set back cable. -- Ted Turner --------------------- From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Fri Dec 19 06:49:12 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 12:49:12 +0000 Subject: Canon Cat: what density 3.5"? In-Reply-To: <410211.70575.qm@web110603.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> References: <410211.70575.qm@web110603.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <494B9848.40006@gjcp.net> steven stengel wrote: > DSDD floppy disks work fine, but I don't believe that you can buy them anymore. > I think the Cat only uses 265K of disk space, and will format them if required. > Steve. We just had this conversation on the Ensoniq Mirage mailing lists. There are plenty of places selling DSDD disks on eBay. The last lot I bought appeared to be reasonably new (manufacturing dates on the carton in this century), rather than NOS. Gordon From db at db.net Fri Dec 19 08:02:37 2008 From: db at db.net (Diane Bruce) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 09:02:37 -0500 Subject: radio shack catalogs In-Reply-To: <009101c95e2a$fc616b10$c004010a@dis754cbb81360> References: <49453E7E.5040009@atarimuseum.com> <009101c95e2a$fc616b10$c004010a@dis754cbb81360> Message-ID: <20081219140237.GA84239@night.db.net> On Sun, Dec 14, 2008 at 08:31:41PM -0000, a.carlini wrote: > David Griffith wrote: > > Someone on comp.os.cpm pointed this out. I don't recall anyone doing > so > > here. http://www.radioshackcatalogs.com/. Mmm... Fond memories of > when > > Radio Shack didn't stink. > I noticed this today on a RSS feed, a article on Radio Shack historically speaking: http://www.arrl.org/news/features/2008/12/19/10513/ - Diane (VA3DB) -- - db at FreeBSD.org db at db.net http://www.db.net/~db From dkelvey at hotmail.com Fri Dec 19 08:41:12 2008 From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 06:41:12 -0800 Subject: Canon Cat: what density 3.5"? In-Reply-To: <494B9848.40006@gjcp.net> References: <410211.70575.qm@web110603.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <494B9848.40006@gjcp.net> Message-ID: > From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net > > steven stengel wrote: >> DSDD floppy disks work fine, but I don't believe that you can buy them anymore. >> I think the Cat only uses 265K of disk space, and will format them if required. >> Steve. > > We just had this conversation on the Ensoniq Mirage mailing lists. > There are plenty of places selling DSDD disks on eBay. The last lot I > bought appeared to be reasonably new (manufacturing dates on the carton > in this century), rather than NOS. > > Gordon Hi I've been using 1.44M disk without much problems. I usually format them several times. There is a disk surface test in the ROMs that I've used a number of times. I expect that the drive doesn't write as deeply into the surface and once the disk is cleaned well enough, the 1.44M disk work OK. A bulk erase would most likely be enough. It is really suppose to use 720K disk but the drive is only single sided. I've fiddled in the Forth code with the disk. The disk is a full 360K on the one side but the Cat only uses 256K part of it since that is all that is needed for the editor. One could hide special code or data in the unused parts. Dwight Googles group for the Cat is canon-cat _________________________________________________________________ It?s the same Hotmail?. If by ?same? you mean up to 70% faster. http://windowslive.com/online/hotmail?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_hotmail_acq_broad1_122008 From halarewich at gmail.com Fri Dec 19 08:55:49 2008 From: halarewich at gmail.com (Chris Halarewich) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 06:55:49 -0800 Subject: Canon Cat: what density 3.5"? In-Reply-To: <494B9848.40006@gjcp.net> References: <410211.70575.qm@web110603.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <494B9848.40006@gjcp.net> Message-ID: <6d6501090812190655v20c40995jfb75c158d167f8d7@mail.gmail.com> heres a couple links to some dsdd floppies http://www.staples.com/office/supplies/p4_Floppy-Diskettes_97406_Business_Supplies_1_10051_SC3:CG1039:CL60200 10/3.29 http://www.staples.com/office/supplies/p4_Floppy-Diskettes_14717_Business_Supplies_1_10051_SC3:CG1039:CL60200 100/29.99 On 12/19/08, Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote: > > steven stengel wrote: > >> DSDD floppy disks work fine, but I don't believe that you can buy them >> anymore. I think the Cat only uses 265K of disk space, and will format them >> if required. >> Steve. >> > > We just had this conversation on the Ensoniq Mirage mailing lists. There > are plenty of places selling DSDD disks on eBay. The last lot I bought > appeared to be reasonably new (manufacturing dates on the carton in this > century), rather than NOS. > > Gordon > From hachti at hachti.de Fri Dec 19 08:58:17 2008 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 15:58:17 +0100 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> <494B4156.7000400@hachti.de> <494B4A3D.2050804@hachti.de> Message-ID: <494BB689.6080101@hachti.de> Hi, > The advantage being that you didn't need to round up all the signals > and OR them yourself :-). (I believe you do get yet more warnings, > though.) Yes, but the goal is to minimize warnings (haha!)..... > Well, that's a matter of perspective, since the end of TS4 is just as > easily thought of as the start of TS1. Thus TP4 triggers the setting > of TS1 and initiates all the work of TS1. Yes, of course. >>> if (tp4'event and tp4 = '1') then >>> fetch <= f_set; >>> defer <= d_set; >>> execute <= e_set; >>> word_count <= wc_set; >>> current_address <= word_count; >>> break <= b_set; >>> end if; >> That's sequential coding!! > > Not sure what the epithet "sequential coding" means in this context. > There is combinatoric logic elsewhere computing the new values for > these 6 latches, which take their new values at the beginning of TP4. Your code above does not result in latches. It results in D type flipflops! They're set on the rising edge of tp4. You would get latches if you omit the tp4'event part of the conditional expression. > every time I look at the 8/i drawings, they seem more synchronous, so > maybe it's just that I haven't fully understood the older machines yet. I have my problems understanding the control and sequencing in the old machines. Data paths are relatively clear and easy... Philipp -- http://www.hachti.de From hachti at hachti.de Fri Dec 19 09:01:22 2008 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 16:01:22 +0100 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: <494B5F96.40904@pacbell.net> References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> <494B4680.7050501@hachti.de> <494B5F96.40904@pacbell.net> Message-ID: <494BB742.7030301@hachti.de> > My solution in the emulator is to compute the ratio of on/off over that > 1/60th of a second and then use that to display an image of a lamp. > Actually, I go one better than that. I have a simple first order time > constant model of the lamp so that it doesn't go from 0->100% in 1/60th > of a second. new_intensity = K*old_intensity + (1-K)*new_duty_cycle. > Pick K to approximate the thermal inertia of the lamp. > > Oh, to keep from having to compute a tally of all the lamps after each > instruction simulation cycle, I have an array of 256 counters for each > byte of address or data bus. So for a given byte, after each instruction > I just do: histo[byte_value]++. At the time it comes to display each > lamp, I look at all the buckets and figure out the average duty cycle > for each of the 8 lamps in the group. A nice idea! But my VGA interface has only 3 bit... So I cannot display "soft" lights. Otherwise I would implement your approach, sounds good! Philipp -- http://www.hachti.de From hachti at hachti.de Fri Dec 19 09:04:15 2008 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 16:04:15 +0100 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> <494B4680.7050501@hachti.de> Message-ID: <494BB7EF.7030809@hachti.de> > I have had the VGA and the incandescent lamps running side-by-side, so I > can see how "wrong" the VGA stuff looks :-). There is stuff flashing on > and off in the VGA display that should just be "on dimly", all over the > place. It gives a misleading impression that things are happening on > a human timescale that just aren't. My VGA display works on the fly off the CPU signals. If I allow update during scanning of the visible image, my lamps begin to look a bit strange - but I think that they look correct. Sorry for not being able to provide a screenshot *g* -- http://www.hachti.de From mcguire at neurotica.com Fri Dec 19 09:09:38 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 10:09:38 -0500 Subject: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) In-Reply-To: <20081219031319.GQ5784@n0jcf.net> References: <4299.71.98.250.26.1229614199.squirrel@mail.neurotica.com> <20081219031319.GQ5784@n0jcf.net> Message-ID: <06555410-D4C2-4E6C-996A-9D558A31F6A6@neurotica.com> On Dec 18, 2008, at 10:13 PM, Chris Elmquist wrote: >>> There was a later PPS-4/1 single-chip version. I don't know how >>> popular >>> this >>> stuff was but I wonder if there aren't more PPS-4 systems buried in >>> equipment >>> and appliances from the period than is commonly known. (I have >>> wondered, >>> for >>> example, what the 70's-era Amana Radarange microwave ovens used for >>> control.) >> >> Umm...mechanical timers. > > No! it was a "Touchmatic". Had a capacitive keypad and LED display. > Very cool for 1974. Mom cooked a meatloaf in it in a bundt pan. Came > out indistinguishable from a lawn tractor tire. > > http://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/images/object_images/ > 277x265/10240744.jpg Ack, I stand corrected! I must've been thinking of another oven. -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From ian_primus at yahoo.com Fri Dec 19 09:10:51 2008 From: ian_primus at yahoo.com (Mr Ian Primus) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 07:10:51 -0800 (PST) Subject: Canon Cat: what density 3.5"? In-Reply-To: <6d6501090812190655v20c40995jfb75c158d167f8d7@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <395239.73879.qm@web52707.mail.re2.yahoo.com> --- On Fri, 12/19/08, Chris Halarewich wrote: > heres a couple links to some dsdd floppies> > http://www.staples.com/office/supplies/... Those are DSHD floppies. Different media. While these will _typically_ work, it's really best to use the proper disk. HD floppies tend not to be as reliable when used as DD floppies. If anyone needs DSDD floppies and can't find any, I found a source a while back and stocked up - perhaps too much. Let me know, and I'd be glad to sell some. -Ian From spectre at floodgap.com Fri Dec 19 09:13:58 2008 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 07:13:58 -0800 (PST) Subject: Canon Cat: what density 3.5"? In-Reply-To: <395239.73879.qm@web52707.mail.re2.yahoo.com> from Mr Ian Primus at "Dec 19, 8 07:10:51 am" Message-ID: <200812191513.mBJFDwie019944@floodgap.com> > If anyone needs DSDD floppies and can't find any, I found a source a while > back and stocked up - perhaps too much. Let me know, and I'd be glad to > sell some. Fortunately, I stock up on DSDD drives to keep my 1581 disk drives happy. Thanks for the responses, everyone. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- Use [Microsoft] IE and Passport and you can browse like it's 1984. -- /. --- From vrs at msn.com Fri Dec 19 12:28:50 2008 From: vrs at msn.com (Vincent Slyngstad) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 10:28:50 -0800 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> <494B4156.7000400@hachti.de> <494B4A3D.2050804@hachti.de> <494BB689.6080101@hachti.de> Message-ID: From: "Philipp Hachtmann" Sent: Friday, December 19, 2008 6:58 AM >>>> if (tp4'event and tp4 = '1') then >>>> fetch <= f_set; >>>> defer <= d_set; >>>> execute <= e_set; >>>> word_count <= wc_set; >>>> current_address <= word_count; >>>> break <= b_set; >>>> end if; >>> That's sequential coding!! >> >> Not sure what the epithet "sequential coding" means in this context. >> There is combinatoric logic elsewhere computing the new values for >> these 6 latches, which take their new values at the beginning of TP4. > > Your code above does not result in latches. It results in D type > flipflops! > They're set on the rising edge of tp4. > You would get latches if you omit the tp4'event part of the conditional > expression. Agreed. I stand corrected on the terminology. The part that is being modeled was originally a 7474 edge triggered device, though, so the model seems correct. The real question about correctness would seem to be whether it is safe to refactor the "gated clock" into the combinatorial inputs. Which basically depends, on whether the gating elements are stable by the end of TSn and throughout TPn. >> every time I look at the 8/i drawings, they seem more synchronous, so >> maybe it's just that I haven't fully understood the older machines yet. > I have my problems understanding the control and sequencing in the old > machines. Me too, though it's generally getting easier. Basically there are a mess of delay lines which establish the spacing of the major timing signals, with a few delay chains that are conditionally inserted for special (longer) cycles. Vince From vrs at msn.com Fri Dec 19 12:37:29 2008 From: vrs at msn.com (Vincent Slyngstad) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 10:37:29 -0800 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> <494B4680.7050501@hachti.de> <494B5F96.40904@pacbell.net> Message-ID: From: "Jim Battle" Sent: Friday, December 19, 2008 12:47 AM > My solution in the emulator is to compute the ratio of on/off over that > 1/60th of a second and then use that to display an image of a lamp. > Actually, I go one better than that. I have a simple first order time > constant model of the lamp so that it doesn't go from 0->100% in 1/60th of > a second. new_intensity = K*old_intensity + (1-K)*new_duty_cycle. Pick K > to approximate the thermal inertia of the lamp. > > Oh, to keep from having to compute a tally of all the lamps after each > instruction simulation cycle, I have an array of 256 counters for each > byte of address or data bus. So for a given byte, after each instruction I > just do: histo[byte_value]++. At the time it comes to display each lamp, > I look at all the buckets and figure out the average duty cycle for each > of the 8 lamps in the group. > > Those two solve the sampling problem to a sufficient degree that I'm done > tweaking with it. Cool! A great use of the extra memory and MIPS on your emulation host :-). There are probably easily enough resources to do the same thing in the FPGA, though most of the VGA outputs lack enough intensity resolution to render the brightness directly. So you'd have to use the intensity to modify the address given to the character generator, and render it as a different sized dot, or the like. Vince From martinm at allwest.net Fri Dec 19 13:40:59 2008 From: martinm at allwest.net (Martin Marshall) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 12:40:59 -0700 Subject: Free for Shipping - Tandy MMPC Model 10 Message-ID: <5A2C1A72470E4BD68A1F96387C51AFC7@p4266> Going to recycle - Tandy MMPC Model 10. Looks like a pretty plain 486sx desktop. Does anyone want it or parts of it? Reply off-list to "martinm" at the domain "allwest.net". I'm in the US at 82930. Thank you, Martin Marshall From cisin at xenosoft.com Fri Dec 19 14:31:22 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 12:31:22 -0800 (PST) Subject: Canon Cat: what density 3.5"? In-Reply-To: <494B9848.40006@gjcp.net> References: <410211.70575.qm@web110603.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> <494B9848.40006@gjcp.net> Message-ID: <20081219122150.V52249@shell.lmi.net> DSDD ("720K") 3.5" disks are 600 Oersted. DSHD ("1.4M") 3.5" disks are 720 to 760 Oersted. The Canon Cat uses 600 Oersted (DSDD, "720K") diskettes. If you use the wrong ones, they will not be as reliable, but, because the two common types of 3.5" diskettes are CLOSE to the same coercivity, you can often GET AWAY WITH using the wrong ones. (You can certainly GET AWAY WITH IT much better than the more extreme difference between 5.25" disk types) Using too high a coercivity diskette results in your data "fading" over time! We can get into that some other time, or Tony can explain it. The Cat is, IIRC, single sided, but using a double sided disk won't matter. Due to the weird shell configuration of 3.5" diskettes, "flippies" are not an option. During the early days of 3.5", single sided diskettes were manufactured, as well as ones with manual and ones with NO shutter. Those will all work, but I'm not parting with them. DSED and floptical disks should not be used. -- Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com From cisin at xenosoft.com Fri Dec 19 14:39:15 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 12:39:15 -0800 (PST) Subject: Canon Cat: what density 3.5"? In-Reply-To: <410211.70575.qm@web110603.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> References: <410211.70575.qm@web110603.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20081219123728.F52249@shell.lmi.net> On Fri, 19 Dec 2008, steven stengel wrote: > DSDD floppy disks work fine, but I don't believe that you can buy them anymore. > I think the Cat only uses 265K of disk space, and will format them if required. > Steve. And if you put a PC or Mac diskette in it, it will gleefully just go ahead and reformat it into a Cat diskette. Jef (R.I.P.) and I had some serious discussions about just how "automatic" such things should be. From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Dec 19 13:24:38 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 19:24:38 +0000 (GMT) Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <20081218140541.G2042@shell.lmi.net> from "Fred Cisin" at Dec 18, 8 02:08:26 pm Message-ID: > Get a spare Model M for the cats - > a model M is to cats what a beaded seat cushion is to a taxi driver. What is it about classic computer enthusiasts and cats :-) Pentina, the cat who choses to live with me, has a love of anything HP. Given a few piles of manuals, he'll curl up on top of the HP ones. Unfortunately (for me) there's a heck of a lot of HP stuff around here... -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Dec 19 13:56:50 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 19:56:50 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Timekeeping (was Re: Sherwood Micro CPU/100) In-Reply-To: <494B55A2.8070807@jetnet.ab.ca> from "bfranchuk@jetnet.ab.ca" at Dec 19, 8 01:04:50 am Message-ID: > > Ethan Dicks wrote: > > > So many ways to tell time in the modern era. This is a huge change > > from a few centuries ago, when a marked stick was close enough. > > Nope ... Looks out side, it is dark but is it after midight yet? Hard to tell There were moon dialks, and things called Nocturnals which told the time by sighting stars. IIRC, though, you need to know the date to use either of those (unlike a normal sundail, where you need the date only for the equation of time correction, and can get the time to within half an hour without it. > with this candle what notch my sundial stick is at. > While you don't get time as accurate as moden clocks A Heliochronometer will give you the (local apparent) time to within a few seconds, which is probably as good as most mechanical clocks. > sundial and moondials are still interesting time telling devices. Inded they are. The problem with many of the books on making sundials is that they were written before the avaialbilitiy of computing devices (even mecvhanical calculators, let alone electronic calculators or personal computers0, so they give geometical constructions for the hour lines. I'd perefe to know how they were calculated, then calculate the angles I need using something electornic and then mark those angles on the dial plate. Timekeeping devices are (and always have been) an interest of mine. All types of timekeeping devices -- sundials, mechanical clocks, electic clocks, electronic clocks, and so on. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Fri Dec 19 14:00:30 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 20:00:30 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Timekeeping (was Re: Sherwood Micro CPU/100) In-Reply-To: from "Ethan Dicks" at Dec 19, 8 03:20:18 am Message-ID: > > While you don't get time as accurate as moden clocks > > sundial and moondials are still interesting time telling devices. > > Yes they are. I've only ever fiddled a little bit with telling time > by the moon, but I did build a sundial at Pole - it was easy - the > normal calculations all cancel out (think of "tangent of 90 degrees"), Err, tan(90 degress) is infinite.... > and I effectively made what looks like a dartboard, divided into 24 > equal-angle slices. Piece of cake (or is that pi?) You can make such a dial at any latitude if you include the dial plate at the apporporate angle (the dial plate is parallel to the equator, hence the name 'equatorial dial). There's a fairly modern one in St Catherine's Dock in London (near Tower Bridge). At the pole, the equatorial dial and horixoantal dial are quite clearly the same thing. So the conventional idea of a sundial -- that is with the dial plate horizontal -- is an equatorial one at the pole. -tony From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Fri Dec 19 15:17:38 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 16:17:38 -0500 Subject: Timekeeping (was Re: Sherwood Micro CPU/100) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Fri, Dec 19, 2008 at 3:00 PM, Tony Duell wrote: >> > While you don't get time as accurate as moden clocks >> > sundial and moondials are still interesting time telling devices. >> >> Yes they are. I've only ever fiddled a little bit with telling time >> by the moon, but I did build a sundial at Pole - it was easy - the >> normal calculations all cancel out (think of "tangent of 90 degrees"), > > Err, tan(90 degress) is infinite.... Exactly. >> and I effectively made what looks like a dartboard, divided into 24 >> equal-angle slices. Piece of cake (or is that pi?) > > You can make such a dial at any latitude if you include the dial plate at > the apporporate angle (the dial plate is parallel to the equator, hence > the name 'equatorial dial). There's a fairly modern one in St Catherine's > Dock in London (near Tower Bridge). True enough. This one is parallel to the ground and easy to make and set. > At the pole, the equatorial dial and horixoantal dial are quite clearly > the same thing. So the conventional idea of a sundial -- that is with the > dial plate horizontal -- is an equatorial one at the pole. Yes. That was the point I was driving at. -ethan From cclist at sydex.com Fri Dec 19 17:22:39 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 15:22:39 -0800 Subject: Timekeeping (was Re: Sherwood Micro CPU/100) In-Reply-To: References: , , Message-ID: <494BBC3F.22710.F99474@cclist.sydex.com> Ethan, speaking of timekeeping devices, how's the Foucalt pendulum doing down there? Has anyone figured out a way to start it smoothly without an open flame? Cheers, Chuck From dkelvey at hotmail.com Fri Dec 19 17:34:34 2008 From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 15:34:34 -0800 Subject: Timekeeping (was Re: Sherwood Micro CPU/100) In-Reply-To: References: <494B55A2.8070807@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: > From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com ---snip--- > > One of these days, I should make a sundial for 40N (Columbus, OH). It > would be a nice accompaniment to all of my newfangled clocks. > > -ethan Hi You should also consider building a free pendulum clock reference. I've considered adding one to my grandfather clock. These were used as references until the quartz oven references replaced them. Dwight _________________________________________________________________ Send e-mail faster without improving your typing skills. http://windowslive.com/online/hotmail?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_hotmail_acq_speed_122008 From dkelvey at hotmail.com Fri Dec 19 18:58:06 2008 From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 16:58:06 -0800 Subject: Timekeeping (was Re: Sherwood Micro CPU/100) In-Reply-To: References: <494B55A2.8070807@jetnet.ab.ca> from "bfranchuk@jetnet.ab.ca" at Dec 19, 8 01:04:50 am Message-ID: ---------------------------------------- > From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk >> >> Ethan Dicks wrote: >> >>> So many ways to tell time in the modern era. This is a huge change >>> from a few centuries ago, when a marked stick was close enough. >> >> Nope ... Looks out side, it is dark but is it after midight yet? Hard to tell > > There were moon dialks, and things called Nocturnals which told the time > by sighting stars. IIRC, though, you need to know the date to use either > of those (unlike a normal sundail, where you need the date only for the > equation of time correction, and can get the time to within half an hour > without it. > >> with this candle what notch my sundial stick is at. >> While you don't get time as accurate as moden clocks > > A Heliochronometer will give you the (local apparent) time to within a few > seconds, which is probably as good as most mechanical clocks. > >> sundial and moondials are still interesting time telling devices. > > Inded they are. The problem with many of the books on making sundials is > that they were written before the avaialbilitiy of computing devices (even > mecvhanical calculators, let alone electronic calculators or personal > computers0, so they give geometical constructions for the hour lines. I'd > perefe to know how they were calculated, then calculate the angles I need > using something electornic and then mark those angles on the dial plate. Hi One can calculate the angles if you first draw a line for local noon and use the following equation to calculate each hour line from that noon line. X = hour lines angle ( each hour is 15 degrees ) Y = 90 - Latitude angle Z = Angle on plate that is level to the ground from noon line arctan( tan(X) / cos ( Y ) ) = Z At least I think I did the trig right. Dwight > > Timekeeping devices are (and always have been) an interest of mine. All > types of timekeeping devices -- sundials, mechanical clocks, electic > clocks, electronic clocks, and so on. > > -tony _________________________________________________________________ Life on your PC is safer, easier, and more enjoyable with Windows Vista?. http://clk.atdmt.com/MRT/go/127032870/direct/01/ From slawmaster at gmail.com Fri Dec 19 19:30:28 2008 From: slawmaster at gmail.com (John Floren) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 20:30:28 -0500 Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus Message-ID: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com> I was poking around Google today and came across 4.3BSD Quasijarus as something that might be interesting to try in SIMH and maybe on my VAXstation, but the ftp site seems to be empty. Does anybody have a mirror of the Quasijarus 0c distro? Without seeing the files, I don't have any idea how it is distributed... I'm hoping it's a CD-ROM image so I can install easily on my vaxstation--anybody know? And yes, NetBSD is just too new for me :) Thanks John -- Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn From sb at thebackend.de Fri Dec 19 19:39:16 2008 From: sb at thebackend.de (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Sebastian_Br=FCckner?=) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 10:39:16 +0900 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project In-Reply-To: <494B4A3D.2050804@hachti.de> References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> <494B4156.7000400@hachti.de> <494B4A3D.2050804@hachti.de> Message-ID: <106958ED-5A36-4641-AB38-E1B9713EC13A@thebackend.de> Good morning! Sorry for the off-topic post... Am 19.12.2008 um 16:16 schrieb Philipp Hachtmann: >> You can emulate that in std_logic with a single driver driving an "H" >> (the "pull-up"), and everyone else drives either "0" or "Z". > Yes. You can write that. But the synthesis tool - if it eats that - > will generate > many ORs... So avoid it. In the company I have worked a bit for, > MANY constructs > were simply forbidden. Thinks like Z, H, L in std_logic are > suspicious :-) What you say is true for FPGA-internal signals but the output drivers _can_ be switched to high-impedance. The open-collector driver you were asking about originally can be emulated by assigning "Z" directly to the IOB, switching it to high-z. That will only work if the signal you use is routed directly to the IOB => use only in top level entity to be sure. -- exhibit A: signal_ext <= output_i when enable_i = 1 else (others => 'Z'); input_i <= signal_ext; -- exhibit B signal_ext <= '0' when output_i ='0' else 'Z'; input_i <= signal_ext; Is that what you wanted to do? For higher voltages that 3.3V you will need two pins, see . Cheers, Sebastian From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Fri Dec 19 20:20:39 2008 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 02:20:39 +0000 (GMT) Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <20081218150040.X2042@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <526703.24990.qm@web23406.mail.ird.yahoo.com> Thanks for that. The recalibration didn't work on my laptop, but that's fine because I prefer a mouse anyway. Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk --- On Thu, 18/12/08, Fred Cisin wrote: From: Fred Cisin Subject: Re: USB Model M To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Date: Thursday, 18 December, 2008, 11:02 PM > silly little mouse stick (not sure what it's called) that lerks between > the G,H and B keys. Wikipedia lists a few more names: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pointing_stick#Naming_and_brands From glen.slick at gmail.com Fri Dec 19 20:35:30 2008 From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 18:35:30 -0800 Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus In-Reply-To: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com> References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com> On Fri, Dec 19, 2008 at 5:30 PM, John Floren wrote: > I was poking around Google today and came across 4.3BSD Quasijarus as > something that might be interesting to try in SIMH and maybe on my > VAXstation, but the ftp site seems to be empty. Does anybody have a > mirror of the Quasijarus 0c distro? Without seeing the files, I don't > have any idea how it is distributed... I'm hoping it's a CD-ROM image > so I can install easily on my vaxstation--anybody know? And yes, > NetBSD is just too new for me :) > Looks like a set of file that are decompressed and then written to a tape and then the VAX is booted from that tape. 62,652 stand.Z 985,822 miniroot.Z 2,082,177 rootdump.Z 7,300,252 usr.tar.Z 2,803,165 srcsys.tar.Z 10,961,052 src.tar.Z 1. stand (512 byte records) 2. miniroot (10240 byte records) 3. rootdump (10240 byte records) 4. usr.tar (10240 byte records) 5. srcsys.tar (10240 byte records) 6. src.tar (10240 byte records) From slawmaster at gmail.com Fri Dec 19 20:50:48 2008 From: slawmaster at gmail.com (John Floren) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 21:50:48 -0500 Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus In-Reply-To: <1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com> References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com> <1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <7d3530220812191850g59cdfbe3qcfb4708047dcd063@mail.gmail.com> On Fri, Dec 19, 2008 at 9:35 PM, Glen Slick wrote: > On Fri, Dec 19, 2008 at 5:30 PM, John Floren wrote: >> I was poking around Google today and came across 4.3BSD Quasijarus as >> something that might be interesting to try in SIMH and maybe on my >> VAXstation, but the ftp site seems to be empty. Does anybody have a >> mirror of the Quasijarus 0c distro? Without seeing the files, I don't >> have any idea how it is distributed... I'm hoping it's a CD-ROM image >> so I can install easily on my vaxstation--anybody know? And yes, >> NetBSD is just too new for me :) >> > > Looks like a set of file that are decompressed and then written to a > tape and then the VAX is booted from that tape. > > 62,652 stand.Z > 985,822 miniroot.Z > 2,082,177 rootdump.Z > 7,300,252 usr.tar.Z > 2,803,165 srcsys.tar.Z > 10,961,052 src.tar.Z > > 1. stand (512 byte records) > 2. miniroot (10240 byte records) > 3. rootdump (10240 byte records) > 4. usr.tar (10240 byte records) > 5. srcsys.tar (10240 byte records) > 6. src.tar (10240 byte records) > Weak-sauce, as my contemporaries would say, because I don't have a tape drive or any tapes. I could still try it on SIMH but the eventual goal is to get something on the VAX John -- Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn From mark at wickensonline.co.uk Sat Dec 20 02:29:15 2008 From: mark at wickensonline.co.uk (Mark Wickens) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 08:29:15 +0000 Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus In-Reply-To: <7d3530220812191850g59cdfbe3qcfb4708047dcd063@mail.gmail.com> References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com> <1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com> <7d3530220812191850g59cdfbe3qcfb4708047dcd063@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <494CACDB.7090904@wickensonline.co.uk> John Floren wrote: > On Fri, Dec 19, 2008 at 9:35 PM, Glen Slick wrote: > >> On Fri, Dec 19, 2008 at 5:30 PM, John Floren wrote: >> >>> I was poking around Google today and came across 4.3BSD Quasijarus as >>> something that might be interesting to try in SIMH and maybe on my >>> VAXstation, but the ftp site seems to be empty. Does anybody have a >>> mirror of the Quasijarus 0c distro? Without seeing the files, I don't >>> have any idea how it is distributed... I'm hoping it's a CD-ROM image >>> so I can install easily on my vaxstation--anybody know? And yes, >>> NetBSD is just too new for me :) >>> >>> >> Looks like a set of file that are decompressed and then written to a >> tape and then the VAX is booted from that tape. >> >> 62,652 stand.Z >> 985,822 miniroot.Z >> 2,082,177 rootdump.Z >> 7,300,252 usr.tar.Z >> 2,803,165 srcsys.tar.Z >> 10,961,052 src.tar.Z >> >> 1. stand (512 byte records) >> 2. miniroot (10240 byte records) >> 3. rootdump (10240 byte records) >> 4. usr.tar (10240 byte records) >> 5. srcsys.tar (10240 byte records) >> 6. src.tar (10240 byte records) >> >> > > Weak-sauce, as my contemporaries would say, because I don't have a > tape drive or any tapes. I could still try it on SIMH but the eventual > goal is to get something on the VAX > > John > As far as I remember this particular OS only runs on a limited subset of particularly old VAX iron, and is not supported on VAXstations. You may get some joy from SIMH however. Regards, Mark. From jkunz at unixag-kl.fh-kl.de Sat Dec 20 04:03:52 2008 From: jkunz at unixag-kl.fh-kl.de (Jochen Kunz) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 11:03:52 +0100 Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus In-Reply-To: <7d3530220812191850g59cdfbe3qcfb4708047dcd063@mail.gmail.com> References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com> <1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com> <7d3530220812191850g59cdfbe3qcfb4708047dcd063@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20081220110352.f8931d65.jkunz@unixag-kl.fh-kl.de> On Fri, 19 Dec 2008 21:50:48 -0500 "John Floren" wrote: > Weak-sauce, as my contemporaries would say, because I don't have a > tape drive or any tapes. I could still try it on SIMH but the eventual > goal is to get something on the VAX In this case your only chance is: Install from virtual tapes into a simh machine. Use a virtual disk that matches your real one exactely. Dump (dd(1)) the virtual disk to a file. Boot NetBSD diskless on the VAX. Dump the disk image from the simh machine to the real drive. But instaling from real tape is much more fun. :-) (I created the tapes by booting NetBSD on the VAX.) You may have a look at http://www.tuhs.org/ There you will find the original 4.3BSD-Tahoe. -- tsch??, Jochen Homepage: http://www.unixag-kl.fh-kl.de/~jkunz/ From brad at heeltoe.com Sat Dec 20 08:47:58 2008 From: brad at heeltoe.com (Brad Parker) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 09:47:58 -0500 Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus In-Reply-To: <1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com> References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com> <1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <24146.1229784478@mini> "Glen Slick" wrote: >On Fri, Dec 19, 2008 at 5:30 PM, John Floren wrote: >> I was poking around Google today and came across 4.3BSD Quasijarus as >> something that might be interesting to try in SIMH and maybe on my >> VAXstation, but the ftp site seems to be empty. Does anybody have a >> mirror of the Quasijarus 0c distro? Without seeing the files, I don't >> have any idea how it is distributed... ... > > 62,652 stand.Z > 985,822 miniroot.Z > 2,082,177 rootdump.Z > 7,300,252 usr.tar.Z > 2,803,165 srcsys.tar.Z >10,961,052 src.tar.Z > >1. stand (512 byte records) >2. miniroot (10240 byte records) >3. rootdump (10240 byte records) >4. usr.tar (10240 byte records) >5. srcsys.tar (10240 byte records) >6. src.tar (10240 byte records) There's a standard readme which describes (with holes) now to install it from tape. Basically you boot off the tape. I have the tape image somewhere. I think I also have a simh ra82 image of 0c. it's 20mb compressed. It's in a directory with a simh config, so it might even work :-) I can try if you like. If you have the images it's easy to write a shell script to reconstruct the tape image. At one time I had his whole cvs tree. The machine it's on is at my office and we just had a big snow storm, so it might be monday before I can check. I would think others would have it also. I'd be happy to host it on my web site. (but I'd think bitsavers would also be a good place) -brad From chrise at pobox.com Fri Dec 19 06:24:33 2008 From: chrise at pobox.com (Chris Elmquist) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 06:24:33 -0600 Subject: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) In-Reply-To: <20081219031319.GQ5784@n0jcf.net> References: <4299.71.98.250.26.1229614199.squirrel@mail.neurotica.com> <20081219031319.GQ5784@n0jcf.net> Message-ID: <20081219122433.GV5784@n0jcf.net> On Thursday (12/18/2008 at 09:13PM -0600), Chris Elmquist wrote: > On Thursday (12/18/2008 at 10:29AM -0500), Dave McGuire wrote: > > On Wed, December 17, 2008 3:05 pm, Brent Hilpert wrote: > > > There was a later PPS-4/1 single-chip version. I don't know how popular > > > this > > > stuff was but I wonder if there aren't more PPS-4 systems buried in > > > equipment > > > and appliances from the period than is commonly known. (I have wondered, > > > for > > > example, what the 70's-era Amana Radarange microwave ovens used for > > > control.) > > > > Umm...mechanical timers. > > No! it was a "Touchmatic". Had a capacitive keypad and LED display. > Very cool for 1974. Mom cooked a meatloaf in it in a bundt pan. Came > out indistinguishable from a lawn tractor tire. > > http://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/images/object_images/277x265/10240744.jpg Sorry, I got the year wrong. It was approx 1978. Less cool then but still not bad. Meatloaf was still bad. -- Chris Elmquist mailto:chrise at pobox.com From steerex at ccvn.com Fri Dec 19 08:08:51 2008 From: steerex at ccvn.com (Steve Robertson) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 09:08:51 -0500 Subject: Timekeeping (was Re: Sherwood Micro CPU/100) In-Reply-To: References: <494B55A2.8070807@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <1229695731.9070.12.camel@host-72-250-236-64.ccvn.com> > Yes they are. I've only ever fiddled a little bit with telling time > by the moon, but I did build a sundial at Pole - it was easy - the > normal calculations all cancel out (think of "tangent of 90 degrees"), > and I effectively made what looks like a dartboard, divided into 24 > equal-angle slices. Piece of cake (or is that pi?) At the pole... That's cheating! So, if you want to know what time it is during July, you have to call someone at the other pole? See ya, SteveRob From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Fri Dec 19 09:53:46 2008 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse) Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 10:53:46 -0500 (EST) Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: <494BB689.6080101@hachti.de> References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> <494B4156.7000400@hachti.de> <494B4A3D.2050804@hachti.de> <494BB689.6080101@hachti.de> Message-ID: <200812191556.KAA14440@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> > Yes, but the goal is to minimize warnings (haha!)..... Funny, I'd've thought the goal would be to have a working circuit. If minimizing warnings really is your goal, there's a very easy fix. > Your code above does not result in latches. It results in D type > flipflops! What's the difference? As I've learned to use the words, D-flops _are_ latches. Have I mislearnt? /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Sat Dec 20 09:48:18 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 08:48:18 -0700 Subject: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) In-Reply-To: <20081219122433.GV5784@n0jcf.net> References: <4299.71.98.250.26.1229614199.squirrel@mail.neurotica.com> <20081219031319.GQ5784@n0jcf.net> <20081219122433.GV5784@n0jcf.net> Message-ID: <494D13C2.50003@jetnet.ab.ca> Chris Elmquist wrote: > Sorry, I got the year wrong. It was approx 1978. Less cool then but still > not bad. Meatloaf was still bad. Umm you don't wait several years to eat Meatloaf. From spectre at floodgap.com Sat Dec 20 10:14:24 2008 From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 08:14:24 -0800 (PST) Subject: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) In-Reply-To: <494D13C2.50003@jetnet.ab.ca> from "bfranchuk@jetnet.ab.ca" at "Dec 20, 8 08:48:18 am" Message-ID: <200812201614.mBKGEOoJ011020@floodgap.com> > > Sorry, I got the year wrong. It was approx 1978. Less cool then but still > > not bad. Meatloaf was still bad. > > Umm you don't wait several years to eat Meatloaf. Listening to him is fine, though. Two out of three ain't bad. -- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com -- To err is human -- to forgive is not company policy. ----------------------- From pcw at mesanet.com Sat Dec 20 10:20:52 2008 From: pcw at mesanet.com (Peter C. Wallace) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 08:20:52 -0800 (PST) Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: <200812191556.KAA14440@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> <494B4156.7000400@hachti.de> <494B4A3D.2050804@hachti.de> <494BB689.6080101@hachti.de> <200812191556.KAA14440@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: On Fri, 19 Dec 2008, der Mouse wrote: > Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 10:53:46 -0500 (EST) > From: der Mouse > Reply-To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > > To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" > Subject: Re: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? > >> Yes, but the goal is to minimize warnings (haha!)..... > > Funny, I'd've thought the goal would be to have a working circuit. If > minimizing warnings really is your goal, there's a very easy fix. > >> Your code above does not result in latches. It results in D type >> flipflops! > > What's the difference? As I've learned to use the words, D-flops _are_ > latches. Have I mislearnt? Yes, a D FF is a _clocked_ latch Its easy to create (non-clocked) latches in VHDL inadvertently. These result in _important_ warnings... > > /~\ The ASCII Mouse > \ / Ribbon Campaign > X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org > / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B > Peter Wallace Mesa Electronics (\__/) (='.'=) This is Bunny. Copy and paste bunny into your (")_(") signature to help him gain world domination. From blstuart at bellsouth.net Sat Dec 20 11:04:15 2008 From: blstuart at bellsouth.net (blstuart at bellsouth.net) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 11:04:15 -0600 Subject: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) In-Reply-To: <200812201614.mBKGEOoJ011020@floodgap.com> Message-ID: <71c5956fd34deae386263042934eb845@bellsouth.net> >> > Sorry, I got the year wrong. It was approx 1978. Less cool then but still >> > not bad. Meatloaf was still bad. >> >> Umm you don't wait several years to eat Meatloaf. > > Listening to him is fine, though. Two out of three ain't bad. He's even on topic. Didn't he have that hit, "Paridise By the Front Panel Lights?" Ducking... BLS From pete at dunnington.plus.com Sat Dec 20 11:55:58 2008 From: pete at dunnington.plus.com (Pete Turnbull) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 17:55:58 +0000 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: <200812191556.KAA14440@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> <494B4156.7000400@hachti.de> <494B4A3D.2050804@hachti.de> <494BB689.6080101@hachti.de> <200812191556.KAA14440@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <494D31AE.8010306@dunnington.plus.com> On 19/12/2008 15:53, der Mouse wrote: >> Your code above does not result in latches. It results in D type >> flipflops! > > What's the difference? As I've learned to use the words, D-flops _are_ > latches. Have I mislearnt? They're not quite the same thing, though a D-type flip-flop is a kind of latch. There are other types of flip-flops, such as T, RS, and JK types, usually edge-triggered. In a D-type, the active clock edge causes the output to change to match the input, and having changed, it stays that way, even if the input changes while the clock is still at the same level. The transparent latches that are commonly just referred to as "latches" (eg in data books, where you'll find some devices referred to as latches and others as flip-flops to distinguish them) are level-sensitive, and the output tracks the input (including changes) while the clock is at its active level. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Dec 20 12:10:04 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 18:10:04 +0000 (GMT) Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: <200812191556.KAA14440@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> from "der Mouse" at Dec 19, 8 10:53:46 am Message-ID: > > Your code above does not result in latches. It results in D type > > flipflops! > > What's the difference? As I've learned to use the words, D-flops _are_ > latches. Have I mislearnt? As I understand the terms, a D-type flip-flop is edge-triggered, a latch (or more exactly a transparent latch) is level-operated. What I eman is that for a D-type flip-flop, the output (Q) is set equal to the input (D) a short time after the rising edge (say), of the clock signal. At all othter times Q does not change state, no matter what D does. So if clock is held high all the time, or held low all the time, Q will never change. But with a transparent latch, then if the clock (sometimes called the enable input) is in one sate (say high). then the output (Q) tracks the input (D). When the clock input goes low, then Q is held in whatever state it was in as the clock input went low. A simple example of the differnce. If you take a D-type flip-flop and connect the output to a NOT gate and the output of that back to the D input, then you get a divide-by-2-circuit. Feed in a regular clock at one frequency and the Q output will toggle at half that frequency. But if you do the same thing with a transparent latch, you get something that oscillates at a frequency determined by the propagation delays when the clock is high. In other words the output is somewhat unpredicatable, it's certainly not a square wave at half the frequency of the clock signal. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Dec 20 12:12:55 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 18:12:55 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Timekeeping (was Re: Sherwood Micro CPU/100) In-Reply-To: from "dwight elvey" at Dec 19, 8 03:34:34 pm Message-ID: > Hi > You should also consider building a free pendulum clock reference. If I ever get a supply of circular tuits, then that's something I have long considered making... Even a single-pendulum (non-free) synchronome would be a fun thing to build > I've considered adding one to my grandfather clock. > These were used as references until the quartz oven references > replaced them. I am told that a free paenddulum in a vacuum chamber (to remove the errors due to air resistance, often called 'barometric errors', since the air resistance depends on the barometric pressure) actually has a better long-term stability than most quartz crystals. -tony From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sat Dec 20 12:16:07 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 18:16:07 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Timekeeping (was Re: Sherwood Micro CPU/100) In-Reply-To: from "dwight elvey" at Dec 19, 8 04:58:06 pm Message-ID: > One can calculate the angles if you first draw a line for local noon > and use the following equation to calculate each hour line from that > noon line. > =20 > X = hour lines angle ( each hour is 15 degrees ) > Y = 90 - Latitude angle Called the 'Colatitude' in some books. > Z = Angle on plate that is level to the ground from noon line > > arctan( tan(X) / cos ( Y ) ) = Z > > At least I think I did the trig right.=20 I beleive that is correct, However, it gets more complicated if you want to have a vertical-ish dial plate (say on a wall) that is neither truely vertical (it 'reclines') and which doesn't face any of the cardinal compass directions (it 'declines'). -tony From innfoclassics at gmail.com Sat Dec 20 15:10:33 2008 From: innfoclassics at gmail.com (Paxton Hoag) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 13:10:33 -0800 Subject: New USB Mod Ms available from Unicomp? was Re: USB Model M Message-ID: > Right here: http://pckeyboards.stores.yahoo.net/cabdetmin.html > Thanks for the link as I need some cables too. I bought a dozen Model Ms from a local community college garage sale. They were complaining about how much noise they made. At 50 cents apiece I bought all they had. I noticed that Unicomp, the site mentioned above sells new Buckling Key keyboards With USB built in for $69. http://pckeyboards.stores.yahoo.net/cus101usenon.html These are the people that bought the Keyboard parts business from IBM. It looks like they are trying to keep the model M and continue to supply the market. Paxton -- Paxton Hoag Astoria, OR USA From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Sat Dec 20 16:48:18 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 17:48:18 -0500 Subject: CBM 8000 VideoCD? Message-ID: Hi, all, I was bouncing around looking for SuperPET info and ran across this page (again)... Unfortunately, the address on the page is no longer active, so it's not possible to request a copy of the video. Did anyone on the list ever get this? -ethan From bert at brothom.nl Sat Dec 20 17:12:18 2008 From: bert at brothom.nl (Bert Thomas) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 00:12:18 +0100 Subject: list of nordisk data books and floppy disks Message-ID: <494D7BD2.3000108@brothom.nl> If you need access to one of these, contact me an urge me to make a deal. Keep pushing, as pushing raises priority with me. Books: NOTIS-BG User Guide NOTIS-RG New functions in the E-version NOTIS-DS User's guide Introduction to ND Office Systems The SPRINT User Guide Documentation Catalogue SINTRAN III Real Time Loader Dialogue-UNIQUE-II User Guide Operator Environment User Guide NOTIS-WP Brief Introduction User Environment Reference Manual NOTIS-WP Reference Manual COSMOS User Guide User Environment Reference Manual SINTRAN III Utilities Manual (3x) ND-110 Instruction Set The Database System SIBAS II ND User Manual SIBAS II Operator Manual NOTIS-DS Introduction (2x) Sintran III Real Time Guide NOTIS-DS Supervisor Guide (2x) ACCESS User Guide File Manager Introduction (2x, one in shrink-wrap) NOMIS Norwegian Medical Information System SINTRAN III COMMANDS Reference Manual SINTRAN III Monitor Calls (2x) Symbolic Debugger User Guide Examples for NOTIS-RG Version B SINTRAN-III Release Information K-version NOTIS-TF Macro Guide (new in shrink wrap) BACKUP User Guide (3x) SINTRAN III System Supervisor Operator Environment User Guide ND-110 COMPACT Operator Guide (contains several quick reference cards) SINTRAN III User Guide BRF-Linker User Manual NOTIS-TF User Guide User Environment Library Routines NOTIS-RG Reference Manual Test Program Description for ND-100/ND-110 ordner with following description: course program the supervisor's responsibility Handbook of Useful information examples of LOAD-MODE etc. telefix customer information miscellaneous materials MEDITEBS (in dutch) bunch of unknown listings a document with information on SCSI on ND ACCESS DBA manual NOTIS-TF text formatter reference manual partly dutch presentation with general user info SINTRAN III Timesharing/Batch guide some dutch documentation on MEDITEBS datasheets of several ND products, such as software packages, computers and accessoiries Floppies: (each floppy or set of floppies contains a few pages of information) SINTRAN III K GENERATION 312 CONF.D VSX, 2 disks (2 sets) PATCH-SIN-K-5400 (2 sets) SINTRAN III Configuration Program SUBSYSTEM PACKAGE 32 BITS FLOATING FORMAT SINTRAN III VSE/VSX Utility Programs ACCOUNTING System for SINTRAN III BACKUP-SYSTEM X-MESSAGE TELEFIX FILES FOR USER SITES SUBSYSTEM PACKAGE II VTM terminal tables USER ENVIRONMENT (3 disks) TEST PROGRAMS FOR ND-100/110 TEST PROGRAMS FOR ND-100/110/120 (2 disks) JEC job execution control ND-10634A MEMORY TO FLOPPY NOTIS-WP FOR ND-100 (4 disks) SIBAS-II for ND-100 (2 disks with pretty much the same label) ACCESS FOR ND-100 (dito) NOTIS-RG for ND-100 norwegian NOTIS-DS for ND-100 (3 disks) NOTIS-DS for ND-100 48-bit floating point (3 disks with pretty much the same label) NOTIS-BG-for ND-100 norwegian version 32 bits fl NOTIS-BG-for ND-100 32 bits fl NOTIS-BG-for ND-100 (business grafics) 32 bits fl PR for ND-100 (Norwegian version) BRF-Linker for ND-100 SINTRAN III MONITOR CALL Pack. SPRINT Spooling System (3 disks) MEDITEBS specials Mass Storage Utilities OPERATOR ENVIRONMENT (4 disks) Disk Restore (3 disks) TESTPROGRAMS FOR ND-100/110/120 (2 disks, both labeled PART 1 OF 2) UNIQUE-II SIBAS for ND-100 UNIQUE TEXT SYSTEM UNIQUE-II SIBAS ND-100 (hand-written label) SOFTWARE KEY DISCETTE From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Sat Dec 20 17:22:17 2008 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 23:22:17 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Engelbart's mouse / 40th anniversary In-Reply-To: <1debc0350812141324y5f70b1bg5957a16ab405d6e6@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <567206.77758.qm@web23406.mail.ird.yahoo.com> Thanks for the photo's. That must have been an interesting event. Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk --- On Sun, 14/12/08, Marcin Wichary wrote: From: Marcin Wichary Subject: Re: Engelbart's mouse / 40th anniversary To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Date: Sunday, 14 December, 2008, 9:24 PM Here are my photos from the event, for those interested: http://flickriver.com/photos/mwichary/sets/72157610918709769/ (48 photos in total. Scroll down to see more.) From aek at bitsavers.org Sat Dec 20 18:15:00 2008 From: aek at bitsavers.org (Al Kossow) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 16:15:00 -0800 Subject: oregon software tape Message-ID: <494D8A84.8080002@bitsavers.org> did anyone on the list buy this tape? http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=120348714966 I got the earlier version, and it is a source tape. I'm trying to find out if the other one was as well. fscking eBay now hides the buyer's ID. From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk Sat Dec 20 20:17:52 2008 From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 02:17:52 +0000 (GMT) Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <960460.33227.qm@web111513.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <346678.75570.qm@web23407.mail.ird.yahoo.com> Awesome pictures. It's seriously impressive how these chips must be made and designed. Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk --- On Tue, 16/12/08, William Blair wrote: They are relatively rare, but they aren't even close to being _THAT_ rare. I'm talking about his asking price. I bought one three years ago from a fellow collector of CPU chips for _$20_ that had some markings worn off and was scratched. I opened it up to photograph the die (a hobby of mine): http://diephotos.blogspot.com/ I've haven't even seen rare versions of white ceramic 4004 ICs in perfect condition go for anything close to his asking price. I've seen a complete, mint condition MCS-4 (4004) chip _SET_ go for something close to $1K. From ray at arachelian.com Sat Dec 20 21:01:22 2008 From: ray at arachelian.com (Ray Arachelian) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 22:01:22 -0500 Subject: any idea what this schematic is? Message-ID: <494DB182.1050106@arachelian.com> http://flickr.com/photos/spaceageboy/3117272956/sizes/o/ Would this be the interface between the Lisa and the Mac as related here: http://folklore.org/StoryView.py?project=Macintosh&story=Shut_Up.txt&sortOrder=Sort%20by%20Date&detail=medium&search=shut%20up > Unfortunately, there was one small snag. We were using the Lisa as the > development machine for writing the software for Macintosh, and we > hadn't yet reached the point where the Macintosh could run > stand-alone. The Macintosh needed to be hooked up to a Lisa, in order > to download software from it. But the Lisa group was writing all of > its own applications for Lisa and didn't want Microsoft to see a Lisa. > They made us promise that we wouldn't let Microsoft see the Lisa. > > We finally came up with a solution where we'd use a twenty-five foot > cable and keep the Lisa in a different room that the Microsoft guys > weren't allowed to enter. I would start up the programs on the Lisa in > the other room, and Bud Tribble would operate the Macintosh. I would > usually run into the main room to see their reaction. From IanK at vulcan.com Sat Dec 20 21:24:43 2008 From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 19:24:43 -0800 Subject: oregon software tape In-Reply-To: <494D8A84.8080002@bitsavers.org> References: <494D8A84.8080002@bitsavers.org> Message-ID: eBay's greed will destroy its empire. At least, it's always worked that way before.... ________________________________________ From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Al Kossow [aek at bitsavers.org] Sent: Saturday, December 20, 2008 4:15 PM To: classiccmp at classiccmp.org Subject: oregon software tape did anyone on the list buy this tape? http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=120348714966 I got the earlier version, and it is a source tape. I'm trying to find out if the other one was as well. fscking eBay now hides the buyer's ID. From lproven at gmail.com Sat Dec 20 22:33:35 2008 From: lproven at gmail.com (Liam Proven) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 04:33:35 +0000 Subject: MS WinWord 6.0 32-bit Message-ID: <575131af0812202033o14e4e811r2071a9316e71d48f@mail.gmail.com> This is somewhat off-topic for here, but I don't know where else to ask. Way back in the early days of 32-bit Windows - I know, 5min ago by local standards - MS did a 32-bit version of Word and Excel for users of MS Office 4 on Windows NT 3. I used to have copies - on floppy - but I've lost them. No idea where to get replacements now, but I would really like to be able to use Word 6/32 again. It was a great WP, and by modern standards, tiny and very fast. Anyone still have a copy, or can suggest where to look or ask? -- Liam Proven ? Profile: http://www.linkedin.com/in/liamproven Email: lproven at cix.co.uk ? GMail/GoogleTalk/Orkut: lproven at gmail.com Tel: +44 20-8685-0498 ? Cell: +44 7939-087884 ? Fax: + 44 870-9151419 AOL/AIM/iChat: liamproven at aol.com ? MSN/Messenger: lproven at hotmail.com Yahoo: liamproven at yahoo.co.uk ? Skype: liamproven ? ICQ: 73187508 From hachti at hachti.de Sat Dec 20 22:43:55 2008 From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 05:43:55 +0100 Subject: PDP-8 on FPGA project In-Reply-To: <106958ED-5A36-4641-AB38-E1B9713EC13A@thebackend.de> References: <4949A888.70902@hachti.de> <494A2214.9050401@hachti.de> <494A9FB9.8050407@hachti.de> <494B4156.7000400@hachti.de> <494B4A3D.2050804@hachti.de> <106958ED-5A36-4641-AB38-E1B9713EC13A@thebackend.de> Message-ID: <494DC98B.2070108@hachti.de> Hi, >>> You can emulate that in std_logic with a single driver driving an "H" >>> (the "pull-up"), and everyone else drives either "0" or "Z". >> Yes. You can write that. But the synthesis tool - if it eats that - >> will generate >> many ORs... So avoid it. In the company I have worked a bit for, MANY >> constructs >> were simply forbidden. Thinks like Z, H, L in std_logic are suspicious >> :-) > > What you say is true for FPGA-internal signals but the output drivers > _can_ be switched to high-impedance. > The open-collector driver you were asking about originally can be > emulated by assigning "Z" directly to the IOB, switching it to high-z. > That will only work if the signal you use is routed directly to the IOB > => use only in top level entity to be sure. Yes, of course... IOBs can also be controlled "manually" using the output enable... The discussion was about the on-chip (!!) wiring of the OMNIBUS. the original OMNIBUS is an open collector thing. Ph :-) -- http://www.hachti.de From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Sun Dec 21 00:00:30 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 06:00:30 +0000 Subject: any idea what this schematic is? In-Reply-To: <494DB182.1050106@arachelian.com> References: <494DB182.1050106@arachelian.com> Message-ID: <494DDB7E.8070901@gjcp.net> Ray Arachelian wrote: > http://flickr.com/photos/spaceageboy/3117272956/sizes/o/ It's a serial port. > Would this be the interface between the Lisa and the Mac as related here: > > http://folklore.org/StoryView.py?project=Macintosh&story=Shut_Up.txt&sortOrder=Sort%20by%20Date&detail=medium&search=shut%20up Hmm, the 1981 date suggests that it would a bit early for the Mac, and the layout of the PCB suggests an Apple II card... Gordon From dkelvey at hotmail.com Sun Dec 21 00:42:28 2008 From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 22:42:28 -0800 Subject: any idea what this schematic is? In-Reply-To: <494DB182.1050106@arachelian.com> References: <494DB182.1050106@arachelian.com> Message-ID: Hi Looks like RS422 interface. Dwight ---------------------------------------- > Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 22:01:22 -0500 > From: ray at arachelian.com > To: > Subject: any idea what this schematic is? > > http://flickr.com/photos/spaceageboy/3117272956/sizes/o/ > > Would this be the interface between the Lisa and the Mac as related here: > > http://folklore.org/StoryView.py?project=Macintosh&story=Shut_Up.txt&sortOrder=Sort%20by%20Date&detail=medium&search=shut%20up > >> Unfortunately, there was one small snag. We were using the Lisa as the >> development machine for writing the software for Macintosh, and we >> hadn't yet reached the point where the Macintosh could run >> stand-alone. The Macintosh needed to be hooked up to a Lisa, in order >> to download software from it. But the Lisa group was writing all of >> its own applications for Lisa and didn't want Microsoft to see a Lisa. >> They made us promise that we wouldn't let Microsoft see the Lisa. >> >> We finally came up with a solution where we'd use a twenty-five foot >> cable and keep the Lisa in a different room that the Microsoft guys >> weren't allowed to enter. I would start up the programs on the Lisa in >> the other room, and Bud Tribble would operate the Macintosh. I would >> usually run into the main room to see their reaction. > _________________________________________________________________ Send e-mail faster without improving your typing skills. http://windowslive.com/online/hotmail?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_hotmail_acq_speed_122008 From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Sun Dec 21 00:53:00 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 01:53:00 -0500 Subject: any idea what this schematic is? In-Reply-To: References: <494DB182.1050106@arachelian.com> Message-ID: On Sun, Dec 21, 2008 at 1:42 AM, dwight elvey wrote: > > Hi > Looks like RS422 interface. > >> From: ray at arachelian.com >> >> http://flickr.com/photos/spaceageboy/3117272956/sizes/o/ >> >> Would this be the interface between the Lisa and the Mac as related here: >> >> I don't know what the bus in the Lisa looks like, but the interface end, the bit that Dwight identifies as an "RS422 interface" will hook right up to a Mac (but I'd have to check to see if their DE-9 pinout matches the DE-9 serial pinout of the 128K/512K Mac board). The "Lisa-Mac Interface Card" legend at the top certainly suggests that it's a schematic for the card from the story. The circuit appears to be what one would need to add a Mac-compatible serial port to _some_ machine. -ethan From jrr at flippers.com Sat Dec 20 11:43:24 2008 From: jrr at flippers.com (John Robertson) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 09:43:24 -0800 Subject: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) In-Reply-To: <49494419.6000608@media.mit.edu> References: <200812171800.mBHI0EcT035138@dewey.classiccmp.org> <49494419.6000608@media.mit.edu> Message-ID: <494D2EBC.6080609@flippers.com> Tim McNerney wrote: > Thanks for the lead on the Rockwell PPS-4. > Does anyone know where I can find architectural info on it, > and/or a die photo? It seems to be quite rare, and there > is almost no information about this chip [family] on the web. > > --Tim > > I have information in PDF format for the PPS-4 as used in Gottlieb and Recel Pinball games in the 70s. This covers the CPU, PIA and Keyboard chips. No architectural or die photos though. John :-#)# From chrise at pobox.com Sat Dec 20 12:54:18 2008 From: chrise at pobox.com (Chris Elmquist) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 12:54:18 -0600 Subject: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) In-Reply-To: <494D13C2.50003@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <4299.71.98.250.26.1229614199.squirrel@mail.neurotica.com> <20081219031319.GQ5784@n0jcf.net> <20081219122433.GV5784@n0jcf.net> <494D13C2.50003@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <20081220185418.GH31448@n0jcf.net> On Saturday (12/20/2008 at 08:48AM -0700), bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > Chris Elmquist wrote: > >> Sorry, I got the year wrong. It was approx 1978. Less cool then but still >> not bad. Meatloaf was still bad. > > Umm you don't wait several years to eat Meatloaf. This one you would have wanted to. Imagine a pale grey colored ring about 10" dia with 3" dia hole in the middle. Wasn't a browned bit of meat on it and not enough ketchup in the world to make it go down. I think we learned then that a microwave is not for "browning". -- Chris Elmquist mailto:chrise at pobox.com From axelsson at acc.umu.se Sat Dec 20 17:29:42 2008 From: axelsson at acc.umu.se (=?ISO-8859-15?Q?G=F6ran_Axelsson?=) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 00:29:42 +0100 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <000801c96111$4eb19910$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca><49416A0D.6070500@gmail.com> <30c101c95f07$28ee3780$46fea8c0@DeskJara><4948086F.3060003@gmail.com> <49481C9D.1020307@gjcp.net> <494824AA.6030508@verizon.net> <000801c96111$4eb19910$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <494D7FE6.1090008@acc.umu.se> Alexandre Souza wrote: >> I have a small uC device that I made that uses an FTDI USB->TTL >> converter. I wish USB was as straight-forward as you describe. I'm >> currently running into problems when transferring, very quickly, some >> data from the uC to the PC. The problems are related to overrunning >> the PC, where the PC isn't scheduling reads from the device fast >> enough to prevent drops. At least interrupt-based I/O can "demand" >> attention from the cpu at any time, where USB is at the mercy of >> being scheduled. > > I do that at 921kbps and had no issues. I have just finished a project with a PIC32 (MIPS32 core) working as a voice codec and talking to a linux PC over the USB buss. We got it up to 310 kBytes/s and not dropping a single package during hours of running. The communication on the PIC side is solved by constantly polling the USB bus to catch every event. We had problems with package dropped every ten seconds or so but we traced it back to a iproute cache flush that the kernel was doing. The USB bus is fast but with standard hardware it isn't hard to get the speed up. If you have problem with overruns, check if the PC is doing some periodic maintainancy or there are any other devices using the bus. Sorry for being a bit OT but just to add a bit of nostalgia to my post, my next hobby project will be a transputer link to USB interface. :-) /G?ran From jetemp at insightbb.com Sat Dec 20 22:15:15 2008 From: jetemp at insightbb.com (Jim Temple) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 23:15:15 -0500 Subject: FDOS for Fluke 1720A Message-ID: <000301c96322$ba111790$2e3346b0$@com> Hello, Saw your post and thought I would ask about the software and manuals for the Fluke 1722A controller. Do you still have them? Did you get them to Bitsavers? I'm interested in obtaining the above software. Sincerely, Jim Temple Louisville, KY. From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Sun Dec 21 01:00:47 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 02:00:47 -0500 Subject: any idea what this schematic is? In-Reply-To: <494DDB7E.8070901@gjcp.net> References: <494DB182.1050106@arachelian.com> <494DDB7E.8070901@gjcp.net> Message-ID: On Sun, Dec 21, 2008 at 1:00 AM, Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote: > Ray Arachelian wrote: >> >> http://flickr.com/photos/spaceageboy/3117272956/sizes/o/ > > It's a serial port. Yep. >> Would this be the interface between the Lisa and the Mac as related here: >> > > Hmm, the 1981 date suggests that it would a bit early for the Mac... Not sure about the date, but that's only two-ish years before I seem to recall seeing an article about the Mac in "Byte" (1983). > ...and the layout of the PCB suggests an Apple II card... I completely disagree. The location of the power and ground pins on the schematic are where the Apple II has the address and data buses (plus +12V, on the wrong pin for the schematic). Additionally, the signal names /VMA, /VPA, and E are usual names for MC68000 buses (or perhaps the 6809), not the 6502. Plus, suggestively, but not conclusively, the card form factor doesn't look to me to be something for the Apple II (the card is too tall compared to the width the fingers are drawn at). I'm reasonably certain that A) it's not an Apple II card, and B) it's a card for some 50-pin-bus 68000 machine. It might as well be the Lisa as anything else, but that could be confirmed by cross referencing the listed bus pins with Lisa documentation. -ethan From lbickley at bickleywest.com Sun Dec 21 01:16:11 2008 From: lbickley at bickleywest.com (Lyle Bickley) Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 23:16:11 -0800 Subject: Engelbart's mouse / 40th anniversary In-Reply-To: <1debc0350812141324y5f70b1bg5957a16ab405d6e6@mail.gmail.com> References: <493F1D6C.78498637@cs.ubc.ca> <964328.23699.qm@web65516.mail.ac4.yahoo.com> <1debc0350812141324y5f70b1bg5957a16ab405d6e6@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <200812202316.11632.lbickley@bickleywest.com> Marcin, On Sunday 14 December 2008, Marcin Wichary wrote: > Here are my photos from the event, for those interested: > http://flickriver.com/photos/mwichary/sets/72157610918709769/ > > (48 photos in total. Scroll down to see more.) Great photos! Thanks for posting them... Cheers, Lyle -- Lyle Bickley Bickley Consulting West Inc. http://bickleywest.com "Black holes are where God is dividing by zero" From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br Sun Dec 21 01:46:51 2008 From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 05:46:51 -0200 Subject: any idea what this schematic is? References: <494DB182.1050106@arachelian.com> <494DDB7E.8070901@gjcp.net> Message-ID: <126b01c96340$757f8d00$46fea8c0@DeskJara> >> http://flickr.com/photos/spaceageboy/3117272956/sizes/o/ I don't know which computer was used but: - It is a serial card - It has a 50-pin card edge connector (Lisa, maybe?) - It has RS-422 line drivers (so, it seems to be connected to a Macintosh) - It is NOT an apple // card, although having 50-pin card edge connector (I tried to reverse the pinout but got also no good result) - It is NOT an apple //e expansion card, that one you put on the 80-column slot. Even reversing the pinout So, it is probable it is used in a Lisa or a Macintosh XL (same machine?) Greetings from Brazil Alexandre Souza, PU1BZZ From bear at typewritten.org Sun Dec 21 02:51:44 2008 From: bear at typewritten.org (r.stricklin) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 00:51:44 -0800 Subject: any idea what this schematic is? In-Reply-To: <126b01c96340$757f8d00$46fea8c0@DeskJara> References: <494DB182.1050106@arachelian.com> <494DDB7E.8070901@gjcp.net> <126b01c96340$757f8d00$46fea8c0@DeskJara> Message-ID: <62F98EEF-A14E-4CF5-9BCF-90EBF9A0DE93@typewritten.org> On Dec 20, 2008, at 11:46 PM, Alexandre Souza wrote: >>> http://flickr.com/photos/spaceageboy/3117272956/sizes/o/ > > - It has a 50-pin card edge connector (Lisa, maybe?) I'm not sure what the mystery is. It fits a Lisa, and was used to download software to the early prototypes of the Macintosh. http://www.digibarn.com/collections/diagrams/early-mac-interfaces/index.html The earliest Lisa prototypes had 50-pin edge connectors for the I/O expansion cards. Sometime between 7/81 and 2/82 the Lisa got the pinch- fit, 56-pin edge connector for I/O expansion cards that it eventually shipped with. The collection of diagrams at DigiBarn (from which the flickr image was nicked) shows this evolution pretty clearly. ok bear From brad at heeltoe.com Sun Dec 21 12:36:45 2008 From: brad at heeltoe.com (Brad Parker) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 13:36:45 -0500 Subject: any idea what this schematic is? In-Reply-To: References: <494DB182.1050106@arachelian.com> Message-ID: <30022.1229884605@mini> dwight elvey wrote: > >Hi > Looks like RS422 interface. for a 68000. I don't know what the hardware looked like in 1981. Maybe there was no serial port at that time. -brad From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Sun Dec 21 12:53:04 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 18:53:04 +0000 (GMT) Subject: any idea what this schematic is? In-Reply-To: <494DB182.1050106@arachelian.com> from "Ray Arachelian" at Dec 20, 8 10:01:22 pm Message-ID: > > http://flickr.com/photos/spaceageboy/3117272956/sizes/o/ > > Would this be the interface between the Lisa and the Mac as related here: Well, it's clearly an ansynchronous serial interface (the 6551 chip) at RS422-ish levels, so that side would talk to a Mac serial port. WHat the host bus is, I can't say, but it might well be Lisa. -tony From ray at arachelian.com Sun Dec 21 13:27:11 2008 From: ray at arachelian.com (Ray Arachelian) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 14:27:11 -0500 Subject: any idea what this schematic is? In-Reply-To: References: <494DB182.1050106@arachelian.com> Message-ID: <494E988F.7040906@arachelian.com> Ethan Dicks wrote: > On Sun, Dec 21, 2008 at 1:42 AM, dwight elvey wrote: > >> Hi >> Looks like RS422 interface. >> >> > I don't know what the bus in the Lisa looks like, but the interface > end, the bit that Dwight identifies as an "RS422 interface" will hook > right up to a Mac (but I'd have to check to see if their DE-9 pinout > matches the DE-9 serial pinout of the 128K/512K Mac board). The > "Lisa-Mac Interface Card" legend at the top certainly suggests that > it's a schematic for the card from the story. The circuit appears to > be what one would need to add a Mac-compatible serial port to _some_ > machine. > > -ethan > > Right, the 6551 is a ACIA, which is an Async. Comm Interface Adapter. So, the date on this is 1981, the 1982 version of the Lisa Hardware Guide indicates that it did not at that time use the Z8530, but rather used individual chips to implement serial ports (I recall a separate chip for the baud generator). So based on that, if this is indeed that interface, it sort of matches that they couldn't just hook it up to the Lisa's serial port (perhaps they could at lower bps rates.) The other interesting thing is the label - at first it looked like ME1002-00, but it could also say MC1002-00, that middle line that would make an E is a bit light, perhaps it was meant as a "C" - now this matches the Mac motherboard labeling scheme here: http://folklore.org/StoryView.py?project=Macintosh&story=Macintosh_Prototypes.txt&characters=Dan%20Kottke&sortOrder=Sort%20by%20Date&detail=medium The DE-9 label matches the label on the original Mac 128 schematic: http://folklore.org/projects/Macintosh/images/schematic.jpg Now what doesn't match is the card connector, it doesn't match the pins on the Lisa motherboard - but perhaps this too was different in the 1981 version. >From what I recall, originally, the Lisa was supposed to be a 16 bit text based computer, and only later, after the Xerox visit, did they change things around. So it might be that interface, it might be something completely different - perhaps a prototype, or it might be mislabeled, or even a hoax. I guess if someone knows how to contact Daniel Kottke, we could get confirmation one way or another... From ray at arachelian.com Sun Dec 21 13:31:20 2008 From: ray at arachelian.com (Ray Arachelian) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 14:31:20 -0500 Subject: any idea what this schematic is? In-Reply-To: <62F98EEF-A14E-4CF5-9BCF-90EBF9A0DE93@typewritten.org> References: <494DB182.1050106@arachelian.com> <494DDB7E.8070901@gjcp.net> <126b01c96340$757f8d00$46fea8c0@DeskJara> <62F98EEF-A14E-4CF5-9BCF-90EBF9A0DE93@typewritten.org> Message-ID: <494E9988.7070309@arachelian.com> r.stricklin wrote: > I'm not sure what the mystery is. It fits a Lisa, and was used to > download software to the early prototypes of the Macintosh. > > http://www.digibarn.com/collections/diagrams/early-mac-interfaces/index.html > > > The earliest Lisa prototypes had 50-pin edge connectors for the I/O > expansion cards. Sometime between 7/81 and 2/82 the Lisa got the > pinch-fit, 56-pin edge connector for I/O expansion cards that it > eventually shipped with. The collection of diagrams at DigiBarn (from > which the flickr image was nicked) shows this evolution pretty clearly. > Ah, there we go! Thanks for that link! :-) From arcarlini at iee.org Sun Dec 21 14:01:32 2008 From: arcarlini at iee.org (a.carlini) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 20:01:32 -0000 Subject: oregon software tape In-Reply-To: <494D8A84.8080002@bitsavers.org> Message-ID: <00b701c963a6$ed331a40$cb01a8c0@dis754cbb81360> Al Kossow wrote: > fscking eBay now hides the buyer's ID. Try emailing the seller asking him if he would forward a message to the buyer (maybe explaining what you do at the CHM and why you care about the tape). The seller sounds like he would care too: "My brother was a vintage computer geek and had tons of manual, schematics, equipment, parts etc. In settling his estate I'm trying to get this stuff to people as passionate as he was. In my mind that's much better than a dumpster." Then again, it is an auction! Antonio From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Sun Dec 21 14:12:14 2008 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 12:12:14 -0800 (PST) Subject: Turbo Pascal evaluation Message-ID: Recently Al Kossow purchased from me an evaluation copy of Turbo Pascal which was previously evaluated by science fiction author Jerry Pournelle for his columnin Byte Magazine. With Al's permission, I have reproduced the text of the letter that came with that copy. ---BEGIN QUOTE--- Borland International 4807 Scots Valley Drive Scots Valley, California 95066 (408) 438-5400 Telex: 172373 Mr. Jerry Pournelle, November 14, 1983 Science Fact and Fiction (address censored) Dear Sir, Thank you for your interest in our company and especially in our new product, Turbo Pascal. I have enclosed the following versions of Turbo Pascal: 1. CP/M 80 on 8-inch SSSD disk for Z80 based systems. 2. CP/M 85 on 8-inch SSSD disk and 5-1/4 inch IBM PC. 3. MS DOS 1.1 version for the IBM PC on a 5-1/4 inch disk. We have already verified that this version runs on the following computers: IBM PC, Eagle PC line, Columbia PC, Compaq PC. 4. Test version for the IBM PC using the 8087 math co-processor. Note that this is only a test version. We will be very pleased to answer all the questions you might have during your evaluation I would like to meet you in person and maybe COMDEX Las Vegas would be a good oportunity. But my plans for COMDEX Las Vegas are not finalized yet. Therefore the easiest thing would be for you to let me know where you will be staying so that we can eventually arrange a meeting. Sincerely yours, (signature) Philippe Kahn President P.S. You will find in this shipment the package that our customers receive for $49.95. We feel it is a good buy! ENCLOSURE ---END QUOTE--- -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? From cclist at sydex.com Sun Dec 21 14:35:25 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 12:35:25 -0800 Subject: Turbo Pascal evaluation In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <494E380D.4807.D5D0A2@cclist.sydex.com> On 21 Dec 2008 at 12:12, David Griffith wrote: > I have enclosed the following versions of Turbo Pascal: > 1. CP/M 80 on 8-inch SSSD disk for Z80 based systems. > 2. CP/M 85 on 8-inch SSSD disk and 5-1/4 inch IBM PC. > 3. MS DOS 1.1 version for the IBM PC on a 5-1/4 inch disk. CP/M 85? Is that in the original letter or is that a typo? Cheers, Chuck From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Sun Dec 21 14:37:00 2008 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 12:37:00 -0800 (PST) Subject: Turbo Pascal evaluation In-Reply-To: <494E380D.4807.D5D0A2@cclist.sydex.com> References: <494E380D.4807.D5D0A2@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: On Sun, 21 Dec 2008, Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 21 Dec 2008 at 12:12, David Griffith wrote: > >> I have enclosed the following versions of Turbo Pascal: >> 1. CP/M 80 on 8-inch SSSD disk for Z80 based systems. >> 2. CP/M 85 on 8-inch SSSD disk and 5-1/4 inch IBM PC. >> 3. MS DOS 1.1 version for the IBM PC on a 5-1/4 inch disk. > > CP/M 85? Is that in the original letter or is that a typo? Whoops! That's my typo. -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? From geoffr at zipcon.net Sun Dec 21 14:55:59 2008 From: geoffr at zipcon.net (Geoff Reed) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 12:55:59 -0800 Subject: CBM 8000 VideoCD? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <9C6E7B5E94B6447E9F8A3084BF746921@liberator> Did you try to contact any of the people who have links on there that reviewed it? http://gaelyne.com/ is a possibility -----Original Message----- From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Ethan Dicks Sent: Saturday, December 20, 2008 2:48 PM To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: CBM 8000 VideoCD? Hi, all, I was bouncing around looking for SuperPET info and ran across this page (again)... Unfortunately, the address on the page is no longer active, so it's not possible to request a copy of the video. Did anyone on the list ever get this? -ethan From gordonjcp at gjcp.net Sun Dec 21 17:04:25 2008 From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 23:04:25 +0000 Subject: Turbo Pascal evaluation In-Reply-To: <494E380D.4807.D5D0A2@cclist.sydex.com> References: <494E380D.4807.D5D0A2@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <494ECB79.406@gjcp.net> Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 21 Dec 2008 at 12:12, David Griffith wrote: > >> I have enclosed the following versions of Turbo Pascal: >> 1. CP/M 80 on 8-inch SSSD disk for Z80 based systems. >> 2. CP/M 85 on 8-inch SSSD disk and 5-1/4 inch IBM PC. >> 3. MS DOS 1.1 version for the IBM PC on a 5-1/4 inch disk. > > CP/M 85? Is that in the original letter or is that a typo? It's one quieter, innit? ;-) Gordon From steven.alan.canning at verizon.net Sun Dec 21 19:58:43 2008 From: steven.alan.canning at verizon.net (Scanning) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 17:58:43 -0800 Subject: Radio Shack Science Fair manuals References: <000501c963cc$a4af7450$1d844946@RonUS67PI6LUV> Message-ID: <000501c963d8$d1de6ab0$0201a8c0@hal9000> Ron, Are you talking about the kit with three knobs on the left side or the 300 in one kit with the two knobs on the left ?? Might be able to help you if it is the 300 in one. Best regards, Steven Subject: Radio Shack Science Fair manuals Do you know where i can get a manual for the Science Fair electronic project kit # 28-247? I would like to give it to my son for Christmas so a manual would be great. Thanks Ron From rtellason at verizon.net Sun Dec 21 21:21:05 2008 From: rtellason at verizon.net (Roy J. Tellason) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 22:21:05 -0500 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <3E72CDA0-4537-4340-BA3B-CCD7D3E059DE@neurotica.com> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <200812171757.30554.rtellason@verizon.net> <3E72CDA0-4537-4340-BA3B-CCD7D3E059DE@neurotica.com> Message-ID: <200812212221.06006.rtellason@verizon.net> On Thursday 18 December 2008 06:07:26 am Dave McGuire wrote: > On Dec 17, 2008, at 5:57 PM, Roy J. Tellason wrote: > >> Re. Model M itself - it's nice to be typing on one; I've suffered > >> a laptop keyboard for far too long! > > > > I can't imagine trying to do any significant amount of typing on > > one. A bit here and there, yeah, but not much... > > You guys are using the wrong laptops. I've written tens (if not > hundreds) of thousands of lines of code on an Apple 17" Aluminum > PowerBook. That keyboard is so good that I went out and found a > desktop keyboard with the same mechanism. Now, I LOVE the venerable > Model M, but I can absolutely fly on one of these Al PowerBook (and > similar) keyboards. Well, if you have any extra of "the right ones" by all means feel free to send 'em in my direction... :-) -- Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters" - Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James M Dakin From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Sun Dec 21 21:25:27 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 20:25:27 -0700 Subject: USB Model M In-Reply-To: <200812212221.06006.rtellason@verizon.net> References: <01C95B9C.D75A1280@host-208-72-122-49.dyn.295.ca> <200812171757.30554.rtellason@verizon.net> <3E72CDA0-4537-4340-BA3B-CCD7D3E059DE@neurotica.com> <200812212221.06006.rtellason@verizon.net> Message-ID: <494F08A7.8040100@jetnet.ab.ca> Roy J. Tellason wrote: > Well, if you have any extra of "the right ones" by all means feel free to > send 'em in my direction... I think they all flew the other way ... :) From michaelgreen42 at comcast.net Sun Dec 21 21:35:59 2008 From: michaelgreen42 at comcast.net (Michael) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 19:35:59 -0800 Subject: Apple Newton Messagepad 100 (Original) boxed complete and Messagepad 120 In-Reply-To: <200812021540.mB2Fe2PY021692@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812021540.mB2Fe2PY021692@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <02fa01c963e6$6867c9b0$39375d10$@net> Very interesting vintage Newtons I've got a complete in box Messagepad 100 and a loose 120. Selling as a lot to the highest offer. From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu Sun Dec 21 23:22:57 2008 From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 21:22:57 -0800 (PST) Subject: Apple Newton Messagepad 100 (Original) boxed complete and Messagepad 120 In-Reply-To: <02fa01c963e6$6867c9b0$39375d10$@net> References: <200812021540.mB2Fe2PY021692@dewey.classiccmp.org> <02fa01c963e6$6867c9b0$39375d10$@net> Message-ID: On Sun, 21 Dec 2008, Michael wrote: > Very interesting vintage Newtons I've got a complete in box Messagepad 100 > and a loose 120. Selling as a lot to the highest offer. There to eat lemons axe gravy soup? -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? From mike at brickfieldspark.org Mon Dec 22 03:07:10 2008 From: mike at brickfieldspark.org (Mike Hatch) Date: Mon, 22 Dec 2008 09:07:10 -0000 Subject: [personal] Re: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? References: Message-ID: <005b01c96414$ac832850$961ca8c0@mss.local> > A simple example of the differnce. If you take a D-type flip-flop and > connect the output to a NOT gate and the output of that back to the D > input, then you get a divide-by-2-circuit. Feed in a regular clock at one > frequency and the Q output will toggle at half that frequency. But if you A clocked JK with the JK held high will perform the same function. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Tony Duell" To: Sent: Saturday, December 20, 2008 6:10 PM Subject: [personal] Re: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? >> > Your code above does not result in latches. It results in D type >> > flipflops! >> >> What's the difference? As I've learned to use the words, D-flops _are_ >> latches. Have I mislearnt? > > As I understand the terms, a D-type flip-flop is edge-triggered, a latch > (or more exactly a transparent latch) is level-operated. > > What I eman is that for a D-type flip-flop, the output (Q) is set equal > to the input (D) a short time after the rising edge (say), of the clock > signal. At all othter times Q does not change state, no matter what D > does. So if clock is held high all the time, or held low all the time, Q > will never change. > > But with a transparent latch, then if the clock (sometimes called the > enable input) is in one sate (say high). then the output (Q) tracks the > input (D). When the clock input goes low, then Q is held in whatever > state it was in as the clock input went low. > > A simple example of the differnce. If you take a D-type flip-flop and > connect the output to a NOT gate and the output of that back to the D > input, then you get a divide-by-2-circuit. Feed in a regular clock at one > frequency and the Q output will toggle at half that frequency. But if you > do the same thing with a transparent latch, you get something that > oscillates at a frequency determined by the propagation delays when the > clock is high. In other words the output is somewhat unpredicatable, it's > certainly not a square wave at half the frequency of the clock signal. > > -tony > > > From chrise at pobox.com Sun Dec 21 18:11:28 2008 From: chrise at pobox.com (Chris Elmquist) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 18:11:28 -0600 Subject: any idea what this schematic is? In-Reply-To: References: <494DB182.1050106@arachelian.com> Message-ID: <20081222001127.GO31448@n0jcf.net> On Sunday (12/21/2008 at 06:53PM +0000), Tony Duell wrote: > > > > http://flickr.com/photos/spaceageboy/3117272956/sizes/o/ > > > > Would this be the interface between the Lisa and the Mac as related here: > > Well, it's clearly an ansynchronous serial interface (the 6551 chip) at > RS422-ish levels, so that side would talk to a Mac serial port. WHat the > host bus is, I can't say, but it might well be Lisa. Perhaps a prototype Appletalk interface? The 26LS30 xmit enable is controlled by the RTS output of the ACIA so it was probably a half-duplex link... ala RS485, which I believe is what Appletalk was. The 6551 won't do sync or any of the fancy header detection that the Z8530 did... which I think is what ultimately became the Appletalk interface in the Mac. Chris -- Chris Elmquist mailto:chrise at pobox.com From rbunz at shaw.ca Sun Dec 21 18:31:34 2008 From: rbunz at shaw.ca (Ron & Franca Bunz) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 17:31:34 -0700 Subject: Radio Shack Science Fair manuals Message-ID: <000501c963cc$a4af7450$1d844946@RonUS67PI6LUV> Do you know where i can get a manual for the Science Fair electronic project kit # 28-247? I would like to give it to my son for Christmas so a manual would be great. Thanks Ron From aek at bitsavers.org Mon Dec 22 11:29:35 2008 From: aek at bitsavers.org (Al Kossow) Date: Mon, 22 Dec 2008 09:29:35 -0800 Subject: oregon software tape Message-ID: <494FCE7F.8000309@bitsavers.org> > The seller sounds like he would care too He doesn't.. I've emailed him several times with questions about specific items or if he has the other bits of things that he listed, and he has never had the courtesy to reply. He does let me know when I've waited too long in his option to pay him, however (I try to group lots together to save on shipping). I have identified the buyer of the other tape. From gerhard.kreuzer at liftoff.at Mon Dec 22 12:22:33 2008 From: gerhard.kreuzer at liftoff.at (Gerhard Kreuzer) Date: Mon, 22 Dec 2008 19:22:33 +0100 Subject: AW: cctalk Digest, Vol 64, Issue 52; any idea what this schematic is? In-Reply-To: <200812211800.mBLI05mY014693@dewey.classiccmp.org> References: <200812211800.mBLI05mY014693@dewey.classiccmp.org> Message-ID: <621015F9BBB4435BBFF23651BBB9AAD3@mars> Hi, Ist definitely a RS422 interface, and ist the 4-wire version. You have two lines for sending data (Tx+, Tx-) and two lines for receiving serial data (Rx+, Rx-). Its a +-5V differentially signalling technique to get high speed on long lines and archive better noise immunity. With best regards Gerhard -----Urspr?ngliche Nachricht----- Von: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] Im Auftrag von cctalk-request at classiccmp.org Gesendet: Sonntag, 21. Dezember 2008 19:01 An: cctalk at classiccmp.org Betreff: cctalk Digest, Vol 64, Issue 52 Send cctalk mailing list submissions to cctalk at classiccmp.org To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit http://www.classiccmp.org/mailman/listinfo/cctalk or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to cctalk-request at classiccmp.org You can reach the person managing the list at cctalk-owner at classiccmp.org When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific than "Re: Contents of cctalk digest..." Today's Topics: 1. Re: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? (Pete Turnbull) 2. Re: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? (Tony Duell) 3. Re: Timekeeping (was Re: Sherwood Micro CPU/100) (Tony Duell) 4. Re: Timekeeping (was Re: Sherwood Micro CPU/100) (Tony Duell) 5. New USB Mod Ms available from Unicomp? was Re: USB Model M (Paxton Hoag) 6. CBM 8000 VideoCD? (Ethan Dicks) 7. list of nordisk data books and floppy disks (Bert Thomas) 8. Re: Engelbart's mouse / 40th anniversary (Andrew Burton) 9. oregon software tape (Al Kossow) 10. Re: 8008 chips (Andrew Burton) 11. any idea what this schematic is? (Ray Arachelian) 12. RE: oregon software tape (Ian King) 13. MS WinWord 6.0 32-bit (Liam Proven) 14. Re: PDP-8 on FPGA project (Philipp Hachtmann) 15. Re: any idea what this schematic is? (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ) 16. RE: any idea what this schematic is? (dwight elvey) 17. Re: any idea what this schematic is? (Ethan Dicks) 18. Re: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) (John Robertson) 19. Re: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) (Chris Elmquist) 20. Re: USB Model M (G?ran Axelsson) 21. FDOS for Fluke 1720A (Jim Temple) 22. Re: any idea what this schematic is? (Ethan Dicks) 23. Re: Engelbart's mouse / 40th anniversary (Lyle Bickley) 24. Re: any idea what this schematic is? (Alexandre Souza) 25. Re: any idea what this schematic is? (r.stricklin) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Message: 1 Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 17:55:58 +0000 From: Pete Turnbull Subject: Re: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Message-ID: <494D31AE.8010306 at dunnington.plus.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed On 19/12/2008 15:53, der Mouse wrote: >> Your code above does not result in latches. It results in D type >> flipflops! > > What's the difference? As I've learned to use the words, D-flops > _are_ latches. Have I mislearnt? They're not quite the same thing, though a D-type flip-flop is a kind of latch. There are other types of flip-flops, such as T, RS, and JK types, usually edge-triggered. In a D-type, the active clock edge causes the output to change to match the input, and having changed, it stays that way, even if the input changes while the clock is still at the same level. The transparent latches that are commonly just referred to as "latches" (eg in data books, where you'll find some devices referred to as latches and others as flip-flops to distinguish them) are level-sensitive, and the output tracks the input (including changes) while the clock is at its active level. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York ------------------------------ Message: 2 Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 18:10:04 +0000 (GMT) From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Subject: Re: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Message-ID: Content-Type: text/plain > > Your code above does not result in latches. It results in D type > > flipflops! > > What's the difference? As I've learned to use the words, D-flops > _are_ latches. Have I mislearnt? As I understand the terms, a D-type flip-flop is edge-triggered, a latch (or more exactly a transparent latch) is level-operated. What I eman is that for a D-type flip-flop, the output (Q) is set equal to the input (D) a short time after the rising edge (say), of the clock signal. At all othter times Q does not change state, no matter what D does. So if clock is held high all the time, or held low all the time, Q will never change. But with a transparent latch, then if the clock (sometimes called the enable input) is in one sate (say high). then the output (Q) tracks the input (D). When the clock input goes low, then Q is held in whatever state it was in as the clock input went low. A simple example of the differnce. If you take a D-type flip-flop and connect the output to a NOT gate and the output of that back to the D input, then you get a divide-by-2-circuit. Feed in a regular clock at one frequency and the Q output will toggle at half that frequency. But if you do the same thing with a transparent latch, you get something that oscillates at a frequency determined by the propagation delays when the clock is high. In other words the output is somewhat unpredicatable, it's certainly not a square wave at half the frequency of the clock signal. -tony ------------------------------ Message: 3 Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 18:12:55 +0000 (GMT) From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Subject: Re: Timekeeping (was Re: Sherwood Micro CPU/100) To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Message-ID: Content-Type: text/plain > Hi > You should also consider building a free pendulum clock reference. If I ever get a supply of circular tuits, then that's something I have long considered making... Even a single-pendulum (non-free) synchronome would be a fun thing to build > I've considered adding one to my grandfather clock. > These were used as references until the quartz oven references > replaced them. I am told that a free paenddulum in a vacuum chamber (to remove the errors due to air resistance, often called 'barometric errors', since the air resistance depends on the barometric pressure) actually has a better long-term stability than most quartz crystals. -tony ------------------------------ Message: 4 Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 18:16:07 +0000 (GMT) From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Subject: Re: Timekeeping (was Re: Sherwood Micro CPU/100) To: cctalk at classiccmp.org Message-ID: Content-Type: text/plain > One can calculate the angles if you first draw a line for local noon > and use the following equation to calculate each hour line from that > noon line. > =20 > X = hour lines angle ( each hour is 15 degrees ) Y = 90 - Latitude > angle Called the 'Colatitude' in some books. > Z = Angle on plate that is level to the ground from noon line > > arctan( tan(X) / cos ( Y ) ) = Z > > At least I think I did the trig right.=20 I beleive that is correct, However, it gets more complicated if you want to have a vertical-ish dial plate (say on a wall) that is neither truely vertical (it 'reclines') and which doesn't face any of the cardinal compass directions (it 'declines'). -tony ------------------------------ Message: 5 Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 13:10:33 -0800 From: "Paxton Hoag" Subject: New USB Mod Ms available from Unicomp? was Re: USB Model M To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Message-ID: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 > Right here: http://pckeyboards.stores.yahoo.net/cabdetmin.html > Thanks for the link as I need some cables too. I bought a dozen Model Ms from a local community college garage sale. They were complaining about how much noise they made. At 50 cents apiece I bought all they had. I noticed that Unicomp, the site mentioned above sells new Buckling Key keyboards With USB built in for $69. http://pckeyboards.stores.yahoo.net/cus101usenon.html These are the people that bought the Keyboard parts business from IBM. It looks like they are trying to keep the model M and continue to supply the market. Paxton -- Paxton Hoag Astoria, OR USA ------------------------------ Message: 6 Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 17:48:18 -0500 From: "Ethan Dicks" Subject: CBM 8000 VideoCD? To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Message-ID: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Hi, all, I was bouncing around looking for SuperPET info and ran across this page (again)... Unfortunately, the address on the page is no longer active, so it's not possible to request a copy of the video. Did anyone on the list ever get this? -ethan ------------------------------ Message: 7 Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 00:12:18 +0100 From: Bert Thomas Subject: list of nordisk data books and floppy disks To: General at lekkervaren.nl, "Discussion at lekkervaren.nl":On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Message-ID: <494D7BD2.3000108 at brothom.nl> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed If you need access to one of these, contact me an urge me to make a deal. Keep pushing, as pushing raises priority with me. Books: NOTIS-BG User Guide NOTIS-RG New functions in the E-version NOTIS-DS User's guide Introduction to ND Office Systems The SPRINT User Guide Documentation Catalogue SINTRAN III Real Time Loader Dialogue-UNIQUE-II User Guide Operator Environment User Guide NOTIS-WP Brief Introduction User Environment Reference Manual NOTIS-WP Reference Manual COSMOS User Guide User Environment Reference Manual SINTRAN III Utilities Manual (3x) ND-110 Instruction Set The Database System SIBAS II ND User Manual SIBAS II Operator Manual NOTIS-DS Introduction (2x) Sintran III Real Time Guide NOTIS-DS Supervisor Guide (2x) ACCESS User Guide File Manager Introduction (2x, one in shrink-wrap) NOMIS Norwegian Medical Information System SINTRAN III COMMANDS Reference Manual SINTRAN III Monitor Calls (2x) Symbolic Debugger User Guide Examples for NOTIS-RG Version B SINTRAN-III Release Information K-version NOTIS-TF Macro Guide (new in shrink wrap) BACKUP User Guide (3x) SINTRAN III System Supervisor Operator Environment User Guide ND-110 COMPACT Operator Guide (contains several quick reference cards) SINTRAN III User Guide BRF-Linker User Manual NOTIS-TF User Guide User Environment Library Routines NOTIS-RG Reference Manual Test Program Description for ND-100/ND-110 ordner with following description: course program the supervisor's responsibility Handbook of Useful information examples of LOAD-MODE etc. telefix customer information miscellaneous materials MEDITEBS (in dutch) bunch of unknown listings a document with information on SCSI on ND ACCESS DBA manual NOTIS-TF text formatter reference manual partly dutch presentation with general user info SINTRAN III Timesharing/Batch guide some dutch documentation on MEDITEBS datasheets of several ND products, such as software packages, computers and accessoiries Floppies: (each floppy or set of floppies contains a few pages of information) SINTRAN III K GENERATION 312 CONF.D VSX, 2 disks (2 sets) PATCH-SIN-K-5400 (2 sets) SINTRAN III Configuration Program SUBSYSTEM PACKAGE 32 BITS FLOATING FORMAT SINTRAN III VSE/VSX Utility Programs ACCOUNTING System for SINTRAN III BACKUP-SYSTEM X-MESSAGE TELEFIX FILES FOR USER SITES SUBSYSTEM PACKAGE II VTM terminal tables USER ENVIRONMENT (3 disks) TEST PROGRAMS FOR ND-100/110 TEST PROGRAMS FOR ND-100/110/120 (2 disks) JEC job execution control ND-10634A MEMORY TO FLOPPY NOTIS-WP FOR ND-100 (4 disks) SIBAS-II for ND-100 (2 disks with pretty much the same label) ACCESS FOR ND-100 (dito) NOTIS-RG for ND-100 norwegian NOTIS-DS for ND-100 (3 disks) NOTIS-DS for ND-100 48-bit floating point (3 disks with pretty much the same label) NOTIS-BG-for ND-100 norwegian version 32 bits fl NOTIS-BG-for ND-100 32 bits fl NOTIS-BG-for ND-100 (business grafics) 32 bits fl PR for ND-100 (Norwegian version) BRF-Linker for ND-100 SINTRAN III MONITOR CALL Pack. SPRINT Spooling System (3 disks) MEDITEBS specials Mass Storage Utilities OPERATOR ENVIRONMENT (4 disks) Disk Restore (3 disks) TESTPROGRAMS FOR ND-100/110/120 (2 disks, both labeled PART 1 OF 2) UNIQUE-II SIBAS for ND-100 UNIQUE TEXT SYSTEM UNIQUE-II SIBAS ND-100 (hand-written label) SOFTWARE KEY DISCETTE ------------------------------ Message: 8 Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 23:22:17 +0000 (GMT) From: Andrew Burton Subject: Re: Engelbart's mouse / 40th anniversary To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Message-ID: <567206.77758.qm at web23406.mail.ird.yahoo.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 Thanks for the photo's. That must have been an interesting event. Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk --- On Sun, 14/12/08, Marcin Wichary wrote: From: Marcin Wichary Subject: Re: Engelbart's mouse / 40th anniversary To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Date: Sunday, 14 December, 2008, 9:24 PM Here are my photos from the event, for those interested: http://flickriver.com/photos/mwichary/sets/72157610918709769/ (48 photos in total. Scroll down to see more.) ------------------------------ Message: 9 Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 16:15:00 -0800 From: Al Kossow Subject: oregon software tape To: classiccmp at classiccmp.org Message-ID: <494D8A84.8080002 at bitsavers.org> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed did anyone on the list buy this tape? http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=120348714966 I got the earlier version, and it is a source tape. I'm trying to find out if the other one was as well. fscking eBay now hides the buyer's ID. ------------------------------ Message: 10 Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 02:17:52 +0000 (GMT) From: Andrew Burton Subject: Re: 8008 chips To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Message-ID: <346678.75570.qm at web23407.mail.ird.yahoo.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 Awesome pictures. It's seriously impressive how these chips must be made and designed. Regards, Andrew B aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk --- On Tue, 16/12/08, William Blair wrote: They are relatively rare, but they aren't even close to being _THAT_ rare. I'm talking about his asking price. I bought one three years ago from a fellow collector of CPU chips for _$20_ that had some markings worn off and was scratched. I opened it up to photograph the die (a hobby of mine): http://diephotos.blogspot.com/ I've haven't even seen rare versions of white ceramic 4004 ICs in perfect condition go for anything close to his asking price. I've seen a complete, mint condition MCS-4 (4004) chip _SET_ go for something close to $1K. ------------------------------ Message: 11 Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 22:01:22 -0500 From: Ray Arachelian Subject: any idea what this schematic is? To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Message-ID: <494DB182.1050106 at arachelian.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 http://flickr.com/photos/spaceageboy/3117272956/sizes/o/ Would this be the interface between the Lisa and the Mac as related here: http://folklore.org/StoryView.py?project=Macintosh&story=Shut_Up.txt&sortOrd er=Sort%20by%20Date&detail=medium&search=shut%20up > Unfortunately, there was one small snag. We were using the Lisa as the > development machine for writing the software for Macintosh, and we > hadn't yet reached the point where the Macintosh could run > stand-alone. The Macintosh needed to be hooked up to a Lisa, in order > to download software from it. But the Lisa group was writing all of > its own applications for Lisa and didn't want Microsoft to see a Lisa. > They made us promise that we wouldn't let Microsoft see the Lisa. > > We finally came up with a solution where we'd use a twenty-five foot > cable and keep the Lisa in a different room that the Microsoft guys > weren't allowed to enter. I would start up the programs on the Lisa in > the other room, and Bud Tribble would operate the Macintosh. I would > usually run into the main room to see their reaction. ------------------------------ Message: 12 Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 19:24:43 -0800 From: Ian King Subject: RE: oregon software tape To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Message-ID: Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" eBay's greed will destroy its empire. At least, it's always worked that way before.... ________________________________________ From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Al Kossow [aek at bitsavers.org] Sent: Saturday, December 20, 2008 4:15 PM To: classiccmp at classiccmp.org Subject: oregon software tape did anyone on the list buy this tape? http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=120348714966 I got the earlier version, and it is a source tape. I'm trying to find out if the other one was as well. fscking eBay now hides the buyer's ID. ------------------------------ Message: 13 Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 04:33:35 +0000 From: "Liam Proven" Subject: MS WinWord 6.0 32-bit To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Message-ID: <575131af0812202033o14e4e811r2071a9316e71d48f at mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=WINDOWS-1252 This is somewhat off-topic for here, but I don't know where else to ask. Way back in the early days of 32-bit Windows - I know, 5min ago by local standards - MS did a 32-bit version of Word and Excel for users of MS Office 4 on Windows NT 3. I used to have copies - on floppy - but I've lost them. No idea where to get replacements now, but I would really like to be able to use Word 6/32 again. It was a great WP, and by modern standards, tiny and very fast. Anyone still have a copy, or can suggest where to look or ask? -- Liam Proven  Profile: http://www.linkedin.com/in/liamproven Email: lproven at cix.co.uk  GMail/GoogleTalk/Orkut: lproven at gmail.com Tel: +44 20-8685-0498  Cell: +44 7939-087884  Fax: + 44 870-9151419 AOL/AIM/iChat: liamproven at aol.com  MSN/Messenger: lproven at hotmail.com Yahoo: liamproven at yahoo.co.uk  Skype: liamproven  ICQ: 73187508 ------------------------------ Message: 14 Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 05:43:55 +0100 From: Philipp Hachtmann Subject: Re: PDP-8 on FPGA project To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Message-ID: <494DC98B.2070108 at hachti.de> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Hi, >>> You can emulate that in std_logic with a single driver driving an "H" >>> (the "pull-up"), and everyone else drives either "0" or "Z". >> Yes. You can write that. But the synthesis tool - if it eats that - >> will generate >> many ORs... So avoid it. In the company I have worked a bit for, MANY >> constructs >> were simply forbidden. Thinks like Z, H, L in std_logic are suspicious >> :-) > > What you say is true for FPGA-internal signals but the output drivers > _can_ be switched to high-impedance. > The open-collector driver you were asking about originally can be > emulated by assigning "Z" directly to the IOB, switching it to high-z. > That will only work if the signal you use is routed directly to the IOB > => use only in top level entity to be sure. Yes, of course... IOBs can also be controlled "manually" using the output enable... The discussion was about the on-chip (!!) wiring of the OMNIBUS. the original OMNIBUS is an open collector thing. Ph :-) -- http://www.hachti.de ------------------------------ Message: 15 Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 06:00:30 +0000 From: Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ Subject: Re: any idea what this schematic is? To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Message-ID: <494DDB7E.8070901 at gjcp.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Ray Arachelian wrote: > http://flickr.com/photos/spaceageboy/3117272956/sizes/o/ It's a serial port. > Would this be the interface between the Lisa and the Mac as related here: > > http://folklore.org/StoryView.py?project=Macintosh&story=Shut_Up.txt&sortOrd er=Sort%20by%20Date&detail=medium&search=shut%20up Hmm, the 1981 date suggests that it would a bit early for the Mac, and the layout of the PCB suggests an Apple II card... Gordon ------------------------------ Message: 16 Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 22:42:28 -0800 From: dwight elvey Subject: RE: any idea what this schematic is? To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Message-ID: Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Hi Looks like RS422 interface. Dwight ---------------------------------------- > Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 22:01:22 -0500 > From: ray at arachelian.com > To: > Subject: any idea what this schematic is? > > http://flickr.com/photos/spaceageboy/3117272956/sizes/o/ > > Would this be the interface between the Lisa and the Mac as related here: > > http://folklore.org/StoryView.py?project=Macintosh&story=Shut_Up.txt&sortOrd er=Sort%20by%20Date&detail=medium&search=shut%20up > >> Unfortunately, there was one small snag. We were using the Lisa as the >> development machine for writing the software for Macintosh, and we >> hadn't yet reached the point where the Macintosh could run >> stand-alone. The Macintosh needed to be hooked up to a Lisa, in order >> to download software from it. But the Lisa group was writing all of >> its own applications for Lisa and didn't want Microsoft to see a Lisa. >> They made us promise that we wouldn't let Microsoft see the Lisa. >> >> We finally came up with a solution where we'd use a twenty-five foot >> cable and keep the Lisa in a different room that the Microsoft guys >> weren't allowed to enter. I would start up the programs on the Lisa in >> the other room, and Bud Tribble would operate the Macintosh. I would >> usually run into the main room to see their reaction. > _________________________________________________________________ Send e-mail faster without improving your typing skills. http://windowslive.com/online/hotmail?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_hotmail_acq_speed_12 2008 ------------------------------ Message: 17 Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 01:53:00 -0500 From: "Ethan Dicks" Subject: Re: any idea what this schematic is? To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Message-ID: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 On Sun, Dec 21, 2008 at 1:42 AM, dwight elvey wrote: > > Hi > Looks like RS422 interface. > >> From: ray at arachelian.com >> >> http://flickr.com/photos/spaceageboy/3117272956/sizes/o/ >> >> Would this be the interface between the Lisa and the Mac as related here: >> >> I don't know what the bus in the Lisa looks like, but the interface end, the bit that Dwight identifies as an "RS422 interface" will hook right up to a Mac (but I'd have to check to see if their DE-9 pinout matches the DE-9 serial pinout of the 128K/512K Mac board). The "Lisa-Mac Interface Card" legend at the top certainly suggests that it's a schematic for the card from the story. The circuit appears to be what one would need to add a Mac-compatible serial port to _some_ machine. -ethan ------------------------------ Message: 18 Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 09:43:24 -0800 From: John Robertson Subject: Re: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) To: General at invalid.domain, "Discussion at invalid.domain":On-Topic Posts Only Message-ID: <494D2EBC.6080609 at flippers.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Tim McNerney wrote: > Thanks for the lead on the Rockwell PPS-4. > Does anyone know where I can find architectural info on it, > and/or a die photo? It seems to be quite rare, and there > is almost no information about this chip [family] on the web. > > --Tim > > I have information in PDF format for the PPS-4 as used in Gottlieb and Recel Pinball games in the 70s. This covers the CPU, PIA and Keyboard chips. No architectural or die photos though. John :-#)# ------------------------------ Message: 19 Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 12:54:18 -0600 From: Chris Elmquist Subject: Re: Rockwell PPS-4 info (was 8008 v. 4004...) To: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Message-ID: <20081220185418.GH31448 at n0jcf.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii On Saturday (12/20/2008 at 08:48AM -0700), bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote: > Chris Elmquist wrote: > >> Sorry, I got the year wrong. It was approx 1978. Less cool then but still >> not bad. Meatloaf was still bad. > > Umm you don't wait several years to eat Meatloaf. This one you would have wanted to. Imagine a pale grey colored ring about 10" dia with 3" dia hole in the middle. Wasn't a browned bit of meat on it and not enough ketchup in the world to make it go down. I think we learned then that a microwave is not for "browning". -- Chris Elmquist mailto:chrise at pobox.com ------------------------------ Message: 20 Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 00:29:42 +0100 From: G?ran Axelsson Subject: Re: USB Model M To: General at acc.umu.se, "Discussion at acc.umu.se":On-Topic Posts Only Message-ID: <494D7FE6.1090008 at acc.umu.se> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-15; format=flowed Alexandre Souza wrote: >> I have a small uC device that I made that uses an FTDI USB->TTL >> converter. I wish USB was as straight-forward as you describe. I'm >> currently running into problems when transferring, very quickly, some >> data from the uC to the PC. The problems are related to overrunning >> the PC, where the PC isn't scheduling reads from the device fast >> enough to prevent drops. At least interrupt-based I/O can "demand" >> attention from the cpu at any time, where USB is at the mercy of >> being scheduled. > > I do that at 921kbps and had no issues. I have just finished a project with a PIC32 (MIPS32 core) working as a voice codec and talking to a linux PC over the USB buss. We got it up to 310 kBytes/s and not dropping a single package during hours of running. The communication on the PIC side is solved by constantly polling the USB bus to catch every event. We had problems with package dropped every ten seconds or so but we traced it back to a iproute cache flush that the kernel was doing. The USB bus is fast but with standard hardware it isn't hard to get the speed up. If you have problem with overruns, check if the PC is doing some periodic maintainancy or there are any other devices using the bus. Sorry for being a bit OT but just to add a bit of nostalgia to my post, my next hobby project will be a transputer link to USB interface. :-) /Gvran ------------------------------ Message: 21 Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 23:15:15 -0500 From: "Jim Temple" Subject: FDOS for Fluke 1720A To: Message-ID: <000301c96322$ba111790$2e3346b0$@com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Hello, Saw your post and thought I would ask about the software and manuals for the Fluke 1722A controller. Do you still have them? Did you get them to Bitsavers? I'm interested in obtaining the above software. Sincerely, Jim Temple Louisville, KY. ------------------------------ Message: 22 Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 02:00:47 -0500 From: "Ethan Dicks" Subject: Re: any idea what this schematic is? To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Message-ID: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 On Sun, Dec 21, 2008 at 1:00 AM, Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote: > Ray Arachelian wrote: >> >> http://flickr.com/photos/spaceageboy/3117272956/sizes/o/ > > It's a serial port. Yep. >> Would this be the interface between the Lisa and the Mac as related here: >> > > Hmm, the 1981 date suggests that it would a bit early for the Mac... Not sure about the date, but that's only two-ish years before I seem to recall seeing an article about the Mac in "Byte" (1983). > ...and the layout of the PCB suggests an Apple II card... I completely disagree. The location of the power and ground pins on the schematic are where the Apple II has the address and data buses (plus +12V, on the wrong pin for the schematic). Additionally, the signal names /VMA, /VPA, and E are usual names for MC68000 buses (or perhaps the 6809), not the 6502. Plus, suggestively, but not conclusively, the card form factor doesn't look to me to be something for the Apple II (the card is too tall compared to the width the fingers are drawn at). I'm reasonably certain that A) it's not an Apple II card, and B) it's a card for some 50-pin-bus 68000 machine. It might as well be the Lisa as anything else, but that could be confirmed by cross referencing the listed bus pins with Lisa documentation. -ethan ------------------------------ Message: 23 Date: Sat, 20 Dec 2008 23:16:11 -0800 From: Lyle Bickley Subject: Re: Engelbart's mouse / 40th anniversary To: "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" , "Marcin Wichary" Message-ID: <200812202316.11632.lbickley at bickleywest.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Marcin, On Sunday 14 December 2008, Marcin Wichary wrote: > Here are my photos from the event, for those interested: > http://flickriver.com/photos/mwichary/sets/72157610918709769/ > > (48 photos in total. Scroll down to see more.) Great photos! Thanks for posting them... Cheers, Lyle -- Lyle Bickley Bickley Consulting West Inc. http://bickleywest.com "Black holes are where God is dividing by zero" ------------------------------ Message: 24 Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 05:46:51 -0200 From: "Alexandre Souza" Subject: Re: any idea what this schematic is? To: "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" Message-ID: <126b01c96340$757f8d00$46fea8c0 at DeskJara> Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed; charset="iso-8859-1"; reply-type=original >> http://flickr.com/photos/spaceageboy/3117272956/sizes/o/ I don't know which computer was used but: - It is a serial card - It has a 50-pin card edge connector (Lisa, maybe?) - It has RS-422 line drivers (so, it seems to be connected to a Macintosh) - It is NOT an apple // card, although having 50-pin card edge connector (I tried to reverse the pinout but got also no good result) - It is NOT an apple //e expansion card, that one you put on the 80-column slot. Even reversing the pinout So, it is probable it is used in a Lisa or a Macintosh XL (same machine?) Greetings from Brazil Alexandre Souza, PU1BZZ ------------------------------ Message: 25 Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2008 00:51:44 -0800 From: "r.stricklin" Subject: Re: any idea what this schematic is? To: "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" Message-ID: <62F98EEF-A14E-4CF5-9BCF-90EBF9A0DE93 at typewritten.org> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed; delsp=yes On Dec 20, 2008, at 11:46 PM, Alexandre Souza wrote: >>> http://flickr.com/photos/spaceageboy/3117272956/sizes/o/ > > - It has a 50-pin card edge connector (Lisa, maybe?) I'm not sure what the mystery is. It fits a Lisa, and was used to download software to the early prototypes of the Macintosh. http://www.digibarn.com/collections/diagrams/early-mac-interfaces/index.html The earliest Lisa prototypes had 50-pin edge connectors for the I/O expansion cards. Sometime between 7/81 and 2/82 the Lisa got the pinch- fit, 56-pin edge connector for I/O expansion cards that it eventually shipped with. The collection of diagrams at DigiBarn (from which the flickr image was nicked) shows this evolution pretty clearly. ok bear End of cctalk Digest, Vol 64, Issue 52 ************************************** From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Mon Dec 22 13:10:26 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Mon, 22 Dec 2008 19:10:26 +0000 (GMT) Subject: [personal] Re: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: <005b01c96414$ac832850$961ca8c0@mss.local> from "Mike Hatch" at Dec 22, 8 09:07:10 am Message-ID: > > > A simple example of the differnce. If you take a D-type flip-flop and > > connect the output to a NOT gate and the output of that back to the D > > input, then you get a divide-by-2-circuit. Feed in a regular clock at one > > frequency and the Q output will toggle at half that frequency. But if you > > A clocked JK with the JK held high will perform the same function. Of course (a proverb involving grandmothers and sucking eggs springs to mind :-)). But the OP asked what was the difference between a D-type flip-flop and a (D-type transparent) latch. No mention of JK flip-flops. -tony From brad at heeltoe.com Mon Dec 22 14:02:00 2008 From: brad at heeltoe.com (Brad Parker) Date: Mon, 22 Dec 2008 15:02:00 -0500 Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus In-Reply-To: <24146.1229784478@mini> References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com> <1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com> <24146.1229784478@mini> Message-ID: <24342.1229976120@mini> fyi: the 4.3bsd quasijarus tape file can be found here: http://www.retrocomputinggeek.com/retrowiki/Install4.3BSDQuasijarus/ along with instructions. (I could swear the person who's website is on this list, btw) and if anyone is bored, I have an "expect" script which automates the whole thing. This comes in handy if you are going to do it a few times for different size disks. -brad From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Mon Dec 22 12:55:31 2008 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse) Date: Mon, 22 Dec 2008 13:55:31 -0500 (EST) Subject: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: <49453812.1040401@gjcp.net> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com> <200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <49453812.1040401@gjcp.net> Message-ID: <200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> >>> [PDF is] an open standard. >> ...which, apparently, most PDF creaters don't follow. I can't >> remember the last time I looked at PDF for which ghostscript didn't >> give me its "please notify the author of the code that produced this >> that it's not conforming to Adobe's published spec" warning. In at >> least one of those cases, it was an Adobe application - or, at >> least, the application name string claimed it was. > That's because ghostscript is based on a long-obsolete version of the > standard, as far as I can see For something like documentation, about the only thing worse than no standard is a moving-target "standard". >> I'm not blaming the tool. I'm blaming the chip makers for using the >> tool inappropriately. PDFs are fine for cases where presentation is >> important compared to content. Chip datasheets are not such a case. > That's fine, if you want to stick with bloated plain-text documents Bloated? As in, smaller than PDFs? > and live without usable searching, As in, how splendidly "grep something *.pdf" works? As compared to how poorly "grep something *.txt" works? Or whatever other searching tool you happen to want to use (as opposed to having to use whatever your specialized PDF viewer application's author thought was a good interface)? > indexes, I've seen usable indexes in plaintext documents - and rarely want them anyway because of the ease of searching. (Indexes are mostly a holdover from paper, where searching is nontrivial and thus a list of pointers is valuable.) > annotations As in, editing the text files to add whatever you want? > and bookmarking. Perhaps. Whatever you mean by it, either it's trivial for text files or I've never missed it. > Please stop railing against the rest of us, who have moved onto > better things. You're welcome to your "better things" all you like. But please stop holding those of us who care more about getting the information than about using the Latest Whizzbang Impediment To Getting Work Done back from getting it! I have nothing against chipmakers providing PDF datasheets. What I object to is their providing _only_ PDF datasheets - or, more precisely, their not providing the useful content in plain text. /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From trixter at oldskool.org Tue Dec 23 12:45:11 2008 From: trixter at oldskool.org (Jim Leonard) Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2008 12:45:11 -0600 Subject: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: <200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com> <200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <49453812.1040401@gjcp.net> <200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <495131B7.8060901@oldskool.org> der Mouse wrote: > You're welcome to your "better things" all you like. But please stop > holding those of us who care more about getting the information than > about using the Latest Whizzbang Impediment To Getting Work Done back > from getting it! .txt doesn't hold diagrams. Obviously, both formats are useful. Since space is cheap, I always store my scans in three formats: - Compressed TIFF - PDF - .txt That way the original TIFFs can be re-processed in a decade with better tools, the PDF is available to distribute and has full text search + diagrams, and the OCR'd .txt is available for those who are just looking for the text data. That's the final solution, and anyone arguing for a single format for scans of datasheets (or any documentation!) is missing the point, all parties included. -- Jim Leonard (trixter at oldskool.org) http://www.oldskool.org/ Help our electronic games project: http://www.mobygames.com/ Or check out some trippy MindCandy at http://www.mindcandydvd.com/ A child borne of the home computer wars: http://trixter.wordpress.com/ From cisin at xenosoft.com Tue Dec 23 14:40:25 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2008 12:40:25 -0800 (PST) Subject: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: <200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com> <200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <49453812.1040401@gjcp.net> <200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net> On Mon, 22 Dec 2008, der Mouse wrote: > I've seen usable indexes in plaintext documents - and rarely want them > anyway because of the ease of searching. (Indexes are mostly a > holdover from paper, where searching is nontrivial and thus a list of > pointers is valuable.) A good professional indexer works with synonyms and subject, not just keywords. A keyword only index is basically a concordance. From lynchaj at yahoo.com Tue Dec 23 15:40:02 2008 From: lynchaj at yahoo.com (Andrew Lynch) Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2008 16:40:02 -0500 Subject: wire-wrap supplies Message-ID: <3C1E905F5F0448698ACA175FAA751ED1@andrewdesktop> Hi! I am building some prototypes for the N8VEM home brew computing project and using the new ECB Prototyping Board. It works great and it allows wire-wrap and/or point-to-point soldering construction. I am making an ECB serial board as part of another larger development. I have some wire-wrap supplies, sockets, and tools but I can see I am fairly quickly using them. If anyone has any old wire-wrap stuff they don't need anymore and would like to sell for a nominal amount, or just find a good home for where you know they'll get used as intended, please contact me. Any supplies offered will be used as intended not scrapped or sold. I will gladly pay for shipping and/or nominal price. Obviously I would rather use old stock than buy up a bunch of new stuff since I will bet there are lots of people with old wire-wrap stuff they don't use anymore. If anyone can help out I certainly would appreciate it. Thanks and have a nice day! Andrew Lynch From rtellason at verizon.net Tue Dec 23 19:21:15 2008 From: rtellason at verizon.net (Roy J. Tellason) Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2008 20:21:15 -0500 Subject: [personal] Re: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: <005b01c96414$ac832850$961ca8c0@mss.local> References: <005b01c96414$ac832850$961ca8c0@mss.local> Message-ID: <200812232021.15888.rtellason@verizon.net> On Monday 22 December 2008 04:07:10 am Mike Hatch wrote: > > A simple example of the differnce. If you take a D-type flip-flop and > > connect the output to a NOT gate and the output of that back to the D > > input, then you get a divide-by-2-circuit. Feed in a regular clock at one > > frequency and the Q output will toggle at half that frequency. But if you > > A clocked JK with the JK held high will perform the same function. As will tying the D input back to not-Q, which most of them have. The advantage to using the D-type over the J-K is two fewer package pins needed, which may or may not be important to somebody. And what the heck does that J-K stand for, anyway? > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Tony Duell" > To: > Sent: Saturday, December 20, 2008 6:10 PM > Subject: [personal] Re: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? > > >> > Your code above does not result in latches. It results in D type > >> > flipflops! > >> > >> What's the difference? As I've learned to use the words, D-flops _are_ > >> latches. Have I mislearnt? > > > > As I understand the terms, a D-type flip-flop is edge-triggered, a latch > > (or more exactly a transparent latch) is level-operated. > > > > What I eman is that for a D-type flip-flop, the output (Q) is set equal > > to the input (D) a short time after the rising edge (say), of the clock > > signal. At all othter times Q does not change state, no matter what D > > does. So if clock is held high all the time, or held low all the time, Q > > will never change. > > > > But with a transparent latch, then if the clock (sometimes called the > > enable input) is in one sate (say high). then the output (Q) tracks the > > input (D). When the clock input goes low, then Q is held in whatever > > state it was in as the clock input went low. > > > > A simple example of the differnce. If you take a D-type flip-flop and > > connect the output to a NOT gate and the output of that back to the D > > input, then you get a divide-by-2-circuit. Feed in a regular clock at one > > frequency and the Q output will toggle at half that frequency. But if you > > do the same thing with a transparent latch, you get something that > > oscillates at a frequency determined by the propagation delays when the > > clock is high. In other words the output is somewhat unpredicatable, it's > > certainly not a square wave at half the frequency of the clock signal. > > > > -tony -- Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters" - Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James M Dakin From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca Tue Dec 23 19:30:10 2008 From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca) Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2008 18:30:10 -0700 Subject: [personal] Re: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: <200812232021.15888.rtellason@verizon.net> References: <005b01c96414$ac832850$961ca8c0@mss.local> <200812232021.15888.rtellason@verizon.net> Message-ID: <495190A2.6030105@jetnet.ab.ca> Roy J. Tellason wrote: > On Monday 22 December 2008 04:07:10 am Mike Hatch wrote: >>> A simple example of the differnce. If you take a D-type flip-flop and >>> connect the output to a NOT gate and the output of that back to the D >>> input, then you get a divide-by-2-circuit. Feed in a regular clock at one >>> frequency and the Q output will toggle at half that frequency. But if you >> A clocked JK with the JK held high will perform the same function. > > As will tying the D input back to not-Q, which most of them have. The > advantage to using the D-type over the J-K is two fewer package pins needed, > which may or may not be important to somebody. > > And what the heck does that J-K stand for, anyway? J(am) and K(lear) ? BTW Lets not forget the early computers used pulses not logic levels. That was fun timing ! From grant at stockly.com Tue Dec 23 21:32:22 2008 From: grant at stockly.com (Grant Stockly) Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2008 18:32:22 -0900 Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: <960460.33227.qm@web111513.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> References: <200812151800.mBFI0E0K095904@dewey.classiccmp.org> <960460.33227.qm@web111513.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <0KCD002ON34L5IA0@msgmmp-1.gci.net> >They are relatively rare, but they aren't even close to being _THAT_ >rare. I'm talking about his asking price. I bought one three years >ago from a fellow collector of CPU chips for _$20_ that had some >markings worn off and was scratched. I opened it up to photograph >the die (a hobby of mine): 8008s go for $15 a piece from unicorn, if you buy 50 From grant at stockly.com Tue Dec 23 21:36:06 2008 From: grant at stockly.com (Grant Stockly) Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2008 18:36:06 -0900 Subject: 8008 chips In-Reply-To: References: <0KBY007840A1D640@vms173001.mailsrvcs.net> Message-ID: <0KCD0091O3AG7560@msgmmp-1.gci.net> At 04:55 AM 12/16/2008, you wrote: > > The 1101 256 byte static ram. > >No, not this either. > >Hard to find, these 1101s, but not impossible. Bought 200 of those from unicorn for $2 each. If I were mean and fought with Rob I could probably get lower prices...but he treats me good. ; ) They charge the same amount for the Altair 1MCS memory chips, 2101 or 2102s, I forget... From frustum at pacbell.net Tue Dec 23 22:20:54 2008 From: frustum at pacbell.net (Jim Battle) Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2008 22:20:54 -0600 Subject: [personal] Re: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: <495190A2.6030105@jetnet.ab.ca> References: <005b01c96414$ac832850$961ca8c0@mss.local> <200812232021.15888.rtellason@verizon.net> <495190A2.6030105@jetnet.ab.ca> Message-ID: <4951B8A6.6010507@pacbell.net> > Roy J. Tellason wrote: >> On Monday 22 December 2008 04:07:10 am Mike Hatch wrote: >>>> A simple example of the differnce. If you take a D-type flip-flop and >>>> connect the output to a NOT gate and the output of that back to the D >>>> input, then you get a divide-by-2-circuit. Feed in a regular clock >>>> at one >>>> frequency and the Q output will toggle at half that frequency. But >>>> if you >>> A clocked JK with the JK held high will perform the same function. >> >> As will tying the D input back to not-Q, which most of them have. >> The advantage to using the D-type over the J-K is two fewer package >> pins needed, which may or may not be important to somebody. >> >> And what the heck does that J-K stand for, anyway? John Kardash invented the JK flip flop. At least, that is what the prof said back in 1982 when I was at school. From cclist at sydex.com Wed Dec 24 00:24:49 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2008 22:24:49 -0800 Subject: [personal] Re: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? In-Reply-To: <4951B8A6.6010507@pacbell.net> References: , <495190A2.6030105@jetnet.ab.ca>, <4951B8A6.6010507@pacbell.net> Message-ID: <49516531.2947.AF5C36@cclist.sydex.com> On 23 Dec 2008 at 22:20, Jim Battle wrote: > John Kardash invented the JK flip flop. At least, that is what the prof said back in 1982 > when I was at school. >From Wikipedia: The origin of the name for the JK flip-flop is detailed by P. L. Lindley, a JPL engineer, in a letter to EDN, an electronics design magazine. The letter is dated June 13, 1968, and was published in the August edition of the newsletter. In the letter, Mr. Lindley explains that he heard the story of the JK flip-flop from Dr. Eldred Nelson, who is responsible for coining the term while working at Hughes Aircraft. Flip-flops in use at Hughes at the time were all of the type that came to be known as J-K. In designing a logical system, Dr. Nelson assigned letters to flip-flop inputs as follows: #1: A & B, #2: C & D, #3: E & F, #4: G & H, #5: J & K. Another theory holds that the set and reset inputs were given the symbols "J" and "K" after one of the engineers that helped design the J-K flip-flop, Jack Kilby. ----------- Or Jack Klugman... Cheers, Chuck From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Tue Dec 23 15:14:32 2008 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse) Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2008 16:14:32 -0500 (EST) Subject: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: <20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com> <200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <49453812.1040401@gjcp.net> <200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> >> I've seen usable indexes in plaintext documents - and rarely want >> them anyway because of the ease of searching. (Indexes are mostly a >> holdover from paper, where searching is nontrivial and thus a list >> of pointers is valuable.) > A good professional indexer works with synonyms and subject, not just > keywords. A keyword only index is basically a concordance. Good point; thanks for catching that - I suspect I've seen too many concordance-style indices and too few of the other sort. But even a good index can be done perfectly well in plain text; the only part that's at all difficult is what to use as the pointer to the referenced text, and that (a) is an issue only if the text is not broken into numbered pages and (b) is not hard to solve even if the text is not paginated (it could use line numbers, section numbers, even search patterns, etc). /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From cisin at xenosoft.com Wed Dec 24 01:52:53 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2008 23:52:53 -0800 (PST) Subject: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: <200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com> <200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <49453812.1040401@gjcp.net> <200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net> <200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net> > >> of pointers is valuable.) > > A good professional indexer works with synonyms and subject, not just > > keywords. A keyword only index is basically a concordance. On Tue, 23 Dec 2008, der Mouse wrote: > Good point; thanks for catching that - I suspect I've seen too many > concordance-style indices and too few of the other sort. But even a > good index can be done perfectly well in plain text; the only part > that's at all difficult is what to use as the pointer to the referenced > text, and that (a) is an issue only if the text is not broken into > numbered pages and (b) is not hard to solve even if the text is not > paginated (it could use line numbers, section numbers, even search > patterns, etc). I wish that I knew a good way in HTML to express offsets from beginning of a document. -- Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com From frustum at pacbell.net Wed Dec 24 02:46:52 2008 From: frustum at pacbell.net (Jim Battle) Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 02:46:52 -0600 Subject: JK Flip flop (was: some other crap) In-Reply-To: <49516531.2947.AF5C36@cclist.sydex.com> References: , <495190A2.6030105@jetnet.ab.ca>, <4951B8A6.6010507@pacbell.net> <49516531.2947.AF5C36@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <4951F6FC.1010306@pacbell.net> Chuck Guzis wrote: > On 23 Dec 2008 at 22:20, Jim Battle wrote: > >> John Kardash invented the JK flip flop. At least, that is what the prof said back in 1982 >> when I was at school. > >>From Wikipedia: > > The origin of the name for the JK flip-flop is detailed by P. L. > Lindley, a JPL engineer, in a letter to EDN, an electronics design > magazine. The letter is dated June 13, 1968, and was published in the > August edition of the newsletter. In the letter, Mr. Lindley explains > that he heard the story of the JK flip-flop from Dr. Eldred Nelson, > who is responsible for coining the term while working at Hughes > Aircraft. Flip-flops in use at Hughes at the time were all of the > type that came to be known as J-K. In designing a logical system, Dr. > Nelson assigned letters to flip-flop inputs as follows: #1: A & B, > #2: C & D, #3: E & F, #4: G & H, #5: J & K. > > Another theory holds that the set and reset inputs were given the > symbols "J" and "K" after one of the engineers that helped design the > J-K flip-flop, Jack Kilby. http://taracom.net/chip.pl?to=management John Kardash, Sr. Scientist M.S. EE, Temple University Over 30 years of experience in IC design and management. Inventor of JK flip flop. Developed many analog and digital integrated circuits for disk drive market. Holds 17 patents on digital and analog circuits and one patent on phone detection system. John was key designer of the Suhl (Sylvania high logic), which became the Industry TTL line. He has also designed many production worthy circuits for Automotive, Telephone, Disk Drive, and Communication markets. From mike at brickfieldspark.org Wed Dec 24 04:18:29 2008 From: mike at brickfieldspark.org (Mike Hatch) Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 10:18:29 -0000 Subject: [personal] Re: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards(Keytronics)) References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com><493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com><200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG><49453812.1040401@gjcp.net><200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG><20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net><200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <002f01c965b0$f9a1a6a0$961ca8c0@mss.local> > I wish that I knew a good way in HTML to express offsets from beginning > of a document. It is a variant of the , for a position in that page it would be , where 'position' is a tag in that page . Mike ----- Original Message ----- From: "Fred Cisin" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Wednesday, December 24, 2008 7:52 AM Subject: [personal] Re: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards(Keytronics)) >> >> of pointers is valuable.) >> > A good professional indexer works with synonyms and subject, not just >> > keywords. A keyword only index is basically a concordance. > > On Tue, 23 Dec 2008, der Mouse wrote: >> Good point; thanks for catching that - I suspect I've seen too many >> concordance-style indices and too few of the other sort. But even a >> good index can be done perfectly well in plain text; the only part >> that's at all difficult is what to use as the pointer to the referenced >> text, and that (a) is an issue only if the text is not broken into >> numbered pages and (b) is not hard to solve even if the text is not >> paginated (it could use line numbers, section numbers, even search >> patterns, etc). > > I wish that I knew a good way in HTML to express offsets from beginning > of a document. > > > -- > Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com > > > From mike at brickfieldspark.org Wed Dec 24 04:45:50 2008 From: mike at brickfieldspark.org (Mike Hatch) Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 10:45:50 -0000 Subject: [personal] Re: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? References: <005b01c96414$ac832850$961ca8c0@mss.local> <200812232021.15888.rtellason@verizon.net> Message-ID: <003501c965b4$c9c1a6c0$961ca8c0@mss.local> The J-K variant can also be used for crude synchronisation or spikeless gating of clocks if the JK is a logic signal rather than tied high. For the JK derivation see the wikipedia entry http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flip-flop_(electronics)#JK_flip-flop, both descriptione have an element of credibility but in the end who knows where the JK convention came from. Mike. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Roy J. Tellason" To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" Sent: Wednesday, December 24, 2008 1:21 AM Subject: Re: [personal] Re: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? > On Monday 22 December 2008 04:07:10 am Mike Hatch wrote: >> > A simple example of the differnce. If you take a D-type flip-flop and >> > connect the output to a NOT gate and the output of that back to the D >> > input, then you get a divide-by-2-circuit. Feed in a regular clock at >> > one >> > frequency and the Q output will toggle at half that frequency. But if >> > you >> >> A clocked JK with the JK held high will perform the same function. > > As will tying the D input back to not-Q, which most of them have. The > advantage to using the D-type over the J-K is two fewer package pins > needed, > which may or may not be important to somebody. > > And what the heck does that J-K stand for, anyway? > >> ----- Original Message ----- >> From: "Tony Duell" >> To: >> Sent: Saturday, December 20, 2008 6:10 PM >> Subject: [personal] Re: PDP-8 on FPGA project & where is Hans Pufal? >> >> >> > Your code above does not result in latches. It results in D type >> >> > flipflops! >> >> >> >> What's the difference? As I've learned to use the words, D-flops >> >> _are_ >> >> latches. Have I mislearnt? >> > >> > As I understand the terms, a D-type flip-flop is edge-triggered, a >> > latch >> > (or more exactly a transparent latch) is level-operated. >> > >> > What I eman is that for a D-type flip-flop, the output (Q) is set equal >> > to the input (D) a short time after the rising edge (say), of the clock >> > signal. At all othter times Q does not change state, no matter what D >> > does. So if clock is held high all the time, or held low all the time, >> > Q >> > will never change. >> > >> > But with a transparent latch, then if the clock (sometimes called the >> > enable input) is in one sate (say high). then the output (Q) tracks the >> > input (D). When the clock input goes low, then Q is held in whatever >> > state it was in as the clock input went low. >> > >> > A simple example of the differnce. If you take a D-type flip-flop and >> > connect the output to a NOT gate and the output of that back to the D >> > input, then you get a divide-by-2-circuit. Feed in a regular clock at >> > one >> > frequency and the Q output will toggle at half that frequency. But if >> > you >> > do the same thing with a transparent latch, you get something that >> > oscillates at a frequency determined by the propagation delays when the >> > clock is high. In other words the output is somewhat unpredicatable, >> > it's >> > certainly not a square wave at half the frequency of the clock signal. >> > >> > -tony > > > > -- > Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and > ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can > be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters" > - > Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by > lies. --James > M Dakin > > > From mcguire at neurotica.com Wed Dec 24 10:45:48 2008 From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire) Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 11:45:48 -0500 Subject: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: <20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com> <200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <49453812.1040401@gjcp.net> <200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net> <200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: On Dec 24, 2008, at 2:52 AM, Fred Cisin wrote: > I wish that I knew a good way in HTML to express offsets from > beginning > of a document. Does the '#' construct not do what you want? -Dave -- Dave McGuire Port Charlotte, FL From cclist at sydex.com Wed Dec 24 10:52:03 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 08:52:03 -0800 Subject: JK Flip flop (was: some other crap) In-Reply-To: <4951F6FC.1010306@pacbell.net> References: , <49516531.2947.AF5C36@cclist.sydex.com>, <4951F6FC.1010306@pacbell.net> Message-ID: <4951F833.26583.1D3BD3@cclist.sydex.com> On 24 Dec 2008 at 2:46, Jim Battle wrote: > http://taracom.net/chip.pl?to=management > > John Kardash, Sr. Scientist > M.S. EE, Temple University Well, why not have someone add it to the Wikipedia page? Personally, I tend to lean toward the first theory, as eponymically-designated logic elements seems to fly in the face of established convention. We don't talk aboiut Sheffer or Pierce gates, after all. Or Jack Klugman. More to the point, who's got documentary (instead of anecdotal) proof? And was this truly the first implementation of this type of flip-flop, or merely the first incidence that was specifically documented and named? Cheers, Chuck From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca Wed Dec 24 12:44:58 2008 From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert) Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 10:44:58 -0800 Subject: JK Flip flop (was: some other crap) References: , <49516531.2947.AF5C36@cclist.sydex.com>, <4951F6FC.1010306@pacbell.net> <4951F833.26583.1D3BD3@cclist.sydex.com> Message-ID: <49528327.161F1B50@cs.ubc.ca> Chuck Guzis wrote: > > On 24 Dec 2008 at 2:46, Jim Battle wrote: > > > http://taracom.net/chip.pl?to=management > > > > John Kardash, Sr. Scientist > > M.S. EE, Temple University > > Well, why not have someone add it to the Wikipedia page? Personally, > I tend to lean toward the first theory, as eponymically-designated > logic elements seems to fly in the face of established convention. > We don't talk aboiut Sheffer or Pierce gates, after all. > > Or Jack Klugman. > > More to the point, who's got documentary (instead of anecdotal) > proof? And was this truly the first implementation of this type of > flip-flop, or merely the first incidence that was specifically > documented and named? Earliest real refs I have are in the 1965 TI and 1966 Fairchild catalogs, both list JK flip-flop ICs. They both list JK types in the early RTL families, amongst others. I presume the JK type was introduced as a common building block after the development of ICs, as it's a relatively expensive construct, applications can generally be implemented more optimally when using discrete components. I find the Wiki entry, or it's phrasing, rather weak. The date mentioned (1968) is a date of a letter about the origins of the name and it doesn't say anything about the date of those origins. It's also ambiguous in saying Hughes used only one type of FF and then implies there were 5 types. From cclist at sydex.com Wed Dec 24 12:59:22 2008 From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis) Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 10:59:22 -0800 Subject: JK Flip flop (was: some other crap) In-Reply-To: <49528327.161F1B50@cs.ubc.ca> References: , <49528327.161F1B50@cs.ubc.ca> Message-ID: <4952160A.9852.91C88E@cclist.sydex.com> On 24 Dec 2008 at 10:44, Brent Hilpert wrote: > > Earliest real refs I have are in the 1965 TI and 1966 Fairchild catalogs, both > list JK flip-flop ICs. > They both list JK types in the early RTL families, amongst others. Indeed, my first experiences with building with RTL digital ICs were with 923 JK flip-flops. Those were the heady days of a half-adder being about the most you could find in a package. Early MOS ICs also featured T flip-flops, I seem to recall. Cheers, Chuck From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk Wed Dec 24 13:06:22 2008 From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 19:06:22 +0000 (GMT) Subject: JK Flip flop (was: some other crap) In-Reply-To: <49528327.161F1B50@cs.ubc.ca> from "Brent Hilpert" at Dec 24, 8 10:44:58 am Message-ID: > Earliest real refs I have are in the 1965 TI and 1966 Fairchild catalogs, both > list JK flip-flop ICs. > They both list JK types in the early RTL families, amongst others. I suspect the name was fairly well-established by that point. The HP9100, which came out about a year afterwards, and which used discrete transsitors, contains 2 PCBs of flip-flops. Each PCB cotnains 20 JK flip-flops (and a little clock control circuitry), they are essentially master-slave JK flip-flops built from 4 transistors. The transistors are labelled in the etch of the PCB 'J', 'K', 'E', 'F'. The 'J' and 'K' transitors are for the input flip-flop (and thus, presumabluy, conrrespond to the J and K inputs). The 'E' and 'F' transistors are for the output flip-flop, why they have those names and not, say 'Q' and something-else I don't know. Alas since the only info on the intenrals of the 9100 is that obtained by lookibng at the machine, I doubt I'll ever work out why 'E' and 'F' -tony From tpeters at mixcom.com Wed Dec 24 13:00:35 2008 From: tpeters at mixcom.com (Tom Peters) Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 13:00:35 -0600 Subject: [personal] Re: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards(Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: <002f01c965b0$f9a1a6a0$961ca8c0@mss.local> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com> <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com> <200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <49453812.1040401@gjcp.net> <200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net> <200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.2.20081224125852.0b6bcd68@localhost> At 10:18 AM 12/24/2008 +0000, you wrote: >>I wish that I knew a good way in HTML to express offsets from beginning >>of a document. > >It is a variant of the To another page it would be , for a position in >that page it would be , where 'position' >is a tag in that page . > >Mike I also use the short form of that, usually works: - I don't think it's standard - Only works for jump within the same document (page) ----- 875. [Government]Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys. --P.J. O'Rourke, Civil Libertarian --... ...-- -.. . -. ----. --.- --.- -... tpeters at nospam.mixcom.com (remove "nospam") N9QQB (amateur radio) "HEY YOU" (loud shouting) WEB: http://www.mixweb.com/tpeters 43? 7' 17.2" N by 88? 6' 28.9" W, Elevation 815', Grid Square EN53wc WAN/LAN/Telcom Analyst, Tech Writer, MCP, CCNA, Registered Linux User 385531 From ethan.dicks at gmail.com Wed Dec 24 13:29:21 2008 From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks) Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 14:29:21 -0500 Subject: [personal] Re: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards(Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.2.20081224125852.0b6bcd68@localhost> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com> <200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <49453812.1040401@gjcp.net> <200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net> <200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net> <002f01c965b0$f9a1a6a0$961ca8c0@mss.local> <5.1.0.14.2.20081224125852.0b6bcd68@localhost> Message-ID: On Wed, Dec 24, 2008 at 2:00 PM, Tom Peters wrote: > At 10:18 AM 12/24/2008 +0000, you wrote: >>> >>> I wish that I knew a good way in HTML to express offsets from beginning >>> of a document. > > I also use the short form of that, usually works: > > > - I don't think it's standard > - Only works for jump within the same document (page) That form certainly only works within the same document (I've used it plenty), but I'm surprised to hear the suggestion that it might not be standard. I've been using it since 1995 and Netscape 0.8. I check my web pages against modernish standards with the W3C checker and I get no complaints about it. -ethan From legalize at xmission.com Wed Dec 24 13:59:13 2008 From: legalize at xmission.com (Richard) Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 12:59:13 -0700 Subject: [personal] Re: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards(Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: Your message of Wed, 24 Dec 2008 14:29:21 -0500. Message-ID: In article , "Ethan Dicks" writes: > On Wed, Dec 24, 2008 at 2:00 PM, Tom Peters wrote: > > At 10:18 AM 12/24/2008 +0000, you wrote: > >>> > >>> I wish that I knew a good way in HTML to express offsets from beginning > >>> of a document. > > > > I also use the short form of that, usually works: > > > > > > - I don't think it's standard > > - Only works for jump within the same document (page) > > That form certainly only works within the same document (I've used it > plenty), but I'm surprised to hear the suggestion that it might not be > standard. I've been using it since 1995 and Netscape 0.8. I check my > web pages against modernish standards with the W3C checker and I get > no complaints about it. Its standard, its been in the URL spec since the beginning. It works across documents, too, not just within the same document. The "#anchor" syntax is part of the URL syntax, its not some magic that only works within a document. -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download Legalize Adulthood! From spc at conman.org Wed Dec 24 14:31:51 2008 From: spc at conman.org (Sean Conner) Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 15:31:51 -0500 Subject: IBM PS2 8573-061 available in South Florida In-Reply-To: <4942E976.6070108@gmail.com> References: <20081212212126.GA27808@brevard.conman.org> <4942E976.6070108@gmail.com> Message-ID: <20081224203151.GA3100@brevard.conman.org> It was thus said that the Great Sridhar Ayengar once stated: > Sean Conner wrote: > > I recieved an email from someone looking to sell an IBM PS2 8573-061 (he > >saw my name mentioned in a newpaper article about collecting old computers > >and contacted me). Asking about the price, here's what he said: > > > >>I did a little research on pricing this morning and I see the same unit at > >>Computer Fusion Inc. for $425 and on eBay for $490. I'd be willing to sell > >>mine for half price to get it out of my garage. > >> > >>I'm thinking of putting it on eBay. Let me know. > > > > If anyone is interested, say so and I'll pass on his email address. > > > > The person lives in Boyton Beach, Florida and works in Boca Raton (home > > of > >the IBM PC). > > He's a bit optimistic on the value. So, what would be a good value for the system he's selling then? -spc From spc at conman.org Wed Dec 24 14:40:00 2008 From: spc at conman.org (Sean Conner) Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 15:40:00 -0500 Subject: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards (Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: <20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net> References: <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com> <200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <49453812.1040401@gjcp.net> <200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net> <200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net> Message-ID: <20081224204000.GB3100@brevard.conman.org> It was thus said that the Great Fred Cisin once stated: > > >> of pointers is valuable.) > > > A good professional indexer works with synonyms and subject, not just > > > keywords. A keyword only index is basically a concordance. > > On Tue, 23 Dec 2008, der Mouse wrote: > > Good point; thanks for catching that - I suspect I've seen too many > > concordance-style indices and too few of the other sort. But even a > > good index can be done perfectly well in plain text; the only part > > that's at all difficult is what to use as the pointer to the referenced > > text, and that (a) is an issue only if the text is not broken into > > numbered pages and (b) is not hard to solve even if the text is not > > paginated (it could use line numbers, section numbers, even search > > patterns, etc). > > I wish that I knew a good way in HTML to express offsets from beginning > of a document. Are you taking about an artibrary HTML document that you may not have control over? Or just for HTML documents you control? If the latter, then there are two methods---one works for all browsers, and the other for more modern ones. The first method is to use the tag as:

Blah blah blah ...

It's then referenced with yada yada (and you can add the '#target' to the end of the URL). It's been a part of HTML for as long as I can remember. The second method works for any tag; it uses the ID attribute.

Blah blah blah ...

It's referenced the same as as the first method. I myself use this second method almost exclusively now. -spc From cisin at xenosoft.com Wed Dec 24 15:04:31 2008 From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin) Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 13:04:31 -0800 (PST) Subject: [personal] Re: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards(Keytronics)) In-Reply-To: <002f01c965b0$f9a1a6a0$961ca8c0@mss.local> References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>, <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com><493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com><200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG><49453812.1040401@gjcp.net><200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG><20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net><200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> <20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net> <002f01c965b0$f9a1a6a0$961ca8c0@mss.local> Message-ID: <20081224123644.G90174@shell.lmi.net> > > I wish that I knew a good way in HTML to express offsets from beginning > > of a document. On Wed, 24 Dec 2008, Mike Hatch wrote: > It is a variant of the To another page it would be , for a position in that > page it would be , where 'position' is a tag > in that page . Yes, you can ADD 'position's to get a form of symbolic labeling. That is a very useful feature for identifying positions within your own files. (Although it left a bit to be desired when implementing full indices. That is only for before-the-fact access. I don't own every website that I reference. In some of my indexing projects, instead of storing both a URL AND a file offset, I would like a URL that dereferences to an offset within the file, such as "notice the wording where he says 'xxx' (684 bytes into that file)". http://www.foo.bar/RFC.html*684 (where '*' is some unique punctuation provided for in the HTML spec) "Dear webmaster, is that a type at xxxx.html/*yyy ?" Unfortunately, as far as I can tell, the current implementations of HTML (and SGML?) do not provide an "offset" operator. If I am wrong, please tell me! It took me weeks to find 
 to be able to do
non-proportional ASCII art, and to be able to create websites that discuss
HTML.

Inclusion of an "offset operator" would permit handing a URL to somebody
and having THEIR browser take them to the desired location within the
file, WITHOUT edit rights to the file.

It would permit creating an index to a document WITHOUT requiring
annotation of the original, nor captive environment for display.
The pointers within the index could then be actual access URLs
"RFC.html*684"  or http://www.foo.bar/RFC.html*684
I do not like providing a proprietary viewer that must be used to be able
to see the referenced items within the file.


BTW, I do NOT see variations in word size or character set, as being
relevant.


From cisin at xenosoft.com  Wed Dec 24 15:12:02 2008
From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin)
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 13:12:02 -0800 (PST)
Subject: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards
	(Keytronics))
In-Reply-To: 
References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>,
	<493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, 
	<493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com>
	<200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<49453812.1040401@gjcp.net>
	<200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>
	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>
	
Message-ID: <20081224130756.L90174@shell.lmi.net>

On Wed, 24 Dec 2008, Dave McGuire wrote:

> On Dec 24, 2008, at 2:52 AM, Fred Cisin wrote:
> > I wish that I knew a good way in HTML to express offsets from
> > beginning
> > of a document.
>
>    Does the '#' construct not do what you want?
Thank you, but not unless there are aspects of it that I'm unaware of.
# lets me embed markers or symbolic addresses within files. I'm looking
for a way to point to a location ("offset"?) within a file that I may not
have edit access to, to be able to do realtime calculated pointers, etc.
with the offset being within the URL, NOT embedded within the HTML file.


Am I the only person who has a use for that capability?

--
Grumpy Ol' Fred     		cisin at xenosoft.com


From cisin at xenosoft.com  Wed Dec 24 15:16:23 2008
From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin)
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 13:16:23 -0800 (PST)
Subject: HTML offsets (Was: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL
 keyboards(Keytronics))
In-Reply-To: 
References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com>
	<200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<49453812.1040401@gjcp.net>
	<200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>
	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>
	<002f01c965b0$f9a1a6a0$961ca8c0@mss.local>
	<5.1.0.14.2.20081224125852.0b6bcd68@localhost>
	
Message-ID: <20081224131317.H90174@shell.lmi.net>

> I also use the short form of that, usually works:
> 
> - I don't think it's standard
> - Only works for jump within the same document (page)

It's been working fine for me - I just see it as being a short jump and as
sort of a "local variable" assumed to be within the same file, just as a
URL without domain is assumed to be a file on the same server.

I guess that I'd better start studying the standards to make sure that
what I do is kosher.




From cisin at xenosoft.com  Wed Dec 24 15:20:38 2008
From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin)
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 13:20:38 -0800 (PST)
Subject: HTML offsets (Was: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL 
In-Reply-To: <20081224204000.GB3100@brevard.conman.org>
References: <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com>
	<493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com>
	<200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<49453812.1040401@gjcp.net>
	<200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>
	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>
	<20081224204000.GB3100@brevard.conman.org>
Message-ID: <20081224131817.D90174@shell.lmi.net>

On Wed, 24 Dec 2008, Sean Conner wrote:
>   Are you taking about an artibrary HTML document that you may not have
> control over?
Yes.
One particular project was to create an add-on index to an existing CDROM
of literature.


--
Grumpy Ol' Fred     		cisin at xenosoft.com


From tpeters at mixcom.com  Wed Dec 24 15:24:43 2008
From: tpeters at mixcom.com (Tom Peters)
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 15:24:43 -0600
Subject: [personal] Re: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL
 keyboards(Keytronics))
In-Reply-To: <20081224123644.G90174@shell.lmi.net>
References: <002f01c965b0$f9a1a6a0$961ca8c0@mss.local>
	<493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com>
	<493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com>
	<200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<49453812.1040401@gjcp.net>
	<200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>
	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>
	<002f01c965b0$f9a1a6a0$961ca8c0@mss.local>
Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.2.20081224151948.00c0b9c0@localhost>

At 01:04 PM 12/24/2008 -0800, you wrote:
> > > I wish that I knew a good way in HTML to express offsets from beginning
> > > of a document.
>
>On Wed, 24 Dec 2008, Mike Hatch wrote:
> > It is a variant of the  > To another page it would be , for a position in that
> > page it would be , where 'position' is 
> a tag
> > in that page .
>
>Yes, you can ADD 'position's to get a form of symbolic labeling.
>That is a very useful feature for identifying positions within your own
>files.  (Although it left a bit to be desired when implementing full
>indices.  That is only for before-the-fact access.
>
>I don't own every website that I reference.  In some of my indexing
>projects, instead of storing both a URL AND a file offset, I would like
>a URL that dereferences to an offset within the file, such as
>"notice the wording where he says 'xxx' (684 bytes into that file)".
>http://www.foo.bar/RFC.html*684
>(where '*' is some unique punctuation provided for in the HTML spec)
>"Dear webmaster, is that a type at xxxx.html/*yyy ?"
>
>
>Unfortunately, as far as I can tell, the current implementations of HTML
>(and SGML?) do not provide an "offset" operator.  If I am wrong, please
>tell me!  It took me weeks to find 
 to be able to do
>non-proportional ASCII art, and to be able to create websites that discuss
>HTML.
>
>Inclusion of an "offset operator" would permit handing a URL to somebody
>and having THEIR browser take them to the desired location within the
>file, WITHOUT edit rights to the file.
>
>It would permit creating an index to a document WITHOUT requiring
>annotation of the original, nor captive environment for display.
>The pointers within the index could then be actual access URLs
>"RFC.html*684"  or http://www.foo.bar/RFC.html*684
>I do not like providing a proprietary viewer that must be used to be able
>to see the referenced items within the file.
>
>
>BTW, I do NOT see variations in word size or character set, as being
>relevant.

HTML can be rendered so radically different on various platforms. What 
would the offset measure? Bytes? Characters? (those two would be very 
different) Lines? How could you possibly compute that? Would a byte offset 
be meaningful? A byte offset that lands you in the middle of a script or 
code of some other type would be the same screen position as a byte offset 
that's hundreds of bytes (or thousands) different; how would that be 
useful? Ever see a web page rendered in Lynx? It's just text and nothing more.

The whole point of a web browser is that the content is rendering engine 
independent. I think that some sort of offset is a step backwards and is 
unlikely to be implemented.

Just my $0.02




-----
311. [Philosophy] No, I don't think smoking should be illegal. Smokers are
already getting the death penalty! --from Stev0's "rant of the week" on
smoking
--... ...--  -.. .  -. ----. --.- --.- -...
tpeters at nospam.mixcom.com   (remove "nospam") N9QQB (amateur radio)
"HEY YOU" (loud shouting)    WEB: http://www.mixweb.com/tpeters
43? 7' 17.2" N by 88? 6' 28.9" W,  Elevation 815',  Grid Square EN53wc
WAN/LAN/Telcom Analyst, Tech Writer, MCP, CCNA, Registered Linux User 385531




From cisin at xenosoft.com  Wed Dec 24 16:16:00 2008
From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin)
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 14:16:00 -0800 (PST)
Subject: Why TEXT must not be tolerated (Was: [personal] Re: PDF datasheets
 (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL keyboards(Keytronics))
In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.2.20081224151948.00c0b9c0@localhost>
References: <002f01c965b0$f9a1a6a0$961ca8c0@mss.local>
	<493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com>
	<200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<49453812.1040401@gjcp.net>
	<200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>
	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>
	<002f01c965b0$f9a1a6a0$961ca8c0@mss.local>
	<5.1.0.14.2.20081224151948.00c0b9c0@localhost>
Message-ID: <20081224133729.U92254@shell.lmi.net>

> >BTW, I do NOT see variations in word size or character set, as being
> >relevant.

On Wed, 24 Dec 2008, Tom Peters wrote:
I actually appreciate your pointing out to me that machine readable (and
reworkable) text is a throwback to more primitive times.  Please don't
feel that this rant is directed at you personally.

> HTML can be rendered so radically different on various platforms. What
> would the offset measure? Bytes? Characters? (those two would be very
> different) Lines? How could you possibly compute that? Would a byte offset
> be meaningful? A byte offset that lands you in the middle of a script or
> code of some other type would be the same screen position as a byte offset
> that's hundreds of bytes (or thousands) different; how would that be
> useful?


Do you see those issues as being ones that you could not resolve?
I think that you are capable of writing code that can identify specific
content within a work.  Word boundaries are hardly a significant project.
I have been talking about software that analyzes content.  Should
non-relative jumps be eliminated from code based on "what happens if it
happens to point to the middle of a script"?  No, the address for the
jump, just as the address of the pointer is created to point to what you
want it to point to.

> Ever see a web page rendered in Lynx? It's just text and nothing more.

Is ALL content "useless" if just text and nothing more?
Last night I googled and read a copy of "Cyrano DeBergerac".  I don't NEED
fancy rendering for everything.  Are the words not useful without control
of the font?

Text is intrinsically a sequence of "character"s.  Yes, if you are so
inclined, you COULD scan a rendering of text, and have a readable screen
display that is actually a graphics image with no practical access to the
underlying text.

When working with text, the basic unit is a "character"; a character count
can often/usually be handled by a BYTE count.
For this pointer to be USEFUL, it needs to work for text.  It does NOT
diminish its usefulness if it can not also point to Uncle Charlie's nose
in a photograph.


> The whole point of a web browser is that the content is rendering engine
> independent. I think that some sort of offset is a step backwards and is
> unlikely to be implemented.

The whole point of that is to RESTRICT content access to only the form in
which it gets rendered by the animal byproducts plant, and to PREVENT
access to the internal content at any point other than explicitly
"marked" by its creator.

Yes, the intrusion into the internal content, rather than pure consumerism
of the rendering is INDEED a step backwards.  I'm surprised that the
retrogressive behavior of Google is tolerated!  They store a URL and an
offset in their index files.  I'm advocating that inclusion of the
[OPTIONAL] offset tag within the URL improves the capabilities of "low
level" access, such as indexing.  Surely, we should immediately replace
ALL HTML of text with graphic images [in non-OCRable fonts] to put a stop
to that step backwards of access for indexing by those who are not the
original creators of the page.


Yes, I guess that I AM the only one who wants to access the internals of
content, not just watch the pretty pictures.  I am indeed guilty of that
most heinous of crimes, indexing and computer analysis of text.

--
Grumpy Ol' Fred (SEVERAL steps backwards)    		cisin at xenosoft.com


Sorry, there is no 




From ljw-cctech at ljw.me.uk  Wed Dec 24 16:17:28 2008
From: ljw-cctech at ljw.me.uk (Lawrence Wilkinson)
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 22:17:28 +0000
Subject: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <20081224130756.L90174@shell.lmi.net>
References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>
	, <493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com>
	<493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com>
	<493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com>
	<200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<49453812.1040401@gjcp.net>
	<200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>
	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>
	
	<20081224130756.L90174@shell.lmi.net>
Message-ID: <1230157048.12570.25.camel@entasis>

On Wed, 2008-12-24 at 13:12 -0800, Fred Cisin wrote:

> Thank you, but not unless there are aspects of it that I'm unaware of.
> # lets me embed markers or symbolic addresses within files. I'm looking
> for a way to point to a location ("offset"?) within a file that I may not
> have edit access to, to be able to do realtime calculated pointers, etc.
> with the offset being within the URL, NOT embedded within the HTML file.

This is what XPath is designed to do.  It's a query language which works
within XML documents (so XHTML, not sure how well it would go on HTML).

This allows you to point to (say) the 5th 
...
 block following the
8th 
..
 heading.  I think this is:
 /body/descendant::h2[8]/following::p[5]

They probably exist, but I can't find a site that lets you enter a URL
and an XPath query and gives you the result, but there are (e.g.)
Firefox addons to do this, and a few sites that let you enter some XML
text and then try the XPath query, such as:
http://www.bit-101.com/xpath/

-- 
Lawrence Wilkinson                                 lawrence at ljw.me.uk
The IBM 360/30 page                       http://www.ljw.me.uk/ibm360



From wb6blv at inreach.com  Wed Dec 24 07:19:19 2008
From: wb6blv at inreach.com (WB6BLV    (DM06))
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 05:19:19 -0800
Subject: Wang 2236 terminals
Message-ID: <005c01c965ca$3adb0080$5888fea9@dwilegal>

If any list members are looking for Wang terminals, I have several of the
2236 models that I used on an 2200MVP system for many years.  In addition, I
believe I still have many 5 Mb removable platters for the Winchester drives
used on the 2200.  Please direct any interest off list to WB6BLV at inreach.com



From cisin at xenosoft.com  Wed Dec 24 16:34:04 2008
From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin)
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 14:34:04 -0800 (PST)
Subject: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <1230157048.12570.25.camel@entasis>
References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> ,
	<493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com>
	<493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com>
	<493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com>
	<200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<49453812.1040401@gjcp.net>
	<200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>
	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>
	
	<20081224130756.L90174@shell.lmi.net>
	<1230157048.12570.25.camel@entasis>
Message-ID: <20081224142852.R92254@shell.lmi.net>

> > Thank you, but not unless there are aspects of it that I'm unaware of.
> > # lets me embed markers or symbolic addresses within files. I'm looking
> > for a way to point to a location ("offset"?) within a file that I may not
> > have edit access to, to be able to do realtime calculated pointers, etc.
> > with the offset being within the URL, NOT embedded within the HTML file.

On Wed, 24 Dec 2008, Lawrence Wilkinson wrote:
> This is what XPath is designed to do.  It's a query language which works
> within XML documents (so XHTML, not sure how well it would go on HTML).

Thank you!
That is very useful.

More than 15 years ago, I had two problems with HTML and URLs -
How can I say in educational sites in HTML "...the  tag will..." ?
and
how can I identify specific locations within files?

Now I have a direction to look.

--
Grumpy Ol' Fred (making a little progress)    	cisin at xenosoft.com


From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca  Wed Dec 24 16:45:00 2008
From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca)
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 15:45:00 -0700
Subject: re-: pickles Re: HTML offsets (Was: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources
 for 8b TTL keyboards(Keytronics))
In-Reply-To: <20081224131317.H90174@shell.lmi.net>
References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>	<493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com>	<200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>	<49453812.1040401@gjcp.net>	<200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>	<002f01c965b0$f9a1a6a0$961ca8c0@mss.local>	<5.1.0.14.2.20081224125852.0b6bcd68@localhost>	
	<20081224131317.H90174@shell.lmi.net>
Message-ID: <4952BB6C.4010309@jetnet.ab.ca>

Fred Cisin wrote:

> I guess that I'd better start studying the standards to make sure that
> what I do is kosher.

I've already changed the topic for you. :)


From cisin at xenosoft.com  Wed Dec 24 16:56:38 2008
From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin)
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 14:56:38 -0800 (PST)
Subject: re-: pickles Re: HTML offsets (Was: PDF datasheets (was Re:
 Sources for 8b TTL keyboards(Keytronics))
In-Reply-To: <4952BB6C.4010309@jetnet.ab.ca>
References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com>
	<200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<49453812.1040401@gjcp.net>
	<200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>
	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>
	<002f01c965b0$f9a1a6a0$961ca8c0@mss.local>
	<5.1.0.14.2.20081224125852.0b6bcd68@localhost>
	
	<20081224131317.H90174@shell.lmi.net> <4952BB6C.4010309@jetnet.ab.ca>
Message-ID: <20081224145425.H92254@shell.lmi.net>

> > I guess that I'd better start studying the standards to make sure that
> > what I do is kosher.

On Wed, 24 Dec 2008, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote:
> I've already changed the topic for you. :)

Thanks.  I do often forget to change the subject line.


--
Grumpy Ol' Fred     		cisin at xenosoft.com


From cisin at xenosoft.com  Wed Dec 24 17:31:34 2008
From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin)
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 15:31:34 -0800 (PST)
Subject: [personal] Re: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL
 keyboards(Keytronics))
In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.2.20081224151948.00c0b9c0@localhost>
References: <002f01c965b0$f9a1a6a0$961ca8c0@mss.local>
	<493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com>
	<200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<49453812.1040401@gjcp.net>
	<200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>
	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>
	<002f01c965b0$f9a1a6a0$961ca8c0@mss.local>
	<5.1.0.14.2.20081224151948.00c0b9c0@localhost>
Message-ID: <20081224152947.U96495@shell.lmi.net>

I need to apologize to Tom Peters.


The world moves on and I can't always keep up.

He pointed that out,
but he doesn't deserve to be a target of my frustration.


--
Grumpy Ol' Fred     		cisin at xenosoft.com


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Wed Dec 24 18:01:09 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 00:01:09 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: Merry Newtonsday
Message-ID: 

Merry Newtonsday, Christmas, Yule, Midwinter, Winter Solstice or whatever 
you choose to celebrate to members of the classic computer list and their 
families.

-tony



From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca  Wed Dec 24 18:11:28 2008
From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca)
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 17:11:28 -0700
Subject: Merry Newtonsday
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <4952CFB0.8090400@jetnet.ab.ca>

Tony Duell wrote:
> Merry Newtonsday, Christmas, Yule, Midwinter, Winter Solstice or whatever 
> you choose to celebrate to members of the classic computer list and their 
> families.

Um the 21 was Winter Solstice ... how about just a happy unbirthday instead :)
> -tony
> 
> 



From cclist at sydex.com  Wed Dec 24 18:37:02 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 16:37:02 -0800
Subject: Merry Newtonsday
In-Reply-To: <4952CFB0.8090400@jetnet.ab.ca>
References: , <4952CFB0.8090400@jetnet.ab.ca>
Message-ID: <4952652E.32564.1C6E9D3@cclist.sydex.com>

On 24 Dec 2008 at 17:11, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote:


> Um the 21 was Winter Solstice ... how about just a happy unbirthday instead :)

No kidding--in my area, we've already had postings on Freecycle for 
used Solstice trees (just in time for Sol Invictus).  (There's a 
pretty sizeable Wiccan community here).

Cheers,
Chuck



From gordonjcp at gjcp.net  Wed Dec 24 19:41:33 2008
From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 01:41:33 +0000
Subject: Merry Newtonsday
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <4952E4CD.10302@gjcp.net>

Tony Duell wrote:
> Merry Newtonsday, Christmas, Yule, Midwinter, Winter Solstice or whatever 
> you choose to celebrate to members of the classic computer list and their 
> families.
> 

Happy Hogswatch!

Gordon


From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca  Wed Dec 24 19:44:29 2008
From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca)
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 18:44:29 -0700
Subject: Merry Newtonsday
In-Reply-To: <4952E4CD.10302@gjcp.net>
References:  <4952E4CD.10302@gjcp.net>
Message-ID: <4952E57D.8060908@jetnet.ab.ca>

Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote:

> 
> Happy Hogswatch!

Too cold out here, to wash my HOG!

> Gordon




From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca  Wed Dec 24 20:04:35 2008
From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert)
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 18:04:35 -0800
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> ,
	<493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com>
	<493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com>
	<493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com>
	<200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<49453812.1040401@gjcp.net>
	<200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>
	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>
	
	<20081224130756.L90174@shell.lmi.net>
	<1230157048.12570.25.camel@entasis>
	<20081224142852.R92254@shell.lmi.net>
Message-ID: <4952EA33.22FE312F@cs.ubc.ca>

Fred Cisin wrote:
> More than 15 years ago, I had two problems with HTML and URLs -
> How can I say in educational sites in HTML "...the  tag will..." ?

Are you asking how to get < and > rendered as displayed text?
Try:

  ...the <BOLD> tag will...

(I'm not sure how I know this, I can't find it in the html reference I use;
which begs the question of whether it's actually part of the standard.)


From cisin at xenosoft.com  Wed Dec 24 20:08:22 2008
From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin)
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 18:08:22 -0800 (PST)
Subject: Merry Newtonsday
In-Reply-To: <4952E57D.8060908@jetnet.ab.ca>
References:  <4952E4CD.10302@gjcp.net>
	<4952E57D.8060908@jetnet.ab.ca>
Message-ID: <20081224180701.R97523@shell.lmi.net>

> > Happy Hogswatch!
>
> Too cold out here, to wash my HOG!

but not to cold to WATCH your hogs


Have a happy humbug, anyway.






From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca  Wed Dec 24 20:27:40 2008
From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca)
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 19:27:40 -0700
Subject: Merry Newtonsday
In-Reply-To: <20081224180701.R97523@shell.lmi.net>
References: 
	<4952E4CD.10302@gjcp.net>	<4952E57D.8060908@jetnet.ab.ca>
	<20081224180701.R97523@shell.lmi.net>
Message-ID: <4952EF9C.5030502@jetnet.ab.ca>

Fred Cisin wrote:
>>> Happy Hogswatch!
>> Too cold out here, to wash my HOG!
> 
> but not to cold to WATCH your hogs
> 
> 
> Have a happy humbug, anyway.
But that brings us back  to the Yule Time ... :).


From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk  Wed Dec 24 20:31:27 2008
From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 02:31:27 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <4952EA33.22FE312F@cs.ubc.ca>
Message-ID: <599869.77801.qm@web23403.mail.ird.yahoo.com>


No idea whether it's standard or not, but here's another way to do it. Go to my webpage...

http://www.geocities.com/aliensrcooluk/testpages/charsetdisplay.html


... and then right-click and select view source. It allows all characters to be displayed using a number instead (e.g. x). The page was written about 5 years ago back when I was using my Sega Dreamcast to go online, so it may not work in other browsers (it doesn't work in Firefox 2.0.0.20, but I think there's a glitch with the displaying of tables in the last couple of updates, as they force me to use FF3).

Anyway < is the code for a < and > is the code for a >, but it's easier to use &#lt; and &#rt; instead!


Regards,
Andrew B
aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk


--- On Thu, 25/12/08, Brent Hilpert  wrote:
From: Brent Hilpert 
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
To: General at invalid.domain, "On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" 
Date: Thursday, 25 December, 2008, 2:04 AM

Fred Cisin wrote:
> More than 15 years ago, I had two problems with HTML and URLs -
> How can I say in educational sites in HTML "...the  tag
will..." ?

Are you asking how to get < and > rendered as displayed text?
Try:

  ...the <BOLD> tag will...

(I'm not sure how I know this, I can't find it in the html reference I
use;
which begs the question of whether it's actually part of the standard.)


From cisin at xenosoft.com  Wed Dec 24 20:35:24 2008
From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin)
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 18:35:24 -0800 (PST)
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <4952EA33.22FE312F@cs.ubc.ca>
References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> ,
	<493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com>
	<493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com>
	<493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com>
	<200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<49453812.1040401@gjcp.net>
	<200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>
	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>
	
	<20081224130756.L90174@shell.lmi.net>
	<1230157048.12570.25.camel@entasis>
	<20081224142852.R92254@shell.lmi.net> <4952EA33.22FE312F@cs.ubc.ca>
Message-ID: <20081224181639.K97523@shell.lmi.net>

On Wed, 24 Dec 2008, Brent Hilpert wrote:
> Are you asking how to get < and > rendered as displayed text?
> Try:
>   ...the <BOLD> tag will...
> (I'm not sure how I know this, I can't find it in the html reference I use;
> which begs the question of whether it's actually part of the standard.)

<  is the "less than" character
>  is the "greater than" character

how would you get HTML to display:
"<  is the "less than" character"
would I have to "escape" the ampersands?
&lt;



 , 
 are fun.
Is there an inconsistency with whether a browser will display special
chatacters within a 
 block?  Do some browsers display them literally,
while others apply the 
 ONLY to whitespace and line breaks?
I have seen at least one browser where I could get away with:

x = <
if (x < y) . . .




I guess that "modern" HTML has evolved to the point where one MUST use an
HTML generating program, and no more tampering with the raw HTML; just as
"nobody" writes Postscript.


--
Grumpy Ol' Fred     		cisin at xenosoft.com



From aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk  Wed Dec 24 20:50:38 2008
From: aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk (Andrew Burton)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 02:50:38 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <20081224181639.K97523@shell.lmi.net>
Message-ID: <877212.96942.qm@web23402.mail.ird.yahoo.com>


It's been a while since I coded in HTML by hand, but I believe you would have to use

&<


I couldn't code javascript by hand, as I don't know the language at all well and I hate any language that uses == instead of =. I mean how would you do <=>, would it be <==>??


Regards,
Andrew B
aliensrcooluk at yahoo.co.uk


--- On Thu, 25/12/08, Fred Cisin  wrote:
From: Fred Cisin 
Subject: Re: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" 
Date: Thursday, 25 December, 2008, 2:35 AM

On Wed, 24 Dec 2008, Brent Hilpert wrote:
> Are you asking how to get < and > rendered as displayed text?
> Try:
>   ...the <BOLD> tag will...
> (I'm not sure how I know this, I can't find it in the html
reference I use;
> which begs the question of whether it's actually part of the
standard.)

<  is the "less than" character
>  is the "greater than" character

how would you get HTML to display:
"<  is the "less than" character"
would I have to "escape" the ampersands?
&lt;



 , 
 are fun.
Is there an inconsistency with whether a browser will display special
chatacters within a 
 block?  Do some browsers display them
literally,
while others apply the 
 ONLY to whitespace and line breaks?
I have seen at least one browser where I could get away with:

x = <
if (x < y) . . .




I guess that "modern" HTML has evolved to the point where one MUST
use an
HTML generating program, and no more tampering with the raw HTML; just as
"nobody" writes Postscript.


--
Grumpy Ol' Fred     		cisin at xenosoft.com



From cisin at xenosoft.com  Wed Dec 24 20:51:35 2008
From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin)
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 18:51:35 -0800 (PST)
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <20081224181639.K97523@shell.lmi.net>
References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> ,
	<493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com>
	<493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com>
	<493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com>
	<200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<49453812.1040401@gjcp.net>
	<200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>
	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>
	
	<20081224130756.L90174@shell.lmi.net>
	<1230157048.12570.25.camel@entasis>
	<20081224142852.R92254@shell.lmi.net> <4952EA33.22FE312F@cs.ubc.ca>
	<20081224181639.K97523@shell.lmi.net>
Message-ID: <20081224184548.I97523@shell.lmi.net>

SORRY

> 
 , 
 are fun.
> Is there an inconsistency with whether a browser will display special
> chatacters within a 
 block?  Do some browsers display them literally,
> while others apply the 
 ONLY to whitespace and line breaks?
> I have seen at least one browser where I could get away with:
> 
> x = <
> if (x < y) . . .
> 


FORGET ALL OF THAT.
It appears that modern/current (less than 15 years old?) browsers do NOT
permit '<', '>', or even "<" within 
 blocks, and require
"escape"ing certain characters and phrases.  You can NOT simply slap tags
around a chunk of text to quote it.
I don't remember which browser I had encountered that in, but it's not
around any more, and not compliant with current specs.


From IanK at vulcan.com  Wed Dec 24 20:53:36 2008
From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King)
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 18:53:36 -0800
Subject: Merry Newtonsday
In-Reply-To: <20081224180701.R97523@shell.lmi.net>
References:  <4952E4CD.10302@gjcp.net>
	<4952E57D.8060908@jetnet.ab.ca>,<20081224180701.R97523@shell.lmi.net>
Message-ID: 

Watching my Hog - and my BMW - is all I've been able to do with them for the last week.    I'm so jonesing for a ride....

Just say Ho!  -- Ian
________________________________________
From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Fred Cisin [cisin at xenosoft.com]
Sent: Wednesday, December 24, 2008 6:08 PM
To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts
Subject: Re: Merry Newtonsday

> > Happy Hogswatch!
>
> Too cold out here, to wash my HOG!

but not to cold to WATCH your hogs


Have a happy humbug, anyway.








From mcguire at neurotica.com  Wed Dec 24 23:56:13 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 00:56:13 -0500
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <20081224181639.K97523@shell.lmi.net>
References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> ,
	<493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>,
	<493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com>
	<200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<49453812.1040401@gjcp.net>
	<200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>
	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>
	
	<20081224130756.L90174@shell.lmi.net>
	<1230157048.12570.25.camel@entasis>
	<20081224142852.R92254@shell.lmi.net> <4952EA33.22FE312F@cs.ubc.ca>
	<20081224181639.K97523@shell.lmi.net>
Message-ID: <5967A3E4-CAF2-4E1D-97E6-23344A59769B@neurotica.com>

On Dec 24, 2008, at 9:35 PM, Fred Cisin wrote:
> I guess that "modern" HTML has evolved to the point where one MUST  
> use an
> HTML generating program, and no more tampering with the raw HTML;  
> just as
> "nobody" writes Postscript.

   Huh?  Hogwash.

          -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From spectre at floodgap.com  Thu Dec 25 00:00:52 2008
From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser)
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 22:00:52 -0800 (PST)
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <5967A3E4-CAF2-4E1D-97E6-23344A59769B@neurotica.com> from Dave
	McGuire at "Dec 25, 8 00:56:13 am"
Message-ID: <200812250600.mBP60qBd018202@floodgap.com>

> On Dec 24, 2008, at 9:35 PM, Fred Cisin wrote:
> > I guess that "modern" HTML has evolved to the point where one MUST  
> > use an HTML generating program, and no more tampering with the raw HTML;  
> > just as "nobody" writes Postscript.
> 
>    Huh?  Hogwash.

I use a very modern HTML editor. It is called vi.

Merry Christmas,

-- 
------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ --
  Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com
-- Perl scripting: the ultimate open source software. -------------------------


From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Thu Dec 25 00:15:33 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 01:15:33 -0500
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <200812250600.mBP60qBd018202@floodgap.com>
References: <5967A3E4-CAF2-4E1D-97E6-23344A59769B@neurotica.com>
	<200812250600.mBP60qBd018202@floodgap.com>
Message-ID: 

On Thu, Dec 25, 2008 at 1:00 AM, Cameron Kaiser  wrote:
>> On Dec 24, 2008, at 9:35 PM, Fred Cisin wrote:
>> > I guess that "modern" HTML has evolved to the point where one MUST
>> > use an HTML generating program, and no more tampering with the raw HTML;
>> > just as "nobody" writes Postscript.
>>
>>    Huh?  Hogwash.
>
> I use a very modern HTML editor. It is called vi.

Mine's more modern... I use vim.  ;-)

Seriously, though, not counting code-generated HTML (usually written
in Perl, but there are a few exceptions to that), I think 90% of  my
HTML has been written with some flavor of vi.  The remaining 10% would
have been done in emacs.  I have more than a few HTML docs that are
13-14 years old.

In the small chance that the OP wasn't just trolling, I write all of
my pages in raw HTML, but I concede that my experiences are not
applicable to the other 99% of webpage builders who have never written
tag manually in their life (but I also have written more than one
utility that emits raw PostScript, specifically to get
machine-generated columnar text for sticky labels and signs).

-ethan


From spectre at floodgap.com  Thu Dec 25 01:27:43 2008
From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser)
Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2008 23:27:43 -0800 (PST)
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To:  from
	Ethan Dicks at "Dec 25, 8 01:15:33 am"
Message-ID: <200812250727.mBP7RhCL020528@floodgap.com>

> > I use a very modern HTML editor. It is called vi.
> 
> Mine's more modern... I use vim.  ;-)
> 
> Seriously, though, not counting code-generated HTML (usually written
> in Perl, but there are a few exceptions to that), I think 90% of  my
> HTML has been written with some flavor of vi.  The remaining 10% would
> have been done in emacs.  I have more than a few HTML docs that are
> 13-14 years old.

Yup, I'm pretty sure I have some dating back nearly that far.

Hand-coding isn't just a good idea for learning HTML, it really causes people
to make leaner documents. People forget that HTML is, as its acronym implies,
a markup language. When people use a page designer, they tend to forget that.

-- 
------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ --
  Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com
-- Glory is fleeting, but obscurity is forever. -- Napoleon Bonaparte ---------


From gordonjcp at gjcp.net  Thu Dec 25 01:38:16 2008
From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 07:38:16 +0000
Subject: HTML index markers, was Re: [personal] Re: PDF datasheets (was Re:
 Sources for 8b TTL keyboards(Keytronics))
In-Reply-To: <20081224123644.G90174@shell.lmi.net>
References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>,
	<493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>,
	<493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com>	<493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com><493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com>	<493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com><200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG><49453812.1040401@gjcp.net><200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG><20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net><200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>	<002f01c965b0$f9a1a6a0$961ca8c0@mss.local>
	<20081224123644.G90174@shell.lmi.net>
Message-ID: <49533868.3000004@gjcp.net>

Fred Cisin wrote:

> Inclusion of an "offset operator" would permit handing a URL to somebody
> and having THEIR browser take them to the desired location within the
> file, WITHOUT edit rights to the file.
> 
> It would permit creating an index to a document WITHOUT requiring
> annotation of the original, nor captive environment for display.
> The pointers within the index could then be actual access URLs
> "RFC.html*684"  or http://www.foo.bar/RFC.html*684
> I do not like providing a proprietary viewer that must be used to be able
> to see the referenced items within the file.

You could probably write a Firefox plugin to do exactly what you 
describe on other people's content.  It would, however, be a function of 
the client, not HTML itself.

Just as a thought, you could implement this on the server side by 
parsing out the offset from the URI handed to you by the client, and 
adding an  tag as the page is rendered.  If you used "#" as the 
delimiter for the offset, then placed the  tag the appropriate number 
of bytes in with that number of bytes as the anchor value.

Let me give you an example:

You request http://www.gjcp.net/hypothetical.html#1024

The server strips off "#1024" and generates hypothetical.html (this 
would actually be a dynamically-generated page, not just flat HTML)

At byte 1024, the server inserts a named anchor tag, 
which the browser will jump to.

You *could*, if you were so inclined, even do this as an Apache module, 
to apply this to static files.

Gordon


From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG  Wed Dec 24 23:18:35 2008
From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 00:18:35 -0500 (EST)
Subject: [personal] Re: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL
 keyboards(Keytronics))
In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.2.20081224151948.00c0b9c0@localhost>
References: <002f01c965b0$f9a1a6a0$961ca8c0@mss.local>
	<493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com>
	<493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com>
	<200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<49453812.1040401@gjcp.net>
	<200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>
	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>
	<002f01c965b0$f9a1a6a0$961ca8c0@mss.local>
	<5.1.0.14.2.20081224151948.00c0b9c0@localhost>
Message-ID: <200812250528.AAA23149@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>

>>>> I wish that I knew a good way in HTML to express offsets from
>>>> beginning of a document.
>>> [...]
>> [...]
> HTML can be rendered so radically different on various platforms.

So what?  How - or even whether - it is rendered is pretty much
irrelevant, as I understand the desire in question.

> What would the offset measure?  Bytes?  Characters?  (those two would
> be very different)

Could be, not necessarily would be.  Either could work.  As long as it
serves for the task and is well defined, I don't see that it matters.

> Lines?  How could you possibly compute that?

Count line endings?  Seems like the obvious way to me.

> Would a byte offset be meaningful?

It could be, if that's the level at which you want to operate.

> A byte offset that lands you in the middle of a script or code of
> some other type would be the same screen position as a byte offset
> that's hundreds of bytes (or thousands) different;

Or, depending on how you look at it, would not represent a screen
position at all.  So what?  Just because some references may be
meaningless or refer to the same point as other references does not
mean that all such references are useless, or that the idea of such
references is bad, any more than the way that most possible pointers in
most C programs don't refer to any object makes C pointers useless.

> The whole point of a web browser is that the content is rendering
> engine independent.

I still don't see what this has to do with it.  Provided it's defined
in terms of the page source - probably in terms of the content as
delivered on the wire - an offset-into-the-page figure is rendering
engine independent too.

These things aren't necessarily going to be used to send people to
specific points in rendered pages (though that's certainly one possible
way to use them).  They could also be used to unambiguously refer to
places in the page for other purposes, such as the typo-reporting
possibility mentioned upthread.

/~\ The ASCII				  Mouse
\ / Ribbon Campaign
 X  Against HTML		mouse at rodents-montreal.org
/ \ Email!	     7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39  4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B


From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca  Thu Dec 25 02:38:35 2008
From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 00:38:35 -0800
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com> ,
	<493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>, <493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com>
	<493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com> <493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com>
	<493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com>
	<200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<49453812.1040401@gjcp.net>
	<200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>
	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>
	
	<20081224130756.L90174@shell.lmi.net>
	<1230157048.12570.25.camel@entasis>
	<20081224142852.R92254@shell.lmi.net> <4952EA33.22FE312F@cs.ubc.ca>
	<20081224181639.K97523@shell.lmi.net>
Message-ID: <4953468C.FF104E35@cs.ubc.ca>

Fred Cisin wrote:
> 
> On Wed, 24 Dec 2008, Brent Hilpert wrote:
> > Are you asking how to get < and > rendered as displayed text?
> > Try:
> >   ...the <BOLD> tag will...
> > (I'm not sure how I know this, I can't find it in the html reference I use;
> > which begs the question of whether it's actually part of the standard.)
> 
> <  is the "less than" character
> >  is the "greater than" character

Just to clarify, I presume everybody dealing with html knows about "&blah;" for
special characters; what I don't see in the ref I have is the 'lt' and 'gt' in
the list of special characters. I either saw them in an example somewhere or
guessed at them.


> how would you get HTML to display:
> "<  is the "less than" character"
> would I have to "escape" the ampersands?
> &lt;

Well, I guessed at that one too (presaging the question), and it works.


> I guess that "modern" HTML has evolved to the point where one MUST use an
> HTML generating program, and no more tampering with the raw HTML; just as
> "nobody" writes Postscript.

If you're complaint is that html is poorly defined in the detail, or difficult
to find a good concise reference for the details, I'm right there with you.
All the books I use to run across about html in the 90's were voluminous
hold-you-by-hand and walk-you-down-the-garden-path blatherings that took ten
pages to tell the simplest thing and still couldn't manage to be comprehensive.
I eventually found one that was 90% fluff (not an exaggeration) but the
remaining 10% (the appendix) presented a reasonable reference.

I still do hand-coded html for web pages, probably considered ugly by
current expectations, but at least makes for fast and consistent loading and
rendering.


From gordonjcp at gjcp.net  Thu Dec 25 02:37:56 2008
From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 08:37:56 +0000
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <200812250727.mBP7RhCL020528@floodgap.com>
References: <200812250727.mBP7RhCL020528@floodgap.com>
Message-ID: <49534664.2010307@gjcp.net>

Cameron Kaiser wrote:

> Hand-coding isn't just a good idea for learning HTML, it really causes people
> to make leaner documents. People forget that HTML is, as its acronym implies,
> a markup language. When people use a page designer, they tend to forget that.

Using "page designer" software is one of the glaringly obvious ways to 
make your page scream "CACK-HANDED AMATEUR!" at the reader.  The amount 
of bloat and cruft and Just Plain Wrong markup that they introduce makes 
the resulting pages slow to load, slow to render and indeed in some 
cases just not render at all.

No-one - I repeat, *no-one* - uses page designer-type software for 
serious, professional websites.  Neither do they tend to use hand-coded 
static HTML pages, except on very, very small sites that are never 
expected to change.

More typically, you'd design a page template, perhaps using Lorem Ipsum 
instead of "real" content but basically resembling the finished page. 
Then the website backend will replace marked blocks of text with the 
real content, pulled from a database.  This ensures that the look and 
feel of the site is consistent across all the pages, and navigation can 
be built automagically by the backend.

Since it's generally simpler to do this for all but the most trivial 
sites, I don't think I've written a static HTML page intended for 
production use in years.

Gordon


From jkunz at unixag-kl.fh-kl.de  Thu Dec 25 07:42:45 2008
From: jkunz at unixag-kl.fh-kl.de (Jochen Kunz)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 14:42:45 +0100
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <4953468C.FF104E35@cs.ubc.ca>
References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com>
	<493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com>
	<200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<49453812.1040401@gjcp.net>
	<200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>
	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>
	
	<20081224130756.L90174@shell.lmi.net>
	<1230157048.12570.25.camel@entasis>
	<20081224142852.R92254@shell.lmi.net> <4952EA33.22FE312F@cs.ubc.ca>
	<20081224181639.K97523@shell.lmi.net> <4953468C.FF104E35@cs.ubc.ca>
Message-ID: <20081225144245.a9c796d1.jkunz@unixag-kl.fh-kl.de>

On Thu, 25 Dec 2008 00:38:35 -0800
Brent Hilpert  wrote:

> I still do hand-coded html for web pages, probably considered ugly by
> current expectations, but at least makes for fast and consistent
> loading and rendering.
Amen!

I don't use books on HTML. Usually all I need is
http://www.selfhtml.org/ as a reference. (Sorry only deutsch and
fran?aise.)

If you do more then a few static pages you definitely want some form of
template engine. Most of the time this will result in some CMS (Content
Management System) like typo3, Joomla, Drupal, ... You can do it also
with cvs, m4, sed / awk, make, ... or a XML processor, where you write
XML files containing just the content and the XML processor generates
(static) HTML... (AFAIK the NetBSD web site is generated this way.)

HTML is human writable. But you need a lot of discipline keeping your
pages straight. A computer can automate this for you...
-- 


tsch??,
       Jochen

Homepage: http://www.unixag-kl.fh-kl.de/~jkunz/




From shoppa at trailing-edge.com  Thu Dec 25 09:36:52 2008
From: shoppa at trailing-edge.com (Tim Shoppa)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 10:36:52 -0500
Subject: HTML sub-document references (was # in href's)
In-Reply-To: <200812250234.mBP2YHo3058592@dewey.classiccmp.org>
References: <200812250234.mBP2YHo3058592@dewey.classiccmp.org>
Message-ID: <20081225153652.7BD59BA50B0@mini-me.trailing-edge.com>

> > I wish that I knew a good way in HTML to express offsets from beginning
> > of a document.
>
>   Are you taking about an artibrary HTML document that you may not have
> control over?  Or just for HTML documents you control?  If the latter, then
> there are two methods---one works for all browsers, and the other for more
> modern ones.  

Just thinking of the PDP-10 archives, it would be real nice if there
were a standard way to let someone reference into the middle of a document
with a standardized content-based offset reference.

For example, someone who is talking about historical LISP's wants
to reference something in the MACLISP reference manual pulled from
a 1970's tape on my site. The original document was not, of course, in
HTML; it was just HTML rendered for web presentation.
They can link to the entire HTML-rendered
version of the document, but it's hundreds of screens long. It would
be nice if there were a way to automatically and context-sensitively
reference something in the middle of the document - and in a way
such that future renderings of the same document still had the same
tags, despite moving to different presentation technologies.

Since many of the original documents were formatted to be presented
on line printers, or on terminal screens, the concepts of "page" and
"line" usually exist. Some of them have originals in RUNOFF-type
sources, where there may be some kind of context-referencing system
in place, but the details of the kind vary from document to document.
So it looks like the best way is to let others index in by original
page number, or original line numbers.

A future project would probably be a way of turning all the different
variants of RUNOFF (and the variants span 3 decades at least, 4 or 5
decades if you count those who still used it in the 90's and 2000's)
into HTML with good invariant content-based subreferences.

Tim.


From shoppa at trailing-edge.com  Thu Dec 25 10:41:46 2008
From: shoppa at trailing-edge.com (Tim Shoppa)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 11:41:46 -0500
Subject: HTML sub-document references (was # in href's)
In-Reply-To: <200812251616.mBPGGPRL075274@ultimate.com>
References: <200812251616.mBPGGPRL075274@ultimate.com>
Message-ID: <20081225164146.83BE8BA50B0@mini-me.trailing-edge.com>

Phil Budne  wrote:

> Tim Shoppa wrote:
> > A future project would probably be a way of turning all the different
> > variants of RUNOFF (and the variants span 3 decades at least, 4 or 5
> > decades if you count those who still used it in the 90's and 2000's)
> > into HTML with good invariant content-based subreferences.
>
> I'm not sure how much (if any) penetration the new fangled "Digital
> Standard Runoff" made in the PDP-10 world.  Other than that, I can't
> recall having much trouble formatting documents of all ages with
> 1980's vintage PDP-10 RUNOFF (and I liked looking at old stuff, even
> then).  I remember finding some TENEX design documents when I was at
> DEC.  I recently regave them to Dan Murphy, we talked about how to
> render them for the web, and I remembered a package I once used that
> reads RUNOFF and outputs troff:
>
> ftp://ftp.cs.toronto.edu/pub/darwin/runoff.troff
>
> Sources for manuals probably have directives for producing indices,
> which would be useful for producing HTML anchors.

True, the concepts at the core of the various RUNOFFs are all pretty
similar.

But by the 80's in between the PDP-10 and -11 there were some pretty
wacky variations. If the features of the variations are used extensively
they get in the way. I haven't tried making a "universal translator"
in a while, maybe I can muster some time over the holidays :-).

> But the MACLISP manual wasn't written in RUNOFF, was it?!

It was a good example because it was so big, but I'm sure that
like most of the surrounding stuff it is sourced in INFO. info2html I see
already exists, and it actually knows about all the nodes etc.,
which would make great anchors. I haven't tried taking any 80's era
info files and running them through. At least some of the files
in the archive that end with an .info extension are in fact info
files that have already been rendered into something for a line
printer.

For better or worse, it's almost necessary to render all documents
into html because if I serve them up with a .doc extension the browser
thinks they're MS Word, if I serve them up with a .mac extension the
browser think's they're some Quicktime file, etc. Mime-types works
with sane browsers but 95% of the world is using Internet Exploder
which decides to ignore mime-types most of the time. Very very frustrating.
I eventually gave up on even serving them up with correct Mime-types because
only a small fraction of browsers pays attention to those fields and
all the others instead give precedence to the apparent extension. At
this point I feel like part of the problem because I gave up on doing
the right mime-type!

Tim.

Tim.


From legalize at xmission.com  Thu Dec 25 11:57:14 2008
From: legalize at xmission.com (Richard)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 10:57:14 -0700
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets) 
In-Reply-To: Your message of Wed, 24 Dec 2008 18:04:35 -0800.
	<4952EA33.22FE312F@cs.ubc.ca> 
Message-ID: 


In article <4952EA33.22FE312F at cs.ubc.ca>,
    Brent Hilpert   writes:

> Fred Cisin wrote:
> > More than 15 years ago, I had two problems with HTML and URLs -
> > How can I say in educational sites in HTML "...the  tag will..." ?
> 
> Are you asking how to get < and > rendered as displayed text?
> Try:
> 
>   ...the <BOLD> tag will...
> 
> (I'm not sure how I know this, I can't find it in the html reference I use;
> which begs the question of whether it's actually part of the standard.)

Yes, its part of the standard.
-- 
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
      

        Legalize Adulthood! 


From legalize at xmission.com  Thu Dec 25 11:58:49 2008
From: legalize at xmission.com (Richard)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 10:58:49 -0700
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets) 
In-Reply-To: Your message of Thu, 25 Dec 2008 01:15:33 -0500.
	 
Message-ID: 


In article ,
    "Ethan Dicks"   writes:

> Seriously, though, not counting code-generated HTML (usually written
> in Perl, but there are a few exceptions to that), [...]

LOL.  Maybe about 10 years ago it was that way.

There's this little thing called ASP/ASP.NET...
-- 
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
      

        Legalize Adulthood! 


From innfoclassics at gmail.com  Thu Dec 25 12:01:38 2008
From: innfoclassics at gmail.com (Paxton Hoag)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 10:01:38 -0800
Subject: IBM PS2 8573-061 available in South Florida
In-Reply-To: <20081224203151.GA3100@brevard.conman.org>
References: <20081212212126.GA27808@brevard.conman.org>
	<4942E976.6070108@gmail.com>
	<20081224203151.GA3100@brevard.conman.org>
Message-ID: 

>  So, what would be a good value for the system he's selling then?
>

I just bought one with a bad floppy for $5.00.  Works otherwise.

 The computer thrift store had it on the shelf for a long time, first
at $80, then several mark downs getting to $20. Finally they took my
$5 offer in a clearance sale.

I search completed sales to find what a real price is. What people are
asking on eBay is often "pie in the sky".

I guess at the real value on eBay is about $40 to $80 depending on its
cosmetic condition. If it has the original box, manuals and Software
it could go for more.

Paxton


-- 
Paxton Hoag
Astoria, OR
USA


From cclist at sydex.com  Thu Dec 25 12:32:33 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 10:32:33 -0800
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets) 
In-Reply-To: 
References:  >,
	
Message-ID: <49536141.18438.59F92F1@cclist.sydex.com>

Bringing things back onto topic, how does one index and reference a 
page when said page may be generated by a combination of client-side 
(e.g. Java) and server-side (e.g. php) technologies, not to ignore 
XML?

A page may not appear the same way between any two visits...

Merry Christmas,
Chuck



From shoppa at trailing-edge.com  Thu Dec 25 12:48:20 2008
From: shoppa at trailing-edge.com (Tim Shoppa)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 13:48:20 -0500
Subject: HTML sub-document references (was # in href's)
In-Reply-To: <200812251616.mBPGGPRL075274@ultimate.com>
References: <200812251616.mBPGGPRL075274@ultimate.com>
Message-ID: <20081225184821.D5F0ABA50B2@mini-me.trailing-edge.com>

Phil Budne  wrote:
> But the MACLISP manual wasn't written in RUNOFF, was it?!

Ah, now I remember: SCRIBE.

Maybe I would've remembered better if it wasn't for that danged time bomb
in the executable. The separation between formatting and content in
SCRIBE is just right.

Tim.


From als at thangorodrim.de  Thu Dec 25 13:21:59 2008
From: als at thangorodrim.de (Alexander Schreiber)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 20:21:59 +0100
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <20081224181639.K97523@shell.lmi.net>
References: <200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>
	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>
	
	<20081224130756.L90174@shell.lmi.net>
	<1230157048.12570.25.camel@entasis>
	<20081224142852.R92254@shell.lmi.net> <4952EA33.22FE312F@cs.ubc.ca>
	<20081224181639.K97523@shell.lmi.net>
Message-ID: <20081225192159.GA13774@thangorodrim.de>

On Wed, Dec 24, 2008 at 06:35:24PM -0800, Fred Cisin wrote:
> I guess that "modern" HTML has evolved to the point where one MUST use an
> HTML generating program, and no more tampering with the raw HTML;

Now that's nonsense. There are plenty of people for whom "HTML editor"
translates to vim, emacs or another TEXT_EDITOR_OF_CHOICE. Writing HTML
markup by hand is very easy and usually results in more readable (and
less crap-littered) markup as well.

> just as "nobody" writes Postscript.

In that case, there are also quite a few nobodies around ...

Regards,
      Alex.
-- 
"Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and
 looks like work."                                      -- Thomas A. Edison


From cisin at xenosoft.com  Thu Dec 25 14:01:32 2008
From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 12:01:32 -0800 (PST)
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <20081225192159.GA13774@thangorodrim.de>
References: <200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>
	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>
	
	<20081224130756.L90174@shell.lmi.net>
	<1230157048.12570.25.camel@entasis>
	<20081224142852.R92254@shell.lmi.net> <4952EA33.22FE312F@cs.ubc.ca>
	<20081224181639.K97523@shell.lmi.net>
	<20081225192159.GA13774@thangorodrim.de>
Message-ID: <20081225115120.V31991@shell.lmi.net>

> > I guess that "modern" HTML has evolved to the point where one MUST use an
> > HTML generating program, and no more tampering with the raw HTML;

On Thu, 25 Dec 2008, Alexander Schreiber wrote:
> Now that's nonsense. There are plenty of people for whom "HTML editor"
> translates to vim, emacs or another TEXT_EDITOR_OF_CHOICE. Writing HTML
> markup by hand is very easy and usually results in more readable (and
> less crap-littered) markup as well.
>
> > just as "nobody" writes Postscript.
> In that case, there are also quite a few nobodies around ...

Thank you.
I wasn't sure for a while if ANYBODY understood my gripe and sarcasm.

I have used an HTML generator only long enough to look at the HTML it put
out.  Everything that I put on the web is handwritten YAFIYGI HTML.  My
[cob]websites may be crude, but they work reliably and quickly, and occupy
KB, not MB, space.

I've written some minor stuff in Postscript, but have also used the
Postscript output of Ventura as a means to communicate with some printing
equipment.   I was always tempted to write my own output routines for the
Ventura WYSIWYG editor.  It's handy for visualization for an amateur like
me, but I still prefer YAFIYGI.


My comments were directed at the probably realistic, but very
disheartening premise that the innards of HTML and Postscript were
"off-limits".

--
Grumpy Ol' Fred     		cisin at xenosoft.com


From cisin at xenosoft.com  Thu Dec 25 14:06:32 2008
From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 12:06:32 -0800 (PST)
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: 
References: <5967A3E4-CAF2-4E1D-97E6-23344A59769B@neurotica.com>
	<200812250600.mBP60qBd018202@floodgap.com>
	
Message-ID: <20081225120226.F31991@shell.lmi.net>

> >> > I guess that "modern" HTML has evolved to the point where one MUST
> >> > use an HTML generating program, and no more tampering with the raw HTML;
> >> > just as "nobody" writes Postscript.

On Thu, 25 Dec 2008, Ethan Dicks wrote:
> In the small chance that the OP wasn't just trolling,

I may be misguided, or simply WRONG, but I was not deliberately trolling.
My remark about evolution of HTML and "nobody" [notice that I put it in
quotes!] was a rant and sarcastic comment about modern attitudes (and how
I don't fit).

> I write all of
> my pages in raw HTML, but I concede that my experiences are not
> applicable to the other 99% of webpage builders who have never written
> tag manually in their life

We have a higher percentage of RAW coders here than the general population
of "professionals".


--
Grumpy Ol' Fred     		cisin at xenosoft.com


From cisin at xenosoft.com  Thu Dec 25 14:13:57 2008
From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 12:13:57 -0800 (PST)
Subject: [personal] Re: PDF datasheets (was Re: Sources for 8b TTL
 keyboards(Keytronics))
In-Reply-To: <200812250528.AAA23149@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
References: <002f01c965b0$f9a1a6a0$961ca8c0@mss.local>
	<493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com> <493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com>
	<493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com> <493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com>
	<200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<49453812.1040401@gjcp.net>
	<200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>
	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>
	<002f01c965b0$f9a1a6a0$961ca8c0@mss.local>
	<5.1.0.14.2.20081224151948.00c0b9c0@localhost>
	<200812250528.AAA23149@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
Message-ID: <20081225120936.C31991@shell.lmi.net>

On Thu, 25 Dec 2008, der Mouse wrote:
[. . . lots of content more articulate than mine deleted . . . ]

> These things aren't necessarily going to be used to send people to
> specific points in rendered pages (though that's certainly one possible
> way to use them).  They could also be used to unambiguously refer to
> places in the page for other purposes, such as the typo-reporting
> possibility mentioned upthread.

and being able to identify the location of an item within and FOR content
analysis software, particularly indexing.


It is refreshing (and a mjor uplift on XMAS) to see that some people
understand that there is valid need for pointers at levels below file, and
even below that of markers provided by the author.

--
Grumpy Ol' Fred     		cisin at xenosoft.com


From cisin at xenosoft.com  Thu Dec 25 14:50:55 2008
From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 12:50:55 -0800 (PST)
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets) 
In-Reply-To: <49536141.18438.59F92F1@cclist.sydex.com>
References:  >, 
	<49536141.18438.59F92F1@cclist.sydex.com>
Message-ID: <20081225124816.L31991@shell.lmi.net>

On Thu, 25 Dec 2008, Chuck Guzis wrote:
> Bringing things back onto topic, how does one index and reference a
> page when said page may be generated by a combination of client-side
> (e.g. Java) and server-side (e.g. php) technologies, not to ignore
> XML?
> A page may not appear the same way between any two visits...

During the process of implementing a pointer structure for use with STATIC
pages, it would be wise to also contemplate how to extend it to volatile
pages, but NOT to forego implementation based on the possibility of
difficulties in future expansion.





From mcguire at neurotica.com  Thu Dec 25 14:59:41 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 15:59:41 -0500
Subject: wire-wrap supplies
In-Reply-To: <3C1E905F5F0448698ACA175FAA751ED1@andrewdesktop>
References: <3C1E905F5F0448698ACA175FAA751ED1@andrewdesktop>
Message-ID: 

On Dec 23, 2008, at 4:40 PM, Andrew Lynch wrote:
> Hi!  I am building some prototypes for the N8VEM home brew  
> computing project
> and using the new ECB Prototyping Board.  It works great and it allows
> wire-wrap and/or point-to-point soldering construction.  I am  
> making an ECB
> serial board as part of another larger development.
>
> I have some wire-wrap supplies, sockets, and tools but I can see I  
> am fairly
> quickly using them.  If anyone has any old wire-wrap stuff they  
> don't need
> anymore and would like to sell for a nominal amount, or just find a  
> good
> home for where you know they'll get used as intended, please  
> contact me.
> Any supplies offered will be used as intended not scrapped or sold.
>
> I will gladly pay for shipping and/or nominal price.  Obviously I  
> would
> rather use old stock than buy up a bunch of new stuff since I will  
> bet there
> are lots of people with old wire-wrap stuff they don't use anymore.
>
> If anyone can help out I certainly would appreciate it.  Thanks and  
> have a
> nice day!

   Just in case you can't find them this way...I buy all of my wire- 
wrap supplies from MarVac Electronics:

   http://www.marvac.com/

   Their prices are reasonable, their selection is excellent, and  
they're easy to deal with.  I'm not affiliated with them, just a  
happy customer.

           -Dave

--
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL



From cclist at sydex.com  Thu Dec 25 16:49:38 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 14:49:38 -0800
Subject: wire-wrap supplies
In-Reply-To: 
References: <3C1E905F5F0448698ACA175FAA751ED1@andrewdesktop>,
	
Message-ID: <49539D82.5284.1AD969@cclist.sydex.com>

On 25 Dec 2008 at 15:59, Dave McGuire wrote:

>    Their prices are reasonable, their selection is excellent, and  
> they're easy to deal with.  I'm not affiliated with them, just a  
> happy customer.

For bulk wrapping wire, is there anyone cheaper than Squires? (<$25 
for 1000' of 30 ga. Kynar)

http://www.squires.com/

Cheers,
Chuck



From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Thu Dec 25 18:07:47 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 19:07:47 -0500
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
	
Message-ID: 

On Thu, Dec 25, 2008 at 12:58 PM, Richard  wrote:
>
> In article ,
>    "Ethan Dicks"   writes:
>
>> Seriously, though, not counting code-generated HTML (usually written
>> in Perl, but there are a few exceptions to that), [...]
>
> LOL.  Maybe about 10 years ago it was that way.

No argument there.

> There's this little thing called ASP/ASP.NET...

Nope.. never played with that (nor any webserver on a Microsoft box -
I've only worked with Apache).

-ethan


From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Thu Dec 25 18:13:00 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 19:13:00 -0500
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <20081225120226.F31991@shell.lmi.net>
References: <5967A3E4-CAF2-4E1D-97E6-23344A59769B@neurotica.com>
	<200812250600.mBP60qBd018202@floodgap.com>
	
	<20081225120226.F31991@shell.lmi.net>
Message-ID: 

On Thu, Dec 25, 2008 at 3:06 PM, Fred Cisin  wrote:
>> >> > I guess that "modern" HTML has evolved to the point where one MUST
>> >> > use an HTML generating program, and no more tampering with the raw HTML;
>> >> > just as "nobody" writes Postscript.
>
> On Thu, 25 Dec 2008, Ethan Dicks wrote:
>> In the small chance that the OP wasn't just trolling,
>
> I may be misguided, or simply WRONG, but I was not deliberately trolling.
> My remark about evolution of HTML and "nobody" [notice that I put it in
> quotes!] was a rant and sarcastic comment about modern attitudes (and how
> I don't fit).

I do see the quotes, but I'm not sure that I initially interpreted
things exactly as you have just explained them - a limitation of the
medium.

>> I write all of
>> my pages in raw HTML, but I concede that my experiences are not
>> applicable to the other 99% of webpage builders who have never written
>> tag manually in their life
>
> We have a higher percentage of RAW coders here than the general population
> of "professionals".

That is certainly true.

-ethan


From spc at conman.org  Fri Dec 26 01:02:27 2008
From: spc at conman.org (Sean Conner)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 02:02:27 -0500
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <20081224181639.K97523@shell.lmi.net>
References: <200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>
	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>
	
	<20081224130756.L90174@shell.lmi.net>
	<1230157048.12570.25.camel@entasis>
	<20081224142852.R92254@shell.lmi.net> <4952EA33.22FE312F@cs.ubc.ca>
	<20081224181639.K97523@shell.lmi.net>
Message-ID: <20081226070227.GA30568@brevard.conman.org>

It was thus said that the Great Fred Cisin once stated:
> On Wed, 24 Dec 2008, Brent Hilpert wrote:
> > Are you asking how to get < and > rendered as displayed text?
> > Try:
> >   ...the <BOLD> tag will...
> > (I'm not sure how I know this, I can't find it in the html reference I use;
> > which begs the question of whether it's actually part of the standard.)
> 
> <  is the "less than" character
> >  is the "greater than" character
> 
> how would you get HTML to display:
> "<  is the "less than" character"
> would I have to "escape" the ampersands?
>&lt;

  In HTML, "<" will display "<", while "&lt;" would display "<". 
Those are really the only two characters that need to be escaped to be
displayed literally; all others can be, but aren't required to.

> 
 , 
 are fun.
> Is there an inconsistency with whether a browser will display special
> chatacters within a 
 block?  Do some browsers display them literally,
> while others apply the 
 ONLY to whitespace and line breaks?
> I have seen at least one browser where I could get away with:
> 
> x = <
> if (x < y) . . .
> 


  The 
 tag is just a method of specifying a monospace font that
preserves runs of spaces, tabs and linefeeds (normally, HTML will "collapse"
a run of spaces and only display a single space; tab and linefeeds are
treated as simple whitespace).  You can still embed other tags within the

 tag, so if you want to display a literal '<' within a 
 tag, you
need to specify it as "<".

  Since I often blog examples of source code, I wrote a program that will
encode text properly for display within a 
 tag, converting:

if (x < 3)
{
  printf("x needs to be higher\n");
}


if (x < 3)
{
  printf("x needs to be higher\n");
}



(Technically, the double quote doesn't need to be converted, but I do it
anyway)

If you don't specify what level of HTML your document is conforming to
(using a  declaration) then most browsers tend to fall back to
what's called "tag soup" parsing, and be *very* forgiving on what it's
parsing.  

> 
> I guess that "modern" HTML has evolved to the point where one MUST use an
> HTML generating program, and no more tampering with the raw HTML; just as
> "nobody" writes Postscript.

  No, I still write raw HTML---heck all my blog entries [1] are written in
raw HTML (beats trying to remember some half-baked ASCII markup monstrostity
like MarkDown), although the entries are pasted into a template when
requested.

  -spc (Does this stuff for a living)

[1]	http://boston.conman.org/



From IanK at vulcan.com  Fri Dec 26 01:07:43 2008
From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 23:07:43 -0800
Subject: Weird cardset - any ideas?
Message-ID: 

Google is failing me on this one.  A while back, I picked up some random boards on ePay.  The boards all have the name TRIAD, and they include a passive backplane, what appears to be a central controller with an FPGA and a bunch of RAM, and several boards that each contain two Z80s and ten 8530 serial communication chips.  One of the oddest things in the silk screening is the identification of two of the ribbon connectors across the top of these latter boards: "LAMB/DROID, ODD HALF" and "EVEN HALF".  (Ironically, I just finished a really good science fiction story regarding a sheep, entitled "The Android's Dream"....)

The only hints I've found are that this may be the guts of a PBX or other telecom unit.  Does anyone have any insight on this?  I'm asking because there are a lot of cool chips on these boards, but before I render them down for spare parts I want to be sure I'm not destroying anything significant.  It sure looks like some sort of distributed processing architecture, but I have no idea what it was processing.  Thanks for any ideas -- Ian



From cclist at sydex.com  Fri Dec 26 01:40:22 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 23:40:22 -0800
Subject: Weird cardset - any ideas?
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <495419E6.13395.200C6B0@cclist.sydex.com>

On 25 Dec 2008 at 23:07, Ian King wrote:

> Google is failing me on this one.  A while back, I picked up some
> random boards on ePay.  The boards all have the name TRIAD, and they
> include a passive backplane, what appears to be a central controller
> with an FPGA and a bunch of RAM, and several boards that each contain
> two Z80s and ten 8530 serial communication chips.  One of the oddest
> things in the silk screening is the identification of two of the
> ribbon connectors across the top of these latter boards: "LAMB/DROID,
> ODD HALF" and "EVEN HALF".  (Ironically, I just finished a really good
> science fiction story regarding a sheep, entitled "The Android's
> Dream"....) 

Triad used to be very big in POS systems, particularly in the auto 
parts business.  Does that make any sense with your gizmo?  Is that 
an FPGA or just a custom gate array?

Cheers,
Chuck




From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca  Fri Dec 26 01:55:17 2008
From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 23:55:17 -0800
Subject: Weird cardset - any ideas?
References: 
Message-ID: <49548DE5.962343AD@cs.ubc.ca>

Ian King wrote:
> 
> Google is failing me on this one.  A while back, I picked up some random boards on ePay.  The boards all have the name TRIAD, and they include a passive backplane, what appears to be a central controller with an FPGA and a bunch of RAM, and several boards that each contain two Z80s and ten 8530 serial communication chips.  One of the oddest things in the silk screening is the identification of two of the ribbon connectors across the top of these latter boards: "LAMB/DROID, ODD HALF" and "EVEN HALF".  (Ironically, I just finished a really good science fiction story regarding a sheep, entitled "The Android's Dream"....)
> 
> The only hints I've found are that this may be the guts of a PBX or other telecom unit.  Does anyone have any insight on this?  I'm asking because there are a lot of cool chips on these boards, but before I render them down for spare parts I want to be sure I'm not destroying anything significant.  It sure looks like some sort of distributed processing architecture, but I have no idea what it was processing.  Thanks for any ideas -- Ian

Just a guess or possibility, as it could be lots of things, but perhaps a
serial/RS232 switch, the sort of thing that Gandalf and Develcon made in the
80's to permit many terminals to selectively connect to one or more machines...?


From phil at ultimate.com  Thu Dec 25 10:16:25 2008
From: phil at ultimate.com (Phil Budne)
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2008 11:16:25 -0500 (EST)
Subject: HTML sub-document references (was # in href's)
In-Reply-To: <20081225153652.7BD59BA50B0@mini-me.trailing-edge.com>
Message-ID: <200812251616.mBPGGPRL075274@ultimate.com>

Tim Shoppa wrote:
> A future project would probably be a way of turning all the different
> variants of RUNOFF (and the variants span 3 decades at least, 4 or 5
> decades if you count those who still used it in the 90's and 2000's)
> into HTML with good invariant content-based subreferences.

I'm not sure how much (if any) penetration the new fangled "Digital
Standard Runoff" made in the PDP-10 world.  Other than that, I can't
recall having much trouble formatting documents of all ages with
1980's vintage PDP-10 RUNOFF (and I liked looking at old stuff, even
then).  I remember finding some TENEX design documents when I was at
DEC.  I recently regave them to Dan Murphy, we talked about how to
render them for the web, and I remembered a package I once used that
reads RUNOFF and outputs troff:

ftp://ftp.cs.toronto.edu/pub/darwin/runoff.troff

Sources for manuals probably have directives for producing indices,
which would be useful for producing HTML anchors.

But the MACLISP manual wasn't written in RUNOFF, was it?!


From IanK at vulcan.com  Fri Dec 26 11:07:42 2008
From: IanK at vulcan.com (Ian King)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 09:07:42 -0800
Subject: Weird cardset - any ideas?
In-Reply-To: <495419E6.13395.200C6B0@cclist.sydex.com>
References: ,
	<495419E6.13395.200C6B0@cclist.sydex.com>
Message-ID: 

My bad on that "FPGA".  I got out my 'serious' reading glasses, looked at it more closely and it's a Z180 processor.  There's a lot of connectivity on these boards, so it makes sense they could have been part of a POS system: serial lines to communicate with the terminals.

These are really well made boards, and about half the chips are socketed.  -- Ian
________________________________________
From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Chuck Guzis [cclist at sydex.com]
Sent: Thursday, December 25, 2008 11:40 PM
To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts
Subject: Re: Weird cardset - any ideas?

On 25 Dec 2008 at 23:07, Ian King wrote:

> Google is failing me on this one.  A while back, I picked up some
> random boards on ePay.  The boards all have the name TRIAD, and they
> include a passive backplane, what appears to be a central controller
> with an FPGA and a bunch of RAM, and several boards that each contain
> two Z80s and ten 8530 serial communication chips.  One of the oddest
> things in the silk screening is the identification of two of the
> ribbon connectors across the top of these latter boards: "LAMB/DROID,
> ODD HALF" and "EVEN HALF".  (Ironically, I just finished a really good
> science fiction story regarding a sheep, entitled "The Android's
> Dream"....)

Triad used to be very big in POS systems, particularly in the auto
parts business.  Does that make any sense with your gizmo?  Is that
an FPGA or just a custom gate array?

Cheers,
Chuck






From innfoclassics at gmail.com  Fri Dec 26 11:18:45 2008
From: innfoclassics at gmail.com (Paxton Hoag)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 09:18:45 -0800
Subject: Weird cardset - any ideas?
In-Reply-To: <495419E6.13395.200C6B0@cclist.sydex.com>
References: 
	<495419E6.13395.200C6B0@cclist.sydex.com>
Message-ID: 

> Triad used to be very big in POS systems, particularly in the auto
> parts business.  Does that make any sense with your gizmo?  Is that
> an FPGA or just a custom gate array?


You see Triad systems at Autoparts dealers and Automobile franchises.
They started with Data general minis and I look for old parts in
automotive dealer auctions.

They migrated to PC based systems in the 1990s

I think your cards are terminal cards for multiple serial
conncections. They used to use Wyse 50 terminals along with TI 8XX
printers.

Paxton
-- 
Paxton Hoag
Astoria, OR
USA


From cclist at sydex.com  Fri Dec 26 11:27:01 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 09:27:01 -0800
Subject: Weird cardset - any ideas?
In-Reply-To: 
References: ,
	<495419E6.13395.200C6B0@cclist.sydex.com>,
	
Message-ID: <4954A365.22349.223AC1@cclist.sydex.com>

On 26 Dec 2008 at 9:07, Ian King wrote:

> My bad on that "FPGA".  I got out my 'serious' reading glasses, looked
> at it more closely and it's a Z180 processor.  There's a lot of
> connectivity on these boards, so it makes sense they could have been
> part of a POS system: serial lines to communicate with the terminals. 
> 
> These are really well made boards, and about half the chips are
> socketed.  -- Ian 

Any ROMs or EPROMs on the board that you could dump for a clue?

Cheers,
Chuck



From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com  Fri Dec 26 14:01:09 2008
From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 14:01:09 -0600
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <20081225192159.GA13774@thangorodrim.de>
References: <200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>		<20081224130756.L90174@shell.lmi.net>	<1230157048.12570.25.camel@entasis>	<20081224142852.R92254@shell.lmi.net>
	<4952EA33.22FE312F@cs.ubc.ca>	<20081224181639.K97523@shell.lmi.net>
	<20081225192159.GA13774@thangorodrim.de>
Message-ID: <49553805.9060107@gmail.com>

Alexander Schreiber wrote:
> On Wed, Dec 24, 2008 at 06:35:24PM -0800, Fred Cisin wrote:
>> I guess that "modern" HTML has evolved to the point where one MUST use an
>> HTML generating program, and no more tampering with the raw HTML;
> 
> Now that's nonsense. There are plenty of people for whom "HTML editor"
> translates to vim, emacs or another TEXT_EDITOR_OF_CHOICE. 

Indeed. Actually, I usually 'first pass' code generation by simply doing "cat 
 > foo.html" and only use an editor (normally vi, occasionally Kate) when I 
need to make changes*. But then I detest both complex HTML and complex website 
interfaces; I believe in HTML being used to add a little structure so as to 
better convey the information within - it's not the ideal mechanism for "busy" 
graphics-laden interactive interfaces (that it's the only mechanism we have 
these days is beside the point :-)

* In my day it was uphill both ways etc. etc.

>> just as "nobody" writes Postscript.
> 
> In that case, there are also quite a few nobodies around ...

Heh, yeah. It's been a long time since I've hacked postscript by hand, but I 
have done it before.

cheers

Jules



From pat at computer-refuge.org  Fri Dec 26 14:18:43 2008
From: pat at computer-refuge.org (Patrick Finnegan)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 15:18:43 -0500
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <200812261518.44134.pat@computer-refuge.org>

On Thursday 25 December 2008, Richard wrote:
> In article
> ,
>
>     "Ethan Dicks"   writes:
> > Seriously, though, not counting code-generated HTML (usually
> > written in Perl, but there are a few exceptions to that), [...]
>
> LOL.  Maybe about 10 years ago it was that way.

I'm pretty sure that Ethan was referring to HTML that he has written.  

> There's this little thing called ASP/ASP.NET...

It would seriously surprise me if Ethan has ever used that.  In fact, 
I'm willing to bet that PHP is more popular than ASP.

In any case, what sane person runs Windows on a web server, who has a 
choice?

*sigh*

I've used ASP.  I really hate VBscript.  I'd rather write CGI programs 
in C (which I've done before), which alone isn't much fun.

Pat
-- 
Purdue University Research Computing ---  http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/
The Computer Refuge                  ---  http://computer-refuge.org


From keithvz at verizon.net  Fri Dec 26 15:26:28 2008
From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 16:26:28 -0500
Subject: Brian Brikon 723/4M-QT floppy drive tester documentation
In-Reply-To: <493DFDE5.6000209@verizon.net>
References: <493DFDE5.6000209@verizon.net>
Message-ID: <49554C04.3010606@verizon.net>

Keith wrote:
> I've just purchased a Brian Instruments Brikon 723/4M-QT floppy drive 
> tester.  I've wanted one of these for quite some time, and was pretty 
> happy to find one on ebay for $20+$23 s/h.
> 
> Anyone have a manual?  Anyone know what the difference would be from 
> 723B vs 723/4M-QT ?? What's the 4M part? The QT?
> 
> Any info would be helpful!
> 
> Thanks
> 
> Keith

Hate to reply to myself BUT I could always buy a COPY for $100.

Does this sound reasonable?

Thanks

Keith







Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 09:27:28 -0800
From: John Bachellier/ MBI-USA 
Subject: Re: Brikon 723 floppy drive tester
To: Keith 
Reply-to: jb1 at mbiusa.com
Message-id: 
Organization: MBI-USA
MIME-version: 1.0
Content-type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit
References: 
User-Agent: Thunderbird 2.0.0.18 (Windows/20081105)

Yes, $100.00 for a copy

Regards,

John Bachellier / MBI

Tel 805-237-0883
Fax 805-239-1867
email jb1 at mbiusa.com

MSN Messenger jb at mbiusa.com
AOL jbmbiusa
YAHOO johnbachellier

Website:- www.mbiusa.com

7.00am-5.00pm Pacific Standard Time

Optical Drive Sales and Optical Drive Repairs
Worm Drive Sales and Worm Drive Repairs
Drive Test Equipment Systems
Hard-to-find Hard and SMD Drives
Drive Emulation Systems
Trailing-edge Technology


Keith wrote:
 > Hi,
 >
 > Do you happen to have a manual for the Brian Instruments Brikon 723
 > floppy drive tester?
 >
 > Thanks
 >
 > Keith
 >






From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk  Fri Dec 26 16:34:53 2008
From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 22:34:53 +0000
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
Message-ID: <49555C0D.4000408@philpem.me.uk>

Hi folks,
   A few of you might remember the Jupiter Ace I had that took a 9V spike to
the expansion slot -- and my futile attempts at repairing it. It's been well 
over four years since I sent it to a listmember who offered to repair it, and 
all attempts to get the board or the spares I sent with it have failed. At 
this point, I haven't seen hide nor hair of him in months, although he's 
apparently still updating his website...

   So basically I'm the proud (?) owner of the two sections of case, most of
the snap-rivets (apparently Maplin sell these, so I might be able to complete 
the set), the rubber keyboard membrane, documentation, demo tape and a 
(supposedly working) 16K RAM pack.

   I've heard rumours of spare, unassembled Jupiter Ace PCBs kicking around;
does anyone happen to have one up for grabs? It looks like the only way I'm
going to get this thing up and running again would be to build a new mainboard
from scratch, thus that's what I'm planning to do. About the only parts I need
are a Z80 CPU and a couple of 74LS logic chips.

   Only other alternative would be to get a few PCBs made up for it, then
build one from scratch on that -- the catch being I haven't had any luck
creating a decent track master from the scans of the PCB that I have....

   Can anyone assist me in my Quest to Build a Working Jupiter Ace (tm)?

Thanks,
-- 
Phil.
classiccmp at philpem.me.uk
http://www.philpem.me.uk/



From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com  Fri Dec 26 16:41:56 2008
From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 16:41:56 -0600
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <200812261518.44134.pat@computer-refuge.org>
References: 
	<200812261518.44134.pat@computer-refuge.org>
Message-ID: <49555DB4.6050505@gmail.com>

Patrick Finnegan wrote:
> In any case, what sane person runs Windows on a web server, who has a 
> choice?

A lot of people tied by corporate policy and the (perceived) overhead of 
switching to and maintaining a new platform, I suspect :(



From ploopster at gmail.com  Fri Dec 26 17:01:04 2008
From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 18:01:04 -0500
Subject: IBM PS2 8573-061 available in South Florida
In-Reply-To: <20081224203151.GA3100@brevard.conman.org>
References: <20081212212126.GA27808@brevard.conman.org>	<4942E976.6070108@gmail.com>
	<20081224203151.GA3100@brevard.conman.org>
Message-ID: <49556230.4090009@gmail.com>

Sean Conner wrote:
> It was thus said that the Great Sridhar Ayengar once stated:
>> Sean Conner wrote:
>>>  I recieved an email from someone looking to sell an IBM PS2 8573-061 (he
>>> saw my name mentioned in a newpaper article about collecting old computers
>>> and contacted me).  Asking about the price, here's what he said:
>>>
>>>> I did a little research on pricing this morning and I see the same unit at
>>>> Computer Fusion Inc. for $425 and on eBay for $490. I'd be willing to sell
>>>> mine for half price to get it out of my garage.
>>>>
>>>> I'm thinking of putting it on eBay. Let me know.
>>>  If anyone is interested, say so and I'll pass on his email address.  
>>>
>>>  The person lives in Boyton Beach, Florida and works in Boca Raton (home 
>>>  of
>>> the IBM PC).
>> He's a bit optimistic on the value.
> 
>   So, what would be a good value for the system he's selling then?

I'd give him $50 for it.  And I probably value the system more than a 
lot of other people.

Peace...  Sridhar


From classiccmp at crash.com  Fri Dec 26 17:03:38 2008
From: classiccmp at crash.com (Steven M Jones)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 15:03:38 -0800
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus 
In-Reply-To: <24342.1229976120@mini>
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>
	<1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com>
	<24146.1229784478@mini> <24342.1229976120@mini>
Message-ID: <9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>


On Dec 22, 2008, at 12:02 PM, Brad Parker wrote:

> and if anyone is bored, I have an "expect" script which automates the
> whole thing.  This comes in handy if you are going to do it a few  
> times
> for different size disks.

The more the merrier, if there's a place to put it.

I've kept a flag set for Quasijarus because it claimed to include/ 
continue support for the 11/730. Has anybody actually used it on a  
physical example of a Nebula?

--S.


From derschjo at mail.msu.edu  Fri Dec 26 17:04:56 2008
From: derschjo at mail.msu.edu (Josh Dersch)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 15:04:56 -0800
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <49555DB4.6050505@gmail.com>
References: 
	<200812261518.44134.pat@computer-refuge.org>
	<49555DB4.6050505@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <40CBE99D-6A32-43C3-AFB3-C52AE83C42AD@mail.msu.edu>



On Dec 26, 2008, at 2:41 PM, Jules Richardson  wrote:

> Patrick Finnegan wrote:
>> In any case, what sane person runs Windows on a web server, who has  
>> a choice?
>
> A lot of people tied by corporate policy and the (perceived)  
> overhead of switching to and maintaining a new platform, I suspect :(
>
>

Or (and I realize this is -complete- insanity...) -- it's possible  
that Windows and IIS do what they need?

Gasp!

Josh


From blstuart at bellsouth.net  Fri Dec 26 17:11:18 2008
From: blstuart at bellsouth.net (blstuart at bellsouth.net)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 17:11:18 -0600
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus 
In-Reply-To: <9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>
Message-ID: <10557a100237d9608fc4a0114a6a3ade@bellsouth.net>

> I've kept a flag set for Quasijarus because it claimed to include/ 
> continue support for the 11/730. Has anybody actually used it on a  
> physical example of a Nebula?

I haven't used Quasijarus on a 730, but lo these many
years ago, I did run 4.2BSD on one.  I'm pretty sure we
were using a 750 by the time we moved to 4.3, but I
just looked at the 4.3 docs, and still see some reference
to the 730, so I'm pretty sure that the 730 was still
supported in the BSD release of 4.3, and I don't see
any reason to expect that would have broken in Quasijarus
since then.

BLS



From mbbrutman-cctalk at brutman.com  Fri Dec 26 17:33:17 2008
From: mbbrutman-cctalk at brutman.com (Michael B. Brutman)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 17:33:17 -0600
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <495569BD.8060808@brutman.com>

Tony Duell wrote:

> As I mentioned, it is possible to take the swtiches apart and clean the 
> contacts and/or coat them in a bit of pencil graphite. But how long it'll 
> last I don't know. I did it to mine, they're still working _but_ I put 
> them in places where I'd not really use them (I rarely use numeric 
> keypads, so I put the bodged switches there). You;'ve got far too many 
> duds to do that, though.

This is an old thread - March of this year.  It was about a TRS-80 Model 
4 with a really bad keyboard.  Only a handful of keys had any sort of 
life in them.

I now have a replacement keyboard for the machine that is significantly 
better.  I was able to cleanly desolder a dead keyswitch and disassemble 
it to examine it.  The keyswitch mechanism is exactly as you described - 
a rubber dome with a conductive pad in the middle.

The question now is about the conductive pad.  Cleaning with rubbing 
alcohol has not helped anything.  Is there anything besides pencil 
graphite that will work to lower the resistance?  I'm looking for 
something that will last a while, and your concerns about the pencil 
graphite have me concerned too.  I'm not going to desolder and repair 
every keyswitch so I won't be able to move dodgy ones to the keypad to 
avoid using them.  I'd rather take a little more time and find a better 
solution ..

If I press hard enough on the bad switch eventually the resistance will 
come down from infinity to around 6000 Ohms.  A good keyswitch shows 
under 100 Ohms of resistance.

A picture of the insides of the keyswitch (including the rubber dome 
contact I'm trying to rejuvenate) can be found here:

http://www.brutman.com/TRS80_Model_4_Keyswitch.jpg


Thanks,
Mike



From lynchaj at yahoo.com  Fri Dec 26 17:30:44 2008
From: lynchaj at yahoo.com (Andrew Lynch)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 18:30:44 -0500
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
Message-ID: <8EC0CC875D8E44EE962AE9C0AD88F55B@andrewdesktop>


Hi folks,
   A few of you might remember the Jupiter Ace I had that took a 9V spike to
the expansion slot -- and my futile attempts at repairing it. It's been well

over four years since I sent it to a listmember who offered to repair it,
and 
all attempts to get the board or the spares I sent with it have failed. At 
this point, I haven't seen hide nor hair of him in months, although he's 
apparently still updating his website...

   So basically I'm the proud (?) owner of the two sections of case, most of
the snap-rivets (apparently Maplin sell these, so I might be able to
complete 
the set), the rubber keyboard membrane, documentation, demo tape and a 
(supposedly working) 16K RAM pack.

   I've heard rumours of spare, unassembled Jupiter Ace PCBs kicking around;
does anyone happen to have one up for grabs? It looks like the only way I'm
going to get this thing up and running again would be to build a new
mainboard
from scratch, thus that's what I'm planning to do. About the only parts I
need
are a Z80 CPU and a couple of 74LS logic chips.

   Only other alternative would be to get a few PCBs made up for it, then
build one from scratch on that -- the catch being I haven't had any luck
creating a decent track master from the scans of the PCB that I have....

   Can anyone assist me in my Quest to Build a Working Jupiter Ace (tm)?

Thanks,
-- 
Phil.
classiccmp at philpem.me.uk
 
http://www.philpem.me.uk/


-----REPLY-----

Hi Phil,

If it were me, I would just take the information from the wikipedia page and
build your own replacement PCB.  The Jupiter Ace appears to be a pretty
straight forward Z80 SBC so just build a prototype board and then get KiCAD
and design your own PCB.  With some luck and patience you probably can
design a board that fits right in the original case.

You might even be able to recoup your costs of the PCB manufacturing run by
selling PCBs or even fully manufactured SBCs to other Jupiter Ace
enthusiasts.  I'd guess they'd be thrilled to see some new hardware
available.  Just a suggestion.  

Thanks and have a nice day!

Andrew Lynch



From ian_primus at yahoo.com  Fri Dec 26 17:43:10 2008
From: ian_primus at yahoo.com (Mr Ian Primus)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 15:43:10 -0800 (PST)
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: <8EC0CC875D8E44EE962AE9C0AD88F55B@andrewdesktop>
Message-ID: <673566.19756.qm@web52702.mail.re2.yahoo.com>

--- On Fri, 12/26/08, Andrew Lynch  wrote:
> It looks like
> the only way I'm
> going to get this thing up and running again would be to
> build a new
> mainboard
> from scratch, thus that's what I'm planning to do.
> About the only parts I
> need
> are a Z80 CPU and a couple of 74LS logic chips.

One guy already drew up plans to build one yourself:
 
 http://home.micros.users.btopenworld.com/JupiterAce/JupiterAce.html

Looks fairly straightforward. You could wirewrap or point-to-point it, and I suppose you could have PCB's made if you were so inclined.

-Ian



From ploopster at gmail.com  Fri Dec 26 17:47:00 2008
From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 18:47:00 -0500
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: <673566.19756.qm@web52702.mail.re2.yahoo.com>
References: <673566.19756.qm@web52702.mail.re2.yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <49556CF4.3040503@gmail.com>

Mr Ian Primus wrote:
> --- On Fri, 12/26/08, Andrew Lynch  wrote:
>> It looks like
>> the only way I'm
>> going to get this thing up and running again would be to
>> build a new
>> mainboard
>> from scratch, thus that's what I'm planning to do.
>> About the only parts I
>> need
>> are a Z80 CPU and a couple of 74LS logic chips.
> 
> One guy already drew up plans to build one yourself:
>  
>  http://home.micros.users.btopenworld.com/JupiterAce/JupiterAce.html
> 
> Looks fairly straightforward. You could wirewrap or point-to-point it, and I suppose you could have PCB's made if you were so inclined.

Or you could roll your own PCBs.

Peace...  Sridhar


From bobalan at sbcglobal.net  Fri Dec 26 17:55:46 2008
From: bobalan at sbcglobal.net (Bob Rosenbloom)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 15:55:46 -0800
Subject: Brian Brikon 723/4M-QT floppy drive tester documentation
In-Reply-To: <49554C04.3010606@verizon.net>
References: <493DFDE5.6000209@verizon.net> <49554C04.3010606@verizon.net>
Message-ID: <49556F02.7060708@sbcglobal.net>

Keith wrote:
> Hate to reply to myself BUT I could always buy a COPY for $100.
>
> Does this sound reasonable?
>
> Thanks
>
> Keith


I just scanned the first part of the docs I have on my 723 and put it up 
on my web site here:

http://www.dvq.com/docs/brian_inst/

It's not the best scan but should do. I'll scan the rest of the docs I 
have and post them by tonight.

Hope it all helps.

Bob


From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com  Fri Dec 26 18:00:58 2008
From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 18:00:58 -0600
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: <49556CF4.3040503@gmail.com>
References: <673566.19756.qm@web52702.mail.re2.yahoo.com>
	<49556CF4.3040503@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <4955703A.80402@gmail.com>

Sridhar Ayengar wrote:
>> Looks fairly straightforward. You could wirewrap or point-to-point it, 
>> and I suppose you could have PCB's made if you were so inclined.
> 
> Or you could roll your own PCBs.

Surely there's an ACE emulator around, and presumably there exists a small 
enough PC mainboard that'll fit in the ACE's case...






From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com  Fri Dec 26 18:03:12 2008
From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 18:03:12 -0600
Subject: Merry Newtonsday
In-Reply-To: <4952E4CD.10302@gjcp.net>
References:  <4952E4CD.10302@gjcp.net>
Message-ID: <495570C0.6020404@gmail.com>

Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote:
> Tony Duell wrote:
>> Merry Newtonsday, Christmas, Yule, Midwinter, Winter Solstice or 
>> whatever you choose to celebrate to members of the classic computer 
>> list and their families.
>>
> 
> Happy Hogswatch!

Is that a timepiece for a pig, or a porcine clothing sample?




From mcguire at neurotica.com  Fri Dec 26 18:05:53 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 19:05:53 -0500
Subject: IBM PS2 8573-061 available in South Florida
In-Reply-To: <49556230.4090009@gmail.com>
References: <20081212212126.GA27808@brevard.conman.org>	<4942E976.6070108@gmail.com>
	<20081224203151.GA3100@brevard.conman.org>
	<49556230.4090009@gmail.com>
Message-ID: 

On Dec 26, 2008, at 6:01 PM, Sridhar Ayengar wrote:
>>>>  I recieved an email from someone looking to sell an IBM PS2  
>>>> 8573-061 (he
>>>> saw my name mentioned in a newpaper article about collecting old  
>>>> computers
>>>> and contacted me).  Asking about the price, here's what he said:
>>>>
>>>>> I did a little research on pricing this morning and I see the  
>>>>> same unit at
>>>>> Computer Fusion Inc. for $425 and on eBay for $490. I'd be  
>>>>> willing to sell
>>>>> mine for half price to get it out of my garage.
>>>>>
>>>>> I'm thinking of putting it on eBay. Let me know.
>>>>  If anyone is interested, say so and I'll pass on his email  
>>>> address.
>>>>  The person lives in Boyton Beach, Florida and works in Boca  
>>>> Raton (home  of
>>>> the IBM PC).
>>> He's a bit optimistic on the value.
>>   So, what would be a good value for the system he's selling then?
>
> I'd give him $50 for it.  And I probably value the system more than  
> a lot of other people.

   Sridhar, if you do grab it, let me know if you need pickup  
help...I could sit on it at my place until you come down for your  
next visit.

            -Dave

--
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL



From mcguire at neurotica.com  Fri Dec 26 18:06:51 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 19:06:51 -0500
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus 
In-Reply-To: <9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>
	<1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com>
	<24146.1229784478@mini> <24342.1229976120@mini>
	<9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>
Message-ID: <31F739FB-182C-4FCB-BFB2-EB73E6ABAE24@neurotica.com>

On Dec 26, 2008, at 6:03 PM, Steven M Jones wrote:
>> and if anyone is bored, I have an "expect" script which automates the
>> whole thing.  This comes in handy if you are going to do it a few  
>> times
>> for different size disks.
>
> The more the merrier, if there's a place to put it.
>
> I've kept a flag set for Quasijarus because it claimed to include/ 
> continue support for the 11/730. Has anybody actually used it on a  
> physical example of a Nebula?

   I'm midway through restoring my 11/730; I'd love to try it.  Where  
does the official distribution live?

           -Dave

--
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL



From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca  Fri Dec 26 18:10:33 2008
From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 17:10:33 -0700
Subject: Merry Newtonsday
In-Reply-To: <495570C0.6020404@gmail.com>
References:  <4952E4CD.10302@gjcp.net>
	<495570C0.6020404@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <49557279.8010707@jetnet.ab.ca>

Jules Richardson wrote:
> Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote:
>> Tony Duell wrote:
>>> Merry Newtonsday, Christmas, Yule, Midwinter, Winter Solstice or 
>>> whatever you choose to celebrate to members of the classic computer 
>>> list and their families.
>>>
>>
>> Happy Hogswatch!
> 
> Is that a timepiece for a pig, or a porcine clothing sample?

Having HAM here for supper ... So the time was up for that pig.  :)




From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu  Fri Dec 26 20:01:20 2008
From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 18:01:20 -0800 (PST)
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: <495569BD.8060808@brutman.com>
References:  <495569BD.8060808@brutman.com>
Message-ID: 

On Fri, 26 Dec 2008, Michael B. Brutman wrote:

> The question now is about the conductive pad.  Cleaning with rubbing alcohol 
> has not helped anything.  Is there anything besides pencil graphite that will 
> work to lower the resistance?  I'm looking for something that will last a 
> while, and your concerns about the pencil graphite have me concerned too. 
> I'm not going to desolder and repair every keyswitch so I won't be able to 
> move dodgy ones to the keypad to avoid using them.  I'd rather take a little 
> more time and find a better solution ..

The PT210 uses identical keyswitches.  I rehabbed those by painting
the undersides of the rubber domes with conductive ink -- the same stuff
sold for repairing PCB traces.


-- 
David Griffith
dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu

A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text.
Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing?
A: Top-posting.
Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail?


From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Fri Dec 26 20:26:54 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 21:26:54 -0500
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>
	<1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com>
	<24146.1229784478@mini> <24342.1229976120@mini>
	<9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>
Message-ID: 

On Fri, Dec 26, 2008 at 6:03 PM, Steven M Jones  wrote:
> I've kept a flag set for Quasijarus because it claimed to include/continue
> support for the 11/730. Has anybody actually used it on a physical example
> of a Nebula?

No, but I have a, 11/725 in the corner I need to diskify and get working again.

I don't mean to bring up the "how crappy RC25s are" thread, but I
either need a cartridge (so I can spin up the internal drive, too), or
a workable Unibus disk solution (SCSI or SDI or ESDI - I doubt the
11/725 can take a UDA50 internally due to power or heat issues).  I'm
also open to exotic suggestions, but back in the day, I remember being
pinched for "creative" Unibus disk solutions.

Also, I should check the memory in it - ISTR it's limited to 5MB.

-ethan


From mcguire at neurotica.com  Fri Dec 26 20:35:57 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 21:35:57 -0500
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: 
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>
	<1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com>
	<24146.1229784478@mini> <24342.1229976120@mini>
	<9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>
	
Message-ID: <9081BA4A-D92D-47E4-94BE-74E12A044B13@neurotica.com>

On Dec 26, 2008, at 9:26 PM, Ethan Dicks wrote:
> On Fri, Dec 26, 2008 at 6:03 PM, Steven M Jones  
>  wrote:
>> I've kept a flag set for Quasijarus because it claimed to include/ 
>> continue
>> support for the 11/730. Has anybody actually used it on a physical  
>> example
>> of a Nebula?
>
> No, but I have a, 11/725 in the corner I need to diskify and get  
> working again.
>
> I don't mean to bring up the "how crappy RC25s are" thread, but I
> either need a cartridge (so I can spin up the internal drive, too), or
> a workable Unibus disk solution (SCSI or SDI or ESDI - I doubt the
> 11/725 can take a UDA50 internally due to power or heat issues).  I'm
> also open to exotic suggestions, but back in the day, I remember being
> pinched for "creative" Unibus disk solutions.

   I'm facing that problem now on my 11/750.  A friend gave me an  
ESE50 as a nice gift recently; I may try to find a UDA50 to stick in  
there to use that.  That should be a neat config.

> Also, I should check the memory in it - ISTR it's limited to 5MB.

   I think 5MB is correct.  And don't they use the same memory array  
boards as the PDP-11/70?

         -Dave

--
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL



From pat at computer-refuge.org  Fri Dec 26 20:41:54 2008
From: pat at computer-refuge.org (Patrick Finnegan)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 21:41:54 -0500
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <49555DB4.6050505@gmail.com>
References: 
	<200812261518.44134.pat@computer-refuge.org>
	<49555DB4.6050505@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <200812262141.54634.pat@computer-refuge.org>

On Friday 26 December 2008, Jules Richardson wrote:
> Patrick Finnegan wrote:
> > In any case, what sane person runs Windows on a web server, who has
> > a choice?
>
> A lot of people tied by corporate policy and the (perceived) overhead
> of switching to and maintaining a new platform, I suspect :(

That's why I said "who has a choice."  The reasons you mentioned 
eliminate the posibilty of choice.

Pat
-- 
Purdue University Research Computing ---  http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/
The Computer Refuge                  ---  http://computer-refuge.org


From pat at computer-refuge.org  Fri Dec 26 20:42:00 2008
From: pat at computer-refuge.org (Patrick Finnegan)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 21:42:00 -0500
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <40CBE99D-6A32-43C3-AFB3-C52AE83C42AD@mail.msu.edu>
References:  <49555DB4.6050505@gmail.com>
	<40CBE99D-6A32-43C3-AFB3-C52AE83C42AD@mail.msu.edu>
Message-ID: <200812262142.00658.pat@computer-refuge.org>

On Friday 26 December 2008, Josh Dersch wrote:
> On Dec 26, 2008, at 2:41 PM, Jules Richardson
> 
>  > wrote:
> >
> > Patrick Finnegan wrote:
> >> In any case, what sane person runs Windows on a web server, who
> >> has a choice?
> >
> > A lot of people tied by corporate policy and the (perceived)
> > overhead of switching to and maintaining a new platform, I suspect
> > :(
>
> Or (and I realize this is -complete- insanity...) -- it's possible
> that Windows and IIS do what they need?

It's possible, I guess.  It's also possible to run power through your 
house using metal coat hangers, even without causing a fire, but that 
doesn't mean that it's a good idea. :)

Pat
-- 
Purdue University Research Computing ---  http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/
The Computer Refuge                  ---  http://computer-refuge.org


From keithvz at verizon.net  Fri Dec 26 20:55:46 2008
From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 21:55:46 -0500
Subject: Brian Brikon 723/4M-QT floppy drive tester documentation
In-Reply-To: <49556F02.7060708@sbcglobal.net>
References: <493DFDE5.6000209@verizon.net> <49554C04.3010606@verizon.net>
	<49556F02.7060708@sbcglobal.net>
Message-ID: <49559932.7020102@verizon.net>

Bob Rosenbloom wrote:

> I just scanned the first part of the docs I have on my 723 and put it up 
> on my web site here:
> 
> http://www.dvq.com/docs/brian_inst/
> 
> It's not the best scan but should do. I'll scan the rest of the docs I 
> have and post them by tonight.
> 
> Hope it all helps.
> 
> Bob

You're the man!  Yes it definitely helps.

Thanks a million.

Keith


From legalize at xmission.com  Fri Dec 26 21:00:36 2008
From: legalize at xmission.com (Richard)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 20:00:36 -0700
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets) 
In-Reply-To: Your message of Fri, 26 Dec 2008 15:18:43 -0500.
	<200812261518.44134.pat@computer-refuge.org> 
Message-ID: 


In article <200812261518.44134.pat at computer-refuge.org>,
    Patrick Finnegan   writes:

> On Thursday 25 December 2008, Richard wrote:
> > In article
> > ,
> >
> >     "Ethan Dicks"   writes:
> > > Seriously, though, not counting code-generated HTML (usually
> > > written in Perl, but there are a few exceptions to that), [...]
> >
> > LOL.  Maybe about 10 years ago it was that way.
> 
> I'm pretty sure that Ethan was referring to HTML that he has written.  

Well, he didn't say, so his statement sounded overly broad.  There was a
time in the infancy of the dynamic web when dynamic web sites were coded
in perl.  Specialized tools for this task have long since displaced most
perl usage in this regard.  Its not that perl can't do it, its simply
that the other tools are so much easier to use to solve problems for most
people that they don't use perl anymore.

> > There's this little thing called ASP/ASP.NET...
> 
> It would seriously surprise me if Ethan has ever used that.  In fact, 
> I'm willing to bet that PHP is more popular than ASP.

Depends on where you go.  If you only go to linux sites and slashdot,
then yeah, PHP might be more dominant there.  I wouldn't bet on there
being more PHP-based sites compared to ASP sites, though.  Its not like
Microsoft is some small dinky company that just started making a dynamic
web solution.

> In any case, what sane person runs Windows on a web server, who has a 
> choice?

Plenty of sane people do this and it works fine for them.  I'm really
tired of the drive-by Microsoft bashing that passes for informed opinion
on this list.

> I've used ASP.  I really hate VBscript.  I'd rather write CGI programs 
> in C (which I've done before), which alone isn't much fun.

ASP is 10 years old (hey, its vintage!).  Even when ASP was new, you
didn't have to use VBScript.  ASP is not CGI and never has been, they are
competing solutions for dynamic web content.
-- 
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
      

        Legalize Adulthood! 


From bobalan at sbcglobal.net  Fri Dec 26 21:08:22 2008
From: bobalan at sbcglobal.net (Bob Rosenbloom)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 19:08:22 -0800
Subject: Brian Brikon 723/4M-QT floppy drive tester documentation
In-Reply-To: <49554C04.3010606@verizon.net>
References: <493DFDE5.6000209@verizon.net> <49554C04.3010606@verizon.net>
Message-ID: <49559C26.50702@sbcglobal.net>

Keith wrote:
> Hate to reply to myself BUT I could always buy a COPY for $100.
>
> Does this sound reasonable?
>
> Thanks
>
> Keith
>
All of my docs are now up at:

http://www.dvq.com/docs/brian_inst/

I also have the tester but have never tried it out.

Bob


From geoffr at zipcon.net  Fri Dec 26 21:19:42 2008
From: geoffr at zipcon.net (Geoff Reed)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 19:19:42 -0800
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: <495569BD.8060808@brutman.com>
References:  <495569BD.8060808@brutman.com>
Message-ID: <4E8E3CFC05F94189892A9A24BC17AA82@liberator>


-----Original Message-----
From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org]
On Behalf Of Michael B. Brutman
Sent: Friday, December 26, 2008 3:33 PM
To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts
Subject: Re: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4

-snip-

The question now is about the conductive pad.  Cleaning with rubbing 
alcohol has not helped anything.  Is there anything besides pencil 
graphite that will work to lower the resistance?  I'm looking for 
something that will last a while, and your concerns about the pencil 
graphite have me concerned too.  I'm not going to desolder and repair 
every keyswitch so I won't be able to move dodgy ones to the keypad to 
avoid using them.  I'd rather take a little more time and find a better 
solution ..

If I press hard enough on the bad switch eventually the resistance will 
come down from infinity to around 6000 Ohms.  A good keyswitch shows 
under 100 Ohms of resistance.

A picture of the insides of the keyswitch (including the rubber dome 
contact I'm trying to rejuvenate) can be found here:

http://www.brutman.com/TRS80_Model_4_Keyswitch.jpg


Thanks,
Mike

- - - - - 
There are companies that sell kits to repair those sort of keys, usually to
repair remote controls.



From bob at jfcl.com  Fri Dec 26 22:04:56 2008
From: bob at jfcl.com (Bob Armstrong)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 20:04:56 -0800
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <9081BA4A-D92D-47E4-94BE-74E12A044B13@neurotica.com>
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>	<1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com>	<24146.1229784478@mini>
	<24342.1229976120@mini>	<9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>	
	<9081BA4A-D92D-47E4-94BE-74E12A044B13@neurotica.com>
Message-ID: <002001c967d8$47df4060$d79dc120$@com>

>Dave McGuire wrote:
>   I think 5MB is correct.  And don't they use the same memory array  
>boards as the PDP-11/70?

  Yes, the 725/730 is limited to 5Mb, although it's tricky to find enough
slots for this if you've got any peripherals.  I have a 11/730 that's
fortunate to also have the BA11-K UNIBUS expander box, so I've got room for
5Mb, but that was an unusual configuration.

  The memory boards used in the 730 are the same as the 11/750 1Mb memory
boards.

  My 11/730 runs, except for the R80 which needs a new HDA (alas, Rx80 HDAs
are pretty much unobtainium today), however it also has a UDA50 and two
RA81s, so there's plenty of disk space.   I'm afraid I'm not much interested
in Un*x, but I'll ask my wife (who is the Un*x dweeb) if she's interested in
trying Quasijarus/BSD on it.

  Is there a 9-track distribution?  How do you install it?  Normally you'd
install VMS from 9-track by booting S/A BACKUP from TU58 or an RL02 pack - I
assume there's some kind of stand alone mtboot program for Un*x, but what
media do you load that from?

  I've also got a 11/725 that's in good shape except for a few missing
pieces of sheet metal, but like Ethan I've no working RC25 drive.  A UNIBUS
SMD controller is an option - there are some small 8" SMD disks that mist
just fit inside the chassis in place of the RC25 - but a UNIBUS SCSI
controller would be a better way to go, since it'd be no problem to fit a
SCSI disk in there.  Unfortunately neither SMD nor SCSI UNIBUS controllers
are easy to come by.

Bob



From brad at heeltoe.com  Fri Dec 26 22:10:54 2008
From: brad at heeltoe.com (Brad Parker)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 23:10:54 -0500
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus 
In-Reply-To: <9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com> 
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>
	<1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com>
	<24146.1229784478@mini> <24342.1229976120@mini>
	<9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>
Message-ID: <4144.1230351054@mini>


Steven M Jones wrote:
>
>I've kept a flag set for Quasijarus because it claimed to include/ 
>continue support for the 11/730. Has anybody actually used it on a  
>physical example of a Nebula?

Yes, I did it a few years ago and it worked fine for me.  As I recall I
ran it on a ra90 with a uda50.

However, I have yet to get netbsd to work.  I hacked a version of the
netbsd 1.5 boot to allow me to do nfs copies with a deuna.  This allowed
me to install 4.3 over the network (slowly).

netbsd wants more memory than I have and the 730 guts were slightly off.
I've gotten close to fixing it but not yet.

-brad






From cclist at sydex.com  Fri Dec 26 22:21:46 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 20:21:46 -0800
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: <4E8E3CFC05F94189892A9A24BC17AA82@liberator>
References: , <495569BD.8060808@brutman.com>,
	<4E8E3CFC05F94189892A9A24BC17AA82@liberator>
Message-ID: <49553CDA.5819.A53805@cclist.sydex.com>


> On Behalf Of Michael B. Brutman

> The question now is about the conductive pad.  Cleaning with rubbing 
> alcohol has not helped anything.  Is there anything besides pencil 
> graphite that will work to lower the resistance?  I'm looking for 
> something that will last a while, and your concerns about the pencil 
> graphite have me concerned too.  I'm not going to desolder and repair 
> every keyswitch so I won't be able to move dodgy ones to the keypad to 
> avoid using them.  I'd rather take a little more time and find a better 
> solution ..

Here's a word you don't hear often - "Aquadag".  That ought to do it. 
GC also has some metallic ink emulsions.

Cheers,
Chuck



From hachti at hachti.de  Fri Dec 26 22:24:15 2008
From: hachti at hachti.de (Philipp Hachtmann)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 05:24:15 +0100
Subject: Video clips
Message-ID: <4955ADEF.2010506@hachti.de>

Hi,
here some video clips I put on youtube:

LGP-30
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7WaYYNUCWMY

H316
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y_y944mbczg

Calcomp 565
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSEvVxdJNIw

LAB-8/e
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akvSE5Z474c


Best wishes,
Philipp :-)


From dkelvey at hotmail.com  Fri Dec 26 23:36:11 2008
From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 21:36:11 -0800
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: <49553CDA.5819.A53805@cclist.sydex.com>
References: , <495569BD.8060808@brutman.com>,
	<4E8E3CFC05F94189892A9A24BC17AA82@liberator> 
	<49553CDA.5819.A53805@cclist.sydex.com>
Message-ID: 




----------------------------------------
> From: cclist at sydex.com
> To: cctalk at classiccmp.org
> Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 20:21:46 -0800
> Subject: RE: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
>
>
>> On Behalf Of Michael B. Brutman
>
>> The question now is about the conductive pad. Cleaning with rubbing
>> alcohol has not helped anything. Is there anything besides pencil
>> graphite that will work to lower the resistance? I'm looking for
>> something that will last a while, and your concerns about the pencil
>> graphite have me concerned too. I'm not going to desolder and repair
>> every keyswitch so I won't be able to move dodgy ones to the keypad to
>> avoid using them. I'd rather take a little more time and find a better
>> solution ..
>
> Here's a word you don't hear often - "Aquadag". That ought to do it.
> GC also has some metallic ink emulsions.
>
> Cheers,
> Chuck
>

Hi
 It might be that one could restore it by removing a little of
the surface. One could try a small piece of 220 or finer sandpaper
and just remove a little of the surface that has been oxidized.
Dwight
 
_________________________________________________________________
Send e-mail anywhere. No map, no compass.
http://windowslive.com/oneline/hotmail?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_hotmail_acq_anywhere_122008


From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca  Fri Dec 26 23:41:48 2008
From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 22:41:48 -0700
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: 
References: , <495569BD.8060808@brutman.com>,
	<4E8E3CFC05F94189892A9A24BC17AA82@liberator>
	<49553CDA.5819.A53805@cclist.sydex.com>
	
Message-ID: <4955C01C.9030708@jetnet.ab.ca>

dwight elvey wrote:

> Hi
>  It might be that one could restore it by removing a little of
> the surface. One could try a small piece of 220 or finer sandpaper
> and just remove a little of the surface that has been oxidized.
> Dwight
> 
What about Dexoit, that might work to clean it.

> _________________________________________________________________
> Send e-mail anywhere. No map, no compass.
> http://windowslive.com/oneline/hotmail?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_hotmail_acq_anywhere_122008
> 



From mbbrutman-cctalk at brutman.com  Fri Dec 26 23:56:48 2008
From: mbbrutman-cctalk at brutman.com (Michael B. Brutman)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 23:56:48 -0600
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: 
References: , <495569BD.8060808@brutman.com>,
	<4E8E3CFC05F94189892A9A24BC17AA82@liberator>
	<49553CDA.5819.A53805@cclist.sydex.com>
	
Message-ID: <4955C3A0.3030000@brutman.com>

dwight elvey wrote:
> Hi
>  It might be that one could restore it by removing a little of
> the surface. One could try a small piece of 220 or finer sandpaper
> and just remove a little of the surface that has been oxidized.
> Dwight

I had tried abrading the surface a little bit with that thought in mind, 
but it did not help at all.  I also measured the resistance of the black 
disc using the meter probes touching it directly (with a little force), 
and the resistance was high as expected.  (Somebody had suggested that 
the disc was conductive, but after that test I doubt it.)

I think the best idea at the moment is the conductive ink used to fix 
circuit board traces.  I'm going to give that a shot - there is a trip 
to Rat Shack in my near future.

It's exciting to think I might get this machine running well again.  The 
keyboard has been a big hangup for me.  I don't mind fixing a few keys 
on this new keyboard, but tearing up all of the keys on the last 
keyboard was too much to fathom.  After it's running I'm going to be in 
sponge mode for a while, and then I'm going to try to setup a 
development environment - I think this machine needs a TCP/IP stack. :-)



Mike




From dkelvey at hotmail.com  Fri Dec 26 23:51:14 2008
From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 21:51:14 -0800
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: <4955C01C.9030708@jetnet.ab.ca>
References: , <495569BD.8060808@brutman.com>,
	<4E8E3CFC05F94189892A9A24BC17AA82@liberator>
	<49553CDA.5819.A53805@cclist.sydex.com>
	 
	<4955C01C.9030708@jetnet.ab.ca>
Message-ID: 




----------------------------------------
> Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 22:41:48 -0700
> From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca
> To:
> Subject: Re: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
>
> dwight elvey wrote:
>
>> Hi
>> It might be that one could restore it by removing a little of
>> the surface. One could try a small piece of 220 or finer sandpaper
>> and just remove a little of the surface that has been oxidized.
>> Dwight
>>
> What about Dexoit, that might work to clean it.
>

Hi
 It might work but I think the problem is rubber oxide
not a metal oxide. After getting a new surface, Dexoit
might be good to keep it from oxidizing again.
Dwight
 
_________________________________________________________________
Life on your PC is safer, easier, and more enjoyable with Windows Vista?. 
http://clk.atdmt.com/MRT/go/127032870/direct/01/


From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Sat Dec 27 00:37:32 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 01:37:32 -0500
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <9081BA4A-D92D-47E4-94BE-74E12A044B13@neurotica.com>
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>
	<1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com>
	<24146.1229784478@mini> <24342.1229976120@mini>
	<9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>
	
	<9081BA4A-D92D-47E4-94BE-74E12A044B13@neurotica.com>
Message-ID: 

On Fri, Dec 26, 2008 at 9:35 PM, Dave McGuire  wrote:
> On Dec 26, 2008, at 9:26 PM, Ethan Dicks wrote:
>> No, but I have a, 11/725 in the corner I need to diskify and get working
>> again.
\>
>  I'm facing that problem now on my 11/750.  A friend gave me an ESE50 as a
> nice gift recently; I may try to find a UDA50 to stick in there to use that.
>  That should be a neat config.

Interesting.

>> Also, I should check the memory in it - ISTR it's limited to 5MB.
>
>  I think 5MB is correct.  And don't they use the same memory array boards as
> the PDP-11/70?

Yes... same 1MB boards in the 11/70, 11/730, 11/725 and 11/750.

-ethan


From jws at jwsss.com  Fri Dec 26 12:13:00 2008
From: jws at jwsss.com (jim s)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 10:13:00 -0800
Subject: Weird cardset - any ideas?
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <49551EAC.506@jwsss.com>

A company a friend worked for was acquired by a Triad which is in the 
business of providing inventory management for auto supply stores.  The 
store systems would maintain the local inventory but Triad's central 
system would tell them what to order.  The stores were indepentent, 
hence the need for local inventory.

I have seen systems old enough to have been Z80 systems and lost out on 
one on Ebay with removable hard drive platter type technology in the 
last 2 years.

Jim

Ian King wrote:
> Google is failing me on this one. 


From jlobocki at gmail.com  Fri Dec 26 19:32:56 2008
From: jlobocki at gmail.com (joe lobocki)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 19:32:56 -0600
Subject: Weird cardset - any ideas?
In-Reply-To: <49548DE5.962343AD@cs.ubc.ca>
References: 
	<49548DE5.962343AD@cs.ubc.ca>
Message-ID: 

that may be another piece to the puzzle, as I remember that autozone,
before z-net came in with diskless pcs(i think that's what they are)
they were basic rs232 terminals on redhat linux....hope that helps

On 12/26/08, Brent Hilpert  wrote:
> Ian King wrote:
>>
>> Google is failing me on this one.  A while back, I picked up some random
>> boards on ePay.  The boards all have the name TRIAD, and they include a
>> passive backplane, what appears to be a central controller with an FPGA
>> and a bunch of RAM, and several boards that each contain two Z80s and ten
>> 8530 serial communication chips.  One of the oddest things in the silk
>> screening is the identification of two of the ribbon connectors across the
>> top of these latter boards: "LAMB/DROID, ODD HALF" and "EVEN HALF".
>> (Ironically, I just finished a really good science fiction story regarding
>> a sheep, entitled "The Android's Dream"....)
>>
>> The only hints I've found are that this may be the guts of a PBX or other
>> telecom unit.  Does anyone have any insight on this?  I'm asking because
>> there are a lot of cool chips on these boards, but before I render them
>> down for spare parts I want to be sure I'm not destroying anything
>> significant.  It sure looks like some sort of distributed processing
>> architecture, but I have no idea what it was processing.  Thanks for any
>> ideas -- Ian
>
> Just a guess or possibility, as it could be lots of things, but perhaps a
> serial/RS232 switch, the sort of thing that Gandalf and Develcon made in the
> 80's to permit many terminals to selectively connect to one or more
> machines...?
>


From nanoman at stny.rr.com  Fri Dec 26 22:30:03 2008
From: nanoman at stny.rr.com (Mr. Sub Micron)
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 23:30:03 -0500
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: <49553CDA.5819.A53805@cclist.sydex.com>
References:  <495569BD.8060808@brutman.com>
	<4E8E3CFC05F94189892A9A24BC17AA82@liberator>
	<49553CDA.5819.A53805@cclist.sydex.com>
Message-ID: <20081227042953.XFPY13791.hrndva-omta05.mail.rr.com@D40ZSC81.stny.rr.com>

What about Neolube?

http://www.newmantools.com/chemicals/neolube1pds.htm

Neolube No. 1 is a dry film, conductive lubricant, used extensively 
at nuclear power generating plants and other nuclear facilities as an 
anti seize compound, thread lubricant and for lubricating moving 
parts and rubbing surfaces.

The composition of this material is 99% pure furnace graphite 
particles, a thermoplastic resin and  isopropanol.  The material has 
excellent radiation resistance and high chemical purity.  The thin, 
non corrosive film of Neolube No. 1 prevents seizing, fretting, 
galling and resists abrasion.  It is easy to apply by spray, dip or 
brush and has excellent adhesion after a fast air dry.  The dry film 
of Neolube No. 1 will not migrate and it is non freezable.

I have found Neolube in hardware stores.

Nanoman.

At 11:21 PM 12/26/2008, Chuck Guzis wrote:

> > On Behalf Of Michael B. Brutman
>
> > The question now is about the conductive pad.  Cleaning with rubbing
> > alcohol has not helped anything.  Is there anything besides pencil
> > graphite that will work to lower the resistance?  I'm looking for
> > something that will last a while, and your concerns about the pencil
> > graphite have me concerned too.  I'm not going to desolder and repair
> > every keyswitch so I won't be able to move dodgy ones to the keypad to
> > avoid using them.  I'd rather take a little more time and find a better
> > solution ..
>
>Here's a word you don't hear often - "Aquadag".  That ought to do it.
>GC also has some metallic ink emulsions.
>
>Cheers,
>Chuck


From ian_primus at yahoo.com  Sat Dec 27 07:57:49 2008
From: ian_primus at yahoo.com (Mr Ian Primus)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 05:57:49 -0800 (PST)
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: <4955C3A0.3030000@brutman.com>
Message-ID: <547620.60391.qm@web52711.mail.re2.yahoo.com>

--- On Sat, 12/27/08, Michael B. Brutman  wrote:

> I think the best idea at the moment is the conductive ink
> used to fix circuit board traces.  I'm going to give
> that a shot - there is a trip to Rat Shack in my near
> future.

Another thing to look for would be that conductive paint that is used to fix rear window defrosters. You can get it at the auto parts store. I've used that to repair those mylar flex-circuits before, when I couldn't get the PCB trace paint.

-Ian


From dkelvey at hotmail.com  Sat Dec 27 09:56:23 2008
From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 07:56:23 -0800
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: <4955C3A0.3030000@brutman.com>
References: , <495569BD.8060808@brutman.com>,
	<4E8E3CFC05F94189892A9A24BC17AA82@liberator>
	<49553CDA.5819.A53805@cclist.sydex.com>
	 
	<4955C3A0.3030000@brutman.com>
Message-ID: 




----------------------------------------
> Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2008 23:56:48 -0600
> From: mbbrutman-cctalk at brutman.com
> To:
> Subject: Re: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
>
> dwight elvey wrote:
>> Hi
>> It might be that one could restore it by removing a little of
>> the surface. One could try a small piece of 220 or finer sandpaper
>> and just remove a little of the surface that has been oxidized.
>> Dwight
>
> I had tried abrading the surface a little bit with that thought in mind,
> but it did not help at all. I also measured the resistance of the black
> disc using the meter probes touching it directly (with a little force),
> and the resistance was high as expected. (Somebody had suggested that
> the disc was conductive, but after that test I doubt it.)
>
> I think the best idea at the moment is the conductive ink used to fix
> circuit board traces. I'm going to give that a shot - there is a trip
> to Rat Shack in my near future.
>

---snip---
 
Hi
 It must be that they originally had some type of coating. I suspect
the conductive ink is the best option if the pads don't have
built in conductive material.
 If R S doesn't carry the ink anymore ( likely ) the auto store
is the next best idea.
Dwight
 
_________________________________________________________________
Send e-mail faster without improving your typing skills.
http://windowslive.com/online/hotmail?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_hotmail_acq_speed_122008


From mcguire at neurotica.com  Sat Dec 27 10:39:11 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 11:39:11 -0500
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <002001c967d8$47df4060$d79dc120$@com>
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>	<1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com>	<24146.1229784478@mini>
	<24342.1229976120@mini>	<9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>	
	<9081BA4A-D92D-47E4-94BE-74E12A044B13@neurotica.com>
	<002001c967d8$47df4060$d79dc120$@com>
Message-ID: <18A56027-5DFB-44EF-BD6A-1BB0AC6D22E6@neurotica.com>

On Dec 26, 2008, at 11:04 PM, Bob Armstrong wrote:
>   I've also got a 11/725 that's in good shape except for a few missing
> pieces of sheet metal, but like Ethan I've no working RC25 drive.   
> A UNIBUS
> SMD controller is an option - there are some small 8" SMD disks  
> that mist
> just fit inside the chassis in place of the RC25 - but a UNIBUS SCSI
> controller would be a better way to go, since it'd be no problem to  
> fit a
> SCSI disk in there.  Unfortunately neither SMD nor SCSI UNIBUS  
> controllers
> are easy to come by.

   5.25" SMD drives do exist; Seagate (and possibly others) made  
them.  I had a few at one point (1990?) but no more.  I know someone  
who has some but I doubt he'd turn loose of them.

            -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From mcguire at neurotica.com  Sat Dec 27 10:40:05 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 11:40:05 -0500
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus 
In-Reply-To: <4144.1230351054@mini>
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>
	<1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com>
	<24146.1229784478@mini> <24342.1229976120@mini>
	<9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>
	<4144.1230351054@mini>
Message-ID: <6370CD8E-9CE2-4256-94B7-B865E87ED62A@neurotica.com>

On Dec 26, 2008, at 11:10 PM, Brad Parker wrote:
>> I've kept a flag set for Quasijarus because it claimed to include/
>> continue support for the 11/730. Has anybody actually used it on a
>> physical example of a Nebula?
>
> Yes, I did it a few years ago and it worked fine for me.  As I  
> recall I
> ran it on a ra90 with a uda50.
>
> However, I have yet to get netbsd to work.  I hacked a version of the
> netbsd 1.5 boot to allow me to do nfs copies with a deuna.  This  
> allowed
> me to install 4.3 over the network (slowly).
>
> netbsd wants more memory than I have and the 730 guts were slightly  
> off.
> I've gotten close to fixing it but not yet.

   How much memory does your system have?  I'd love to see NetBSD on  
the 11/730.

            -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From ggs at shiresoft.com  Sat Dec 27 11:42:48 2008
From: ggs at shiresoft.com (Guy Sotomayor)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 09:42:48 -0800
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: 
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>
	<1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com>
	<24146.1229784478@mini> <24342.1229976120@mini>
	<9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>
	
Message-ID: 

I do have a number (4 I *think*) Emulex Unibus SMD controllers.  I  
also have a fair number of the "big" Eagle drives.  Let me know if  
anyone's interested.

TTFN - Guy

On Dec 26, 2008, at 6:26 PM, Ethan Dicks wrote:

> On Fri, Dec 26, 2008 at 6:03 PM, Steven M Jones  
>  wrote:
>> I've kept a flag set for Quasijarus because it claimed to include/ 
>> continue
>> support for the 11/730. Has anybody actually used it on a physical  
>> example
>> of a Nebula?
>
> No, but I have a, 11/725 in the corner I need to diskify and get  
> working again.
>
> I don't mean to bring up the "how crappy RC25s are" thread, but I
> either need a cartridge (so I can spin up the internal drive, too), or
> a workable Unibus disk solution (SCSI or SDI or ESDI - I doubt the
> 11/725 can take a UDA50 internally due to power or heat issues).  I'm
> also open to exotic suggestions, but back in the day, I remember being
> pinched for "creative" Unibus disk solutions.
>
> Also, I should check the memory in it - ISTR it's limited to 5MB.
>
> -ethan
>



From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Sat Dec 27 11:52:02 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 12:52:02 -0500
Subject: new disks, old DEC (was Re: 4.3BSD Quasijarus)
Message-ID: 

On Sat, Dec 27, 2008 at 11:39 AM, Dave McGuire  wrote:
> On Dec 26, 2008, at 11:04 PM, Bob Armstrong wrote:
>>
>>  I've also got a 11/725 that's in good shape except for a few missing
>> pieces of sheet metal, but like Ethan I've no working RC25 drive.

I don't know about the state of your drive, Bob, but mine is merely
missing a cartridge so I can't spin up the fixed platter.  For those
that might not know, the RC25 is 25MB/25MB removable on one spindle.
I think the original idea was that you would put VMS on the internal
platter and swap out the cartridge for either backup/restore, and
perhaps installs, but in practice, VMS got large enough fast enough
that you really needed all 50MB for the OS and a few user dirs.

You _can_ fit 5.0 on it, I've seen it, but 4.x is a better fit.

>>  A UNIBUS SMD controller is an option - there are some small 8" SMD disks that mist
>> just fit inside the chassis in place of the RC25 - but a UNIBUS SCSI
>> controller would be a better way to go, since it'd be no problem to fit a
>> SCSI disk in there.  Unfortunately neither SMD nor SCSI UNIBUS controllers
>> are easy to come by.
>
>  5.25" SMD drives do exist; Seagate (and possibly others) made them.  I had
> a few at one point (1990?) but no more.  I know someone who has some but I
> doubt he'd turn loose of them.

I know I've seen SMD-E drives in 5.25" form-factor, but I don't know
if SMD-E drives are happy on an older SMD controller (despite using
SMD drives since 1984, I really don't know lots about their
limitations - I only ever worked with a couple of combinations that
were known to work - I never had to match up settings and cables,
etc., on random configurations as I later did plenty of times with MFM
and ESDI).

Given the drives I do have on hand, I would, of course, love to have a
Unibus SCSI controller (or 3-4 or them, really), but they were really,
really rare back in the day.  Every once in a while, I entertain the
idea of turning old COMBOARDs into some form of disk controller (IDE
or SCSI would be the easiest), but I never get past the napkin stage
of designing.  What would be far more practical would be an Unibus
ESDI controller, but I don't remember seeing too many of those in the
past (what I did see was "lots" of SMD for Unibus and SMD or ESDI for
Qbus - all popular for those that were happy enough with non-DEC
controllers).

It all comes down to drivers.  2BSD I know can handle Emulex and other
controllers just fine.  I'm not as certain about Ultrix-32 (it seemed
to be heavily slanted towards a DEC system disk, at least).  I recall
a variety of releases of VMS drivers for SI and Emulex controllers, so
it would be handy, I'd say, to identify what OS and version targets,
seek out ancient driver install kits _then_ go looking for a suitable
controller, but I think in practice, it'll be a case of finding a $50
card and then looking for drivers.

It's this struggle that makes me start to envision what it would take
to turn a COMBOARD into a low-performance disk controller.  I say "low
performance" because no matter how one would reasonably hack on the
existing hardware, and though it has a Unibus DMA engine (the 18-bits
of the Unibus are  mapped into 1/4 of the memory space of the onboard
68000, so DMA cycles are as easy as a DBcc loop), it's programmed I/O
from the 68000 side, limiting the max transfer speed to about
200KB/sec.  You _could_ stick a disk on it, but it really was designed
as a communications controller.  Since you'd have to write the drivers
from scratch anyway, one might as well start with something that's
_meant_ to talk to disks.  I only keep coming back to the idea since I
have a stack of working boards on the shelf and I have 100% of the
engineering info on them (and all the rights).

Thinking of COMBOARDs, ISTR someone (more than one?) on the list found
a COMBOARD in a machine they picked up some time back. I am still
trying to recreate our old test/development environment with simh, but
I'm lacking in a way to bootstrap a simulated 11/780 with VMS 4.x.
Once I get around the issue, I have backup saveset files made from the
last days of Software Results I can restore - all of the source and
tools and textual docs are there, and I'd be able to "cut a tape" of
the install kit for a variety of OSes and COMBOARD products.  This is
assuming anyone still wants to talk HASP or 3780 from a real Unibus
box, of course.  That's what the board did, and it did do it well.
The disk-controller idea is just something I kick around from time to
time.

-ethan


From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Sat Dec 27 12:02:48 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 13:02:48 -0500
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <6370CD8E-9CE2-4256-94B7-B865E87ED62A@neurotica.com>
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>
	<1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com>
	<24146.1229784478@mini> <24342.1229976120@mini>
	<9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>
	<4144.1230351054@mini>
	<6370CD8E-9CE2-4256-94B7-B865E87ED62A@neurotica.com>
Message-ID: 

On Sat, Dec 27, 2008 at 11:40 AM, Dave McGuire  wrote:
>> netbsd wants more memory than I have and the 730 guts were slightly off.
>> I've gotten close to fixing it but not yet.
>
>  How much memory does your system have?  I'd love to see NetBSD on the
> 11/730.

The 11/730Z configuration (same backplane as for the 11/725) only has
room for five 1MB boards.  I don't know about the later 11/730
packaging, the one that looks like it's in a BA-11-type box at the top
of a 42" cabinet (reminding me a little of a skinny 11/750).  I never
had one of those, and after the limitations of the -Z packaging, was
always curious about it.

The -Z is nice if all you need is a CPU, an RB80 disk, an RL02, 5MB of
memory, a DMF32, and perhaps a tape drive or a couple of SPCs.  You
can run an external BA-11 (we did), but having a side-along cabinet
sort-of defeats the purpose of the integrated packaging.

The 11/725 can also be rigged with a BA-11 (I've seen it done, but
haven't done it myself), but it helps to nibble out a notch in the
outer skin to pass the Unibus cable out.  Electrically, it works, but
it was never a supported configuration, and there's no pre-made way to
deal with cable issues.

8MB on an 11/750 is adequate for many things.  5MB on a KA730 is much
more constrictive.  I know they were balancing models and trying not
to cannibalize high-end customers on a cheaper package, but we found
memory, not CPU speed (slow as it is) to be the ultimate limiting
factor with those models.

-ethan


From ken at seefried.com  Sat Dec 27 12:02:27 2008
From: ken at seefried.com (Ken Seefried)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 13:02:27 -0500 (EST)
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
Message-ID: <20081227180227.3E5123800072A@portal.seefried.com>

FWIW...we ran 4.3 (locally hacked up, of course) on our 11/750s at
GaTech in the late 80s and it was really very pleasant.  A lot of 
good research work got done on those boxes (as well as a ton of
nethack).

KJ


From technobug at comcast.net  Sat Dec 27 12:25:31 2008
From: technobug at comcast.net (CRC)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 11:25:31 -0700
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: <200812271800.mBRI0HxV018291@dewey.classiccmp.org>
References: <200812271800.mBRI0HxV018291@dewey.classiccmp.org>
Message-ID: 



--- On Sat, 12/27/08, Michael B. Brutman  wrote:

> I think the best idea at the moment is the conductive ink
> used to fix circuit board traces.  I'm going to give
> that a shot - there is a trip to Rat Shack in my near
> future.

To repair keyboards in the past I've picked up a cheap calculator (<  
$1) at the dollar store, cut out the conductive pads from the keys,  
and pasted them in place of the hardened, non-operational pads. Works  
for me...

	CRC


From bob at jfcl.com  Sat Dec 27 12:29:35 2008
From: bob at jfcl.com (Bob Armstrong)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 10:29:35 -0800
Subject: new disks, old DEC (was Re: 4.3BSD Quasijarus)
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <003801c96851$12111980$36334c80$@com>

>Ethan Dicks wrote:

>I don't know about the state of your drive, Bob, but mine is merely
>missing a cartridge so I can't spin up the fixed platter. 

  I've got cartridges, but I really, really, (_really_!) doubt that it'll
make your drive work.  RC25s were notoriously unreliable even when they were
new, and as unsealed (even the fixed platter is open to the air) drives they
just don't age well at all.  I've got two RC25 drives (well, maybe even
three but that's another story) and none will work.  I spent a couple of
weeks working on them once, and all will now try to spin up and then fault
with various error conditions (I've since forgotten the error codes -
sorry).

>Every once in a while, I entertain the
>idea of turning old COMBOARDs into some form of disk controller (IDE
>or SCSI would be the easiest),

  Another option would be to build something that plugs into the LESI (aka
Aztec) controller and pretends to be a disk.  That'd be way cool.  But I've
never seen any documentation on the LESI interface, either electrical or the
protocol, so I've no idea how hard that would be.  As long as the interface
remains undocumented, I'd guess "really hard".  And of course the LESI
interface wasn't very popular (it was only ever used for the TU81 and the
RC25) so the potential market, outside of you and me, is limited :-)

  The important thing is that whatever you come up with has to be close
enough to a standard MSCP controller so that you can boot it with the
standard DU bootstrap and so that VMB can talk to it.  Unfortunately some of
the third party SMD controllers weren't really MSCP compatible and needed
custom bootstraps and VMS drivers (we used to have an SI controller on a 780
that fell into this category) - those would be a problem unless a) you can
also recover the software (difficult), and b) they supported a 11/730 (even
more unlikely!).  The LESI approach at least avoids this problem.

  Of course if you only want to run Un*x then you have more flexibility :-)

Bob



From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Sat Dec 27 13:10:32 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 14:10:32 -0500
Subject: new disks, old DEC (was Re: 4.3BSD Quasijarus)
In-Reply-To: <003801c96851$12111980$36334c80$@com>
References: 
	<003801c96851$12111980$36334c80$@com>
Message-ID: 

On Sat, Dec 27, 2008 at 1:29 PM, Bob Armstrong  wrote:
>>Ethan Dicks wrote:
>
>>I don't know about the state of your drive, Bob, but mine is merely
>>missing a cartridge so I can't spin up the fixed platter.
>
>  I've got cartridges, but I really, really, (_really_!) doubt that it'll
> make your drive work.  RC25s were notoriously unreliable even when they were
> new, and as unsealed (even the fixed platter is open to the air) drives they
> just don't age well at all.  I've got two RC25 drives (well, maybe even
> three but that's another story) and none will work.  I spent a couple of
> weeks working on them once, and all will now try to spin up and then fault
> with various error conditions (I've since forgotten the error codes -
> sorry).

I've owned two 11/725s over the years.  As I've posted before, I've
never had the problems with the RC25 that others report.  I know they
are notorious, but _I_ never had one fail.  That being said, of
course, the chances of mine working are now diminished merely because
I've said something.  ;-)

>>Every once in a while, I entertain the
>>idea of turning old COMBOARDs into some form of disk controller (IDE
>>or SCSI would be the easiest),
>
>  Another option would be to build something that plugs into the LESI (aka
> Aztec) controller and pretends to be a disk.  That'd be way cool.  But I've
> never seen any documentation on the LESI interface, either electrical or the
> protocol, so I've no idea how hard that would be.  As long as the interface
> remains undocumented, I'd guess "really hard".  And of course the LESI
> interface wasn't very popular (it was only ever used for the TU81 and the
> RC25) so the potential market, outside of you and me, is limited :-)

Yes... that would be an interesting way to go, but as you point out,
lack of documentation makes that an unlikely path.

>  The important thing is that whatever you come up with has to be close
> enough to a standard MSCP controller so that you can boot it with the
> standard DU bootstrap and so that VMB can talk to it.  Unfortunately some of
> the third party SMD controllers weren't really MSCP compatible and needed
> custom bootstraps and VMS drivers (we used to have an SI controller on a 780
> that fell into this category) - those would be a problem unless a) you can
> also recover the software (difficult), and b) they supported a 11/730 (even
> more unlikely!).  The LESI approach at least avoids this problem.

Agreed.  OS driver support is always foremost in my mind when fiddling
with 3rd party disks.  We always had to wait for SI to release driver
patches for our SI9900 since a Fuji Eagle is not the same size as any
DEC disk (in our case, they would patch the geometry table in
DRDRIVER.EXE to "oversize" the RM05 entry since we didn't have any
real RM05s on the system).

It sure would be nice to find a Unibus SCSI card that looked to the
system like a UDA50 - i.e. - true and proper MSCP emulation.  I don't
know if there ever was such a product, but the VAXBI ones I saw years
later were $10,000 new.  :-(

>  Of course if you only want to run Un*x then you have more flexibility :-)

True, and I _do_ care about Unix (2BSD for PDP-11 and Ultrix-32 for
VAX), but I also care about RT-11 and pre-6.0 VMS.

Just thinking back to when I used to do this every day for a living, I
don't recall there ever being an ideal solution, just solutions that
fit enough criteria to be acceptable (Re: price-compatibility-capacity
matrix).  If you had money, you paid for DEC disk.  If you had a no
budget, you bought 3rd party and decided what features to give up (the
ability to seamlessly install the OS and upgrade at will was almost
always the first thing to go).

Not all of the "good old days" were as good as we'd like to remember.

-ethan


From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Sat Dec 27 13:23:07 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 14:23:07 -0500
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <20081227180227.3E5123800072A@portal.seefried.com>
References: <20081227180227.3E5123800072A@portal.seefried.com>
Message-ID: 

On Sat, Dec 27, 2008 at 1:02 PM, Ken Seefried  wrote:
> FWIW...we ran 4.3 (locally hacked up, of course) on our 11/750s at
> GaTech in the late 80s and it was really very pleasant.  A lot of
> good research work got done on those boxes (as well as a ton of
> nethack).

I ran 4.2BSD on an 8MB 11/750 (along with other OSes from time to
time) from the mid-1980s through the early 1990s.  It was really nice
when you were the only one on the system.  Fortunately, our user load
rarely exceeded 5 simultaneous logins, so the machine usually felt
like a single-user machine anyway.  Our only (reasonable) complaint
was not enough disk space - the machine we had for Unix product
development (the CPU I still have in storage) had only a pair of RK07s
for disk.  It was enough for the OS and our dev areas, but not enough
to really stretch out in.  For that, our 11/730 with Ultrix 1.1 (4BSD
covered in DEC-hardware-specific scripts and other DECisms) with its
120MB R80 fit the bill better, even though the CPU was 75% as fast.
Eventually (1988?) we had a need to develop a "new" Unibus product
under UNIX - really just a repackaging of our existing products in a
new arrangement for a particular customer.  For that, we bought a
spare RA81, being the cheapest moderate-sized disk at the time, and
had *plenty* of room for the two of us that used the machine.
Unfortunately, the development effort had to be balanced against the
"other" uses for the machine (as the main computer for everyone at the
company for MAIL, MASS-11, 2020 (spreadsheet), cutting customer tapes,
downloading test programs for the hardware guys, etc.), but as a UNIX
box, it screamed.

I can imagine that 4.3BSDmight not have grown so much that it would
crush an old Unibus machine, but I've never had the chance to try it
out.

-ethan


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Sat Dec 27 14:23:17 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 20:23:17 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: <495569BD.8060808@brutman.com> from "Michael B. Brutman" at Dec
	26, 8 05:33:17 pm
Message-ID: 

> 
> Tony Duell wrote:
> 
> > As I mentioned, it is possible to take the swtiches apart and clean the 
> > contacts and/or coat them in a bit of pencil graphite. But how long it'll 
> > last I don't know. I did it to mine, they're still working _but_ I put 
> > them in places where I'd not really use them (I rarely use numeric 
> > keypads, so I put the bodged switches there). You;'ve got far too many 
> > duds to do that, though.
> 
> This is an old thread - March of this year.  It was about a TRS-80 Model 

Sure, but I'm still here (and I am still using that Model 4)

> 4 with a really bad keyboard.  Only a handful of keys had any sort of 
> life in them.
> 
> I now have a replacement keyboard for the machine that is significantly 
> better.  I was able to cleanly desolder a dead keyswitch and disassemble 

I found it relatively easy to desolder the keyoard. I think it's just a 
single-sided PCB. From what I rememebr, it's easiest to pull all the 
keycaps, then desolder the 2 pins of a particular switch and unclip it 
from the frame. Dont' try to desolder the whole lot at once and take the 
PCB off before removing any swtiches.

> it to examine it.  The keyswitch mechanism is exactly as you described - 
> a rubber dome with a conductive pad in the middle.

_Many_ years ago, I needed a replacement keyswitch for my Model 3 
(similar keyboard, indentical switches, but with a few fewer keys). Back 
then you could order them from Tandy National Parts (at least in the UK), 
but I head to give the maker of the switch. I was told that there had 
been several keyswitches used, and they weren't all interchangeable. Mine 
(and the ones in the M4) were made by Alps, which might help you find a 
sourve of replacements. I've never mamanged to do that, but I suspect 
they were (at least 20 years ago) a stnadard part.

> 
> The question now is about the conductive pad.  Cleaning with rubbing 
> alcohol has not helped anything.  Is there anything besides pencil

Id didn't help for me either. Nor did abrading the surface with wet-n-dry 
paper.

> graphite that will work to lower the resistance?  I'm looking for 
> something that will last a while, and your concerns about the pencil 
> graphite have me concerned too.  I'm not going to desolder and repair 

There are kits sold to repair(TV, etc)  remote controls which use a 
similar technology. The one I used (not on this keyoard) was made by 
Chemtronics IIRC, it was a 2-part thing. You mixed the contents to the 2 
pots and applied the result to the surface of the bad. You had about 30 
minutes to do that after mixing (so have all the swithces open at the 
start) and then you left it overnight to set.

The prolem is that the kit is not cheap, and once you've mixed it it only 
lasts 30 minutes. And you have to mix the lot in one go.

> every keyswitch so I won't be able to move dodgy ones to the keypad to 
> avoid using them.  I'd rather take a little more time and find a better 
> solution ..

-tony


From cisin at xenosoft.com  Sat Dec 27 14:36:20 2008
From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 12:36:20 -0800 (PST)
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: 
References: <200812271800.mBRI0HxV018291@dewey.classiccmp.org>
	
Message-ID: <20081227123501.J11956@shell.lmi.net>

On Sat, 27 Dec 2008, CRC wrote:
> To repair keyboards in the past I've picked up a cheap calculator (<
> $1) at the dollar store, cut out the conductive pads from the keys,
> and pasted them in place of the hardened, non-operational pads. Works
> for me...

I've been wondering how to deal with keys on an HP "Programmer" LCD
calculator.  I'll just get a cheap keyboard and cut out the pads.






From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Sat Dec 27 14:28:52 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 20:28:52 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: <49553CDA.5819.A53805@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at Dec
	26, 8 08:21:46 pm
Message-ID: 

> Here's a word you don't hear often - "Aquadag".  That ought to do it. 

You're hanging out with the wrong (?) people. I use that word quite 
often, particualrly when working on CRT-based units...

-tony



From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Sat Dec 27 14:14:40 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 20:14:40 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: <49555C0D.4000408@philpem.me.uk> from "Philip Pemberton" at Dec
	26, 8 10:34:53 pm
Message-ID: 

>    Only other alternative would be to get a few PCBs made up for it, then
> build one from scratch on that -- the catch being I haven't had any luck
> creating a decent track master from the scans of the PCB that I have....

I hae an Ace -- somewhere (:-)). Assuming I can find it, I would be happy 
to take the casing off and help you figure out the track layout. For 
(very) obvious reasons I am not going to let that PCB out of my sight, 
but I am sure something can be worked out. 

-tony


From mcguire at neurotica.com  Sat Dec 27 14:39:03 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 15:39:03 -0500
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: 

On Dec 27, 2008, at 3:28 PM, Tony Duell wrote:
>> Here's a word you don't hear often - "Aquadag".  That ought to do it.
>
> You're hanging out with the wrong (?) people. I use that word quite
> often, particualrly when working on CRT-based units...

   I only use it when I'm really mad at someone, and NEVER in front  
of children.

   *snicker*

   But seriously, it's one I've not heard in a while.  Right along  
with "corona dope".

           -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Sat Dec 27 14:48:52 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 18:48:52 -0200
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
References: 
Message-ID: <0c2e01c96864$8bdbb5a0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

>>    Only other alternative would be to get a few PCBs made up for it, then
>> build one from scratch on that -- the catch being I haven't had any luck
>> creating a decent track master from the scans of the PCB that I have....
> I hae an Ace -- somewhere (:-)). Assuming I can find it, I would be happy
> to take the casing off and help you figure out the track layout. For
> (very) obvious reasons I am not going to let that PCB out of my sight,
> but I am sure something can be worked out.

    The schematic is on the web, it is half-a-day worth of work to enter it 
in a proper PCB cad and autoroute it. Of course, something can be done with 
single side, but I doubt it is worth it.

    What is so special about this junior ace?

    Alexandre



From keithvz at verizon.net  Sat Dec 27 14:56:36 2008
From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 15:56:36 -0500
Subject: Brian Brikon 723/4M-QT floppy drive tester documentation
In-Reply-To: <49559C26.50702@sbcglobal.net>
References: <493DFDE5.6000209@verizon.net> <49554C04.3010606@verizon.net>
	<49559C26.50702@sbcglobal.net>
Message-ID: <49569684.10005@verizon.net>

Bob Rosenbloom wrote:

> All of my docs are now up at:
> 
> http://www.dvq.com/docs/brian_inst/
> 
> I also have the tester but have never tried it out.
> 
> Bob

Bob and all,

I've taken the liberty of OCR'ing those documents and combined them into 
a single bookmarked PDF.  It's about 9 times smaller, is now able to be 
searched, text is much more readable.  I've tried to keep OCR errors to 
a minimum, all ~100 pages were hand-proofread and machine-spell-checked. 
  I'm sure I missed a few errors, and there's likely to be very minor 
formatting issues here or there, but overall I think the quality is 
pretty good.

http://www.techtravels.org/tech/BrianInstrumentsManuals.pdf

Thanks again.

Keith

P.S. Is mbiusa.com on crack for selling these Brikon 723's for $800 and 
a COPY of the manual for $100?



From mbbrutman-cctalk at brutman.com  Sat Dec 27 15:11:22 2008
From: mbbrutman-cctalk at brutman.com (Michael B. Brutman)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 15:11:22 -0600
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <495699FA.7040307@brutman.com>

Tony Duell wrote:

> Sure, but I'm still here (and I am still using that Model 4)

Tony,

We expect you to be around for a while because rumor has it that you can 
be fixed with parts commonly found in a kitchen drawer.

> I found it relatively easy to desolder the keyoard. I think it's just a 
> single-sided PCB. From what I rememebr, it's easiest to pull all the 
> keycaps, then desolder the 2 pins of a particular switch and unclip it 
> from the frame. Dont' try to desolder the whole lot at once and take the 
> PCB off before removing any swtiches.

Desoldering the single switch was fairly easy.  I just wasn't looking 
forward to doing 70 of them.  My particular key switches have four 
contact pins.  The only inscription on the switches is 'SMK'.  The trick 
was figuring out how to pull the switch through the metal mounting plate 
without having ready access to the sides of the switch.

  > There are kits sold to repair(TV, etc)  remote controls which use a
> similar technology. The one I used (not on this keyoard) was made by 
> Chemtronics IIRC, it was a 2-part thing. You mixed the contents to the 2 
> pots and applied the result to the surface of the bad. You had about 30 
> minutes to do that after mixing (so have all the swithces open at the 
> start) and then you left it overnight to set.
> 
> The prolem is that the kit is not cheap, and once you've mixed it it only 
> lasts 30 minutes. And you have to mix the lot in one go.

Bingo - somebody else informed me about these kits over at Erik Klein's 
web forum.  Except for the mixing and expiring part, the kit sounds like 
the perfect fix.

I paid a visit to Rat Shack (Radio Shack for you non-US citizens) and 
did not find the conductive ink pen.  The store manager is pretty good 
about his parts, and he knew it was discontinued.  I told him I was 
restoring a Model 4 and his face just lit up. :-)

I'm going to experiment with the conductive ink pen first because it 
looks easy to apply.  I only need to fix a few keys on this keyboard. 
If that fix doesn't hold up then I will go for the rubber keypad repair kit.



Mike




From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com  Sat Dec 27 15:09:11 2008
From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 15:09:11 -0600
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: <0c2e01c96864$8bdbb5a0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
References:  <0c2e01c96864$8bdbb5a0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
Message-ID: <49569977.2000003@gmail.com>

Alexandre Souza wrote:
>    What is so special about this junior ace?

I always think of it as the "forgotten ZX80" because it's built to the same 
sort of quality level (and, IIRC, was built by ex-Sinclair employees).

It was reasonably unique* in running FORTH from ROM rather than BASIC (which 
probably makes it a rarer animal than a ZX80, too)

* I'm not going to play the "only one ever" game, but I can't actually think 
of another home system which ran FORTH as the primary language...

cheers

Jules


From gordonjcp at gjcp.net  Sat Dec 27 15:16:18 2008
From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 21:16:18 +0000
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: <49555C0D.4000408@philpem.me.uk>
References: <49555C0D.4000408@philpem.me.uk>
Message-ID: <49569B22.7030507@gjcp.net>

Philip Pemberton wrote:

>   I've heard rumours of spare, unassembled Jupiter Ace PCBs kicking around;
> does anyone happen to have one up for grabs? It looks like the only way I'm
> going to get this thing up and running again would be to build a new 
> mainboard

I have a motherboard which probably works (may need some work).  The 
case basically crumbled and fell apart.  It's up at my Mum's place, so 
I'll dig it out of the loft next time I'm over there.  I'd love to see 
it brought back to life, too.

Mine's a pint.

Gordon


From brad at heeltoe.com  Sat Dec 27 15:24:09 2008
From: brad at heeltoe.com (Brad Parker)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 16:24:09 -0500
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus 
In-Reply-To: <6370CD8E-9CE2-4256-94B7-B865E87ED62A@neurotica.com> 
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>
	<1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com>
	<24146.1229784478@mini> <24342.1229976120@mini>
	<9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>
	<4144.1230351054@mini>
	<6370CD8E-9CE2-4256-94B7-B865E87ED62A@neurotica.com>
Message-ID: <29171.1230413049@mini>


Dave McGuire wrote:
>
>   How much memory does your system have?  I'd love to see NetBSD on  
>the 11/730.

good question.  it's been a few years.  I think it originally had 5mb
with an external box, but i needed some slots for the uda50 and it's now
at 3mb.

(I'll look next week).  I know I have 5mb but I think I've been running
with 3.

I have since found a scsi unibus controller so I can add more memory.

I think my next attempts at netbsd will be using that since loading
via the network was pretty slow.

-brad


From brad at heeltoe.com  Sat Dec 27 15:26:39 2008
From: brad at heeltoe.com (Brad Parker)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 16:26:39 -0500
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus 
In-Reply-To: <20081227180227.3E5123800072A@portal.seefried.com> 
References: <20081227180227.3E5123800072A@portal.seefried.com>
Message-ID: <29245.1230413199@mini>


Ken Seefried wrote:
>FWIW...we ran 4.3 (locally hacked up, of course) on our 11/750s at
>GaTech in the late 80s and it was really very pleasant.  A lot of 
>good research work got done on those boxes (as well as a ton of
>nethack).

I also ran More/bsd (4.3) 780's and 750's.

I wish the source for that had survived.  I've looked and not found it
anywhere.

wish I'd made a copy back in the day.

-brad




From gordonjcp at gjcp.net  Sat Dec 27 15:33:51 2008
From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 21:33:51 +0000
Subject: Merry Newtonsday
In-Reply-To: <495570C0.6020404@gmail.com>
References:  <4952E4CD.10302@gjcp.net>
	<495570C0.6020404@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <49569F3F.3030806@gjcp.net>

Jules Richardson wrote:
> Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote:
>> Tony Duell wrote:
>>> Merry Newtonsday, Christmas, Yule, Midwinter, Winter Solstice or 
>>> whatever you choose to celebrate to members of the classic computer 
>>> list and their families.
>>>
>>
>> Happy Hogswatch!
> 
> Is that a timepiece for a pig, or a porcine clothing sample?
> 

Can't believe how many people here have never read anything by Terry 
Pratchett...

Gordon


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Sat Dec 27 15:26:19 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 21:26:19 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: <20081227123501.J11956@shell.lmi.net> from "Fred Cisin" at Dec 27,
	8 12:36:20 pm
Message-ID: 

> I've been wondering how to deal with keys on an HP "Programmer" LCD
> calculator.  I'll just get a cheap keyboard and cut out the pads.

I thought I knew most of the HP calculators, but I can't think of one 
that's called the 'Programmer'. The nearest would be the HP16C (codename 
'Pr' IIRC) which is the 'Voyager' series machine designed for low-level 
programemrs with boolean operations, shifts/rotates, etc. One currently 
resides on my eelctronics bench.

If it _is_ a 16C, then the keyboard uses metal dome swtiches, not 
conductive rubber. I also recoemnd against dismandling it, the keyboard 
PCB [1] is heat-staked to the top case and it's difficult to get back 
securely if you take it out.

[1] Early Voyagers have a conventional PCB heat-staked to the top case 
containing jyst the keyboard and a separate module fixed ot the dispaly 
built on a flexible PCB that carries th 2 chips [2]. later models have 
everythin on the one, conventional, PCB. Incidentally, dry-joints on the 
pins of the chips are not too uncommon, I've got serveral Voyagers going 
again by resoldering the chips

[2] THese are NUT (the smaller chip, CPU and keyboard interface) and R2D2 
(the larger chip, the neame is an acronym for ROM/RAM/Display Driver)

-tony


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Sat Dec 27 15:37:52 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 21:37:52 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: <495699FA.7040307@brutman.com> from "Michael B. Brutman" at Dec
	27, 8 03:11:22 pm
Message-ID: 

> 
> Tony Duell wrote:
> 
> > Sure, but I'm still here (and I am still using that Model 4)
> 
> Tony,
> 
> We expect you to be around for a while because rumor has it that you can 
> be fixed with parts commonly found in a kitchen drawer.

Well, in _our_ kitchen, that's probably true...

On the other hand, I'll only be around if I don't do something silly when 
repairing a SMPSU, a monitor, or whatever. But if I don;t carry on 
working on such things, I won't get new repair tricks to share with you 
all. Oh well...


> 
> > I found it relatively easy to desolder the keyoard. I think it's just a 
> > single-sided PCB. From what I rememebr, it's easiest to pull all the 
> > keycaps, then desolder the 2 pins of a particular switch and unclip it 
> > from the frame. Dont' try to desolder the whole lot at once and take the 
> > PCB off before removing any swtiches.
> 
> Desoldering the single switch was fairly easy.  I just wasn't looking 
> forward to doing 70 of them.  My particular key switches have four 
> contact pins.  The only inscription on the switches is 'SMK'.  The trick

Thinking about it (and it's been about 10 years since I've been inside my 
M4), mine might well have had 4 pins too.
 
> was figuring out how to pull the switch through the metal mounting plate 
> without having ready access to the sides of the switch.

Is it easier to remove the ones near the edge of the array (can you reach 
between the PCB and the frame)? If so, that may be why I took the whole 
thing apart. On some keyboard -- again I can't rememebr if the M4 is like 
this -- you can get to the locking clips on top of the keyboard, I 
modified an IC extractor tool to squeeze those in and release the switch 
when I was repairing HP9826 (etc) keyboards.

> 
>   > There are kits sold to repair(TV, etc)  remote controls which use a
> > similar technology. The one I used (not on this keyoard) was made by 
> > Chemtronics IIRC, it was a 2-part thing. You mixed the contents to the 2 
> > pots and applied the result to the surface of the bad. You had about 30 
> > minutes to do that after mixing (so have all the swithces open at the 
> > start) and then you left it overnight to set.
> > 
> > The prolem is that the kit is not cheap, and once you've mixed it it only 
> > lasts 30 minutes. And you have to mix the lot in one go.
> 
> Bingo - somebody else informed me about these kits over at Erik Klein's 
> web forum.  Except for the mixing and expiring part, the kit sounds like 
> the perfect fix.

The miixnig is trivial (IIRC you pour the little pot into the bigger one 
and stir it :-)). But the fact yuou have to use the whole lot at one go 
is a pain.

> 
> I paid a visit to Rat Shack (Radio Shack for you non-US citizens) and 

Oh, I've some across Radio Shack (traded as 'Tandy' over here, until 
about 10 years ago). The thing to watch for is that when UK people talk 
about 'RS' they almost certainly mean 'RS components' 
(http://www.rswww.com/) who are a well-known component distributor over 
here and nothing to do with Tandy/Radio Shack.

> did not find the conductive ink pen.  The store manager is pretty good 
> about his parts, and he knew it was discontinued.  I told him I was 
> restoring a Model 4 and his face just lit up. :-)
> 
> I'm going to experiment with the conductive ink pen first because it 
> looks easy to apply.  I only need to fix a few keys on this keyboard.

How many? If it's less than 12, I really would move them onto the numeric 
keypard. On these machines the keypad is wired in parallel with the 
appropriate swiches in the main part of the keyboard (so shifting the 
keypad keys does giuve you the top-row punctuation characters). You cna 
manage without it. 

-tony


From bobalan at sbcglobal.net  Sat Dec 27 15:49:07 2008
From: bobalan at sbcglobal.net (Bob Rosenbloom)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 13:49:07 -0800
Subject: Brian Brikon 723/4M-QT floppy drive tester documentation
In-Reply-To: <49569684.10005@verizon.net>
References: <493DFDE5.6000209@verizon.net>
	<49554C04.3010606@verizon.net>	<49559C26.50702@sbcglobal.net>
	<49569684.10005@verizon.net>
Message-ID: <4956A2D3.2040508@sbcglobal.net>

Keith wrote:
> Bob and all,
>
> I've taken the liberty of OCR'ing those documents and combined them 
> into a single bookmarked PDF.  It's about 9 times smaller, is now able 
> to be searched, text is much more readable.  I've tried to keep OCR 
> errors to a minimum, all ~100 pages were hand-proofread and 
> machine-spell-checked.  I'm sure I missed a few errors, and there's 
> likely to be very minor formatting issues here or there, but overall I 
> think the quality is pretty good.
>
> http://www.techtravels.org/tech/BrianInstrumentsManuals.pdf
>
> Thanks again.
>
> Keith
>
> P.S. Is mbiusa.com on crack for selling these Brikon 723's for $800 
> and a COPY of the manual for $100?
>

I bought mine from a dovebid auction for $20 or so with the adapters, 
manual, and printer.

What OCR program did you use? I bought a Fujitsu duplex scanner off of 
Craigslist for $10 which I used
to scan the manuals. The only output format it supports is the pdf one 
which I believe is just converted tiff images.
It's supposed to save as tif, jpg, etc but all of those options are 
grayed out and cannot be selected. Your OCR
of the files makes the scanner much more usable.

Bob


From cclist at sydex.com  Sat Dec 27 16:00:23 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 14:00:23 -0800
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: 
References: <20081227123501.J11956@shell.lmi.net> from "Fred Cisin" at Dec 27,
	8 12:36:20 pm, 
Message-ID: <495634F7.26019.46E6390@cclist.sydex.com>

On 27 Dec 2008 at 21:26, Tony Duell wrote:


> I thought I knew most of the HP calculators, but I can't think of one 
> that's called the 'Programmer'. The nearest would be the HP16C (codename 
> 'Pr' IIRC) which is the 'Voyager' series machine designed for low-level 
> programemrs with boolean operations, shifts/rotates, etc. One currently 
> resides on my eelctronics bench.

IIRC, the 16C was called the "Computer Scientist"; the TI hex-capable 
calculator (based loosely on the TI-30) was called the "Programmer".  
LED display initially, replaced by the LCD Programmer and the 
Programmer II.  None of the TI models holds a candle to the HP16C 
(mine is still chugging along...

Cheers,
Chuck



From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Sat Dec 27 16:03:59 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 17:03:59 -0500
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <200812261518.44134.pat@computer-refuge.org>
References: 
	<200812261518.44134.pat@computer-refuge.org>
Message-ID: 

On Fri, Dec 26, 2008 at 3:18 PM, Patrick Finnegan
 wrote:
> On Thursday 25 December 2008, Richard wrote:
>> In article
>> ,
>>
>>     "Ethan Dicks"   writes:
>> > Seriously, though, not counting code-generated HTML (usually
>> > written in Perl, but there are a few exceptions to that), [...]
>>
>> LOL.  Maybe about 10 years ago it was that way.
>
> I'm pretty sure that Ethan was referring to HTML that he has written.

You are both correct... I started writing HTML in 1995 this way and
still do it that way mostly.  To be fair, I'm not in the business of
writing it (I do it for fun), so commercial feasibility is not part of
the equation.

>> There's this little thing called ASP/ASP.NET...
>
> It would seriously surprise me if Ethan has ever used that.

Quite so.

> In fact, I'm willing to bet that PHP is more popular than ASP.

Perhaps, but I've had my brushes with PHP and have some issues with
certain aspects of it.

> In any case, what sane person runs Windows on a web server, who has a
> choice?

*ding*!  When I was working at CompuServe (after they were bought by
AOL), we had a directive come down the pipe for all parties running
Microsoft web servers to provide the date they'd be shut down.  There
was no room for debate - you had to pick one of like *four* acceptable
web platforms (including Apache), but MS was not allowed, period.

> I've used ASP.  I really hate VBscript.  I'd rather write CGI programs
> in C (which I've done before), which alone isn't much fun.

I've done CGI in C.  It wasn't so bad, but I do recall that debugging
wasn't as easy as the Perl CGI scripts I've done.

-ethan


From gordonjcp at gjcp.net  Sat Dec 27 16:11:23 2008
From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 22:11:23 +0000
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <20081225144245.a9c796d1.jkunz@unixag-kl.fh-kl.de>
References: <493AA2BF.24642.932F080@cclist.sydex.com>	<493E566B.47.48E5D2C@cclist.sydex.com>	<493ED559.6010605@jbrain.com>	<493E7912.23183.515B667@cclist.sydex.com>	<493EFAC2.5010905@jbrain.com>
	<493FAE5F.808@arachelian.com>	<200812101654.LAA12768@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>	<49453812.1040401@gjcp.net>	<200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>		<20081224130756.L90174@shell.lmi.net>	<1230157048.12570.25.camel@entasis>	<20081224142852.R92254@shell.lmi.net>
	<4952EA33.22FE312F@cs.ubc.ca>	<20081224181639.K97523@shell.lmi.net>
	<4953468C.FF104E35@cs.ubc.ca>
	<20081225144245.a9c796d1.jkunz@unixag-kl.fh-kl.de>
Message-ID: <4956A80B.5070004@gjcp.net>

Jochen Kunz wrote:

> Management System) like typo3, Joomla, Drupal, ... You can do it also
> with cvs, m4, sed / awk, make, ... or a XML processor, where you write
> XML files containing just the content and the XML processor generates
> (static) HTML... (AFAIK the NetBSD web site is generated this way.)

I tried that.  Down that path madness lies.  It's far better to just 
store the text in a database, possibly marked up in one of the "simple" 
markup languages like markdown, and serve it up as required.

Computers are good at stuff like that.  Humans aren't.

Gordon


From pat at computer-refuge.org  Sat Dec 27 16:30:38 2008
From: pat at computer-refuge.org (Patrick Finnegan)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 17:30:38 -0500
Subject: new disks, old DEC (was Re: 4.3BSD Quasijarus)
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
	<003801c96851$12111980$36334c80$@com>
	
Message-ID: <200812271730.38787.pat@computer-refuge.org>

On Saturday 27 December 2008, Ethan Dicks wrote:
> It sure would be nice to find a Unibus SCSI card that looked to the
> system like a UDA50 - i.e. - true and proper MSCP emulation.  I don't
> know if there ever was such a product, but the VAXBI ones I saw years
> later were $10,000 new.  :-(

My UC18 seems to work like that, and I've had it up and running on my 
11/780 with both VMS (a few different releases) and 4BSD.  
Unfortunately for you, I'm not willing to give it up (and I only have 
one).  A potentially easier (and definately less expensive) path you 
might try is a Qniverter and QBUS SCSI card, which could be had for 
less than $100 each, last I was looking at this stuff.  After I found 
the UC18, though (in the 11/780 I'm using it in even), I gave up on 
that path. 2U or so for a small 4-quad slot QBUS box shouldn't be too 
hard to come up with. :)  With some trickery, you could probably mount 
the SCSI disk in there too, since there will be plenty of left-over 
space.

> Not all of the "good old days" were as good as we'd like to remember.

Oh, now that's not something that I'd expect someone in this group to 
say. :)

Pat
-- 
Purdue University Research Computing ---  http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/
The Computer Refuge                  ---  http://computer-refuge.org


From cisin at xenosoft.com  Sat Dec 27 16:34:45 2008
From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 14:34:45 -0800 (PST)
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <20081227143158.B17765@shell.lmi.net>

> > I've been wondering how to deal with keys on an HP "Programmer" LCD
> > calculator.  I'll just get a cheap keyboard and cut out the pads.

On Sat, 27 Dec 2008, Tony Duell wrote:
> I thought I knew most of the HP calculators, but I can't think of one
> that's called the 'Programmer'.

Sorry
Extreme sloppiness on my part.  TI "Programmer".  The later, LCD model;
the earlier LED model didn't have many keyboard problems, although its
batter life was shorter.


From gordonjcp at gjcp.net  Sat Dec 27 16:39:14 2008
From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 22:39:14 +0000
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <49553805.9060107@gmail.com>
References: <200812221907.OAA19940@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>	<20081223123723.L45479@shell.lmi.net>	<200812232118.QAA03414@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>	<20081223234928.B67341@shell.lmi.net>		<20081224130756.L90174@shell.lmi.net>	<1230157048.12570.25.camel@entasis>	<20081224142852.R92254@shell.lmi.net>	<4952EA33.22FE312F@cs.ubc.ca>	<20081224181639.K97523@shell.lmi.net>	<20081225192159.GA13774@thangorodrim.de>
	<49553805.9060107@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <4956AE92.30205@gjcp.net>

Jules Richardson wrote:

> structure so as to better convey the information within - it's not the 
> ideal mechanism for "busy" graphics-laden interactive interfaces (that 
> it's the only mechanism we have these days is beside the point :-)

Interestingly, the way that web design has been going over the past few 
years is towards simply-structured pages, and then CSS to do all the pretty.

With the advent of Javascript frameworks like jQuery, Dojo, prototype.js 
and so on, it's become easier to do clever tricks in the browser and 
keep sites portable - the library deals with things like coping with 
browser-specific quirks, so you don't need to concern yourself with 
them.  One fairly popular trick, for example, is to make an expanding 
navigation menu tree consisting of nested lists, with the sub-nav lists 
hidden until they are moused over.  If you display this with Javascript 
disabled or on a non-Javascript browser, or if a search engine indexes 
the page, then the links just appear to be nested 
     tags.

We've come a long, long way from the fussy, fidgety, usually-broken 
Javascript twiddly things of old.  But it's interesting to see that the 
best way to make your pages work is to keep the markup very simple - 
even Mosaic would render a good, well-designed modern site readably if 
not visually correctly.

Gordon


From gordonjcp at gjcp.net  Sat Dec 27 16:42:59 2008
From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 22:42:59 +0000
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <49536141.18438.59F92F1@cclist.sydex.com>
References:  >,
	
	<49536141.18438.59F92F1@cclist.sydex.com>
Message-ID: <4956AF73.5000601@gjcp.net>

Chuck Guzis wrote:
> Bringing things back onto topic, how does one index and reference a 
> page when said page may be generated by a combination of client-side 
> (e.g. Java) and server-side (e.g. php) technologies, not to ignore 
> XML?
> 
> A page may not appear the same way between any two visits...
> 

Depends how you choose to implement it.  In the situation I outlined, 
the index would be an index into the body copy, not the boilerplate.

Gordon


From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Sat Dec 27 17:35:36 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 21:35:36 -0200
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
References:  <0c2e01c96864$8bdbb5a0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
	<49569977.2000003@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <0d2801c9687b$f3b08db0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

> I always think of it as the "forgotten ZX80" because it's built to the 
> same
> sort of quality level (and, IIRC, was built by ex-Sinclair employees).
> It was reasonably unique* in running FORTH from ROM rather than BASIC 
> (which
> probably makes it a rarer animal than a ZX80, too)
> * I'm not going to play the "only one ever" game, but I can't actually 
> think
> of another home system which ran FORTH as the primary language...

    Hmmm...

    Maybe I may be bribed to create a single board for it :) What is the 
size of the original mainboard? :o)



From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Sat Dec 27 17:49:07 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 21:49:07 -0200
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
References:  <0c2e01c96864$8bdbb5a0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
	<49569977.2000003@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <0d5401c9687d$b8efbe10$46fea8c0@DeskJara>


    Grrr...

    It is SO simple...grrr...

    Grrr...

    Grr...

    I'll give it a try, as soon as I have some free time :oP

    Anyone willing into a "junior ace" project?

    It has some simple milestones:
    - 16K RAM if possible
    - Reduction of number of ICs without using programable logic
    - Single sided board (does not matter how much jumpers I'll have to put 
in this beast)
    - REMOVABLE keyboard (it is easy to make two single sided boards instead 
of just one, because of the size)
    - Fits inside the case of Jr. Ace.

    http://www.jupiter-ace.co.uk/blankpcb.html

    Andrew, since you have the empty case, would you mind taking the photos 
of the above link and creating a schematic of dimensions and positions/size 
of the holes?

    Here I go in another crazy project...Bah :oP I do love to route boards

    (small joke: I use an old program called CIRCAD98, and have lots of 
pratice with that. Someday in my work, my coleagues were designing a board 
for a PIC (bleargh) programmer, in a 10x10 board in Eagle PCB. I told them 
why not create a smaller board, using single side only, and they said it was 
impossible. I told them it was easy to do, without jumpers. To make a long 
story short, they bidded an entire week of lunch on that - If I could route 
manually this board, they would pay me a week of lunch. If I lost, I'd pay 
their lunches for a week. I spent some two hours routing the board, but I 
got it - imagine a board the size of a DIP-40 socket, with some 3 or 4 
centimeters more. The board was for 40, 28, 20 and 16 pin PICs, if I'm not 
mistaken, and I made it fit inside the DIP-40 socket, along part of the 
circuit. I may have this drawing stashed somewhere, and the lunch was fine, 
thanks! :oD)

    Alexandre, the crazy guy. :oP
    PS: Any hams here? PU1BZZ is how I'm called :)



From keithvz at verizon.net  Sat Dec 27 18:20:44 2008
From: keithvz at verizon.net (Keith)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 19:20:44 -0500
Subject: Brian Brikon 723/4M-QT floppy drive tester documentation
In-Reply-To: <4956A2D3.2040508@sbcglobal.net>
References: <493DFDE5.6000209@verizon.net>	<49554C04.3010606@verizon.net>
	<49559C26.50702@sbcglobal.net>	<49569684.10005@verizon.net>
	<4956A2D3.2040508@sbcglobal.net>
Message-ID: <4956C65C.8050303@verizon.net>

Bob Rosenbloom wrote:

> I bought mine from a dovebid auction for $20 or so with the adapters, 
> manual, and printer.

I paid $20 for the unit.  It didn't come with anything except a few 
cables.  I haven't taken it apart to see if there are any adapters, etc. 
  I did get a 723-4m/qt model.

> What OCR program did you use?

ABBYY FineReader 9 and Acrobat 8.  FineReader works extremely well in 
general.  You need a fast machine (luckily my quad core 2.8ghz w/ 8 gigs 
of ram qualifies, brag brag) and plenty of patience.  Even a good OCR 
package needs hand-holding to identify non-ocr picture areas vs text 
areas. And then the software detects OCR errors, which need to be 
checked one by one -- 95% are false positives.

You know that Acrobat 8 supports its own OCR.  Which is good, easy, and 
fast.  But it can't (easily) recreate an entire document like FR9.  It 
makes too many mistakes, doesn't have a complete enough interface for 
fixing problems.  It's nice to take an existing PDF and quickly add a 
search capability to it -- but you wouldn't want to try what I did using it.

> Your OCR
> of the files makes the scanner much more usable.

No doubt.  That's why I didn't mind spending the time.  The real point 
is that OCR isn't automatic.  The automatic routines get you to maybe 
85% or 90% -- you need a fair bit of work to get to or close to 100%.

Since google indexes the contents of searchable PDFs, I hope that this 
OCR copy makes it out there for people to find.

Thanks

> Bob

Keith


From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Sat Dec 27 18:26:08 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 19:26:08 -0500
Subject: new disks, old DEC (was Re: 4.3BSD Quasijarus)
In-Reply-To: <200812271730.38787.pat@computer-refuge.org>
References: 
	<003801c96851$12111980$36334c80$@com>
	
	<200812271730.38787.pat@computer-refuge.org>
Message-ID: 

On Sat, Dec 27, 2008 at 5:30 PM, Patrick Finnegan
 wrote:
> On Saturday 27 December 2008, Ethan Dicks wrote:
>> It sure would be nice to find a Unibus SCSI card that looked to the
>> system like a UDA50...
>
> My UC18 seems to work like that, and I've had it up and running on my
> 11/780 with both VMS (a few different releases) and 4BSD.

Nice.

> Unfortunately for you, I'm not willing to give it up (and I only have
> one)\.

Fair enough.  I wouldn't mind eventually finding a UC17 or UC18 myself, though.

>  A potentially easier (and definately less expensive) path you
> might try is a Qniverter and QBUS SCSI card, which could be had for
> less than $100 each, last I was looking at this stuff.

I already have a couple of Qbus SCSI cards, but I'll have to check
which ones might be TMSCP only.

>  After I found
> the UC18, though (in the 11/780 I'm using it in even), I gave up on
> that path. 2U or so for a small 4-quad slot QBUS box shouldn't be too
> hard to come up with. :)  With some trickery, you could probably mount
> the SCSI disk in there too, since there will be plenty of left-over
> space.

Well... in a BA-11, there's plenty of room.  I even have a DEC 18-bit
"Qniverter" for putting an IBV11 on an 11/34 (it came with a DDV11C,
if you can imagine such a thing).  I should dig that out and see if I
can get it working.

It won't solve the problem of how to put a SCSI disk _in_ an 11/750
(using the internal DD11D backplane) or inside my 11/725.  It would
probably work fine in my 11/44 or an 11/70, though.

>> Not all of the "good old days" were as good as we'd like to remember.
>
> Oh, now that's not something that I'd expect someone in this group to
> say. :)

I see the smiley there, but as someone who has been playing with DEC
equipment since 1982, some stuff is brilliant, and some stuff drove us
downright nuts.  Fortunately, there were many more brilliant moments.

-ethan


From bryan.pope at comcast.net  Sat Dec 27 18:43:48 2008
From: bryan.pope at comcast.net (Bryan Pope)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 19:43:48 -0500
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: <4955C3A0.3030000@brutman.com>
References: , <495569BD.8060808@brutman.com>,
	<4E8E3CFC05F94189892A9A24BC17AA82@liberator>	<49553CDA.5819.A53805@cclist.sydex.com>	
	<4955C3A0.3030000@brutman.com>
Message-ID: <4956CBC4.7090601@comcast.net>

Michael B. Brutman wrote:
>
> I had tried abrading the surface a little bit with that thought in 
> mind, but it did not help at all.  I also measured the resistance of 
> the black disc using the meter probes touching it directly (with a 
> little force), and the resistance was high as expected.  (Somebody had 
> suggested that the disc was conductive, but after that test I doubt it.)
>
> I think the best idea at the moment is the conductive ink used to fix 
> circuit board traces.  I'm going to give that a shot - there is a trip 
> to Rat Shack in my near future.
>
> It's exciting to think I might get this machine running well again.  
> The keyboard has been a big hangup for me.  I don't mind fixing a few 
> keys on this new keyboard, but tearing up all of the keys on the last 
> keyboard was too much to fathom.  After it's running I'm going to be 
> in sponge mode for a while, and then I'm going to try to setup a 
> development environment - I think this machine needs a TCP/IP stack. :-)

Mike,

    Has anyone mentioned using a pink eraser to clean the surfaces?  I 
have used that to restore keys on a PET that had become unresponsive.  
The problem keys had a "shine" on the black conductive rubber matching 
the shape of PCB traces they were hitting.  The pink eraser removed this 
shine and the keyboard worked like new afterwards.  Just make sure to 
get rid of any eraser leavings!

Cheers,

Bryan


From als at thangorodrim.de  Sat Dec 27 18:37:15 2008
From: als at thangorodrim.de (Alexander Schreiber)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 01:37:15 +0100
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
	<200812261518.44134.pat@computer-refuge.org>
	
Message-ID: <20081228003715.GA30878@thangorodrim.de>

On Sat, Dec 27, 2008 at 05:03:59PM -0500, Ethan Dicks wrote:
> On Fri, Dec 26, 2008 at 3:18 PM, Patrick Finnegan
> 
> > I've used ASP.  I really hate VBscript.  I'd rather write CGI programs
> > in C (which I've done before), which alone isn't much fun.
> 
> I've done CGI in C.  It wasn't so bad, but I do recall that debugging
> wasn't as easy as the Perl CGI scripts I've done.

Oh yes, debugging CGIs written in C is not much fun. Especially if you
are developing on Linux/x86 and your deployment is on Solaris/SPARC. You
get to find quite a bunch of little differences ... the hard way,
usually ;-)

Regards,
      Alex.
-- 
"Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and
 looks like work."                                      -- Thomas A. Edison


From derschjo at mail.msu.edu  Sat Dec 27 18:56:08 2008
From: derschjo at mail.msu.edu (Josh Dersch)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 16:56:08 -0800
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
Message-ID: 

Hey all --

Picked up a DEC VT103 with an empty cardcage and I'm trying to decide  
what manner of Qbus based system to put in it...

I understand it's possible to upgrade the backplane to 22 bits -- how  
is this done?

I currently have a MicroVax 1 CPU, an  11/23 half-height CPU, a few  
misc serial cards and the like, and a nice Emulex ESDI controller in  
my box of spares... I'm worried about power consumption,  though.   
Anyone else hacked together a system like this and have any  
recommendations for hardware/software?

Thanks!
Josh
  


From doug at stillhq.com  Sat Dec 27 18:57:10 2008
From: doug at stillhq.com (Doug Jackson)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 11:57:10 +1100
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: <0d2801c9687b$f3b08db0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
References:  <0c2e01c96864$8bdbb5a0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
	<49569977.2000003@gmail.com>
	<0d2801c9687b$f3b08db0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
Message-ID: <9397B21F-489D-498C-9703-171AA1717A4F@stillhq.com>

Ooo ooo yes.  Count me in for $50 towards a pcb if u go down that  
route.    Happy to pay via paypal or similar or simply put a note in  
the post.  I am in Australia

Doug Jackson
Principal Security Consultant
EWA Australia
Ph 02 6230 6833
Mo 0414 986 878

Sent from my iPhone

On 28/12/2008, at 10:35, "Alexandre Souza"  wrote:

>> I always think of it as the "forgotten ZX80" because it's built to  
>> the same
>> sort of quality level (and, IIRC, was built by ex-Sinclair  
>> employees).
>> It was reasonably unique* in running FORTH from ROM rather than  
>> BASIC (which
>> probably makes it a rarer animal than a ZX80, too)
>> * I'm not going to play the "only one ever" game, but I can't  
>> actually think
>> of another home system which ran FORTH as the primary language...
>
>   Hmmm...
>
>   Maybe I may be bribed to create a single board for it :) What is  
> the size of the original mainboard? :o)
>


From cclist at sydex.com  Sat Dec 27 19:13:48 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 17:13:48 -0800
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <4956AF73.5000601@gjcp.net>
References: ,
	<4956AF73.5000601@gjcp.net>
Message-ID: <4956624C.31283.51F741D@cclist.sydex.com>

On 27 Dec 2008 at 22:42, Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ wrote:

> Depends how you choose to implement it.  In the situation I outlined, 
> the index would be an index into the body copy, not the boilerplate.

Going further OT, I wonder what Google will do with a dynamic page 
that changes content drastically every time it's visited....

Cheers,
Chuck



From classiccmp at crash.com  Sat Dec 27 19:29:27 2008
From: classiccmp at crash.com (Steven M Jones)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 17:29:27 -0800
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <002001c967d8$47df4060$d79dc120$@com>
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>	<1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com>	<24146.1229784478@mini>	<24342.1229976120@mini>	<9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>		<9081BA4A-D92D-47E4-94BE-74E12A044B13@neurotica.com>
	<002001c967d8$47df4060$d79dc120$@com>
Message-ID: <4956D677.3000407@crash.com>

Bob Armstrong wrote:
>
>   Yes, the 725/730 is limited to 5Mb, although it's tricky to find enough
> slots for this if you've got any peripherals.  I have a 11/730 that's
> fortunate to also have the BA11-K UNIBUS expander box, so I've got room for
> 5Mb, but that was an unusual configuration.

Mine was also configured with an expander, but I only got the 730Z rack. 
Along with that I got up to a total of 4 or 5 1MB boards, a TC13(?) tape 
controller, and a Cipher F880 drive. Recently bought a DELUA for when I 
pick up a BA11, in case it's supported.


Ethan Dicks wrote:
 >
 > The 11/730Z configuration (same backplane as for the 11/725) only has
 > room for five 1MB boards.

My question is whether the Nebula was limited to addressing 5MB, or is 
it a matter of open/correctly-wired slots? Any way to get past 5 memory 
boards if you have a BA11, for instance? I don't have the machine or my 
UNIBUS VAXen handbook handy...


Bob Armstrong wrote:
 >
>   My 11/730 runs, except for the R80 which needs a new HDA (alas, Rx80 HDAs
> are pretty much unobtainium today)

The reason I was able to acquire the machine as surplus in 1990 was that 
the R80 was throwing bad blocks constantly, causing grief for the lone 
researcher that was using it as a big, noisy PC for running her FORTRAN 
code. I was able to connect her with another lab that had decommissioned 
11/750s lying around with racks of RA81 drives they were willing to 
provide via internal transfer.

In a fit of youthful idealism I pitched the entire R80 mechanism, 
figuring that SCSI was the One True Path and the IDC was supposed to be 
slow anyway. Well, and the fact that I had to find a nearly unused 
circuit from another room just to spin the thing up... Pretty dumb to 
toss it, but that's hindsight for ya.


Brad Parker wrote:
 >> [ running Quasijarus on a physical 11/730 ]
 >
 > Yes, I did it a few years ago and it worked fine for me.  As I
 > recall I ran it on a ra90 with a uda50.

Cool, my main concern was around support for the CPU. I recalled some 
fuss about the stock 4.3BSD distribution not having support for the 
730's data paths, or somesuch, and doubted that later flavors would have 
continued support for the Low Cost Node.


Ethan Dicks wrote:
 >
 > [...]  For that, our 11/730 with Ultrix 1.1 (4BSD covered in
 > DEC-hardware-specific scripts and other DECisms) with its 120MB R80
 > fit the bill better, even though the CPU was 75% as fast.

I recall that the only other 11/730 that I saw in service back in the 
day was running Ultrix and serving as little more than a print spooler 
for a line printer. Again this was ~1990 and the labs in question 
weren't hit with an electric bill for running these things in a way that 
encouraged conservation...

 > [...] but as a UNIX box, it screamed.

Heh -- I'm not expecting it to impress in that department. ;^)


--Steve.


From classiccmp at crash.com  Sat Dec 27 21:04:09 2008
From: classiccmp at crash.com (Steven M Jones)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 19:04:09 -0800
Subject: new disks, old DEC (was Re: 4.3BSD Quasijarus)
In-Reply-To: <200812271730.38787.pat@computer-refuge.org>
References: 	<003801c96851$12111980$36334c80$@com>	
	<200812271730.38787.pat@computer-refuge.org>
Message-ID: <4956ECA9.6040204@crash.com>

Patrick Finnegan wrote:
> 
> A potentially easier (and definately less expensive) path you 
> might try is a Qniverter and QBUS SCSI card, which could be had for 
> less than $100 each, last I was looking at this stuff.

Interesting -- I actually hadn't run across that scenario somehow. But I 
think I have more things claiming to be S-100 SCSI interfaces than I do 
for the Qbus...

Hey Brad, what about that universal disk controller for UNIBUS you were 
working on? http://www.heeltoe.com/retro/udisk/index.html  (Apologies if 
I missed an update.)

--S.


From classiccmp at crash.com  Sat Dec 27 21:19:23 2008
From: classiccmp at crash.com (Steven M Jones)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 19:19:23 -0800
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <4956F03B.1030802@crash.com>

Josh Dersch wrote:
> 
> I understand it's possible to upgrade the backplane to 22 bits -- how is 
> this done?

I have a VT103 (with cards), and a funky rackmount cage with three 
separate Qbus backplanes in it (thanks Phil!) that may only be 18 bit.

A while back I grabbed a number of bare Q22 backplanes off of eBay in 
case I found I needed to replace the backplanes on these systems. 
Haven't gotten around to even assessing feasibility, but the plan is to 
try and just swap the backplanes whole. I've got a handful of KDJ11-A 
dual-height CPUs to use if that works, though I'll probably need some 
MXV11's or something to go with them.

The bigger question, to my mind, is how to cheaply attach disks. With 
the VT103 I believe some folks have placed small disks (3.5"?) under the 
CRT, where the TU58 drives would have been on a PDT-11/130. But you 
still need a drive interface to talk to 'em. Perhaps one of the 
Micropolis half-height ESDI drives would fit, and work with your controller.

In addition I see two projects out there for Qbus disk interfaces:

wintersweet:	http://www.mscpscsi.com/
CHD's Q22-ATA:	http://www.chd.dyndns.org/qbus_ide/

No further information, like availability or compatibility, and no 
timeline for when I'll drag out the stuff I have and start contributing 
... ;^)

--S.




From jhfinedp3k at compsys.to  Sat Dec 27 20:41:08 2008
From: jhfinedp3k at compsys.to (Jerome H. Fine)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 21:41:08 -0500
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <4956E744.4010007@compsys.to>

 >Josh Dersch wrote:

> Hey all --
>
> Picked up a DEC VT103 with an empty cardcage and I'm trying to decide  
> what manner of Qbus based system to put in it...
>
> I understand it's possible to upgrade the backplane to 22 bits -- how  
> is this done?
>
> I currently have a MicroVax 1 CPU, an  11/23 half-height CPU, a few  
> misc serial cards and the like, and a nice Emulex ESDI controller in  
> my box of spares... I'm worried about power consumption,  though.   
> Anyone else hacked together a system like this and have any  
> recommendations for hardware/software?

Jerome Fine replies:

Power is DEFINITELY  VERY limited - 16 amps for the 5 volts including 
the video display card!!!!!!!!!!!

An M8186 is VERY possible.  Use a DLV11-J strapped for the console 
port.  If you have the adapter
card to switch the terminals for port 0 and port 3, this makes it easy.  
That also allows port 0 to be used
for a serial printer.

Check the Emulex ESDI controller for the power to be used.  It is 
probably OK.  However, I  STRONGLY
recommend that you use an additional PC power supply for the ESDI hard 
disk drive if you are going to
run the system for more than a minute.  Since the Emulex controller 
probably has boot ROMs, you don't
need to type in a bootstrap each time.

Upgrading the back plane to 22 bits is easy and probably would take Tony 
Duell only 15 minutes.  It will
usually take everyone else a few hours.  Wire wrap is probably the least 
difficult to use with a small soldering
iron.  You will need to use lead based solder.  A total of 16 points 
need to be soldered - 4 for each wire
to connect address bits 19, 20, 21 and 22.  Leave the insulation on the 
wire wrap except where the soldering
takes place.  Probably Al Kossow has a manual with a diagram for the 
VT103 back plane which show where
address bits 19, 20, 21 and 22 are located.

Using an M8190 quad 11/73 board is probably your best choice with as 
much memory as possible.  I would
suggest that you use a few memory boards as possible to keep the power 
needed as low as possible.  You
can also add the DHV11 or a DHQ11 to obtain 8 more serial ports.  Add 
the Emulex ESDI controller,
and external PC power supply for the drive with a fan on the drive since 
those ESDI drives usually run hot.

Check the Micro Vax 1 for the power needed.  Since it uses ordinary Qbus 
memory, it should be OK.  I am
aware that it is possible to make the first two slots ABCD to allow a 
Micro Vax II, but I have no details.

With a PDP-11 CPU, I run RT-11.  The normal problem of transferring 
anything to the hard drive is the
problem.  But the VT103 is a very nice small system.  It was the first 
system I ever owned and arrived
with an M8186, 256 KBytes of memory, DLV11-J and a DSD 880/8 hard / 
floppy drive combo which
ran RT-11.  Obviously, it was very slow compared to a PDP-11/73 and ESDI 
hard drives with 4 MB
of memory, but I used it for many years for development work.

I still have the original box, but the DSD 880/8 failed about 20 years 
ago and was replaced with a
DSD 880/30 and a PDP-11/73.  I guess it has not been used for at least 
10 years now.

Any other questions?

Sincerely yours,

Jerome Fine


From derschjo at mail.msu.edu  Sat Dec 27 21:49:20 2008
From: derschjo at mail.msu.edu (Josh Dersch)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 19:49:20 -0800
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: <4956F03B.1030802@crash.com>
References: 
	<4956F03B.1030802@crash.com>
Message-ID: 



On Dec 27, 2008, at 7:19 PM, Steven M Jones   
wrote:

> Josh Dersch wrote:
>> I understand it's possible to upgrade the backplane to 22 bits --  
>> how is this done?
>
> I have a VT103 (with cards), and a funky rackmount cage with three  
> separate Qbus backplanes in it (thanks Phil!) that may only be 18 bit.
>
> A while back I grabbed a number of bare Q22 backplanes off of eBay  
> in case I found I needed to replace the backplanes on these systems.  
> Haven't gotten around to even assessing feasibility, but the plan is  
> to try and just swap the backplanes whole. I've got a handful of  
> KDJ11-A dual-height CPUs to use if that works, though I'll probably  
> need some MXV11's or something to go with them.
>
> The bigger question, to my mind, is how to cheaply attach disks.  
> With the VT103 I believe some folks have placed small disks (3.5"?)  
> under the CRT, where the TU58 drives would have been on a  
> PDT-11/130. But you still need a drive interface to talk to 'em.  
> Perhaps one of the Micropolis half-height ESDI drives would fit, and  
> work with your controller.

I have a number of external TRS-80 external hard-disk enclosures,   
which at one point contained MFM-style drives -- since the cabling is  
the same as ESDI I was considering putting an ESDI drive in one and  
cabling it to the Emulex controller,  thus allowing an external drive  
and cutting down on space/power issues in the VT103.

>
>
> In addition I see two projects out there for Qbus disk interfaces:
>
> wintersweet:    http://www.mscpscsi.com/
> CHD's Q22-ATA:    http://www.chd.dyndns.org/qbus_ide/
>
> No further information, like availability or compatibility, and no  
> timeline for when I'll drag out the stuff I have and start  
> contributing ... ;^)

Man, One (or two!) of those things would be sweet!  I lucked out and  
snagged a CQD-220 SCSI controller off eBay for $80 last year,  but I  
doubt I'll ever find another SCSI controller for that price...

Josh
>
>
> --S.
>
>
>


From glen.slick at gmail.com  Sat Dec 27 23:00:19 2008
From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 21:00:19 -0800
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: <4956E744.4010007@compsys.to>
References: 
	<4956E744.4010007@compsys.to>
Message-ID: <1e1fc3e90812272100q1800eaeqd26e24412108e9ea@mail.gmail.com>

On Sat, Dec 27, 2008 at 6:41 PM, Jerome H. Fine  wrote:
>
> Using an M8190 quad 11/73 board is probably your best choice with as much
> memory as possible.

You wouldn't really want to put an M8190 KDJ11-B in a VT103 Q-Q
backplane instead of a Q-C/D would you?

An M7554 KDJ11-D/S might be more suitable for the Q-Q backplane.

Address bits 18 - 21 are on BC1 - BF1 (SSPARE4 - SSPARE7)

BC1 - BDAL18L
BD1 - BDAL19L
BE1 - BDAL20L
BF1 - BDAL21L


From labrams at san.rr.com  Sat Dec 27 12:35:55 2008
From: labrams at san.rr.com (Larry L. Abrams)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 10:35:55 -0800
Subject: (fwd) IMSAI 8080 S100 Computer for sale (fwd)
Message-ID: <000001c96851$f45ac980$dd105c80$@rr.com>

Navseacenpac  ?



From bqt at softjar.se  Sat Dec 27 15:25:46 2008
From: bqt at softjar.se (Johnny Billquist)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 22:25:46 +0100
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <200812271801.mBRI0Hxi018291@dewey.classiccmp.org>
References: <200812271801.mBRI0Hxi018291@dewey.classiccmp.org>
Message-ID: <49569D5A.6030001@softjar.se>

"Bob Armstrong"  wrote:

>> Dave McGuire wrote:
>>   I think 5MB is correct.  And don't they use the same memory array  
>> boards as the PDP-11/70?
> 
>   Yes, the 725/730 is limited to 5Mb, although it's tricky to find enough
> slots for this if you've got any peripherals.  I have a 11/730 that's
> fortunate to also have the BA11-K UNIBUS expander box, so I've got room for
> 5Mb, but that was an unusual configuration.
> 
>   The memory boards used in the 730 are the same as the 11/750 1Mb memory
> boards.

Fun. I didn't know the 11/730 used the same memory bus.
The 11/750 and PDP-11/70 MK-11 box uses the same memory bus, but 
unfortunately the MK-11 don't support any larger arrays than 256 KB 
memory boards.

	Johnny


From bqt at softjar.se  Sat Dec 27 15:29:27 2008
From: bqt at softjar.se (Johnny Billquist)
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2008 22:29:27 +0100
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <200812271801.mBRI0Hxi018291@dewey.classiccmp.org>
References: <200812271801.mBRI0Hxi018291@dewey.classiccmp.org>
Message-ID: <49569E37.3060807@softjar.se>

"Ethan Dicks"  wrote:

> On Fri, Dec 26, 2008 at 9:35 PM, Dave McGuire  wrote:
>> On Dec 26, 2008, at 9:26 PM, Ethan Dicks wrote:
>>> Also, I should check the memory in it - ISTR it's limited to 5MB.
>>  I think 5MB is correct.  And don't they use the same memory array boards as
>> the PDP-11/70?
> 
> Yes... same 1MB boards in the 11/70, 11/730, 11/725 and 11/750.

Nope. The MK-11 memory box for the 11/70 (there are others) have the 
same memory bus as the 11/750, but the MK-11 don't support 1MB boards. 
Believe me, I know...
256 KB memory boards works fine in both MK-11 and 11/750 though.

And if someone *really* have 1MB boards, and an MK-11, and wants to use 
them, contact me and I can start explaining what you need to do to 
actually get it to work. But it requires both serious hardware hacking 
and software fiddling.

	Johnny


From bqt at softjar.se  Sat Dec 27 17:55:31 2008
From: bqt at softjar.se (Johnny Billquist)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 00:55:31 +0100
Subject: new disks, old DEC (was Re: 4.3BSD Quasijarus)
In-Reply-To: <200812272238.mBRMcEeJ022335@dewey.classiccmp.org>
References: <200812272238.mBRMcEeJ022335@dewey.classiccmp.org>
Message-ID: <4956C073.1000609@softjar.se>

"Ethan Dicks"  wrote:

> On Sat, Dec 27, 2008 at 1:29 PM, Bob Armstrong  wrote:
>>> Ethan Dicks wrote:
>>> I don't know about the state of your drive, Bob, but mine is merely
>>> missing a cartridge so I can't spin up the fixed platter.
>>  I've got cartridges, but I really, really, (_really_!) doubt that it'll
>> make your drive work.  RC25s were notoriously unreliable even when they were
>> new, and as unsealed (even the fixed platter is open to the air) drives they
>> just don't age well at all.  I've got two RC25 drives (well, maybe even
>> three but that's another story) and none will work.  I spent a couple of
>> weeks working on them once, and all will now try to spin up and then fault
>> with various error conditions (I've since forgotten the error codes -
>> sorry).
> 
> I've owned two 11/725s over the years.  As I've posted before, I've
> never had the problems with the RC25 that others report.  I know they
> are notorious, but _I_ never had one fail.  That being said, of
> course, the chances of mine working are now diminished merely because
> I've said something.  ;-)

:-)
I haven't even seen an RC25 in 20 years... But they worked back then. 
But then again, I was working at DEC at the time, and needed them for 
the work I was doing, so I guess had they failed, I would just have 
gotten another one. :-)

>>> Every once in a while, I entertain the
>>> idea of turning old COMBOARDs into some form of disk controller (IDE
>>> or SCSI would be the easiest),
>>  Another option would be to build something that plugs into the LESI (aka
>> Aztec) controller and pretends to be a disk.  That'd be way cool.  But I've
>> never seen any documentation on the LESI interface, either electrical or the
>> protocol, so I've no idea how hard that would be.  As long as the interface
>> remains undocumented, I'd guess "really hard".  And of course the LESI
>> interface wasn't very popular (it was only ever used for the TU81 and the
>> RC25) so the potential market, outside of you and me, is limited :-)
> 
> Yes... that would be an interesting way to go, but as you point out,
> lack of documentation makes that an unlikely path.

Don't the TK50 also use LESI?
Or did I just imagine that?

>>  The important thing is that whatever you come up with has to be close
>> enough to a standard MSCP controller so that you can boot it with the
>> standard DU bootstrap and so that VMB can talk to it.  Unfortunately some of
>> the third party SMD controllers weren't really MSCP compatible and needed
>> custom bootstraps and VMS drivers (we used to have an SI controller on a 780
>> that fell into this category) - those would be a problem unless a) you can
>> also recover the software (difficult), and b) they supported a 11/730 (even
>> more unlikely!).  The LESI approach at least avoids this problem.
> 
> Agreed.  OS driver support is always foremost in my mind when fiddling
> with 3rd party disks.  We always had to wait for SI to release driver
> patches for our SI9900 since a Fuji Eagle is not the same size as any
> DEC disk (in our case, they would patch the geometry table in
> DRDRIVER.EXE to "oversize" the RM05 entry since we didn't have any
> real RM05s on the system).
> 
> It sure would be nice to find a Unibus SCSI card that looked to the
> system like a UDA50 - i.e. - true and proper MSCP emulation.  I don't
> know if there ever was such a product, but the VAXBI ones I saw years
> later were $10,000 new.  :-(

There are/were several. I have a CDU-720/TM. That's CMDs Unibus version 
of the CQD-220. Very nice. Works about the same way as the CQD too.
I also have a Viking one, but that only talks TMSCP (but I'm pretty sure 
they did exist for disks as well).

>>  Of course if you only want to run Un*x then you have more flexibility :-)
> 
> True, and I _do_ care about Unix (2BSD for PDP-11 and Ultrix-32 for
> VAX), but I also care about RT-11 and pre-6.0 VMS.
> 
> Just thinking back to when I used to do this every day for a living, I
> don't recall there ever being an ideal solution, just solutions that
> fit enough criteria to be acceptable (Re: price-compatibility-capacity
> matrix).  If you had money, you paid for DEC disk.  If you had a no
> budget, you bought 3rd party and decided what features to give up (the
> ability to seamlessly install the OS and upgrade at will was almost
> always the first thing to go).
> 
> Not all of the "good old days" were as good as we'd like to remember.

Sure they were!
But as far as disks go, until good MSCP emulating controllers came out, 
it was always a headache with 3rd party disks and controllers.

	Johnny


From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Sun Dec 28 03:32:15 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 04:32:15 -0500
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <4956D677.3000407@crash.com>
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>
	<1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com>
	<24146.1229784478@mini> <24342.1229976120@mini>
	<9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>
	
	<9081BA4A-D92D-47E4-94BE-74E12A044B13@neurotica.com>
	<002001c967d8$47df4060$d79dc120$@com> <4956D677.3000407@crash.com>
Message-ID: 

On Sat, Dec 27, 2008 at 8:29 PM, Steven M Jones  wrote:
> Ethan Dicks wrote:
>>
>> The 11/730Z configuration (same backplane as for the 11/725) only has
>> room for five 1MB boards.
>
> My question is whether the Nebula was limited to addressing 5MB, or is it a
> matter of open/correctly-wired slots? Any way to get past 5 memory boards if
> you have a BA11, for instance? I don't have the machine or my UNIBUS VAXen
> handbook handy...

Yeah... that would be a great question to have answered... from what I
recall from 20 years ago, there's 5 slots in a KA730 backplane wired
to work with memory, but only enough to refresh 5MB of 1MB cards.  You
could stuff two 4MB cards in a late-model 11/750 with a newer memory
controller (plus six 1MB cards), but the 11/750 could *not* be
expanded more because it's VAX address space was limited to 24 bits of
RAM out of 32 bits total (16MB total address space, like an MC68000).

I haven't closely examined the KA730, but *if* one could fill the
entire address space below 8MB with RAM, one could theoreticaly make a
new-build 8MB single card for it, perhaps with a fresh address line
run to a memory slot.   I would be surprised to hear that one could
exceed 1MB/slot in an unmodified KK730 backplane.  These days, I'd
personally recommend sets-of-four SRAMs to make a 32-bit-wide
datapath, making 2MB trivial to put one one card, *if* the memory
slots would easily support that.  I've run wires on a 256K-card
VAX/11-750 backplane.  I don't mind finding a way to support 8MB in
one to four cards on an 11-730Z backplane, even if it necessitates
fresh backplane wires to pass along extra multiplexed address bits.
Encoders and decoders are plenty cheap compared to limited backplane
realestate.

-ethan


From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Sun Dec 28 03:35:38 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 04:35:38 -0500
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <49569E37.3060807@softjar.se>
References: <200812271801.mBRI0Hxi018291@dewey.classiccmp.org>
	<49569E37.3060807@softjar.se>
Message-ID: 

On Sat, Dec 27, 2008 at 4:29 PM, Johnny Billquist  wrote:
> "Ethan Dicks"  wrote:
>> Yes... same 1MB boards in the 11/70, 11/730, 11/725 and 11/750.
>
> Nope. The MK-11 memory box for the 11/70 (there are others) have the same
> memory bus as the 11/750, but the MK-11 don't support 1MB boards. Believe
> me, I know...
> 256 KB memory boards works fine in both MK-11 and 11/750 though.
>
> And if someone *really* have 1MB boards, and an MK-11, and wants to use
> them, contact me and I can start explaining what you need to do to actually
> get it to work. But it requires both serious hardware hacking and software
> fiddling.

Ah... unfortunate to learn.  I got my start on 11/750s with 256K
boards and *thought* that 1MB boards would work with the MK11 box.  I
have a couple of 11/70s that I've never tried to upgrade, so I guess
I'm just not experienced with it to know the difference.

I suppose what I'd most like to have is the 4MB cache module that I've
heard about for the 11/70 so I didn't have to worry about memory in an
MK11.

-ethan


From ploopster at gmail.com  Sun Dec 28 05:12:51 2008
From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 06:12:51 -0500
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <6370CD8E-9CE2-4256-94B7-B865E87ED62A@neurotica.com>
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>	<1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com>	<24146.1229784478@mini>
	<24342.1229976120@mini>	<9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>	<4144.1230351054@mini>
	<6370CD8E-9CE2-4256-94B7-B865E87ED62A@neurotica.com>
Message-ID: <49575F33.5030008@gmail.com>

Dave McGuire wrote:
> On Dec 26, 2008, at 11:10 PM, Brad Parker wrote:
>>> I've kept a flag set for Quasijarus because it claimed to include/
>>> continue support for the 11/730. Has anybody actually used it on a
>>> physical example of a Nebula?
>>
>> Yes, I did it a few years ago and it worked fine for me.  As I recall I
>> ran it on a ra90 with a uda50.
>>
>> However, I have yet to get netbsd to work.  I hacked a version of the
>> netbsd 1.5 boot to allow me to do nfs copies with a deuna.  This allowed
>> me to install 4.3 over the network (slowly).
>>
>> netbsd wants more memory than I have and the 730 guts were slightly off.
>> I've gotten close to fixing it but not yet.
> 
>   How much memory does your system have?  I'd love to see NetBSD on the 
> 11/730.

If you install <1.5, 4MB should be enough, right?

Peace...  Sridhar


From ploopster at gmail.com  Sun Dec 28 05:37:58 2008
From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 06:37:58 -0500
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: <4956E744.4010007@compsys.to>
References: 
	<4956E744.4010007@compsys.to>
Message-ID: <49576516.4040008@gmail.com>

Jerome H. Fine wrote:
>> Picked up a DEC VT103 with an empty cardcage and I'm trying to decide  
>> what manner of Qbus based system to put in it...
>>
>> I understand it's possible to upgrade the backplane to 22 bits -- how  
>> is this done?
>>
>> I currently have a MicroVax 1 CPU, an  11/23 half-height CPU, a few  
>> misc serial cards and the like, and a nice Emulex ESDI controller in  
>> my box of spares... I'm worried about power consumption,  though.   
>> Anyone else hacked together a system like this and have any  
>> recommendations for hardware/software?
> 
> Jerome Fine replies:
> 
> Power is DEFINITELY  VERY limited - 16 amps for the 5 volts including 
> the video display card!!!!!!!!!!!
> 
> An M8186 is VERY possible.  Use a DLV11-J strapped for the console 
> port.  If you have the adapter
> card to switch the terminals for port 0 and port 3, this makes it easy.  
> That also allows port 0 to be used
> for a serial printer.

How much power does an 11/93 CPU/Memory board use?

Peace...  Sridhar


From jhfinedp3k at compsys.to  Sun Dec 28 07:11:16 2008
From: jhfinedp3k at compsys.to (Jerome H. Fine)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 08:11:16 -0500
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: <49576516.4040008@gmail.com>
References: 	<4956E744.4010007@compsys.to>
	<49576516.4040008@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <49577AF4.2010803@compsys.to>

 >Sridhar Ayengar wrote:

>> Jerome Fine replies:
>>
>> Power is DEFINITELY  VERY limited - 16 amps for the 5 volts including 
>> the video display card!!!!!!!!!!!
>>
>> An M8186 is VERY possible.  Use a DLV11-J strapped for the console 
>> port.  If you have the adapter
>> card to switch the terminals for port 0 and port 3, this makes it 
>> easy.  That also allows port 0 to be used
>> for a serial printer.
>
>
> How much power does an 11/93 CPU/Memory board use?

Since the memory is part of the PDP-11/93, probably the total on the 5 amps
is reasonable for the VT103 power supply.  I have a PDP-11/93 manual 
somewhere,
but not handy at the moment.  Al Kossow probably has the manual available.


From jhfinedp3k at compsys.to  Sun Dec 28 07:14:22 2008
From: jhfinedp3k at compsys.to (Jerome H. Fine)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 08:14:22 -0500
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: 
References: 	<4956F03B.1030802@crash.com>
	
Message-ID: <49577BAE.9060902@compsys.to>

 >Josh Dersch wrote:

> >On Dec 27, 2008, at 7:19 PM, Steven M Jones   
> wrote:
>
>> A while back I grabbed a number of bare Q22 backplanes off of eBay  
>> in case I found I needed to replace the backplanes on these systems.  
>> Haven't gotten around to even assessing feasibility, but the plan is  
>> to try and just swap the backplanes whole. I've got a handful of  
>> KDJ11-A dual-height CPUs to use if that works, though I'll probably  
>> need some MXV11's or something to go with them.
>
Jerome Fine replies:

A MXV11 (or other board with a bootstrap) is needed only when a DEC 
controller
(without a bootstrap) is used.  Most (probably all) 3rd party 
controllers or host
adapters contain bootstrap code.  Note that neither the M8186 nor the M8192
(KDJ11-A) contain a bootstrap (or a serial DL port).

Both the M8189 and the M8190 quad boards contain a bootstrap, although the
versions available with the M8189 are often restricted to RL02 / RX02 
drives.

>> The bigger question, to my mind, is how to cheaply attach disks.  
>> With the VT103 I believe some folks have placed small disks (3.5"?)  
>> under the CRT, where the TU58 drives would have been on a  
>> PDT-11/130. But you still need a drive interface to talk to 'em.  
>> Perhaps one of the Micropolis half-height ESDI drives would fit, and  
>> work with your controller.
>
> I have a number of external TRS-80 external hard-disk enclosures,   
> which at one point contained MFM-style drives -- since the cabling is  
> the same as ESDI I was considering putting an ESDI drive in one and  
> cabling it to the Emulex controller,  thus allowing an external drive  
> and cutting down on space/power issues in the VT103.

An external hard disk enclosure is not essential.  I usually just use a PC
power supply and a bare hard drive with the cables from the controller
hanging out the back of the VT103, especially when using an ESDI hard
drive which requires more power than an MFM hard drive.  I suggest
that you also place a fan beside any ESDI hard drive since they usually
run very hot.

Note that an RQDX3 (dual board from DEC WITHOUT a boot ROM)
is probably quite reasonable with an M8190 and Qbus memory as far as
power is concerned.  An RQDX1/2 (quad board from DEC WITHOUT
a boot ROM) needs 6 amps for the 5 volts and will often overload the
VT103 power supply when the other boards are added to the total needed
to run a minimum system.

As for placing the hard drive under the CRT, while there is ample room for
a 3.5" hard drive, I have managed with an ST412 5.25" hard drive - although
I agree that it was a VERY tight squeeze.  A third party MFM controller
(with a boot ROM), M8186 / M8192, memory and DLV11-J are sufficient to run
RT-11 and the VT103 power supply is sufficient to support the ST412 as 
well.

>> In addition I see two projects out there for Qbus disk interfaces:
>>
>> wintersweet:    http://www.mscpscsi.com/
>> CHD's Q22-ATA:    http://www.chd.dyndns.org/qbus_ide/
>>
>> No further information, like availability or compatibility, and no  
>> timeline for when I'll drag out the stuff I have and start  
>> contributing ... ;^)
>
> Man, One (or two!) of those things would be sweet!  I lucked out and  
> snagged a CQD-220 SCSI controller off eBay for $80 last year,  but I  
> doubt I'll ever find another SCSI controller for that price...

Was that a CQD 220TM?  A CQD 220T will handle only a tape drive.  If you
have a CQD 220TM that works, $80 is certainly a very low cost.  It usually
supports optical disk drives as well and may support CDROM drives.  In
my case, I have an Adaptec AHA 2940AU SCSI host adapter on my PC
and can use a Sony SMO S-501 media to move 295 MB from the real
PDP-11 to the PC running E11 under Windows 98SE.  I am hoping that
E11 will also be able to use the optical drive under Windows XP, but I
will not know for about 6 months.

Sincerely yours,

Jerome Fine


From jhfinedp3k at compsys.to  Sun Dec 28 07:15:24 2008
From: jhfinedp3k at compsys.to (Jerome H. Fine)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 08:15:24 -0500
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: <1e1fc3e90812272100q1800eaeqd26e24412108e9ea@mail.gmail.com>
References: 	<4956E744.4010007@compsys.to>
	<1e1fc3e90812272100q1800eaeqd26e24412108e9ea@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <49577BEC.2090306@compsys.to>

 >Glen Slick wrote:

>>On Sat, Dec 27, 2008 at 6:41 PM, Jerome H. Fine  wrote:
>  
>
>>Using an M8190 quad 11/73 board is probably your best choice with as much
>>memory as possible.
>>    
>>
>
>You wouldn't really want to put an M8190 KDJ11-B in a VT103 Q-Q
>backplane instead of a Q-C/D would you?
>  
>
Jerome Fine replies:

Not a problem.  The M8190 will operate in both ABAB and ABCD backplanes.
I have successfully used an M8190 (a quad board) with a 4 MB memory board
(also a quad board)  in a VT103 backplane that had been upgraded to 22 bits.
Note that since the VT103 backplane is ABAB on all 4 slots, it is not 
possible
to use PMI memory as PMI memory.  The PMI memory can, of course, be used
as ordinary memory.

I have heard that it is possible to alter the first 2 ABAB slots to be 
ABCD so that
PMI memory can be used - or a Micro Vax II can be used.  No details are 
available.

>An M7554 KDJ11-D/S might be more suitable for the Q-Q backplane.
>
>Address bits 18 - 21 are on BC1 - BF1 (SSPARE4 - SSPARE7)
>
>BC1 - BDAL18L
>BD1 - BDAL19L
>BE1 - BDAL20L
>BF1 - BDAL21L
>  
>
A diagram would be helpful to identify the required points on the backplane.

By the way, I stated (incorrectly) that 16 solder points are needed.  
Actually, 32 solder
points are required, 2 for each slot (both AB and AB on each slot) and 4 
slots and
4 address lines for a total of 8 solder points per wire and 4 wires.  
Lead based solder
is needed for this very old backplane.

Sincerely yours,

Jerome Fine


From emu at e-bbes.com  Sun Dec 28 08:31:39 2008
From: emu at e-bbes.com (e.stiebler)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 07:31:39 -0700
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: 
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>	<1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com>	<24146.1229784478@mini>
	<24342.1229976120@mini>	<9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>		<9081BA4A-D92D-47E4-94BE-74E12A044B13@neurotica.com>	<002001c967d8$47df4060$d79dc120$@com>
	<4956D677.3000407@crash.com>
	
Message-ID: <49578DCB.5010204@e-bbes.com>

Ethan Dicks wrote:
> I haven't closely examined the KA730, but *if* one could fill the
> entire address space below 8MB with RAM, one could theoreticaly make a
> new-build 8MB single card for it, perhaps with a fresh address line
> run to a memory slot.   

Probably it is time now to make new memory boards for the vaxen and 
11/70 to keep them running. I guess all the people who still like to run 
them have SCSI controllers on them by now, but memory on this machines 
still chews a bit of power ...


From glen.slick at gmail.com  Sun Dec 28 09:52:14 2008
From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 07:52:14 -0800
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: <49577BEC.2090306@compsys.to>
References: 
	<4956E744.4010007@compsys.to>
	<1e1fc3e90812272100q1800eaeqd26e24412108e9ea@mail.gmail.com>
	<49577BEC.2090306@compsys.to>
Message-ID: <1e1fc3e90812280752h2d1b8d45sfecc412d42eba525@mail.gmail.com>

On Sun, Dec 28, 2008 at 5:15 AM, Jerome H. Fine wrote:
>>
>> Address bits 18 - 21 are on BC1 - BF1 (SSPARE4 - SSPARE7)
>>
>> BC1 - BDAL18L
>> BD1 - BDAL19L
>> BE1 - BDAL20L
>> BF1 - BDAL21L
>>
>
> A diagram would be helpful to identify the required points on the backplane.
>

http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/terminal/vt103/MP00731_VT103_Aug80.pdf

Page 73 of 76, VT103 BACKPLANE


From spectre at floodgap.com  Sun Dec 28 10:12:31 2008
From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 08:12:31 -0800 (PST)
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <4956AE92.30205@gjcp.net> from Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ at "Dec 27,
	8 10:39:14 pm"
Message-ID: <200812281612.mBSGCV7f012624@floodgap.com>

> We've come a long, long way from the fussy, fidgety, usually-broken 
> Javascript twiddly things of old.  But it's interesting to see that the 
> best way to make your pages work is to keep the markup very simple - 
> even Mosaic would render a good, well-designed modern site readably if 
> not visually correctly.

My rule of thumb: if the site isn't sane in Lynx, I redesign it. It may not
be perfect, but it should be navigable. 

-- 
------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ --
  Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com
-- It's not Camelot, but it's not Cleveland either. -- Boston mayor Kevin White


From spectre at floodgap.com  Sun Dec 28 10:13:41 2008
From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 08:13:41 -0800 (PST)
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <4956A80B.5070004@gjcp.net> from Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ at "Dec
	27, 8 10:11:23 pm"
Message-ID: <200812281613.mBSGDg0K012648@floodgap.com>

> > Management System) like typo3, Joomla, Drupal, ... You can do it also
> > with cvs, m4, sed / awk, make, ... or a XML processor, where you write
> > XML files containing just the content and the XML processor generates
> > (static) HTML... (AFAIK the NetBSD web site is generated this way.)
> 
> I tried that.  Down that path madness lies.  It's far better to just 
> store the text in a database, possibly marked up in one of the "simple" 
> markup languages like markdown, and serve it up as required.

Then you have all the headaches of a database. Sometimes a Makefile and
some skeletons pulling in flat files really *is* the simplest approach.

-- 
------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ --
  Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com
-- Software sucks because users demand it to. -- Nathan Mhyrvold, Microsoft ---


From mcguire at neurotica.com  Sun Dec 28 11:34:27 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 12:34:27 -0500
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: <0d5401c9687d$b8efbe10$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
References:  <0c2e01c96864$8bdbb5a0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
	<49569977.2000003@gmail.com>
	<0d5401c9687d$b8efbe10$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
Message-ID: <9E214DBF-7110-439B-8BF2-587AFC2B6E34@neurotica.com>

On Dec 27, 2008, at 6:49 PM, Alexandre Souza wrote:
>    Grrr...
>
>    It is SO simple...grrr...
>
>    Grrr...
>
>    Grr...
>
>    I'll give it a try, as soon as I have some free time :oP
>
>    Anyone willing into a "junior ace" project?

   I'm interested.  I'd have offered to route the board myself if you  
hadn't. :)  I was mildly interested earlier in the thread, but when I  
learned that this machine has a Forth system in ROM, I became MUCH  
more interested.  I've got too many projects on the fire right now,  
but that should get straightened out soon.

>    (small joke: I use an old program called CIRCAD98, and have lots  
> of pratice with that. Someday in my work, my coleagues were  
> designing a board for a PIC (bleargh) programmer, in a 10x10 board  
> in Eagle PCB. I told them why not create a smaller board, using  
> single side only, and they said it was impossible. I told them it  
> was easy to do, without jumpers. To make a long story short, they  
> bidded an entire week of lunch on that - If I could route manually  
> this board, they would pay me a week of lunch. If I lost, I'd pay  
> their lunches for a week. I spent some two hours routing the board,  
> but I got it - imagine a board the size of a DIP-40 socket, with  
> some 3 or 4 centimeters more. The board was for 40, 28, 20 and 16  
> pin PICs, if I'm not mistaken, and I made it fit inside the DIP-40  
> socket, along part of the circuit. I may have this drawing stashed  
> somewhere, and the lunch was fine, thanks! :oD)

   :-)

>    PS: Any hams here? PU1BZZ is how I'm called :)

   I'm formerly KA2UZK, but long expired.  The last time I was  
licensed, the US had five license classes!  I dearly want to get a  
new ticket but haven't had the time.

            -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From mcguire at neurotica.com  Sun Dec 28 11:35:22 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 12:35:22 -0500
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <49575F33.5030008@gmail.com>
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>	<1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com>	<24146.1229784478@mini>
	<24342.1229976120@mini>	<9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>	<4144.1230351054@mini>
	<6370CD8E-9CE2-4256-94B7-B865E87ED62A@neurotica.com>
	<49575F33.5030008@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <7A9B75A2-43E6-46FF-8207-C10EDAEA57C1@neurotica.com>

On Dec 28, 2008, at 6:12 AM, Sridhar Ayengar wrote:
>>>> I've kept a flag set for Quasijarus because it claimed to include/
>>>> continue support for the 11/730. Has anybody actually used it on a
>>>> physical example of a Nebula?
>>>
>>> Yes, I did it a few years ago and it worked fine for me.  As I  
>>> recall I
>>> ran it on a ra90 with a uda50.
>>>
>>> However, I have yet to get netbsd to work.  I hacked a version of  
>>> the
>>> netbsd 1.5 boot to allow me to do nfs copies with a deuna.  This  
>>> allowed
>>> me to install 4.3 over the network (slowly).
>>>
>>> netbsd wants more memory than I have and the 730 guts were  
>>> slightly off.
>>> I've gotten close to fixing it but not yet.
>>   How much memory does your system have?  I'd love to see NetBSD  
>> on the 11/730.
>
> If you install <1.5, 4MB should be enough, right?

   That sounds about right.

          -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From emu at e-bbes.com  Sun Dec 28 12:01:22 2008
From: emu at e-bbes.com (e.stiebler)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 11:01:22 -0700
Subject: paging clint wolf
Message-ID: <4957BEF2.9060708@e-bbes.com>

Could you please contact me via PM ?


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Sun Dec 28 11:45:32 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 17:45:32 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: Tandy TRS-80 Model 4
In-Reply-To: <495634F7.26019.46E6390@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at
	Dec 27, 8 02:00:23 pm
Message-ID: 

> 
> On 27 Dec 2008 at 21:26, Tony Duell wrote:
> 
> 
> > I thought I knew most of the HP calculators, but I can't think of one 
> > that's called the 'Programmer'. The nearest would be the HP16C (codename 
> > 'Pr' IIRC) which is the 'Voyager' series machine designed for low-level 
> > programemrs with boolean operations, shifts/rotates, etc. One currently 
> > resides on my eelctronics bench.
> 
> IIRC, the 16C was called the "Computer Scientist"; the TI hex-capable 

You are probably right. I am pretty sure that the internal code name for 
the 16C was 'PR' which certainly suggest 'programmer'. The other Voyagers 
had numeric code names (10C = 0.5, 11C, 12C = 1.0; 15C = 1.5 IIRC)

> calculator (based loosely on the TI-30) was called the "Programmer".  
> LED display initially, replaced by the LCD Programmer and the 
> Programmer II.  None of the TI models holds a candle to the HP16C 
> (mine is still chugging along...

I have never been able to get my head round a calculator with an '=' 
button (at least not unless said '=' is used only for comparisons). Which 
maeans it's very rare for me to use a non-HP handheld calculator.

-tony


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Sun Dec 28 11:50:36 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 17:50:36 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: <0d5401c9687d$b8efbe10$46fea8c0@DeskJara> from "Alexandre Souza"
	at Dec 27, 8 09:49:07 pm
Message-ID: 

>     Anyone willing into a "junior ace" project?

It's 'Jupiter Ace', or at least the orignal was.

> 
>     It has some simple milestones:
>     - 16K RAM if possible
>     - Reduction of number of ICs without using programable logic

Why? Why change the design at all. All the original parts are, AFAIK, 
easy to get still. 

Certianly don't use programmable logic, which would make the thing harder 
to repair in the future. There arne't that many TTL chips in there anyhow.

As regards the memory, the origianl Ace had 3K of RAM. 3 _separate_ areas 
of 1K each (each one a pair of 2114s). One was used for program storage, 
one for video RAM, and the last as the character generator. Without a 
major redsign, you are goign to have ato keep the last 2 unchanged.

>     - Single sided board (does not matter how much jumpers I'll have to put 
> in this beast)

Double sided PCBs are not much harder, surely?

-tony



From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Sun Dec 28 12:23:03 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 18:23:03 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: <4956E744.4010007@compsys.to> from "Jerome H. Fine" at Dec 27,
	8 09:41:08 pm
Message-ID: 

> Upgrading the back plane to 22 bits is easy and probably would take Tony 
> Duell only 15 minutes.  It will

About 1 minute per connection on average? That sounds right :-)

> usually take everyone else a few hours.  Wire wrap is probably the least 
> difficult to use with a small soldering
> iron.  You will need to use lead based solder.  A total of 16 points 
> need to be soldered - 4 for each wire
> to connect address bits 19, 20, 21 and 22.  Leave the insulation on the 
> wire wrap except where the soldering
> takes place.  Probably Al Kossow has a manual with a diagram for the 
> VT103 back plane which show where
> address bits 19, 20, 21 and 22 are located.

The only thing to watch for when doing a modification like this is to 
make sure that hte pins you're connecting to have not been used for some 
other singal (and connected by PCB traces). I don't think this is a 
problem with the VT103, but I've never seen one.

-tony



From mcguire at neurotica.com  Sun Dec 28 14:16:26 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 15:16:26 -0500
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <2840AD63-9B33-4116-AA44-DA02A72CE654@neurotica.com>

On Dec 28, 2008, at 12:50 PM, Tony Duell wrote:
>>     - Single sided board (does not matter how much jumpers I'll  
>> have to put
>> in this beast)
>
> Double sided PCBs are not much harder, surely?

   In fact they're a whole lot easier, at least for the soldering!

          -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From mcguire at neurotica.com  Sun Dec 28 15:07:12 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 16:07:12 -0500
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <49569E37.3060807@softjar.se>
References: <200812271801.mBRI0Hxi018291@dewey.classiccmp.org>
	<49569E37.3060807@softjar.se>
Message-ID: <22345478-3CEF-4CC3-9019-B792750724D3@neurotica.com>

On Dec 27, 2008, at 4:29 PM, Johnny Billquist wrote:
> Nope. The MK-11 memory box for the 11/70 (there are others) have  
> the same memory bus as the 11/750, but the MK-11 don't support 1MB  
> boards. Believe me, I know...
> 256 KB memory boards works fine in both MK-11 and 11/750 though.
>
> And if someone *really* have 1MB boards, and an MK-11, and wants to  
> use them, contact me and I can start explaining what you need to do  
> to actually get it to work. But it requires both serious hardware  
> hacking and software fiddling.

   I must admit, I find the idea interesting!  1MB boards do show up  
from time to time, and my 11/70 could definitely use more memory. :)

          -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From jhfinedp3k at compsys.to  Sun Dec 28 15:33:47 2008
From: jhfinedp3k at compsys.to (Jerome H. Fine)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 16:33:47 -0500
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <4957F0BB.1090300@compsys.to>

 >Tony Duell wrote:

>>Upgrading the back plane to 22 bits is easy and probably would take Tony 
>>Duell only 15 minutes.  It will
>>
>About 1 minute per connection on average? That sounds right :-)
>  
>
Jerome Fine replies:

Glad to know that my appraisal of your ability to solder was accurate.  
I figured that dividing
my time by about 100 would be a good estimate.

>>usually take everyone else a few hours.  Wire wrap is probably the least 
>>difficult to use with a small soldering
>>iron.  You will need to use lead based solder.  A total of 16 points 
>>need to be soldered - 4 for each wire
>>to connect address bits 19, 20, 21 and 22.  Leave the insulation on the 
>>wire wrap except where the soldering
>>takes place.  Probably Al Kossow has a manual with a diagram for the 
>>VT103 back plane which show where
>>address bits 19, 20, 21 and 22 are located.
>>
>The only thing to watch for when doing a modification like this is to 
>make sure that hte pins you're connecting to have not been used for some 
>other singal (and connected by PCB traces). I don't think this is a 
>problem with the VT103, but I've never seen one.
>  
>
As far I my experience is worth, the upgrade to a 22 bit backplane with 
the version DEC
provides in the VT103 works VERY well.  I watched over at least 6 VT103s 
having the
modification and all responded as expected.  I also tested each point on 
the backplane
before they were soldered and all points showed an open circuit to 
everything else.

 >Glen Slick wrote:

>On Sun, Dec 28, 2008 at 5:15 AM, Jerome H. Fine wrote:
>  
>
>>>Address bits 18 - 21 are on BC1 - BF1 (SSPARE4 - SSPARE7)
>>>
>>>BC1 - BDAL18L
>>>BD1 - BDAL19L
>>>BE1 - BDAL20L
>>>BF1 - BDAL21L
>>>
>>>      
>>>
>>A diagram would be helpful to identify the required points on the backplane.
>>
>>    
>>
>
>http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/terminal/vt103/MP00731_VT103_Aug80.pdf
>
>Page 73 of 76, VT103 BACKPLANE
>
And as final confirmation, the pdf should confirm that the 4 address 
points in each AB portion
of the backplane are not connected to anything else.

The really cool reason to use a VT103 is that a hard drive can be placed 
right under the CRT.
For someone who does not look closely, the VT103 will look identical to 
a normal VT100.
Thus, when the VT103 is powered up and boots into one of the PDP-11 
operating systems,
the look of surprise is quite evident when they are told there are a 
pair of small monkeys
inside who are answering the responses typed into the keyboard. :-)

The one problem of using the VT103 is that the power supply is really 
too limited, although with
only 4 slots, not a lot of power needed.  Tony, perhaps you might be 
able to suggest how
the 5 amp supply could be enhanced?  On the other hand, with a BA23 
being relatively easy
to locate, perhaps it is not worth while even asking.  I recently 
managed to acquire a 3rd BA123
box (with 12 slots) to be a spare in case one of the other 2 power 
supplies on the other BA123
boxes fails.

As for modes of failure, how often should a power supply be used to be 
sure that keeping it out
of service does not cause a failure when the power supply is used after 
a few years?  Does anyone
have any recommendations?

Sincerely yours,

Jerome Fine


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Sun Dec 28 15:57:03 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 21:57:03 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: <4957F0BB.1090300@compsys.to> from "Jerome H. Fine" at Dec 28,
	8 04:33:47 pm
Message-ID: 

> 
>  >Tony Duell wrote:
> 
> >>Upgrading the back plane to 22 bits is easy and probably would take Tony 
> >>Duell only 15 minutes.  It will
> >>
> >About 1 minute per connection on average? That sounds right :-)
> >  
> >
> Jerome Fine replies:
> 
> Glad to know that my appraisal of your ability to solder was accurate.  
> I figured that dividing
> my time by about 100 would be a good estimate.

I refuse to beleive it takes you over an hour to solder one connection! :-)

> As far I my experience is worth, the upgrade to a 22 bit backplane with 
> the version DEC
> provides in the VT103 works VERY well.  I watched over at least 6 VT103s 

That does not suprise me. I was under the impression that some very early 
Q-bus modules used at least one of those pins for something else (I've 
seen 3rd-party Q-bus cards with 22 bit DMA capability where the bus 
driver for thsoe upper 4 address lines (normally a '38 or similar) is 
socketed with instructions to remove it if used in certain backplanes) 
but I suspect the VT103 is late enoguh for this not to be an issue.

> 
> The really cool reason to use a VT103 is that a hard drive can be placed 
> right under the CRT.

I wonder about stray magnetic fields from the yoke and/or flybackj 
transformer. Not that they'll corrupt the magnetic patterns on the disk, 
but that they'll be picked up by the read amplifier anf cause random data 
erros. But I guess it works OK.

> The one problem of using the VT103 is that the power supply is really 
> too limited, although with
> only 4 slots, not a lot of power needed.  Tony, perhaps you might be 
> able to suggest how
> the 5 amp supply could be enhanced?  On the other hand, with a BA23 

Do you mean '5 amp' or '5 volt' here? I was under the impression it was 
around 15A or so at 5V.

Increasing the rating of a PSU is not easy in general. Many of the 
components would need replacign with higher-rated parts, including the 
transformer (whether linear or switch-mode), the rectifiers, smoothing 
capacitors (increase in capacitance value), chopper transistors (if an 
SMSPU), pass transistors (if a linear design), etc.and of course you'd have 
modify any current limit circuitry. It'd probably be easier to design a 
replacement PSU from scratch to fit in the same space.

> As for modes of failure, how often should a power supply be used to be 
> sure that keeping it out
> of service does not cause a failure when the power supply is used after 
> a few years?  Does anyone
> have any recommendations?

About the only thing that'll fail from not being used are electrolytic 
capacitors, and I am not convinced this is a major problem with 
modern-ish ones. Certainly it's not a failure I've ever encountered (yes, 
I've had electrolytics fail, but not by the oxide-film disolving due to 
them not being used).

-tony


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Sun Dec 28 15:47:37 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 21:47:37 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: <2840AD63-9B33-4116-AA44-DA02A72CE654@neurotica.com> from "Dave
	McGuire" at Dec 28, 8 03:16:26 pm
Message-ID: 

> > Double sided PCBs are not much harder, surely?
> 
>    In fact they're a whole lot easier, at least for the soldering!

If they have plated through holes then they take solder very nicely 
(although desoldering can be slightly harder if you need to correct a 
mistake :-)). Even without such holes (which means you'll need to solder 
some components on both sides of the PCB and maybe put pins through vias, 
it's a lot easier to solder such a PCB then fit numerous wire links

-tony


From afra at aurigae.demon.co.uk  Sun Dec 28 16:10:14 2008
From: afra at aurigae.demon.co.uk (Phill Harvey-Smith)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 22:10:14 +0000
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: <2840AD63-9B33-4116-AA44-DA02A72CE654@neurotica.com>
References: 
	<2840AD63-9B33-4116-AA44-DA02A72CE654@neurotica.com>
Message-ID: <4957F946.7070306@aurigae.demon.co.uk>

Dave McGuire wrote:
> On Dec 28, 2008, at 12:50 PM, Tony Duell wrote:
>>>     - Single sided board (does not matter how much jumpers I'll have 
>>> to put
>>> in this beast)
>>
>> Double sided PCBs are not much harder, surely?
> 
>   In fact they're a whole lot easier, at least for the soldering!

And if you use turned pin IC sockets, and place them carefully & solder 
them in in the right order you can also top solder them if you are 
making the board at home, where you won't have plated through holes.

Plus generally a double sided board has less holes to drill :)

BTW I was given a bare unpopulated Ace board for Christmas, I have taken 
some scans of it but at 1200dpi they are *HUGE*

Cheers.

Phill.

-- 
Phill Harvey-Smith, Programmer, Hardware hacker, and general eccentric !

"You can twist perceptions, but reality won't budge" -- Rush.


From derschjo at mail.msu.edu  Sun Dec 28 16:20:42 2008
From: derschjo at mail.msu.edu (Josh Dersch)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 14:20:42 -0800
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: <1e1fc3e90812280752h2d1b8d45sfecc412d42eba525@mail.gmail.com>
References: 	<4956E744.4010007@compsys.to>	<1e1fc3e90812272100q1800eaeqd26e24412108e9ea@mail.gmail.com>	<49577BEC.2090306@compsys.to>
	<1e1fc3e90812280752h2d1b8d45sfecc412d42eba525@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <4957FBBA.2010003@mail.msu.edu>

Glen Slick wrote:
> On Sun, Dec 28, 2008 at 5:15 AM, Jerome H. Fine wrote:
>   
>>> Address bits 18 - 21 are on BC1 - BF1 (SSPARE4 - SSPARE7)
>>>
>>> BC1 - BDAL18L
>>> BD1 - BDAL19L
>>> BE1 - BDAL20L
>>> BF1 - BDAL21L
>>>
>>>       
>> A diagram would be helpful to identify the required points on the backplane.
>>
>>     
>
> http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/terminal/vt103/MP00731_VT103_Aug80.pdf
>
> Page 73 of 76, VT103 BACKPLANE
>
>   
So forgive my inexperience here -- but just to make sure I'm 
understanding the changes I need to make -- is all that's necessary just 
wiring up the address lines (18-21) from slot 1, to slot 2, to slot 3, 
to slot 4?

Also, just to satisfy my curiosity -- it's been mentioned by several 
people that lead-based solder is necessary -- why is this?  (I think I 
have a spool of it somewhere that I liberated from my grandfather's 
basement some years back, but I'll have to dig it up...)

Thanks!
Josh


From mcguire at neurotica.com  Sun Dec 28 16:32:24 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 17:32:24 -0500
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: <4957F946.7070306@aurigae.demon.co.uk>
References: 
	<2840AD63-9B33-4116-AA44-DA02A72CE654@neurotica.com>
	<4957F946.7070306@aurigae.demon.co.uk>
Message-ID: 

On Dec 28, 2008, at 5:10 PM, Phill Harvey-Smith wrote:
>>>>     - Single sided board (does not matter how much jumpers I'll  
>>>> have to put
>>>> in this beast)
>>>
>>> Double sided PCBs are not much harder, surely?
>>   In fact they're a whole lot easier, at least for the soldering!
>
> And if you use turned pin IC sockets, and place them carefully &  
> solder them in in the right order you can also top solder them if  
> you are making the board at home, where you won't have plated  
> through holes.
>
> Plus generally a double sided board has less holes to drill :)
>
> BTW I was given a bare unpopulated Ace board for Christmas, I have  
> taken some scans of it but at 1200dpi they are *HUGE*

   I'd be willing to turn those scans into Gerber files if you send  
them to me..

           -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From derschjo at mail.msu.edu  Sun Dec 28 16:34:25 2008
From: derschjo at mail.msu.edu (Josh Dersch)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 14:34:25 -0800
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: <49577BAE.9060902@compsys.to>
References: 	<4956F03B.1030802@crash.com>	
	<49577BAE.9060902@compsys.to>
Message-ID: <4957FEF1.3010109@mail.msu.edu>



Jerome H. Fine wrote:
> >Josh Dersch wrote:
>>
>> I have a number of external TRS-80 external hard-disk enclosures,   
>> which at one point contained MFM-style drives -- since the cabling 
>> is  the same as ESDI I was considering putting an ESDI drive in one 
>> and  cabling it to the Emulex controller,  thus allowing an external 
>> drive  and cutting down on space/power issues in the VT103.
>
> An external hard disk enclosure is not essential.  I usually just use 
> a PC
> power supply and a bare hard drive with the cables from the controller
> hanging out the back of the VT103, especially when using an ESDI hard
> drive which requires more power than an MFM hard drive.  I suggest
> that you also place a fan beside any ESDI hard drive since they usually
> run very hot.
No, not essential, but I have very few working, RQDX3-compatible, 
half-height MFM drives left.  And even those are very low capacity.  I 
have a number of high-capacity ("high" being a relative term -- anywhere 
from 80 to 760mb) ESDI drives, but most of them are full-height.  I 
don't mind having an external box, though it would be very cool to have 
an all-in-one unit.
>
> Note that an RQDX3 (dual board from DEC WITHOUT a boot ROM)
> is probably quite reasonable with an M8190 and Qbus memory as far as
> power is concerned.  An RQDX1/2 (quad board from DEC WITHOUT
> a boot ROM) needs 6 amps for the 5 volts and will often overload the
> VT103 power supply when the other boards are added to the total needed
> to run a minimum system.
I have a number of RQDX3's, but I'll probably go with the Emulex QD21 
ESDI controller that I have.  It has an auto-boot option, which will be 
useful since the 11/23 board I have just has the ODT ROMs...

>
> As for placing the hard drive under the CRT, while there is ample room 
> for
> a 3.5" hard drive, I have managed with an ST412 5.25" hard drive - 
> although
> I agree that it was a VERY tight squeeze.  A third party MFM controller
> (with a boot ROM), M8186 / M8192, memory and DLV11-J are sufficient to 
> run
> RT-11 and the VT103 power supply is sufficient to support the ST412 as 
> well.
>
>>> In addition I see two projects out there for Qbus disk interfaces:
>>>
>>> wintersweet:    http://www.mscpscsi.com/
>>> CHD's Q22-ATA:    http://www.chd.dyndns.org/qbus_ide/
>>>
>>> No further information, like availability or compatibility, and no  
>>> timeline for when I'll drag out the stuff I have and start  
>>> contributing ... ;^)
>>
>> Man, One (or two!) of those things would be sweet!  I lucked out and  
>> snagged a CQD-220 SCSI controller off eBay for $80 last year,  but I  
>> doubt I'll ever find another SCSI controller for that price...
>
> Was that a CQD 220TM?  A CQD 220T will handle only a tape drive.  If you
> have a CQD 220TM that works, $80 is certainly a very low cost.  It 
> usually
> supports optical disk drives as well and may support CDROM drives.  In
> my case, I have an Adaptec AHA 2940AU SCSI host adapter on my PC
> and can use a Sony SMO S-501 media to move 295 MB from the real
> PDP-11 to the PC running E11 under Windows 98SE.  I am hoping that
> E11 will also be able to use the optical drive under Windows XP, but I
> will not know for about 6 months.
Yeah, it's the 220TM.  I have it in my MicroVAX II at the moment.  It 
works with CD-ROM drives but does not like booting from them (it doesn't 
seem to be patient enough to wait for the drive to spin up and come 
ready).  I currently am using a pair of SCSI Jaz drives for both 
removable and "permanent" storage -- I can "dd" the contents of a 
bootable CD-ROM to the Jaz disk and then boot from the Jaz disk on the 
VAX.  I've installed a couple of versions of NetBSD, VMS, and Ultrix 
this way (though the Jaz drives interact poorly with Ultrix because they 
spin down the disks after a few minutes of inactivity, which Ultrix 
appears to be unable to cope with.)  It's nice to have bootable OSes on 
removable media to make fooling around with different operating systems 
fairly painless.  Though I really don't like Jaz drives/disks that much...

>
> Sincerely yours,
>
> Jerome Fine
>
>
Thanks for the info!

Josh


From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Sun Dec 28 16:36:23 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 17:36:23 -0500
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <22345478-3CEF-4CC3-9019-B792750724D3@neurotica.com>
References: <200812271801.mBRI0Hxi018291@dewey.classiccmp.org>
	<49569E37.3060807@softjar.se>
	<22345478-3CEF-4CC3-9019-B792750724D3@neurotica.com>
Message-ID: 

On Sun, Dec 28, 2008 at 4:07 PM, Dave McGuire  wrote:
> On Dec 27, 2008, at 4:29 PM, Johnny Billquist wrote:
>>
>> Nope. The MK-11 memory box for the 11/70 (there are others) have the same
>> memory bus as the 11/750, but the MK-11 don't support 1MB boards. Believe
>> me, I know...
>> 256 KB memory boards works fine in both MK-11 and 11/750 though.
>>
>> And if someone *really* have 1MB boards, and an MK-11, and wants to use
>> them, contact me and I can start explaining what you need to do to actually
>> get it to work. But it requires both serious hardware hacking and software
>> fiddling.
>
>  I must admit, I find the idea interesting!  1MB boards do show up from time
> to time, and my 11/70 could definitely use more memory. :)

My curiosity is piqued.  If the mods are really extensive, I may never
try it, but it would be interesting to learn what's involved.

ISTR there were some 4MB "cache" boards for the 11/70 that one could
use in place of the MK11, but I doubt that it would be easy to find a
loose one these days.

-ethan


From afra at aurigae.demon.co.uk  Sun Dec 28 17:02:40 2008
From: afra at aurigae.demon.co.uk (Phill Harvey-Smith)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 23:02:40 +0000
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: 
References: 	<2840AD63-9B33-4116-AA44-DA02A72CE654@neurotica.com>	<4957F946.7070306@aurigae.demon.co.uk>
	
Message-ID: <49580590.9060400@aurigae.demon.co.uk>

Dave McGuire wrote:
> On Dec 28, 2008, at 5:10 PM, Phill Harvey-Smith wrote:
>> BTW I was given a bare unpopulated Ace board for Christmas, I have 
>> taken some scans of it but at 1200dpi they are *HUGE*
> 
>   I'd be willing to turn those scans into Gerber files if you send them 
> to me..

That would be cool, an eagle board layout would be better still.....

Let me see if I can zip em up small, I'll prolly upload them to a server 
at work (and email off list) as it has much more bandwidth than I do and 
they are really huge :)

Cheers.

Phill.

-- 
Phill Harvey-Smith, Programmer, Hardware hacker, and general eccentric !

"You can twist perceptions, but reality won't budge" -- Rush.


From cclist at sydex.com  Sun Dec 28 17:09:18 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 15:09:18 -0800
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: <4957F946.7070306@aurigae.demon.co.uk>
References: ,
	<2840AD63-9B33-4116-AA44-DA02A72CE654@neurotica.com>,
	<4957F946.7070306@aurigae.demon.co.uk>
Message-ID: <4957969E.11500.9D3D095@cclist.sydex.com>

On 28 Dec 2008 at 22:10, Phill Harvey-Smith wrote:

> And if you use turned pin IC sockets, and place them carefully & solder 
> them in in the right order you can also top solder them if you are 
> making the board at home, where you won't have plated through holes.

There are also copper eyelets available intended for providing vias.

Cheers,
Chuck



From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Sun Dec 28 17:10:13 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 18:10:13 -0500
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: <4957FBBA.2010003@mail.msu.edu>
References: 
	<4956E744.4010007@compsys.to>
	<1e1fc3e90812272100q1800eaeqd26e24412108e9ea@mail.gmail.com>
	<49577BEC.2090306@compsys.to>
	<1e1fc3e90812280752h2d1b8d45sfecc412d42eba525@mail.gmail.com>
	<4957FBBA.2010003@mail.msu.edu>
Message-ID: 

On Sun, Dec 28, 2008 at 5:20 PM, Josh Dersch  wrote:
> Also, just to satisfy my curiosity -- it's been mentioned by several people
> that lead-based solder is necessary -- why is this?

Because the equipment was made with lead-based solder (being many,
many years older than the RoHS directives), and mixing lead-free and
lead-based solder is not a good idea.  I'm sure someone here can quote
chapter and verse, but AFAIK, you'll get unreliable solder joints if
you try.

> (I think I have a spool
> of it somewhere that I liberated from my grandfather's basement some years
> back, but I'll have to dig it up...)

If that's plumbing solder, you are unlikely to get good results.
Really, really old plumbing solder _is_ lead-based, but most of what
you are likely to find is not (so that it's safe to use on supply
lines).  Plumbing solder is also frequently acid-cored or fluxless.  I
don't recall running into any plumbing solder that is compatible with
electronic circuits.

Now...if your grandfather was a Ham or did electronic repairs, what
you have might be just perfect, but be sure you have the right stuff
before you get started.

What you are after is rosin-core lead-based solder around 60/40 or
63/37 tin/lead, with a diameter around 0.5mm (.020") to 0.8mm (.032").
 The exact ratio of lead to tin is not critical, nor is the exact
diameter, but since you aren't doing ultra-fine work or trying to
solder down something huge and heavy, like bundles of power-supply
leads or RF cages, I'd recommend something "medium" weight, like the
0.8mm (.032").

There should be a label on one end of the spool (if it's still on the
original spool) describing the various characteristics.  If you aren't
practiced at making good joints, I'd recommend getting an inexpensive
electronic hobby kit to practice on.  My earliest efforts from when I
was in Jr. High are rather ugly - by the time I was adding blue wires
to $2000 boards at work five years later, I'd gotten much, much better
from the early practice.

-ethan


From ggs at shiresoft.com  Sun Dec 28 17:37:27 2008
From: ggs at shiresoft.com (Guy Sotomayor)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 15:37:27 -0800
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <22345478-3CEF-4CC3-9019-B792750724D3@neurotica.com>
References: <200812271801.mBRI0Hxi018291@dewey.classiccmp.org>
	<49569E37.3060807@softjar.se>
	<22345478-3CEF-4CC3-9019-B792750724D3@neurotica.com>
Message-ID: 


On Dec 28, 2008, at 1:07 PM, Dave McGuire wrote:

> On Dec 27, 2008, at 4:29 PM, Johnny Billquist wrote:
>> Nope. The MK-11 memory box for the 11/70 (there are others) have  
>> the same memory bus as the 11/750, but the MK-11 don't support 1MB  
>> boards. Believe me, I know...
>> 256 KB memory boards works fine in both MK-11 and 11/750 though.
>>
>> And if someone *really* have 1MB boards, and an MK-11, and wants to  
>> use them, contact me and I can start explaining what you need to do  
>> to actually get it to work. But it requires both serious hardware  
>> hacking and software fiddling.
>
>  I must admit, I find the idea interesting!  1MB boards do show up  
> from time to time, and my 11/70 could definitely use more memory. :)

The easiest thing to do would be to replicate a PEP-70.  It's fairly  
easy as it would be one hex board with all of the memory.  The only  
modification needed for the 11/70 is 4 power jumpers to slot 19.  Then  
just route short cables from the cache boards to the new board rather  
than to the external memory boxes.  I wouldn't run an 11/70 any other  
way.  :-)



From emu at e-bbes.com  Sun Dec 28 17:50:10 2008
From: emu at e-bbes.com (e.stiebler)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 16:50:10 -0700
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: 
References: <200812271801.mBRI0Hxi018291@dewey.classiccmp.org>	<49569E37.3060807@softjar.se>	<22345478-3CEF-4CC3-9019-B792750724D3@neurotica.com>
	
Message-ID: <495810B2.7050403@e-bbes.com>

Guy Sotomayor wrote:
> The easiest thing to do would be to replicate a PEP-70.  It's fairly 
> easy as it would be one hex board with all of the memory.  The only 
> modification needed for the 11/70 is 4 power jumpers to slot 19.  Then 
> just route short cables from the cache boards to the new board rather 
> than to the external memory boxes.  I wouldn't run an 11/70 any other 
> way.  :-)
And the manuals/schematics are where ?



From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Sun Dec 28 18:31:13 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 22:31:13 -0200
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
References: <2840AD63-9B33-4116-AA44-DA02A72CE654@neurotica.com><4957F946.7070306@aurigae.demon.co.uk>
	
Message-ID: <064a01c9694c$c7b5c820$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

>   I'd be willing to turn those scans into Gerber files if you send  
> them to me..

    I think this is a WAY better solution than mine :o)

    BTW, which method/program you use for doing that, Dave?



From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Sun Dec 28 18:31:33 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 22:31:33 -0200
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
References: 	<2840AD63-9B33-4116-AA44-DA02A72CE654@neurotica.com>	<4957F946.7070306@aurigae.demon.co.uk>
	<49580590.9060400@aurigae.demon.co.uk>
Message-ID: <065901c9694c$ee718da0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

> Let me see if I can zip em up small, I'll prolly upload them to a server 
> at work (and email off list) as it has much more bandwidth than I do and 
> they are really huge :)

    Rapidshare comes to mind



From brain at jbrain.com  Sun Dec 28 18:57:23 2008
From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 18:57:23 -0600
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: 
References: 	<2840AD63-9B33-4116-AA44-DA02A72CE654@neurotica.com>	<4957F946.7070306@aurigae.demon.co.uk>
	
Message-ID: <49582073.8030202@jbrain.com>

Dave McGuire wrote:
>
>   I'd be willing to turn those scans into Gerber files if you send 
> them to me..
>
>           -Dave
>
I'd be interested in how this is done as well.  Lots of folks ask me to 
reproduce vintage boards, and creating EAGLE CAD drawings for them is 
time consuming.

Jim

-- 
Jim Brain, Brain Innovations                                      (X)
brain at jbrain.com 
Dabbling in WWW, Embedded Systems, Old CBM computers, and Good Times! 
Home: http://www.jbrain.com



From ggs at shiresoft.com  Sun Dec 28 19:12:12 2008
From: ggs at shiresoft.com (Guy Sotomayor)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 17:12:12 -0800
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <495810B2.7050403@e-bbes.com>
References: <200812271801.mBRI0Hxi018291@dewey.classiccmp.org>	<49569E37.3060807@softjar.se>	<22345478-3CEF-4CC3-9019-B792750724D3@neurotica.com>
	
	<495810B2.7050403@e-bbes.com>
Message-ID: 

There aren't any schematics, but the installation manual is on  
bitsavers.  If I were to do it, I'd look at the cache interface going  
to the MK11 and just build a board that interfaces to that.  Putting  
the memory on with an FPGA to do all of the timing/interfacing  
shouldn't be too hard.  I'm doing something similar for regular Unibus  
memory + ROMs + KW11L + 2 SLUs .  It's basically it's an FRAM, FPGA  
(Spartan 3E), level shifters (3.3v to/from 5v) and Unibus  
transceivers.  All of the work is in the FPGA written in verilog.  It  
shouldn't be hard to do something similar to emulate a full set of  
MK11 memory to the cache interface (probably using high density SRAM  
rather than FRAM).  Depending upon the density of the SRAM(s) it might  
even be possible to do it as a quad board vs hex.  The only thing  
coming from the 11/70 backplane is power and ground (for slot 19).   
All signaling is from the ribbon cables connected to the cache boards  
(4 cables).

TTFN - Guy

On Dec 28, 2008, at 3:50 PM, e.stiebler wrote:

> Guy Sotomayor wrote:
>> The easiest thing to do would be to replicate a PEP-70.  It's  
>> fairly easy as it would be one hex board with all of the memory.   
>> The only modification needed for the 11/70 is 4 power jumpers to  
>> slot 19.  Then just route short cables from the cache boards to the  
>> new board rather than to the external memory boxes.  I wouldn't run  
>> an 11/70 any other way.  :-)
> And the manuals/schematics are where ?
>
>



From brad at heeltoe.com  Sun Dec 28 19:35:26 2008
From: brad at heeltoe.com (Brad Parker)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 20:35:26 -0500
Subject: new disks, old DEC (was Re: 4.3BSD Quasijarus) 
In-Reply-To: <4956ECA9.6040204@crash.com> 
References: 
	<003801c96851$12111980$36334c80$@com>
	
	<200812271730.38787.pat@computer-refuge.org>
	<4956ECA9.6040204@crash.com>
Message-ID: <11898.1230514526@mini>


Steven M Jones wrote:
>
>Hey Brad, what about that universal disk controller for UNIBUS you were 
>working on? http://www.heeltoe.com/retro/udisk/index.html  (Apologies if 
>I missed an update.)

ugg.  It works, but is currently collecting dust waiting for the economy
to force me into another idle period (which I predict will occur soon).

I programmed it to look like an RL02 and got it to boot rt-11 on my
11/44.  But I didn't like some of the hacks I had to do and so re-did
the cpld and then ran out of space.  Always the way. 

I plan to have another go at it this spring/summer.  I think the idea
has merit.  I think I should have used an fpga instead of a cpld however
but I was being cheap.  It's nice to put the entire bus transaction
engine with dma support inside the cpld.  Originally I had the cpu doing
everything but found it was hard to keep bus timeouts from happening.
The last working version has several state machines which minimize the
cpu work.

It can look like rom and can be a bus master so I use it to goose a copy
of the boot loader into ram which makes life easier.

like everyone, I took on some huge projects over the last 1.5 years and
all my fun work was on hold.  But those days appear to be over for a
while :-| so my back room will be a little warmer.

-brad



From jfoust at threedee.com  Sun Dec 28 19:58:00 2008
From: jfoust at threedee.com (John Foust)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 19:58:00 -0600
Subject: Heathkit manuals under tighter control
Message-ID: <6.2.3.4.2.20081228195539.06181cc0@mail.threedee.com>


http://techdirt.com/articles/20081215/0106043118.shtml


- John



From ploopster at gmail.com  Sun Dec 28 20:04:13 2008
From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 21:04:13 -0500
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: 
References: <200812271801.mBRI0Hxi018291@dewey.classiccmp.org>	<49569E37.3060807@softjar.se>	<22345478-3CEF-4CC3-9019-B792750724D3@neurotica.com>
	
Message-ID: <4958301D.8010507@gmail.com>

Ethan Dicks wrote:
> ISTR there were some 4MB "cache" boards for the 11/70 that one could
> use in place of the MK11, but I doubt that it would be easy to find a
> loose one these days.

I wonder how hard it would be to replicate that functionality today, 
with some SRAM and a CPLD?

Peace...  Sridhar


From ploopster at gmail.com  Sun Dec 28 20:07:31 2008
From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 21:07:31 -0500
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: 
References: 	<4956E744.4010007@compsys.to>	<1e1fc3e90812272100q1800eaeqd26e24412108e9ea@mail.gmail.com>	<49577BEC.2090306@compsys.to>	<1e1fc3e90812280752h2d1b8d45sfecc412d42eba525@mail.gmail.com>	<4957FBBA.2010003@mail.msu.edu>
	
Message-ID: <495830E3.8000908@gmail.com>

Ethan Dicks wrote:
> What you are after is rosin-core lead-based solder around 60/40 or
> 63/37 tin/lead, with a diameter around 0.5mm (.020") to 0.8mm (.032").

I highly recommend 63/37 over 60/40.  I find it easer to work with.

Peace...  Sridhar


From geneb at deltasoft.com  Sun Dec 28 20:17:07 2008
From: geneb at deltasoft.com (Gene Buckle)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 18:17:07 -0800 (PST)
Subject: Heathkit manuals under tighter control
In-Reply-To: <6.2.3.4.2.20081228195539.06181cc0@mail.threedee.com>
References: <6.2.3.4.2.20081228195539.06181cc0@mail.threedee.com>
Message-ID: 

On Sun, 28 Dec 2008, John Foust wrote:

>
> http://techdirt.com/articles/20081215/0106043118.shtml
>
>
I think the phrase I'm looking for is "EPIC FAIL".

g.

-- 
Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007
http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind.



From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Sun Dec 28 20:26:24 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 21:26:24 -0500
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: <495830E3.8000908@gmail.com>
References: 
	<4956E744.4010007@compsys.to>
	<1e1fc3e90812272100q1800eaeqd26e24412108e9ea@mail.gmail.com>
	<49577BEC.2090306@compsys.to>
	<1e1fc3e90812280752h2d1b8d45sfecc412d42eba525@mail.gmail.com>
	<4957FBBA.2010003@mail.msu.edu>
	
	<495830E3.8000908@gmail.com>
Message-ID: 

On Sun, Dec 28, 2008 at 9:07 PM, Sridhar Ayengar  wrote:
> Ethan Dicks wrote:
>>
>> What you are after is rosin-core lead-based solder around 60/40 or
>> 63/37 tin/lead, with a diameter around 0.5mm (.020") to 0.8mm (.032").
>
> I highly recommend 63/37 over 60/40.  I find it easer to work with.

Sure, but I'd never _not_ do a project because all I had on hand was
60/40, though.

-ethan


From jhfinedp3k at compsys.to  Sun Dec 28 20:36:29 2008
From: jhfinedp3k at compsys.to (Jerome H. Fine)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 21:36:29 -0500
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <495837AD.2060707@compsys.to>

 >Tony Duell wrote:

>I refuse to beleive it takes you over an hour to solder one connection! :-)
>  
>
Jerome Fine replies:

Well, maybe soldering a VT103 backplane was not so bad, but I seem to 
remember the
problems I once had with a DRV11 module.  It needed to be strapped, but 
the only way that
DEC provided to change the CSR value was with zero ohm resistors.  
Removing a strap just
meant cutting out a resistor.  But I found it impossible to add a 
resistor.  Finally after several
hours of unsuccessful attempts (and almost damaging the board), I solved 
the problem by
removing a few male connector pins from a damaged board and soldering 
them into the
appropriate holes where the zero ohm resistor leads would normally be 
placed.  Since the
very tiny pin was easy to manipulate and could be easily inserted into a 
melted solder hole,
I ended up with two pins which I could them wire wrap since the pins 
were very similar to
wire wrap posts in the first place.  Why DEC had not done that to start 
with I don't know,
but I finally did change the CSR value.  And it took about TWO hours 
each to finally insert
each pin.

Needless to say, I am not a bit fan of making solder connections at this 
point.

>>As far I my experience is worth, the upgrade to a 22 bit backplane with 
>>the version DEC
>>provides in the VT103 works VERY well.  I watched over at least 6 VT103s
>>
>That does not suprise me. I was under the impression that some very early 
>Q-bus modules used at least one of those pins for something else (I've 
>seen 3rd-party Q-bus cards with 22 bit DMA capability where the bus 
>driver for thsoe upper 4 address lines (normally a '38 or similar) is 
>socketed with instructions to remove it if used in certain backplanes) 
>but I suspect the VT103 is late enoguh for this not to be an issue.
>  
>
As far as I know, the LSI-11 CPU modules (both dual and quad) do use 
some of those address lines.

But the M8186, M8189, M8190 and M8192 can't since they all support 22 
bit addresses for
memory.

So the VT103 backplane from DEC with 18 bit address lines probably 
supports the use of
the LSI-11 CPUs, but not after modification to 22 bit addresses.  Since 
the PDP-11/73 CPUs
are now readily available, I can't see anyone using an LSI-11 CPU at 
this point except in VERY
unusual situations which require the LSI-11 CPU for a special reason - 
like the microcode which
can be modified.  I don't know of anyone who ever modified the microcode 
for an LSI-11 CPU.

That is not to say that I will not invent new PDP-11 instructions such 
as an UNSIGNED multiply,
32 bit multiply and divide which will be implemented under Ersatz-11.  
But as the fellow in Irma
La Duce said "That is another story."

>>The really cool reason to use a VT103 is that a hard drive can be placed 
>>right under the CRT.
>>
>I wonder about stray magnetic fields from the yoke and/or flybackj 
>transformer. Not that they'll corrupt the magnetic patterns on the disk, 
>but that they'll be picked up by the read amplifier anf cause random data 
>erros. But I guess it works OK.
>  
>
Not knowing about stray magnetic fields, I just put an ST412 (actually a 
DEC RD51) under the
tube and started to run.  This used a Sigma RQD11-B MFM controller (dual 
board with boot
ROMs) with an M8186.  Worked great.  Made them available to Ontario 
Hydro as a work
station.  Since they were already using the VT103 with a dual RX02 
floppy drive, the hard
drive was a huge improvement.  They ran RT-11 and having a 10 MByte hard 
drive rather
than a 0.5 Mbyte floppy made a huge improvement.  Expensive at the time, 
but worth while
for commercial use.

>>The one problem of using the VT103 is that the power supply is really 
>>too limited, although with
>>only 4 slots, not a lot of power needed.  Tony, perhaps you might be 
>>able to suggest how
>>the 5 amp supply could be enhanced?  On the other hand, with a BA23 
>>    
>>
>
>Do you mean '5 amp' or '5 volt' here? I was under the impression it was 
>around 15A or so at 5V.
>  
>
Yes!  I did mean the 5 Volt which is limited to 16 Amps on the VT103.  
And that includes
all of the boards, including the VT100 video card and anything else in 
the VT100 which uses
the 5 Volt level.

>Increasing the rating of a PSU is not easy in general. Many of the 
>components would need replacign with higher-rated parts, including the 
>transformer (whether linear or switch-mode), the rectifiers, smoothing 
>capacitors (increase in capacitance value), chopper transistors (if an 
>SMSPU), pass transistors (if a linear design), etc.and of course you'd have 
>modify any current limit circuitry. It'd probably be easier to design a 
>replacement PSU from scratch to fit in the same space.
>  
>
I thought as much.  I will continue to use the BA23 and BA123 for now.  
Since the core 2 duo
CPU runs Windows XP which runs Ersatz-11 which runs RT-11 at more than 
100 times the
speed of a PDP-11/93, it is not likely that I will be using a real DEC 
CPU much in any case.
By the way, with SATA II drives, the disk I/O is probably 200 times 
faster than any ESDI or
SCSI drive connected to a PDP-11.

>>As for modes of failure, how often should a power supply be used to be 
>>sure that keeping it out
>>of service does not cause a failure when the power supply is used after 
>>a few years?  Does anyone
>>have any recommendations?
>>
>About the only thing that'll fail from not being used are electrolytic 
>capacitors, and I am not convinced this is a major problem with 
>modern-ish ones. Certainly it's not a failure I've ever encountered (yes, 
>I've had electrolytics fail, but not by the oxide-film disolving due to 
>them not being used).
>
I probably turn on the PDP-11/83 about 2 times a year.  Since I had 2 
BA123 power supplies
fail in the past 10 years, I wondered about having to use them or loose 
them.  At one point,
I was told by a company that I did some software programming for that 
their major customer
required them to run the PDP-11 systems every 3 months until delivery 
which was not to be
for 2 years.  Thus the reason for my question.

Sincerely yours,

Jerome Fine


From jhfinedp3k at compsys.to  Sun Dec 28 20:37:02 2008
From: jhfinedp3k at compsys.to (Jerome H. Fine)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 21:37:02 -0500
Subject: [SPAM] - Re: Suggestions for VT103? - Sending mail server found
 on dnsbl.sorbs.net
In-Reply-To: <4957FBBA.2010003@mail.msu.edu>
References: 	<4956E744.4010007@compsys.to>	<1e1fc3e90812272100q1800eaeqd26e24412108e9ea@mail.gmail.com>	<49577BEC.2090306@compsys.to><1e1fc3e90812280752h2d1b8d45sfecc412d42eba525@mail.gmail.com>
	<4957FBBA.2010003@mail.msu.edu>
Message-ID: <495837CE.9070208@compsys.to>

 >Josh Dersch wrote:

> >Glen Slick wrote:
>
>> http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/terminal/vt103/MP00731_VT103_Aug80.pdf
>>
>> Page 73 of 76, VT103 BACKPLANE 
>
> So forgive my inexperience here -- but just to make sure I'm 
> understanding the changes I need to make -- is all that's necessary 
> just wiring up the address lines (18-21) from slot 1, to slot 2, to 
> slot 3, to slot 4?

Jerome Fine replies:

Don't forget that both ABs in each slot need to be wired in since each 
quad slot
can hold 2 dual boards.  That means a total of 8 solder joints for each 
address line
and a total of 32 solder joints for all 4 address lines.

Very fine insulated wire wrap seems to be a good solution.  The plastic 
insulation
can be stretched after each solder joint is made to cover the wire right 
up to the
solder joint.  A wire stripper can be used to custom cut the insulation 
at the exact
spot needed - cut a bit short and stretch the insulation after the 
solder is cold.  Then
daisy chain from slot to slot as needed.  Start with the first solder 
joint with about
2" of free wire, then custom cut the insulation to the correct length 
for the second
solder joint on the same slot (second AB on that slot).  It probably 
helps to keep
the wires as neat as possible since the next address line is very close.

> Also, just to satisfy my curiosity -- it's been mentioned by several 
> people that lead-based solder is necessary -- why is this?  (I think I 
> have a spool of it somewhere that I liberated from my grandfather's 
> basement some years back, but I'll have to dig it up...)

Ethan answered this much better than my limited knowledge!

Sincerely yours,

Jerome Fine


From jhfinedp3k at compsys.to  Sun Dec 28 20:38:02 2008
From: jhfinedp3k at compsys.to (Jerome H. Fine)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 21:38:02 -0500
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: <4957FEF1.3010109@mail.msu.edu>
References: 	<4956F03B.1030802@crash.com>	<49577BAE.9060902@compsys.to>
	<4957FEF1.3010109@mail.msu.edu>
Message-ID: <4958380A.2040204@compsys.to>

 >Josh Dersch wrote:

> I have a number of RQDX3's, but I'll probably go with the Emulex QD21 
> ESDI controller that I have.  It has an auto-boot option, which will 
> be useful since the 11/23 board I have just has the ODT ROMs...

Jerome Fine replies:

I use a Sigma RQD11-EC quad ESDI controller which can run 4 ESDI drives.
What I like best is that 3 drives are VERY easily (just ground the 
correct line)
made WRITE  PROTECTED.  Not having a proper panel, I just use a 10 pin
cable and alligator clips to ground the line.

The Hitachi DK515 with about 600 MBytes each work well.  I modified the
RT-11 MSCP device driver to allow me to boot any of the 60 partitions on the
3 drives.  Normally, I use 3 drives with 2 being backups and only drive 
0 with
20 RT-11 partitions being modified at any time.  All drives are usually 
WRITE
PROTECTED most of the time since I normally fix bugs in the RT-11 operating
system and the device drivers.  Since any mistakes in my code modifications
could corrupt the hard drive, having them hardware WRITE  PROTECTED
prevents that until I have checked out the code.  After I have made the 
changes
to the backup drives, I boot the backup drive and copy the changes to 
drive 0
which is now just a data drive.

I have 2 command files which compare all 20 partitions on drive 0 to each of
the 20 partitions on drive 1 or drive 2.  That takes about 4 minutes for 
each
pair of RT-11 partitions of 32 MBytes each or about 80 minutes in total.

Under Ersatz-11 with a core 2 duo, it takes about 1.7 seconds per pair of
RT-11 partitions of 32 MBytes or about 30 seconds for all 20 pair of RT-11
partitions - not even time to get a drink.  I am working on enhancing 
the HD:
device driver under Ersatz-11.  It is twice as fast as the MSCP device 
driver.

For raw throughput, if I bypass the HD: device driver code and use a user
subroutine without interrupts (hardly necessary when things are this fast),
making a copy of an RT-11 partition of 32 MBytes is twice as fast again.
A straight copy is about 0.2 seconds for all 32 MBytes as opposed to
about 240 seconds the copy an RT-11 partition on those very fast (for
a real DEC PDP-11/83 system) ESDI hard drives.

Sincerely yours,

Jerome Fine


From jhfinedp3k at compsys.to  Sun Dec 28 20:39:02 2008
From: jhfinedp3k at compsys.to (Jerome H. Fine)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 21:39:02 -0500
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: 
References: 	<4956E744.4010007@compsys.to>	<1e1fc3e90812272100q1800eaeqd26e24412108e9ea@mail.gmail.com>	<49577BEC.2090306@compsys.to>	<1e1fc3e90812280752h2d1b8d45sfecc412d42eba525@mail.gmail.com>	<4957FBBA.2010003@mail.msu.edu>
	
Message-ID: <49583846.4070900@compsys.to>

 >Ethan Dicks wrote:

>>On Sun, Dec 28, 2008 at 5:20 PM, Josh Dersch  wrote:
>  
>
>>Also, just to satisfy my curiosity -- it's been mentioned by several people
>>that lead-based solder is necessary -- why is this?
>>    
>>
>
>Because the equipment was made with lead-based solder (being many,
>many years older than the RoHS directives), and mixing lead-free and
>lead-based solder is not a good idea.  I'm sure someone here can quote
>chapter and verse, but AFAIK, you'll get unreliable solder joints if
>you try.
>
>  
>
>>(I think I have a spool
>>of it somewhere that I liberated from my grandfather's basement some years
>>back, but I'll have to dig it up...)
>>    
>>
>
>If that's plumbing solder, you are unlikely to get good results.
>Really, really old plumbing solder _is_ lead-based, but most of what
>you are likely to find is not (so that it's safe to use on supply
>lines).  Plumbing solder is also frequently acid-cored or fluxless.  I
>don't recall running into any plumbing solder that is compatible with
>electronic circuits.
>
>Now...if your grandfather was a Ham or did electronic repairs, what
>you have might be just perfect, but be sure you have the right stuff
>before you get started.
>
>What you are after is rosin-core lead-based solder around 60/40 or
>63/37 tin/lead, with a diameter around 0.5mm (.020") to 0.8mm (.032").
> The exact ratio of lead to tin is not critical, nor is the exact
>diameter, but since you aren't doing ultra-fine work or trying to
>solder down something huge and heavy, like bundles of power-supply
>leads or RF cages, I'd recommend something "medium" weight, like the
>0.8mm (.032").
>
>There should be a label on one end of the spool (if it's still on the
>original spool) describing the various characteristics.  If you aren't
>practiced at making good joints, I'd recommend getting an inexpensive
>electronic hobby kit to practice on.  My earliest efforts from when I
>was in Jr. High are rather ugly - by the time I was adding blue wires
>to $2000 boards at work five years later, I'd gotten much, much better
>from the early practice.
>  
>
Very helpful - thank you!

Sincerely yours,

Jerome Fine

obtained by replacing the four characters preceding the
'at' with the four digits of the current year.



From jhfinedp3k at compsys.to  Sun Dec 28 20:42:57 2008
From: jhfinedp3k at compsys.to (Jerome H. Fine)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 21:42:57 -0500
Subject: Suggestions for VT103? 
In-Reply-To: <495837CE.9070208@compsys.to>
References: 	<4956E744.4010007@compsys.to>	<1e1fc3e90812272100q1800eaeqd26e24412108e9ea@mail.gmail.com>	<49577BEC.2090306@compsys.to><1e1fc3e90812280752h2d1b8d45sfecc412d42eba525@mail.gmail.com>	<4957FBBA.2010003@mail.msu.edu>
	<495837CE.9070208@compsys.to>
Message-ID: <49583931.4090103@compsys.to>

 >Jerome H. Fine wrote:

[Snip]

Sorry about the subject line - my son modifies it when his server thinks 
it is something suspect.

> >Josh Dersch wrote:
>
>> >Glen Slick wrote:
>>
>>> http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/terminal/vt103/MP00731_VT103_Aug80.pdf
>>>
>>> Page 73 of 76, VT103 BACKPLANE 
>>
>>
>> So forgive my inexperience here -- but just to make sure I'm 
>> understanding the changes I need to make -- is all that's necessary 
>> just wiring up the address lines (18-21) from slot 1, to slot 2, to 
>> slot 3, to slot 4?
>
>
> Jerome Fine replies:
>
> Don't forget that both ABs in each slot need to be wired in since each 
> quad slot
> can hold 2 dual boards.  That means a total of 8 solder joints for 
> each address line
> and a total of 32 solder joints for all 4 address lines.
>
> Very fine insulated wire wrap seems to be a good solution.  The 
> plastic insulation
> can be stretched after each solder joint is made to cover the wire 
> right up to the
> solder joint.  A wire stripper can be used to custom cut the 
> insulation at the exact
> spot needed - cut a bit short and stretch the insulation after the 
> solder is cold.  Then
> daisy chain from slot to slot as needed.  Start with the first solder 
> joint with about
> 2" of free wire, then custom cut the insulation to the correct length 
> for the second
> solder joint on the same slot (second AB on that slot).  It probably 
> helps to keep
> the wires as neat as possible since the next address line is very close.
>
>> Also, just to satisfy my curiosity -- it's been mentioned by several 
>> people that lead-based solder is necessary -- why is this?  (I think 
>> I have a spool of it somewhere that I liberated from my grandfather's 
>> basement some years back, but I'll have to dig it up...)
>
>
> Ethan answered this much better than my limited knowledge!
>
> Sincerely yours,
>
> Jerome Fine



From doc at mdrconsult.com  Sun Dec 28 21:53:23 2008
From: doc at mdrconsult.com (Doc Shipley)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 21:53:23 -0600
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: <495830E3.8000908@gmail.com>
References: 	<4956E744.4010007@compsys.to>	<1e1fc3e90812272100q1800eaeqd26e24412108e9ea@mail.gmail.com>	<49577BEC.2090306@compsys.to>	<1e1fc3e90812280752h2d1b8d45sfecc412d42eba525@mail.gmail.com>	<4957FBBA.2010003@mail.msu.edu>	
	<495830E3.8000908@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <495849B3.6020708@mdrconsult.com>

Sridhar Ayengar wrote:
> Ethan Dicks wrote:
>> What you are after is rosin-core lead-based solder around 60/40 or
>> 63/37 tin/lead, with a diameter around 0.5mm (.020") to 0.8mm (.032").
> 
> I highly recommend 63/37 over 60/40.  I find it easer to work with.

   I had the dubious distinction of being a "Certified Solder Operator" 
for TI's Lubbock, TX plant (in, what, '82?).  Although the training I 
got there spoiled me forever in some ways, it's been invaluable over the 
years.

   One of the things that stuck was the "true purpose" of eutectic 
solder.  We always used 60/40 for original or initial soldering, and 
eutectic for repairs or "oversolders".  If you have a good iron and a 
good eye (or, these days, good Optivisor), the flow-point difference 
allows doing new work without disturbing old joints.


	Doc


From dkelvey at hotmail.com  Sun Dec 28 22:04:44 2008
From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 20:04:44 -0800
Subject: Heathkit manuals under tighter control
In-Reply-To: <6.2.3.4.2.20081228195539.06181cc0@mail.threedee.com>
References: <6.2.3.4.2.20081228195539.06181cc0@mail.threedee.com>
Message-ID: 




----------------------------------------
> Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 19:58:00 -0600
> To: cctalk at classiccmp.org
> From: jfoust at threedee.com
> Subject: Heathkit manuals under tighter control
>
>
> http://techdirt.com/articles/20081215/0106043118.shtml
>
>
> - John
>
 
Hi
 Technically, if you have a H89 or such and you've lost
the manual, you have a right to a copy of the manual
without paying any copyright fee. The manual is already
payed for.
 Still, if they have the copyright, they can have it removed
from the web if they can prove it is used for anything
other than replacing lost manuals.
 I'm no lawyer and this is just a personal opinion.
Dwight

 
_________________________________________________________________
Life on your PC is safer, easier, and more enjoyable with Windows Vista?. 
http://clk.atdmt.com/MRT/go/127032870/direct/01/


From ploopster at gmail.com  Sun Dec 28 22:10:19 2008
From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 23:10:19 -0500
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: 
References: 	<4956E744.4010007@compsys.to>	<1e1fc3e90812272100q1800eaeqd26e24412108e9ea@mail.gmail.com>	<49577BEC.2090306@compsys.to>	<1e1fc3e90812280752h2d1b8d45sfecc412d42eba525@mail.gmail.com>	<4957FBBA.2010003@mail.msu.edu>		<495830E3.8000908@gmail.com>
	
Message-ID: <49584DAB.1000500@gmail.com>

Ethan Dicks wrote:
> On Sun, Dec 28, 2008 at 9:07 PM, Sridhar Ayengar  wrote:
>> Ethan Dicks wrote:
>>> What you are after is rosin-core lead-based solder around 60/40 or
>>> 63/37 tin/lead, with a diameter around 0.5mm (.020") to 0.8mm (.032").
>> I highly recommend 63/37 over 60/40.  I find it easer to work with.
> 
> Sure, but I'd never _not_ do a project because all I had on hand was
> 60/40, though.

Oh no, that's not what I'm saying at all.  It's just that, if I'm going 
to be buying lead solder, I'll buy 63/37 every time.

Peace...  Sridhar


From healyzh at aracnet.com  Sun Dec 28 23:24:08 2008
From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 21:24:08 -0800
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
Message-ID: 

The uIEC/SD I bought from Jim Brain was delivered Friday night (USPS 
was actually unable to deliver for several days in our area).  My 
mail is currently going to a different location than we're living, so 
I picked it up yesterday, and retrieved my customized C64 from 
storage, and got everything plugged in last night (this was the first 
time we'd been able to get our car out of the driveway in over two 
weeks).

Once I figured out how to use it, all I can say it is seriously cool, 
way better than my MMC-Replay for dealing with D64 images, and it was 
a lot cheaper!  I'm even able to use it with the MMC-Replay plugged 
in so I have my Ethernet connection.  With the MMC-Replay I was only 
able to get one or two D64 images to work, with the uIEC most I've 
tried have worked.  I've been playing "Temple of Apshai" all day and 
having a blast! :-)

Now to decide if I put it in some sort of case, or if I mount it 
inside the C64 somehow.

Zane


-- 
| Zane H. Healy                    | UNIX Systems Administrator |
| healyzh at aracnet.com (primary)    | OpenVMS Enthusiast         |
| MONK::HEALYZH (DECnet)           | Classic Computer Collector |
+----------------------------------+----------------------------+
|     Empire of the Petal Throne and Traveller Role Playing,    |
|          PDP-10 Emulation and Zane's Computer Museum.         |
|                http://www.aracnet.com/~healyzh/               |


From mcguire at neurotica.com  Mon Dec 29 00:30:28 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 01:30:28 -0500
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: <49580590.9060400@aurigae.demon.co.uk>
References: 	<2840AD63-9B33-4116-AA44-DA02A72CE654@neurotica.com>	<4957F946.7070306@aurigae.demon.co.uk>
	
	<49580590.9060400@aurigae.demon.co.uk>
Message-ID: <36662B2D-068D-4CD9-B096-F1129A6CCCA3@neurotica.com>

On Dec 28, 2008, at 6:02 PM, Phill Harvey-Smith wrote:
>>> BTW I was given a bare unpopulated Ace board for Christmas, I  
>>> have taken some scans of it but at 1200dpi they are *HUGE*
>>   I'd be willing to turn those scans into Gerber files if you send  
>> them to me..
>
> That would be cool, an eagle board layout would be better still.....
>
> Let me see if I can zip em up small, I'll prolly upload them to a  
> server at work (and email off list) as it has much more bandwidth  
> than I do and they are really huge :)

   I use PCB, not Eagle, (see http://www.geda.seul.org/) but getting  
them into SOME maintainable format would be better than nothing.

          -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From brain at jbrain.com  Mon Dec 29 00:33:44 2008
From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 00:33:44 -0600
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <49586F48.3090205@jbrain.com>

Zane H. Healy wrote:
> The uIEC/SD I bought from Jim Brain was delivered Friday night (USPS 
> was actually unable to deliver for several days in our area).  My mail 
> is currently going to a different location than we're living, so I 
> picked it up yesterday, and retrieved my customized C64 from storage, 
> and got everything plugged in last night (this was the first time we'd 
> been able to get our car out of the driveway in over two weeks).
>
> Once I figured out how to use it, all I can say it is seriously cool, 
> way better than my MMC-Replay for dealing with D64 images, and it was 
> a lot cheaper!  I'm even able to use it with the MMC-Replay plugged in 
> so I have my Ethernet connection.  With the MMC-Replay I was only able 
> to get one or two D64 images to work, with the uIEC most I've tried 
> have worked.  I've been playing "Temple of Apshai" all day and having 
> a blast! :-)
>
> Now to decide if I put it in some sort of case, or if I mount it 
> inside the C64 somehow.
>
> Zane
>
>
I'm glad you're enjoying it. 

As I implied in a previous post, the device has an interesting history 
that has shifted my philosophy concerning such projects.  I've come to 
realize that, in the hobbyist space, collaboration yields much more 
fruit for the project, even though one loses the "I did it all myself" 
statement.  I was always afraid I would never learn as much if I didn't 
do it all myself, but that has *NOT* been the case.  And, it's nice to 
bounce ideas off others when trying to map new concepts like IDE 
partitions and such into a 25+ year old platform.

Although I am now biased, I started uIEC because I felt the IDE64 took 
away too much flexibility.  It assumes the 64 is the only CBM machine, 
requires an expansion port, and requires programs use only the normal 
KERNAL IEC routines if they are to work.  As a VIC/C128 owner, that 
seemed wrong.

The MMC64, on the other hand, is more complex to explain.  As a 
"mega-cart", it's fine (load cart images onto SD card, play lots of cart 
or single filer games).  But, then they started marketing it as a 
general purpose drive unit (or people started assuming it world work 
like that), I think it suffered.  It's not ideally suited for that use.

There are still things to do with the uIEC base, though.  IEEE488 
support would be a great win, as then PET/CBM machines would have a 
solid state device to use, and I am working on a USB link to a PC, so 
one can slave their Win/Mac/Linux box to their CBM.  And, for those who 
want something more vintage as a target, the protocol is simple RS232 (I 
use a RS232->USB converter), so they could add a MAX232 and write a 
suitable app for anything that provides RS232.

Jim



From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Mon Dec 29 01:02:47 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 02:02:47 -0500
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: <495849B3.6020708@mdrconsult.com>
References: 
	<4956E744.4010007@compsys.to>
	<1e1fc3e90812272100q1800eaeqd26e24412108e9ea@mail.gmail.com>
	<49577BEC.2090306@compsys.to>
	<1e1fc3e90812280752h2d1b8d45sfecc412d42eba525@mail.gmail.com>
	<4957FBBA.2010003@mail.msu.edu>
	
	<495830E3.8000908@gmail.com> <495849B3.6020708@mdrconsult.com>
Message-ID: 

On Sun, Dec 28, 2008 at 10:53 PM, Doc Shipley  wrote:
>> I highly recommend 63/37 over 60/40.  I find it easer to work with.
>
>  I had the dubious distinction of being a "Certified Solder Operator" for
> TI's Lubbock, TX plant (in, what, '82?).  Although the training I got there
> spoiled me forever in some ways, it's been invaluable over the years.

Neat.  I never had formal training - just practical tips and
experience.  Oh, wait... I _did_ get one training course - on how to
do SMT benchwork when I was at Lucent... I worked on the plant floor
for a couple of weeks.

>  One of the things that stuck was the "true purpose" of eutectic solder.  We
> always used 60/40 for original or initial soldering, and eutectic for
> repairs or "oversolders".  If you have a good iron and a good eye (or, these
> days, good Optivisor), the flow-point difference allows doing new work
> without disturbing old joints.

Ah!  I get it.  Interesting.

None of the stuff I've done was that finicky, but it's good to know.

-ethan


From bqt at softjar.se  Sun Dec 28 09:33:15 2008
From: bqt at softjar.se (Johnny Billquist)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 16:33:15 +0100
Subject: Facit 4431 terminal
Message-ID: <49579C3B.2040307@softjar.se>

Anyone have any docs for this terminal? It's a plain glass terminal. 
VT100-compatible.
I have a problem with mine, and don't have any kind of documentation. I do see 
that the data lines have junk on them, and the serial port isn't working.
But internal tests pass, and the setup and local mode works fine.

	Johnny

-- 
Johnny Billquist                  || "I'm on a bus
                                   ||  on a psychedelic trip
email: bqt at softjar.se             ||  Reading murder books
pdp is alive!                     ||  tryin' to stay hip" - B. Idol


From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG  Sun Dec 28 13:09:08 2008
From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (der Mouse)
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 14:09:08 -0500 (EST)
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <49578DCB.5010204@e-bbes.com>
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>	<1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com>	<24146.1229784478@mini>
	<24342.1229976120@mini>	<9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>		<9081BA4A-D92D-47E4-94BE-74E12A044B13@neurotica.com>	<002001c967d8$47df4060$d79dc120$@com>
	<4956D677.3000407@crash.com>
	
	<49578DCB.5010204@e-bbes.com>
Message-ID: <200812281912.OAA13191@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>

> I guess all the people who still like to run them have SCSI
> controllers on them by now, [...]

I wish.  I don't run my uV2, but that's largely because I don't have
more than trivial quantities of disk that's compatible with the Qbus
disk interfaces I have.

At one point it looked as though I might get a Qbus SCSI card that
wasn't bootable (I don't mind netbooting as long as I can _run_ off
local disk), but that never actually materialized....

/~\ The ASCII				  Mouse
\ / Ribbon Campaign
 X  Against HTML		mouse at rodents-montreal.org
/ \ Email!	     7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39  4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B


From sellam at vintagetech.com  Mon Dec 29 06:20:57 2008
From: sellam at vintagetech.com (Sellam Ismail)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 04:20:57 -0800
Subject: ACCRC Sealed-Bid Auction Lot #2 Ready
Message-ID: <4958C0A9.mailH7I13DY3H@vintagetech.com>

Announcing: ACCRC Seald-Bid Auction Lot #2

*** This is the last notice that will be sent to the general VCF
mailing list.  To ensure you receive further updates regarding this
auction, please visit the VCF website and click the "Mailing List"
link in the navigation tab on the right-hand side or bottom of any
page.  Then click on the link to update your contact information and
follow the prompts from there to get into your profile.  You should
then select which announcements you want to receive.  If you don't
want to receive any more of these auction notices, select "Major
announcements and newsletter only".  Otherwise, select "Send me all
VCF announcements".

The Alameda County Computer Resource Center (ACCRC) is forced to
liquidate its computer museum due to the current economic climate.
The VCF has been contracted to auction off the ACCRC museum to raise
needed funds for their non-profit operation.

I have put up the second batch of machines at the following URL:

   http://www.vintage.org/special/2008/accrc/

In order to use the system you must have a VCF Community ID.  Getting
one is simple: just follow the links and prompts when you visit the
URL above and read the instructions.

The closing time for this lot is Monday, January 5, at 12:00PM PST.

New lots will be posted by noon every Monday on a weekly basis until
all items are depleted.  At this rate we expect 4-5 more lots.


ACCRC Sealed-Bid Auction Lot #2

## Description
-- -------------------------------------------------
16 Kaypro 2X
24 Kaypro 1
42 Eagle II
43 HP 41CV Calculator
44 JC Penny Video Sports
45 Timex-Sinclair 1000
46 Stratus V101 Dumb Terminal
47 HP 85
48 Tandy Color Computer 3
49 Calcomp Drawing Board
50 Atari 2600 Video Computer System
51 Tandy CCR-82 Computer Cassette Recorder
52 Generic Lunchbox Portable
53 Atari 830 Acoustic Coupler Modem + 850 Interface
54 Magnavox Odyssey2 Console
55 Commodore Amiga 500
56 GRiDPad 1900
57 Compaq Portable
58 Platinum Apple IIe
59 Processor Technology Sol-20
60 Non-Linear Systems Kaypro 10

Check the item listings at the link above for further information and
details.

All items must be sold. No reasonable offer will be refused.  Your
purchases will go towards supporting an organization that over the
years has provided nearly 20,000 refurbished computers to needy
organizations and individuals worldwide.  100% of the proceeds of this
auction will go directly to the ACCRC (minus the handling fees, which
are covering my time...barely).


Best regards,

Sellam Ismail
Proprietor
Vintage Computer Festival
http://www.vintage.org


From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Mon Dec 29 06:48:36 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 10:48:36 -0200
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
References: 	<2840AD63-9B33-4116-AA44-DA02A72CE654@neurotica.com>	<4957F946.7070306@aurigae.demon.co.uk>
	<49582073.8030202@jbrain.com>
Message-ID: <08d001c969b3$d10c0c60$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

> I'd be interested in how this is done as well.  Lots of folks ask me to 
> reproduce vintage boards, and creating EAGLE CAD drawings for them is 
> time consuming.
    
    It is because eagle sux. A lot. :o)



From ploopster at gmail.com  Mon Dec 29 07:21:28 2008
From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 08:21:28 -0500
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <200812281912.OAA13191@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>	<1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com>	<24146.1229784478@mini>	<24342.1229976120@mini>	<9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>		<9081BA4A-D92D-47E4-94BE-74E12A044B13@neurotica.com>	<002001c967d8$47df4060$d79dc120$@com>	<4956D677.3000407@crash.com>		<49578DCB.5010204@e-bbes.com>
	<200812281912.OAA13191@Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
Message-ID: <4958CED8.5050201@gmail.com>

der Mouse wrote:
>> I guess all the people who still like to run them have SCSI
>> controllers on them by now, [...]
> 
> I wish.  I don't run my uV2, but that's largely because I don't have
> more than trivial quantities of disk that's compatible with the Qbus
> disk interfaces I have.
> 
> At one point it looked as though I might get a Qbus SCSI card that
> wasn't bootable (I don't mind netbooting as long as I can _run_ off
> local disk), but that never actually materialized....

Why not cluster-boot with local swap?  Shouldn't be too slow.

Peace...  Sridhar


From db at db.net  Mon Dec 29 07:54:50 2008
From: db at db.net (Diane Bruce)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 08:54:50 -0500
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
	<4956E744.4010007@compsys.to>
	<1e1fc3e90812272100q1800eaeqd26e24412108e9ea@mail.gmail.com>
	<49577BEC.2090306@compsys.to>
	<1e1fc3e90812280752h2d1b8d45sfecc412d42eba525@mail.gmail.com>
	<4957FBBA.2010003@mail.msu.edu>
	
	<495830E3.8000908@gmail.com>
	
Message-ID: <20081229135450.GA35079@night.db.net>

On Sun, Dec 28, 2008 at 09:26:24PM -0500, Ethan Dicks wrote:
> On Sun, Dec 28, 2008 at 9:07 PM, Sridhar Ayengar  wrote:
> > Ethan Dicks wrote:
> >>
> >> What you are after is rosin-core lead-based solder around 60/40 or
> >> 63/37 tin/lead, with a diameter around 0.5mm (.020") to 0.8mm (.032").
> >
> > I highly recommend 63/37 over 60/40.  I find it easer to work with.
>
> Sure, but I'd never _not_ do a project because all I had on hand was
> 60/40, though.

As you know, the biggest difference is the lower melting point of 63/37,
that does make it easier to work with.

I don't suppose I need to say this, but never ever ever use the roll of solder
your father used for plumbing with the acid core. Ever.

>
> -ethan
>

- 73 Diane VA3DB
--
- db at FreeBSD.org db at db.net http://www.db.net/~db


From ploopster at gmail.com  Mon Dec 29 07:57:38 2008
From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 08:57:38 -0500
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: <20081229135450.GA35079@night.db.net>
References: 	<4956E744.4010007@compsys.to>	<1e1fc3e90812272100q1800eaeqd26e24412108e9ea@mail.gmail.com>	<49577BEC.2090306@compsys.to>	<1e1fc3e90812280752h2d1b8d45sfecc412d42eba525@mail.gmail.com>	<4957FBBA.2010003@mail.msu.edu>		<495830E3.8000908@gmail.com>	
	<20081229135450.GA35079@night.db.net>
Message-ID: <4958D752.4040607@gmail.com>

Diane Bruce wrote:
> On Sun, Dec 28, 2008 at 09:26:24PM -0500, Ethan Dicks wrote:
>> On Sun, Dec 28, 2008 at 9:07 PM, Sridhar Ayengar  wrote:
>>> Ethan Dicks wrote:
>>>> What you are after is rosin-core lead-based solder around 60/40 or
>>>> 63/37 tin/lead, with a diameter around 0.5mm (.020") to 0.8mm (.032").
>>> I highly recommend 63/37 over 60/40.  I find it easer to work with.
>> Sure, but I'd never _not_ do a project because all I had on hand was
>> 60/40, though.
> 
> As you know, the biggest difference is the lower melting point of 63/37,
> that does make it easier to work with.

It's not the lower melting point.  It's that the mixture is eutectic.

Peace...  Sridhar


From db at db.net  Mon Dec 29 08:08:57 2008
From: db at db.net (Diane Bruce)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 09:08:57 -0500
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: <4958D752.4040607@gmail.com>
References: <4956E744.4010007@compsys.to>
	<1e1fc3e90812272100q1800eaeqd26e24412108e9ea@mail.gmail.com>
	<49577BEC.2090306@compsys.to>
	<1e1fc3e90812280752h2d1b8d45sfecc412d42eba525@mail.gmail.com>
	<4957FBBA.2010003@mail.msu.edu>
	
	<495830E3.8000908@gmail.com>
	
	<20081229135450.GA35079@night.db.net> <4958D752.4040607@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <20081229140857.GB35079@night.db.net>

On Mon, Dec 29, 2008 at 08:57:38AM -0500, Sridhar Ayengar wrote:
> Diane Bruce wrote:
> >On Sun, Dec 28, 2008 at 09:26:24PM -0500, Ethan Dicks wrote:
> >>On Sun, Dec 28, 2008 at 9:07 PM, Sridhar Ayengar 
...
> >>Sure, but I'd never _not_ do a project because all I had on hand was
> >>60/40, though.
> >
> >As you know, the biggest difference is the lower melting point of 63/37,
> >that does make it easier to work with.
>
> It's not the lower melting point.  It's that the mixture is eutectic.

Yes I know it is eutectic. But for newbies the lower temperature is much
easier on the board, one tends to lift fewer foils this way. It's also
much easier with a decent soldering station to not lift foils, but if you
don't have such, a lower melting point means the newbie tends not to overdo it.
Of course, if you are soldering some heavy duty backplane, which I believe
was the start of this thread, I suppose it's not as much of a problem.
But I'd still recommend not using lead/acid solder for a backplane. ;-)


>
> Peace...  Sridhar
>

- 73 Diane VA3DB
--
- db at FreeBSD.org db at db.net http://www.db.net/~db


From healyzh at aracnet.com  Mon Dec 29 09:59:00 2008
From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 07:59:00 -0800
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <49586F48.3090205@jbrain.com>
References: 
	<49586F48.3090205@jbrain.com>
Message-ID: 

At 12:33 AM -0600 12/29/08, Jim Brain wrote:
>The MMC64, on the other hand, is more complex to explain.  As a 
>"mega-cart", it's fine (load cart images onto SD card, play lots of 
>cart or single filer games).  But, then they started marketing it as 
>a general purpose drive unit (or people started assuming it world 
>work like that), I think it suffered.  It's not ideally suited for 
>that use.

I'm glad I own a MMC-Replay cart, especially with the RRNET option, 
but if the uIEC had been available I might not of purchased it. 
While you can mount D64 images, you can't run most software from 
them.  I think the situation might be better on PAL C64's.

I've found that Individual Computers has a habit of advertising 
features that don't quite live up to my expectations.  I also own a 
Catweasel card for my Amiga, and even though I bought it nearly 10 
years ago, I'm still a bit ticked over it.  If something doesn't 
include device drivers, you shouldn't advertise it as supporting 
various formats.  It basically could read 2 of the floppy types it 
claimed to support.

>to use, and I am working on a USB link to a PC, so one can slave 
>their Win/Mac/Linux box to their CBM.  And, for those who want 
>something more vintage as a target, the protocol is simple RS232 (I 
>use a RS232->USB converter), so they could add a MAX232 and write a 
>suitable app for anything that provides RS232.

If you support Mac & Linux this might be of interest to me.  My major 
problem with just things has been the fact that it only ever seems to 
support Windows, and I don't typically have a Windows machine running.

One question, what size SD cards does the uIEC support, and does it 
support HDSD cards?  Right now I'm using the 2GB card from my 
MMC-Replay and it wants its card back. :-)

Zane


-- 
| Zane H. Healy                    | UNIX Systems Administrator |
| healyzh at aracnet.com (primary)    | OpenVMS Enthusiast         |
| MONK::HEALYZH (DECnet)           | Classic Computer Collector |
+----------------------------------+----------------------------+
|     Empire of the Petal Throne and Traveller Role Playing,    |
|          PDP-10 Emulation and Zane's Computer Museum.         |
|                http://www.aracnet.com/~healyzh/               |


From johnny.billquist at synap.se  Mon Dec 29 05:35:28 2008
From: johnny.billquist at synap.se (Johnny Billquist)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 12:35:28 +0100
Subject: MK11 with 1MB boards
Message-ID: <4958B600.50405@synap.se>

Ok. To start with the short version. Get back when you really want more 
details.

The deal is to fake the MK11 so that it thinks there are four 256KB 
cards when you have a 1MB card.

The memory bus is pretty simple. You have address lines, and card select 
lines. Address lines are as usual.
Card select lines are like chip selects, or whatever you are used to in 
terminology. It selects which card should respond when address and data 
and other control signals are on the bus.
Usually only one card select line is active at a time.

So you have three things to deal with:
. Address lines
. Card select lines
. ECC

Address lines are pretty simple. You grab four card select lines, hook a 
4-to-2 binary multiplexor in there, and you get A18,A19 from those. This 
means that four adjacent cards will cause A18,A19 to be generated.

Card select lines are even simpler. You just OR the four card select 
lines together, and output it on one of them. I seem to remember that 
you don't need to cut anything on the backplane, but check that to be 
sure. Also, you need a total of four of these special cards in order to 
get 4 MB working in the MK11, but all four cards will be identical.

With that, the hardware side is done. Now, the one part left is a bit 
more tricky, but it's a hardware problem with a software solution.
The MK11 (as well as the 11/750) have ECC memory. In order for the 
memory to not scream bloody hell when you access it, the syndrome bits 
must be set right. At power up, the MK11 initialize the syndrome bits 
for all memory in the box, but it does this in a really clever way. It 
runs though all addresses and do a write to them, forcing the ECC 
syndrome bits to be updated.
*But*... It does this on all cards in the box in parallell. That is, all 
card select lines are active at the same time, at this one instance.
The problem with that is that (obviously) not all the memory in the 1MB 
memory board will be reset. By designing your small adapter card the 
right way, you can get atleast the first 256KB ECC syndrome bits set 
right. The rest you'll have to do by software instead, before the memory 
can be used. Otherwise you'll just get parity errors if you try to 
access that memory.
And, normal writes to memory won't work! The memory is 32 bits wide, and 
a normal write from a PDP-11 will only write 16 bits, so it won't cause 
the memory to do a blind write and just set the syndrome bits.
If you read the documentation for the MK11, you'll find that it actually 
have a CSR as well, and in that, you can set bits to force writing the 
syndrome bits and ignore errors. And for the initialization that's what 
you need to do: set the right bits in the CSR, write to all memory 
needed, and then reset the CSR again.
The last "funny" thing with this is that the CSR isn't easy to access. 
All accesses to the I/O page in an 11/70 will cause the reference to run 
out on the Unibus (not surprising). However, the MK11 isn't on the 
Unibus. :-)
The trick is to realize that the Unibus map will always direct the 
access to the memory bus, even if the final address is in the I/O page. 
So, you need to setup the Unibus map to point to the I/O page, and then 
access the MK11 CSR through the Unibus map.

After that, you're all done, and the MK11 with 1MB memory boards will be 
happy. I've done it in the past, and it really not any more complicated 
than that.

	Johnny



From bqt at softjar.se  Mon Dec 29 05:52:14 2008
From: bqt at softjar.se (Johnny Billquist)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 12:52:14 +0100
Subject: PDP-11/70 cache memory
Message-ID: <4958B9EE.1050507@softjar.se>

And since some have mentioned it, there was a 3rd party upgrade to the 
11/70 which replaced the whole memory system with a few cards in the CPU 
box, which turned all memory into cache.
This was by a company called SETASI, and the product was the hypercache.
They actually had two products. HC-70 was the hypercache, and then you 
had something called the PEP-70 as well. It appears they could be used 
together, but I don't know if one was required for the other, or if they 
were related in any way, and if so how.

(SETASI also did other stuff, such as a SCSI adapted for massbus, which 
was pretty nice, and usable both on 16-bit and 36-bit machines.)

	Johnny


From gagnonr at vif.com  Mon Dec 29 09:47:37 2008
From: gagnonr at vif.com (Robin Gagnon)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 10:47:37 -0500
Subject: 5 + q inch diskettes, crate full
Message-ID: <3C378E31FF2B4366ADBAC95DE42E7898@homee8fac8eca1>

I have a banker's box full of 5 1/4" diskettes, in their original boxes, DSDD, of various brands. I haven't counted, but probably a few hundred. A few packages unopened. These diskettes were largely used to run back-ups, so didn't get much wear and tear. Would prefer that some classic computer collector rescue these rather than have them end up in landfill. The whole crate is yours for 20$

gagnonr (at sign) vif.com

Robin Gagnon, Ph.D.
Psychology Department
Dawson College

From mcguire at neurotica.com  Mon Dec 29 10:39:06 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 11:39:06 -0500
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: <065901c9694c$ee718da0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
References: 	<2840AD63-9B33-4116-AA44-DA02A72CE654@neurotica.com>	<4957F946.7070306@aurigae.demon.co.uk>
	<49580590.9060400@aurigae.demon.co.uk>
	<065901c9694c$ee718da0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
Message-ID: <1947BADA-3F0F-4778-9252-5FA8BBE0272B@neurotica.com>

On Dec 28, 2008, at 7:31 PM, Alexandre Souza wrote:
>> Let me see if I can zip em up small, I'll prolly upload them to a  
>> server at work (and email off list) as it has much more bandwidth  
>> than I do and they are really huge :)
>
>    Rapidshare comes to mind

   It wasn't that big, 230MB...only took ~15mins.

          -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From mcguire at neurotica.com  Mon Dec 29 10:40:29 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 11:40:29 -0500
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: <064a01c9694c$c7b5c820$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
References: <2840AD63-9B33-4116-AA44-DA02A72CE654@neurotica.com><4957F946.7070306@aurigae.demon.co.uk>
	
	<064a01c9694c$c7b5c820$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
Message-ID: <3AE9E46F-0CF6-4165-A5D4-6D1183EE24B0@neurotica.com>

On Dec 28, 2008, at 7:31 PM, Alexandre Souza wrote:
>>   I'd be willing to turn those scans into Gerber files if you  
>> send  them to me..
>
>    I think this is a WAY better solution than mine :o)
>
>    BTW, which method/program you use for doing that, Dave?

   I'm thinking of just tracing it by hand into PCB (see http:// 
www.geda.seul.org/) which is the layout program I use for everything  
I do.

           -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From mcguire at neurotica.com  Mon Dec 29 10:46:49 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 11:46:49 -0500
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: <49582073.8030202@jbrain.com>
References: 	<2840AD63-9B33-4116-AA44-DA02A72CE654@neurotica.com>	<4957F946.7070306@aurigae.demon.co.uk>
	
	<49582073.8030202@jbrain.com>
Message-ID: <88416209-FD9C-4363-8A15-2704B2F3BAB8@neurotica.com>

On Dec 28, 2008, at 7:57 PM, Jim Brain wrote:
>>   I'd be willing to turn those scans into Gerber files if you send  
>> them to me..
>>
> I'd be interested in how this is done as well.  Lots of folks ask  
> me to reproduce vintage boards, and creating EAGLE CAD drawings for  
> them is time consuming.

   Well I'm thinking about just tracing it manually as I've  
mentioned...It is a bit time-consuming, but it's a simple board.

   Now that I see the keyboard is a part of the main PCB, and looks  
to be the type that uses those rubbery pads, I'm not sure what to do  
about that.  Any thoughts?

   (I think I need to subscribe to cctalk as well, I seem to be  
missing about half of every conversation)

           -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From jim at photojim.ca  Mon Dec 29 10:48:05 2008
From: jim at photojim.ca (Jim MacKenzie)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 10:48:05 -0600
Subject: 5 + q inch diskettes, crate full
References: <3C378E31FF2B4366ADBAC95DE42E7898@homee8fac8eca1>
Message-ID: <2C29428408354F278A24688899F37B6F@JIMM>

What would postage to Regina (S4R 4K7) cost?

I don't have an imminent need for them but could put them to use.

If someone else has a near-term need, feel free to choose that person 
instead.

Jim
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Robin Gagnon" 
To: 
Sent: Monday, December 29, 2008 9:47 AM
Subject: 5 + q inch diskettes, crate full


I have a banker's box full of 5 1/4" diskettes, in their original boxes, 
DSDD, of various brands. I haven't counted, but probably a few hundred. A 
few packages unopened. These diskettes were largely used to run back-ups, so 
didn't get much wear and tear. Would prefer that some classic computer 
collector rescue these rather than have them end up in landfill. The whole 
crate is yours for 20$

gagnonr (at sign) vif.com

Robin Gagnon, Ph.D.
Psychology Department
Dawson College



From brain at jbrain.com  Mon Dec 29 10:57:28 2008
From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 10:57:28 -0600
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: 
References: 	<49586F48.3090205@jbrain.com>
	
Message-ID: <49590178.5000703@jbrain.com>

Zane H. Healy wrote:
> At 12:33 AM -0600 12/29/08, Jim Brain wrote:
>
> I've found that Individual Computers has a habit of advertising 
> features that don't quite live up to my expectations.  I also own a 
> Catweasel card for my Amiga, and even though I bought it nearly 10 
> years ago, I'm still a bit ticked over it.  If something doesn't 
> include device drivers, you shouldn't advertise it as supporting 
> various formats.  It basically could read 2 of the floppy types it 
> claimed to support.
Yours is not the first time I've heard this concern.  My hope is simply 
that I don't fall into the same trap.
>
> If you support Mac & Linux this might be of interest to me.  My major 
> problem with just things has been the fact that it only ever seems to 
> support Windows, and I don't typically have a Windows machine running.
non-Windows support is mandatory, for the same reason I designed an 
IEC-based unit instead of something that would only work on the C64. 
>
> One question, what size SD cards does the uIEC support, and does it 
> support HDSD cards?  Right now I'm using the 2GB card from my 
> MMC-Replay and it wants its card back. :-)
Any size you can get...  I got an 8GB card here a few weeks ago, which 
works fine.  It does support SDHC.  However, due to how CBM implemented 
the directory listing function, it can only report 65535 blocks free in 
a dir listing, even if there are more blocks free. 

Jim


From emu at e-bbes.com  Mon Dec 29 11:31:34 2008
From: emu at e-bbes.com (e.stiebler)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 10:31:34 -0700
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <49586F48.3090205@jbrain.com>
References: 
	<49586F48.3090205@jbrain.com>
Message-ID: <49590976.6050705@e-bbes.com>

Jim Brain wrote:
> 
> There are still things to do with the uIEC base, though.  IEEE488 
> support would be a great win, as then PET/CBM machines would have a 
> solid state device to use, and I am working on a USB link to a PC, so 
> one can slave their Win/Mac/Linux box to their CBM.  And, for those who 
> want something more vintage as a target, the protocol is simple RS232 (I 
> use a RS232->USB converter), so they could add a MAX232 and write a 
> suitable app for anything that provides RS232.

Any chance for HP support (hp85, hp86, etc) ?


From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Mon Dec 29 11:43:27 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 15:43:27 -0200
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
References: <2840AD63-9B33-4116-AA44-DA02A72CE654@neurotica.com><4957F946.7070306@aurigae.demon.co.uk><064a01c9694c$c7b5c820$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
	<3AE9E46F-0CF6-4165-A5D4-6D1183EE24B0@neurotica.com>
Message-ID: <004d01c969dd$14894880$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

>>    BTW, which method/program you use for doing that, Dave?
>   I'm thinking of just tracing it by hand into PCB (see http://
> www.geda.seul.org/) which is the layout program I use for everything
> I do.

    But does it have any facility like put the picture of the board in the 
screen for you to redraw it?



From cclist at sydex.com  Mon Dec 29 11:56:26 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 09:56:26 -0800
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: <4958D752.4040607@gmail.com>
References: ,
	<20081229135450.GA35079@night.db.net>, <4958D752.4040607@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <49589ECA.15573.DDBBACF@cclist.sydex.com>

On 29 Dec 2008 at 8:57, Sridhar Ayengar wrote:

> It's not the lower melting point.  It's that the mixture is eutectic.

There's a lot of misconception about what solder alloys are really 
about.

The characteristics of various tin/lead ratios are very useful.  I 
work a lot soldering sheet brass.  Normally, I work with 50/50 alloy 
because of its large plastic range and its ability to fill gaps and 
be tooled while cooling.  But if I'm working with something that 
requires a joint to solidify almost immediately from the liquid state 
(eutectic), it'll be a 63/37 alloy.  Melting point isn't a major 
issue as I'm working with an acetylene torch.  60/40 gives you a bit 
of plastic time before solidifying, but not much.

If I were soldering PCBs, I'd want the eutectic alloy--liquid or 
solid, with virtually no plastic phase in between. 

Plumbers and radiator repair shops use the 50/50 alloy because it can 
be tooled while cooling.  (In theory, the term should be "plumbers 
used to use" since lead-bearing solder for plumbing now violates code 
in the USA.  But I've yet to see a plumber who doesn't keep a couple 
of rolls of 50/50 squirreled away for the tough jobs).  The tradeoff 
is that the workpiece must be solidly clamped or otherwise fixed so 
that it doesn't move while the solder is solidifying.

This control of state-change characteristics is one thing for me that 
sets lead-bearing solders apart from the RoHS pack.

Cheers,
Chuck





From cclist at sydex.com  Mon Dec 29 12:04:10 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 10:04:10 -0800
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: <20081229135450.GA35079@night.db.net>
References: ,
	,
	<20081229135450.GA35079@night.db.net>
Message-ID: <4958A09A.29435.DE2CE46@cclist.sydex.com>

On 29 Dec 2008 at 8:54, Diane Bruce wrote:

> I don't suppose I need to say this, but never ever ever use the roll of solder
> your father used for plumbing with the acid core. Ever.

I haven't seen a roll of acid core solder in perhaps 20 years.  Most 
plumbers that I'm acquainted with use sold-core solder and flux.  
Liquid-cored solders tend to sputter when being used and spew flux 
everywhere--they were a lousy idea.  After all, you need only flux 
the surfaces that you're going to solder befor you heat them--you 
don't need flux mixed into the solder. 

Other than for convenience, I've wondered why rosin-core solder 
exists.  Better to flux then solder with pure solder.

And the new crop of fluxes are acid-free and clean up with water.  
Better living through chemistry.

Cheers,
Chuck







From gordonjcp at gjcp.net  Mon Dec 29 12:04:35 2008
From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 18:04:35 +0000
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: <0d5401c9687d$b8efbe10$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
References: 
	<0c2e01c96864$8bdbb5a0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>	<49569977.2000003@gmail.com>
	<0d5401c9687d$b8efbe10$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
Message-ID: <49591133.3070106@gjcp.net>

Alexandre Souza wrote:

>    PS: Any hams here? PU1BZZ is how I'm called :)

MM3YEQ here, in IO75 square.  If you're on IRC you might try #hamradio 
on freenode.

Gordon


From gordonjcp at gjcp.net  Mon Dec 29 12:06:56 2008
From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 18:06:56 +0000
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: <88416209-FD9C-4363-8A15-2704B2F3BAB8@neurotica.com>
References: 	<2840AD63-9B33-4116-AA44-DA02A72CE654@neurotica.com>	<4957F946.7070306@aurigae.demon.co.uk>		<49582073.8030202@jbrain.com>
	<88416209-FD9C-4363-8A15-2704B2F3BAB8@neurotica.com>
Message-ID: <495911C0.6040907@gjcp.net>

Dave McGuire wrote:
> On Dec 28, 2008, at 7:57 PM, Jim Brain wrote:
>>>   I'd be willing to turn those scans into Gerber files if you send 
>>> them to me..
>>>
>> I'd be interested in how this is done as well.  Lots of folks ask me 
>> to reproduce vintage boards, and creating EAGLE CAD drawings for them 
>> is time consuming.
> 
>   Well I'm thinking about just tracing it manually as I've 
> mentioned...It is a bit time-consuming, but it's a simple board.
> 
>   Now that I see the keyboard is a part of the main PCB, and looks to be 
> the type that uses those rubbery pads, I'm not sure what to do about 
> that.  Any thoughts?

Redraw them to use clicky switches, such as you can buy in huge bags 
from eBay for a couple of quid.

Gordon



From Apergy at aol.com  Mon Dec 29 10:12:00 2008
From: Apergy at aol.com (Apergy at aol.com)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 11:12:00 EST
Subject: WTB: Sony SMC-70G Software, Peripherals, Manuals, Etc.
Message-ID: 

Please contact me directly at _apergy at aol.com_ (mailto:apergy at aol.com) .
 
Happy New Year,
 
Randy 
 
 
In a message dated 12/29/2008 11:06:25 A.M. Eastern Standard Time,  
cctalk-request at classiccmp.org writes:

Send  cctalk mailing list submissions to
cctalk at classiccmp.org

To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide  Web, visit
http://www.classiccmp.org/mailman/listinfo/cctalk
or, via email, send a  message with subject or body 'help' to
cctalk-request at classiccmp.org

You can reach the person managing the  list at
cctalk-owner at classiccmp.org

When replying,  please edit your Subject line so it is more specific
than "Re: Contents of  cctalk digest..."


Today's Topics:

1. Re:  Suggestions for VT103? (Ethan Dicks)
2. Re: Suggestions for  VT103? (Jerome H. Fine)
3. Re: [SPAM] - Re: Suggestions for  VT103? - Sending mail server
found on dnsbl.sorbs.net  (Jerome H. Fine)
4. Re: Suggestions for VT103? (Jerome H.  Fine)
5. Re: Suggestions for VT103? (Jerome H.  Fine)
6. Re: Suggestions for VT103?  (Jerome H.  Fine)
7. Re: Suggestions for VT103? (Doc  Shipley)
8. RE: Heathkit manuals under tighter control (dwight  elvey)
9. Re: Suggestions for VT103? (Sridhar  Ayengar)
10. uIEC/SD == AWESOME! (Zane H. Healy)
11. Re:  Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such (Dave McGuire)
12. Re: uIEC/SD ==  AWESOME! (Jim Brain)
13. Re: Suggestions for VT103? (Ethan  Dicks)
14. Facit 4431 terminal (Johnny Billquist)
15. Re:  4.3BSD Quasijarus (der Mouse)
16. ACCRC Sealed-Bid Auction Lot #2  Ready (Sellam Ismail)
17. Re: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such (Alexandre  Souza)
18. Re: 4.3BSD Quasijarus (Sridhar Ayengar)
19. Re:  Suggestions for VT103? (Diane Bruce)
20. Re: Suggestions for VT103?  (Sridhar Ayengar)
21. Re: Suggestions for VT103? (Diane  Bruce)
22. Re: uIEC/SD == AWESOME! (Zane H. Healy)
23.  MK11 with 1MB boards (Johnny Billquist)
24. PDP-11/70 cache memory  (Johnny  Billquist)


----------------------------------------------------------------------

Message:  1
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 21:26:24 -0500
From: "Ethan Dicks"  
Subject: Re: Suggestions for VT103?
To:  "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts"

Message-ID:

Content-Type:  text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1

On Sun, Dec 28, 2008 at 9:07 PM, Sridhar  Ayengar  wrote:
> Ethan Dicks  wrote:
>>
>> What you are after is rosin-core lead-based  solder around 60/40 or
>> 63/37 tin/lead, with a diameter around  0.5mm (.020") to 0.8mm (.032").
>
> I highly recommend 63/37 over  60/40.  I find it easer to work with.

Sure, but I'd never _not_ do  a project because all I had on hand was
60/40,  though.

-ethan


------------------------------

Message:  2
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 21:36:29 -0500
From: "Jerome H. Fine"  
Subject: Re: Suggestions for VT103?
To:  General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts

Message-ID:  <495837AD.2060707 at compsys.to>
Content-Type: text/plain;  charset=us-ascii; format=flowed

>Tony Duell wrote:

>I  refuse to beleive it takes you over an hour to solder one connection!  :-)
>  
>
Jerome Fine replies:

Well, maybe  soldering a VT103 backplane was not so bad, but I seem to 
remember  the
problems I once had with a DRV11 module.  It needed to be  strapped, but 
the only way that
DEC provided to change the CSR value  was with zero ohm resistors.  
Removing a strap just
meant cutting  out a resistor.  But I found it impossible to add a 
resistor.   Finally after several
hours of unsuccessful attempts (and almost damaging  the board), I solved 
the problem by
removing a few male connector pins  from a damaged board and soldering 
them into the
appropriate holes  where the zero ohm resistor leads would normally be 
placed.  Since  the
very tiny pin was easy to manipulate and could be easily inserted into  a 
melted solder hole,
I ended up with two pins which I could them wire  wrap since the pins 
were very similar to
wire wrap posts in the first  place.  Why DEC had not done that to start 
with I don't know,
but  I finally did change the CSR value.  And it took about TWO hours 
each  to finally insert
each pin.

Needless to say, I am not a bit fan of  making solder connections at this 
point.

>>As far I my  experience is worth, the upgrade to a 22 bit backplane with 
>>the  version DEC
>>provides in the VT103 works VERY well.  I watched  over at least 6 VT103s
>>
>That does not suprise me. I was  under the impression that some very early 
>Q-bus modules used at least  one of those pins for something else (I've 
>seen 3rd-party Q-bus cards  with 22 bit DMA capability where the bus 
>driver for thsoe upper 4  address lines (normally a '38 or similar) is 
>socketed with  instructions to remove it if used in certain backplanes) 
>but I suspect  the VT103 is late enoguh for this not to be an issue.
>   
>
As far as I know, the LSI-11 CPU modules (both dual and quad) do  use 
some of those address lines.

But the M8186, M8189, M8190 and  M8192 can't since they all support 22 
bit addresses  for
memory.

So the VT103 backplane from DEC with 18 bit address  lines probably 
supports the use of
the LSI-11 CPUs, but not after  modification to 22 bit addresses.  Since 
the PDP-11/73 CPUs
are  now readily available, I can't see anyone using an LSI-11 CPU at 
this  point except in VERY
unusual situations which require the LSI-11 CPU for a  special reason - 
like the microcode which
can be modified.  I  don't know of anyone who ever modified the microcode 
for an LSI-11  CPU.

That is not to say that I will not invent new PDP-11 instructions  such 
as an UNSIGNED multiply,
32 bit multiply and divide which will be  implemented under Ersatz-11.  
But as the fellow in Irma
La Duce  said "That is another story."

>>The really cool reason to use a  VT103 is that a hard drive can be placed 
>>right under the  CRT.
>>
>I wonder about stray magnetic fields from the yoke  and/or flybackj 
>transformer. Not that they'll corrupt the magnetic  patterns on the disk, 
>but that they'll be picked up by the read  amplifier anf cause random data 
>erros. But I guess it works  OK.
>  
>
Not knowing about stray magnetic fields, I just  put an ST412 (actually a 
DEC RD51) under the
tube and started to  run.  This used a Sigma RQD11-B MFM controller (dual 
board with  boot
ROMs) with an M8186.  Worked great.  Made them available to  Ontario 
Hydro as a work
station.  Since they were already using  the VT103 with a dual RX02 
floppy drive, the hard
drive was a huge  improvement.  They ran RT-11 and having a 10 MByte hard 
drive  rather
than a 0.5 Mbyte floppy made a huge improvement.  Expensive at  the time, 
but worth while
for commercial use.

>>The one  problem of using the VT103 is that the power supply is really 
>>too  limited, although with
>>only 4 slots, not a lot of power  needed.  Tony, perhaps you might be 
>>able to suggest  how
>>the 5 amp supply could be enhanced?  On the other hand,  with a BA23 
>>    
>>
>
>Do you mean  '5 amp' or '5 volt' here? I was under the impression it was 
>around 15A  or so at 5V.
>  
>
Yes!  I did mean the 5 Volt which  is limited to 16 Amps on the VT103.  
And that includes
all of the  boards, including the VT100 video card and anything else in 
the VT100  which uses
the 5 Volt level.

>Increasing the rating of a PSU is  not easy in general. Many of the 
>components would need replacign with  higher-rated parts, including the 
>transformer (whether linear or  switch-mode), the rectifiers, smoothing 
>capacitors (increase in  capacitance value), chopper transistors (if an 
>SMSPU), pass  transistors (if a linear design), etc.and of course you'd have 
>modify  any current limit circuitry. It'd probably be easier to design a  
>replacement PSU from scratch to fit in the same space.
>   
>
I thought as much.  I will continue to use the BA23 and BA123  for now.  
Since the core 2 duo
CPU runs Windows XP which runs  Ersatz-11 which runs RT-11 at more than 
100 times the
speed of a  PDP-11/93, it is not likely that I will be using a real DEC 
CPU much in  any case.
By the way, with SATA II drives, the disk I/O is probably 200  times 
faster than any ESDI or
SCSI drive connected to a  PDP-11.

>>As for modes of failure, how often should a power  supply be used to be 
>>sure that keeping it out
>>of  service does not cause a failure when the power supply is used after  
>>a few years?  Does anyone
>>have any  recommendations?
>>
>About the only thing that'll fail from not  being used are electrolytic 
>capacitors, and I am not convinced this is  a major problem with 
>modern-ish ones. Certainly it's not a failure  I've ever encountered (yes, 
>I've had electrolytics fail, but not by  the oxide-film disolving due to 
>them not being used).
>
I  probably turn on the PDP-11/83 about 2 times a year.  Since I had 2  
BA123 power supplies
fail in the past 10 years, I wondered about having  to use them or loose 
them.  At one point,
I was told by a company  that I did some software programming for that 
their major  customer
required them to run the PDP-11 systems every 3 months until  delivery 
which was not to be
for 2 years.  Thus the reason for my  question.

Sincerely yours,

Jerome  Fine


------------------------------

Message: 3
Date: Sun,  28 Dec 2008 21:37:02 -0500
From: "Jerome H. Fine"  
Subject: Re: [SPAM] - Re: Suggestions for  VT103? - Sending mail server
found on dnsbl.sorbs.net
To:  General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts

Message-ID:  <495837CE.9070208 at compsys.to>
Content-Type: text/plain;  charset=us-ascii; format=flowed

>Josh Dersch wrote:

>  >Glen Slick wrote:
>
>>  http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/terminal/vt103/MP00731_VT103_Aug80.pdf
>>
>>  Page 73 of 76, VT103 BACKPLANE 
>
> So forgive my inexperience  here -- but just to make sure I'm 
> understanding the changes I need to  make -- is all that's necessary 
> just wiring up the address lines  (18-21) from slot 1, to slot 2, to 
> slot 3, to slot 4?

Jerome  Fine replies:

Don't forget that both ABs in each slot need to be wired  in since each 
quad slot
can hold 2 dual boards.  That means a  total of 8 solder joints for each 
address line
and a total of 32 solder  joints for all 4 address lines.

Very fine insulated wire wrap seems to  be a good solution.  The plastic 
insulation
can be stretched after  each solder joint is made to cover the wire right 
up to the
solder  joint.  A wire stripper can be used to custom cut the insulation 
at  the exact
spot needed - cut a bit short and stretch the insulation after  the 
solder is cold.  Then
daisy chain from slot to slot as  needed.  Start with the first solder 
joint with about
2" of free  wire, then custom cut the insulation to the correct length 
for the  second
solder joint on the same slot (second AB on that slot).  It  probably 
helps to keep
the wires as neat as possible since the next  address line is very close.

> Also, just to satisfy my curiosity --  it's been mentioned by several 
> people that lead-based solder is  necessary -- why is this?  (I think I 
> have a spool of it  somewhere that I liberated from my grandfather's 
> basement some years  back, but I'll have to dig it up...)

Ethan answered this much better  than my limited knowledge!

Sincerely yours,

Jerome  Fine


------------------------------

Message: 4
Date: Sun,  28 Dec 2008 21:38:02 -0500
From: "Jerome H. Fine"  
Subject: Re: Suggestions for VT103?
To:  General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts

Message-ID:  <4958380A.2040204 at compsys.to>
Content-Type: text/plain;  charset=us-ascii; format=flowed

>Josh Dersch wrote:

> I  have a number of RQDX3's, but I'll probably go with the Emulex QD21 
>  ESDI controller that I have.  It has an auto-boot option, which will  
> be useful since the 11/23 board I have just has the ODT  ROMs...

Jerome Fine replies:

I use a Sigma RQD11-EC quad ESDI  controller which can run 4 ESDI drives.
What I like best is that 3 drives  are VERY easily (just ground the 
correct line)
made WRITE   PROTECTED.  Not having a proper panel, I just use a 10 pin
cable and  alligator clips to ground the line.

The Hitachi DK515 with about 600  MBytes each work well.  I modified the
RT-11 MSCP device driver to  allow me to boot any of the 60 partitions on the
3 drives.  Normally,  I use 3 drives with 2 being backups and only drive 
0 with
20 RT-11  partitions being modified at any time.  All drives are usually  
WRITE
PROTECTED most of the time since I normally fix bugs in the RT-11  operating
system and the device drivers.  Since any mistakes in my  code modifications
could corrupt the hard drive, having them hardware  WRITE  PROTECTED
prevents that until I have checked out the  code.  After I have made the 
changes
to the backup drives, I boot  the backup drive and copy the changes to 
drive 0
which is now just a  data drive.

I have 2 command files which compare all 20 partitions on  drive 0 to each of
the 20 partitions on drive 1 or drive 2.  That  takes about 4 minutes for 
each
pair of RT-11 partitions of 32 MBytes  each or about 80 minutes in total.

Under Ersatz-11 with a core 2 duo,  it takes about 1.7 seconds per pair of
RT-11 partitions of 32 MBytes or  about 30 seconds for all 20 pair of RT-11
partitions - not even time to get  a drink.  I am working on enhancing 
the HD:
device driver under  Ersatz-11.  It is twice as fast as the MSCP device 
driver.

For  raw throughput, if I bypass the HD: device driver code and use a  user
subroutine without interrupts (hardly necessary when things are this  fast),
making a copy of an RT-11 partition of 32 MBytes is twice as fast  again.
A straight copy is about 0.2 seconds for all 32 MBytes as opposed  to
about 240 seconds the copy an RT-11 partition on those very fast  (for
a real DEC PDP-11/83 system) ESDI hard drives.

Sincerely  yours,

Jerome  Fine


------------------------------

Message: 5
Date: Sun,  28 Dec 2008 21:39:02 -0500
From: "Jerome H. Fine"  
Subject: Re: Suggestions for VT103?
To:  General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts

Message-ID:  <49583846.4070900 at compsys.to>
Content-Type: text/plain;  charset=us-ascii; format=flowed

>Ethan Dicks  wrote:

>>On Sun, Dec 28, 2008 at 5:20 PM, Josh Dersch   wrote:
>  
>
>>Also,  just to satisfy my curiosity -- it's been mentioned by several  
people
>>that lead-based solder is necessary -- why is  this?
>>    
>>
>
>Because the  equipment was made with lead-based solder (being many,
>many years older  than the RoHS directives), and mixing lead-free and
>lead-based solder  is not a good idea.  I'm sure someone here can quote
>chapter and  verse, but AFAIK, you'll get unreliable solder joints if
>you  try.
>
>  
>
>>(I think I have a  spool
>>of it somewhere that I liberated from my grandfather's  basement some years
>>back, but I'll have to dig it  up...)
>>    
>>
>
>If that's plumbing  solder, you are unlikely to get good results.
>Really, really old  plumbing solder _is_ lead-based, but most of what
>you are likely to  find is not (so that it's safe to use on supply
>lines).  Plumbing  solder is also frequently acid-cored or fluxless.  I
>don't recall  running into any plumbing solder that is compatible with
>electronic  circuits.
>
>Now...if your grandfather was a Ham or did electronic  repairs, what
>you have might be just perfect, but be sure you have the  right stuff
>before you get started.
>
>What you are after  is rosin-core lead-based solder around 60/40 or
>63/37 tin/lead, with a  diameter around 0.5mm (.020") to 0.8mm (.032").
> The exact ratio of  lead to tin is not critical, nor is the exact
>diameter, but since you  aren't doing ultra-fine work or trying to
>solder down something huge  and heavy, like bundles of power-supply
>leads or RF cages, I'd  recommend something "medium" weight, like the
>0.8mm  (.032").
>
>There should be a label on one end of the spool (if  it's still on the
>original spool) describing the various  characteristics.  If you aren't
>practiced at making good joints,  I'd recommend getting an inexpensive
>electronic hobby kit to practice  on.  My earliest efforts from when I
>was in Jr. High are rather  ugly - by the time I was adding blue wires
>to $2000 boards at work five  years later, I'd gotten much, much better
>from the early  practice.
>  
>
Very helpful - thank you!

Sincerely  yours,

Jerome Fine

obtained by replacing the four characters  preceding the
'at' with the four digits of the current  year.



------------------------------

Message: 6
Date:  Sun, 28 Dec 2008 21:42:57 -0500
From: "Jerome H. Fine"  
Subject: Re: Suggestions for VT103? 
To:  General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts

Message-ID:  <49583931.4090103 at compsys.to>
Content-Type: text/plain;  charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed

>Jerome H. Fine  wrote:

[Snip]

Sorry about the subject line - my son modifies it  when his server thinks 
it is something suspect.

> >Josh  Dersch wrote:
>
>> >Glen Slick  wrote:
>>
>>>  http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/dec/terminal/vt103/MP00731_VT103_Aug80.pdf
>>>
>>>  Page 73 of 76, VT103 BACKPLANE 
>>
>>
>> So forgive  my inexperience here -- but just to make sure I'm 
>> understanding  the changes I need to make -- is all that's necessary 
>> just wiring  up the address lines (18-21) from slot 1, to slot 2, to 
>> slot 3,  to slot 4?
>
>
> Jerome Fine replies:
>
> Don't  forget that both ABs in each slot need to be wired in since each 
> quad  slot
> can hold 2 dual boards.  That means a total of 8 solder  joints for 
> each address line
> and a total of 32 solder joints  for all 4 address lines.
>
> Very fine insulated wire wrap seems  to be a good solution.  The 
> plastic insulation
> can be  stretched after each solder joint is made to cover the wire 
> right up  to the
> solder joint.  A wire stripper can be used to custom cut  the 
> insulation at the exact
> spot needed - cut a bit short and  stretch the insulation after the 
> solder is cold.  Then
>  daisy chain from slot to slot as needed.  Start with the first solder  
> joint with about
> 2" of free wire, then custom cut the  insulation to the correct length 
> for the second
> solder joint  on the same slot (second AB on that slot).  It probably 
> helps to  keep
> the wires as neat as possible since the next address line is very  close.
>
>> Also, just to satisfy my curiosity -- it's been  mentioned by several 
>> people that lead-based solder is necessary  -- why is this?  (I think 
>> I have a spool of it somewhere  that I liberated from my grandfather's 
>> basement some years back,  but I'll have to dig it up...)
>
>
> Ethan answered this  much better than my limited knowledge!
>
> Sincerely  yours,
>
> Jerome  Fine



------------------------------

Message: 7
Date:  Sun, 28 Dec 2008 21:53:23 -0600
From: Doc Shipley  
Subject: Re: Suggestions for VT103?
To:  General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts

Message-ID:  <495849B3.6020708 at mdrconsult.com>
Content-Type: text/plain;  charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed

Sridhar Ayengar wrote:
> Ethan  Dicks wrote:
>> What you are after is rosin-core lead-based solder  around 60/40 or
>> 63/37 tin/lead, with a diameter around 0.5mm  (.020") to 0.8mm (.032").
> 
> I highly recommend 63/37 over  60/40.  I find it easer to work with.

I had the  dubious distinction of being a "Certified Solder Operator" 
for TI's  Lubbock, TX plant (in, what, '82?).  Although the training I 
got  there spoiled me forever in some ways, it's been invaluable over the  
years.

One of the things that stuck was the "true  purpose" of eutectic 
solder.  We always used 60/40 for original or  initial soldering, and 
eutectic for repairs or "oversolders".  If you  have a good iron and a 
good eye (or, these days, good Optivisor), the  flow-point difference 
allows doing new work without disturbing old  joints.


Doc


------------------------------

Message: 8
Date: Sun,  28 Dec 2008 20:04:44 -0800
From: dwight elvey  
Subject: RE: Heathkit manuals under tighter  control
To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts"

Message-ID:  
Content-Type:  text/plain;  charset="iso-8859-1"




----------------------------------------
>  Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 19:58:00 -0600
> To:  cctalk at classiccmp.org
> From: jfoust at threedee.com
> Subject:  Heathkit manuals under tighter control
>
>
>  http://techdirt.com/articles/20081215/0106043118.shtml
>
>
>  - John
>

Hi
Technically, if you have a H89 or such and you've  lost
the manual, you have a right to a copy of the manual
without paying  any copyright fee. The manual is already
payed for.
Still, if they have  the copyright, they can have it removed
from the web if they can prove it  is used for anything
other than replacing lost manuals.
I'm no lawyer  and this is just a personal  opinion.
Dwight


_________________________________________________________________
Life  on your PC is safer, easier, and more enjoyable with Windows Vista?.  
http://clk.atdmt.com/MRT/go/127032870/direct/01/


------------------------------

Message:  9
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 23:10:19 -0500
From: Sridhar Ayengar  
Subject: Re: Suggestions for VT103?
To:  General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts

Message-ID:  <49584DAB.1000500 at gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain;  charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed

Ethan Dicks wrote:
> On Sun,  Dec 28, 2008 at 9:07 PM, Sridhar Ayengar   
wrote:
>> Ethan Dicks wrote:
>>> What you are after is  rosin-core lead-based solder around 60/40 or
>>> 63/37 tin/lead,  with a diameter around 0.5mm (.020") to 0.8mm (.032").
>> I highly  recommend 63/37 over 60/40.  I find it easer to work with.
>  
> Sure, but I'd never _not_ do a project because all I had on hand  was
> 60/40, though.

Oh no, that's not what I'm saying at  all.  It's just that, if I'm going 
to be buying lead solder, I'll buy  63/37 every time.

Peace...   Sridhar


------------------------------

Message: 10
Date:  Sun, 28 Dec 2008 21:24:08 -0800
From: "Zane H. Healy"  
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
To:  classiccmp at classiccmp.org
Message-ID:  
Content-Type: text/plain;  charset="us-ascii" ; format="flowed"

The uIEC/SD I bought from Jim  Brain was delivered Friday night (USPS 
was actually unable to deliver for  several days in our area).  My 
mail is currently going to a different  location than we're living, so 
I picked it up yesterday, and retrieved my  customized C64 from 
storage, and got everything plugged in last night  (this was the first 
time we'd been able to get our car out of the driveway  in over two 
weeks).

Once I figured out how to use it, all I can say  it is seriously cool, 
way better than my MMC-Replay for dealing with D64  images, and it was 
a lot cheaper!  I'm even able to use it with the  MMC-Replay plugged 
in so I have my Ethernet connection.  With the  MMC-Replay I was only 
able to get one or two D64 images to work, with the  uIEC most I've 
tried have worked.  I've been playing "Temple of  Apshai" all day and 
having a blast! :-)

Now to decide if I put it  in some sort of case, or if I mount it 
inside the C64  somehow.

Zane


-- 
| Zane H. Healy       | UNIX Systems Administrator  |
| healyzh at aracnet.com (primary)    | OpenVMS Enthusiast   |
| MONK::HEALYZH (DECnet)       | Classic Computer Collector  |
+----------------------------------+----------------------------+
|   Empire of the Petal Throne and Traveller Role Playing,   |
|          PDP-10 Emulation and Zane's  Computer Museum.         |
|       http://www.aracnet.com/~healyzh/    |


------------------------------

Message: 11
Date: Mon,  29 Dec 2008 01:30:28 -0500
From: Dave McGuire  
Subject: Re: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and  such
To: "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only"  
Cc: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts  
Message-ID:  <36662B2D-068D-4CD9-B096-F1129A6CCCA3 at neurotica.com>
Content-Type:  text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; delsp=yes; format=flowed

On Dec 28, 2008,  at 6:02 PM, Phill Harvey-Smith wrote:
>>> BTW I was given a bare  unpopulated Ace board for Christmas, I  
>>> have taken some  scans of it but at 1200dpi they are *HUGE*
>>   I'd be  willing to turn those scans into Gerber files if you send  
>>  them to me..
>
> That would be cool, an eagle board layout would  be better still.....
>
> Let me see if I can zip em up small, I'll  prolly upload them to a  
> server at work (and email off list) as  it has much more bandwidth  
> than I do and they are really huge  :)

I use PCB, not Eagle, (see http://www.geda.seul.org/)  but getting  
them into SOME maintainable format would be better than  nothing.

-Dave

-- 
Dave  McGuire
Port Charlotte,  FL




------------------------------

Message:  12
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 00:33:44 -0600
From: Jim Brain  
Subject: Re: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
To: General  Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts

Cc: classiccmp at classiccmp.org
Message-ID:  <49586F48.3090205 at jbrain.com>
Content-Type: text/plain;  charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed

Zane H. Healy wrote:
> The  uIEC/SD I bought from Jim Brain was delivered Friday night (USPS 
> was  actually unable to deliver for several days in our area).  My mail  
> is currently going to a different location than we're living, so I  
> picked it up yesterday, and retrieved my customized C64 from storage,  
> and got everything plugged in last night (this was the first time  we'd 
> been able to get our car out of the driveway in over two  weeks).
>
> Once I figured out how to use it, all I can say it is  seriously cool, 
> way better than my MMC-Replay for dealing with D64  images, and it was 
> a lot cheaper!  I'm even able to use it with  the MMC-Replay plugged in 
> so I have my Ethernet connection.   With the MMC-Replay I was only able 
> to get one or two D64 images to  work, with the uIEC most I've tried 
> have worked.  I've been  playing "Temple of Apshai" all day and having 
> a blast!  :-)
>
> Now to decide if I put it in some sort of case, or if I  mount it 
> inside the C64 somehow.
>
>  Zane
>
>
I'm glad you're enjoying it. 

As I implied in a  previous post, the device has an interesting history 
that has shifted my  philosophy concerning such projects.  I've come to 
realize that, in  the hobbyist space, collaboration yields much more 
fruit for the project,  even though one loses the "I did it all myself" 
statement.  I was  always afraid I would never learn as much if I didn't 
do it all myself,  but that has *NOT* been the case.  And, it's nice to 
bounce ideas off  others when trying to map new concepts like IDE 
partitions and such into a  25+ year old platform.

Although I am now biased, I started uIEC because  I felt the IDE64 took 
away too much flexibility.  It assumes the 64  is the only CBM machine, 
requires an expansion port, and requires programs  use only the normal 
KERNAL IEC routines if they are to work.  As a  VIC/C128 owner, that 
seemed wrong.

The MMC64, on the other hand, is  more complex to explain.  As a 
"mega-cart", it's fine (load cart  images onto SD card, play lots of cart 
or single filer games).  But,  then they started marketing it as a 
general purpose drive unit (or people  started assuming it world work 
like that), I think it suffered.  It's  not ideally suited for that use.

There are still things to do with the  uIEC base, though.  IEEE488 
support would be a great win, as then  PET/CBM machines would have a 
solid state device to use, and I am working  on a USB link to a PC, so 
one can slave their Win/Mac/Linux box to their  CBM.  And, for those who 
want something more vintage as a target, the  protocol is simple RS232 (I 
use a RS232->USB converter), so they could  add a MAX232 and write a 
suitable app for anything that provides  RS232.

Jim



------------------------------

Message:  13
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 02:02:47 -0500
From: "Ethan Dicks"  
Subject: Re: Suggestions for VT103?
To:  "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts"

Message-ID:

Content-Type:  text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1

On Sun, Dec 28, 2008 at 10:53 PM, Doc  Shipley  wrote:
>> I highly recommend 63/37  over 60/40.  I find it easer to work with.
>
>  I had  the dubious distinction of being a "Certified Solder Operator" for
>  TI's Lubbock, TX plant (in, what, '82?).  Although the training I got  
there
> spoiled me forever in some ways, it's been invaluable over the  years.

Neat.  I never had formal training - just practical tips  and
experience.  Oh, wait... I _did_ get one training course - on how  to
do SMT benchwork when I was at Lucent... I worked on the plant  floor
for a couple of weeks.

>  One of the things that stuck  was the "true purpose" of eutectic solder.  
We
> always used 60/40  for original or initial soldering, and eutectic for
> repairs or  "oversolders".  If you have a good iron and a good eye (or, 
these
>  days, good Optivisor), the flow-point difference allows doing new work
>  without disturbing old joints.

Ah!  I get it.   Interesting.

None of the stuff I've done was that finicky, but it's  good to  know.

-ethan


------------------------------

Message:  14
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 16:33:15 +0100
From: Johnny Billquist  
Subject: Facit 4431 terminal
To:  cctalk at classiccmp.org
Message-ID:  <49579C3B.2040307 at softjar.se>
Content-Type: text/plain;  charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed

Anyone have any docs for this  terminal? It's a plain glass terminal. 
VT100-compatible.
I have a  problem with mine, and don't have any kind of documentation. I do 
see 
that  the data lines have junk on them, and the serial port isn't working.
But  internal tests pass, and the setup and local mode works fine.

Johnny

-- 
Johnny Billquist           || "I'm on a bus
||  on a psychedelic trip
email:  bqt at softjar.se             ||  Reading  murder books
pdp is alive!               ||  tryin' to stay hip" - B.  Idol


------------------------------

Message: 15
Date:  Sun, 28 Dec 2008 14:09:08 -0500 (EST)
From: der Mouse  
Subject: Re: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
To:  "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts"

Message-ID:  <200812281912.OAA13191 at Sparkle.Rodents-Montreal.ORG>
Content-Type:  text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"

> I guess all the people who still  like to run them have SCSI
> controllers on them by now, [...]

I  wish.  I don't run my uV2, but that's largely because I don't  have
more than trivial quantities of disk that's compatible with the  Qbus
disk interfaces I have.

At one point it looked as though I  might get a Qbus SCSI card that
wasn't bootable (I don't mind netbooting as  long as I can _run_ off
local disk), but that never actually  materialized....

/~\ The ASCII             Mouse
\ / Ribbon Campaign
X  Against  HTML        mouse at rodents-montreal.org
/ \ Email!   7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39  4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27  4B


------------------------------

Message: 16
Date: Mon,  29 Dec 2008 04:20:57 -0800
From: sellam at vintagetech.com (Sellam  Ismail)
Subject: ACCRC Sealed-Bid Auction Lot #2 Ready
To:  cctalk at classiccmp.org
Message-ID:  <4958C0A9.mailH7I13DY3H at vintagetech.com>
Content-Type: text/plain;  charset=us-ascii

Announcing: ACCRC Seald-Bid Auction Lot #2

***  This is the last notice that will be sent to the general VCF
mailing  list.  To ensure you receive further updates regarding this
auction,  please visit the VCF website and click the "Mailing List"
link in the  navigation tab on the right-hand side or bottom of any
page.  Then  click on the link to update your contact information and
follow the prompts  from there to get into your profile.  You should
then select which  announcements you want to receive.  If you don't
want to receive any  more of these auction notices, select "Major
announcements and newsletter  only".  Otherwise, select "Send me all
VCF announcements".

The  Alameda County Computer Resource Center (ACCRC) is forced to
liquidate its  computer museum due to the current economic climate.
The VCF has been  contracted to auction off the ACCRC museum to raise
needed funds for their  non-profit operation.

I have put up the second batch of machines at the  following URL:

http://www.vintage.org/special/2008/accrc/

In order to use the system  you must have a VCF Community ID.  Getting
one is simple: just follow  the links and prompts when you visit the
URL above and read the  instructions.

The closing time for this lot is Monday, January 5, at  12:00PM PST.

New lots will be posted by noon every Monday on a weekly  basis until
all items are depleted.  At this rate we expect 4-5 more  lots.


ACCRC Sealed-Bid Auction Lot #2

## Description
--  -------------------------------------------------
16 Kaypro 2X
24 Kaypro  1
42 Eagle II
43 HP 41CV Calculator
44 JC Penny Video Sports
45  Timex-Sinclair 1000
46 Stratus V101 Dumb Terminal
47 HP 85
48 Tandy  Color Computer 3
49 Calcomp Drawing Board
50 Atari 2600 Video Computer  System
51 Tandy CCR-82 Computer Cassette Recorder
52 Generic Lunchbox  Portable
53 Atari 830 Acoustic Coupler Modem + 850 Interface
54 Magnavox  Odyssey2 Console
55 Commodore Amiga 500
56 GRiDPad 1900
57 Compaq  Portable
58 Platinum Apple IIe
59 Processor Technology Sol-20
60  Non-Linear Systems Kaypro 10

Check the item listings at the link above  for further information and
details.

All items must be sold. No  reasonable offer will be refused.  Your
purchases will go towards  supporting an organization that over the
years has provided nearly 20,000  refurbished computers to needy
organizations and individuals  worldwide.  100% of the proceeds of this
auction will go directly to  the ACCRC (minus the handling fees, which
are covering my  time...barely).


Best regards,

Sellam  Ismail
Proprietor
Vintage Computer  Festival
http://www.vintage.org


------------------------------

Message:  17
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 10:48:36 -0200
From: "Alexandre Souza"  
Subject: Re: Jupiter Ace - PCBs  and such
To: "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only"  
Message-ID:  <08d001c969b3$d10c0c60$46fea8c0 at DeskJara>
Content-Type: text/plain;  format=flowed; charset="iso-8859-1";
reply-type=original

> I'd be interested in how this is done as  well.  Lots of folks ask me to 
> reproduce vintage boards, and  creating EAGLE CAD drawings for them is 
> time consuming.

It is because eagle sux. A lot.  :o)



------------------------------

Message: 18
Date:  Mon, 29 Dec 2008 08:21:28 -0500
From: Sridhar Ayengar  
Subject: Re: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
To: General  Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts

Message-ID:  <4958CED8.5050201 at gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain;  charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed

der Mouse wrote:
>> I guess  all the people who still like to run them have SCSI
>> controllers on  them by now, [...]
> 
> I wish.  I don't run my uV2, but  that's largely because I don't have
> more than trivial quantities of  disk that's compatible with the Qbus
> disk interfaces I have.
>  
> At one point it looked as though I might get a Qbus SCSI card  that
> wasn't bootable (I don't mind netbooting as long as I can _run_  off
> local disk), but that never actually materialized....

Why  not cluster-boot with local swap?  Shouldn't be too  slow.

Peace...   Sridhar


------------------------------

Message: 19
Date:  Mon, 29 Dec 2008 08:54:50 -0500
From: Diane Bruce  
Subject: Re: Suggestions for VT103?
To: "General  Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts"

Message-ID:  <20081229135450.GA35079 at night.db.net>
Content-Type: text/plain;  charset=us-ascii

On Sun, Dec 28, 2008 at 09:26:24PM -0500, Ethan Dicks  wrote:
> On Sun, Dec 28, 2008 at 9:07 PM, Sridhar Ayengar   
wrote:
> > Ethan Dicks wrote:
>  >>
> >> What you are after is rosin-core lead-based solder  around 60/40 or
> >> 63/37 tin/lead, with a diameter around 0.5mm  (.020") to 0.8mm (.032").
> >
> > I highly recommend 63/37  over 60/40.  I find it easer to work with.
>
> Sure, but I'd  never _not_ do a project because all I had on hand was
> 60/40,  though.

As you know, the biggest difference is the lower melting point  of 63/37,
that does make it easier to work with.

I don't suppose I  need to say this, but never ever ever use the roll of 
solder
your father  used for plumbing with the acid core. Ever.

>
>  -ethan
>

- 73 Diane VA3DB
--
- db at FreeBSD.org db at db.net  http://www.db.net/~db


------------------------------

Message:  20
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 08:57:38 -0500
From: Sridhar Ayengar  
Subject: Re: Suggestions for VT103?
To:  General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts

Message-ID:  <4958D752.4040607 at gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain;  charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed

Diane Bruce wrote:
> On Sun,  Dec 28, 2008 at 09:26:24PM -0500, Ethan Dicks wrote:
>> On Sun, Dec  28, 2008 at 9:07 PM, Sridhar Ayengar   
wrote:
>>> Ethan Dicks wrote:
>>>> What you are  after is rosin-core lead-based solder around 60/40 or
>>>>  63/37 tin/lead, with a diameter around 0.5mm (.020") to 0.8mm  (.032").
>>> I highly recommend 63/37 over 60/40.  I find it  easer to work with.
>> Sure, but I'd never _not_ do a project because  all I had on hand was
>> 60/40, though.
> 
> As you know,  the biggest difference is the lower melting point of 63/37,
> that does  make it easier to work with.

It's not the lower melting point.   It's that the mixture is eutectic.

Peace...   Sridhar


------------------------------

Message: 21
Date:  Mon, 29 Dec 2008 09:08:57 -0500
From: Diane Bruce  
Subject: Re: Suggestions for VT103?
To: "General  Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts"

Cc: General Discussion:
Message-ID:  <20081229140857.GB35079 at night.db.net>
Content-Type: text/plain;  charset=us-ascii

On Mon, Dec 29, 2008 at 08:57:38AM -0500, Sridhar  Ayengar wrote:
> Diane Bruce wrote:
> >On Sun, Dec 28, 2008 at  09:26:24PM -0500, Ethan Dicks wrote:
> >>On Sun, Dec 28, 2008 at  9:07 PM, Sridhar Ayengar 
...
>  >>Sure, but I'd never _not_ do a project because all I had on hand  was
> >>60/40, though.
> >
> >As you know, the  biggest difference is the lower melting point of 63/37,
> >that does  make it easier to work with.
>
> It's not the lower melting  point.  It's that the mixture is eutectic.

Yes I know it is  eutectic. But for newbies the lower temperature is much
easier on the  board, one tends to lift fewer foils this way. It's also
much easier with a  decent soldering station to not lift foils, but if you
don't have such, a  lower melting point means the newbie tends not to overdo 
it.
Of course, if  you are soldering some heavy duty backplane, which I believe
was the start  of this thread, I suppose it's not as much of a problem.
But I'd still  recommend not using lead/acid solder for a backplane.  ;-)


>
> Peace...  Sridhar
>

- 73 Diane  VA3DB
--
- db at FreeBSD.org db at db.net  http://www.db.net/~db


------------------------------

Message:  22
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 07:59:00 -0800
From: "Zane H. Healy"  
Subject: Re: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
To:  "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts"
,    General Discussion:
Cc:  classiccmp at classiccmp.org
Message-ID:  
Content-Type: text/plain;  charset="us-ascii" ; format="flowed"

At 12:33 AM -0600 12/29/08, Jim  Brain wrote:
>The MMC64, on the other hand, is more complex to  explain.  As a 
>"mega-cart", it's fine (load cart images onto SD  card, play lots of 
>cart or single filer games).  But, then they  started marketing it as 
>a general purpose drive unit (or people  started assuming it world 
>work like that), I think it suffered.   It's not ideally suited for 
>that use.

I'm glad I own a  MMC-Replay cart, especially with the RRNET option, 
but if the uIEC had  been available I might not of purchased it. 
While you can mount D64  images, you can't run most software from 
them.  I think the situation  might be better on PAL C64's.

I've found that Individual Computers has  a habit of advertising 
features that don't quite live up to my  expectations.  I also own a 
Catweasel card for my Amiga, and even  though I bought it nearly 10 
years ago, I'm still a bit ticked over  it.  If something doesn't 
include device drivers, you shouldn't  advertise it as supporting 
various formats.  It basically could read  2 of the floppy types it 
claimed to support.

>to use, and I am  working on a USB link to a PC, so one can slave 
>their Win/Mac/Linux  box to their CBM.  And, for those who want 
>something more vintage  as a target, the protocol is simple RS232 (I 
>use a RS232->USB  converter), so they could add a MAX232 and write a 
>suitable app for  anything that provides RS232.

If you support Mac & Linux this might  be of interest to me.  My major 
problem with just things has been the  fact that it only ever seems to 
support Windows, and I don't typically  have a Windows machine running.

One question, what size SD cards does  the uIEC support, and does it 
support HDSD cards?  Right now I'm  using the 2GB card from my 
MMC-Replay and it wants its card back.  :-)

Zane


-- 
| Zane H. Healy         | UNIX Systems Administrator |
|  healyzh at aracnet.com (primary)    | OpenVMS Enthusiast     |
| MONK::HEALYZH (DECnet)         | Classic Computer Collector  |
+----------------------------------+----------------------------+
|   Empire of the Petal Throne and Traveller Role Playing,   |
|          PDP-10 Emulation and Zane's  Computer Museum.         |
|       http://www.aracnet.com/~healyzh/    |


------------------------------

Message: 23
Date: Mon,  29 Dec 2008 12:35:28 +0100
From: Johnny Billquist  
Subject: MK11 with 1MB boards
To:  mcguire at neurotica.com
Cc: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts  
Message-ID:  <4958B600.50405 at synap.se>
Content-Type: text/plain;  charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed

Ok. To start with the short version.  Get back when you really want more 
details.

The deal is to fake the  MK11 so that it thinks there are four 256KB 
cards when you have a 1MB  card.

The memory bus is pretty simple. You have address lines, and card  select 
lines. Address lines are as usual.
Card select lines are like  chip selects, or whatever you are used to in 
terminology. It selects which  card should respond when address and data 
and other control signals are on  the bus.
Usually only one card select line is active at a time.

So  you have three things to deal with:
. Address lines
. Card select  lines
. ECC

Address lines are pretty simple. You grab four card  select lines, hook a 
4-to-2 binary multiplexor in there, and you get  A18,A19 from those. This 
means that four adjacent cards will cause A18,A19  to be generated.

Card select lines are even simpler. You just OR the  four card select 
lines together, and output it on one of them. I seem to  remember that 
you don't need to cut anything on the backplane, but check  that to be 
sure. Also, you need a total of four of these special cards in  order to 
get 4 MB working in the MK11, but all four cards will be  identical.

With that, the hardware side is done. Now, the one part left  is a bit 
more tricky, but it's a hardware problem with a software  solution.
The MK11 (as well as the 11/750) have ECC memory. In order for  the 
memory to not scream bloody hell when you access it, the syndrome bits  
must be set right. At power up, the MK11 initialize the syndrome bits  
for all memory in the box, but it does this in a really clever way. It  
runs though all addresses and do a write to them, forcing the ECC  
syndrome bits to be updated.
*But*... It does this on all cards in the  box in parallell. That is, all 
card select lines are active at the same  time, at this one instance.
The problem with that is that (obviously) not  all the memory in the 1MB 
memory board will be reset. By designing your  small adapter card the 
right way, you can get atleast the first 256KB ECC  syndrome bits set 
right. The rest you'll have to do by software instead,  before the memory 
can be used. Otherwise you'll just get parity errors if  you try to 
access that memory.
And, normal writes to memory won't work!  The memory is 32 bits wide, and 
a normal write from a PDP-11 will only  write 16 bits, so it won't cause 
the memory to do a blind write and just  set the syndrome bits.
If you read the documentation for the MK11, you'll  find that it actually 
have a CSR as well, and in that, you can set bits to  force writing the 
syndrome bits and ignore errors. And for the  initialization that's what 
you need to do: set the right bits in the CSR,  write to all memory 
needed, and then reset the CSR again.
The last  "funny" thing with this is that the CSR isn't easy to access. 
All accesses  to the I/O page in an 11/70 will cause the reference to run 
out on the  Unibus (not surprising). However, the MK11 isn't on the 
Unibus. :-)
The  trick is to realize that the Unibus map will always direct the 
access to  the memory bus, even if the final address is in the I/O page. 
So, you need  to setup the Unibus map to point to the I/O page, and then 
access the MK11  CSR through the Unibus map.

After that, you're all done, and the MK11  with 1MB memory boards will be 
happy. I've done it in the past, and it  really not any more complicated 
than that.

Johnny



------------------------------

Message:  24
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 12:52:14 +0100
From: Johnny Billquist  
Subject: PDP-11/70 cache memory
To: General  Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts

Message-ID:  <4958B9EE.1050507 at softjar.se>
Content-Type: text/plain;  charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed

And since some have mentioned it,  there was a 3rd party upgrade to the 
11/70 which replaced the whole memory  system with a few cards in the CPU 
box, which turned all memory into  cache.
This was by a company called SETASI, and the product was the  hypercache.
They actually had two products. HC-70 was the hypercache, and  then you 
had something called the PEP-70 as well. It appears they could be  used 
together, but I don't know if one was required for the other, or if  they 
were related in any way, and if so how.

(SETASI also did other  stuff, such as a SCSI adapted for massbus, which 
was pretty nice, and  usable both on 16-bit and 36-bit machines.)

Johnny


End of cctalk Digest, Vol 64, Issue  65
**************************************

**************One site keeps you connected to all your email: AOL Mail, 
Gmail, and Yahoo Mail. Try it now. 
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From gagnonr at vif.com  Mon Dec 29 12:06:23 2008
From: gagnonr at vif.com (Robin Gagnon)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 13:06:23 -0500
Subject: Correction to earlier posting about 5 + q inch diskettes
Message-ID: 

I have approximately 1 1/2 banker's boxes (crates) full of 5 1/4" DSDD diskettes in their boxes. I am located in Montreal, Canada.

Thanks,

Robin Gagnon, Ph.D.
Psychology Department
Dawson College

From feedle at feedle.net  Mon Dec 29 12:35:30 2008
From: feedle at feedle.net (C. Sullivan)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 10:35:30 -0800
Subject: Heathkit manuals under tighter control
In-Reply-To: 
References: <6.2.3.4.2.20081228195539.06181cc0@mail.threedee.com>
	
Message-ID: <38D28A49-3F41-4950-9B36-17A89262599F@feedle.net>


On Dec 28, 2008, at 8:04 PM, dwight elvey wrote:

> Technically, if you have a H89 or such and you've lost
> the manual, you have a right to a copy of the manual
> without paying any copyright fee. The manual is already
> payed for.
> I'm no lawyer and this is just a personal opinion.

It's apparent that you aren't a lawyer.  I'm not one either, but a  
little common sense goes a long way here.

I won't touch your claim that you have a "right" to the manual.   
That's not the issue, even if I think you don't have the rights you  
think you do.  The issue is that only the "intellectual property  
owner" has the "right to copy" and distribute the manual: hence the  
term "copyright".

Data Professionals is completely within their "rights" to ask that  
distribution of their intellectual property on the Internet cease and  
desist.  Those posting the manuals don't have the "rights" to  
distribute them in any form.

Whether this is "correct" in the moral sense is certainly subject to  
debate.  But under the law, the manuals are under copyright, and we  
don't have the right to copy and distribute other people's manuals  
without explicit permission to do so.


Common sense says if you didn't write it, you don't have the rights to  
copy and distribute it, and any action along those lines is likely  
violating somebody's copyright.  Running off a photocopy of a few  
pages for a friend or to include in a research document might be  
"justifiable infringement" (called "fair use").  Duplicating the  
works /en masse/ on a website is not permissible under any  
circumstances, unless permission to do so has been obtained.

Doing otherwise is a dangerous game, specifically because of  
circumstances like this.  The manuals' copyright is held by somebody,  
even if it's a megacorp who purchased the assets at auction from a  
bankruptcy sale.

Note I'm not arguing the moral and/or ethical sides of this, purely  
the legal ones.



From me at junc.org  Mon Dec 29 12:40:05 2008
From: me at junc.org (Benny Pedersen)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 19:40:05 +0100 (CET)
Subject: WTB: Sony SMC-70G Software, Peripherals, Manuals, Etc.
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <38262.RkEUX0YQVF8=.1230576005.squirrel@mail.junc.org>


On Mon, December 29, 2008 17:12, Apergy at aol.com wrote:

> Happy New Year,

one wish, newer ever more post a whole digest back to the maillist


-- 
Benny Pedersen
Need more webspace ? http://www.servage.net/?coupon=cust37098



From gordonjcp at gjcp.net  Mon Dec 29 12:49:59 2008
From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 18:49:59 +0000
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <200812281613.mBSGDg0K012648@floodgap.com>
References: <200812281613.mBSGDg0K012648@floodgap.com>
Message-ID: <49591BD7.2050606@gjcp.net>

Cameron Kaiser wrote:
>>> Management System) like typo3, Joomla, Drupal, ... You can do it also
>>> with cvs, m4, sed / awk, make, ... or a XML processor, where you write
>>> XML files containing just the content and the XML processor generates
>>> (static) HTML... (AFAIK the NetBSD web site is generated this way.)
>> I tried that.  Down that path madness lies.  It's far better to just 
>> store the text in a database, possibly marked up in one of the "simple" 
>> markup languages like markdown, and serve it up as required.
> 
> Then you have all the headaches of a database. Sometimes a Makefile and
> some skeletons pulling in flat files really *is* the simplest approach.
> 

Any sane distro will either have a database installed or one easily 
installable.  It's not hard.

If you use a framework that uses the active record pattern (like, maybe 
Django) then you never even see the database.  Objects just appear when 
you ask for them, and you call save() on them when you're done.

Some people just seem to like doing things the hard way.

Gordon


From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Mon Dec 29 12:51:49 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 13:51:49 -0500
Subject: PDP-11/70 cache memory
In-Reply-To: <4958B9EE.1050507@softjar.se>
References: <4958B9EE.1050507@softjar.se>
Message-ID: 

On Mon, Dec 29, 2008 at 6:52 AM, Johnny Billquist  wrote:
> And since some have mentioned it, there was a 3rd party upgrade to the 11/70
> which replaced the whole memory system with a few cards in the CPU box,
> which turned all memory into cache.
> This was by a company called SETASI, and the product was the hypercache.
> They actually had two products. HC-70 was the hypercache, and then you had
> something called the PEP-70 as well. It appears they could be used together,
> but I don't know if one was required for the other, or if they were related
> in any way, and if so how.

Once I got the keyword "PEP-70", I easily found the previously
mentioned install guide.  It appears that the products are usable
singly or combined.  Since I don't really care about squeezing extra
CPU performance, I wouldn't personally hold out for the hypercache,
but replacing an MK-11 loaded with 16 256K cards with a single card is
enticing.

> (SETASI also did other stuff, such as a SCSI adapted for massbus, which was
> pretty nice, and usable both on 16-bit and 36-bit machines.)

Neat.  I've never seen any of that - I've only played with real DEC
peripherals on MASSBUS.

-ethan


From spectre at floodgap.com  Mon Dec 29 12:53:38 2008
From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 10:53:38 -0800 (PST)
Subject: OT: HTML queries (was Re: PDF datasheets)
In-Reply-To: <49591BD7.2050606@gjcp.net> from Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ at "Dec
	29, 8 06:49:59 pm"
Message-ID: <200812291853.mBTIrckP014054@floodgap.com>

> >>> Management System) like typo3, Joomla, Drupal, ... You can do it also
> >>> with cvs, m4, sed / awk, make, ... or a XML processor, where you write
> >>> XML files containing just the content and the XML processor generates
> >>> (static) HTML... (AFAIK the NetBSD web site is generated this way.)
> >> I tried that.  Down that path madness lies.  It's far better to just 
> >> store the text in a database, possibly marked up in one of the "simple" 
> >> markup languages like markdown, and serve it up as required.
> > 
> > Then you have all the headaches of a database. Sometimes a Makefile and
> > some skeletons pulling in flat files really *is* the simplest approach.
> > 
> 
> Any sane distro will either have a database installed or one easily 
> installable.  It's not hard.

That doesn't obviate in any way keeping the database maintained. It's
another package mouth to feed, not to mention (if networked) another
potential security issue.

> If you use a framework that uses the active record pattern (like, maybe 
> Django) then you never even see the database.  Objects just appear when 
> you ask for them, and you call save() on them when you're done.
> 
> Some people just seem to like doing things the hard way.

I daresay ;-)

However, we'll just have to agree to disagree on this one.

-- 
------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ --
  Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com
-- BOND THEME NOW PLAYING: "Moonraker" ----------------------------------------


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Mon Dec 29 12:27:18 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 18:27:18 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: Facit 4431 terminal
In-Reply-To: <49579C3B.2040307@softjar.se> from "Johnny Billquist" at Dec 28,
	8 04:33:15 pm
Message-ID: 

> 
> Anyone have any docs for this terminal? It's a plain glass terminal. 
> VT100-compatible.
 > I have a problem with mine, and don't have any kind of documentation. 
> I do see 
> that the data lines have junk on them, and the serial port isn't working.

By 'Data lines' do you mean the TxD line on the RS232 port, or some 
internal data bus? 

If the former, then I've seen a similar problem when there was excessive 
ripple on the power lines to the RS232 driver chip (probably a 1488, but 
it's easy to find by tracing the signal back from the RS232 connector). 
The 5V line is probaly OK, so the machine passes all self-tests (which, 
unless you use a loopback test connecotr don't normally check the RS232 
drivers/receivers)

In my case it was on the RS232 PCB in my P850 minicomputer. The DC-DC 
converter had failed (a totally open-cricuit output capacitor) so the 
supply to the chip was actually dipping to 0V. 

It would be worth 'scoping the supply lines to the line drivers i nthe 
terminal anyhow.

-tony


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Mon Dec 29 12:30:18 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 18:30:18 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: <4957F946.7070306@aurigae.demon.co.uk> from "Phill Harvey-Smith"
	at Dec 28, 8 10:10:14 pm
Message-ID: 

> 
> Dave McGuire wrote:
> > On Dec 28, 2008, at 12:50 PM, Tony Duell wrote:
> >>>     - Single sided board (does not matter how much jumpers I'll have 
> >>> to put
> >>> in this beast)
> >>
> >> Double sided PCBs are not much harder, surely?
> > 
> >   In fact they're a whole lot easier, at least for the soldering!
> 
> And if you use turned pin IC sockets, and place them carefully & solder 
> them in in the right order you can also top solder them if you are 
> making the board at home, where you won't have plated through holes.

Sure. Acutally, I only use turned-pin sockets now, the extra cost is well 
worth the lack of stress caused by intermittant connections [1]. 

In general, leaded compoents (resistors, capacitors, diodes, transistors, 
etc cna be trivially soldered on both sides. ICs can too (if you are 
careful not to overheat them), and of course turned-pin sockets. Some 
connectors (particularly those box header plugs) and switches can't. With 
those, you have to run a track on the bottom side of the PCB to a 
suitable via.

-tony



From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Mon Dec 29 12:34:15 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 18:34:15 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: <4957FBBA.2010003@mail.msu.edu> from "Josh Dersch" at Dec 28,
	8 02:20:42 pm
Message-ID: 

> So forgive my inexperience here -- but just to make sure I'm 
> understanding the changes I need to make -- is all that's necessary just 
> wiring up the address lines (18-21) from slot 1, to slot 2, to slot 3, 
> to slot 4?

Yes, but I think it's _twice_ on each slot (the Q-bus being based round 
dual-height boards). So a total of 8 points to link for each of 4 wires.

But it is just a matter of running wires between those points and 
soldering them down.


> 
> Also, just to satisfy my curiosity -- it's been mentioned by several 
> people that lead-based solder is necessary -- why is this?  (I think I 

Is there ever a good reason not to use leaded solder in homebrew stuff 
and classic computer repairs (neither of which come under any RoHS 
directives in the UK)?

It is a very bad idea to mix solders, the worst way, or so I am told is 
to use lead-free solder on a PCB that was originally soldered with leaded 
solder (the VT103 certainly was!) The resuling lead-free solder 
contaminated with a little lead produces a very poor, brittle, joint.

> have a spool of it somewhere that I liberated from my grandfather's 
> basement some years back, but I'll have to dig it up...)

This is electornic-grade resin-cored solder, I hope!. You can still buy 
leaded solderm at least in the UK, fortunately.

-tony


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Mon Dec 29 12:46:03 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 18:46:03 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: Suggestions for VT103?
In-Reply-To: <495837AD.2060707@compsys.to> from "Jerome H. Fine" at Dec 28,
	8 09:36:29 pm
Message-ID: 

> Well, maybe soldering a VT103 backplane was not so bad, but I seem to 

I've never done one, but I can;'t believe it's as bad as some of the 
things I've soldered, like : 

Upgrading an HP42S to 32K RAM while being photographed using flash... (28 
pin SOIC to desolder and resodler, one link to move)

Upgrading the ram card in a Sharp PC1350 to 16K (ti's a very thin PCB 
that wanders all over the bench, of course it's all SMD)

Just about any (Mac or later) Apple PCB. They have undersized holes 
(which makes it difficult to desolder/resolder), traces that are much 
thinner than they need been, and IMHO poor quality PCB material so the 
traces lift if you look at them wrongly...

> remember the
> problems I once had with a DRV11 module.  It needed to be strapped, but 
> the only way that
> DEC provided to change the CSR value was with zero ohm resistors.  
> Removing a strap just
> meant cutting out a resistor.  But I found it impossible to add a 
> resistor.  Finally after several

There's a trick to cleaning out holes in a plated-throuh-hole PCB. It's 
to hold or clamp the PCB vertically, melt the solder with the iron on the 
solder sice and suck with a good solder sucker [1] on the component side. 
If the hole doesn't clear, resolder it and try again.

[1] Most sodler suckerc can be made 'good' for this if you take them 
apart and put a little petroleum jelly (Vaseline) on the O-ring/washer on 
the piston.
> Needless to say, I am not a bit fan of making solder connections at this 
> point.

I guess it comes with experience, but it doesn't bother me at all now. I 
just gra the iron and do it.

-tony



From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Mon Dec 29 12:56:16 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 18:56:16 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <49590976.6050705@e-bbes.com> from "e.stiebler" at Dec 29,
	8 10:31:34 am
Message-ID: 

> 
> Jim Brain wrote:
> > 
> > There are still things to do with the uIEC base, though.  IEEE488 
> > support would be a great win, as then PET/CBM machines would have a 
> > solid state device to use, and I am working on a USB link to a PC, so 
> > one can slave their Win/Mac/Linux box to their CBM.  And, for those who 
> > want something more vintage as a target, the protocol is simple RS232 (I 
> > use a RS232->USB converter), so they could add a MAX232 and write a 
> > suitable app for anything that provides RS232.
> 
> Any chance for HP support (hp85, hp86, etc) ?

I was secretly hoping for much the same thing. I have several HP machines 
that use Amigo or SS/80 disks. I'd probably buy one if it wasn't _too_ 
expensive 9read : I can't afford the prices charged for such things to 
people who depened on such machines for their work).

How 'open' is the uIEC? The more open something like this is, the more 
likely I am to get it (of course!).

-tony


From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu  Mon Dec 29 14:01:02 2008
From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 12:01:02 -0800 (PST)
Subject: CP/M on Sun 68k
Message-ID: 


Has anyone here ever seriously considered trying to get CP/M-68k running 
on an older Sun machine, say, a Sun 2 or 3?

-- 
David Griffith
dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu

A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text.
Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing?
A: Top-posting.
Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail?


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Mon Dec 29 14:24:42 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 20:24:42 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To:  from "Tony Duell" at Dec 29,
	8 06:30:18 pm
Message-ID: 

Ooops, I missed a footnote. What I meant to say was : 

> Sure. Acutally, I only use turned-pin sockets now, the extra cost is well 
> worth the lack of stress caused by intermittant connections [1]. 

[1] My Whitechapel MG1 came with nice turned-pin sockets for all the 
'expensive stuff' (32016CPU, MMU, FPU, etc) but had the EPROMs in cheap 
sockets. I had numerous problems due to bad connections at the latter. I 
cut out the old sockets (the sockets were junk, the PCB valuable..) then 
soldered turned-pin ones in place of them. And had no more problems.

-tony



From cisin at xenosoft.com  Mon Dec 29 15:32:28 2008
From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 13:32:28 -0800 (PST)
Subject: Heathkit manuals under tighter control
In-Reply-To: <38D28A49-3F41-4950-9B36-17A89262599F@feedle.net>
References: <6.2.3.4.2.20081228195539.06181cc0@mail.threedee.com>
	
	<38D28A49-3F41-4950-9B36-17A89262599F@feedle.net>
Message-ID: <20081229133037.O3688@shell.lmi.net>

> > Technically, if you have a H89 or such and you've lost
> > the manual, you have a right to a copy of the manual
> > without paying any copyright fee. The manual is already
> > payed for.
> > I'm no lawyer and this is just a personal opinion.

On Mon, 29 Dec 2008, C. Sullivan wrote:
> think you do.  The issue is that only the "intellectual property
> owner" has the "right to copy" and distribute the manual: hence the
> term "copyright".

To bring this completely back on topic:
Remember the issues between Randy Cook, RS, and Apparat over distribution
of APR-DOS  (early NEWDOS)


--
Grumpy Ol' Fred    (IANAL)


From mcguire at neurotica.com  Mon Dec 29 15:58:52 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 16:58:52 -0500
Subject: CP/M on Sun 68k
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <4231C647-C3D8-4E25-9F49-312BD45C7A71@neurotica.com>

On Dec 29, 2008, at 3:01 PM, David Griffith wrote:
> Has anyone here ever seriously considered trying to get CP/M-68k  
> running on an older Sun machine, say, a Sun 2 or 3?

   That's sick and twisted.  I like it.

           -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From lynchaj at yahoo.com  Mon Dec 29 16:00:36 2008
From: lynchaj at yahoo.com (Andrew Lynch)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 17:00:36 -0500
Subject: Z80 CTC, DART, & PIO system clock question
Message-ID: <9EFF4F3C3DA742BC8E2E6AF73C40631D@andrewdesktop>

Hi!

I am building a Z80 peripheral for an ECB bus device.  All the Z80 control,
data, and address bus signals are present on the ECB bus.  However, the
system clock (4MHz) signal is not available.

The Z80 peripheral data sheets mention a "standard Z80 single-phase system
clock" input to the CTC, DART, and PIO.  I would like to supply a "local"
4MHz TTL oscillator can as an input to the CTC, DART, and PIO chips.

Obviously, the "local" oscillator will not be exactly in phase or
synchronized with the CPU clock.

Do the Z80 peripherals require *the* CPU system clock or *a* system clock?

I believe it is *a* system clock but do not know for sure and the
documentation is not clear enough for me to tell.  This is what the
documentation says regarding the CTC

Clock(phi)
System Clock (input). This single-phase clock is used by the CTC to
internally synchronize certain signals.

If anyone knows *definitively* (not speculation) whether a "local"
oscillator can serve as the CTC, DART, & PIO system clock and still work
with the SBC CPU over the bus please let me know.

Responses to this thread or send to my email.

Thank you in advance

Andrew Lynch




From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Mon Dec 29 15:54:53 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 19:54:53 -0200
Subject: PDP-11/70 cache memory
References: <4958B9EE.1050507@softjar.se>
	
Message-ID: <02d301c96a01$2388f6e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

> but replacing an MK-11 loaded with 16 256K cards with a single card is
> enticing.

    Ethan, how hard it is to create a wire-up (or like) board with some PC 
SRAMs?



From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Mon Dec 29 15:56:45 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 19:56:45 -0200
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
References: <49586F48.3090205@jbrain.com>
	<49590976.6050705@e-bbes.com>
	
Message-ID: <02d401c96a01$296bc510$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

> Personally I was just thinking a couple hours ago how nice it would be if
> someone would make something like this for the Amiga 500.

    There is!

    Power of Asm : HxC Floppy Emulator 
    HxC Floppy Drive Emulator 

    Have fun
    Alexandre
    



From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Mon Dec 29 16:00:01 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 20:00:01 -0200
Subject: Heathkit manuals under tighter control
References: <6.2.3.4.2.20081228195539.06181cc0@mail.threedee.com><38D28A49-3F41-4950-9B36-17A89262599F@feedle.net>
	<20081229133037.O3688@shell.lmi.net>
Message-ID: <02d501c96a01$2c9da410$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

http://techdirt.com/articles/20081215/0106043118.shtml


From rogpugh at mac.com  Mon Dec 29 16:08:51 2008
From: rogpugh at mac.com (Roger Pugh)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 22:08:51 +0000
Subject: compugraphic on ebay UK
Message-ID: <48e66cc9130566f8ef0a179deb1e6493@mac.com>

Merry christmas, happy new year all.

Spotted this on Ebay UK in case its of interest to anyone.  its listed 
in the wrong category so may not appear on everyones radar.

Item no.    180317075811	

roger



From silent700 at gmail.com  Mon Dec 29 16:19:46 2008
From: silent700 at gmail.com (Jason T)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 16:19:46 -0600
Subject: Ebay: "new" 029 Keypunch
Message-ID: <51ea77730812291419u2dfcb7a3l5591a4e73ebbd4bf@mail.gmail.com>

Either new or very new-looking.  Not mine, don't know the seller, etc:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=280297753368

\


From bobalan at sbcglobal.net  Mon Dec 29 16:27:14 2008
From: bobalan at sbcglobal.net (Bob Rosenbloom)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 14:27:14 -0800 (PST)
Subject: Ebay: "new" 029 Keypunch
In-Reply-To: <51ea77730812291419u2dfcb7a3l5591a4e73ebbd4bf@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <762706.14787.qm@web82701.mail.mud.yahoo.com>

--- On Mon, 12/29/08, Jason T  wrote:
From: Jason T 
Subject: Ebay: "new" 029 Keypunch
To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" 
Date: Monday, December 29, 2008, 2:19 PM

Either new or very new-looking.  Not mine, don't know the seller, etc:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=280297753368





Looks like the one from govliquidation that sold a few weeks ago.


Bob


From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Mon Dec 29 16:36:13 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 17:36:13 -0500
Subject: PDP-11/70 cache memory
In-Reply-To: <02d301c96a01$2388f6e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
References: <4958B9EE.1050507@softjar.se>
	
	<02d301c96a01$2388f6e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
Message-ID: 

On Mon, Dec 29, 2008 at 4:54 PM, Alexandre Souza
 wrote:
>> but replacing an MK-11 loaded with 16 256K cards with a single card is
>> enticing.
>
>   Ethan, how hard it is to create a wire-up (or like) board with some PC
> SRAMs?

How hard?  Not particularly... in this case, I'd use the same SRAMs
that Bob Armstrong did with the SBC6120 RAM disk - JEDEC pinout,
512Kx8.  You'd need 4-wide for the data, and 5-wide if you wanted to
not fake the ECC (the real boards are 39-bits wide).  There's one free
slot in the 11/70 CPU backplane (where the PEP-70 goes), and as I
think someone (Guy?) pointed out, it only gets power and ground from
the backplane - all the signals come in on ribbon cables from the
cache cards, so a quad-height (or dual-height?) card would be enough.

I don't know the memory cycle time of the 11/70 (or the 11/730 or
11/750), but the MS730AA should be identical to the MS750AA and
identical to what goes in the MK11, unless I'm really mistaken (the
MS730CA and MS750CA 1MB cards are also the same as each other - I've
moved them from machine to machine).  The DRAMs in all of these are
ordinary 16-pin DRAMs of late 1970s vintage, so like the 4096 and
4116, AFAIK, but the printset will confirm that (and they happen to be
same chips used in the MS8AA and MS8CA and MS8DJ 16K, 32K and 128K
boards for the PDP-8/a).  These are glacially slow by modern
standards, 120ns to 150ns, so I don't think SRAM access times would be
a factor.

You'd need 8 of those chips (or 10 for ECC) to completely fill the
11/70s memory space, wired as two banks of 4 (or 5).  That's not much
room, even for DIP parts.  I suppose if you wanted to try a
dual-height card, it might be necessary to stay at the quad-height
card size, but with SMT RAM, I don't see why you couldn't go with
dual-height (just remember to get 5V RAMs to simplify things).

That's all fairly trivial stuff to do with the RAM field.  With the
quantities involved, buffering isn't a big issue, and neither is
select logic.  What I do not know the first thing about, though, is
what sort of logic needs to be there to implement even a fake ECC
scheme, including, probably, CSR registers, etc.  Unlike DIMMs in a
PC, PDP-11 memory isn't just a passive field of chips; it's "active"
to various degrees,  Bust out the docs for any Unibus memory card and
browse around the schematic - there's lots going on, and not just DRAM
refresh.

I do not know nearly enough to contemplate designing a board to
imitate the entire MK11 and a stack of memory.  The memory is the
simple part.  The idea of mating a RAM field with a Spartan 3 FPGA
sounds entirely workable, but I wouldn't know how to bring it all
together nor what to stuff in the FPGA to make it all magically work.

I do find the idea enticing.  I'm not the guy to make it happen.  I
could build one, but someone else will have to design it.

In the meantime, similarly, a 4MB card for the KA730 would be nice -
I know that never existed in real life.  If there's a chance of
getting one up to 7MB or 8MB, it would take new memory to try.

-ethan

-ethan


From brain at jbrain.com  Mon Dec 29 16:36:56 2008
From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 16:36:56 -0600
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <49590976.6050705@e-bbes.com>
References: 	<49586F48.3090205@jbrain.com>
	<49590976.6050705@e-bbes.com>
Message-ID: <49595108.5090205@jbrain.com>

e.stiebler wrote:
> Jim Brain wrote:
>>
>> There are still things to do with the uIEC base, though.  IEEE488 
>> support would be a great win, as then PET/CBM machines would have a 
>> solid state device to use, and I am working on a USB link to a PC, so 
>> one can slave their Win/Mac/Linux box to their CBM.  And, for those 
>> who want something more vintage as a target, the protocol is simple 
>> RS232 (I use a RS232->USB converter), so they could add a MAX232 and 
>> write a suitable app for anything that provides RS232.
>
> Any chance for HP support (hp85, hp86, etc) ?
Has anyone ever tried a CBM IEEE DRIVE on an HP?  If the differences are 
trivial or not too insurmountable and I had someone to help me (I have 
no HP machines here with HPIB to try), i'm happy to add support.

Jim

-- 
Jim Brain, Brain Innovations                                      (X)
brain at jbrain.com 
Dabbling in WWW, Embedded Systems, Old CBM computers, and Good Times! 
Home: http://www.jbrain.com



From brain at jbrain.com  Mon Dec 29 16:39:13 2008
From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 16:39:13 -0600
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <49595191.7050609@jbrain.com>

Tony Duell wrote:
>>
>
> I was secretly hoping for much the same thing. I have several HP machines 
> that use Amigo or SS/80 disks. I'd probably buy one if it wasn't _too_ 
> expensive 9read : I can't afford the prices charged for such things to 
> people who depened on such machines for their work).
>   
Well, uIEC tries to hit the $50-$100 price range, so it's not terribly 
expensive, but provides enough profit to pay for my tools I needed to 
buy to create it and add functionality to it.
> How 'open' is the uIEC? The more open something like this is, the more 
> likely I am to get it (of course!).
>   
The plans, source, PCB, etc. are all under GPL v2.  However, for the ASM 
lovers and the C haters of the list, I will note that almost the entire 
firmware is in 'C'.

Jim


From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Mon Dec 29 16:44:17 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 20:44:17 -0200
Subject: PDP-11/70 cache memory
References: <4958B9EE.1050507@softjar.se><02d301c96a01$2388f6e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
	
Message-ID: <03c801c96a07$1fcffed0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

> I do not know nearly enough to contemplate designing a board to
> imitate the entire MK11 and a stack of memory.  The memory is the
> simple part.  The idea of mating a RAM field with a Spartan 3 FPGA
> sounds entirely workable, but I wouldn't know how to bring it all
> together nor what to stuff in the FPGA to make it all magically work.

    Nor do I, but it would be something interesting :o)

    The SBC6120 is a **real nice** SBC, wish I had saved a T-11 (was it?) 
processor from many of the arcade boards I saw going to trash...I do not 
even know how to operate a PDP, but it would be something fun to learn :o)

    Ok, I know the ersatz-11, but this is not hardware... :o)

    Alexandre, the hardware lover :D



From gordonjcp at gjcp.net  Mon Dec 29 16:52:21 2008
From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 22:52:21 +0000
Subject: PDP-11/70 cache memory
In-Reply-To: <03c801c96a07$1fcffed0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
References: <4958B9EE.1050507@softjar.se><02d301c96a01$2388f6e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>	
	<03c801c96a07$1fcffed0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
Message-ID: <495954A5.9080109@gjcp.net>

Alexandre Souza wrote:

>    The SBC6120 is a **real nice** SBC, wish I had saved a T-11 (was it?) 
> processor from many of the arcade boards I saw going to trash...I do not 
> even know how to operate a PDP, but it would be something fun to learn :o)

I think I asked the question a couple of years ago, about which 
"classic" non-typical CPUs turned up in arcade machines.  I seem to 
recall someone saying that the T-11 was used in Paperboy.

Gordon


From dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu  Mon Dec 29 16:54:11 2008
From: dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu (David Griffith)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 14:54:11 -0800 (PST)
Subject: PDP-11/70 cache memory
In-Reply-To: <03c801c96a07$1fcffed0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
References: <4958B9EE.1050507@softjar.se><02d301c96a01$2388f6e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
	
	<03c801c96a07$1fcffed0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
Message-ID: 

On Mon, 29 Dec 2008, Alexandre Souza wrote:

>> I do not know nearly enough to contemplate designing a board to
>> imitate the entire MK11 and a stack of memory.  The memory is the
>> simple part.  The idea of mating a RAM field with a Spartan 3 FPGA
>> sounds entirely workable, but I wouldn't know how to bring it all
>> together nor what to stuff in the FPGA to make it all magically work.
>
>   Nor do I, but it would be something interesting :o)
>
>   The SBC6120 is a **real nice** SBC, wish I had saved a T-11 (was it?) 
> processor from many of the arcade boards I saw going to trash...I do not even 
> know how to operate a PDP, but it would be something fun to learn :o)

If you don't have an SBC6120, you can get in on the new run announced a 
couple days ago.  Bob apparently found some NOS processor chips.  See the 
sparetimegizmos mailing list for more info.

-- 
David Griffith
dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu

A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text.
Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing?
A: Top-posting.
Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail?


From ggs at shiresoft.com  Mon Dec 29 17:02:54 2008
From: ggs at shiresoft.com (Guy Sotomayor)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 15:02:54 -0800
Subject: PDP-11/70 cache memory
In-Reply-To: <03c801c96a07$1fcffed0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
References: <4958B9EE.1050507@softjar.se><02d301c96a01$2388f6e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
	
	<03c801c96a07$1fcffed0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
Message-ID: <35BD6185-38DB-49EA-942A-939729CC43F4@shiresoft.com>


On Dec 29, 2008, at 2:44 PM, Alexandre Souza wrote:

>> I do not know nearly enough to contemplate designing a board to
>> imitate the entire MK11 and a stack of memory.  The memory is the
>> simple part.  The idea of mating a RAM field with a Spartan 3 FPGA
>> sounds entirely workable, but I wouldn't know how to bring it all
>> together nor what to stuff in the FPGA to make it all magically work.
>
>   Nor do I, but it would be something interesting :o)

If there's enough interest, I'll try for it since I'm doing a unibus  
memory board (a multifunction board) with an FPGA for everything but  
the memory and interfaces.  I'd have to look at the interface from the  
cache boards, but I might be tempted to use SSRAMs since they can be  
obtained in wide bit widths (36 bits) in a single chip and aren't too  
difficult to interface to (timing wise).  I know that they come in  
512K x 36 since I'm considering that for another project.  So that  
would only require 2 parts for the entire memory array (4MB).  If ECC  
were required, there'd be a bit more involved and I'd have to look to  
see what was available.

However, I'm swamped with my real job and haven't had a lot of time  
(read none) to spend on this stuff.  I've already done the schematic  
capture for the Unibus interface and level shifters and I'm about  
15-20% done coding up the verilog for the FPGA.  I've done all of the  
high level design, memory timing and unibus address decode.  The rest  
is the internal interconnect, serial, unibus state machine and  
configuration state machine plus the individual unibus devices  
(memory, KW11L, ROMs, 2 SLUs).

TTFN - Guy



From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Mon Dec 29 18:21:07 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 19:21:07 -0500
Subject: T-11 (was Re: PDP-11/70 cache memory)
Message-ID: 

On Mon, Dec 29, 2008 at 5:52 PM, Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ
 wrote:
> Alexandre Souza wrote:
>
>>   The SBC6120 is a **real nice** SBC...

Yes it is, and it's back in "print"!

> ... [I] wish I had saved a T-11 (was it?)
>> processor from many of the arcade boards I saw going to trash...I do not
>> even know how to operate a PDP, but it would be something fun to learn :o)

T-11s aren't terribly rare.  Perhaps not as common as other 40-pin
CPUs from the 1980s but they can be found on DEC boards and in at
least one DEC terminal.  The issue of using one in a modern
SBC6120-like board has been brought up from time to time, and one of
the limitations I think I recall is that they don't have a MMU and,
unlike the F-11, there wasn't one for it, severely limiting your OS
choices.  Between that and it not being simple to emulate DEC
interfaces down to the CSR level, turning a T-11 into a bootable
PDP-11 isn't easy at all.  Making a 64KB board that runs PDP-11
instructions isn't hard - but then what do you do for software?  It's
a harder problem to solve than on the PDP-8 since there really is only
one dominant OS there (plus a lot of OS-less paper-tape software).
Writing _a_ disk driver for one OS for your new disk (such as with the
SBC6120) isn't a terrible obstacle.  For the PDP-11, you have to
consider that folks would be interested in RT-11, RSX, RSTS, and
several varieties of UNIX.

The T-11 would make a fun little board if you happen to know or want
to learn the PDP-11 instruction set and have a use in mind for some
configuration smaller than a console line and a disk/disk emulator.

> I think I asked the question a couple of years ago, about which "classic"
> non-typical CPUs turned up in arcade machines.  I seem to recall someone
> saying that the T-11 was used in Paperboy.

Yeah... I remember reading about the T-11 in Paperboy some time back
and was quite surprised.  Large quantities of video games spanned the
progression over the years from 8080 to Z-80 and 6809 to 68000 as
complexity and sound and color advanced, and there were a few games
here and there with something odd like a 6502, but the rare appearance
of a T-11 really stood out for me.  I never played Paperboy much, and
I haven't seen too many of the machines in the wild since I learned
they hid a T-11 inside.

-ethan


From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Mon Dec 29 18:30:01 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 19:30:01 -0500
Subject: PDP-11/70 cache memory
In-Reply-To: <35BD6185-38DB-49EA-942A-939729CC43F4@shiresoft.com>
References: <4958B9EE.1050507@softjar.se>
	
	<02d301c96a01$2388f6e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
	
	<03c801c96a07$1fcffed0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
	<35BD6185-38DB-49EA-942A-939729CC43F4@shiresoft.com>
Message-ID: 

On Mon, Dec 29, 2008 at 6:02 PM, Guy Sotomayor  wrote:
> If there's enough interest, I'll try for it since I'm doing a unibus memory
> board (a multifunction board) with an FPGA for everything but the memory and
> interfaces.  I'd have to look at the interface from the cache boards, but I
> might be tempted to use SSRAMs since they can be obtained in wide bit widths
> (36 bits) in a single chip and aren't too difficult to interface to (timing
> wise).  I know that they come in 512K x 36 since I'm considering that for
> another project.  So that would only require 2 parts for the entire memory
> array (4MB).

Handy.

>  If ECC were required, there'd be a bit more involved and I'd
> have to look to see what was available.

My personal thought was that one could get away with simulated ECC
(enough to fool what the OS is expecting) or I do know that one can do
some form of ECC with 36 bits per word - I have an Alpha board that
does it (36-bit-wide 72-pin SIMMs).

> However, I'm swamped with my real job and haven't had a lot of time (read
> none) to spend on this stuff.

Understandable.

> I've already done the schematic capture for
> the Unibus interface and level shifters and I'm about 15-20% done coding up
> the verilog for the FPGA.  I've done all of the high level design, memory
> timing and unibus address decode.  The rest is the internal interconnect,
> serial, unibus state machine and configuration state machine plus the
> individual unibus devices (memory, KW11L, ROMs, 2 SLUs).

Cool.

Speaking only for myself, a modern Unibus board is more interesting
than a board that only works in 11/70s.  The number of 11/70s running
in hobbyists' hands is tiny compared to the overall number of lesser
Unibus machines.  And since many of those lesser machines might not
have a full load of memory, the impact of changing from old to new is
greater.  My 11/70s have full MK11s - the idea of running without an
MK11 is about space (second rack) and power consumption and
maintainability.  If I had run across an 11/70 CPU only that had lost
the MK-11 some time back, I might feel differently, but I think the
ratio of 11/70s with no memory to ones that are complete is rather
small.

I look forward to hearing more about, then buying, your universal
memory board.  I'm not sure I could afford a modern PEP-70
replacement, let alone two.

-ethan


From emu at e-bbes.com  Mon Dec 29 18:44:54 2008
From: emu at e-bbes.com (e.stiebler)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 17:44:54 -0700
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <49595108.5090205@jbrain.com>
References: 	<49586F48.3090205@jbrain.com>	<49590976.6050705@e-bbes.com>
	<49595108.5090205@jbrain.com>
Message-ID: <49596F06.1040000@e-bbes.com>

Jim Brain wrote:
> e.stiebler wrote:
>> Jim Brain wrote:

>> Any chance for HP support (hp85, hp86, etc) ?
> Has anyone ever tried a CBM IEEE DRIVE on an HP?  If the differences are 
> trivial or not too insurmountable and I had someone to help me (I have 
> no HP machines here with HPIB to try), i'm happy to add support.

Where are you located ?
I have a hp87xm here I don't use at the moment ...

Cheers


From legalize at xmission.com  Mon Dec 29 19:01:03 2008
From: legalize at xmission.com (Richard)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 18:01:03 -0700
Subject: compugraphic on ebay UK 
In-Reply-To: Your message of Mon, 29 Dec 2008 22:08:51 +0000.
	<48e66cc9130566f8ef0a179deb1e6493@mac.com> 
Message-ID: 


In article <48e66cc9130566f8ef0a179deb1e6493 at mac.com>,
    Roger Pugh   writes:

> Merry christmas, happy new year all.
> 
> Spotted this on Ebay UK in case its of interest to anyone.  its listed 
> in the wrong category so may not appear on everyones radar.
> 
> Item no.    180317075811	

It looks in pretty sad shape, what a pity.  It looks like its been
covered in dust/dirt and the enclosure around the monitor has been
removed.
-- 
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
      

        Legalize Adulthood! 


From cclist at sydex.com  Mon Dec 29 18:40:08 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 16:40:08 -0800
Subject: T-11 (was Re: PDP-11/70 cache memory)
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <4958FD68.5056.F4D5C5C@cclist.sydex.com>

On 29 Dec 2008 at 19:21, Ethan Dicks wrote:

 
> The T-11 would make a fun little board if you happen to know or want
> to learn the PDP-11 instruction set and have a use in mind for some
> configuration smaller than a console line and a disk/disk emulator.

On the other hand, the Russians used their clone of a PDP-11 
microprocessor in a bunch of products--even a pocket calculator.

Cheers,
Chuck



From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Mon Dec 29 19:58:25 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 20:58:25 -0500
Subject: T-11 (was Re: PDP-11/70 cache memory)
In-Reply-To: <4958FD68.5056.F4D5C5C@cclist.sydex.com>
References: 
	<4958FD68.5056.F4D5C5C@cclist.sydex.com>
Message-ID: 

On Mon, Dec 29, 2008 at 7:40 PM, Chuck Guzis  wrote:
> On 29 Dec 2008 at 19:21, Ethan Dicks wrote:
>
>
>> The T-11 would make a fun little board if you happen to know or want
>> to learn the PDP-11 instruction set and have a use in mind for some
>> configuration smaller than a console line and a disk/disk emulator.
>
> On the other hand, the Russians used their clone of a PDP-11
> microprocessor in a bunch of products--even a pocket calculator.

True!  A calculator or hand-held electronic game is just the sort of
thing a T-11 would be good for.

It should be as easy to design in as a 68000, and a lot of fun to program.

Hmm... a T-11-based PDA... just stick an LCD on it, add a keypad and
some flash...

-ethan


From spectre at floodgap.com  Mon Dec 29 20:25:53 2008
From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 18:25:53 -0800 (PST)
Subject: T-11 (was Re: PDP-11/70 cache memory)
In-Reply-To: 
	from Ethan Dicks at "Dec 29, 8 08:58:25 pm"
Message-ID: <200812300225.mBU2PrZj015246@floodgap.com>

> True!  A calculator or hand-held electronic game is just the sort of
> thing a T-11 would be good for.
> It should be as easy to design in as a 68000, and a lot of fun to program.

Heck, Atari Games used the T-11 heavily.

-- 
------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ --
  Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com
-- Space is limited/In a haiku so it's hard/To finish what you - Tristan Miller


From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Mon Dec 29 20:35:30 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 21:35:30 -0500
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <49595191.7050609@jbrain.com>
References:  <49595191.7050609@jbrain.com>
Message-ID: 

On Mon, Dec 29, 2008 at 5:39 PM, Jim Brain  wrote:
> The plans, source, PCB, etc. are all under GPL v2.  However, for the ASM
> lovers and the C haters of the list, I will note that almost the entire
> firmware is in 'C'.

Assembler lovers should _love_ C... it's all really just PDP-11 MACRO
shorthand anyway.

-ethan


From brain at jbrain.com  Mon Dec 29 20:39:53 2008
From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 20:39:53 -0600
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <49596F06.1040000@e-bbes.com>
References: 	<49586F48.3090205@jbrain.com>	<49590976.6050705@e-bbes.com>	<49595108.5090205@jbrain.com>
	<49596F06.1040000@e-bbes.com>
Message-ID: <495989F9.1070902@jbrain.com>

e.stiebler wrote:
>
> Where are you located ?
> I have a hp87xm here I don't use at the moment ...
I'm in Iowa.

If that works, I'll keep you in mind.  I don't need it yet, as I need to 
get some basic IEEE488 stuff implemented.

Jim


From joachim.thiemann at gmail.com  Mon Dec 29 20:57:25 2008
From: joachim.thiemann at gmail.com (Joachim Thiemann)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 21:57:25 -0500
Subject: CP/M on Sun 68k
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <4affc5e0812291857j342bb80dj8a49a6d90f709678@mail.gmail.com>

On 12/29/08, David Griffith  wrote:
>
> Has anyone here ever seriously considered trying to get CP/M-68k running
> on an older Sun machine, say, a Sun 2 or 3?

I have always thought the Amiga 500 might be a good target. It's well
documented, and easy to bootstrap.  Additionally, they're cheap and
plentiful still.

-- 
Joachim Thiemann :: http://www.tsp.ece.mcgill.ca/~jthiem


From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Mon Dec 29 21:05:53 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 01:05:53 -0200
Subject: T-11 (was Re: PDP-11/70 cache memory)
References: 
Message-ID: <04a601c96a2b$93cb9320$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

>>>   The SBC6120 is a **real nice** SBC...
> Yes it is, and it's back in "print"!

    Nice to know! Maybe I'll take a chance this time :)
 
> T-11s aren't terribly rare.  Perhaps not as common as other 40-pin

    Try that here in Brazil :o)

    Greetz, Alexandre :)



From glen.slick at gmail.com  Mon Dec 29 21:29:21 2008
From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 19:29:21 -0800
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <002001c967d8$47df4060$d79dc120$@com>
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>
	<1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com>
	<24146.1229784478@mini> <24342.1229976120@mini>
	<9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>
	
	<9081BA4A-D92D-47E4-94BE-74E12A044B13@neurotica.com>
	<002001c967d8$47df4060$d79dc120$@com>
Message-ID: <1e1fc3e90812291929v4af84160icefd77976408aeec@mail.gmail.com>

On Fri, Dec 26, 2008 at 8:04 PM, Bob Armstrong  wrote:
>
>  Is there a 9-track distribution?  How do you install it?  Normally you'd
> install VMS from 9-track by booting S/A BACKUP from TU58 or an RL02 pack - I
> assume there's some kind of stand alone mtboot program for Un*x, but what
> media do you load that from?
>

Back to the original subject, yes, you install 4.3BSD Quasijarus by
booting the distribution tape.

I created my own 9-track tape by grabbing the distribution files from
the net and then writing them to a tape.  (I used some DOS utility
programs I wrote along with a PCTD16 controller in a PC to write the
files to a tape.)  I then booted the tape on a KA655 with an Emulex
QT13 controller in TMSCP mode attached to a Fujitsu M2444AC 9-track
tape drive and installed on an RA70 disk drive attached to a KDA50.

I basically followed along with the installation info I found here and
gettting a basic bootable system installed was fairly straight
forward.

http://www.itsecuritygeek.com/itsgeek/comments/43bsd-quasijarus-on-simh-vax/


From spectre at floodgap.com  Mon Dec 29 21:40:04 2008
From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 19:40:04 -0800 (PST)
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: 
	from Ethan Dicks at "Dec 29, 8 09:35:30 pm"
Message-ID: <200812300340.mBU3e4MY018354@floodgap.com>

> > The plans, source, PCB, etc. are all under GPL v2.  However, for the ASM
> > lovers and the C haters of the list, I will note that almost the entire
> > firmware is in 'C'.
> 
> Assembler lovers should _love_ C... 

Actually, I hate C. Dunno why, just never developed a taste for it. I can
write C, but I don't like to. Most of my projects are in Perl.

If you forced me to use a low(er) level language, I would probably use Forth.

-- 
------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ --
  Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com
-- Time makes more converts than reason. -- Thomas Payne ----------------------


From bob at jfcl.com  Mon Dec 29 23:14:03 2008
From: bob at jfcl.com (Bob Armstrong)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 21:14:03 -0800
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <1e1fc3e90812291929v4af84160icefd77976408aeec@mail.gmail.com>
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>	<1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com>	<24146.1229784478@mini>
	<24342.1229976120@mini>	<9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>		<9081BA4A-D92D-47E4-94BE-74E12A044B13@neurotica.com>	<002001c967d8$47df4060$d79dc120$@com>
	<1e1fc3e90812291929v4af84160icefd77976408aeec@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <00b301c96a3d$6eb736e0$4c25a4a0$@com>

> Glen Slick wrote:
>I basically followed along with the installation info I found here and
>gettting a basic bootable system installed was fairly straight
>forward.
>
>http://www.itsecuritygeek.com/itsgeek/comments/43bsd-quasijarus-on-simh-vax
/

  This procedure is for a MicroVAX, though.  You're not going to be able to
boot directly from magtape on a 11/7xx VAX.

Bob




From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Mon Dec 29 23:49:25 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 00:49:25 -0500
Subject: Bootstrapping the oldest VAXen (was Re: 4.3BSD Quasijarus)
Message-ID: 

On Tue, Dec 30, 2008 at 12:14 AM, Bob Armstrong  wrote:
>> Glen Slick wrote:
>>I basically followed along with the installation info I found here and
>>gettting a basic bootable system installed was fairly straight
>>forward.
>>
>>http://www.itsecuritygeek.com/itsgeek/comments/43bsd-quasijarus-on-simh-vax

Nice.

>  This procedure is for a MicroVAX, though.  You're not going to be able to
> boot directly from magtape on a 11/7xx VAX.

If you already know this (or still have the battle scars yourself),
what we did back in the day, for installs, we booted 9-track tapes on
PDP-11s (RK05 or RL02 if you didn't have tape, but the media charge
was expensive), TK50s or RX50s on early MicroVAXen, and "console
media" for large VAXen.    The 11/78x models had RX01s via the
internal PDP-11 console processor, the 11/725 and 11/730 had TU58 by
the internal 8085 console "processor", the 11/750 came right up via
ROM and could boot TU58s, and ISTR the 86xx had RL02, but I don't know
by what attachment.  You had to order your OS with the right console
media to be able to boot up a "standalone restore" program which was
then used to (sometimes) prep the disk and to restore the first
saveset off of, commonly, a 9-track tape.  Early on, VMS might have
been small enough to fit on console media entirely, but by the time I
was doing it (VMS 4.x), we had a tape and a pack of TU58s for our
11/750.  Our UNIX distros (System III, 4BSD...) always came on
magtape.

I still have a pile of TU58s from our 11/750, but when I went to read
them off a few years ago, I did not achieve 100% for any tape set.  If
anyone would still have a stack of VMS install floppies for a 11/78x,
I think those might be more robust and quite possibly still legible.
What I can't recall is how hard it is (i.e. - how manual and how much
esoteric knowledge you have to have at your fingertips) to make a
standalone restore kit once you have a running system.  Eventually,
and I forget when it started, you could create a VMS "SYSE" directory
structure on your system disk for standalone backup with a provided
script, but that doesn't help you get a completely bare machine up and
running.

This aspect of VAXen has hampered me now and then over the years -
there's a lot of little fiddly software bits you have to have for
installs and complete recoveries - stuff you never need when the
machine is working fine.  Unfortunately, I don't think I have
everything we did when I did this every day or I'd have more working
machines.  It appears, looking back on things, that a long-term
advantage of the MicroVAX architecture was that they did _not_ have
console processors, so they had to be able to boot any MSCP device, so
disks and diskettes and tape interfaces all were designed to fit the
bill.  The 11/7xx line does _not_ have that advantage, so takes more
resources to bootstrap from the factory-fresh state.

So if anyone who has resources from before 1995 (VMS before 6.0 or
older versions of Ultrix or 4BSD) wants to write me off-list, I think
there's a need to pull out what we all might have to see what
combinations of systems and operating systems we can cover.  With the
present state of simh, it seems that the 11/780 is the way to go
(there was a recent thread on the simh mailing list about this sort of
thing and I think it's safe to say that emulation of other 11/7xx
machines is distant or worse).  Unfortunately for me, I don't happen
to have *any* 11/780-specific resources, but I do have plenty of OS
magtapes, etc. from about 1985-1995, FWIW, and quite a few 11/750 and
11/730-specific resources since that's what we had then.

*Is* anyone on the list sitting on a pile of ancient OS install kits?
If so, have they been read into disk and tape image files already?

-ethan


From brain at jbrain.com  Tue Dec 30 00:50:16 2008
From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 00:50:16 -0600
Subject: turned-pin headers
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <4959C4A8.8050009@jbrain.com>

Tony Duell wrote:
>> And if you use turned pin IC sockets, and place them carefully & solder 
>>     
This raised a question for me.

Lots of folks are asking for simple "adapters" for things like:

* older 24 pin EPROM to 28 pin JEDEC EPROM
* daughtercards for 40 pin CPUs and such

I have some vintage items like this, and as I look at them, it looks 
like they use something similar to a machine-pin socket, but each end of 
the pin is the same (small diameter.

It looks similar to this:

http://www.king-cart.com/cgi-bin/cart.cgi?store=phoenixent&product_name=HWS2807

But, this one has forks on the top, not a small pin.

Here's the right pin, but it's a 1x header, not a socket:

http://cgi.ebay.com/Machined-Pin-Header-male-40-round-gold-machine-pins_W0QQitemZ160301434584QQcmdZViewItem

I know they are still made, but I have no idea what they are called.  
Digikey and Mouser are not helping me find them.  Anyone know what I am 
talking about?

Jim



From vrs at msn.com  Tue Dec 30 01:36:24 2008
From: vrs at msn.com (Vincent Slyngstad)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 23:36:24 -0800
Subject: turned-pin headers
References:  <4959C4A8.8050009@jbrain.com>
Message-ID: 

From: "Jim Brain"
> Here's the right pin, but it's a 1x header, not a socket:
>
> http://cgi.ebay.com/Machined-Pin-Header-male-40-round-gold-machine-pins_W0QQitemZ160301434584QQcmdZViewItem
>
> I know they are still made, but I have no idea what they are called. 
> Digikey and Mouser are not helping me find them.  Anyone know what I am 
> talking about?

Something like Mouser #535-18-3625-11?  (The 18 is the number of pins.)

    Vince 



From cclist at sydex.com  Tue Dec 30 01:38:48 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 23:38:48 -0800
Subject: turned-pin headers
In-Reply-To: <4959C4A8.8050009@jbrain.com>
References: , <4959C4A8.8050009@jbrain.com>
Message-ID: <49595F88.10308.10CCCF62@cclist.sydex.com>

On 30 Dec 2008 at 0:50, Jim Brain wrote:

> I know they are still made, but I have no idea what they are called.  
> Digikey and Mouser are not helping me find them.  Anyone know what I am 
> talking about?

Jim, are you talking about the adpaters made by Aries?

http://www.larsenassociates.com/ariesadapterlist.html

I remember when they introduced the Correct-A-Chip--intended for 
applicationwhen your PCB layout guy was suffering the morning after 
the night before and reversed the pins on an IC.

BTW, the Landmark ROM POST for the PC and XT used to use one of these 
to adapt a 2764 to the 24-pin ROM configuration in the 5150.  It has 
a small slide swich on it to switch between 24 and 28 pins (when you 
used it in a 5150, you let 4 pins hang over the edge of the socket).

Cheers,
Chuck



From afra at aurigae.demon.co.uk  Tue Dec 30 01:54:48 2008
From: afra at aurigae.demon.co.uk (Phill Harvey-Smith)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 07:54:48 +0000
Subject: turned-pin headers
In-Reply-To: <4959C4A8.8050009@jbrain.com>
References:  <4959C4A8.8050009@jbrain.com>
Message-ID: <4959D3C8.5050007@aurigae.demon.co.uk>

Jim Brain wrote:
> http://cgi.ebay.com/Machined-Pin-Header-male-40-round-gold-machine-pins_W0QQitemZ160301434584QQcmdZViewItem 

I've done several projects with these cut to the needed length the 
important thing is to inset them into a turned pin socket whilst you 
solder the thing to ensure the correct pin spacing.

Cheers.

Phill.




From glen.slick at gmail.com  Tue Dec 30 02:38:27 2008
From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 00:38:27 -0800
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <00b301c96a3d$6eb736e0$4c25a4a0$@com>
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>
	<1e1fc3e90812191835y622dc20ex83fdfcf12b146bcd@mail.gmail.com>
	<24146.1229784478@mini> <24342.1229976120@mini>
	<9CC35F7F-9FF1-40A1-8DDE-CAB6986A9631@crash.com>
	
	<9081BA4A-D92D-47E4-94BE-74E12A044B13@neurotica.com>
	<002001c967d8$47df4060$d79dc120$@com>
	<1e1fc3e90812291929v4af84160icefd77976408aeec@mail.gmail.com>
	<00b301c96a3d$6eb736e0$4c25a4a0$@com>
Message-ID: <1e1fc3e90812300038s3c8bc3daofabeaef042f47975@mail.gmail.com>

On Mon, Dec 29, 2008 at 9:14 PM, Bob Armstrong  wrote:
>
>  This procedure is for a MicroVAX, though.  You're not going to be able to
> boot directly from magtape on a 11/7xx VAX.
>

Here's some other notes on the net that are 11/780 specific.

http://www.employees.org/~kirk/page0207.html

Looks like it involves loading some bootstrap images into the
simulator at various stages during the installation process with
simulator commands that I am not familiar with:

Example:

sim> load -o ./tp/copy 0
sim> run 2

sim> load -o ./tp/boot 0
sim> run 2

sim> load -o ./boot43 0
sim> d r10 9
sim> d r11 0
sim> run 2

Where copy and boot were extracted from srcsys.tar on the distribution
tape.  I guess on real hardware you would need to somehow get those
files onto whatever the console media is, however that works.


From healyzh at slate.spiritone.com  Mon Dec 29 12:16:40 2008
From: healyzh at slate.spiritone.com (Zane H. Healy)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 10:16:40 -0800 (PST)
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <49590976.6050705@e-bbes.com>
References: 
	<49586F48.3090205@jbrain.com> <49590976.6050705@e-bbes.com>
Message-ID: 

On Mon, 29 Dec 2008, e.stiebler wrote:
> Jim Brain wrote:
>> 
>> There are still things to do with the uIEC base, though.  IEEE488 support 
>> would be a great win, as then PET/CBM machines would have a solid state 
>> device to use, and I am working on a USB link to a PC, so one can slave 
>> their Win/Mac/Linux box to their CBM.  And, for those who want something 
>> more vintage as a target, the protocol is simple RS232 (I use a RS232->USB 
>> converter), so they could add a MAX232 and write a suitable app for 
>> anything that provides RS232.
>
> Any chance for HP support (hp85, hp86, etc) ?

I suspect that the uIEC is just a little tied to the IEC bus. :-)

Personally I was just thinking a couple hours ago how nice it would be if
someone would make something like this for the Amiga 500.

Zane





From healyzh at slate.spiritone.com  Mon Dec 29 12:48:19 2008
From: healyzh at slate.spiritone.com (Zane H. Healy)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 10:48:19 -0800 (PST)
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <49590178.5000703@jbrain.com>
References: 
	<49586F48.3090205@jbrain.com>
	
	<49590178.5000703@jbrain.com>
Message-ID: 

On Mon, 29 Dec 2008, Jim Brain wrote:

> Zane H. Healy wrote:

> non-Windows support is mandatory, for the same reason I designed an IEC-based 
> unit instead of something that would only work on the C64. 
>> 
>> One question, what size SD cards does the uIEC support, and does it support 
>> HDSD cards?  Right now I'm using the 2GB card from my MMC-Replay and it 
>> wants its card back. :-)
> Any size you can get...  I got an 8GB card here a few weeks ago, which works 
> fine.  It does support SDHC.  However, due to how CBM implemented the 
> directory listing function, it can only report 65535 blocks free in a dir 
> listing, even if there are more blocks free.

Excellent news!  I might buy one of the SDHC cards for the uIEC and give the
MMC-Replay back its 2GB card.  I have a large enough SID collection on the
2GB card, it is actually a little bit cramped.  One of the things the
MMC-Replay does do a good job of is playing SID files.

Zane



From sieler at allegro.com  Mon Dec 29 17:49:13 2008
From: sieler at allegro.com (Stan Sieler)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 15:49:13 -0800
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
In-Reply-To: <49569977.2000003@gmail.com>
References: ,
	<0c2e01c96864$8bdbb5a0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>,
	<49569977.2000003@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <4958F179.12495.291D4C32@sieler.allegro.com>

Re:
> It was reasonably unique* in running FORTH from ROM rather than BASIC (which 
> probably makes it a rarer animal than a ZX80, too)
> 
> * I'm not going to play the "only one ever" game, but I can't actually think 
> of another home system which ran FORTH as the primary language...

The Hector HRX :)

http://www.old-computers.com/museum/computer.asp?c=142

(Par Torlus is trying to make an FPGA reimplementation of the HRX, at
http://www.torlus.com/index.php?2007/01/31/198-hector-hrx-in-a-fpga )

-- 
Stan Sieler
sieler at allegro.com
www.allegro.com/sieler/wanted/index.html 



From jws at jwsss.com  Mon Dec 29 18:54:16 2008
From: jws at jwsss.com (jim s)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 16:54:16 -0800
Subject: Ebay: "new" 029 Keypunch
In-Reply-To: <51ea77730812291419u2dfcb7a3l5591a4e73ebbd4bf@mail.gmail.com>
References: <51ea77730812291419u2dfcb7a3l5591a4e73ebbd4bf@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <49597138.6040500@jwsss.com>


This really looks like 1 of the 4 or 5 that were in a govliquidation 
site auction a few weeks back, which were all wood crated.

This guy is just doing a corn pone description of where they came from 
to make it seem like it is "rare" I suspect.

Jim


From ajp166 at bellatlantic.net  Mon Dec 29 19:45:13 2008
From: ajp166 at bellatlantic.net (Allison)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 20:45:13 -0500
Subject: T-11 (was Re: PDP-11/70 cache memory)
Message-ID: <0KCO00KVE26YTQC5@vms044.mailsrvcs.net>

>
>Subject: T-11 (was Re: PDP-11/70 cache memory)
>   From: "Ethan Dicks" 
>   Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 19:21:07 -0500
>     To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" 
>
>On Mon, Dec 29, 2008 at 5:52 PM, Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ
> wrote:
>> Alexandre Souza wrote:
>>
>>>   The SBC6120 is a **real nice** SBC...
>
>Yes it is, and it's back in "print"!
>
>> ... [I] wish I had saved a T-11 (was it?)
>>> processor from many of the arcade boards I saw going to trash...I do not
>>> even know how to operate a PDP, but it would be something fun to learn :o)
>
>T-11s aren't terribly rare.  Perhaps not as common as other 40-pin
>CPUs from the 1980s but they can be found on DEC boards and in at
>least one DEC terminal.  The issue of using one in a modern
>SBC6120-like board has been brought up from time to time, and one of
>the limitations I think I recall is that they don't have a MMU and,
>unlike the F-11, there wasn't one for it, severely limiting your OS
>choices.  Between that and it not being simple to emulate DEC
>interfaces down to the CSR level, turning a T-11 into a bootable
>PDP-11 isn't easy at all.  Making a 64KB board that runs PDP-11
>instructions isn't hard - but then what do you do for software?  It's
>a harder problem to solve than on the PDP-8 since there really is only
>one dominant OS there (plus a lot of OS-less paper-tape software).
>Writing _a_ disk driver for one OS for your new disk (such as with the
>SBC6120) isn't a terrible obstacle.  For the PDP-11, you have to
>consider that folks would be interested in RT-11, RSX, RSTS, and
>several varieties of UNIX.
>

I have a few T-11s and they are fun to play with.  The bare T11 will
run RT-11 without mmu. The real problem is you need DL serial (or fake it)
and also a disk otherwise you have to build your own drivers.

The VT24x terminals used it and they actually implmented the basic 
PDP11 MMU to get 18 bit addressing.  the parts load to do that is 
not steep but it didn't have the memory protection half of the MMU.  

>The T-11 would make a fun little board if you happen to know or want
>to learn the PDP-11 instruction set and have a use in mind for some
>configuration smaller than a console line and a disk/disk emulator.
>

In this day and age a disk would best be a SD or maybe CF part fewer parts
and easier to bring up.

>> I think I asked the question a couple of years ago, about which "classic"
>> non-typical CPUs turned up in arcade machines.  I seem to recall someone
>> saying that the T-11 was used in Paperboy.
>
>Yeah... I remember reading about the T-11 in Paperboy some time back
>and was quite surprised.  Large quantities of video games spanned the
>progression over the years from 8080 to Z-80 and 6809 to 68000 as
>complexity and sound and color advanced, and there were a few games
>here and there with something odd like a 6502, but the rare appearance
>of a T-11 really stood out for me.  I never played Paperboy much, and
>I haven't seen too many of the machines in the wild since I learned
>they hid a T-11 inside.
>

One of the few non industrial or DEC designs that did use it.

Allison 

>-ethan


From mike at brickfieldspark.org  Tue Dec 30 03:32:48 2008
From: mike at brickfieldspark.org (Mike Hatch)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 09:32:48 -0000
Subject: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such
References: 
Message-ID: <005801c96a63$11ad5ad0$3400a8c0@xyleth.local>

Same problem on the PET's we used to use, replaced the sockets with turned 
pin types and all the problems were solved.

Mike.

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Tony Duell" 
To: 
Sent: Monday, December 29, 2008 8:24 PM
Subject: Re: Jupiter Ace - PCBs and such


> Ooops, I missed a footnote. What I meant to say was :
>
>> Sure. Acutally, I only use turned-pin sockets now, the extra cost is well
>> worth the lack of stress caused by intermittant connections [1].
>
> [1] My Whitechapel MG1 came with nice turned-pin sockets for all the
> 'expensive stuff' (32016CPU, MMU, FPU, etc) but had the EPROMs in cheap
> sockets. I had numerous problems due to bad connections at the latter. I
> cut out the old sockets (the sockets were junk, the PCB valuable..) then
> soldered turned-pin ones in place of them. And had no more problems.
>
> -tony
>
>
> 



From jkunz at unixag-kl.fh-kl.de  Tue Dec 30 04:18:44 2008
From: jkunz at unixag-kl.fh-kl.de (Jochen Kunz)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 11:18:44 +0100
Subject: PDP-11/70 cache memory
In-Reply-To: <03c801c96a07$1fcffed0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
References: <4958B9EE.1050507@softjar.se>
	
	<02d301c96a01$2388f6e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
	
	<03c801c96a07$1fcffed0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
Message-ID: <20081230111844.36d2ab35.jkunz@unixag-kl.fh-kl.de>

On Mon, 29 Dec 2008 20:44:17 -0200
"Alexandre Souza"  wrote:

> The SBC6120 is a **real nice** SBC, wish I had saved a T-11 (was it?) 
The T11 is a PDP-11, the SBC6120 is a PDP-8.
-- 


tsch??,
       Jochen

Homepage: http://www.unixag-kl.fh-kl.de/~jkunz/




From dave06a at dunfield.com  Tue Dec 30 07:49:33 2008
From: dave06a at dunfield.com (Dave Dunfield)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 08:49:33 -0500
Subject: Burroughs B80 available in Maryland
Message-ID: 

Hi Guys,

I've been contacted by a chap in Maryland with a Borroughs
B80 he wants to find a home for - I don't think he wants
anything for it other than shipping cost if non-local.

Too big/far for me ... if anyone is interested, please contact
me for his info.

Regards,
Dave

--
dave06a (at)    Dave Dunfield
dunfield (dot)  Firmware development services & tools: www.dunfield.com
com             Collector of vintage computing equipment:
                http://www.classiccmp.org/dunfield/index.html


From dave06a at dunfield.com  Tue Dec 30 07:55:48 2008
From: dave06a at dunfield.com (Dave Dunfield)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 08:55:48 -0500
Subject: VT-180 docs/sw available in SW Ohio
Message-ID: 

Hi Guys,

I've been contacted by a chap in SW Ohio with a load of
DEC VT-180 documentation and software to find a home for.

It's a heavy box (11kg), so a bit pricy to ship ... It
would be ideal if someone closer to him could obtain this
and scan/image any of the docs and software not already
available.

Here's the list he sent me:

MANUALS:
VT-180 User Guide
VT-180 Series Technical Manual
CP/M Operating System Manual
CP/M Operating System Command Summary
CP/M BIOS User Guide for VT-180
Read Me First for CP/M Users
CP/M Applications Software Referral Catalogue
VT-100 User Guide (covers the underlying VT-100 terminal)
VT-102 Video Terminal User Guide (copy ? not original)
VT-18X Upgrade and System Test Guide
VT-180 Series Pocket Service Guide
VT-18X Diagnostic 5.25 (original DEC disc)
VT-180 CP/M 2.2 OS (original Dec disc)

SOFTWARE:
Select Word Processing for VT-180 (original DEC discs + manual)
Multiplan Spreadsheet for VT-180 (original DEC discs + manual)
MBasic for VT-180 (original DEC discs + manual)


If interested, please contact me for his info.

Regards,
Dave

--
dave06a (at)    Dave Dunfield
dunfield (dot)  Firmware development services & tools: www.dunfield.com
com             Collector of vintage computing equipment:
                http://www.classiccmp.org/dunfield/index.html


From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Tue Dec 30 08:09:59 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 12:09:59 -0200
Subject: PDP-11/70 cache memory
References: <4958B9EE.1050507@softjar.se><02d301c96a01$2388f6e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara><03c801c96a07$1fcffed0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
	<20081230111844.36d2ab35.jkunz@unixag-kl.fh-kl.de>
Message-ID: <085801c96a88$79a36e20$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

>> The SBC6120 is a **real nice** SBC, wish I had saved a T-11 (was it?) 
> The T11 is a PDP-11, the SBC6120 is a PDP-8.

    As I told you, I know nothing about these beasties

    (shame, Alexandre...Shame...)

    :o)
    Alexandre



From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Tue Dec 30 08:51:38 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 12:51:38 -0200
Subject: PDP-11/70 cache memory
References: <4958B9EE.1050507@softjar.se><02d301c96a01$2388f6e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>	<03c801c96a07$1fcffed0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
	<495954A5.9080109@gjcp.net>
Message-ID: <093601c96a8e$60079620$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

> I think I asked the question a couple of years ago, about which
> "classic" non-typical CPUs turned up in arcade machines.  I seem to
> recall someone saying that the T-11 was used in Paperboy.

    If I'm not mistaken, paperboy and 720.

    Somewhere, in the MAME site or docs, there is a complete list of 
processors used in all games



From pat at computer-refuge.org  Tue Dec 30 08:57:19 2008
From: pat at computer-refuge.org (Patrick Finnegan)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 09:57:19 -0500
Subject: 4.3BSD Quasijarus
In-Reply-To: <1e1fc3e90812300038s3c8bc3daofabeaef042f47975@mail.gmail.com>
References: <7d3530220812191730r496ca3d6h9e5be321d6e90f5b@mail.gmail.com>
	<00b301c96a3d$6eb736e0$4c25a4a0$@com>
	<1e1fc3e90812300038s3c8bc3daofabeaef042f47975@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <200812300957.19352.pat@computer-refuge.org>

On Tuesday 30 December 2008, Glen Slick wrote:
> Here's some other notes on the net that are 11/780 specific.
>
> http://www.employees.org/~kirk/page0207.html
>
> Looks like it involves loading some bootstrap images into the
> simulator at various stages during the installation process with
> simulator commands that I am not familiar with:
>
> Example:
>
> sim> load -o ./tp/copy 0
> sim> run 2
>
> sim> load -o ./tp/boot 0
> sim> run 2
>
> sim> load -o ./boot43 0
> sim> d r10 9
> sim> d r11 0
> sim> run 2
>
> Where copy and boot were extracted from srcsys.tar on the
> distribution tape.  I guess on real hardware you would need to
> somehow get those files onto whatever the console media is, however
> that works.

I used VMS to copy them to the console media when I was getting my 
11/780 booted, because that was the most convenient way I had of 
putting files on an RX01 (it has a DEUNA).  The commands listed pretty 
closely mirror what you'd type on the console, or put into 
an "indirect" (aka script) file on the console media.

Pat
-- 
Purdue University Research Computing ---  http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/
The Computer Refuge                  ---  http://computer-refuge.org


From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Tue Dec 30 09:20:51 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 13:20:51 -0200
Subject: PDP-11/70 cache memory
References: <4958B9EE.1050507@softjar.se><02d301c96a01$2388f6e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara><03c801c96a07$1fcffed0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
	
Message-ID: <09fb01c96a92$45e513e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

> If you don't have an SBC6120, you can get in on the new run announced a
> couple days ago.  Bob apparently found some NOS processor chips.  See the
> sparetimegizmos mailing list for more info.

    Those are good news! Take a look there, but too expensive for a 
third-worlder to play at home. If I can find a HD6120 chip around (I've seen 
it somewhere...but...WHERE? :oO) I'll build one :o) The PC Board has a very 
fair price :oD

    BTW, what about a list of what gadget uses these old processors? It 
sould be great to find old chips for cheap :oD



From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com  Tue Dec 30 09:32:35 2008
From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 09:32:35 -0600
Subject: CP/M on Sun 68k
In-Reply-To: <4affc5e0812291857j342bb80dj8a49a6d90f709678@mail.gmail.com>
References: 
	<4affc5e0812291857j342bb80dj8a49a6d90f709678@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <495A3F13.7030807@gmail.com>

Joachim Thiemann wrote:
> On 12/29/08, David Griffith  wrote:
>> Has anyone here ever seriously considered trying to get CP/M-68k running
>> on an older Sun machine, say, a Sun 2 or 3?
> 
> I have always thought the Amiga 500 might be a good target. It's well
> documented, and easy to bootstrap.  Additionally, they're cheap and
> plentiful still.

Can the disk controller be easily driven? I had the impression that the 
Amiga's controller was less than easy to talk to (because it was so flexible), 
which might make writing disk routines a bit of a pain (same's true of Sun, I 
suppose).




From geneb at deltasoft.com  Tue Dec 30 10:26:56 2008
From: geneb at deltasoft.com (Gene Buckle)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 08:26:56 -0800 (PST)
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
	<49586F48.3090205@jbrain.com> <49590976.6050705@e-bbes.com>
	
Message-ID: 

On Mon, 29 Dec 2008, Zane H. Healy wrote:

> Personally I was just thinking a couple hours ago how nice it would be if
> someone would make something like this for the Amiga 500.
>

Zane, you could just use an IDE-CF bridge.  That's what I use in my Amiga 
2000 (albeit with a SCSI-IDE bridge in the middle of that).

g.

-- 
Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007
http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind.



From emu at e-bbes.com  Tue Dec 30 10:37:57 2008
From: emu at e-bbes.com (e.stiebler)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 09:37:57 -0700
Subject: SCSI <--> CF, was : Re: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
Message-ID: <495A4E65.8040904@e-bbes.com>

Gene Buckle wrote:
 > Zane, you could just use an IDE-CF bridge.  That's what I use in my
 > Amiga 2000 (albeit with a SCSI-IDE bridge in the middle of that).

Isn't there a SCSI <--> CF bridge available ?
I thought I read once on the web about it ...


From geneb at deltasoft.com  Tue Dec 30 10:47:04 2008
From: geneb at deltasoft.com (Gene Buckle)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 08:47:04 -0800 (PST)
Subject: SCSI <--> CF, was : Re: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <495A4E65.8040904@e-bbes.com>
References: <495A4E65.8040904@e-bbes.com>
Message-ID: 

On Tue, 30 Dec 2008, e.stiebler wrote:

> Gene Buckle wrote:
>> Zane, you could just use an IDE-CF bridge.  That's what I use in my
>> Amiga 2000 (albeit with a SCSI-IDE bridge in the middle of that).
>
> Isn't there a SCSI <--> CF bridge available ?
> I thought I read once on the web about it ...
>

There may be, but the route I took was cheaper than the examples I've seen 
of SCSI-CF bridges.  (the SCSI-IDE bridge was $30 and the IDE-CF bridge 
was $9)

g.

  -- 
Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007
http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind.



From lehmann at ans-netz.de  Tue Dec 30 12:34:28 2008
From: lehmann at ans-netz.de (Oliver Lehmann)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 19:34:28 +0100
Subject: What kind of IC is this
Message-ID: <20081230193428.69f05be5.lehmann@ans-netz.de>

Hi,

My Zilog S8000 Winchester Controller board carries 2 ceramic DIL16
packaged chips labeled (beside a logo) just with the two lines of text.
The chip looks like this (tried to ASCII-art the logo in front of the
text)

  +----------------------------------------+
  |  +-------+                             |
  |  |-----  |                             |
  \  | > ----|   6306-1J                   |
  /  |-----  |   8147                      |
  |  | > ----|                             |
  |  +-------+                             |
  +----------------------------------------+

I guess the 2nd line means:
  81 == 1981 
  47 == calendar week 47

So I wonder what 6306-1J stands for? I've not analyzed the circuit to see
if it is a PROM or something like that. It is put in a socket so I guess
it must be something (onetime?) programmable...

Maybe you can tell...

-- 
 Oliver Lehmann
  http://www.pofo.de/
  http://wishlist.ans-netz.de/


From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Tue Dec 30 12:42:38 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 16:42:38 -0200
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
References: <49586F48.3090205@jbrain.com>
	<49590976.6050705@e-bbes.com>
	
Message-ID: <0b9801c96aae$7a0520e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

> I don't believe I have a single IDE capable Amiga that works (does the 
> A600
> have IDE?), both of my A1200's are unstable.  On my A3000 SCSI isn't an
> issue as I have lots of small SCSI drives, and I gave my A2000's away.  I
> would just like a way to play floppy based games on the A500 without the
> floppies. :-)  Of course once I get everything out of storage, I need to
> figure out what condition my Amiga's are in before I start worrying about
> such things.

    A600 have IDE, I have one here (although with a broken keyboard). 1200 
usually has troubles with electrolytic capacitors on motherboard, this is an 
easy fix. If you want to play floppie games on the 500, the easiest way is:
    - A1200
    - Memory expansion (at least 4MB)
    - CF card or Hard Disk
    - A program that read image floppies and emulate a floppy. I don't 
remember the name now, but it is easy to find on the net



From healyzh at aracnet.com  Tue Dec 30 13:02:16 2008
From: healyzh at aracnet.com (Zane H. Healy)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 11:02:16 -0800 (PST)
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <0b9801c96aae$7a0520e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
References: <49586F48.3090205@jbrain.com>
	<49590976.6050705@e-bbes.com>
	
	<0b9801c96aae$7a0520e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
Message-ID: 

On Tue, 30 Dec 2008, Alexandre Souza wrote:
>   A600 have IDE, I have one here (although with a broken keyboard). 1200 
> usually has troubles with electrolytic capacitors on motherboard, this is an 
> easy fix. If you want to play floppie games on the 500, the easiest way is:
>   - A1200
>   - Memory expansion (at least 4MB)
>   - CF card or Hard Disk
>   - A program that read image floppies and emulate a floppy. I don't 
> remember the name now, but it is easy to find on the net

It has been many years since I looked at them, but the one has a bad video
circuit, and the other has a surface mount IC that overheats.  If I keep
spraying the chip that overheats with canned air, it stays up.  Please note
that canned air is not an ideal solution to keep a system up. :-)

I'll definitetly have to take a look at my A600 once I get it dug out.

Zane



From hilpert at cs.ubc.ca  Tue Dec 30 13:08:40 2008
From: hilpert at cs.ubc.ca (Brent Hilpert)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 11:08:40 -0800
Subject: What kind of IC is this
References: <20081230193428.69f05be5.lehmann@ans-netz.de>
Message-ID: <495A71B8.F3B01C35@cs.ubc.ca>

Oliver Lehmann wrote:
> 
> My Zilog S8000 Winchester Controller board carries 2 ceramic DIL16
> packaged chips labeled (beside a logo) just with the two lines of text.
> The chip looks like this (tried to ASCII-art the logo in front of the
> text)
> 
>   +----------------------------------------+
>   |  +-------+                             |
>   |  |-----  |                             |
>   \  | > ----|   6306-1J                   |
>   /  |-----  |   8147                      |
>   |  | > ----|                             |
>   |  +-------+                             |
>   +----------------------------------------+
> 
> I guess the 2nd line means:
>   81 == 1981
>   47 == calendar week 47
> 
> So I wonder what 6306-1J stands for? I've not analyzed the circuit to see
> if it is a PROM or something like that. It is put in a socket so I guess
> it must be something (onetime?) programmable...

Your guess sounds like a good one.

IC Master 1982 lists a 6306-1 as a 512*4 PROM from MMI.
60nS, TTL, 5V, 16 pins, tri-state outputs.
MMI is Monolithic Memories Inc.

It's also listed with alternate sources of:
  AM27S13   AMD
  AM29770
  AM29771
  93446     Fairchild
  HM7621    Harris
  IM5624    Intersil
  DM74S571  National
  N82S131   Signetics
  SN74S370  TI


From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Tue Dec 30 13:15:40 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 17:15:40 -0200
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
References: <49586F48.3090205@jbrain.com><49590976.6050705@e-bbes.com><0b9801c96aae$7a0520e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
	
Message-ID: <0c0501c96ab3$25e27c60$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

> It has been many years since I looked at them, but the one has a bad video
> circuit, and the other has a surface mount IC that overheats.  If I keep
> spraying the chip that overheats with canned air, it stays up.  Please 
> note
> that canned air is not an ideal solution to keep a system up. :-)

    Maybe a PC memory heatsink on top of that? :)



From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca  Tue Dec 30 13:29:14 2008
From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 12:29:14 -0700
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <0c0501c96ab3$25e27c60$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
References: <49586F48.3090205@jbrain.com><49590976.6050705@e-bbes.com><0b9801c96aae$7a0520e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>	
	<0c0501c96ab3$25e27c60$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
Message-ID: <495A768A.9080802@jetnet.ab.ca>

Alexandre Souza wrote:

>> that canned air is not an ideal solution to keep a system up. :-)
> 
>    Maybe a PC memory heatsink on top of that? :)
> 
     ######      <--- heat sink
         [ ]<          <--- canned air
         [ ]








From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Tue Dec 30 13:04:13 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 19:04:13 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <49595108.5090205@jbrain.com> from "Jim Brain" at Dec 29,
	8 04:36:56 pm
Message-ID: 

> > Any chance for HP support (hp85, hp86, etc) ?
> Has anyone ever tried a CBM IEEE DRIVE on an HP?  If the differences are 

Well, the hardware interface is much the same (IEEE-488/HPIB/GPIB). But 
the command set is totally differnt. So it certainly won't just plug-n-play.

IIRC, the CBM disk units are essentailly file-oriented. You send a 
command to open a file (including the file name), the drive unit contains 
the part of the OS that finds that file in the directory, finds where 
it's stored on the disk and so on.

The HP drives work at a much lower level. The file system is managed by 
the host computer. The commands to the disk drive unit read/write bocks 
(essentially the same thign as sectors). It's up to the host to turn 
those into a file system.

> trivial or not too insurmountable and I had someone to help me (I have 
> no HP machines here with HPIB to try), i'm happy to add support.

There are many, many, HPs that supported HPIB drives. There were, alas, 3 
different command sets -- Amigo (the earliest one), CS/80 (Command Set 
80) and SS/80 (Sub Set 80).Documentaiton for all of those should be on 
the web (try bitsavers or the Australian HP museum site for details).

You could probaly find an HP150 or an HP9000/200 machine fairly easily 
on E-bay. 

Now I don;'t know the exact details, but I read (I think on one of the 
HP9845 pages) that somebody had written an HP drive simulator programs 
for PCs fitted with an HPIB card (I believe said program has source 
available if you want to look for hints on the command set, etc). But one 
thing that this weg page siad was that it couldn't run with a 9914-based 
HPIB card, since HP did something that was essentially against the 
standard and which the 9914 couldn';t do. I do know that HP used the 9914 
in their computers quite a bit, but that the drives used the Intel 8291. 
Of course if you're planning on bit-banging the HPIB protocol on the pins 
of a microcontroller (I think you need a little external logic, there is 
one transition where you can't take arbitrarily long to change one of the 
signals), then this won;'t be a problem.

-tony


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Tue Dec 30 13:07:21 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 19:07:21 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <49595191.7050609@jbrain.com> from "Jim Brain" at Dec 29,
	8 04:39:13 pm
Message-ID: 

> 
> Tony Duell wrote:
> >>
> >
> > I was secretly hoping for much the same thing. I have several HP machines 
> > that use Amigo or SS/80 disks. I'd probably buy one if it wasn't _too_ 
> > expensive 9read : I can't afford the prices charged for such things to 
> > people who depened on such machines for their work).
> >   
> Well, uIEC tries to hit the $50-$100 price range, so it's not terribly 

I call that 'not too expensive' :-). Nobody is saying you have to make a 
loss :-). It's just that some of the commercial solutions are many 
thousands of dollars and I simply can't afford that for an add-on to a 
hobby system.

> expensive, but provides enough profit to pay for my tools I needed to 
> buy to create it and add functionality to it.
> > How 'open' is the uIEC? The more open something like this is, the more 
> > likely I am to get it (of course!).
> >   
> The plans, source, PCB, etc. are all under GPL v2.  However, for the ASM 

OK. That's open :-)

> lovers and the C haters of the list, I will note that almost the entire 
> firmware is in 'C'.

There's a na English proverb 'Never look a gift horse in the mouth' :-). 
Yes, I do prefer assembly language over C. But if I am being _given_ 
something I am not going to moan...

Actually my main moan on C for microcontrollers is that the compiler is 
either expensive or I can't sensibly run it, or both.

-tony


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Tue Dec 30 13:09:33 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 19:09:33 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: PDP-11/70 cache memory
In-Reply-To: <03c801c96a07$1fcffed0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> from "Alexandre Souza"
	at Dec 29, 8 08:44:17 pm
Message-ID: 

>     The SBC6120 is a **real nice** SBC, wish I had saved a T-11 (was it?) 
> processor from many of the arcade boards I saw going to trash...I do not 
> even know how to operate a PDP, but it would be something fun to learn :o)

A real Unibus PDP11, built from TTL and with a lights-n-switches front 
panel is a lot more fun :-)

One unexpected (at least to me) place where the T11 turns up is in the
VT240 terminal. I thought those were relatively easy to find and not much
desired. I know nobofy bid against me when I bought one on E-bay a year or
so back. 

-tony


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Tue Dec 30 13:13:49 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 19:13:49 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: 
	from "Ethan Dicks" at Dec 29, 8 09:35:30 pm
Message-ID: 

> 
> On Mon, Dec 29, 2008 at 5:39 PM, Jim Brain  wrote:
> > The plans, source, PCB, etc. are all under GPL v2.  However, for the ASM
> > lovers and the C haters of the list, I will note that almost the entire
> > firmware is in 'C'.
> 
> Assembler lovers should _love_ C... it's all really just PDP-11 MACRO
> shorthand anyway.

Yes, but the assembly language of most microcontrollers is nothing like 
Macro-11 :-)

(SO translating C into the microcontroller instruction set is non-trivial 
by hand...)

-tony


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Tue Dec 30 13:19:19 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 19:19:19 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: turned-pin headers
In-Reply-To: <4959C4A8.8050009@jbrain.com> from "Jim Brain" at Dec 30,
	8 00:50:16 am
Message-ID: 

> 
> Tony Duell wrote:
> >> And if you use turned pin IC sockets, and place them carefully & solder 
> >>     
> This raised a question for me.
> 
> Lots of folks are asking for simple "adapters" for things like:
> 
> * older 24 pin EPROM to 28 pin JEDEC EPROM
> * daughtercards for 40 pin CPUs and such
> 
> I have some vintage items like this, and as I look at them, it looks 
> like they use something similar to a machine-pin socket, but each end of 
> the pin is the same (small diameter.

The ones I've seen have a slightly thicker pin on the soldering side.

Last time I bought soemthing like this, it came as a 32-pin SIL strip. You 
cut off as many pins as you needed and soldered them to the PCB. To fit a 
DIL socket you'd cut off, say, 2 lenghts of 12 pins and solder them to 
the PCB the appropraite distance apart to fit a 24 pin DIL socket. I 
found that inserting the 'plug' end of the pins into a turned-pin DIL 
socket kept them at the right spacing when I was soldering them.

I think I ought them from Farnell. Maybe RS components. I don't recall 
having any prolems finding them.

-tony


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Tue Dec 30 13:22:36 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 19:22:36 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: turned-pin headers
In-Reply-To: <49595F88.10308.10CCCF62@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at
	Dec 29, 8 11:38:48 pm
Message-ID: 

> I remember when they introduced the Correct-A-Chip--intended for 
> applicationwhen your PCB layout guy was suffering the morning after 
> the night before and reversed the pins on an IC.

This reminds me of the possibly apocryphal story of the (expensive) 
custom chip in a digital meter that turned out to be nothing more than a 
7106 (or maybe a 7107) left-right reveresed. Apparently the designer 
laied the PCB out wrongly..

(Of course once this was realised there were all sorts of 'creative' 
solutions to save the cost of the right chip. Bending the pins of a 7106 
right over, soldering one eupside-down to a header, or even mounting a 
DIL socket on the solder side of the instrument PCB...)

-tony


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Tue Dec 30 13:33:51 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 19:33:51 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <20081230193428.69f05be5.lehmann@ans-netz.de> from "Oliver
	Lehmann" at Dec 30, 8 07:34:28 pm
Message-ID: 

> 
> So I wonder what 6306-1J stands for? I've not analyzed the circuit to see

I seem to rememebr the 6306 is one of those fusible-link PROMs. I can 
look for detials if noody else has them.

-tony


From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Tue Dec 30 13:38:58 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 17:38:58 -0200
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
References: <49586F48.3090205@jbrain.com><49590976.6050705@e-bbes.com><0b9801c96aae$7a0520e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>	<0c0501c96ab3$25e27c60$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
	<495A768A.9080802@jetnet.ab.ca>
Message-ID: <0c4401c96ab6$7b5219a0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

>>> that canned air is not an ideal solution to keep a system up. :-)
>> 
>>    Maybe a PC memory heatsink on top of that? :)
>> 
>     ######      <--- heat sink
>         [ ]<          <--- canned air
>         [ ]

    Nooo, you did it all wrong! 

     The heatsink must be on vertical!



From mcguire at neurotica.com  Tue Dec 30 13:43:22 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 14:43:22 -0500
Subject: PDP-11/70 cache memory
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: 

On Dec 30, 2008, at 2:09 PM, Tony Duell wrote:
> One unexpected (at least to me) place where the T11 turns up is in the
> VT240 terminal. I thought those were relatively easy to find and  
> not much
> desired. I know nobofy bid against me when I bought one on E-bay a  
> year or
> so back.

   I dearly love VT240s.  I suspect the lack of demand is more a  
matter of surplus of supply...there are a LOT of them out there.  A  
surplus dealer in the Washington DC area whose facility I used to  
frequent had quite a few...on three separate occasions he received  
shipments of HUNDREDS of them.  I grabbed a couple; now in hindsight  
I regret not having grabbed more.

            -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Tue Dec 30 13:44:22 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 17:44:22 -0200
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
References: 
Message-ID: <0c5701c96ab7$156accd0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

> Actually my main moan on C for microcontrollers is that the compiler is
> either expensive or I can't sensibly run it, or both.

    Tony, you just like to complain. Every microcontroller I know has a free 
C version that can be run on mostly anything, and most microcontrollers can 
be programmed even with a PDP-8 :oD

    Wake up, we aren't in 1960 anymore :o)
    Alexandre, your fan :D



From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Tue Dec 30 13:44:53 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 17:44:53 -0200
Subject: PDP-11/70 cache memory
References: 
Message-ID: <0c6b01c96ab7$48a3e5f0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

> A real Unibus PDP11, built from TTL and with a lights-n-switches front 
> panel is a lot more fun :-)

    Hmmm...It will take a bit longer to build :o(
 




From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Tue Dec 30 13:48:18 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 17:48:18 -0200
Subject: turned-pin headers
References: 
Message-ID: <0c6c01c96ab7$ab196f20$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

> (Of course once this was realised there were all sorts of 'creative'
> solutions to save the cost of the right chip. Bending the pins of a 7106
> right over, soldering one eupside-down to a header, or even mounting a
> DIL socket on the solder side of the instrument PCB...)

    (insert expletive here) happens! :oD

    http://www.orkut.com.br/Main#AlbumZoom.aspx?uid=12070581936206943299&pid=1202742378237&aid=1202063776

    (an entire linear adjustable power supply, soldered backyards :oD 



From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca  Tue Dec 30 13:54:18 2008
From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 12:54:18 -0700
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <0c4401c96ab6$7b5219a0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
References: <49586F48.3090205@jbrain.com><49590976.6050705@e-bbes.com><0b9801c96aae$7a0520e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>	<0c0501c96ab3$25e27c60$46fea8c0@DeskJara>	<495A768A.9080802@jetnet.ab.ca>
	<0c4401c96ab6$7b5219a0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
Message-ID: <495A7C6A.7010704@jetnet.ab.ca>

Alexandre Souza wrote:
>>>> that canned air is not an ideal solution to keep a system up. :-)
>>>
>>>    Maybe a PC memory heatsink on top of that? :)
>>>
>>     ######      <--- heat sink
>>         [ ]<          <--- canned air
>>         [ ]
> 
>    Nooo, you did it all wrong!
>     The heatsink must be on vertical!
> 
> 
My god he is right ...

       #
       #
       #
       #
       *
     [ ]<  ~~~~
     [ ]

And notice how the can is spraying air



From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Tue Dec 30 13:59:23 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 17:59:23 -0200
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
References: <49586F48.3090205@jbrain.com><49590976.6050705@e-bbes.com><0b9801c96aae$7a0520e0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>	<0c0501c96ab3$25e27c60$46fea8c0@DeskJara>	<495A768A.9080802@jetnet.ab.ca><0c4401c96ab6$7b5219a0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
	<495A7C6A.7010704@jetnet.ab.ca>
Message-ID: <0c9801c96ab9$4bba14b0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>


    Now the heat sink can dissipate the heat propperly, remember that hot 
air is less dense than cold ar, so the cold air will go left-right and the 
hot ar will be down-up, making a perfect conveccion movement.

    Why go to MIT when you can subscribe to cctech?!

----- Original Message ----- 
From: 
To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" 

Sent: Tuesday, December 30, 2008 5:54 PM
Subject: Re: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!


> Alexandre Souza wrote:
>>>>> that canned air is not an ideal solution to keep a system up. :-)
>>>>
>>>>    Maybe a PC memory heatsink on top of that? :)
>>>>
>>>     ######      <--- heat sink
>>>         [ ]<          <--- canned air
>>>         [ ]
>>
>>    Nooo, you did it all wrong!
>>     The heatsink must be on vertical!
>>
>>
> My god he is right ...
>
>       #
>       #
>       #
>       #
>       *
>     [ ]<  ~~~~
>     [ ]
>
> And notice how the can is spraying air
>
>


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



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Checked by AVG - http://www.avg.com
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10:48



From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Tue Dec 30 14:29:20 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 15:29:20 -0500
Subject: PDP-11/70 cache memory
In-Reply-To: 
References: <03c801c96a07$1fcffed0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> 
Message-ID: 

On Tue, Dec 30, 2008 at 2:09 PM, Tony Duell  wrote:
> A real Unibus PDP11, built from TTL and with a lights-n-switches front
> panel is a lot more fun :-)

Yep... I still gotta restore a chopped-up 11/20 I rescued, one of
these days.  It needs a lot of work, but I think I have +95% of the
parts.

> One unexpected (at least to me) place where the T11 turns up is in the
> VT240 terminal. I thought those were relatively easy to find and not much
> desired. I know nobofy bid against me when I bought one on E-bay a year or
> so back.

I've had a VT240 for a while - I liked my VT220 more (lighter,
smaller, and I didn't _need_ the graphics, but they were fun to play
with), but I couldn't argue with the price: I worked for a guy doing
DEC stuff at the time, and he gave me two and said if I got them both
working, I could keep one... a couple of EIA line receivers and power
switches later, I was all set.

-ethan


From afra at aurigae.demon.co.uk  Tue Dec 30 14:33:41 2008
From: afra at aurigae.demon.co.uk (Phill Harvey-Smith)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 20:33:41 +0000
Subject: turned-pin headers
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <495A85A5.4030409@aurigae.demon.co.uk>

Tony Duell wrote:
> I think I ought them from Farnell. Maybe RS components. I don't recall 
> having any prolems finding them.

In the UK at least, they can be bought from Maplin, and from Rapid 
Electrionics, and probably others, but the ones I have used have come 
from those two. IIRC Rapid do them in convenient 20 pin strips, so if 
using on a 40 pin IC, saves the cutting....

Cheers.

Phill.

-- 
Phill Harvey-Smith, Programmer, Hardware hacker, and general eccentric !

"You can twist perceptions, but reality won't budge" -- Rush.


From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Tue Dec 30 14:34:18 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 15:34:18 -0500
Subject: turned-pin headers
In-Reply-To: 
References: <49595F88.10308.10CCCF62@cclist.sydex.com>
	
Message-ID: 

On Tue, Dec 30, 2008 at 2:22 PM, Tony Duell  wrote:
>> I remember when they introduced the Correct-A-Chip--intended for
>> applicationwhen your PCB layout guy was suffering the morning after
>> the night before and reversed the pins on an IC.
>
> This reminds me of the possibly apocryphal story of the (expensive)
> custom chip in a digital meter that turned out to be nothing more than a
> 7106 (or maybe a 7107) left-right reveresed. Apparently the designer
> laied the PCB out wrongly..

Ow... we had a Rev 0 board were the ins and outs were swapped - for
the few that were made, it was "easier" to correct the fault by
chopping the pins short of the board and making "X"es with wire to
swap pairs of adjacent pins.

Obviously that got fixed before Rev 1.

-ethan


From pat at computer-refuge.org  Tue Dec 30 14:38:00 2008
From: pat at computer-refuge.org (Patrick Finnegan)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 15:38:00 -0500
Subject: PDP-11/70 cache memory
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <200812301538.00343.pat@computer-refuge.org>

On Tuesday 30 December 2008, Tony Duell wrote:
> One unexpected (at least to me) place where the T11 turns up is in
> the VT240 terminal. I thought those were relatively easy to find and
> not much desired. I know nobofy bid against me when I bought one on
> E-bay a year or so back.

Yep, I've got a few, and I don't think I've paid more than $10 (maybe 
$15 with shipping) for any of them.  I was thinking about reusing the 
T-11 for some sort of project (or figuring out enough of the hardware 
to turn it into a minimal "pdp-11".)  I thought that it'd be fun to run 
RT-11 (or something) on a VT240, and hook another terminal up to it for 
a console. :)  Unfortunately, other projects, and the probable 
difficulty kept me from working much on it.

Pat
-- 
Purdue University Research Computing ---  http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/
The Computer Refuge                  ---  http://computer-refuge.org


From brain at jbrain.com  Tue Dec 30 14:51:07 2008
From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 14:51:07 -0600
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <495A89BB.9070600@jbrain.com>

Tony Duell wrote:
> I call that 'not too expensive' :-). Nobody is saying you have to make a 
> loss :-). It's just that some of the commercial solutions are many 
> thousands of dollars and I simply can't afford that for an add-on to a 
> hobby system.
>
>   
I've been pleasantly surprised by the response to the product price 
range.  I feel that range is in the "discretionary" area.
> OK. That's open :-)
>   
I thought you'd see it that way.

> Actually my main moan on C for microcontrollers is that the compiler is 
> either expensive or I can't sensibly run it, or both.
>   
I share this particular concern.  The fact that GCC supports the AVR8 
architecture and I would need to buy a commercial C compiler for the PIC 
line was a significant deciding factor.

Jim



From lehmann at ans-netz.de  Tue Dec 30 14:55:41 2008
From: lehmann at ans-netz.de (Oliver Lehmann)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 21:55:41 +0100
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <495A71B8.F3B01C35@cs.ubc.ca>
References: <20081230193428.69f05be5.lehmann@ans-netz.de>
	<495A71B8.F3B01C35@cs.ubc.ca>
Message-ID: <20081230215541.951316b8.lehmann@ans-netz.de>

Brent Hilpert wrote:

> It's also listed with alternate sources of:
>   AM27S13   AMD

Ah great - my ALL-02 programmmer knows this one - so I can back it up if
something bad happens....


-- 
 Oliver Lehmann
  http://www.pofo.de/
  http://wishlist.ans-netz.de/


From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk  Tue Dec 30 15:13:33 2008
From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 21:13:33 +0000
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <20081230193428.69f05be5.lehmann@ans-netz.de>
References: <20081230193428.69f05be5.lehmann@ans-netz.de>
Message-ID: <495A8EFD.7060208@philpem.me.uk>

Oliver Lehmann wrote:
>   +----------------------------------------+
>   |  +-------+                             |
>   |  |-----  |                             |
>   \  | > ----|   6306-1J                   |
>   /  |-----  |   8147                      |
>   |  | > ----|                             |
>   |  +-------+                             |
>   +----------------------------------------+

Let me guess, the logo looks a bit like the text "MMI", but in a "computer" 
style font?

Like this: http://www.elnec.com/ic_logos/mmi.gif ?

That would make it a Monolithic Memories 6306-1 fuse-link PROM. Basically a 
fast (for the 1980s), one-time-programmable memory device.

They haven't been produced for *years*, but the cross reference at 
 
says it's a 512x4 (512 addresses, four data bits) PROM with tristate outputs. 
Pinout is:

    +------+
A6 |1   16| Vcc
A5 |2   15| A7
A4 |3   14| A8
A3 |4   13| CE/
A0 |5   12| O1
A1 |6   11| O2
A2 |7   10| O3
GND|8    9| O4
    +------+

This crosses to:
   Signetics 82S131
   Harris/Intersil 7621-5
   AMD 27S13
   National 74S571
   Intel 3622

Your best bet out of those is probably the 82S131, which you might be able to 
find NOS somewhere. You'll still need a programmer, though. You can build one 
for the Signetics chips fairly easily (the algorithms are called "Generic I" 
and "Generic II"), but good luck finding a programmer for the MMI chips. I've 
been meaning to build a "generic" fuse-PROM programmer (I've got a couple of 
82S chips in a box somewhere) but could never find the MMI programming specs.

> I guess the 2nd line means:
>   81 == 1981 
>   47 == calendar week 47

That sounds about right for an MMI part.

-- 
Phil.
classiccmp at philpem.me.uk
http://www.philpem.me.uk/


From lehmann at ans-netz.de  Tue Dec 30 15:30:36 2008
From: lehmann at ans-netz.de (Oliver Lehmann)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 22:30:36 +0100
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <495A8EFD.7060208@philpem.me.uk>
References: <20081230193428.69f05be5.lehmann@ans-netz.de>
	<495A8EFD.7060208@philpem.me.uk>
Message-ID: <20081230223036.d5a23737.lehmann@ans-netz.de>

Philip Pemberton wrote:


> Like this: http://www.elnec.com/ic_logos/mmi.gif ?

Yeah, it is MMI.


> Your best bet out of those is probably the 82S131, which you might be able to 
> find NOS somewhere. You'll still need a programmer, though. You can build one 
> for the Signetics chips fairly easily (the algorithms are called "Generic I" 
> and "Generic II"), but good luck finding a programmer for the MMI chips. I've 
> been meaning to build a "generic" fuse-PROM programmer (I've got a couple of 
> 82S chips in a box somewhere) but could never find the MMI programming specs.

I've an ALL-02 (http://matthieu.benoit.free.fr/145.htm) which might be
from the same decade as this PROM ;) 
For BPROMs it support chips from the manufactures AMD, NS, SIG, TI and
MMI - but the 6306 is not listed for MMI (the 512x4 Type listed for MMI
is 63S240).
But right now I just care about backing up all EPROMs and PROMs from this
system here just in case something happens... (and the 6306's are now
backed up as well :-)

-- 
 Oliver Lehmann
  http://www.pofo.de/
  http://wishlist.ans-netz.de/


From mike at brickfieldspark.org  Tue Dec 30 15:38:34 2008
From: mike at brickfieldspark.org (Mike Hatch)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 21:38:34 -0000
Subject: turned-pin headers
References: <49595F88.10308.10CCCF62@cclist.sydex.com>
	
Message-ID: <007b01c96ac7$b3989fd0$3400a8c0@xyleth.local>

> Ow... we had a Rev 0 board were the ins and outs were swapped - for
> the few that were made, it was "easier" to correct the fault by
> chopping the pins short of the board and making "X"es with wire to
> swap pairs of adjacent pins.

No ins ans outs swapped here - just connected together !.
Way back when, I maintained PDP7 and PDP11 for the UK Gov, a student 
engineer was brought in to design a custom interface between the two 
machines - smoke - the student dissappeared. Manager said find out why. The 
design had input wired to output with a lot of unconnected logic in the 
middle. -3V logic does not play nicely with +5V logic.

Mike

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Ethan Dicks" 
To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" 

Sent: Tuesday, December 30, 2008 8:34 PM
Subject: Re: turned-pin headers


> On Tue, Dec 30, 2008 at 2:22 PM, Tony Duell  
> wrote:
>>> I remember when they introduced the Correct-A-Chip--intended for
>>> applicationwhen your PCB layout guy was suffering the morning after
>>> the night before and reversed the pins on an IC.
>>
>> This reminds me of the possibly apocryphal story of the (expensive)
>> custom chip in a digital meter that turned out to be nothing more than a
>> 7106 (or maybe a 7107) left-right reveresed. Apparently the designer
>> laied the PCB out wrongly..
>
> Ow... we had a Rev 0 board were the ins and outs were swapped - for
> the few that were made, it was "easier" to correct the fault by
> chopping the pins short of the board and making "X"es with wire to
> swap pairs of adjacent pins.
>
> Obviously that got fixed before Rev 1.
>
> -ethan
>
> 



From cclist at sydex.com  Tue Dec 30 15:59:20 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 13:59:20 -0800
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <20081230223036.d5a23737.lehmann@ans-netz.de>
References: <20081230193428.69f05be5.lehmann@ans-netz.de>,
	<495A8EFD.7060208@philpem.me.uk>,
	<20081230223036.d5a23737.lehmann@ans-netz.de>
Message-ID: <495A2938.26406.13E0672A@cclist.sydex.com>

On 30 Dec 2008 at 22:30, Oliver Lehmann wrote:

> But right now I just care about backing up all EPROMs and PROMs from this
> system here just in case something happens... (and the 6306's are now
> backed up as well :-)

Do fusible-link PROMs go bad?  At least do they go bad any more often 
than some of the LSI on that board? (Okay, I don't know what's on it, 
but I assume some sort of bit-slice implementation).

Cheers,
Chuck



From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Tue Dec 30 16:17:54 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 22:17:54 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <495A2938.26406.13E0672A@cclist.sydex.com> from "Chuck Guzis" at
	Dec 30, 8 01:59:20 pm
Message-ID: 

> 
> On 30 Dec 2008 at 22:30, Oliver Lehmann wrote:
> 
> > But right now I just care about backing up all EPROMs and PROMs from this
> > system here just in case something happens... (and the 6306's are now
> > backed up as well :-)
> 
> Do fusible-link PROMs go bad?  At least do they go bad any more often 

_Any_ device can fail. Fusible link PROMs can suffer from a form of 
bit-rot where the links actually grow back as well.

> than some of the LSI on that board? (Okay, I don't know what's on it, 
> but I assume some sort of bit-slice implementation).

Well, having a backup of the PROMs is surely a good idea for 2 reasons : 

1) If the rest of the board is standard parts (even if they are failry 
rare ones), then shoulc something fail you have a chance to get the 
replacements. If it's one of the standard parts, you can hunt for 
another board that used it (not necessarily from this machine), if the 
PROM fails, you can burn a replacement.

2) Even if there are custom LSI parts on the board, then having a ackup 
of the PROMs means you can fix it if the PROMs go bad. Even if you can't 
do anything if the LSI device fails, you can fix some faults.

-tony


From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com  Tue Dec 30 16:30:01 2008
From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 16:30:01 -0600
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <495AA0E9.1000507@gmail.com>

Tony Duell wrote:
> Well, having a backup of the PROMs is surely a good idea for 2 reasons : 
> 
> 1) If the rest of the board is standard parts (even if they are failry 
> rare ones), then shoulc something fail you have a chance to get the 
> replacements. If it's one of the standard parts, you can hunt for 
> another board that used it (not necessarily from this machine), if the 
> PROM fails, you can burn a replacement.

What do people do regarding microcontrollers (old or new) with embedded ROM? I 
mean an EPROM or PROM's just address lines and data, so reasonably easy to 
dump - but presumably life's a bit more difficult when the ROM is local to the 
CPU...

cheers

Jules



From lehmann at ans-netz.de  Tue Dec 30 16:36:25 2008
From: lehmann at ans-netz.de (Oliver Lehmann)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 23:36:25 +0100
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <495A2938.26406.13E0672A@cclist.sydex.com>
References: <20081230193428.69f05be5.lehmann@ans-netz.de>
	<495A8EFD.7060208@philpem.me.uk>
	<20081230223036.d5a23737.lehmann@ans-netz.de>
	<495A2938.26406.13E0672A@cclist.sydex.com>
Message-ID: <20081230233625.e8ccb7d7.lehmann@ans-netz.de>

Chuck Guzis wrote:

> On 30 Dec 2008 at 22:30, Oliver Lehmann wrote:
> 
> > But right now I just care about backing up all EPROMs and PROMs from this
> > system here just in case something happens... (and the 6306's are now
> > backed up as well :-)
> 
> Do fusible-link PROMs go bad?  At least do they go bad any more often 
> than some of the LSI on that board? 

Who knows - think of short circuits... All the other 74 logic, z80 chips
and so on are more or less replaceable by just reading what is written on
them - but w/o having a backup of any "custom" chip those are the single
point of failure ;) Even if it turns out to be impossible to get those
bPROMs (who knows...) to restore the backup - I could replace it with
other (EP)ROM stuff more or less easily - but w/o the contents... you get
the picture? ;)


-- 
 Oliver Lehmann
  http://www.pofo.de/
  http://wishlist.ans-netz.de/


From cisin at xenosoft.com  Tue Dec 30 16:41:15 2008
From: cisin at xenosoft.com (Fred Cisin)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 14:41:15 -0800 (PST)
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <0c5701c96ab7$156accd0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
References:  <0c5701c96ab7$156accd0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
Message-ID: <20081230144000.Y53931@shell.lmi.net>

On Tue, 30 Dec 2008, Alexandre Souza wrote:
>     Tony, you just like to complain. Every microcontroller I know has a free
> C version that can be run on mostly anything, and most microcontrollers can
> be programmed even with a PDP-8 :oD
>
>     Wake up, we aren't in 1960 anymore :o)

THAT is worthy of a complaint.
The good old days are gone, but do we HAVE TO face that?





From legalize at xmission.com  Tue Dec 30 16:45:50 2008
From: legalize at xmission.com (Richard)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 15:45:50 -0700
Subject: Ebay: "new" 029 Keypunch 
In-Reply-To: Your message of Mon, 29 Dec 2008 16:54:16 -0800.
	<49597138.6040500@jwsss.com> 
Message-ID: 


In article <49597138.6040500 at jwsss.com>,
    jim s   writes:

> This guy is just doing a corn pone description of where they came from 
> to make it seem like it is "rare" I suspect.

It is rare, not "rare".

C=64s are "rare".

IBM 029 key punches are rare.
-- 
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
      

        Legalize Adulthood! 


From lehmann at ans-netz.de  Tue Dec 30 16:52:47 2008
From: lehmann at ans-netz.de (Oliver Lehmann)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 23:52:47 +0100
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <495AA0E9.1000507@gmail.com>
References: 
	<495AA0E9.1000507@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <20081230235247.58b033ba.lehmann@ans-netz.de>

Jules Richardson wrote:

> What do people do regarding microcontrollers (old or new) with embedded ROM? I 
> mean an EPROM or PROM's just address lines and data, so reasonably easy to 
> dump - but presumably life's a bit more difficult when the ROM is local to the 
> CPU...

You could take out the cpu, build an own circuit around it and write a
small program to output it's internal ROM content on its data lines
where you fetch it from and store it then..
Complicated solution of course....


-- 
 Oliver Lehmann
  http://www.pofo.de/
  http://wishlist.ans-netz.de/


From cclist at sydex.com  Tue Dec 30 16:59:43 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 14:59:43 -0800
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <495AA0E9.1000507@gmail.com>
References: , <495AA0E9.1000507@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <495A375F.10829.1417B629@cclist.sydex.com>

On 30 Dec 2008 at 16:30, Jules Richardson wrote:

> What do people do regarding microcontrollers (old or new) with embedded ROM? I 
> mean an EPROM or PROM's just address lines and data, so reasonably easy to 
> dump - but presumably life's a bit more difficult when the ROM is local to the 
> CPU...

It depends on the vendor and the uC.  Many uCs can have their program 
be read back quite easiy (in cirucit) *if* the security fuses aren't 
blown.  But the same goes for a lot of programmable logic, doesn't 
it?

Cheers,
Chuck



From cclist at sydex.com  Tue Dec 30 17:05:07 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 15:05:07 -0800
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <20081230235247.58b033ba.lehmann@ans-netz.de>
References: , <495AA0E9.1000507@gmail.com>,
	<20081230235247.58b033ba.lehmann@ans-netz.de>
Message-ID: <495A38A3.4679.141CAAB7@cclist.sydex.com>

On 30 Dec 2008 at 23:52, Oliver Lehmann wrote:

> Jules Richardson wrote:
> 
> > What do people do regarding microcontrollers (old or new) with embedded ROM? I 
> > mean an EPROM or PROM's just address lines and data, so reasonably easy to 
> > dump - but presumably life's a bit more difficult when the ROM is local to the 
> > CPU...
> 
> You could take out the cpu, build an own circuit around it and write a
> small program to output it's internal ROM content on its data lines
> where you fetch it from and store it then..
> Complicated solution of course....

How would you do that?  Many uCs with Harvard architectures don't 
have instructions to read up the content of program memory.  Even so, 
how would you get the program into the uC without erasing the program 
flash to start with?

I'm not following your logic here.

Cheers,
Chuck



From emu at e-bbes.com  Tue Dec 30 17:11:33 2008
From: emu at e-bbes.com (e.stiebler)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 16:11:33 -0700
Subject: PDP-11/70 cache memory
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <495AAAA5.60904@e-bbes.com>

Tony Duell wrote:
> 
> One unexpected (at least to me) place where the T11 turns up is in the
> VT240 terminal. I thought those were relatively easy to find and not much
> desired. I know nobofy bid against me when I bought one on E-bay a year or
> so back. 

They are also on the rqdx3, and there are many more rqdx3 still out 
there then rd54 ;-)


From wdonzelli at gmail.com  Tue Dec 30 17:12:16 2008
From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 18:12:16 -0500
Subject: Ebay: "new" 029 Keypunch
In-Reply-To: 
References: <49597138.6040500@jwsss.com> 
Message-ID: 

>  IBM 029 key punches are rare.

Yes, they are rare. In outer space.

They pop up with regularity elsewhere.

--
Will


From emu at e-bbes.com  Tue Dec 30 17:13:25 2008
From: emu at e-bbes.com (e.stiebler)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 16:13:25 -0700
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <20081230144000.Y53931@shell.lmi.net>
References:  <0c5701c96ab7$156accd0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
	<20081230144000.Y53931@shell.lmi.net>
Message-ID: <495AAB15.7080103@e-bbes.com>

Fred Cisin wrote:
> On Tue, 30 Dec 2008, Alexandre Souza wrote:
>>     Tony, you just like to complain. Every microcontroller I know has a free
>> C version that can be run on mostly anything, and most microcontrollers can
>> be programmed even with a PDP-8 :oD
>>
>>     Wake up, we aren't in 1960 anymore :o)
> 
> THAT is worthy of a complaint.
> The good old days are gone, but do we HAVE TO face that?

Yes.
If we are trying to use new chips.
If we design with t11/j11, and use MACRO11 for it, that's a completely 
different issue ;-)


From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk  Tue Dec 30 17:14:24 2008
From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 23:14:24 +0000
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <20081230223036.d5a23737.lehmann@ans-netz.de>
References: <20081230193428.69f05be5.lehmann@ans-netz.de>	<495A8EFD.7060208@philpem.me.uk>
	<20081230223036.d5a23737.lehmann@ans-netz.de>
Message-ID: <495AAB50.6080507@philpem.me.uk>

Oliver Lehmann wrote:
> I've an ALL-02 (http://matthieu.benoit.free.fr/145.htm) which might be
> from the same decade as this PROM ;) 
> For BPROMs it support chips from the manufactures AMD, NS, SIG, TI and
> MMI - but the 6306 is not listed for MMI (the 512x4 Type listed for MMI
> is 63S240).

63S240 is an open-collector 512x4 PROM, and slightly faster (33ns) than the 
6306 (50ns). For reading back it should work fine, but if you want to copy the 
data onto a new chip, you absolutely need a chip the programmer supports.

With EPROMs you can (sometimes) use the Intel Quick-pulse or 10ms Pulse 
algorithms if you don't know the manufacturer's specific algorithm, but with 
PROMs getting the algorithm wrong can, and WILL fry the chip. That said, with 
EPROMs it's hard to find something that isn't supported by modern programmers. 
I've got an Elnec Preprom-02aLV (only recently EOL'd and still under software 
support) and it's handled everything I've plugged in, with the obvious 
exception of a few dead EPROMs that have probably spent a little too long in 
the UV box...

That said, Widlarization is a great way to deal with parts like that. :)

-- 
Phil.
classiccmp at philpem.me.uk
http://www.philpem.me.uk/


From brain at jbrain.com  Tue Dec 30 17:35:09 2008
From: brain at jbrain.com (Jim Brain)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 17:35:09 -0600
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <495AB02D.2020902@jbrain.com>

Tony Duell wrote:
>
> The HP drives work at a much lower level. The file system is managed by 
> the host computer. The commands to the disk drive unit read/write bocks 
> (essentially the same thign as sectors). It's up to the host to turn 
> those into a file system.
>   
This is not as problematic as it may seem.  The uIEC can auto-update the 
firmware, so I could simply write a special version of the SW for 
HPIG/GPIB (even different flavors for the various command sets) and the 
owner can simply place the flavor desired onto a flash drive, turn on 
the unit, and it will program itself with the correct DOS.


> You could probaly find an HP150 or an HP9000/200 machine fairly easily 
> on E-bay. 
>   
I am hopeful someone finds enough value in the possibility to provide a 
unit for testing.  Still, this is very premature, since I still need to 
get the PET IEEE stuff working.
> Now I don;'t know the exact details, but I read (I think on one of the 
> HP9845 pages) that somebody had written an HP drive simulator programs 
> for PCs fitted with an HPIB card (I believe said program has source 
> available if you want to look for hints on the command set, etc). But one 
> thing that this weg page siad was that it couldn't run with a 9914-based 
> HPIB card, since HP did something that was essentially against the 
> standard and which the 9914 couldn';t do. I do know that HP used the 9914 
> in their computers quite a bit, but that the drives used the Intel 8291. 
> Of course if you're planning on bit-banging the HPIB protocol on the pins 
> of a microcontroller (I think you need a little external logic, there is 
> one transition where you can't take arbitrarily long to change one of the 
> signals), then this won;'t be a problem.
>   
It'll be a bit-bang approach, so save HW costs, but I can wire up some 
TTL logic if needed.

Jim


From legalize at xmission.com  Tue Dec 30 18:22:14 2008
From: legalize at xmission.com (Richard)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 17:22:14 -0700
Subject: Ebay: "new" 029 Keypunch 
In-Reply-To: Your message of Tue, 30 Dec 2008 18:12:16 -0500.
	 
Message-ID: 


In article ,
    "William Donzelli"   writes:

> >  IBM 029 key punches are rare.
> 
> Yes, they are rare. In outer space.
> 
> They pop up with regularity elsewhere.

Really?  Reaction on this list to the original govliq lot seemed to
indicate otherwise.  I don't know how often they come up on ebay
because I don't have an active search looking for them.

Still, considering that someone snatched that one up with a buy-it-now
option instead of waiting out the auction tells me that they aren't
common on ebay either.

While rare is a relative and not an absolute term, I don't think this
sort of item (particularly in this condition) would qualify as common.
-- 
"The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download
      

        Legalize Adulthood! 


From billdeg at degnanco.com  Tue Dec 30 18:28:56 2008
From: billdeg at degnanco.com (B Degnan)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 19:28:56 -0500
Subject: 1950 Simon 
In-Reply-To: <200812301801.mBUI17JW082038@dewey.classiccmp.org>
References: <200812301801.mBUI17JW082038@dewey.classiccmp.org>
Message-ID: <495ABCC8.5040208@degnanco.com>

I have posted a transcript from the Oct 1950 Radio-Electronics article 
"The World's Smallest Electric Brain" with pictures.

http://vintagecomputer.net/simon.cfm

Bill



From sethm at loomcom.com  Tue Dec 30 18:29:18 2008
From: sethm at loomcom.com (Seth Morabito)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 16:29:18 -0800
Subject: T-11 (was Re: PDP-11/70 cache memory)
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: 

On Mon, Dec 29, 2008 at 4:21 PM, Ethan Dicks  wrote:
> On Mon, Dec 29, 2008 at 5:52 PM, Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ
>  wrote:
>> Alexandre Souza wrote:
>>
>>>   The SBC6120 is a **real nice** SBC...
>
> Yes it is, and it's back in "print"!

Wait, what's this?!  It's back?!  Holy cow!  OK, I just ordered one.
I missed my chance last time, I won't miss it again!

(Where on EARTH did Bob find a new supply of 6120s?)

-Seth


From wdonzelli at gmail.com  Tue Dec 30 18:41:14 2008
From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 19:41:14 -0500
Subject: Ebay: "new" 029 Keypunch
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
	
Message-ID: 

> Really?  Reaction on this list to the original govliq lot seemed to
>  indicate otherwise.  I don't know how often they come up on ebay
>  because I don't have an active search looking for them.

Most I see are not on Ebay. In the past couple of years, I have come
across maybe six 029 and 129 machines _off_ Ebay, then there are the
ones that we see _on_ Ebay. 029s and 129s seem to be neck and neck as
far as availability. Other keystations, like the 024 and 026 are not.
Then there are some weird variants, generally part of data comm sets,
that really are rare. But then, often the difference is only a hair
more than a new tag.

>  Still, considering that someone snatched that one up with a buy-it-now
>  option instead of waiting out the auction tells me that they aren't
>  common on ebay either.

Lots of people, including some of the mainframe collectors (big guns),
still think that the 029s and 129s are really rare. I suspect they are
not looking past their screens. For those of us that are actually
doing the legwork, the things just come around.

>  While rare is a relative and not an absolute term, I don't think this
>  sort of item (particularly in this condition) would qualify as common.

Yes, the condition matters greatly in this example. I will admit that.

--
Will


From glen.slick at gmail.com  Tue Dec 30 19:17:08 2008
From: glen.slick at gmail.com (Glen Slick)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 17:17:08 -0800
Subject: RS/6000 7012-320 7013-520, free, Seattle area, any interest?
Message-ID: <1e1fc3e90812301717p3e656ae7pf424982ea8199fdc@mail.gmail.com>

Any interest in the following for free if you can pickup in the Seattle area?

1990-1992 IBM RS/6000 POWERserver / POWERstation
(2x) 7012-320 20MHz desktop
(1x) 7012-320H 25MHz desktop
(3x) 7013-520 20MHz deskside
(2x) 3151 serial terminal

As far as I know these are on the slowest end of the POWER processor
range (before POWER2 and PowerPC) and probably run best with AIX
3.2.5.

I think some of these have 32MB RAM and some 16MB, and SCSI hard
drives.  I won't bother poking around for more details unless someone
is interested.

If anyone is interested reply privately.  If there is no interest a
new free computer recycling law goes into effect in 2009 in WA state
and these will go to a recycler sometime next month.


From jzg22 at drexel.edu  Tue Dec 30 19:18:31 2008
From: jzg22 at drexel.edu (Jonathan Gevaryahu)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 20:18:31 -0500
Subject: Any interest in a build-it-yourself votrax synthesizer kit?
Message-ID: <495AC867.4090809@drexel.edu>

If offered for $300 would anyone be interested in a kit to build a 
discrete resistor/capacitor/analog implementation of a Votrax 
synthesizer/vocal tract? Most of the digital parts would be done using a 
PIC. Would be mostly SC-01 compatible with possible RS-232 phoneme entry 
and optional text to speech.
Please respond off-list if you're interested, if enough people show 
interest we may offer it. The price is not final.

-- 
Jonathan Gevaryahu
jgevaryahu(@t)hotmail(d0t)com
jzg22(@t)drexel(d0t)edu



From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca  Tue Dec 30 19:23:30 2008
From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 18:23:30 -0700
Subject: T-11 (was Re: PDP-11/70 cache memory)
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
	
Message-ID: <495AC992.5000205@jetnet.ab.ca>

Seth Morabito wrote:

> (Where on EARTH did Bob find a new supply of 6120s?)

Who said Bob is from the Earth?

> -Seth




From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca  Tue Dec 30 19:28:23 2008
From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 18:28:23 -0700
Subject: T-11 (was Re: PDP-11/70 cache memory)
In-Reply-To: <495AC992.5000205@jetnet.ab.ca>
References: 	
	<495AC992.5000205@jetnet.ab.ca>
Message-ID: <495ACAB7.3040907@jetnet.ab.ca>

bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote:
> Seth Morabito wrote:
> 
>> (Where on EARTH did Bob find a new supply of 6120s?)
> 
> Who said Bob is from the Earth?
> 
>> -Seth
> 

PS.  Now only if   BOB could make a PDP 11 kit . :(




From steven.alan.canning at verizon.net  Tue Dec 30 20:53:08 2008
From: steven.alan.canning at verizon.net (Scanning)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 18:53:08 -0800
Subject: Any interest in a build-it-yourself votrax synthesizer kit?
References: <495AC867.4090809@drexel.edu>
Message-ID: <000301c96af2$e9981d60$0201a8c0@hal9000>

Jonathan,

I do not think there will be much of a market for a kit as the SC-01As are
still available. A reputable dealer I've purchased Hero Robot parts from
before is offering SC-01As  for $36 on E-bay ( 380093154233 ). Just for the
exercise and learning experience you should go ahead and figure out the
design. Your time would be well spent. Don't see a market though, at least
not yet.

Best regards, Steven


Subject: Any interest in a build-it-yourself votrax synthesizer kit?


> If offered for $300 would anyone be interested in a kit to build a
> discrete resistor/capacitor/analog implementation of a Votrax
> synthesizer/vocal tract? Most of the digital parts would be done using a
> PIC. Would be mostly SC-01 compatible with possible RS-232 phoneme entry
> and optional text to speech.
> Please respond off-list if you're interested, if enough people show
> interest we may offer it. The price is not final.
>
> --
> Jonathan Gevaryahu



From curt at atarimuseum.com  Tue Dec 30 20:58:51 2008
From: curt at atarimuseum.com (Curt @ Atari Museum)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 21:58:51 -0500
Subject: Any interest in a build-it-yourself votrax synthesizer kit?
In-Reply-To: <495AC867.4090809@drexel.edu>
References: <495AC867.4090809@drexel.edu>
Message-ID: <495ADFEB.2050902@atarimuseum.com>

Jonathan,

   That sounds like a cool project for those who like to delve into such 
things, but to be honest, the Speakjet is  pretty much a functional 
equivalent with a full kit for $69.99

http://magnevation.com/products.htm


Curt

 

Jonathan Gevaryahu wrote:
> If offered for $300 would anyone be interested in a kit to build a 
> discrete resistor/capacitor/analog implementation of a Votrax 
> synthesizer/vocal tract? Most of the digital parts would be done using 
> a PIC. Would be mostly SC-01 compatible with possible RS-232 phoneme 
> entry and optional text to speech.
> Please respond off-list if you're interested, if enough people show 
> interest we may offer it. The price is not final.
>


From technobug at comcast.net  Tue Dec 30 21:49:10 2008
From: technobug at comcast.net (CRC)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 20:49:10 -0700
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <200812302204.mBUM4XoG086467@dewey.classiccmp.org>
References: <200812302204.mBUM4XoG086467@dewey.classiccmp.org>
Message-ID: <87D68E8A-314B-4987-BC15-E5462869A5E1@comcast.net>


On 30 Dec 2008 13:59:20 -0800, Chuck Guzis wrote:

> Do fusible-link PROMs go bad?  At least do they go bad any more often
> than some of the LSI on that board? [...]

Indeed they do. Six months ago I was given a DOA Rockland-Wavetek  
5820B spectrum analyzer that had a disconnected power supply lead.  
Fixing that brought up the unit sans random pixels on the displayed  
alpha-numerics. I finally traced the problem to a 8S115 PROM that was  
feeding a 8X300 (two other CPUs in the beast - Z80s). After decoding  
the ROM I began editing the data to restore the missing 1-bits and  
reprogrammed the very same chip. After the first half of the alphabet,  
the remainder of the letters magically appeared. Once the bit "heals"  
it is possible to reblow it. How long this fix is going to last is  
anyones guess - probably another 20 years...

	CRC


From locutus at puscii.nl  Tue Dec 30 22:00:09 2008
From: locutus at puscii.nl (locutus at puscii.nl)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 05:00:09 +0100
Subject: T-11 (was Re: PDP-11/70 cache memory)
In-Reply-To: <4958FD68.5056.F4D5C5C@cclist.sydex.com>
References: 
	<4958FD68.5056.F4D5C5C@cclist.sydex.com>
Message-ID: <878wpxhu46.wl%locutus@puscii.nl>

> On the other hand, the Russians used their clone of a PDP-11 
> microprocessor in a bunch of products--even a pocket calculator.

You are refering to the bk1011 series of machines if i recall
correctly, which are instructionset wise equivelant to a baseline
pdp11/23+ without CIS or float, but with a 22bit adress bus, there are
essentially 2 variants of this machine (with some subvariations in
amount of memory), the first is a wedgestyle (think C64 etc.)
homecomputer, which has their implementation of the 11/23 chipset,
with very very slow DRAM, running at 3.58MHz. and memory mapped bitmap
graphics, which also has a inrom emulation of a console device for the
RT-11 derived (presumedly from stolen or reverse
engineered/disassembled code), the interesting part of this machine is
though, is that it has a QBUS connector on the back of the machine,
which allows for a wide variation of (homebrewn!) addons for the
machine, i think it also has a custom local network protocol (non
rs4xx) for connecting several together to a larger soviet produced
minicomputer (i do not know what one would be used for that).

The second variant is architecturally the same, and used the same
microprocessor implementation of the -11, but is in the format of a
large graphing calculator, and is functionally equivelant to say, a
Ti81, but with very slow graphics plot from what i recall from a
ukrainian telling me about it :-), it is not freely programmable
though, and you can only run some simple BASIC-esque interpreter on
it, together with the calculator software in ROM.

the Homecomputer versions are actually not that hard to get, and go
for fairly reasonable prices on ebay (i paid 80 euros for mine
including shipping from ukraine), but the graphing calculator version
of the machine will sell for up to 500 euros, of special interest is,
that the graphing calculator was possibly the last produced consumer
computer from soviet design (it was released in 1991 from what i
recall), altough its not completely soviet from what i read, the LCD
screen was actually a western imported part.


All the best, a very very sleepy Locutus.



From cclist at sydex.com  Tue Dec 30 22:30:02 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 20:30:02 -0800
Subject: Any interest in a build-it-yourself votrax synthesizer kit?
In-Reply-To: <000301c96af2$e9981d60$0201a8c0@hal9000>
References: <495AC867.4090809@drexel.edu>,
	<000301c96af2$e9981d60$0201a8c0@hal9000>
Message-ID: <495A84CA.27264.1546388B@cclist.sydex.com>

While I think the SC01A is sort of interesting, why not go vintage 
with an S-100 board circa 1976?

http://web.inter.nl.net/hcc/davies/esp7cpt.html

A friend ordered a demo tape from them and we'd get together with a 
bunch of friends and a big pot of spaghetti and bring out various 
substances to abuse and play the tape:

http://incolor.inetnebr.com/bill_r/computalker.htm

...and laugh ourselves silly.  Hey, what can I say, it was the 70's. 
Angie Dickinson was still pretty hot stuff...

Cheers,
Chuck




From locutus at puscii.nl  Tue Dec 30 22:47:07 2008
From: locutus at puscii.nl (locutus at puscii.nl)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 05:47:07 +0100
Subject: T-11 (was Re: PDP-11/70 cache memory)
In-Reply-To: <4958FD68.5056.F4D5C5C@cclist.sydex.com>
References: 
	<4958FD68.5056.F4D5C5C@cclist.sydex.com>
Message-ID: <877i5hhrxw.wl%locutus@puscii.nl>

> On the other hand, the Russians used their clone of a PDP-11 
> microprocessor in a bunch of products--even a pocket calculator.

You are refering to the bk1011 series of machines if i recall
correctly, which are instructionset wise equivelant to a baseline
pdp11/23+ without CIS or float, but with a 22bit adress bus, there are
essentially 2 variants of this machine (with some subvariations in
amount of memory), the first is a wedgestyle (think C64 etc.)
homecomputer, which has their implementation of the 11/23 chipset,
with very very slow DRAM, running at 3.58MHz. and memory mapped bitmap
graphics, which also has a inrom emulation of a console device for the
RT-11 derived (presumedly from stolen or reverse
engineered/disassembled code), the interesting part of this machine is
though, is that it has a QBUS connector on the back of the machine,
which allows for a wide variation of (homebrewn!) addons for the
machine, i think it also has a custom local network protocol (non
rs4xx) for connecting several together to a larger soviet produced
minicomputer (i do not know what one would be used for that).

The second variant is architecturally the same, and used the same
microprocessor implementation of the -11, but is in the format of a
large graphing calculator, and is functionally equivelant to say, a
Ti81, but with very slow graphics plot from what i recall from a
ukrainian telling me about it :-), it is not freely programmable
though, and you can only run some simple BASIC-esque interpreter on
it, together with the calculator software in ROM.

the Homecomputer versions are actually not that hard to get, and go
for fairly reasonable prices on ebay (i paid 80 euros for mine
including shipping from ukraine), but the graphing calculator version
of the machine will sell for up to 500 euros, of special interest is,
that the graphing calculator was possibly the last produced consumer
computer from soviet design (it was released in 1991 from what i
recall), altough its not completely soviet from what i read, the LCD
screen was actually a western imported part.


All the best, a very very sleepy Locutus.



From martinm at allwest.net  Tue Dec 30 22:55:47 2008
From: martinm at allwest.net (Martin Marshall)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 21:55:47 -0700
Subject: Free for Shipping:  SyQuest EZFlyer, EZDrive
Message-ID: <5C86D0B253E241D1A6D59FEE66EAC0C0@p4266>

More from the cleanup:

One = SyQuest EZFlyer 230 MB Drive - Parallel Port - Original box - complete

One = SyQuest EZDrive 135 MB Drive - SCSI External - Shrink-wrapped 

Free for shipping from 82930.  Reply off-list to "martinm" at the domain
"allwest.net".

Thank you,
Martin Marshall




From sellam at vintagetech.com  Tue Dec 30 23:09:05 2008
From: sellam at vintagetech.com (Sellam Ismail)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 21:09:05 -0800 (PST)
Subject: Why it is sometimes necessary to re-seat a board or chip
Message-ID: 


I was perusing some topics on Wikipedia and came across this enlightening 
tidbit of information in the article on "Gold plating":

"With direct gold-on-copper plating, the copper atoms tend to diffuse 
through the gold layer, causing tarnishing of its surface and formation of 
an oxide and/or sulfide layer.

"A layer of a suitable barrier metal, usually nickel, is usually deposited 
on the copper substrate before the gold plating. The layer of nickel 
provides mechanical backing for the gold layer, improving its wear 
resistance. It also reduces the impact of pores present in the gold 
layer."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_plating

So this is why a re-seating of certain cards, connectors and ICs 
oftentimes cures a fidgety system.

Just thought I'd share this.  It was novel to me at least.

P.S. I'm assuming this information is accurate :)

-- 

Sellam Ismail                                        Vintage Computer Festival
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
International Man of Intrigue and Danger                http://www.vintage.org

[ Old computing resources for business || Buy/Sell/Trade Vintage Computers   ]
[ and academia at www.VintageTech.com  || at http://marketplace.vintage.org  ]


From spectre at floodgap.com  Tue Dec 30 23:26:25 2008
From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 21:26:25 -0800 (PST)
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <87D68E8A-314B-4987-BC15-E5462869A5E1@comcast.net> from CRC at
	"Dec 30, 8 08:49:10 pm"
Message-ID: <200812310526.mBV5QPHB009026@floodgap.com>

Just for some levity here, every time I see this thread subject "What Child
Is This" starts playing in my head.

'Tis the season 'n' all that.

-- 
------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ --
  Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com
-- It is not enough to succeed. Others must fail. -- Gore Vidal ---------------


From cclist at sydex.com  Wed Dec 31 00:18:45 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 22:18:45 -0800
Subject: Why it is sometimes necessary to re-seat a board or chip
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <495A9E45.27888.15A999D4@cclist.sydex.com>

On 30 Dec 2008 at 21:09, Sellam Ismail wrote:

> So this is why a re-seating of certain cards, connectors and ICs 
> oftentimes cures a fidgety system.

Maybe the scrappers know this, but how often is pure gold used as the 
contact material on edge connectors?  I thought that an alloy was 
plated as pure gold is very soft and doesn't withstand too many 
insertion cycles.  Anyone?

Cheers,
Chuck




From dkelvey at hotmail.com  Wed Dec 31 00:41:06 2008
From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 22:41:06 -0800
Subject: Why it is sometimes necessary to re-seat a board or chip
In-Reply-To: <495A9E45.27888.15A999D4@cclist.sydex.com>
References: 
	<495A9E45.27888.15A999D4@cclist.sydex.com>
Message-ID: 



> From: cclist at sydex.com
> To: cctalk at classiccmp.org
> Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 22:18:45 -0800
> Subject: Re: Why it is sometimes necessary to re-seat a board or chip
>
> On 30 Dec 2008 at 21:09, Sellam Ismail wrote:
>
>> So this is why a re-seating of certain cards, connectors and ICs
>> oftentimes cures a fidgety system.
>
> Maybe the scrappers know this, but how often is pure gold used as the
> contact material on edge connectors? I thought that an alloy was
> plated as pure gold is very soft and doesn't withstand too many
> insertion cycles. Anyone?
>
> Cheers,
> Chuck
>
>

Hi
 To my knowledge, it is pure gold. It is difficult to plate
alloys.
 Another reason why boards need to be resetted is because
there are differences in the materials. Gold to solderplate
will cause problem over time.
 Keeping air and moisture away from the contacts will avoid
problems. This is why I have been using things like DC#4
on contacts for my machines for years. I've never had to
reset any of my machines boards or ICs that I've applied
the grease to( not ever ).
 But back on the plating, it is done very thin. 15 or 30
micro inches are common. The nickel ( as well as a barrier
to the copper ) provides the stiffness.
 The gold is so thin that a few minutes with a pencil
eraser will remove most of it.
 That is why I hate to see people using this method to
clean boards. I find that this can more properly be done
with some damp lense paper. The eraser often leaves a
little of the rubber as well that will eventually release
the sulfur, causing the need for more cleaning.
Dwight
 
_________________________________________________________________
Send e-mail faster without improving your typing skills.
http://windowslive.com/online/hotmail?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_hotmail_acq_speed_122008


From locutus at puscii.nl  Tue Dec 30 22:47:38 2008
From: locutus at puscii.nl (locutus at puscii.nl)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 05:47:38 +0100
Subject: T-11 (was Re: PDP-11/70 cache memory)
In-Reply-To: <4958FD68.5056.F4D5C5C@cclist.sydex.com>
References: 
	<4958FD68.5056.F4D5C5C@cclist.sydex.com>
Message-ID: <8763l1hrx1.wl%locutus@puscii.nl>

> On the other hand, the Russians used their clone of a PDP-11 
> microprocessor in a bunch of products--even a pocket calculator.

You are refering to the bk1011 series of machines if i recall
correctly, which are instructionset wise equivelant to a baseline
pdp11/23+ without CIS or float, but with a 22bit adress bus, there are
essentially 2 variants of this machine (with some subvariations in
amount of memory), the first is a wedgestyle (think C64 etc.)
homecomputer, which has their implementation of the 11/23 chipset,
with very very slow DRAM, running at 3.58MHz. and memory mapped bitmap
graphics, which also has a inrom emulation of a console device for the
RT-11 derived (presumedly from stolen or reverse
engineered/disassembled code), the interesting part of this machine is
though, is that it has a QBUS connector on the back of the machine,
which allows for a wide variation of (homebrewn!) addons for the
machine, i think it also has a custom local network protocol (non
rs4xx) for connecting several together to a larger soviet produced
minicomputer (i do not know what one would be used for that).

The second variant is architecturally the same, and used the same
microprocessor implementation of the -11, but is in the format of a
large graphing calculator, and is functionally equivelant to say, a
Ti81, but with very slow graphics plot from what i recall from a
ukrainian telling me about it :-), it is not freely programmable
though, and you can only run some simple BASIC-esque interpreter on
it, together with the calculator software in ROM.

the Homecomputer versions are actually not that hard to get, and go
for fairly reasonable prices on ebay (i paid 80 euros for mine
including shipping from ukraine), but the graphing calculator version
of the machine will sell for up to 500 euros, of special interest is,
that the graphing calculator was possibly the last produced consumer
computer from soviet design (it was released in 1991 from what i
recall), altough its not completely soviet from what i read, the LCD
screen was actually a western imported part.


All the best, a very very sleepy Locutus



From cclist at sydex.com  Wed Dec 31 02:13:50 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 00:13:50 -0800
Subject: Why it is sometimes necessary to re-seat a board or chip
In-Reply-To: 
References: ,
	<495A9E45.27888.15A999D4@cclist.sydex.com>,
	
Message-ID: <495AB93E.16611.16130531@cclist.sydex.com>

On 30 Dec 2008 at 22:41, dwight elvey wrote:

>  To my knowledge, it is pure gold. It is difficult to plate
> alloys.

Not really that hard, depending on the alloy.  For instance, I can 
plate brass in my own shop--it's not difficult; just an acid bath 
process. (Tin-lead) Solder has been electroplated onto PCBs for 
decades.

Some people have pointed to their college chemistry texts and told me 
definitively that it was impossible to electrodeposit an alloy.  I 
don't know where that one got started.   

I'll agree that cooking up a plating bath can be a black art.  Stuff 
you'd never think would affect the outcome such as sugar sometimes 
winds up in them and I know a retired fellow who ran a plating shop 
who swore that he got better results than anyone else because he 
urinated in his tanks.

From: http://www.pfonline.com/articles/pfd0022.html

Hard, Bright Gold

Platers who gold plate contacts and connectors generally use bright 
acid gold formulations. These baths contain complexed cobalt or 
nickel in small quantities, to improve hardness and brightness of the 
deposit. Such gold electroplates will be 99.7 to 99.9 pct pure, and 
hardness can be 120 to 300 Knoop. The small amount of nickel or 
cobalt will interfere with die bonding, so these baths cannot be used 
for semiconductor plating. Hard, bright gold baths, if operated with 
good housekeeping and chemical control, have very long life-often 
three years and more. 

Cheers,
Chuck






From lehmann at ans-netz.de  Wed Dec 31 04:10:17 2008
From: lehmann at ans-netz.de (Oliver Lehmann)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 11:10:17 +0100
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <495A38A3.4679.141CAAB7@cclist.sydex.com>
References:  <495AA0E9.1000507@gmail.com>
	<20081230235247.58b033ba.lehmann@ans-netz.de>
	<495A38A3.4679.141CAAB7@cclist.sydex.com>
Message-ID: <20081231111017.d8fbf69a.lehmann@ans-netz.de>

Chuck Guzis wrote:

> How would you do that?  Many uCs with Harvard architectures don't 
> have instructions to read up the content of program memory.  Even so, 
> how would you get the program into the uC without erasing the program 
> flash to start with?
> 
> I'm not following your logic here.

Ok, i don't know much CPUs with onboard ROMs, but I think it should work
with Zilogs Z8 with on-chip ROM - or am I wrong at all?

-- 
 Oliver Lehmann
  http://www.pofo.de/
  http://wishlist.ans-netz.de/


From bqt at softjar.se  Tue Dec 30 05:41:58 2008
From: bqt at softjar.se (Johnny Billquist)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 12:41:58 +0100
Subject: Memory/cache on the 11/70
Message-ID: <495A0906.6050206@softjar.se>

Since there have been a few discussions about the memory/cache of the 
11/70 now, I think I might make a few comments as well.

When we talk about the MK11 memory, you need to remember that it's a 
separate memory box, and is not at all transparent to the 11/70.

The 11/70 have a memory bus. This memory bus is what you would interface 
to if you designed your own memory which you put in the free CPU slot. 
The memory bus don't have any ECC. The ECC of the MK11 is totally 
located inside the MK11, and is not visible outside.
The 11/70 memory bus only have parity bits. So you can skip all the ECC 
stuff if you want to play with your own memory "box" design.
Pretend it's a MJ11 instead, which is simpler.
Another detail is that memory refresh is also something that is internal 
to the box. None of that is visible to the CPU. And neither is memory 
rewrites in the case of core.

Now, my memory of the 11/70 memory bus is fuzzy, since it's been quite a 
while since I was studying it. But the schematics and manuals are out 
there, so all of this can be read up on.
But as far as I remember, the 11/70 memory bus is rather simple and 
asynchronous. The machine presents 22 address (actually 24 are defined, 
but the top two are always zero). You have 32 data bits. 4 parity on 
data, and probably also parity on address. You have a few control lines, 
and that's it.
You have three types of transactions. Read, Write, and Read-modiy-write. 
With the 11/74 you also have an interlock function, but I guess that's a 
moot point since noone around here have an 11/74 CPU anyway.

However, the 11/70 cache and memory controller presents quite a lot of 
overhead and slowdown. If you really would like to speed the 11/70 up 
(and you can, believe me), you would want to replace the cache and 
memory controller all together.

Now, after reading a few comments here, I've finally understood the 
relationship between the SETASI PEP-70 and HC-70.
The PEP-70 is 4 megs of memory. You can connect that to the 11/70 memory 
bus.
The HC-70 replaces the cache and memory controller in the CPU. This 
makes the whole 4 Meg of memory look like cache. You hook the PEP-70 to 
the HC-70 instead. Nice solution actually. I wonder if (in theory) you 
could hook any memory box to the HC-70, or if the PEP-70 can work in two 
modes. One as a device on the memory bus, and one as a cache memory for 
the HC-70.

Anyway, if someone were to design a memory system for the 11/70, the way 
I'd recommend is to go the whole way, since that's where the real gains 
are. Skip the memory bus and the original cache. The original cache is 
just 2 KB of 2-way associative memory. If you set up a 4 MB cache, the 
CPU can run at full steam the whole time, with a cycle time of about 150 
nS, if I remember right.

It is more complicated, though. You'll have access paths from CPU, 
Unibus and four massbus controllers to deal with. But it should 
definitely be doable (heck, SETASI have already done it once).

I might be interested in such a project myself, since the 11/70s we have 
around here still are on MK11 boxes. I could deal with PCBs and design, 
but I'm very short on time, as usual... :-(
No experience at all with FPGAs or any such fancy stuff.

	Johnny


From healyzh at slate.spiritone.com  Tue Dec 30 11:09:36 2008
From: healyzh at slate.spiritone.com (Zane H. Healy)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 09:09:36 -0800 (PST)
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
	<49586F48.3090205@jbrain.com> <49590976.6050705@e-bbes.com>
	
	
Message-ID: 

On Tue, 30 Dec 2008, Gene Buckle wrote:

> On Mon, 29 Dec 2008, Zane H. Healy wrote:
>
>> Personally I was just thinking a couple hours ago how nice it would be if
>> someone would make something like this for the Amiga 500.
>> 
>
> Zane, you could just use an IDE-CF bridge.  That's what I use in my Amiga 
> 2000 (albeit with a SCSI-IDE bridge in the middle of that).

I don't believe I have a single IDE capable Amiga that works (does the A600
have IDE?), both of my A1200's are unstable.  On my A3000 SCSI isn't an
issue as I have lots of small SCSI drives, and I gave my A2000's away.  I
would just like a way to play floppy based games on the A500 without the
floppies. :-)  Of course once I get everything out of storage, I need to
figure out what condition my Amiga's are in before I start worrying about
such things.

Zane




From ajp166 at bellatlantic.net  Tue Dec 30 20:14:51 2008
From: ajp166 at bellatlantic.net (Allison)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 21:14:51 -0500
Subject: T-11 (was Re: PDP-11/70 cache memory)
Message-ID: <0KCP00CGYY87E3G2@vms173003.mailsrvcs.net>

>
>Subject: Re: T-11 (was Re: PDP-11/70 cache memory)
>   From: "bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca" 
>   Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 18:23:30 -0700
>     To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts 
>
>Seth Morabito wrote:
>
>> (Where on EARTH did Bob find a new supply of 6120s?)
>
>Who said Bob is from the Earth?
>
>> -Seth
>

The 1802 and 6120 have had a long production life and there are many 
scattered around. 

Allison



From andrew at smokebelch.org  Wed Dec 31 05:33:14 2008
From: andrew at smokebelch.org (Andrew Back)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 11:33:14 +0000
Subject: RSTS/E question and media.
Message-ID: <20081231113314.GA14823@plum.flirble.org>

So I finally got the Micro PDP11/53 hooked-up to a terminal. When back at the folks at over Christmas I found an old MMJ cable and DB25F adapter, which work when the latter is plugged into the VT. I need to try the MMJ cable I bought recently with this adapter, but suspect it is something about using an MMJ direct between the PDP and VT. ISTR having this problem before trying to direct cable a MicroVAX to a VT's MMJ port.

In any case, I'd like to join this machine into Hecnet, hope to run RSTS/E and have a couple of questions:

- Looks like only v7 of RSTS/E is available, would this suffice? 
- Would anyone be willing to help me out with media (happy to cover cost for media and postage, of course)? 

Regards,

Andrew

-- 
Andrew Back
a at smokebelch.org


From ploopster at gmail.com  Wed Dec 31 06:26:37 2008
From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 07:26:37 -0500
Subject: Ebay: "new" 029 Keypunch
In-Reply-To: 
References: <49597138.6040500@jwsss.com> 
	
Message-ID: <495B64FD.4050008@gmail.com>

William Donzelli wrote:
>>  IBM 029 key punches are rare.
> 
> Yes, they are rare. In outer space.
> 
> They pop up with regularity elsewhere.

They're rarer over on the left coast than they are here.

Peace...  Sridhar


From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Wed Dec 31 06:53:36 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 10:53:36 -0200
Subject: What kind of IC is this
References: <495AA0E9.1000507@gmail.com>
	<20081230235247.58b033ba.lehmann@ans-netz.de>
Message-ID: <013001c96b46$df969400$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

> You could take out the cpu, build an own circuit around it and write a
> small program to output it's internal ROM content on its data lines
> where you fetch it from and store it then..
> Complicated solution of course....

    How you do that into a 8051? :)



From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Wed Dec 31 06:52:58 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 10:52:58 -0200
Subject: What kind of IC is this
References:  <495AA0E9.1000507@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <012f01c96b46$def46090$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

> What do people do regarding microcontrollers (old or new) with embedded 
> ROM? I
> mean an EPROM or PROM's just address lines and data, so reasonably easy to
> dump - but presumably life's a bit more difficult when the ROM is local to 
> the
> CPU...

    If the protection is not set, you can read just like a EPROM 
microcontroller. If it is set...well, there are ways, but it is something 
hard to do :)



From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Wed Dec 31 06:54:43 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 10:54:43 -0200
Subject: What kind of IC is this
References: <20081230193428.69f05be5.lehmann@ans-netz.de>	<495A8EFD.7060208@philpem.me.uk><20081230223036.d5a23737.lehmann@ans-netz.de>
	<495AAB50.6080507@philpem.me.uk>
Message-ID: <014401c96b47$070ecbb0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

> With EPROMs you can (sometimes) use the Intel Quick-pulse or 10ms Pulse
> algorithms if you don't know the manufacturer's specific algorithm, but 
> with
> PROMs getting the algorithm wrong can, and WILL fry the chip. That said, 
> with
> EPROMs it's hard to find something that isn't supported by modern 
> programmers.
> I've got an Elnec Preprom-02aLV (only recently EOL'd and still under 
> software
> support) and it's handled everything I've plugged in, with the obvious
> exception of a few dead EPROMs that have probably spent a little too long 
> in
> the UV box...

    Of course, you can always use a 2716 or like EPROM on the place of PROMs 
:o)



From austin at ozpass.co.uk  Wed Dec 31 08:19:20 2008
From: austin at ozpass.co.uk (Austin Pass)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 14:19:20 +0000
Subject: Free items, West Yorkshire.
Message-ID: <48D7F90A-EC77-4D83-B30C-66BFF2D41FFE@ozpass.co.uk>

Hello!

Having a New-Years clearout before my son/daughter arrives.

Free for collection:

SGI 20" Monitor (including little slide-out remote control)
Digital (DEC) 17" Monitor (originally used with a VAXstation)
Generic (beige) 19" Monitor with BNC inputs (used for my SGI Crimson)
Sun PowerMac G4 (sawtooth) X 2
Sun SparcStation 4
Sun SparcStation 5 (bad cosmetic condition - missing front "feet")
Sun SparcStation 2
Sun ULTRA 1
Sun ULTRA Enterprise 2
Xemplar Power Macintosh ONE/225
HP Deskjet 1220C

Ideally I'd like to get rid of it all in one go, but I appreciate this  
is somewhat optimistic!

I can provide further information on any of the kit, upon request.   
All replies directly to myself, please.  I'm based in Holmfirth.

Happy New Year!

-Austin.


From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com  Wed Dec 31 08:27:17 2008
From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 08:27:17 -0600
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <20081231111017.d8fbf69a.lehmann@ans-netz.de>
References: 
	<495AA0E9.1000507@gmail.com>	<20081230235247.58b033ba.lehmann@ans-netz.de>	<495A38A3.4679.141CAAB7@cclist.sydex.com>
	<20081231111017.d8fbf69a.lehmann@ans-netz.de>
Message-ID: <495B8145.7070306@gmail.com>

Oliver Lehmann wrote:
> Ok, i don't know much CPUs with onboard ROMs, but I think it should work
> with Zilogs Z8 with on-chip ROM - or am I wrong at all?

That reminds me - I keep meaning to look up details on the Z8. I was told once 
that it was just a Z80 with on-board ROM, but that never explained why I had 
one in the junk box marked "Z8 ROMless"...




From austin at ozpass.co.uk  Wed Dec 31 08:29:02 2008
From: austin at ozpass.co.uk (Austin Pass)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 14:29:02 +0000
Subject: Free items, West Yorkshire.
In-Reply-To: <48D7F90A-EC77-4D83-B30C-66BFF2D41FFE@ozpass.co.uk>
References: <48D7F90A-EC77-4D83-B30C-66BFF2D41FFE@ozpass.co.uk>
Message-ID: <011DF2FE-6895-4480-B62C-69A1DBC739A4@ozpass.co.uk>

On 31 Dec 2008, at 14:19, Austin Pass wrote:

[SNIP]

> Sun PowerMac G4 (sawtooth) X 2

[SNIP]

Should, of course, read *Apple* PowerMac G4 (sawtooth) X 2

-Austin.



From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com  Wed Dec 31 08:33:16 2008
From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 08:33:16 -0600
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <012f01c96b46$def46090$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
References:  <495AA0E9.1000507@gmail.com>
	<012f01c96b46$def46090$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
Message-ID: <495B82AC.9010207@gmail.com>

Alexandre Souza wrote:
>> What do people do regarding microcontrollers (old or new) with 
>> embedded ROM? I
>> mean an EPROM or PROM's just address lines and data, so reasonably 
>> easy to
>> dump - but presumably life's a bit more difficult when the ROM is 
>> local to the
>> CPU...
> 
>    If the protection is not set, you can read just like a EPROM 
> microcontroller. If it is set...well, there are ways, but it is 
> something hard to do :)

So do EPROM/PAL programmers exist that are also capable of programming (and 
reading) a variety of microcontroller on-board ROMs? They quite possibly do, 
although I've never seen one (but I haven't gone shopping for a programmer in 
years)

Thankfully I thought I had something with an 8051 in, but it turns out to be 
an 8031, which makes life a bit easier ;)

cheers

Jules



From dkelvey at hotmail.com  Wed Dec 31 09:01:10 2008
From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 07:01:10 -0800
Subject: Why it is sometimes necessary to re-seat a board or chip
In-Reply-To: <495AB93E.16611.16130531@cclist.sydex.com>
References: ,
	<495A9E45.27888.15A999D4@cclist.sydex.com>,
	 
	<495AB93E.16611.16130531@cclist.sydex.com>
Message-ID: 




----------------------------------------
> From: cclist at sydex.com
>
> On 30 Dec 2008 at 22:41, dwight elvey wrote:
>
>> To my knowledge, it is pure gold. It is difficult to plate
>> alloys.
>
> Not really that hard, depending on the alloy. For instance, I can
> plate brass in my own shop--it's not difficult; just an acid bath
> process. (Tin-lead) Solder has been electroplated onto PCBs for
> decades.
>
> Some people have pointed to their college chemistry texts and told me
> definitively that it was impossible to electrodeposit an alloy. I
> don't know where that one got started.
>
> I'll agree that cooking up a plating bath can be a black art. Stuff
> you'd never think would affect the outcome such as sugar sometimes
> winds up in them and I know a retired fellow who ran a plating shop
> who swore that he got better results than anyone else because he
> urinated in his tanks.
>
> From: http://www.pfonline.com/articles/pfd0022.html
>
> Hard, Bright Gold
>
> Platers who gold plate contacts and connectors generally use bright
> acid gold formulations. These baths contain complexed cobalt or
> nickel in small quantities, to improve hardness and brightness of the
> deposit. Such gold electroplates will be 99.7 to 99.9 pct pure, and
> hardness can be 120 to 300 Knoop. The small amount of nickel or
> cobalt will interfere with die bonding, so these baths cannot be used
> for semiconductor plating. Hard, bright gold baths, if operated with
> good housekeeping and chemical control, have very long life-often
> three years and more.
>
> Cheers,
> Chuck

Hi Chuck
 I only meant that is wasn't 18K gold and not that is was impossible.
speed is important, as mentioned in the article you point to.
It is harden some but it is still quite close to 24K.
Dwight
 
_________________________________________________________________
Suspicious message? There?s an alert for that. 
http://windowslive.com/Explore/hotmail?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_hotmail_acq_broad2_122008


From dgahling at hotmail.com  Wed Dec 31 09:12:19 2008
From: dgahling at hotmail.com (Dan Gahlinger)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 10:12:19 -0500
Subject: Why it is sometimes necessary to re-seat a board or chip
In-Reply-To: 
References: ,
	<495A9E45.27888.15A999D4@cclist.sydex.com>,
	 
	<495AB93E.16611.16130531@cclist.sydex.com> 
	
Message-ID: 


I always thought this was because of "chip-creep"
over time chips (ICs) will work their way out of sockets...

> From: dkelvey at hotmail.com
> To: cctalk at classiccmp.org
> Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 07:01:10 -0800
> Subject: RE: Why it is sometimes necessary to re-seat a board or chip
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ----------------------------------------
> > From: cclist at sydex.com
> >
> > On 30 Dec 2008 at 22:41, dwight elvey wrote:
> >
> >> To my knowledge, it is pure gold. It is difficult to plate
> >> alloys.
> >
> > Not really that hard, depending on the alloy. For instance, I can
> > plate brass in my own shop--it's not difficult; just an acid bath
> > process. (Tin-lead) Solder has been electroplated onto PCBs for
> > decades.
> >
> > Some people have pointed to their college chemistry texts and told me
> > definitively that it was impossible to electrodeposit an alloy. I
> > don't know where that one got started.
> >
> > I'll agree that cooking up a plating bath can be a black art. Stuff
> > you'd never think would affect the outcome such as sugar sometimes
> > winds up in them and I know a retired fellow who ran a plating shop
> > who swore that he got better results than anyone else because he
> > urinated in his tanks.
> >
> > From: http://www.pfonline.com/articles/pfd0022.html
> >
> > Hard, Bright Gold
> >
> > Platers who gold plate contacts and connectors generally use bright
> > acid gold formulations. These baths contain complexed cobalt or
> > nickel in small quantities, to improve hardness and brightness of the
> > deposit. Such gold electroplates will be 99.7 to 99.9 pct pure, and
> > hardness can be 120 to 300 Knoop. The small amount of nickel or
> > cobalt will interfere with die bonding, so these baths cannot be used
> > for semiconductor plating. Hard, bright gold baths, if operated with
> > good housekeeping and chemical control, have very long life-often
> > three years and more.
> >
> > Cheers,
> > Chuck
> 
> Hi Chuck
>  I only meant that is wasn't 18K gold and not that is was impossible.
> speed is important, as mentioned in the article you point to.
> It is harden some but it is still quite close to 24K.
> Dwight
>  
> _________________________________________________________________
> Suspicious message? There?s an alert for that. 
> http://windowslive.com/Explore/hotmail?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_hotmail_acq_broad2_122008

_________________________________________________________________



From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Wed Dec 31 09:32:23 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 13:32:23 -0200
Subject: What kind of IC is this
References: 
	<495AA0E9.1000507@gmail.com><012f01c96b46$def46090$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
	<495B82AC.9010207@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <029c01c96b5d$08488230$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

> So do EPROM/PAL programmers exist that are also capable of programming 
> (and
> reading) a variety of microcontroller on-board ROMs? They quite possibly 
> do,
> although I've never seen one (but I haven't gone shopping for a programmer 
> in
> years)
> Thankfully I thought I had something with an 8051 in, but it turns out to 
> be
> an 8031, which makes life a bit easier ;)

    Jules, an internal ROM microcontroller is just like an internal EPROM 
microcontroller. It can be read as an EPROM one. Just needs to have the 
protection bit disabled :o)



From dkelvey at hotmail.com  Wed Dec 31 09:50:57 2008
From: dkelvey at hotmail.com (dwight elvey)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 07:50:57 -0800
Subject: Why it is sometimes necessary to re-seat a board or chip
In-Reply-To: 
References: ,
	<495A9E45.27888.15A999D4@cclist.sydex.com>,
	 
	<495AB93E.16611.16130531@cclist.sydex.com> 
	 
	
Message-ID: 




----------------------------------------
> From: dgahling at hotmail.com
>
>
> I always thought this was because of "chip-creep"
> over time chips (ICs) will work their way out of sockets...
>

Hi
 It is interesting that you mentioned this. This was
a real problem at one time, created by automatic
chip insetion.
 When one puts a chip into a socket with tention spreading
the legs, it will tend to pop out of the socket.
Why it does this I'm not sure because you'd think that
with the lead spread out they'd tend to pull the chip
into the socket.
 The solution for this is to straighten the leads so
that they go straight into the socket without side
tention.
 Those nice little insertion tools that keep some
tention on the leads should only be used for soldered
in parts and if used for sockets, one should straighten
the leads first. It doesn't hold nicely in the tool
but part won't work out of the socket over time.
Dwight
 
_________________________________________________________________
It?s the same Hotmail?. If by ?same? you mean up to 70% faster.
http://windowslive.com/online/hotmail?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_hotmail_acq_broad1_122008


From mcguire at neurotica.com  Wed Dec 31 09:57:11 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 10:57:11 -0500
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <495B8145.7070306@gmail.com>
References: 
	<495AA0E9.1000507@gmail.com>	<20081230235247.58b033ba.lehmann@ans-netz.de>	<495A38A3.4679.141CAAB7@cclist.sydex.com>
	<20081231111017.d8fbf69a.lehmann@ans-netz.de>
	<495B8145.7070306@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <482B08E6-CE6C-43BF-91AD-79DDB81736A1@neurotica.com>

On Dec 31, 2008, at 9:27 AM, Jules Richardson wrote:
>> Ok, i don't know much CPUs with onboard ROMs, but I think it  
>> should work
>> with Zilogs Z8 with on-chip ROM - or am I wrong at all?
>
> That reminds me - I keep meaning to look up details on the Z8. I  
> was told once that it was just a Z80 with on-board ROM, but that  
> never explained why I had one in the junk box marked "Z8 ROMless"...

   "The Z8 is an embedded version of the Z80" is a very common  
mistake, one I've even seen in print in magazines.  Nothing could be  
further from the truth...it is a completely different architecture  
that doesn't even bear a passing resemblance to the Z80.

   It's a pretty neat register-file-based architecture, kinda fun to  
program.  They've been around for a long while, and are still current  
products.  The current Z8 implementations are available in low-pin- 
count packages and are pretty fast.  What's lacking is free  
development tool support, which is sad, and very unusual for today's  
embedded world.

   Zilog did a nice BASIC, which they shipped in a mask-ROM version  
(Z8671) which Steve Ciarcia had a ball with in several of his BYTE  
Magazine articles.  There's also a Forth implementation which I've  
messed with, after having typed in the entirety of a faded printout  
of a hex dump in order to get into digital form...that was tedious.

   Your "Z8 ROMLESS" chip is just that; a Z8 microcontroller that is  
designed for use with an external ROM.  Still others (Z8603, Z8613)  
are available which have a 24-pin EPROM socket permanently mounted  
atop the ceramic 40-pin DIP, with the die well pushed off to one side  
to make room for it.  It's neat.  I've got quite a few of those;  
they're what I use to mess about with the Z8671-shipped BASIC, and  
the Forth system I mentioned above.

   Here's a pic of a quickie board I threw together to exercise both  
the BASIC and Forth implementations, using one of those "EPROM socket  
on top" chips:

   http://www.neurotica.com/misc/Z8-board.jpg

              -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From mcguire at neurotica.com  Wed Dec 31 09:59:30 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 10:59:30 -0500
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <495B82AC.9010207@gmail.com>
References:  <495AA0E9.1000507@gmail.com>
	<012f01c96b46$def46090$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
	<495B82AC.9010207@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <04A946E6-106E-4918-AC06-8CA1442B3AED@neurotica.com>

On Dec 31, 2008, at 9:33 AM, Jules Richardson wrote:
>>> What do people do regarding microcontrollers (old or new) with  
>>> embedded ROM? I
>>> mean an EPROM or PROM's just address lines and data, so  
>>> reasonably easy to
>>> dump - but presumably life's a bit more difficult when the ROM is  
>>> local to the
>>> CPU...
>>    If the protection is not set, you can read just like a EPROM  
>> microcontroller. If it is set...well, there are ways, but it is  
>> something hard to do :)
>
> So do EPROM/PAL programmers exist that are also capable of  
> programming (and reading) a variety of microcontroller on-board  
> ROMs? They quite possibly do, although I've never seen one (but I  
> haven't gone shopping for a programmer in years)

   My Data I/O UniSite (purchased from a listmember) has dealt with  
every bizarre chip I've thrown at it.  The supported device list for  
the current release of its software contains more than TWENTY  
THOUSAND entries.  I can't recommend them highly enough.

   No 1702[A] support, though, sadly, but I have another programmer  
for those. :)

             -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From mcguire at neurotica.com  Wed Dec 31 10:09:43 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 11:09:43 -0500
Subject: Ebay: "new" 029 Keypunch
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
	
	
Message-ID: <8C532031-1CF0-4ACC-A676-12D9917F140E@neurotica.com>

On Dec 30, 2008, at 7:41 PM, William Donzelli wrote:
>>  Still, considering that someone snatched that one up with a buy- 
>> it-now
>>  option instead of waiting out the auction tells me that they aren't
>>  common on ebay either.
>
> Lots of people, including some of the mainframe collectors (big guns),
> still think that the 029s and 129s are really rare. I suspect they are
> not looking past their screens. For those of us that are actually
> doing the legwork, the things just come around.

   I'd sure like to know what planet you're on in which 029's "just  
come around".  Perhaps you'd be willing to share the wealth a bit? ;)

   The closest thing to "vintage hardware" I've seen in this part of  
the country is a middle-aged AS/400 and an Osborne 1...The only truly  
interesting thing I've found here was the System/36 (5360) I picked  
up last summer.

             -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com  Wed Dec 31 10:09:38 2008
From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 10:09:38 -0600
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <482B08E6-CE6C-43BF-91AD-79DDB81736A1@neurotica.com>
References: 	<495AA0E9.1000507@gmail.com>	<20081230235247.58b033ba.lehmann@ans-netz.de>	<495A38A3.4679.141CAAB7@cclist.sydex.com>	<20081231111017.d8fbf69a.lehmann@ans-netz.de>	<495B8145.7070306@gmail.com>
	<482B08E6-CE6C-43BF-91AD-79DDB81736A1@neurotica.com>
Message-ID: <495B9942.4030205@gmail.com>

Dave McGuire wrote:
>   Your "Z8 ROMLESS" chip is just that; a Z8 microcontroller
 > [snip]

Dave, thanks for all that! Saves me going to look... :-)

I have no idea where I got mine from; a lot of my junk micro parts were 
scavenged from an old phone exchange, which was an interesting beast - lots of 
Z80 support chips, but a totally different CPU*. It's possible that the Z8 
might have come from there too.

* I don't recall if they were 6809's or 6509's now, and aforementioned junk 
box is in storage...

>   http://www.neurotica.com/misc/Z8-board.jpg

Ha, that's pretty awesome. I've seen piggybacked ICs before as part of 
prototype systems, but I don't think I've ever come across something purposely 
designed that way!

cheers

Jules



From mcguire at neurotica.com  Wed Dec 31 10:10:38 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 11:10:38 -0500
Subject: Any interest in a build-it-yourself votrax synthesizer kit?
In-Reply-To: <495AC867.4090809@drexel.edu>
References: <495AC867.4090809@drexel.edu>
Message-ID: <2B52B90F-240B-429A-AD5C-38467B4FAAC9@neurotica.com>

On Dec 30, 2008, at 8:18 PM, Jonathan Gevaryahu wrote:
> If offered for $300 would anyone be interested in a kit to build a  
> discrete resistor/capacitor/analog implementation of a Votrax  
> synthesizer/vocal tract? Most of the digital parts would be done  
> using a PIC. Would be mostly SC-01 compatible with possible RS-232  
> phoneme entry and optional text to speech.
> Please respond off-list if you're interested, if enough people show  
> interest we may offer it. The price is not final.

   Interesting idea, but...I see SC-01A chips pop up every so often.   
I'd say it's more valuable as a "cool thing to do" rather than a big  
sales venture.

            -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Wed Dec 31 10:16:16 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 11:16:16 -0500
Subject: Memory/cache on the 11/70
In-Reply-To: <495A0906.6050206@softjar.se>
References: <495A0906.6050206@softjar.se>
Message-ID: 

On Tue, Dec 30, 2008 at 6:41 AM, Johnny Billquist  wrote:
> Since there have been a few discussions about the memory/cache of the 11/70
> now, I think I might make a few comments as well.
>
> When we talk about the MK11 memory, you need to remember that it's a
> separate memory box, and is not at all transparent to the 11/70.
.
.
.
> However, the 11/70 cache and memory controller presents quite a lot of
> overhead and slowdown. If you really would like to speed the 11/70 up (and
> you can, believe me), you would want to replace the cache and memory
> controller all together.

I see what you are getting at.  I didn't understand how the MK11
interacted with the CPU itself.


> Now, after reading a few comments here, I've finally understood the
> relationship between the SETASI PEP-70 and HC-70.
> The PEP-70 is 4 megs of memory. You can connect that to the 11/70 memory
> bus.
> The HC-70 replaces the cache and memory controller in the CPU. This makes
> the whole 4 Meg of memory look like cache. You hook the PEP-70 to the HC-70
> instead. Nice solution actually. I wonder if (in theory) you could hook any
> memory box to the HC-70, or if the PEP-70 can work in two modes. One as a
> device on the memory bus, and one as a cache memory for the HC-70.

Ah ha!  I've heard of the arrangement but didn't know that it was the
combination of the PEP-70 and the HC-70 that did it.

> Anyway, if someone were to design a memory system for the 11/70, the way I'd
> recommend is to go the whole way, since that's where the real gains are.

Now that I understand it better, I completely agree.

> Skip the memory bus and the original cache. The original cache is just 2 KB
> of 2-way associative memory. If you set up a 4 MB cache, the CPU can run at
> full steam the whole time, with a cycle time of about 150 nS, if I remember
> right.

Handy, since 70ns SRAM is easy to find.

> It is more complicated, though. You'll have access paths from CPU, Unibus
> and four massbus controllers to deal with. But it should definitely be
> doable (heck, SETASI have already done it once).
>
> I might be interested in such a project myself, since the 11/70s we have
> around here still are on MK11 boxes. I could deal with PCBs and design, but
> I'm very short on time, as usual... :-(
> No experience at all with FPGAs or any such fancy stuff.

If such a thing were to be designed (I could participate in the design
phase, but not drive it), I'd probably be interested in two,
especially if the blank board was only a few hundred dollars.  If it
came closer to $1000, I'd really have to think about passing on the
second one (I used to order multi-layer DEC backplane boards, and at
the time, $500 was a good price for orders between q10 and q100, but
things in the PCB market have changed radically).

I'm in no hurry - my 11/70s are in storage and I won't be able to even
pull them out to look at them in the next 90 days.

-ethan


From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com  Wed Dec 31 10:17:47 2008
From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 10:17:47 -0600
Subject: Why it is sometimes necessary to re-seat a board or chip
In-Reply-To: 
References: ,
	<495A9E45.27888.15A999D4@cclist.sydex.com>,
	
	<495AB93E.16611.16130531@cclist.sydex.com>
	
	
	
Message-ID: <495B9B2B.6050509@gmail.com>

dwight elvey wrote:
>  When one puts a chip into a socket with tention spreading
> the legs, it will tend to pop out of the socket.
> Why it does this I'm not sure because you'd think that
> with the lead spread out they'd tend to pull the chip
> into the socket.

I suppose you can ignore the outside edge of the socket, which results in an 
IC leg at an angle pressing against the inside edge:

             XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
IC leg ->  /                 \
          |/| <-- sockets --> |\|

... if the IC legs are under tension and trying to pull inwards, it generates 
a lifting effect against the inner edges of the IC socket's pins.

It wouldn't surprise me if heat doesn't make this worse, and vibration almost 
certainly will.

> in parts and if used for sockets, one should straighten
> the leads first.

I've got a nice little tool for doing that somewhere...

cheers

Jules



From mcguire at neurotica.com  Wed Dec 31 10:22:41 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 11:22:41 -0500
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <495AAB50.6080507@philpem.me.uk>
References: <20081230193428.69f05be5.lehmann@ans-netz.de>	<495A8EFD.7060208@philpem.me.uk>
	<20081230223036.d5a23737.lehmann@ans-netz.de>
	<495AAB50.6080507@philpem.me.uk>
Message-ID: <2C535D4C-0F9D-4FDC-BEAB-283BE688F3D7@neurotica.com>

On Dec 30, 2008, at 6:14 PM, Philip Pemberton wrote:
> With EPROMs you can (sometimes) use the Intel Quick-pulse or 10ms  
> Pulse algorithms if you don't know the manufacturer's specific  
> algorithm, but with PROMs getting the algorithm wrong can, and WILL  
> fry the chip. That said, with EPROMs it's hard to find something  
> that isn't supported by modern programmers. I've got an Elnec  
> Preprom-02aLV (only recently EOL'd and still under software  
> support) and it's handled everything I've plugged in, with the  
> obvious exception of a few dead EPROMs that have probably spent a  
> little too long in the UV box...
>
> That said, Widlarization is a great way to deal with parts like  
> that. :)

   YAY!!  Someone else knows of Widlarization!  I sure wish I  
could've met him.

            -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com  Wed Dec 31 10:29:23 2008
From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 10:29:23 -0600
Subject: Ebay: "new" 029 Keypunch
In-Reply-To: <8C532031-1CF0-4ACC-A676-12D9917F140E@neurotica.com>
References: 		
	<8C532031-1CF0-4ACC-A676-12D9917F140E@neurotica.com>
Message-ID: <495B9DE3.30300@gmail.com>

Dave McGuire wrote:
> On Dec 30, 2008, at 7:41 PM, William Donzelli wrote:
>>>  Still, considering that someone snatched that one up with a buy-it-now
>>>  option instead of waiting out the auction tells me that they aren't
>>>  common on ebay either.
>>
>> Lots of people, including some of the mainframe collectors (big guns),
>> still think that the 029s and 129s are really rare. I suspect they are
>> not looking past their screens. For those of us that are actually
>> doing the legwork, the things just come around.
> 
>   I'd sure like to know what planet you're on in which 029's "just come 
> around".  Perhaps you'd be willing to share the wealth a bit? ;)
> 
>   The closest thing to "vintage hardware" I've seen in this part of the 
> country is a middle-aged AS/400 and an Osborne 1...The only truly 
> interesting thing I've found here was the System/36 (5360) I picked up 
> last summer.

Vintage availability always varies by area - I've seen precisely nothing up 
here, although doubtless a few odds and ends exist down in Minneapolis (but 
that's still a 10 hour round-trip for me, so I can't easily find things and 
just hop in a vehicle to go get them).

However, experience in the past has been that there's two routes to vintage 
collecting:

    1) Ebay
    2) Not Ebay

:-) The second route seems to find more obscure stuff (as well as 'common' 
items) and typically for free or beer money - but it's a lot of work to get 
yourself established as a collector of ${foo} and then to actively seek out 
items. The old time vs. money equation, I guess.

cheers

Jules




From Paul_Koning at Dell.com  Wed Dec 31 10:33:35 2008
From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 11:33:35 -0500
Subject: RSTS/E question and media.
In-Reply-To: <20081231113314.GA14823@plum.flirble.org>
References: <20081231113314.GA14823@plum.flirble.org>
Message-ID: 

I had to check some history for this... the Wikipedia article on RSTS/E
is helpful.

What would you use for a DECnet interface?  V7.0 is DECnet Phase II.
Phase III was added in V7.1, but that's still iffy with HECnet, and
you'd need a sync DDCMP interface (for a Q-bus system like that it would
be a DMV11).  More to the point, it looks like the Micro-PDP11 support
appeared in V8.0, and I suspect there may be some other small details
specific to the 11/53 that are later still.

For Ethernet (DECnet Phase IV) you'd need V9.3 or later.  I don't know
about availability of late releases like that...

	paul

> -----Original Message-----
> From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk-
> bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Andrew Back
> Sent: Wednesday, December 31, 2008 6:33 AM
> To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts
> Subject: RSTS/E question and media.
> 
> So I finally got the Micro PDP11/53 hooked-up to a terminal. When back
> at the folks at over Christmas I found an old MMJ cable and DB25F
> adapter, which work when the latter is plugged into the VT. I need to
> try the MMJ cable I bought recently with this adapter, but suspect it
> is something about using an MMJ direct between the PDP and VT. ISTR
> having this problem before trying to direct cable a MicroVAX to a VT's
> MMJ port.
> 
> In any case, I'd like to join this machine into Hecnet, hope to run
> RSTS/E and have a couple of questions:
> 
> - Looks like only v7 of RSTS/E is available, would this suffice?
> - Would anyone be willing to help me out with media (happy to cover
> cost for media and postage, of course)?
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Andrew
> 
> --
> Andrew Back
> a at smokebelch.org



From andrew at smokebelch.org  Wed Dec 31 10:51:28 2008
From: andrew at smokebelch.org (Andrew Back)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 16:51:28 +0000
Subject: RSTS/E question and media.
In-Reply-To: 
References: <20081231113314.GA14823@plum.flirble.org>
	
Message-ID: <20081231165128.GC2303@plum.flirble.org>

On (11:33 31/12/08), Paul Koning wrote:
> I had to check some history for this... the Wikipedia article on RSTS/E
> is helpful.
> 
> What would you use for a DECnet interface?  V7.0 is DECnet Phase II.
> Phase III was added in V7.1, but that's still iffy with HECnet, and
> you'd need a sync DDCMP interface (for a Q-bus system like that it would
> be a DMV11).  More to the point, it looks like the Micro-PDP11 support
> appeared in V8.0, and I suspect there may be some other small details
> specific to the 11/53 that are later still.

Right, so I'd need to plumb the 11/53 into say an Alpha via a serial
connection. Sync... so I'd need to get a PCI sync card too, for the latter.
 Ugh.

> For Ethernet (DECnet Phase IV) you'd need V9.3 or later.  I don't know
> about availability of late releases like that...

Right...

Thanks for the info!

Andrew

-- 
Andrew Back
a at smokebelch.org


From technobug at comcast.net  Wed Dec 31 10:57:47 2008
From: technobug at comcast.net (CRC)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 09:57:47 -0700
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <200812311620.mBVGKEH6099601@dewey.classiccmp.org>
References: <200812311620.mBVGKEH6099601@dewey.classiccmp.org>
Message-ID: <1CF9C8E7-2BC0-42BB-9BBA-529ED26DEDA7@comcast.net>


On 1 Dec 2008 10:54:43 -0200, Alexandre Souza wrote:

>    Of course, you can always use a 2716 or like EPROM on the place  
> of PROMs
> :o)

Actually not... A fast 2716 has an access time of 200 nsec whereas TTL  
PROMs have sub 100 nsec access times (e.g. 82S115 = 60nsec max). At  
the time, TTL PROMs were used where access speed was necessary. To  
replace them with an EPROM or EEPROM you have to go to something much  
more current.

	CRC



From pat at computer-refuge.org  Wed Dec 31 11:01:33 2008
From: pat at computer-refuge.org (Patrick Finnegan)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 12:01:33 -0500
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <495B9942.4030205@gmail.com>
References: 
	<482B08E6-CE6C-43BF-91AD-79DDB81736A1@neurotica.com>
	<495B9942.4030205@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <200812311201.33920.pat@computer-refuge.org>

On Wednesday 31 December 2008, Jules Richardson wrote:
> I have no idea where I got mine from; a lot of my junk micro parts
> were scavenged from an old phone exchange, which was an interesting
> beast - lots of Z80 support chips, but a totally different CPU*. It's
> possible that the Z8 might have come from there too.

It's possible that it's also a Z8000 (the 8002 MMU-less version 
probably); I picked up a pile of telephone switch stuff that was full 
of Z8002's.

Pat
-- 
Purdue University Research Computing ---  http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/
The Computer Refuge                  ---  http://computer-refuge.org


From martinm at allwest.net  Wed Dec 31 11:14:56 2008
From: martinm at allwest.net (Martin Marshall)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 10:14:56 -0700
Subject: Free for Shipping:  SyQuest EZFlyer, EZDrive
Message-ID: 

The items are claimed.

Thank you,
Martin Marshall

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Martin Marshall [mailto:martinm at allwest.net] 
> Sent: Tuesday, December 30, 2008 9:56 PM
> To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts; The Rescue List
> Subject: Free for Shipping: SyQuest EZFlyer, EZDrive
> 
> 
> More from the cleanup:
> 
> One = SyQuest EZFlyer 230 MB Drive - Parallel Port - Original 
> box - complete
> 
> One = SyQuest EZDrive 135 MB Drive - SCSI External - Shrink-wrapped 
> 
> Free for shipping from 82930.  Reply off-list to "martinm" at 
> the domain "allwest.net".
> 
> Thank you,
> Martin Marshall
> 



From ploopster at gmail.com  Wed Dec 31 11:29:17 2008
From: ploopster at gmail.com (Sridhar Ayengar)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 12:29:17 -0500
Subject: Ebay: "new" 029 Keypunch
In-Reply-To: <8C532031-1CF0-4ACC-A676-12D9917F140E@neurotica.com>
References: 		
	<8C532031-1CF0-4ACC-A676-12D9917F140E@neurotica.com>
Message-ID: <495BABED.6090100@gmail.com>

Dave McGuire wrote:
> On Dec 30, 2008, at 7:41 PM, William Donzelli wrote:
>>>  Still, considering that someone snatched that one up with a buy-it-now
>>>  option instead of waiting out the auction tells me that they aren't
>>>  common on ebay either.
>>
>> Lots of people, including some of the mainframe collectors (big guns),
>> still think that the 029s and 129s are really rare. I suspect they are
>> not looking past their screens. For those of us that are actually
>> doing the legwork, the things just come around.
> 
>   I'd sure like to know what planet you're on in which 029's "just come 
> around".  Perhaps you'd be willing to share the wealth a bit? ;)

He's not that far from Poughkeepsie.

Peace...  Sridhar


From Paul_Koning at Dell.com  Wed Dec 31 11:38:33 2008
From: Paul_Koning at Dell.com (Paul Koning)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 12:38:33 -0500
Subject: RSTS/E question and media.
In-Reply-To: <20081231165128.GC2303@plum.flirble.org>
References: <20081231113314.GA14823@plum.flirble.org>
	<20081231165128.GC2303@plum.flirble.org>
Message-ID: 

> > ...you'd need a sync DDCMP interface (for a Q-bus system like that
it
> would
> > be a DMV11).  More to the point, it looks like the Micro-PDP11
> support
> > appeared in V8.0, and I suspect there may be some other small
details
> > specific to the 11/53 that are later still.
> 
> Right, so I'd need to plumb the 11/53 into say an Alpha via a serial
> connection. Sync... so I'd need to get a PCI sync card too, for the
> latter.

Or later yet (V10.x?) there's async DDCMP, I'm not sure how clearly
accessible but I'm pretty sure it's in there.

	paul



From jfoust at threedee.com  Wed Dec 31 11:54:53 2008
From: jfoust at threedee.com (John Foust)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 11:54:53 -0600
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <2C535D4C-0F9D-4FDC-BEAB-283BE688F3D7@neurotica.com>
References: <20081230193428.69f05be5.lehmann@ans-netz.de>
	<495A8EFD.7060208@philpem.me.uk>
	<20081230223036.d5a23737.lehmann@ans-netz.de>
	<495AAB50.6080507@philpem.me.uk>
	<2C535D4C-0F9D-4FDC-BEAB-283BE688F3D7@neurotica.com>
Message-ID: <6.2.3.4.2.20081231115327.074af3a0@mail.threedee.com>

At 10:22 AM 12/31/2008, Dave McGuire wrote:
>On Dec 30, 2008, at 6:14 PM, Philip Pemberton wrote:
>>That said, Widlarization is a great way to deal with parts like  
>>that. :)
>
>  YAY!!  Someone else knows of Widlarization!  I sure wish I  
>could've met him.

http://www.national.com/rap/Story/widlar.html

"We still have a sign around our lab, "This is not a black-smith shop." But 
there were times when Bob would discover he had wasted a day or two, just 
because one bad part had screwed up his circuit. He would bring this bad 
part -- a capacitor, a pot, a transistor, an IC, or whatever -- over to 
the vise and lay it on the anvil part. Then he would calmly, methodically 
beat it with a hammer until the smallest remaining part was indistinguishable 
from the dust on the floor. Then he would go back to work and get the right 
answer. He explained that it makes you feel much better if you do this, and, 
you know that bad part will never come around again and goof you up. He was 
right. And I recommend that you join me in doing this "Widlarizing" when a 
bad component fools you. You will feel a lot better."

- John






From ggs at shiresoft.com  Wed Dec 31 12:14:47 2008
From: ggs at shiresoft.com (Guy Sotomayor)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 10:14:47 -0800
Subject: Memory/cache on the 11/70
In-Reply-To: 
References: <495A0906.6050206@softjar.se>
	
Message-ID: <6754BC9A-7276-4C39-ABFB-25CA08CB3E53@shiresoft.com>


On Dec 31, 2008, at 8:16 AM, Ethan Dicks wrote:
>
>> Skip the memory bus and the original cache. The original cache is  
>> just 2 KB
>> of 2-way associative memory. If you set up a 4 MB cache, the CPU  
>> can run at
>> full steam the whole time, with a cycle time of about 150 nS, if I  
>> remember
>> right.
>
> Handy, since 70ns SRAM is easy to find.
>
>> It is more complicated, though. You'll have access paths from CPU,  
>> Unibus
>> and four massbus controllers to deal with. But it should definitely  
>> be
>> doable (heck, SETASI have already done it once).
>>
>> I might be interested in such a project myself, since the 11/70s we  
>> have
>> around here still are on MK11 boxes. I could deal with PCBs and  
>> design, but
>> I'm very short on time, as usual... :-(
>> No experience at all with FPGAs or any such fancy stuff.
>
> If such a thing were to be designed (I could participate in the design
> phase, but not drive it), I'd probably be interested in two,
> especially if the blank board was only a few hundred dollars.  If it
> came closer to $1000, I'd really have to think about passing on the
> second one (I used to order multi-layer DEC backplane boards, and at
> the time, $500 was a good price for orders between q10 and q100, but
> things in the PCB market have changed radically).
>
> I'm in no hurry - my 11/70s are in storage and I won't be able to even
> pull them out to look at them in the next 90 days.

The problem with replacing the cache is that it is composed of 4 hex  
boards (M8142, M8143, M8144 and M8145).  I haven't looked at the  
backplane signals, but I'm dubious that it could be done with less.   
The advantage of just replacing the MK11 boxes, is that it could be  
done with just one board.  Depending upon signaling and such (and with  
sufficient integration - ie FPGAs and SMTs) it *might* even fit on a  
quad board vs hex.

As far as pricing goes, a 4 layer board (you *really* want at least 4  
layers here) + components + assembly & test should be < $1000.  How  
much less I don't know.  The target for my unibus memory board is ~ 
$500 (fully assembled & tested + some profit).  Given that this  
wouldn't need unibus transceivers (hideously expensive when you can  
find them) I would expect this to be in the same ball park especially  
if it can be contained on a quad board.

The other issue with not replacing the cache, is that the verilog to  
implement this would *much* simpler (ie it can probably be completed  
faster).

TTFN - Guy



From mcguire at neurotica.com  Wed Dec 31 12:23:56 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 13:23:56 -0500
Subject: Ebay: "new" 029 Keypunch
In-Reply-To: <495BABED.6090100@gmail.com>
References: 		
	<8C532031-1CF0-4ACC-A676-12D9917F140E@neurotica.com>
	<495BABED.6090100@gmail.com>
Message-ID: 

On Dec 31, 2008, at 12:29 PM, Sridhar Ayengar wrote:
>>>>  Still, considering that someone snatched that one up with a buy- 
>>>> it-now
>>>>  option instead of waiting out the auction tells me that they  
>>>> aren't
>>>>  common on ebay either.
>>>
>>> Lots of people, including some of the mainframe collectors (big  
>>> guns),
>>> still think that the 029s and 129s are really rare. I suspect  
>>> they are
>>> not looking past their screens. For those of us that are actually
>>> doing the legwork, the things just come around.
>>   I'd sure like to know what planet you're on in which 029's "just  
>> come around".  Perhaps you'd be willing to share the wealth a bit? ;)
>
> He's not that far from Poughkeepsie.

   That figures. ;)

         -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca  Wed Dec 31 12:26:10 2008
From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 11:26:10 -0700
Subject: Memory/cache on the 11/70
In-Reply-To: <6754BC9A-7276-4C39-ABFB-25CA08CB3E53@shiresoft.com>
References: <495A0906.6050206@softjar.se>	
	<6754BC9A-7276-4C39-ABFB-25CA08CB3E53@shiresoft.com>
Message-ID: <495BB942.9030409@jetnet.ab.ca>

Guy Sotomayor wrote:

> As far as pricing goes, a 4 layer board (you *really* want at least 4 
> layers here) + components + assembly & test should be < $1000.  How much 
> less I don't know.  The target for my unibus memory board is ~$500 
> (fully assembled & tested + some profit).  Given that this wouldn't need 
> unibus transceivers (hideously expensive when you can find them) I would 
> expect this to be in the same ball park especially if it can be 
> contained on a quad board.

> The other issue with not replacing the cache, is that the verilog to 
> implement this would *much* simpler (ie it can probably be completed 
> faster).

TTL ... and a few gals... I trust hardware more than software is my view point.
Real cache memory   32k*8 is about 15ns access time in a skinny 28 pin package.
I am just not sure how much memory you can get on a card however ... Sigh.

> TTFN - Guy
> 
> 



From mcguire at neurotica.com  Wed Dec 31 12:31:44 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 13:31:44 -0500
Subject: Memory/cache on the 11/70
In-Reply-To: <495BB942.9030409@jetnet.ab.ca>
References: <495A0906.6050206@softjar.se>	
	<6754BC9A-7276-4C39-ABFB-25CA08CB3E53@shiresoft.com>
	<495BB942.9030409@jetnet.ab.ca>
Message-ID: 

On Dec 31, 2008, at 1:26 PM, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote:
>> As far as pricing goes, a 4 layer board (you *really* want at  
>> least 4 layers here) + components + assembly & test should be <  
>> $1000.  How much less I don't know.  The target for my unibus  
>> memory board is ~$500 (fully assembled & tested + some profit).   
>> Given that this wouldn't need unibus transceivers (hideously  
>> expensive when you can find them) I would expect this to be in the  
>> same ball park especially if it can be contained on a quad board.
>
>> The other issue with not replacing the cache, is that the verilog  
>> to implement this would *much* simpler (ie it can probably be  
>> completed faster).
>
> TTL ... and a few gals... I trust hardware more than software is my  
> view point.
> Real cache memory   32k*8 is about 15ns access time in a skinny 28  
> pin package.
> I am just not sure how much memory you can get on a card  
> however ... Sigh.

   Just don't use "PC motherboard SRAMs" as someone suggested  
earlier.  They're nowhere near as easy to find as some people think  
they are, at least for some of us...I trashed all of my 486 boards a  
decade ago.  Standard, currently-available SRAMs are cheap and easy  
to work with, and are just as fast.  I have a few 512KB SRAMs in  
SOJ-36 packages sitting on the bench right now; I think they were  
about $7/ea in small quantities from a distributor.

            -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From ggs at shiresoft.com  Wed Dec 31 12:34:46 2008
From: ggs at shiresoft.com (Guy Sotomayor)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 10:34:46 -0800
Subject: Memory/cache on the 11/70
In-Reply-To: <495BB942.9030409@jetnet.ab.ca>
References: <495A0906.6050206@softjar.se>	
	<6754BC9A-7276-4C39-ABFB-25CA08CB3E53@shiresoft.com>
	<495BB942.9030409@jetnet.ab.ca>
Message-ID: <2095F124-2CBE-4EAF-A2CE-9D2AB42EBD5A@shiresoft.com>


On Dec 31, 2008, at 10:26 AM, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote:

> Guy Sotomayor wrote:
>
>> As far as pricing goes, a 4 layer board (you *really* want at least  
>> 4 layers here) + components + assembly & test should be < $1000.   
>> How much less I don't know.  The target for my unibus memory board  
>> is ~$500 (fully assembled & tested + some profit).  Given that this  
>> wouldn't need unibus transceivers (hideously expensive when you can  
>> find them) I would expect this to be in the same ball park  
>> especially if it can be contained on a quad board.
>
>> The other issue with not replacing the cache, is that the verilog  
>> to implement this would *much* simpler (ie it can probably be  
>> completed faster).
>
> TTL ... and a few gals... I trust hardware more than software is my  
> view point.
> Real cache memory   32k*8 is about 15ns access time in a skinny 28  
> pin package.
> I am just not sure how much memory you can get on a card however ...  
> Sigh.

I'd be looking at using 133MHz SSRAMs which are available in at least  
512K x 36 (QFP - SMT).  So you'd need 2 parts.

TTFN - Guy



From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca  Wed Dec 31 12:43:34 2008
From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 11:43:34 -0700
Subject: Memory/cache on the 11/70
In-Reply-To: <2095F124-2CBE-4EAF-A2CE-9D2AB42EBD5A@shiresoft.com>
References: <495A0906.6050206@softjar.se>		<6754BC9A-7276-4C39-ABFB-25CA08CB3E53@shiresoft.com>	<495BB942.9030409@jetnet.ab.ca>
	<2095F124-2CBE-4EAF-A2CE-9D2AB42EBD5A@shiresoft.com>
Message-ID: <495BBD56.5040608@jetnet.ab.ca>

Guy Sotomayor wrote:

> I'd be looking at using 133MHz SSRAMs which are available in at least 
> 512K x 36 (QFP - SMT).  So you'd need 2 parts.

I am a Thru The Hole guy myself ...

> TTFN - Guy
> 
> 



From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com  Wed Dec 31 12:51:22 2008
From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 12:51:22 -0600
Subject: Memory/cache on the 11/70
In-Reply-To: 
References: <495A0906.6050206@softjar.se>		<6754BC9A-7276-4C39-ABFB-25CA08CB3E53@shiresoft.com>	<495BB942.9030409@jetnet.ab.ca>
	
Message-ID: <495BBF2A.8070401@gmail.com>

Dave McGuire wrote:
>   Just don't use "PC motherboard SRAMs" as someone suggested earlier.  
> They're nowhere near as easy to find as some people think they are, at 
> least for some of us...I trashed all of my 486 boards a decade ago.  

Heh, I mostly did so too - but kept the NVRAM batteries, keyboard sockets and 
SRAM for a rainy day...



From wdonzelli at gmail.com  Wed Dec 31 13:02:00 2008
From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 14:02:00 -0500
Subject: Ebay: "new" 029 Keypunch
In-Reply-To: <8C532031-1CF0-4ACC-A676-12D9917F140E@neurotica.com>
References: 
	
	
	<8C532031-1CF0-4ACC-A676-12D9917F140E@neurotica.com>
Message-ID: 

>   I'd sure like to know what planet you're on in which 029's "just come
> around".  Perhaps you'd be willing to share the wealth a bit? ;)

And reveal my secrets?

>   The closest thing to "vintage hardware" I've seen in this part of the
> country is a middle-aged AS/400 and an Osborne 1...The only truly
> interesting thing I've found here was the System/36 (5360) I picked up last
> summer.

A fair number of interesting things show up in the Atlanta area. Is
that too far for you?

--
Will


From wdonzelli at gmail.com  Wed Dec 31 13:02:52 2008
From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 14:02:52 -0500
Subject: Ebay: "new" 029 Keypunch
In-Reply-To: <495BABED.6090100@gmail.com>
References: 
	
	
	<8C532031-1CF0-4ACC-A676-12D9917F140E@neurotica.com>
	<495BABED.6090100@gmail.com>
Message-ID: 

>  He's not that far from Poughkeepsie.

But more than a few of the keypunches I refer to are not in IBMland.

--
Will


From ggs at shiresoft.com  Wed Dec 31 13:03:46 2008
From: ggs at shiresoft.com (Guy Sotomayor)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 11:03:46 -0800
Subject: Memory/cache on the 11/70
In-Reply-To: <495BBD56.5040608@jetnet.ab.ca>
References: <495A0906.6050206@softjar.se>		<6754BC9A-7276-4C39-ABFB-25CA08CB3E53@shiresoft.com>	<495BB942.9030409@jetnet.ab.ca>
	<2095F124-2CBE-4EAF-A2CE-9D2AB42EBD5A@shiresoft.com>
	<495BBD56.5040608@jetnet.ab.ca>
Message-ID: 


On Dec 31, 2008, at 10:43 AM, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote:

> Guy Sotomayor wrote:
>
>> I'd be looking at using 133MHz SSRAMs which are available in at  
>> least 512K x 36 (QFP - SMT).  So you'd need 2 parts.
>
> I am a Thru The Hole guy myself ...

The problem is that to get the density in order to put this on one  
board (even hex) you have to do SMT.  There's no way around it.   
You're also looking at mostly 3.3v parts as well.  It took me a while  
before I went down this road, but now I'm pretty committed to this  
approach.  I've also decided that any boards that I do from here on  
out are going to be a minimum of 4 layers.  It just makes the routing  
*so* much easier by not having to figure out how to route power (or  
multiple powers) and ground.  Also being able to put some passives (ie  
bypass caps and pull-up/down resistors) on the back side of the board  
helps too.

TTFN - Guy


From wdonzelli at gmail.com  Wed Dec 31 13:09:18 2008
From: wdonzelli at gmail.com (William Donzelli)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 14:09:18 -0500
Subject: Ebay: "new" 029 Keypunch
In-Reply-To: <495B9DE3.30300@gmail.com>
References: 
	
	
	<8C532031-1CF0-4ACC-A676-12D9917F140E@neurotica.com>
	<495B9DE3.30300@gmail.com>
Message-ID: 

>  Vintage availability always varies by area - I've seen precisely nothing up
> here, although doubtless a few odds and ends exist down in Minneapolis (but
> that's still a 10 hour round-trip for me, so I can't easily find things and
> just hop in a vehicle to go get them).

Some of us, however, can do a 10 hour round trip on the drop of a hat
to go fetch something.

But, I know some of us have family or work obligations that can get in the way.

Find some middle ground - I have found that quite a few sources are
willing to hold onto some goodie for a short amount of time, as they
often realize all too well that *their* family and work obligations
often get in *their* way of having fun.

Beer, donuts, pizza or money can help!

>  :-) The second route seems to find more obscure stuff (as well as 'common'
> items) and typically for free or beer money - but it's a lot of work to get
> yourself established as a collector of ${foo} and then to actively seek out
> items. The old time vs. money equation, I guess.

Basically, yes.

--
Will


From pete at dunnington.plus.com  Wed Dec 31 13:09:28 2008
From: pete at dunnington.plus.com (Pete Turnbull)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 19:09:28 +0000
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <482B08E6-CE6C-43BF-91AD-79DDB81736A1@neurotica.com>
References: 	<495AA0E9.1000507@gmail.com>	<20081230235247.58b033ba.lehmann@ans-netz.de>	<495A38A3.4679.141CAAB7@cclist.sydex.com>	<20081231111017.d8fbf69a.lehmann@ans-netz.de>	<495B8145.7070306@gmail.com>
	<482B08E6-CE6C-43BF-91AD-79DDB81736A1@neurotica.com>
Message-ID: <495BC368.1080701@dunnington.plus.com>

On 31/12/2008 15:57, Dave McGuire wrote:

>   Zilog did a nice BASIC, which they shipped in a mask-ROM version 
> (Z8671) which Steve Ciarcia had a ball with in several of his BYTE 
> Magazine articles.  There's also a Forth implementation which I've 
> messed with, after having typed in the entirety of a faded printout of a 
> hex dump in order to get into digital form...that was tedious.

I got two of the first batch of Z8671 (BASIC in ROM) and Z8681 (ROMless) 
in the UK, and built a couple of little boards along the lines of Steve 
Ciarcia's.  As Dave says, it's not at all like a Z80.  It's a nice 
architecture, but I never did an awful lot with it once I'd built the 
boards.  I remember that my Z8681 was a very early version and it came 
with a sheet explaining that the reset didn't work as intended and how 
to implement a hardware workaround.

-- 
Pete						Peter Turnbull
						Network Manager
						University of York


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Wed Dec 31 12:49:40 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 18:49:40 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <495AA0E9.1000507@gmail.com> from "Jules Richardson" at Dec 30,
	8 04:30:01 pm
Message-ID: 

> What do people do regarding microcontrollers (old or new) with 
> embedded ROM? I 
> mean an EPROM or PROM's just address lines and data, so reasonably easy to 
> dump - but presumably life's a bit more difficult when the ROM is 
> local to the CPU...

If you're lucky, eitehr th microcontroller is old enough not to have any 
security features, or they're not used. In which case you remove the chip 
from the PCB and stick it in a suitable programmer.

If you're unlucky then either the microcontroller doesn't have any 
external access to the ROM (some mask-programmed ones are like that), or 
the secutrity bit has been set so you can't read it out. In which case, 
alas, you just pray it never fails...

-tony


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Wed Dec 31 12:52:41 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 18:52:41 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <495AAB15.7080103@e-bbes.com> from "e.stiebler" at Dec 30,
	8 04:13:25 pm
Message-ID: 

> 
> Fred Cisin wrote:
> > On Tue, 30 Dec 2008, Alexandre Souza wrote:
> >>     Tony, you just like to complain. Every microcontroller I know has a free
> >> C version that can be run on mostly anything, and most microcontrollers can
> >> be programmed even with a PDP-8 :oD
> >>
> >>     Wake up, we aren't in 1960 anymore :o)
> > 
> > THAT is worthy of a complaint.
> > The good old days are gone, but do we HAVE TO face that?
> 
> Yes.
> If we are trying to use new chips.

Hnag on a second. Last week yopu were all telling me that I could program 
just about any modern microcontroller using whatever classic computer I 
liked. Now you're telling me I have to use C (and presumably have some 
machine that can host the C compiler). Which is it? :-)

-tony


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Wed Dec 31 13:12:14 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 19:12:14 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <495AB02D.2020902@jbrain.com> from "Jim Brain" at Dec 30,
	8 05:35:09 pm
Message-ID: 

> 
> Tony Duell wrote:
> >
> > The HP drives work at a much lower level. The file system is managed by 
> > the host computer. The commands to the disk drive unit read/write bocks 
> > (essentially the same thign as sectors). It's up to the host to turn 
> > those into a file system.
> >   
> This is not as problematic as it may seem.  The uIEC can auto-update the 
> firmware, so I could simply write a special version of the SW for 
> HPIG/GPIB (even different flavors for the various command sets) and the 
> owner can simply place the flavor desired onto a flash drive, turn on 
> the unit, and it will program itself with the correct DOS.

I assume there's a limited number of writes to the microcontroller 
program memroy, though...

I don;t know how much firmware space you have, but it would be nice if at 
least Amigo and SS/80 could be fitted in together with a jumper/switch to 
select between them. I'd also suggest some kind of configuration 
switch-thingy to select the drive size -- some HP machines moan if the 
drive is not the one they're expecting...


> 
> 
> > You could probaly find an HP150 or an HP9000/200 machine fairly easily 
> > on E-bay. 
> >   
> I am hopeful someone finds enough value in the possibility to provide a 
> unit for testing.  Still, this is very premature, since I still need to 
> get the PET IEEE stuff working.

Well, I haev quite a few HPs, but (a) I am rather partial to them and (b) 
there's this little bit of water in the way [1]. On the other had, if  I 
can be of any help wen testing, let me know...

[1] HP stuff may well be solidly made, but it can still be mangled by 
shipping it. I speak, alas, from experience.
> It'll be a bit-bang approach, so save HW costs, but I can wire up some 
> TTL logic if needed.

HO did bti-bang HPIB on several devices. The 82169 (HPIL-HPIB translator) 
uses an 8049 IIRC, a custom HP buffer chip (which is nothing more than 
line drivers/receivers) and a couple of TTL chips. The 98034 (HPIB 
interface for the 98x5 machines) used HP's custom 'nanocontroller', some 
standard buffer chips (3448s?) and a little TTL. Scheamtics for the 
latter should eb on the Austalian Museum site.

-tony


From mcguire at neurotica.com  Wed Dec 31 13:14:48 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 14:14:48 -0500
Subject: Memory/cache on the 11/70
In-Reply-To: <495BBD56.5040608@jetnet.ab.ca>
References: <495A0906.6050206@softjar.se>		<6754BC9A-7276-4C39-ABFB-25CA08CB3E53@shiresoft.com>	<495BB942.9030409@jetnet.ab.ca>
	<2095F124-2CBE-4EAF-A2CE-9D2AB42EBD5A@shiresoft.com>
	<495BBD56.5040608@jetnet.ab.ca>
Message-ID: <531AE6BC-44E9-403C-9D51-8FE0937255F8@neurotica.com>

On Dec 31, 2008, at 1:43 PM, bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca wrote:
>> I'd be looking at using 133MHz SSRAMs which are available in at  
>> least 512K x 36 (QFP - SMT).  So you'd need 2 parts.
>
> I am a Thru The Hole guy myself ...

   Ahh, you like doing things the hard way. ;)

          -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From mcguire at neurotica.com  Wed Dec 31 13:17:10 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 14:17:10 -0500
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <9AC2E2BD-D2D5-4B15-A0FB-159C232DE595@neurotica.com>

On Dec 31, 2008, at 1:49 PM, Tony Duell wrote:
>> What do people do regarding microcontrollers (old or new) with
>> embedded ROM? I
>> mean an EPROM or PROM's just address lines and data, so reasonably  
>> easy to
>> dump - but presumably life's a bit more difficult when the ROM is
>> local to the CPU...
>
> If you're lucky, eitehr th microcontroller is old enough not to  
> have any
> security features, or they're not used. In which case you remove  
> the chip
> from the PCB and stick it in a suitable programmer.

   Even the original Intel 8051/8751, circa 1980, has security  
bits. :-(  There are ways to get around (at least) those, though.

           -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca  Wed Dec 31 13:37:27 2008
From: bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca (bfranchuk at jetnet.ab.ca)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 12:37:27 -0700
Subject: Memory/cache on the 11/70
In-Reply-To: <531AE6BC-44E9-403C-9D51-8FE0937255F8@neurotica.com>
References: <495A0906.6050206@softjar.se>		<6754BC9A-7276-4C39-ABFB-25CA08CB3E53@shiresoft.com>	<495BB942.9030409@jetnet.ab.ca>	<2095F124-2CBE-4EAF-A2CE-9D2AB42EBD5A@shiresoft.com>	<495BBD56.5040608@jetnet.ab.ca>
	<531AE6BC-44E9-403C-9D51-8FE0937255F8@neurotica.com>
Message-ID: <495BC9F7.5020301@jetnet.ab.ca>

Dave McGuire wrote:

>> I am a Thru The Hole guy myself ...
> 
>   Ahh, you like doing things the hard way. ;)

Tubes ... Good old direct heated tubes are the way to go ... Wait this post is 
digital
and on topic even.
Transistors man are the way to go ... Oddly they never tell you even with tubes 
you still
had Crystal Diodes used for switching with the early computers.

>          -Dave




From mcguire at neurotica.com  Wed Dec 31 13:39:00 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 14:39:00 -0500
Subject: Ebay: "new" 029 Keypunch
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
	
	
	<8C532031-1CF0-4ACC-A676-12D9917F140E@neurotica.com>
	
Message-ID: <4CC8E662-AB7D-4C14-93F3-4722BB111CA0@neurotica.com>

On Dec 31, 2008, at 2:02 PM, William Donzelli wrote:
>>   I'd sure like to know what planet you're on in which 029's "just  
>> come
>> around".  Perhaps you'd be willing to share the wealth a bit? ;)
>
> And reveal my secrets?

   Heh, YOU said the stuff was common. ;)

>>   The closest thing to "vintage hardware" I've seen in this part  
>> of the
>> country is a middle-aged AS/400 and an Osborne 1...The only truly
>> interesting thing I've found here was the System/36 (5360) I  
>> picked up last
>> summer.
>
> A fair number of interesting things show up in the Atlanta area. Is
> that too far for you?

   No, that's not too far; it's about an eight hour drive.  I'm  
certainly willing to head up there if there's something interesting  
available.  I'd appreciate any leads you'd be willing to throw my way.

             -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL




From cclist at sydex.com  Wed Dec 31 13:45:35 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 11:45:35 -0800
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: 
References: <495AAB15.7080103@e-bbes.com> from "e.stiebler" at Dec 30,
	8 04:13:25 pm, 
Message-ID: <495B5B5F.29096.188C487D@cclist.sydex.com>

On 31 Dec 2008 at 18:52, Tony Duell wrote:

> Hnag on a second. Last week yopu were all telling me that I could program 
> just about any modern microcontroller using whatever classic computer I 
> liked. Now you're telling me I have to use C (and presumably have some 
> machine that can host the C compiler). Which is it? :-)

Are there any uCs made that don't have an assembly language?

Some have instruction sets that are actually very regular and 
pleasant to use.

Cheers,
Chuck



From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk  Wed Dec 31 13:47:20 2008
From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 19:47:20 +0000
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <9AC2E2BD-D2D5-4B15-A0FB-159C232DE595@neurotica.com>
References: 
	<9AC2E2BD-D2D5-4B15-A0FB-159C232DE595@neurotica.com>
Message-ID: <495BCC48.5050905@philpem.me.uk>

Dave McGuire wrote:
>   Even the original Intel 8051/8751, circa 1980, has security bits. :-(  
> There are ways to get around (at least) those, though.

Only on the early mask revs. On the later chips, /EA is latched on reset, 
which means the "/EA toggle hack" doesn't work any more. Anything post-1990 is 
unlikely to be vulnerable, IIRC.

-- 
Phil.
classiccmp at philpem.me.uk
http://www.philpem.me.uk/


From ethan.dicks at gmail.com  Wed Dec 31 13:58:46 2008
From: ethan.dicks at gmail.com (Ethan Dicks)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 14:58:46 -0500
Subject: Memory/cache on the 11/70
In-Reply-To: 
References: <495A0906.6050206@softjar.se>
	
	<6754BC9A-7276-4C39-ABFB-25CA08CB3E53@shiresoft.com>
	<495BB942.9030409@jetnet.ab.ca>
	
Message-ID: 

On Wed, Dec 31, 2008 at 1:31 PM, Dave McGuire  wrote:
>> Real cache memory   32k*8 is about 15ns access time in a skinny 28 pin
>> package.
>
>  Just don't use "PC motherboard SRAMs" as someone suggested earlier.
>  They're nowhere near as easy to find as some people think they are, at
> least for some of us...I trashed all of my 486 boards a decade ago.

Most other people scrapped theirs then, too.  Those SRAMs are not
pennies-per-pound as they were when the world migrated from 486s to
Pentium boards with a pair of SMT cache RAMs.

>  Standard, currently-available SRAMs are cheap and easy to work with, and
> are just as fast.  I have a few 512KB SRAMs in SOJ-36 packages sitting on
> the bench right now; I think they were about $7/ea in small quantities from
> a distributor.

I think 32Kx8s faster than 70ns are also about $7 each.

Fortunately, we are not talking about anything that fast - the DRAMs
on the boards in a real MK11 are most likely 150ns, and 70ns-80ns
SRAMs aren't all that expensive, even in +5V DIP varieties.

I did notice that trying to replace cache _and_ main memory would have
to sit in many slots, it might not be so expensive if paddlecards
could be employed.  The question then becomes how many.  If it's a
dual-height card for each of 3 slots, then one hex-height card for the
the slot with the RAM, that's not so bad.  If you need to tap more
spots in the cache card slots, it could get pricey quickly.

I agree that a 4-layer board is vastly preferable over a 2-layer board
for something like this.  We did 4 and 6-layer boards back in the day,
and I'm pretty sure we didn't have noise problems running an 8MHz
68000 with its own local memory bus.

Oh, and point taken about the lack of Unibus interface ICs not driving
up the price of this.  I did kinda skirt that issue by leaving the
chips out of my target price since I have quantities of many things
that one might find on such a board and really just need the PCB.

-ethan


From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Wed Dec 31 13:59:43 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 17:59:43 -0200
Subject: Memory/cache on the 11/70
References: <495A0906.6050206@softjar.se>	<6754BC9A-7276-4C39-ABFB-25CA08CB3E53@shiresoft.com>
	<495BB942.9030409@jetnet.ab.ca>
Message-ID: <03bb01c96b82$6f22ec50$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

> TTL ... and a few gals... I trust hardware more than software is my view 
> point.
> Real cache memory   32k*8 is about 15ns access time in a skinny 28 pin 
> package.
> I am just not sure how much memory you can get on a card however ... Sigh.

    You have many ways to go. Old Pentium cache is 128K X 4 in a very small 
SMD package. But you can get 32X8 in DIP packages which will be free for 
asking anywhere. A 4-layer board is way more expensive with PTH. But in 
Brazil you can have these boards made for cheap, many american friends use 
to make boards on cirvale and tec-ci.



From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Wed Dec 31 14:00:38 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 18:00:38 -0200
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
References: 
Message-ID: <03cb01c96b82$96a954d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

> Hnag on a second. Last week yopu were all telling me that I could program
> just about any modern microcontroller using whatever classic computer I
> liked. Now you're telling me I have to use C (and presumably have some
> machine that can host the C compiler). Which is it? :-)

    Tony, as an example, AVR-GCC is a good C compiler which has all (C) 
sources which you can recompile on your prefered classic computer.



From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com  Wed Dec 31 14:02:26 2008
From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 14:02:26 -0600
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <495B5B5F.29096.188C487D@cclist.sydex.com>
References: <495AAB15.7080103@e-bbes.com> from "e.stiebler" at Dec 30,
	8 04:13:25 pm,
	 <495B5B5F.29096.188C487D@cclist.sydex.com>
Message-ID: <495BCFD2.8000105@gmail.com>

Chuck Guzis wrote:
> On 31 Dec 2008 at 18:52, Tony Duell wrote:
> 
>> Hnag on a second. Last week yopu were all telling me that I could program 
>> just about any modern microcontroller using whatever classic computer I 
>> liked. Now you're telling me I have to use C (and presumably have some 
>> machine that can host the C compiler). Which is it? :-)
> 
> Are there any uCs made that don't have an assembly language?

That possibly depends on the definition of assembly. To me it's something 
along the lines of "the lowest-level instructions that can be fed to the CPU" 
(even if those instructions might be quite involved and do multiple things), 
  so it's hard to imagine a CPU that didn't essentially support assembly.

What the user gets to see is another matter; I expect lots of systems have 
existed where the "bare metal" is essentially hidden from the user.

I've never looked into Sun's Java CPUs to see what they do, but I bet the 
bytecode that they run is pretty low-level rather taking the higher-level 
constructs familiar to most programming languages.

(Interesting question, though - I wonder what a CPU might look like where you 
could just throw C source code at it, for instance :)

cheers

Jules


From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com  Wed Dec 31 14:08:27 2008
From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 14:08:27 -0600
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <495BD13B.4040604@gmail.com>

Tony Duell wrote:
>> What do people do regarding microcontrollers (old or new) with 
>> embedded ROM? I 
>> mean an EPROM or PROM's just address lines and data, so reasonably easy to 
>> dump - but presumably life's a bit more difficult when the ROM is 
>> local to the CPU...
> 
> If you're lucky, eitehr th microcontroller is old enough not to have any 
> security features, or they're not used. In which case you remove the chip 
> from the PCB and stick it in a suitable programmer.
> 
> If you're unlucky then either the microcontroller doesn't have any 
> external access to the ROM (some mask-programmed ones are like that), or 
> the secutrity bit has been set so you can't read it out. In which case, 
> alas, you just pray it never fails...

:-(

I was worrying about my LVROM player a few weeks ago, but looking at board 
photos (the physical thing's in storage) that's based on the 8031 and not 8051 
as I'd remembered, so it should just need external ROM (which I've already 
backed up)

I'm not sure what else I have which falls into the embedded-ROM category. Of 
course I do have various custom* ULAs in things which are similarly awkward to 
handle.

* A drop-in replacement for Acorn's TUBE ULA would be nice - I used my last 
remaining spare a couple of years ago, and still have a couple of devices with 
dead ones - swapping in from a working unit is a real pain.

cheers

Jules



From gordonjcp at gjcp.net  Wed Dec 31 14:17:19 2008
From: gordonjcp at gjcp.net (Gordon JC Pearce MM3YEQ)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 20:17:19 +0000
Subject: Any interest in a build-it-yourself votrax synthesizer kit?
In-Reply-To: <495AC867.4090809@drexel.edu>
References: <495AC867.4090809@drexel.edu>
Message-ID: <495BD34F.3070907@gjcp.net>

Jonathan Gevaryahu wrote:
> If offered for $300 would anyone be interested in a kit to build a 
> discrete resistor/capacitor/analog implementation of a Votrax 
> synthesizer/vocal tract? Most of the digital parts would be done using a 
> PIC. Would be mostly SC-01 compatible with possible RS-232 phoneme entry 
> and optional text to speech.
> Please respond off-list if you're interested, if enough people show 
> interest we may offer it. The price is not final.
> 

I'd be more interested to see a good model (or indeed just a circuit 
diagram) of the filter part, so I could implement it in software ;-)

Gordon


From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com  Wed Dec 31 14:18:40 2008
From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 14:18:40 -0600
Subject: Ebay: "new" 029 Keypunch
In-Reply-To: 
References: 			<8C532031-1CF0-4ACC-A676-12D9917F140E@neurotica.com>	<495B9DE3.30300@gmail.com>
	
Message-ID: <495BD3A0.1070202@gmail.com>

William Donzelli wrote:
>>  Vintage availability always varies by area - I've seen precisely nothing up
>> here, although doubtless a few odds and ends exist down in Minneapolis (but
>> that's still a 10 hour round-trip for me, so I can't easily find things and
>> just hop in a vehicle to go get them).
> 
> Some of us, however, can do a 10 hour round trip on the drop of a hat
> to go fetch something.

Actually, I did used to make trips like that back in England once in a while - 
but then I had a nice network of old friends to bump into along the way. Over 
here, where the only folk I know are local, it's hard to justify the cost 
involved to do a huge trip unless it's something really special.

> Find some middle ground - I have found that quite a few sources are
> willing to hold onto some goodie for a short amount of time, as they
> often realize all too well that *their* family and work obligations
> often get in *their* way of having fun.

Yeah, that does work sometimes. But (e.g.) freecycle lists can be good in some 
places, but typical freecyclers offer stuff because they want it gone ASAP so 
can be reluctant to give things to those who can only pick up in a 
week/month/half-year.

(As I've said before, I have space here in the middle of MN for anyone needing 
a temporary storage home for things - but it's sufficiently out of normal 
trade routes to be of much use, I suspect)

>>  :-) The second route seems to find more obscure stuff (as well as 'common'
>> items) and typically for free or beer money - but it's a lot of work to get
>> yourself established as a collector of ${foo} and then to actively seek out
>> items. The old time vs. money equation, I guess.
> 
> Basically, yes.

I did find that once established in a particular area, things would tend to 
fall into my lap as word spread, though. But it's hard work to get to that point.


From ggs at shiresoft.com  Wed Dec 31 15:07:13 2008
From: ggs at shiresoft.com (Guy Sotomayor)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 13:07:13 -0800
Subject: Memory/cache on the 11/70
In-Reply-To: <03bb01c96b82$6f22ec50$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
References: <495A0906.6050206@softjar.se>	<6754BC9A-7276-4C39-ABFB-25CA08CB3E53@shiresoft.com>
	<495BB942.9030409@jetnet.ab.ca>
	<03bb01c96b82$6f22ec50$46fea8c0@DeskJara>
Message-ID: <4EC554F8-96E9-4DAD-8BED-03804EF7E74E@shiresoft.com>


On Dec 31, 2008, at 11:59 AM, Alexandre Souza wrote:
>  A 4-layer board is way more expensive with PTH. But in Brazil you  
> can have these boards made for cheap, many american friends use to  
> make boards on cirvale and tec-ci.

I'm doing full production boards (not prototypes) that are fully silk  
screened with solder mask and gold fingers.  Going from 2 -> 4 layers  
is ~20% adder in the quantities that I do (~25).  And they're made  
right here in USA.  :-)

TTFN - Guy



From ggs at shiresoft.com  Wed Dec 31 15:11:14 2008
From: ggs at shiresoft.com (Guy Sotomayor)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 13:11:14 -0800
Subject: Memory/cache on the 11/70
In-Reply-To: 
References: <495A0906.6050206@softjar.se>
	
	<6754BC9A-7276-4C39-ABFB-25CA08CB3E53@shiresoft.com>
	<495BB942.9030409@jetnet.ab.ca>
	
	
Message-ID: <57564F9C-1D54-4C25-B74F-840379387D0C@shiresoft.com>


On Dec 31, 2008, at 11:58 AM, Ethan Dicks wrote:

>
> Oh, and point taken about the lack of Unibus interface ICs not driving
> up the price of this.  I did kinda skirt that issue by leaving the
> chips out of my target price since I have quantities of many things
> that one might find on such a board and really just need the PCB.

With SMT and such, it's just easier to have the board assembled with  
all of the components too.  The board house that I use now does full  
assembly and ICT (flying probe).  They even supply the "random"  
passives (ie R's and C's).  0603 capacitors and resistors are  
basically "free" for them.  The price that they're charging for  
assembly isn't outrageous per board (on the order of the raw PCB cost)  
so for all my boards going forward, I'll just "kit" the parts and send  
them to the board house when I order the PCBs.  I'll get back  
assembled boards.

TTFN - Guy



From spectre at floodgap.com  Wed Dec 31 15:27:08 2008
From: spectre at floodgap.com (Cameron Kaiser)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 13:27:08 -0800 (PST)
Subject: Language-specific CPUs was Re: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <495BCFD2.8000105@gmail.com> from Jules Richardson at "Dec 31,
	8 02:02:26 pm"
Message-ID: <200812312127.mBVLR8PQ014734@floodgap.com>

> (Interesting question, though - I wonder what a CPU might look like where you 
> could just throw C source code at it, for instance :)

Well, there *was* the AT&T Hobbit:

	http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AT%26T_Hobbit

Not quite that, but still optimized for C, allegedly. Never worked with
the architecture myself.

-- 
------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ --
  Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com
-- Immigration is the sincerest form of flattery. -- Jack Paar ----------------


From ray at arachelian.com  Wed Dec 31 16:26:15 2008
From: ray at arachelian.com (Ray Arachelian)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 17:26:15 -0500
Subject: Eo's and Hobbits (was Re: Language-specific CPUs was Re: uIEC/SD
 == AWESOME!)
In-Reply-To: <200812312127.mBVLR8PQ014734@floodgap.com>
References: <200812312127.mBVLR8PQ014734@floodgap.com>
Message-ID: <495BF187.60600@arachelian.com>

Cameron Kaiser wrote:
>> (Interesting question, though - I wonder what a CPU might look like where you 
>> could just throw C source code at it, for instance :)
>>     
>
> Well, there *was* the AT&T Hobbit:
>
> 	http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AT%26T_Hobbit
>
> Not quite that, but still optimized for C, allegedly. Never worked with
> the architecture myself
It's optimized in the sense that it's a stack based architecture.  i.e.
no registers.  You work with it as if it has registers, but your
registers are offsets into the stack based on the stack pointer.   It's
kinda CISC like, opcodes aren't all the same size, but it's also RISC
like in other regards.  I don't recall if it had an FPU, but it did have
a separate chip for an MMU, another one for video, another one for
PCMCIA I/O - was a whole family.  Far as I know, was only used for the
AT&T Eo and very early Be Boxes.

Funny thing about it, it was built for Apple's Newton project, but they
chose the ARM chip instead.  But they went into Eo's instead.

Go's Penpoint OS is used in the Eo's - IBM made a touch screen thinkpad
that could run either PenWindows or Penpoint.  It's interesting to note
that while the 486 inside the Thinkpad (I think it's a 730T?) runs at
the same clock rate, runs the same OS, but the Eo runs circles around
it. :-)  So certainly, the Hobbit could kick the crap out of a 486.

Sad, it was a neat little CPU.  Too bad nothing else used it.


There were two Eo's, 440 and 880.  The 880 even had SCSI support and a
floppy drive port too.  There was also a funky cellular module (analog
of course) with a full size desk phone handset that it cradled.  Both
used SRAM PCMCIA cards and a PCMCIA like ROM slot - both had internal
hard drive options, but the drives from the 880 don't match those in the
440 - they're all nonstandard.   The 880, but not the 440 also has a
backlight, but it's not software controlled, there's a hard switch that
you can use to make it light up.

They use a magnetic digitizer, so you need special pens.  The pens from
the 730 Thinkpad work with the Eo's and vice versa (I think).


The Eo's spoke UUCP over their cellular modem and could thus
receive/send email that way.

The Newton of course had much better handwriting recognition, so the Eo
died (to be in turn killed by Palm), but despite that, Penpoint was an
interesting OS that had the look and feel of a paper organizer (tabs,
pages, etc. as opposed to desktop GUIs which appropriately use a
"desktop" metaphor.)

If you recall the "AT&T You will commercials" back in the early 90's -
the ones with "Have you ever sent a fax from the beach?" - they showed
an Eo without one of the ears.  The ears contain a microphone on one
side and a speaker on the other.


From cclist at sydex.com  Wed Dec 31 16:28:28 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 14:28:28 -0800
Subject: Language-specific CPUs was Re: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <200812312127.mBVLR8PQ014734@floodgap.com>
References: <495BCFD2.8000105@gmail.com> from Jules Richardson at "Dec 31,
	8 02:02:26 pm", <200812312127.mBVLR8PQ014734@floodgap.com>
Message-ID: <495B818C.32309.19216ECD@cclist.sydex.com>

On 31 Dec 2008 at 13:27, Cameron Kaiser wrote:

> > (Interesting question, though - I wonder what a CPU might look like where you 
> > could just throw C source code at it, for instance :)
> 
> Well, there *was* the AT&T Hobbit:
> 
> 	http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AT%26T_Hobbit
> 
> Not quite that, but still optimized for C, allegedly. Never worked with
> the architecture myself.

Well, the Burroughs B5000 was purportedly an Algol machine; there 
have been CPU designs to eat UCSD Pascal bytecodes and Java bytecodes 
and there have been various LISP machines.  But none, AFAIK, to 
actually lexically parse program text input in hardware.  I suppose 
1401 Autocoder might be in that league, if you consider Autocoder to 
be a "language".

I believe that Intel actively discouraged programming in assembly on 
the i860, given the mind-bending instruction scheduling issues.

Cheers,
Chuck



From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Wed Dec 31 16:50:52 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 22:50:52 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <9AC2E2BD-D2D5-4B15-A0FB-159C232DE595@neurotica.com> from "Dave
	McGuire" at Dec 31, 8 02:17:10 pm
Message-ID: 

> > If you're lucky, eitehr th microcontroller is old enough not to  
> > have any
> > security features, or they're not used. In which case you remove  
> > the chip
> > from the PCB and stick it in a suitable programmer.
> 
>    Even the original Intel 8051/8751, circa 1980, has security  
> bits. :-(  There are ways to get around (at least) those, though.

Yes, but IIRC the 8048 series (common in classic computer stuff) doesn't...

-tony


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Wed Dec 31 16:54:27 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 22:54:27 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
In-Reply-To: <03cb01c96b82$96a954d0$46fea8c0@DeskJara> from "Alexandre Souza"
	at Dec 31, 8 06:00:38 pm
Message-ID: 

>     Tony, as an example, AVR-GCC is a good C compiler which has all (C) 
> sources which you can recompile on your prefered classic computer.

... Assuming said classic already has a native C compiler and sufficient 
memory, I assume. I've yet to see a GCC-anything that will run on an 8 
bit micro, for example.

-tony


From frustum at pacbell.net  Wed Dec 31 17:03:58 2008
From: frustum at pacbell.net (Jim Battle)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 17:03:58 -0600
Subject: Language-specific CPUs 
In-Reply-To: <495B818C.32309.19216ECD@cclist.sydex.com>
References: <495BCFD2.8000105@gmail.com> from Jules Richardson at "Dec 31,
	8 02:02:26 pm", <200812312127.mBVLR8PQ014734@floodgap.com>
	<495B818C.32309.19216ECD@cclist.sydex.com>
Message-ID: <495BFA5E.4000203@pacbell.net>

Chuck Guzis wrote:
...
> Well, the Burroughs B5000 was purportedly an Algol machine; there 
> have been CPU designs to eat UCSD Pascal bytecodes and Java bytecodes 
> and there have been various LISP machines.  But none, AFAIK, to 
> actually lexically parse program text input in hardware.  I suppose 
> 1401 Autocoder might be in that league, if you consider Autocoder to 
> be a "language".

I remember reading a computer architecture book back in the early/mid 80s, I think it was 
by Stone.  The subject was "advanced" architectures.  One section described on attempt to 
build a timesharing system for running a BASIC-like subset, and everything was hardwired 
-- parsing was via gate-level state machines, not microcode.  The intended audience was 
college-level computer classes.  As I recall, they gave up after getting a simplified 
version going.

> I believe that Intel actively discouraged programming in assembly on 
> the i860, given the mind-bending instruction scheduling issues.

The exposed pipe hazards weren't the real issue.  The problem was exceptions.  In certain 
states, there was no simple way to restore the pipe, so the interrupt handler had to 
detect when one of those bad cases existed, then nudge the state along one instruction at 
a time until it go to a point where it could restore the state fully and really return 
from the interrupt.

I never saw it, but I heard the return from interrupt code was a couple thousand lines of 
tricky assembly.


From frustum at pacbell.net  Wed Dec 31 17:23:50 2008
From: frustum at pacbell.net (Jim Battle)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 17:23:50 -0600
Subject: Language-specific CPUs
In-Reply-To: <495BFA5E.4000203@pacbell.net>
References: <495BCFD2.8000105@gmail.com> from Jules Richardson at "Dec 31,
	8 02:02:26 pm",
	<200812312127.mBVLR8PQ014734@floodgap.com>	<495B818C.32309.19216ECD@cclist.sydex.com>
	<495BFA5E.4000203@pacbell.net>
Message-ID: <495BFF06.7020103@pacbell.net>

Jim Battle wrote:
> Chuck Guzis wrote:
> ...
>> Well, the Burroughs B5000 was purportedly an Algol machine; there have 
>> been CPU designs to eat UCSD Pascal bytecodes and Java bytecodes and 
>> there have been various LISP machines.  But none, AFAIK, to actually 
>> lexically parse program text input in hardware.  I suppose 1401 
>> Autocoder might be in that league, if you consider Autocoder to be a 
>> "language".
> 
> I remember reading a computer architecture book back in the early/mid 
> 80s, I think it was by Stone.  The subject was "advanced" 
> architectures.  One section described on attempt to build a timesharing 
> system for running a BASIC-like subset, and everything was hardwired -- 
> parsing was via gate-level state machines, not microcode.  The intended 
> audience was college-level computer classes.  As I recall, they gave up 
> after getting a simplified version going.

Dang, I have the book.  I bought used recently it because of its i432 section, but didn't 
recognize it was the same book I had read so many years ago.

Chapter 8 of "Advances in Computer Architecture" describes the SYMBOL computer, designed 
and built buy Fairchild Camera, and operated at Iowa State.  Only one was built.  The 
design was started in the mid 60s.  Here is an excerpt:

The language is described as "a high-level language architecture.  Its instruction set is 
a one-for-one reverse Polish representation of the system's programming language, the 
SYMBOL programming language (SPL), and the compilation process is performed by the machine 
rather than the software."

"An initially startling aspect of SYMBOL is the first goal; the phrase 'directly ... 
implemented in hardware' means that SYMBOL contains virtually no software (it does contain 
some software, but the software performs only a few auxiliary functions, and the system 
can be operated with no software), and it contains no microcode; all the system's 
functions are implemented as sequential logic networks.  For instance, the 'compiler' is a 
hardware sequential logic network, the memory-allocation and page-replacement algorithms 
are sequential logic networks, the functions that interpret end-user terminal commands are 
sequential logic networks, and so on."

The machine was built as a collection of specialized processors. One did parsing, one did 
numeric formatting, etc.  When the user ran a program, it was handed off between the 
specialized task processors, and the user was unaware of what was going on under the hood.

The compilation was so fast that programs were all stored in source code form.  The 
machine could process 75,000 lines per minute.  They had a design that could handle 300K 
lines/minute, but it was never built.  When a single user was on the system and submitted 
a trivial program, the time from hitting carriage return after typing "RUN" until the 
program was done was 315 microseconds.

Other factoids: 64b core memory, 4 uS cycle time. SPL had two data types: scalars and 
lists.  Numeric scalars could be up to 99 mantissa digits, with one or two exponent 
digits.  Decimal math.  Lists were limited in length only by the amount of of memory 
available.


From mcguire at neurotica.com  Wed Dec 31 17:39:00 2008
From: mcguire at neurotica.com (Dave McGuire)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 18:39:00 -0500
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <366BDB6E-4D6C-4FEB-98A6-A153130E0667@neurotica.com>

On Dec 31, 2008, at 5:50 PM, Tony Duell wrote:
>>> If you're lucky, eitehr th microcontroller is old enough not to
>>> have any
>>> security features, or they're not used. In which case you remove
>>> the chip
>>> from the PCB and stick it in a suitable programmer.
>>
>>    Even the original Intel 8051/8751, circa 1980, has security
>> bits. :-(  There are ways to get around (at least) those, though.
>
> Yes, but IIRC the 8048 series (common in classic computer stuff)  
> doesn't...

   Doesn't it??  Hmm ok.  I've not done much with the 8048.  I guess  
that was one of the things they added in the 8048->8051 evolution.

             -Dave

--
Dave McGuire
Port Charlotte, FL



From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk  Wed Dec 31 17:40:09 2008
From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 23:40:09 +0000
Subject: BBC Second Processor Tube ULA (was Re: What kind of IC is this)
In-Reply-To: <495BD13B.4040604@gmail.com>
References:  <495BD13B.4040604@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <495C02D9.8010705@philpem.me.uk>

Jules Richardson wrote:
> * A drop-in replacement for Acorn's TUBE ULA would be nice - I used my 
> last remaining spare a couple of years ago, and still have a couple of 
> devices with dead ones - swapping in from a working unit is a real pain.

Hmm, shouldn't be too hard with modern programmable-logic devices.

Or four FIFOs, for that matter. 24 bytes, 8 ways (4 host-to-parasite and 4 
parasite-to-host FIFOs), plus a couple of status registers, with an operating 
frequency of 3MHz or so. Not exactly groundbreaking (though the Tube ULA DMA 
stuff doesn't seem to be documented anywhere obvious).

If you went discrete-logic (i.e. 74LS chips and FIFOs) you're going to need 
rather a lot of ICs, and a fairly big PCB. Probably about ?100 worth of parts 
(the cheapest FIFOs I can find are ?5 each, times 8 is ?40, plus the PCB, and 
some 74LS chips).

Truth be told, the documentation is ambiguous enough that I'm not even sure 
all the FIFOs *are* 24-level deep...

A CPLD or FPGA version should be doable, probably at around the ?30 mark. 
Small FPGAs run about ?5 (or less), but nearly all of them use +3.3V I/Os, and 
very few of them are 5V-tolerant.

-- 
Phil.
classiccmp at philpem.me.uk
http://www.philpem.me.uk/



From cclist at sydex.com  Wed Dec 31 17:43:22 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 15:43:22 -0800
Subject: Language-specific CPUs 
In-Reply-To: <495BFA5E.4000203@pacbell.net>
References: <495BCFD2.8000105@gmail.com>,
	<495B818C.32309.19216ECD@cclist.sydex.com>,
	<495BFA5E.4000203@pacbell.net>
Message-ID: <495B931A.24986.1965FF3B@cclist.sydex.com>

On 31 Dec 2008 at 17:03, Jim Battle wrote:

> I remember reading a computer architecture book back in the early/mid 80s, I think it was 
> by Stone.  The subject was "advanced" architectures.  One section described on attempt to 
> build a timesharing system for running a BASIC-like subset, and everything was hardwired 
> -- parsing was via gate-level state machines, not microcode.  The intended audience was 
> college-level computer classes.  As I recall, they gave up after getting a simplified 
> version going.

Such efforts seemed to me almost always to come from the university 
environment.  In the commercial setting, languages didn't seem to 
matter as much (unless they were mandated by goverument contract).  I 
haven't the faintest idea how many different anguages that I've had 
to learn during my life, but it's been a lot.

The nice part is that now I forget them as easily as I learned them.
 
> The exposed pipe hazards weren't the real issue.  The problem was exceptions.  In certain 
> states, there was no simple way to restore the pipe, so the interrupt handler had to 
> detect when one of those bad cases existed, then nudge the state along one instruction at 
> a time until it go to a point where it could restore the state fully and really return 
> from the interrupt.
> 
> I never saw it, but I heard the return from interrupt code was a couple thousand lines of 
> tricky assembly.

I'd heard that the latency of interrupt servicing could vary wildly, 
which meant that the most successful i860 applications were those 
where no interrupts or context switches were required.  The MS 
implmentation of NT must have been a riot to use.  Did any copies 
ever make it out of Redmond?

I have the Margulus (sp?) book on the i860.  I remember initially 
being very interested but noticing that I seemed to develop a 
headache every time I picked the book up to read it.  Just found the 
book on my bookshelf, opened it and now my head hurts.  I guess the 
book still works.

Cheers,
Chuck



From doc at mdrconsult.com  Wed Dec 31 18:00:41 2008
From: doc at mdrconsult.com (Doc Shipley)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 18:00:41 -0600
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <6.2.3.4.2.20081231115327.074af3a0@mail.threedee.com>
References: <20081230193428.69f05be5.lehmann@ans-netz.de>	<495A8EFD.7060208@philpem.me.uk>	<20081230223036.d5a23737.lehmann@ans-netz.de>	<495AAB50.6080507@philpem.me.uk>	<2C535D4C-0F9D-4FDC-BEAB-283BE688F3D7@neurotica.com>
	<6.2.3.4.2.20081231115327.074af3a0@mail.threedee.com>
Message-ID: <495C07A9.6000102@mdrconsult.com>

John Foust wrote:
> At 10:22 AM 12/31/2008, Dave McGuire wrote:
>> On Dec 30, 2008, at 6:14 PM, Philip Pemberton wrote:
>>> That said, Widlarization is a great way to deal with parts like  
>>> that. :)
>>  YAY!!  Someone else knows of Widlarization!  I sure wish I  
>> could've met him.
> 
> http://www.national.com/rap/Story/widlar.html
> 
> "We still have a sign around our lab, "This is not a black-smith shop." But 
> there were times when Bob would discover he had wasted a day or two, just 
> because one bad part had screwed up his circuit. He would bring this bad 
> part -- a capacitor, a pot, a transistor, an IC, or whatever -- over to 
> the vise and lay it on the anvil part. Then he would calmly, methodically 
> beat it with a hammer until the smallest remaining part was indistinguishable 
> from the dust on the floor. Then he would go back to work and get the right 
> answer. He explained that it makes you feel much better if you do this, and, 
> you know that bad part will never come around again and goof you up. He was 
> right. And I recommend that you join me in doing this "Widlarizing" when a 
> bad component fools you. You will feel a lot better."

   Woohooo!  There's a *name* for that!

   When I worked for Broken Feather Silver (Lubbock, TX, defunct), we 
kept an old anvil and an unfinished 2lb hammer for fixing unfixable 
projects, as well as one wall that we kept drywalled, but not 
taped-and-bedded.  When you ruin a piece you've spent hours on, beating 
it to smithereens not only helps your feelings, but it helps ensure that 
the next effort doesn't end up on "The Final Solution".

   The raw wall was an interim measure.  There were usually a few files 
and a hammer or two hanging out of it.  :)


	Doc


From ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk  Wed Dec 31 18:10:48 2008
From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
Date: Thu, 1 Jan 2009 00:10:48 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: BBC Second Processor Tube ULA (was Re: What kind of IC is this)
In-Reply-To: <495C02D9.8010705@philpem.me.uk> from "Philip Pemberton" at Dec
	31, 8 11:40:09 pm
Message-ID: 

Happy new year! You know, I find it a little hard to accept machines made 
in 1999 as being 'classic' :-)

> > * A drop-in replacement for Acorn's TUBE ULA would be nice - I used my=20
> > last remaining spare a couple of years ago, and still have a couple of=20
> > devices with dead ones - swapping in from a working unit is a real pain.
> 
> Hmm, shouldn't be too hard with modern programmable-logic devices.

Was the Tube ULA (or the Tube interface) fully documented anywhere? 
Obviously a pinout of the ULA exists, as does a general description of 
what it did. And I think the source code to the drivers on at least one 
side were published somewhere (I seem to rememebr a book on the Master 
512 the contains such sources). But I didn't think there was enough info 
to necessarily correctly implent the ULA functions.

-tony



From cclist at sydex.com  Wed Dec 31 18:11:05 2008
From: cclist at sydex.com (Chuck Guzis)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 16:11:05 -0800
Subject: What kind of IC is this
In-Reply-To: <495C07A9.6000102@mdrconsult.com>
References: <20081230193428.69f05be5.lehmann@ans-netz.de>,
	<6.2.3.4.2.20081231115327.074af3a0@mail.threedee.com>,
	<495C07A9.6000102@mdrconsult.com>
Message-ID: <495B9999.10398.197F4F64@cclist.sydex.com>

On 31 Dec 2008 at 18:00, Doc Shipley wrote:

>    Woohooo!  There's a *name* for that!

I remember my father losing his composure and giving the fuel gauge 
from hs Studebaker Scotsman the treatment...  He looked a lot happier 
afterwards.

Cheers,
Chuck



From ken at seefried.com  Wed Dec 31 18:05:26 2008
From: ken at seefried.com (Ken Seefried)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 19:05:26 -0500 (EST)
Subject: RSTS/E question and media
Message-ID: <20090101000526.2B0333800072F@portal.seefried.com>

From: Andrew Back 
> Right, so I'd need to plumb the 11/53 into say an Alpha via a 
> serial connection. Sync... so I'd need to get a PCI sync card 
> too, for the latter.  Ugh.

Is this something you could do with a low end Cisco (2500 class)
and the apropos IOS image (Enterprise, with support for DECNet)?
Sync serial is built in.

KJ


From jules.richardson99 at gmail.com  Wed Dec 31 18:38:24 2008
From: jules.richardson99 at gmail.com (Jules Richardson)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 18:38:24 -0600
Subject: BBC Second Processor Tube ULA (was Re: What kind of IC is this)
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <495C1080.6070803@gmail.com>

Tony Duell wrote:
> Happy new year! You know, I find it a little hard to accept machines made 
> in 1999 as being 'classic' :-)
> 
>>> * A drop-in replacement for Acorn's TUBE ULA would be nice - I used my=20
>>> last remaining spare a couple of years ago, and still have a couple of=20
>>> devices with dead ones - swapping in from a working unit is a real pain.
>> Hmm, shouldn't be too hard with modern programmable-logic devices.
> 
> Was the Tube ULA (or the Tube interface) fully documented anywhere? 

Not *completely*, AFAIK - although there are fragments all over the place. I 
think there's enough amassed wisdom around now that it *could* be done though, 
because the software to drive either side is understood enough, as is the 
electrical (physical) interface, and there are still survivors of all the 
vintage hardware which made use of the ULA.

The problem is that very few people have both a grasp on that knowledge and 
the ability to do the necessary electronic design - it's only really worth it 
for a drop-in replacement (i.e. a single chip or a very small daughter-board 
to plug into the ULA's 40-pin to DIP socket) because (as Phil says) it'd be a 
reasonably large board to do it as discrete logic.

cheers

Jules




From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk  Wed Dec 31 19:04:09 2008
From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton)
Date: Thu, 01 Jan 2009 01:04:09 +0000
Subject: BBC Second Processor Tube ULA (was Re: What kind of IC is this)
In-Reply-To: 
References: 
Message-ID: <495C1689.5010505@philpem.me.uk>

Tony Duell wrote:
> Was the Tube ULA (or the Tube interface) fully documented anywhere? 
> Obviously a pinout of the ULA exists, as does a general description of 
> what it did. And I think the source code to the drivers on at least one 
> side were published somewhere (I seem to rememebr a book on the Master 
> 512 the contains such sources). But I didn't think there was enough info 
> to necessarily correctly implent the ULA functions.

It seems to be 80%-documented:
  - The 6502 and Z80 Second Processor Service Manuals explain how big the 
FIFOs are, and how to write to them:
     - http://acorn.chriswhy.co.uk/docs/Acorn/Manuals/Acorn_65022ndprocSM.pdf
     - http://acorn.chriswhy.co.uk/docs/Acorn/Manuals/Acorn_Z802ndprocSM.pdf

  - Acorn Support Group Application Note 004 explains a bit about the 
host<=>parasite interface, but not a lot. Mainly useful for the Parasite->Host 
FIFO #1 size (24 bytes, or 20 bytes depending on who you ask)
     - http://acorn.chriswhy.co.uk/docs/Acorn/AN/004.pdf

  - Yellow Pig (?!) explains a lot of stuff about the ULA on his website 
(). 
This explains (in some detail) how the first Status register works.

  - The New Advanced User Guide (Dickens and Holmes) p.327 onwards lists the 
ULA registers, but then goes on to say "you won't need to control the ULA 
directly".

 From what I've gathered, there are three FIFOs -- one 24-byte, two 2-byte, 
and the rest of the transfer paths are latches.

The problem, of course, is that 20% of undocumented stuff. Things like:
   - The inner workings of the DMA system (DREQ, DACK and friends)
   - What happens if you write 25 bytes to the 24-byte FIFO? What about the 
2-byte FIFOs?
   - What does a Parasite-originated reset clear, if anything?

If I had a Tube ULA (or a complete 6502 2nd processor), I might be tempted to 
breadboard it and do some "experimental analysis" with the logic analyser and 
a digital signal generator.

Duplicating the "known 80%" in Verilog HDL is probably about a day's work; 
probably a week for the whole thing assuming no hold-ups or "WTF?!" moments.

-- 
Phil.
classiccmp at philpem.me.uk
http://www.philpem.me.uk/


From classiccmp at philpem.me.uk  Wed Dec 31 19:20:50 2008
From: classiccmp at philpem.me.uk (Philip Pemberton)
Date: Thu, 01 Jan 2009 01:20:50 +0000
Subject: BBC Second Processor Tube ULA (was Re: What kind of IC is this)
In-Reply-To: <495C1080.6070803@gmail.com>
References:  <495C1080.6070803@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <495C1A72.7000201@philpem.me.uk>

Jules Richardson wrote:
> Not *completely*, AFAIK - although there are fragments all over the 
> place. I think there's enough amassed wisdom around now that it *could* 
> be done though, because the software to drive either side is understood 
> enough, as is the electrical (physical) interface, and there are still 
> survivors of all the vintage hardware which made use of the ULA.

What's available appears to be fairly thin on the ground though. A quick 
search on 'the bay' revealed tons of Master 128s and BBC Bs, but nary a second 
processor in sight.

I'd feel a bit bad if I ended up killing a ULA or a 2nd processor though :-/

> The problem is that very few people have both a grasp on that knowledge 
> and the ability to do the necessary electronic design - it's only really 
> worth it for a drop-in replacement (i.e. a single chip or a very small 
> daughter-board to plug into the ULA's 40-pin to DIP socket) because (as 
> Phil says) it'd be a reasonably large board to do it as discrete logic.

Oh, is that a challenge I hear? :)

Once I've sorted the floppy disc R/W project out (probably around Easter), I'd 
be more than happy to have a crack at cloning the Tube ULA. Seems Sprow has a 
few ULAs left, and one of those (assuming it's working) should be enough to 
clone the thing, but a 6502 2proc (either cheesewedge or internal, as long as 
it works on a Master 128) might be handy for a bit of live testing, if such a 
thing proves necessary.

-- 
Phil.
classiccmp at philpem.me.uk
http://www.philpem.me.uk/


From alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br  Wed Dec 31 21:09:41 2008
From: alexandre-listas at e-secure.com.br (Alexandre Souza)
Date: Thu, 1 Jan 2009 01:09:41 -0200
Subject: What kind of IC is this
References: <20081230193428.69f05be5.lehmann@ans-netz.de><495A8EFD.7060208@philpem.me.uk><20081230223036.d5a23737.lehmann@ans-netz.de><495AAB50.6080507@philpem.me.uk><2C535D4C-0F9D-4FDC-BEAB-283BE688F3D7@neurotica.com>
	<6.2.3.4.2.20081231115327.074af3a0@mail.threedee.com>
Message-ID: <019901c96bbe$9b577c50$46fea8c0@DeskJara>

> http://www.national.com/rap/Story/widlar.html

    I can't stop laughting! :oD



From jrkeys at jrkeys.cnc.net  Wed Dec 31 10:53:26 2008
From: jrkeys at jrkeys.cnc.net (Keys)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 10:53:26 -0600 (CST)
Subject: Ebay: "new" 029 Keypunch
Message-ID: <20081231165326.847673705@theseus.cnc.net>


---- General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts  wrote:
>
> > Really?  Reaction on this list to the original govliq lot seemed to
> >  indicate otherwise.  I don't know how often they come up on ebay
> >  because I don't have an active search looking for them.
> 
> Most I see are not on Ebay. In the past couple of years, I have come
> across maybe six 029 and 129 machines _off_ Ebay, then there are the
> ones that we see _on_ Ebay. 029s and 129s seem to be neck and neck as
> far as availability. Other keystations, like the 024 and 026 are not.
> Then there are some weird variants, generally part of data comm sets,
> that really are rare. But then, often the difference is only a hair
> more than a new tag.
> 
> >  Still, considering that someone snatched that one up with a buy-it-now
> >  option instead of waiting out the auction tells me that they aren't
> >  common on ebay either.
> 
> Lots of people, including some of the mainframe collectors (big guns),
> still think that the 029s and 129s are really rare. I suspect they are
> not looking past their screens. For those of us that are actually
> doing the legwork, the things just come around.
> 
> >  While rare is a relative and not an absolute term, I don't think this
> >  sort of item (particularly in this condition) would qualify as common.
> 
> Yes, the condition matters greatly in this example. I will admit that.
> 
> --
> Will
> 
I have found none here in Texas but have found several outside of Texas both in CO & GA. Picked up some 024's and other loder devices.
John K



From jws at jwsss.com  Wed Dec 31 12:25:56 2008
From: jws at jwsss.com (jim s)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 10:25:56 -0800
Subject: Ebay: "new" 029 Keypunch
In-Reply-To: <495BABED.6090100@gmail.com>
References: 			<8C532031-1CF0-4ACC-A676-12D9917F140E@neurotica.com>
	<495BABED.6090100@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <495BB934.8030601@jwsss.com>



Sridhar Ayengar wrote:
> Dave McGuire wrote:
>> On Dec 30, 2008, at 7:41 PM, William Donzelli wrote:
>>>>  Still, considering that someone snatched that one up with a 
>>>> buy-it-now
>>>>  option instead of waiting out the auction tells me that they aren't
>>>>  common on ebay either.
>>>
There is no telling where these buyers come from.  I'd sell some parts 
of my collection to them at the prices they pay, and find other things.  
Also this was probably a nice specimen if you really wanted a working 
keypunch.

The one I found was in the Pennysaver here in Orange County, Ca, and a 
friend called me about it, so it was overlooked long enough for someone 
to actually call me about it.
>>> Lots of people, including some of the mainframe collectors (big guns),
>>> still think that the 029s and 129s are really rare. I suspect they are
>>> not looking past their screens. For those of us that are actually
>>> doing the legwork, the things just come around.
>>
I trolled at the TRW swap meet and some of the vendors there would come 
to me with things they found I would like.  Sometimes the items come 
find you if you ask a lot of people, not the other way around.

If you think about it, these items are large and if the vendor realizes 
what they have they may not store that well at the vendors location, so 
they must be moved quickly before they get damaged or lost in the 
operation for as much as possible.  If you are lucky enough to have a 
vendor remember you, you get a phone call, and get your treasure.

I fear that now with the new recycling frenzy going on to be "green" 
that a lot of this simply is thrown in the pile and ground up, and lost.

The earlier efforts to recycle, such as the Kansas City Surplus Exchange 
was nice in that the original operators would try to seek out people who 
could pick out bits to save and find buyers for the equipment rather 
than breaking it up.

I think now the mentality is to just grind everything back to its base 
material and w/o brains, much the way that most operations are run these 
days.  The process is the driving force, and usually does not include 
people who have unique skills, such as knowledge of old computers and 
equipment to pick out bits and pieces.

>>   I'd sure like to know what planet you're on in which 029's "just 
>> come around".  Perhaps you'd be willing to share the wealth a bit? ;)
>
> He's not that far from Poughkeepsie.
>
> Peace...  Sridhar
>
>


From ajp166 at bellatlantic.net  Wed Dec 31 16:46:08 2008
From: ajp166 at bellatlantic.net (Allison)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 17:46:08 -0500
Subject: RSTS/E question and media.
Message-ID: <0KCR00LBCJ89Q9T6@vms046.mailsrvcs.net>

>
>Subject: RE: RSTS/E question and media.
>   From: "Paul Koning" 
>   Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 12:38:33 -0500
>     To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" 
>
>> > ...you'd need a sync DDCMP interface (for a Q-bus system like that
>it
>> would
>> > be a DMV11).  More to the point, it looks like the Micro-PDP11
>> support
>> > appeared in V8.0, and I suspect there may be some other small
>details
>> > specific to the 11/53 that are later still.
>> 
>> Right, so I'd need to plumb the 11/53 into say an Alpha via a serial
>> connection. Sync... so I'd need to get a PCI sync card too, for the
>> latter.
>
>Or later yet (V10.x?) there's async DDCMP, I'm not sure how clearly
>accessible but I'm pretty sure it's in there.
>
>	paul

DDCMP can run over sync or async lines it was commonly done async for slow
lines and sync for fast lines the division was around 19.2kbaud with the 
sync cards favoring the faster than that rates.  

I used to run DDCMP async at 2400baud though the Mill gandalf switch to a Vax 
host in the the Mill. Worked ok in the days when 2400 was fast and 9600 was 
fastest and expensive.



Allison



From ajp166 at bellatlantic.net  Wed Dec 31 18:40:03 2008
From: ajp166 at bellatlantic.net (Allison)
Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 19:40:03 -0500
Subject: What kind of IC is this
Message-ID: <0KCR00M2UOI3PLM3@vms173003.mailsrvcs.net>

>
>Subject: Re: What kind of IC is this
>   From: ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell)
>   Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 22:50:52 +0000 (GMT)
>     To: cctalk at classiccmp.org
>
>> > If you're lucky, eitehr th microcontroller is old enough not to  
>> > have any
>> > security features, or they're not used. In which case you remove  
>> > the chip
>> > from the PCB and stick it in a suitable programmer.
>> 
>>    Even the original Intel 8051/8751, circa 1980, has security  
>> bits. :-(  There are ways to get around (at least) those, though.
>
>Yes, but IIRC the 8048 series (common in classic computer stuff) doesn't...
>
>-tony


My fractional portion of currency is that the 630x is a hitachi varient of the 
680x (6800 single chip mpus).  I've seen and have some them from older hard 
disks and DC300 tape drives that had mechanically expired.

Allison


From bqt at softjar.se  Wed Dec 31 20:14:20 2008
From: bqt at softjar.se (Johnny Billquist)
Date: Thu, 01 Jan 2009 03:14:20 +0100
Subject: Memory/cache on the 11/70
In-Reply-To: <200812312022.mBVKLL6E005244@dewey.classiccmp.org>
References: <200812312022.mBVKLL6E005244@dewey.classiccmp.org>
Message-ID: <495C26FC.7020709@softjar.se>

Guy Sotomayor  wrote:

> 
> On Dec 31, 2008, at 8:16 AM, Ethan Dicks wrote:
>>> Skip the memory bus and the original cache. The original cache is  
>>> just 2 KB
>>> of 2-way associative memory. If you set up a 4 MB cache, the CPU  
>>> can run at
>>> full steam the whole time, with a cycle time of about 150 nS, if I  
>>> remember
>>> right.
>> Handy, since 70ns SRAM is easy to find.

True. And 70ns is definitely fast enough.

>>> It is more complicated, though. You'll have access paths from CPU,  
>>> Unibus
>>> and four massbus controllers to deal with. But it should definitely  
>>> be
>>> doable (heck, SETASI have already done it once).
>>>
>>> I might be interested in such a project myself, since the 11/70s we  
>>> have
>>> around here still are on MK11 boxes. I could deal with PCBs and  
>>> design, but
>>> I'm very short on time, as usual... :-(
>>> No experience at all with FPGAs or any such fancy stuff.
>> If such a thing were to be designed (I could participate in the design
>> phase, but not drive it), I'd probably be interested in two,
>> especially if the blank board was only a few hundred dollars.  If it
>> came closer to $1000, I'd really have to think about passing on the
>> second one (I used to order multi-layer DEC backplane boards, and at
>> the time, $500 was a good price for orders between q10 and q100, but
>> things in the PCB market have changed radically).
>>
>> I'm in no hurry - my 11/70s are in storage and I won't be able to even
>> pull them out to look at them in the next 90 days.
> 
> The problem with replacing the cache is that it is composed of 4 hex  
> boards (M8142, M8143, M8144 and M8145).  I haven't looked at the  
> backplane signals, but I'm dubious that it could be done with less.   

Correct. The cache and memory controller is a total of four cards.
But unless my memory fails me, all the signals needed are actually 
located in just two of the slots. So you'd have to go with a two card 
solution. Either one card and paddles, or two cards with interconnects.

> The advantage of just replacing the MK11 boxes, is that it could be  
> done with just one board.  Depending upon signaling and such (and with  
> sufficient integration - ie FPGAs and SMTs) it *might* even fit on a  
> quad board vs hex.

Oh, it could definitely be done with just one quad board. The memory bus 
is really simple.
It's just that you won't get much of a speed gain that way, so it will 
mostly be a space and power save thing.
Not at all as interesting, atleast not from my point of view.

You can probably get it all in with through holes on a quad card even.
The memory bus is really simple to interface. And since you'll keep it 
in the CPU box, and have the full 4 megs on one card, you can ignore all 
the requirements of the bus drivers for the memory bus as well.
The 11/70 memory bus is otherwise designed for quite a long signal path. 
Total max was two cabinets full of memory boxes, or eight of them. That 
would get it close to ten feet. Power was accordingly.
So, while not Unibus, there are drivers and terminators on that bus as 
well. (Actually, the terminators are the same as those small cards that 
terminate a massbus, if anyone ever disassembled one of those.)

Remember, SETASI did this on a hex card something like 20 years ago, if 
not more. Most of the area was probably memory chips, which can be 
reduced extremely much by now.

But, as I said, I don't find that exercise very interesting.

> The other issue with not replacing the cache, is that the verilog to  
> implement this would *much* simpler (ie it can probably be completed  
> faster).

True. Simple stuff is always faster to actually do. :-)


And to make a few comments on other stuff that's been mentioned.

You don't seem to appreciate the speed of things on the memory bus. A 
read cycle form the MK11 was typically something like 600ns, and could 
be as much as 1200ns (when error correction was required), if I remember 
right. Write was just as bad, while modify was worse. The max speed 
possible is still much lower than 150 ns, which is what the CPU will run 
at when you have cache hits (assuming my memory is right). There is 
setups, handshakes and signal propagations on a big bus involved.

70ns memory will definitely be sufficient for whatever we would design. 
Surface mount or through? Well, I don't really have much of a 
preference. Of course, through hole is easier to solder, test and 
repair, but they do take more space. And I can do either.
My cad program have extensive libraries for all of it, so that's not a 
problem.

I very much doubt that we'd have any problems getting it all into one or 
two cards.
One advantage of replacing the cache is that then we'd definitely just 
talk TTL. No buses with drivers at all.
Much simpler and cheaper from that point of view.

Absolutely best would of course be if we could find drawings for the 
HC-70/PEP-70 combination, and use those as the basis for a design, and 
just improve by using current available technology.

But of course, since I'm not offering to do this, except as a spare time 
project to aid in a community effort (unless I could actually make up 
for the time I would spend on it, and I somehow doubt there is a 
commercial case for this nowadays). So if anyone else wants to design a 
memory card to hook to the 11/70 memory bus, I definitely won't stop 
them, and might try to atleast give some helpful comments.

	Johnny


From ajp166 at bellatlantic.net  Wed Dec 31 23:49:33 2008
From: ajp166 at bellatlantic.net (Allison)
Date: Thu, 01 Jan 2009 00:49:33 -0500
Subject: Language-specific CPUs was Re: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
Message-ID: <0KCS00A8P2TXXQH7@vms173005.mailsrvcs.net>

>
>Subject: Language-specific CPUs was Re: uIEC/SD == AWESOME!
>   From: Cameron Kaiser 
>   Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 13:27:08 -0800 (PST)
>     To: cctalk at classiccmp.org
>
>> (Interesting question, though - I wonder what a CPU might look like where you 
>> could just throw C source code at it, for instance :)
>
>Well, there *was* the AT&T Hobbit:
>
>	http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AT%26T_Hobbit
>
>Not quite that, but still optimized for C, allegedly. Never worked with
>the architecture myself.
>

C was written for or about the PDP-11.  Just about all the C addressing 
modes and basic OPs are native for pdp11 addressing and many instructions.

Then we have the WD Pascal Microengine that basically was the implementation
of P-code in microcode.

There are machines that are coded for forth primitives directly.

I believe somewhere there was or is a a Java engine.

Memory says there was a Wang machine that directly executed Basic.

Generally it was not uncommon but most were lost to time.


Allison

>-- 
>------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ --
>  Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com
>-- Immigration is the sincerest form of flattery. -- Jack Paar ----------------